Vim or Emacs which is the best? The question that will never be fully answered or decided.

a Vim user and I think it is great. I have tried Emacs a few times and I could not stay with it longer then a few hours. But why? Both are good editors and both are very useful. The problem I have with Emacs is the same problem I have Vim both were designed with two handed typist in mind. There is the rub. What if you type one handed? What are you to do?

If you home row is f g h j and you only can type using five fingers you have to rethink much of your computer use.

Keyboard driven programs are the best. They don't require the use of the mouse. Using the mouse for the one handed typist means leaving the keyboard completely and going to the mouse and then coming back. The idea of using the mouse and a key combination at the same time is a huge pain.

Any two key combinations are a pain in the hand. Try doing the Windows key and the enter key at the same time on a laptop keyboard. That is a very far reach. There is the problem with Emacs with all it key combinations it is very hard and uncomfortable for the one handed typist. That is where Vim's modal design shines for the one handed typist. The modal design of Vim makes it much easier for me to type and edit one handed. The uncomfortable key combinations are left behind and you can type much faster and much more comfortably.

I can hear people now saying what about the escape key and the colon key. Both keys are a difficult keys for the one handed typist. I have swapped the Escape key and the Caps Lock key at the OS level. I have also swapped the colon and the semicolon at the Vim Normal mode.

The escape key is used so much in and out of Vim I did the swap at the OS level. Since the colon is used mostly in the Vim Normal mode and the semicolon more during typing of text I did that change in Vim.

While I have no idea which editor is best for the two handed typist, Vim wins hand down for the one handed typist.