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Add to SafariWhen comparing Neovim vs Codeanywhere, the Slant community recommends Neovim for most people. In the question“What are the best JavaScript IDEs or editors?” Neovim is ranked 3rd while Codeanywhere is ranked 14th. The most important reason people chose Neovim is:
NeoVim was a complete rewrite of Vim, with new features added and underlying issues resolved thanks to the Vim code base. The keybindings and configuration are the same as Vim, so the switch can be pretty simple.
Specs
Question Ranking
Pros
Pro Still Vim but with upgraded features and some issues fixed
NeoVim was a complete rewrite of Vim, with new features added and underlying issues resolved thanks to the Vim code base. The keybindings and configuration are the same as Vim, so the switch can be pretty simple.
Pro Better integration with external tools
The core text editor is "headless", meaning it's detached from the user-interface so other programs can hook into it. This enables better integration with IDEs and browsers, where "Vim mode" has typically been a poor substitute because it was a partial rewrite or a partial port at best. One of the advantages of Vim has always been ubiquity and Neovim makes it even more ubiquitous.
Pro Powerful plugin model
Vim plugins have always been useful, but tied to specific languages. Neovim's architecture provides better separation between plugins and the core product, so that plugins are completely flexible and can be written in any language.
Pro Built-in terminal emulator
This avoids the user having to make any installations.
Pro UI Agnostic
The core functionality is handled apart from the UI, meaning that Neovim can be embedded into any other GUI system, such as Atom.
Pro Async plugin execution
Pro Active development community
Pro Opens a 3Gig Text File in a few seconds
Not many editors can open such a large text file so quickly.
Pro Fast and light on memory usage
New neovim editor instance starts instantly and you can have multiple editors open at the same time, because id does not require a lot of memory to run.
Pro Easier to pick-up than ever
Don't believe it? Try typing vimtutor in your command line right now.
Pro Work in TUI (Text User Interface)
Neovim can work on terminal, on a remote server over ssh.
Pro Modern code base
As a refactor over Vim, Neovim has greatly improved its code base. For example, some functionality is handled by libuv, the same code base that powers Node.js.
Pro Comes with some good configurations out of the box
Some typical configurations most of VIM users make are default in Neovim.
Pro Even more powerful since 2019, because of additions such as vim-coc, TabNine, fzf, skim
Vim gets stronger every time command-line tools get stronger. This isn't even it's the final form.
Pro Config file is where it should be
I don't like having dotfiles or dotdirs in my homefolder unless they're needed. Configs should be in the .config dir in their respective folder.
Pro Built-in file-explorer and ability to make splits and edit multiple things simutaneously.
This makes editing multiple files at once, moving code around so easy.
Pro Treesitter and LSP
Pro Terminal mode is very convenient for testing code in a split window
Pro Full terminal access
CodeAnywhere gives users full terminal access.
Pro BitBucket integration
Integrates with BitBucket and allows logging in with your BitBucket account. It's possible to launch Codeanywhere from within BitBucket's repo by adding Codeanywhere integration as an add-on.
Pro Dropbox and Google Drive support
Codeanywhere allows connecting and pulling development files from a Dropbox or a Google Drive account, making it easy to sync development files across devices.
Pro Unlimited revisions
Each action performed on any file from any resource will be saved forever.
Pro Github integration
Integrates with Github and allows logging in with your Github account.
Pro Has mobile apps for all major mobile OSs
Codeanywhere has apps for iOS, Android, Kindle Fire, Windows, and Blackberry.
Pro SFTP access
Allows connecting code via FTP, SFTP.
Pro Good editor
Supports multiple cursors. Has code completion for JavaScript, PHP, HTML, CSS and linting for JavaScript and CSS.
Pro Allows inviting collaborators with a link
Codeanywhere has a feature called Share Links, that allows users to collaborate with others on their projects in real-time by simply sharing a link to their work.
Pro Multiple devboxes
DevBoxes are saveable, fully customizable development environments that run on either Open VZ or Docker and each has a dedicated amount of memory and disk space. Multiple devboxes can be run at the same time.
Pro SSH Terminal
Even for 3rd party SSH connections.
Pro Integration with DigitalOcean
CodeAnywhere recently partnered up with DigitalOcean. Now users can manage, spin up and provision DigitalOcean droplets all from the CodeAnywhere IDE. This is a great addition for both products, combining the power of an affordable host with the portability and power of CodeAnywhere IDE.
Pro OneDrive integration
Similar to their Dropbox integration, it gives you full access.
Cons
Con Poor feature discoverability
Con High effort to customize
A lot of time and effort is put in to make it specific to your needs.
Con Requires Brain Mode Switching
When editing in vim, you have you use the vim keys; when editing in every other window on your PC, or in Word or Excel or other application, you need to use the standard system key combinations. Learning the vim combinations can actually make you SLOWER at everything else.
Con Consume brain energy for editing that should be used for logic
Text editing in vim can be great once you've learned it, but it requires thinking about combination of commands. In other editors, you don't have to think about how to delete this part of code. You just think about how to implement a feature, what is a good design for this code. Even after you get used to using vim, it still requires your brain for editing.
Con Ambiguity in extensive documentation
Con Limited cross platform support
Neovim is not available for many legacy platforms
Con Split the VIM community
Moolenaar to be blamed for. If he opened up the development for vim to other bright minds, no fork would have happened. As it is mostly compatible with vim, it is not such a big issue.
Con Poor support for external tooling
Con No debugging options found (stepping through code)
Con Non free/libre (proprietary)
Con Web terminal window doesn't always run
In many instances, opening a terminal window in CodeEnvy would continue to load eternally.
Con Customer support is virtually non-existent
Con Custom domains do not work
The custom domain feature fails at the SSL cert, even if you are bringing your own via Cloudflare, etc. Running on port 80 appears to break the site. This is especially frustrating when you paid an extra $24 for 15 custom domains that you cannot use. Support is non-existent so they will not help resolve the issue.
Con Does not jump to definitions
Unable to navigate the class definition or declaration.
Con Very unstable
It's a nice IDE when it works, but suffers a lot from instability with things like being unable to save files, or not starting up, as well as crashes, etc.
Con iOS app hasn't been updated in almost 3 years
Update as of August 20 2017.
Con Web editor on iPad is severely lacking
Codeanywhere relies on right click for major actions but doesn't support this interaction on iPad. Selecting listed Dev box URLs to access site is also unworkable in practice. iPad app allows the actions but has very limited set of Dev box controls.
Using an external keyboard with the app can also be problematic as the arrow keys don't work.
Con SSH Port will be different each time you start your DevBox
Only for Always on DevBoxes will SSH ports remain static.
Con Does not have a function name list in side panel view
Con Can't use SFTP with GIT
Con UI is not optimized and zoom is applied to the entire screen, rather than just the editor
The buttons are way too small. The UI feels washed out and opaque. Zoom (Ctrl++) is applied on the entire screen and not just on the editor.
Con 2 Factor authentication is a joke
Con Confusing, not user friendly
It's so confusing versus other IDEs. Not recommended for newbies and programming students.
