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- By the end of 2026, how useful do you think agentic/multi-agent AI systems will actually be in your daily work or personal projects? Posted on March 11th, 2026 | 8779 votes
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- By the end of 2026, how useful do you think agentic/multi-agent AI systems will actually be in your daily work or personal projects? Posted on March 11th, 2026 | 40 comments
good old text editor flamewar .... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:good old text editor flamewar .... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:good old text editor flamewar .... (Score:3, Funny)
Stallman: No, its vi versus GNUemacs.
Gesh
Re:good old text editor flamewar .... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:good old text editor flamewar .... (Score:3, Interesting)
And don't forget the equally useful subflames about GNUemacs vs. Xemacs and vi vs. vim, etc. Of course there are other choices for editors, too, which spur their own flamewars. I'm personally a GNUemacs man myself, and I just can't see how anyone can use that damn vi thing.
Emacs is NOT an editor! (Score:5, Interesting)
I can read my mail in emacs, I can compose my mail in emacs, I can read usenet in Emacs, I can build my programs in Emacs, I can run my programs in Emacs, I can debug my programs in Emacs, I can run my shell in Emacs, I can visit ftp sites in Emacs, I can browse gzipped tarballs in Emacs, I can automatically encrypt and decrypt PGP files in Emacs, I can do just about anything I ever need to do in Emacs without ever having to take my hands off the keyboard to reach for a mouse.
(I can even browse the Web in emacs, though for that task I still prefer Galeon.)
But get this straight once and for all: Emacs is not (just) an editor!
--Jim
Re:Emacs is NOT an editor! (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Emacs is NOT an editor! (Score:2)
For ftp, and web browsing, I use the shell in Vim and launch lynx which is better then the emacs browser.
Now, here are some things that gvim and vim can do better then emacs. Supperior automatic indentation, and syntax highlighting for just about everything from Debian change logs, to even UNREAL SCRIPT, to academic langauges like forth. As an example of supperior automatic indentation, lets take a c++ program thats missing a ";" termination after a cout statement. In emacs the particular cout statement would return to the same columm with or without the termination after the enter key is pressed. On vim the indentation would be a tab ahead. This is also handy when typing a long statment on two lines. With the indentation visable, another programmer can read the code easier. The editor does this automaticially. Emacs does not or does limited indentation depending on the langauge. Also Visual C++ doesn't do this either.
Sure emacs is a great environment for those using old console based terminals who do not want to press ctrl-alt-F+keys to view multiple programs. But for those using a Window Manager, using GVim+KMail+Konqueror is alot easier and requires less keystorkes then to stay all in emacs. All you do is use alt + tab to switch programs. Infact I can use all the seperate programs mentioned above with less keystrokes then using the emacs equilivant packages all in emacs itself.
THe spirit of unix are lots of simple programs that do one thing really well and all work together. VIm does one thing really well and that job is editing text. I would rather use the best browser, the best email program, and the best editor all seperately then to use one program with mediocre equilivants.
As a stand alone editor nothing beats vim.
Re:Emacs is NOT an editor! (Score:2, Funny)
Can you get a life in Emacs? It sounds like that part is sadly lacking....
Try M-x apply-life-to-user.
Re:Emacs is NOT an editor! (Score:2)
M-x life
(no, really)
Re:good old text editor flamewar .... (Score:2, Funny)
http://www.red-bean.com/~joelh/vigor/
Re:good old text editor flamewar .... (Score:4, Funny)
We've got a good example flowing here....
:)~
Re:good old text editor flamewar .... (Score:2, Funny)
Heh. Two favourite parodies of mine:
Re:good old text editor flamewar .... (Score:2, Interesting)
NEdit! [nedit.org]
Re:good old text editor flamewar .... (Score:2)
Re:good old text editor flamewar .... (Score:2)
Re:good old text editor flamewar .... (Score:2)
THE MIGHTY ED (Score:5, Funny)
-
From: patl@athena.mit.edu (Patrick J. LoPresti)
Message-ID:
Sender: news@athena.mit.edu (News system)
Subject: The True Path (long)
Date: 11 Jul 91 03:17:31 GMT
Path: ai-lab!mintaka!olivea!samsung!zaphod.mps.ohio-sta
Newsgroups: alt.religion.emacs,alt.slack
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Lines: 95
Xref: ai-lab alt.religion.emacs:244 alt.slack:1935
When I log into my Xenix system with my 110 baud teletype, both vi *and* Emacs are just too damn slow. They print useless messages like, 'C-h for help' and '"foo" File is read only'. So I use the editor that doesn't waste my VALUABLE time.
Ed, man! !man ed
ED(1) UNIX Programmer's Manual ED(1)
NAME
ed - text editor
SYNOPSIS
ed [ - ] [ -x ] [ name ]
DESCRIPTION
Ed is the standard text editor.
- ---
Computer Scientists love ed, not just because it comes first alphabetically, but because it's the standard. Everyone else loves ed because it's ED!
"Ed is the standard text editor."
And ed doesn't waste space on my Timex Sinclair. Just look: /bin/ed /usr/ucb/vi /usr/bin/emacs
- -rwxr-xr-x 1 root 24 Oct 29 1929
- -rwxr-xr-t 4 root 1310720 Jan 1 1970
- -rwxr-xr-x 1 root 5.89824e37 Oct 22 1990
Of course, on the system *I* administrate, vi is symlinked to ed. Emacs has been replaced by a shell script which 1) Generates a syslog message at level LOG_EMERG; 2) reduces the user's disk quota by 100K; and 3) RUNS ED!!!!!!
"Ed is the standard text editor."
Let's look at a typical novice's session with the mighty ed:
golem> ed
?
help
?
?
?
quit
?
exit
?
bye
?
hello?
?
eat flaming death
?
^C
?
^C
?
^D
?
- ---
Note the consistent user interface and error reportage. Ed is generous enough to flag errors, yet prudent enough not to overwhelm the novice with verbosity.
"Ed is the standard text editor."
Ed, the greatest WYGIWYG editor of all.
ED IS THE TRUE PATH TO NIRVANA! ED HAS BEEN THE CHOICE OF EDUCATED AND IGNORANT ALIKE FOR CENTURIES! ED WILL NOT CORRUPT YOUR PRECIOUS BODILY FLUIDS!! ED IS THE STANDARD TEXT EDITOR! ED MAKES THE SUN SHINE AND THE BIRDS SING AND THE GRASS GREEN!!
When I use an editor, I don't want eight extra KILOBYTES of worthless help screens and cursor positioning code! I just want an EDitor!! Not a "viitor". Not a "emacsitor". Those aren't even WORDS!!!! ED! ED! ED IS THE STANDARD!!!
TEXT EDITOR.
When IBM, in its ever-present omnipotence, needed to base their "edlin" on a UNIX standard, did they mimic vi? No. Emacs? Surely you jest. They chose the most karmic editor of all. The standard.
Ed is for those who can *remember* what they are working on. If you are an idiot, you should use Emacs. If you are an Emacs, you should not be vi. If you use ED, you are on THE PATH TO REDEMPTION. THE SO-CALLED "VISUAL" EDITORS HAVE BEEN PLACED HERE BY ED TO TEMPT THE FAITHLESS. DO NOT GIVE IN!!! THE MIGHTY ED HAS SPOKEN!!!
Re:good old text editor flamewar .... (Score:2)
Hmmmm... interesting error:
Your comment violated the postercomment compression filter. Comment aborted
EMACS! (Score:2)
What the hell are you talking about? Anyone who knows anything uses Emacs. Sheesh!
Yeah, flamebait, of course :-) I really do prefer emacs to vi, but, heck - it doesn't really matter THAT much. Of course, I keep expecting someone to do some minor tweaking to emacs, bloat it just a little more, and turn it into it's own operating system ;-)
Re:EMACS! (Score:3, Funny)
Shouldn't flamebait be a +1 in this thread?
Re:EMACS! (Score:2, Funny)
Sorry, I can't remember who originally said that.
Re:EMACS! (Score:2)
Sorry, I can't remember who originally said that.
Along similar lines, someone once said that emacs makes a great OS, which makes Unix the best device driver ever written...
Of course, we all know that emacs sucks, and vi is the one true way.
VI! (Score:2)
Stallman reminder (Score:2)
Thats GNUemacs.
Of course, Linux -vs- GNU/Linux.... (Score:2)
Thats GNUemacs.
Do NOT make me bitch-slap you. >;-)
But, that does bring up one of the slightly newer but definitely worthy of being a contender flamewars that are starting:
Linux -vs- GNU/Linux
This is a new and evolving flamewar, with people starting to take sides. It's a wonderful thing to watch a community begin to take sides on a relatively new set of flamewars that are happening ;-)
(I understand RMS's idea, and meaning and all but - really, come one. The name is Linux. Even if Linus didn't name it that, it's what stuck. Being a revisionist isn't doing anyone favors, 'specially when it comes to trying to explain "What Linux Is" to a PHB or computer newbie.)
Windows Notepad! (Score:2, Funny)
Re:PICO! (Score:2)
I used pico when I was a newbie but after you learn the basic commands you will wonder why you ever even considered using pico.
Re:PICO! (Score:2)
It's in the 'xap' set as gvim.rpm. At least it is in 7.2.
Re:PICO! (Score:2)
VI commands (Score:2)
Here is a simple example. at the command prompt type vim hello.txt . Vim is now open. Press the Insert thats next to the backspace one and type "Hello World". Then hit esc, and type
joe! (Score:2)
Re:Pico (Score:2)
Pico doesn't have half the power of either, and is non-free to boot.
Re:Pico (Score:2)
Re:BBedit rules! Yes!!! (Score:2)
Re:I guess that's under OS ... (Score:2)
Nah, the OS wars are to be expected (Score:2)
But heated arguments about distributions and Open vs. Free software are awesome. The little guys, all with much in common, just can't see eye to eye and work together. They just _have_ to bicker about something that no one else cares about. And man is that amusing to outsiders
Clever... (Score:5, Funny)
No religion? (Score:2, Interesting)
language wars (Score:2, Informative)
these have produced more carnage than any other holy war, as far as i can tell
LaTeX vs MS Word (Score:2, Interesting)
Write in choices (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Write in choices (Score:2)
Blondes vs. Brunettes (Score:2)
> Blondes vs. Brunettes
Redheads!!!
A worthy write in... (Score:2)
But NO, no one cares about cartoons now, do they?
Re:Write in choices (Score:2)
Re:Write in choices (Score:2)
This is the question that basically divides men into two categories. I'll take Mary Ann.
Re:Write in choices (Score:2)
Ah, what am I saying, this is an insane post. Wilma would never leave Fred and we know it.
Re:Write in choices (Score:5, Funny)
Cat: Wilma Flintstone?
Lister: Maybe we've been alone in deep space too long, but every time I see that body, it drives me crazy. Is it me?
Cat: Well, I think in all probability, Wilma Flintstone is the most desirable woman that ever lived.
Lister: That's good. I thought I was going strange.
Cat: She's incredible!
Lister: What d'ya think of Betty?
Cat: Betty Rubble? Well, I would go with Betty... but I'd be thinking of Wilma.
Lister: This is crazy. Why are we talking about going to bed with Wilma Flintstone?
Cat: You're right. We're nuts. This is an insane conversation.
Lister: She'll never leave Fred, and we know it.
Re:Write in choices (Score:2)
Oh, wait! I think I once saw one a few years ago. Never seen one since then. I guess BSOD wins this. I see lots of those.
I've been reading /. for a while... (Score:2)
and I thought it was "Ida" vs. "Katy". I would like to see Cowboy Neal vs. Mothra on the big screen, though.
What About... (Score:2)
Man, I thought for sure that would be in there...
OS Wars Over - MS Releasing Open Source Windows! (Score:5, Funny)
Anime (Score:2)
Re:Anime (Score:2)
In general, I would have to say sub. Especially on Eva, where you will never really totally understand how defeatist Shinji is until you hear his voice in Japanese, whining and pleading while he is controlling the most powerful war machine ever made.
Which reminds me of another anime flame war...
Asuka vs. Rei
Impossible Moderation (Score:2, Offtopic)
Offtopic
Troll
Can't believe you left out.... (Score:4, Funny)
But Katz isn't really for geeks (Score:2)
Sad, really.
Bigger than Distro (Score:2)
Lets get this flame war rolling! (Score:3, Funny)
I vote Macintosh for every option!
(Yes, even best band. No, I don't know how, this is supposed to be a mindless flame war.)
What? (Score:2)
No shell choice?
No CPU option?
No 3D card? (well, ok, 3dfx lost, and ATi never really had rabid wolves supporting it...)
I can't believe this. You don't even know how to start a proper flame war. We need *real* poll options for *that*.
Emacs sucks!! vi sucks!! Meta-flamewar!! (Score:2)
But on the other hand, Emacs is definitely the pinnacle of text-editor design. vi is so limited and primitive as to make me giggle. I run Emacs at login and never leave!! I can run vi inside Emacs emulated in Lisp!! Emacs can rub my tummy and pat my head... at the same time!!
Plus, the Slashdot Editors are complete idiots for not including this classic flamewar in their list!! And anyone who thinks these namby-pamby flamwars like "the operating system" flamewar, or the equally dead "distribution" flamewar add up to the classic vi vs. Emacs... well you guys must all be vi users, because you are all IDIOTS!!!! I mean Emacs users...
(anyone who thinks I am serious is being silly)
What about databases? (Score:2)
a linux flame poem (Score:5, Funny)
Irc, licq
whilst websites remotely queue,
Check email, usenet too,
check to see what posts are new
Block the spam, and moderate.
Got first post? No, slightly late,
Write some code, obfuscate,
now Napster has met it's fate.
Overclock and break the fan,
dodge that little channel ban,
Do not sleep, loose that tan,
buy more memory if you can.
Never mind your paler looks,
read some more O'Reilly books,
vi's best, there's no hooks,
rule the world and run linux!
not to start a flamewar, but... (Score:2)
John Katz (Score:2)
Near and dear to every Linux Hacker's heart... (Score:5, Interesting)
Also known as "Torvalds v Tannenbaum," 1992. Rehashing itself to some extent in the Linux vs. HURD "debate."
Now THAT's a classic.
My choice (Score:2)
Besides, I think RMS is hilarious.
Why Moltar vs. Zorak? (Score:2)
We need more moderators like Space Ghost!
What will you buy with your tax return... (Score:2)
What will you buy with your tax return.
Answer:
A new poll writer. Not only are they bad polls, they are bad options. How can you miss "editors", "Jon Katz", "Trolls", and many others? Geeeeez....
Code Style (Score:5, Funny)
void dosomething(void) {
}
vs
void dosomething(void)
{
}
SGC2C (Score:3, Funny)
Space Ghost Coast to Coast cracks me up :) Sunday night/Monday morning at midnight on Cartoon Network in case anyone doesn't know. And in case everyone isn't already aware, Zorak and Moltar are the two other main characters on the show. If anyone else has some good SGC2C quotes I'd love to read them.
GUI vs. Command Line? (Score:2, Insightful)
This pits MacOS and some Windows people against almost all Linux/UNIX people. Regardless of what distro you use or which GUI you prefer, you probably have an opinion on this debate. It also comes into play when people select text/HTML editors and mail clients.
Overall, I think the reason most people pick an OS is that they feel comfortable with the interface. The GUI vs. command line debate is one deciding factor in whether to use Linux, MacOS, Windows, or another OS on your personal computer.
Music Outlives Technology Fads (Score:2)
BC3K vs Detractors (Score:2, Interesting)
Tha war has pretty much driven away any discussion of actual Space-Sims (not that there are any Space-sims to discuss), and frequently spreads to other game-related groups.
The war continues, un-abated, at comp.sys.ibm.games.space-sim.
EC
Balrog's wings (Score:2)
Balrogs...do they have wings or not?
(This has started quite a few falme wars on Rec.alt.books.tolkien)
RMS vs T (Score:2)
Flame Writing HOWTO (Score:2)
I'd have to say... (Score:2)
Brace/indent style? (Score:2)
What about K5 vs /.?! (Score:2)
open source vs. free software (Score:2)
Can't Vote. New option (Score:2)
So I went looking through the other posts to see what else people thought sould have been in there.
After looking at:
lang vs lang, editor vs editor, browser vs browser, shell vs shell many others including cowboy vs everyone I here by nominate "Best Flame War" to be the Best Flame War(tm).
Could we please get the poll updated.
Best classic flame war - minix vs. linux (Score:2)
Heh, technically Linus was off-topic posting about his new project in comp.os.minix, but that's beside the point...it makes for an interesting discussion, as well as an early insight into Linus's personality.
Trolls vs. Moderators (Score:2, Funny)
The Archie War (Score:2)
(My vote would totally be for Betty.
Most days.)
Oh great. Now we have a flame war over flame wars. (Score:2)
They couldn't just let the flame wars run on their own, they had to make a poll to generate the "secret wars" of all flame wars.
Woe is me.
Re:CowboyNeal vs Mothra? (Score:2, Funny)
And C64 vs Apple II (Score:2)
There was another good one to add to the fray. (Of course, it was only logical that the C64 people would win that fight. Look at what they were up against! ;-) And of course there's still the occasional Mac -vs- PC fight. I avoid that one thought - I keep thinking about picking up a nice G4 machine one o' these days to play with...
Re:And C64 vs Apple II (Score:2)
(said with a big fat :-), of course)
Re:Best Trek! (Score:2)
TNG was great. But Enterprise - well, I really to think it's going to be at least as good as TOS. Definitely better than DS9 and ST:Borager.
One of the things that is making me look forward to Enterprise is that it's so much closer to home. The people, the technology, etc won't be as far flung as TNG and the rest. Plus there's supposed to be a great deal less Technobable in this one. I'll believe it when I watch it, of course - but that would be a good thing IMHO :-) The other thing is I hope the writers have some balls this time - where the timeframe is so close to our own again, there's a good chance to do something trek as done fairly well in two of the series: reasonably deep statments on our status as humans. Granted, they aren't really deep stuff, but better than most of the brain fluff out there.
Re:Science versus religion is the biggest (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Science versus religion is the biggest (Score:2)
Holy Wars (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Clearly the best flame war (Score:2)
>take C++
>A small wizard pops into the room and says "Poof!" Your trusty old C++ is now Perl.
>use Perl;
It's not easy being green (Score:2, Informative)
As someone has already noted, drawing the distinction between atheism and morality this way is a bit like asking, "How long have you been beating your wife?"
Who is more moral, the person who treats others with respect for these reasons:
a) We're all in this together
b) Everyone deserves respect
or these reasons:
a) God will smite me for being bad
b) I'd like to get in to heaven
My morality is based on the mutual respect of others. I do not try to treat others as I would like to be treated; rather, I treat them as they would *like* to be treated, as long as it doesn't interfere with my own morality. (ie, I don't bow to people who wish to be treated as an emporor (*cough*Bush*cough*).)
Treating people with respect because they deserve respect is honest and admirable. Treating people with respect because you'd like to sit at God's side is merely a hidden agenda.
These two are not mutually exclusive; you can respect people and still believe in and love God. But unless your belief is more than a tautology ("I believe in the God because the Bible proves there is a God"), it is a *personal* belief, and not an *objective* fact, and annoying other people with incessant ranting will merely piss them off.
Anyway, that's *my* rant for today. Have a nice day.
Re:vi is for masochists (Score:2)
Well, I used to be a faithful emacs guy. Then I had to use ed daily. On an unreliable link. When I was finailly given vi it didn't fell that bad.
PS, could someone please explain how telnet over TCP/IP can be unreliable? I just know that "1,100l" droped enough random letters that you couldn't do it twice an merge outputs as odds where in favor of at least one letter being droped both times. icky.
Re:DISTROS!! (Score:3, Informative)
Re:The Best Trek is B5 (of course). (Score:2)
Re:RMS v. ESR (Score:2)
RMS is rather, ahem, non-agile, and ESR loves his guns.
ESR says "Dodge this." ESR pulls trigger. End of fight.