this post was submitted on 15 Apr 2026
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Programmer Humor

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[–] Feyter@programming.dev 228 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

No one can exit vim. It's simply not possible.

There are even legends that the devil himself was onced tricked into opening vim and is stuck there since.

[–] affenlehrer@feddit.org 113 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

That explains the many vim enthusiasts that don't want any other editor. They simply can't exit the vim instance they once accidentally opened...

[–] wewbull@feddit.uk 43 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

The Eagles called it Hotel California.

[–] hakunawazo@lemmy.world 26 points 3 weeks ago

"We are all just prisoners here of our own device"
So true, so true.

[–] BlackVenom@lemmy.world 12 points 3 weeks ago

Stockholm Editor

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[–] Bakkoda@lemmy.world 26 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)
[–] Hossenfeffer@feddit.uk 20 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

"... and that's why I need you to take the power plant offline."

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[–] Cevilia@lemmy.blahaj.zone 135 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

Every computer has a built-in "exit vim" button, conveniently located on the chassis, usually next to the power cord. Flick it to 0, then back to 1, and you'll find vim has been successfully exited. :)

[–] four@lemmy.zip 57 points 3 weeks ago (10 children)

What if my PC boots straight into Vim? It's not like I need anything else, can do everything in Vim

[–] enumerator4829@sh.itjust.works 27 points 3 weeks ago (4 children)

Jokes aside, vim as PID 1 is just a bad idea.

Emacs on the other hand: https://github.com/emacs-os/el-init

[–] GenosseFlosse@feddit.org 12 points 3 weeks ago (7 children)

That's a great idea from GitHub user el-sloppo and Claude.

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[–] Malix@sopuli.xyz 109 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)
[–] heuristic_lemur@lemmy.ml 51 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Isn't it? I can't decide whether I believe this is an easter egg

[–] wheezy@lemmy.ml 48 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

If it was trained properly on Internet data it would just respond with "you can't"

[–] BarbecueCowboy@lemmy.dbzer0.com 17 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

If you need to exit vim, just open a new terminal and reboot the machine.

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[–] herseycokguzelolacak@lemmy.ml 100 points 3 weeks ago

Ok this proves that AI has reaches human level intelligence.

[–] Jhex@lemmy.world 89 points 3 weeks ago

This is the closest I have seen Copilot doing something like a human Programmer would

[–] weimaraner_of_doom@piefed.social 75 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

Instructions: "Next, open the .config file in vim..."

Me:

[–] BluescreenOfDeath@lemmy.world 53 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

What a weird way to spell nano

[–] weimaraner_of_doom@piefed.social 21 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

Nano is the proper tool for this job.

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[–] otter@lemmy.dbzer0.com 58 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

This is how we trap it. This is how we win.

[–] AmanitaCaesarea@slrpnk.net 31 points 3 weeks ago

This is how we vim😏

[–] GreenShimada@lemmy.world 18 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Are you sure? It looks like this is going "Hey, I can't get the front door open to the house, so I called the cops and told them I was being held hostage so they would break down the door with a battering ram."

How long is it before CoPilot can't exit vim and just deletes vim as the solution?

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[–] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 42 points 3 weeks ago
[–] kSPvhmTOlwvMd7Y7E@programming.dev 36 points 3 weeks ago (5 children)
[–] panda_abyss@lemmy.ca 75 points 3 weeks ago (4 children)

If it’s a read only file it won’t work, but it might be in insert mode and can’t escape.

It should have tried :q!

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[–] electric_nan@lemmy.ml 35 points 3 weeks ago

Just like me fr

[–] mcv@lemmy.zip 33 points 3 weeks ago (5 children)

I often see Copilot get stuck in a nonresponsive shell after it used cat > file. It's hilarious to watch the first time, but I'm a bit tired of it by now. Why doesn't it just edit files like it normally does?

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[–] bizza@lemmy.zip 31 points 3 weeks ago

Blowing through all those tokens failing to exit a vim

[–] inari@piefed.zip 26 points 3 weeks ago
[–] 1984@lemmy.today 22 points 3 weeks ago

First funny thing ive seen Microslop Copilot do...

[–] reksas@sopuli.xyz 18 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (24 children)

i cant understand all the vim hyping. its probably very neat and can do whatever, but what good is that if it takes awful amount of bother to learn everything by heart since interface has been designed to be as unfriendly as possible. it doesnt have to be fit for office worker, but at least some ease of use is needed.

[–] lemon@sh.itjust.works 49 points 3 weeks ago (6 children)

The interface is modal editing, which, yes, takes some getting used to. The payoff is that you get a kind of programming language for text editing. Rather than memorizing ctrl+shift+alt-style keybinds, you decompose stuff into chainable actions.

Have you ever played a video game, be it with kbd+mouse or gamepad, and realize you’re doing a bunch of stuff without actually consciously thinking about what buttons you’re pressing? That’s what working in editors like Vim or (my fav) Helix feels like.

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[–] schnurrito@discuss.tchncs.de 32 points 3 weeks ago (7 children)

since interface has been designed to be as unfriendly as possible

No, it hasn't.

It (well, vi, which vim is a clone of) has been designed to be a possible interface on a keyboard that doesn't have arrow keys or other modifier keys than shift. There aren't that many ways to program a visual text editor when those are your constraints.

That it's more productive once you know it is a side-effect.

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[–] chonglibloodsport@lemmy.world 25 points 3 weeks ago (7 children)

It’s a specialist tool. You can say the same thing about any specialist tool. Why should CNC machine tools exist if they’re so hard to use and take a lot of training and are dangerous in the hands of untrained people?

[–] Korhaka@sopuli.xyz 11 points 3 weeks ago

Reject CNC machines, return to rock!

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[–] Noctambulist@lemmy.world 24 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Vim is actually highly ergonomic; you can do everything with a minimum of keystrokes without moving a hand away to a mouse or touchpad or oven the arrow keys. If that's worth the time investment to learn it, is a highly subjective question. But I’d say it's a lot easier than many people think.

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[–] lime@feddit.nu 19 points 3 weeks ago

fluency. languages are hard to learn but when you know them you communicate better. same as touch-typing, or mobas.

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[–] ramble81@lemmy.zip 17 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Ngl, there have been some times when i Ctrl-Z, then found and killed the PID

[–] myotheraccount@lemmy.world 13 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

No need to find it, just kill %1, to kill the first background job in a shell (check jobs otherwise to find the right %n)

[–] errer@lemmy.world 11 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

AI gonna train on this comment thread and learn to kill

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It has achieved the same level of awareness as the average emacs user.

[–] daychilde@lemmy.world 16 points 3 weeks ago

I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't exit vim.

[–] jeffep@lemmy.world 15 points 3 weeks ago

How to protect your computer from automated AI attacks 101: start vim

[–] Luminous5481@anarchist.nexus 15 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)
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[–] notabot@piefed.social 13 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

Come on in, <esc>J us, soon you will learn to love the one true editor. Launch vi and be <esc>:w. Soon you will want to <esc>:%s/other editors/vi/g. <esc>dd your hesitation and do it.

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[–] Hisse@programming.dev 12 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Is it stupid? Just do C-x-c!

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[–] BlushedPotatoPlayers@sopuli.xyz 11 points 3 weeks ago

If you use nvim you don't exit you open a float terminal. Why would you exit?

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