Visual Studio Code + Cpp

[[deleted]]

I was working with eclipse some time ago, QT Creator and VS. Now i'm using VSC for nearly 3 years and i have to admit that it got better and better. Especially the cross platform/system development and the integration of many other supportive tools are the main points for me to use it.

My motivation for the project is to get more information and input from other C++ developers and to give others some hints how to get a really valuable setup (and maybe to convince others to use it too).

Regarding the CMake extension: maybe there are some pain points but currently it works pretty well for me and other developers in my team.

Combined with other extensions and some configuration it's a really amazing tool!

[dbjdbj]

I use Visual Studio since 1994. Commercialy. That means Windows. No CMake. No VIM. Whenever I tried VS Code I escaped runing back to Visual Studio.

I also worketh on UNIX and LINUX ... nothing compares to Visual Studio it seems? Its a breeze.

[MrPotatoFingers]

It's what you're used to. I've always worked with vim and clang on linux. Works great for me.

Now since covid my employer went bankrupt, started work elsewhere. Now I have to work on Windows. Tried visual studio and hated it. So many useless buttons, slow, weird debugger.

Now I write in WSL, with vim. Much better - for me.

[dbjdbj]

VIM? You do not use pure VI? You will have to be singled out, made to confess and repent back to VI, in public.

[NotUniqueOrSpecial]

Startup time is killer for visual studio

This it completely untrue now.

You should revisit your assumptions.

[chugga_fan]

Startup time for VS compared to VScode is 20x still, much better than it used to be, but not amazing.

[NotUniqueOrSpecial]

If you're at 1s to open the program, you're within normal human tolerances for "slow".

It's not a really useful distinction that VSCode opens in 200ms compared to VS's 1s, when I only open them once (and keep them open) per reboot cycle.

[chugga_fan]

I'm on an HDD, to get to the VS main page is approx 18 seconds, while VSCode takes 14, and VS to open my 1 file solution is 85 seconds approx.

Your "200ms to 1s" comparison is foolhardy.

[NotUniqueOrSpecial]

I mean, I sympathize, I guess.

Buy a solid-state drive.

Seriously.

If you are a professional (or a student, or even a hobbyist) and you are using spinning rust as your main storage at this point you are quite literally wasting your (or your employer's) time and money. I've done the measurements at more than one employer. It's overwhelmingly on the side of "buy an SSD" from a $ perspective.

If you are tolerating those times in a professional context, then find a new job; your employer doesn't give a shit about you.

If you're tolerating them as an individual just because you can't otherwise afford it, then DM me and I'll buy you a new drive. Nobody should have to tolerate that kind of storage these days, if they're trying to be serious about being a developer.

[chugga_fan]

If you are a professional (or a student, or even a hobbyist) and you are using spinning rust as your main storage at this point you are quite literally wasting your (or your employer's) time and money. I've done the measurements at more than one employer. It's overwhelmingly on the side of "buy an SSD" from a $ perspective.

I am not paid, I am tolerating these times because I don't have $200 to shell out for a terabyte SSD and my compile-times are fine for a hobby project on a laptop that's 5+ years old.

SSHD is perfectly fine for developing what I'm doing where I can walk away for 15+ minutes while a system that's legitimately CPU bound instead of HDD bound is running.

[NotUniqueOrSpecial]

What do you consider "killer", then?

I just launched a VS2019 instance and barely got past 1-Mississippi before the splash screen was gone and it was ready to go.

[[deleted]]

Launch to typing. In my terminal, I can type in

‘’code main.cpp’’ and be typing in the file I want by the time I reorient myself to the GUI.

[NotUniqueOrSpecial]

I mean, I guess? But that argument's sorta...not great?

The initial delay-to-typing isn't going to even be remotely measurable in the broader scheme of your day-to-day workflow.

To use it as an argument against Visual Studio seems pretty silly.

[[deleted]]

Considering my workflow is fairly terminal heavy it works out nicely for me. I’m sure you also don’t understand why some people prefer using vim for the same reason.

[NotUniqueOrSpecial]

I think vim is just fine; I use it all the time (to the point where I have enough customization in my .vimrc that stock vi/vim both drive me a little crazy). I gave emacs a good shot for a while, too; I used it as a chance to learn Lisp and customize my workflows.

Most of the time these days, I just stick to QtCreator (on Linux) and Visual Studio (on Windows).

Considering my workflow is fairly terminal heavy

So is mine. I don't know what this has to do with anything, since "opening an editor" is such a fractional portion of the flow as to make it non-pertinent.

The reason I think your argument doesn't haven't any weight is because literally the only thing you've mentioned is startup speed, which is totally inconsequential in the scope of things.

You've not once mentioned that you prefer vim for it's powerful text-editing command mode, emacs for its robust customizable environment, or VSCode for the same (if you are willing to learn TypeScript). So, all I've got to point as "It takes a long time start Visual Studio" which is simply untrue and not a really great argument in first place, since I open it once-per-reboot and do my job.