Writing in Neovim

I have a long list of things to do. Where do I start?

One thing I’m doing is slowly getting Neovim set up so I can use it. I’m writing this story in Neovim right now. I want to get used to the Neovim key bindings. Get used to using Neovim.

I’m also using the Krusader file browser. So, I have my old way, using Kate and Dolphin, and my new way, using Neovim and Krusader. I don’t really like all the militaristic names, like Krusader and Konquerer, but I do like that KDE is trying to build advanced development tools I can use in my home office.

The one non-KDE tool I’m using is Kitty. I would use Konsole, but I tested them for speed and Kitty, which runs on the GPU instead of the CPU, is at least three times faster than Konsole. That’s a bummer, because your terminal is the heart of your development environment.

Using Neovim to write stories will help you get used to the vim user interface. Learn how to use the multi-modal editing system and move around in your files. I have already forgotten most of the movement keys. I will probably be able to remember them pretty quickly. I’ll have to find a good cheat-sheet.

Another program that I want to learn how to use this year is Kile, for writing Latex documents. I want to write a few stories about mathematics and Latex makes it possible to write mathematical formulas.

I’m writing a book right now using OpenOffice Writer. I’ll set it up in Scribus and submit it to the literature review department to get permission to publish the story. It will be ready to publish. I can get a publisher to publish it, or I can self-publish the story using Lulu.com or IngramSpark.

I’ll start writing all my blog posts and website articles in Neovim, just to get used to using Neovim. I do have a tiny bit of experience using Vim and Neovim, so hopefully, I’ll pick it back up fairly quickly.

I’ll write a bunch of stories about how to use all these tools. There will probably be a few not very well written articles and blog posts, like this one, while I get used to using Neovim. I’m doing a lot of editing in my website’s Gutenberg editor.

I’m demonstrating how you can do this. Start with not knowing very much about how to doing it to begin with. I like using these complex tools. I could waist my time playing video games or I can learn how to use these complex tools and make something valuable with them. It’s fun. Like playing chess or putting a giant jigsaw puzzle together.

I’ll be starting slowly and improving in waves of progress from now on. If you want to set your computer up to be a high performance development environment, you can follow along. And participate. Comment, Ask questions. I may not know the answer, but I figure that making this into a conversation will make an even better learning experience for all of us. Just make sure your comments are productive and not hateful. Haters will be blocked out.

So, here I am, writing another blog post about what I am doing. This is a bad habit I want to improve about myself. Get in the habit of writing about your audience’s agenda, not yours.

Narrow your focus. Get in the habit of finishing projects, before you start a new one. Start writing every day, first thing in the morning. Accomplish something valuable. After you get a good story written, start reading. Write in the morning, read in the afternoon.

Do that every day. Work on developing your muscle memory. Work on configuring your tools. Don’t hurry. Right now I’m using the default settings of Neovim. I have a config file from my last setup, but I want to go slow and set this one up fresh. I’ll be investigating the Lua programming language and using it to configure Neovim.

Photo: Bob Mccoy, Screenshot of my desktop