Why I migrated from Sublime Text to VSCode
I've been working as a web developer since 2010 and besides different programming languages, one of the most common things we developers usually try a lot is different IDEs or text editors.
While working as a full stack developer with Php, I've used Aptana, Eclipse, Dreamweaver (haha), Notepad++.
When working as a full stack developer with Java, I used NetBeans and also Eclipse.
When I started working more focused on frontend development, I was very happy to leave Eclipse and migrate to Sublime Text. That was a really satisfactory change once I could really focus on Javascript and using a lightweight text editor for that made me feel much more productive.
Personally, the most painful thing for me when I change my IDE/Text editor is getting used with the new shortcuts. I mean, normally one of the main criteria I set when I am considering migrating to another IDE is that it has to make me be more productive, so if the new IDE I am testing has shortcuts that I am already used to, it's a plus!
I was really happy working with Sublime Text, and suddenly everybody was migrating to VScode and trying to convince me to do the same. I used to ask myself: Why? Why would I want to migrate to VSCode? I mean.. I like to test new things, but I don't like to follow "new trends" just because it's the next "hype". So.. Why have I done that?
Well, one single reason made me go for it: The Git integration!
Yes, I know that VSCode has many other awesome features, but I just want to focus on what motivated me. I tried many times to find good Git plugins for Sublime Text, but it never felt complete.
The Git integration on VSCode is really good. I don't really like WYSIWYG tools for Git, because I am very used to running git commands via terminal, but I never enjoyed comparing file changes on it, and this is what I loved the most in VSCode at the beginning.
When I first tried it, besides loving the Git integration, when I noticed that the shortcuts were different from Sublime Text, I thought: Oh man.. I'll have to get used to it again.. I didn't really want to go over this process one more time, so to solve this issue, I just googled for a package for VSCode that would import the Sublime shortcuts and guess what? I found it: "Sublime Text Keymap and Settings Importer".
Conclusion
The community support for VSCode is so great that migrating from Sublime Text was facilitated with the use of packages like "Sublime Text Keymap and Settings importer".
The git integration in VSCode is amazing and there are some awesome packages that you can install to make it even greater: Gitlens is my favorite!
I only focused here on the two main things that helped ME migrating to VSCode, but the tool is amazing and if you haven't tried it yet, you won't regret (but of course, if you don't have any motivations for that, it's also fine! 😄)
Just in case, here's a list of awesome plugins for VSCode. There are many plugins that also help you migrating from other IDEs/Text Editors like Atom or IntelliJ for example. Enjoy it!
