Software Alternatives & Startups

Light Table VS pyvim

Compare Light Table VS pyvim and see what are their differences

Light Table logo Light Table

Light Table is a new interactive IDE that lets you modify running programs and embed anything from...

pyvim logo pyvim

An implementation of Vim in Python
  • Light Table Landing page
    Landing page //
    2021-10-21
  • pyvim Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-10-20

Light Table features and specs

  • Real-time Feedback
    Light Table provides real-time feedback as you write code, allowing for instant debugging and code corrections. This feature enhances the development speed and helps catch errors early.
  • Inline Evaluation
    The editor supports inline evaluation of code, meaning you can see the output of your code right next to it, without compiling or running the whole application. This boosts productivity and learning.
  • Plugin Ecosystem
    Light Table has a robust plugin ecosystem which allows you to extend its functionality to suit your specific coding needs. This provides considerable flexibility and customization.
  • Minimalistic Interface
    The user interface is clean and minimalistic, reducing distractions and helping developers to focus on coding tasks.
  • Responsive UI
    Light Table has a highly responsive and lag-free interface. This ensures that the development experience is fluid and seamless.

Possible disadvantages of Light Table

  • Limited Language Support
    While it supports a variety of languages, Light Table's support for newer or less common languages may be lacking compared to other more mature IDEs.
  • Community Activity
    The project has seen periods of low activity from its development community, which could be a concern for long-term support and updates.
  • Learning Curve
    Its novel interface and features can be unfamiliar to developers who are used to traditional IDEs, leading to a higher learning curve.
  • Limitations in Large Projects
    Light Table can struggle with handling very large projects, resulting in performance issues and slower response times, particularly when dealing with large codebases.
  • Dependency on Internet
    Some of its functionalities and plugins require an internet connection, which can be a limitation when working in an offline environment.

pyvim features and specs

  • Keyboard Shortcuts
    PyVim supports Vim-style keyboard shortcuts, allowing users familiar with Vim to perform efficient text editing without needing to learn a new set of commands.
  • Extensibility
    Being based on the prompt-toolkit, PyVim is highly extensible and can be customized to suit specific user needs, allowing for a tailored editing experience.
  • Lightweight
    PyVim is designed to be a lightweight Python-based text editor, which can be advantageous for users seeking a minimalist tool with basic functionality.
  • Integration with Python
    As a Python-based tool, PyVim can easily integrate with other Python libraries and tools, making it suitable for Python developers.

Possible disadvantages of pyvim

  • Limited Features
    Compared to the full version of Vim, PyVim lacks many advanced features and plugins, which might be a drawback for users needing more complex functionality.
  • Stability Concerns
    As a project, pyvim might not be as extensively tested or stable as more established text editors, potentially leading to bugs or other issues.
  • Lack of Community Support
    PyVim is a less common choice compared to other editors, which can mean limited community support and fewer resources for troubleshooting or learning.
  • Command Line Interface
    PyVim operates as a command-line tool, which may not appeal to users who prefer graphical user interfaces for text editing tasks.

Analysis of Light Table

Overall verdict

  • Overall, Light Table is a good choice for developers looking for an interactive and lightweight IDE that encourages experimentation. However, it may lack some of the more advanced features of other IDEs, and the project has seen less activity in recent years, which may affect its viability for long-term projects.

Why this product is good

  • Light Table is an integrated development environment (IDE) known for its real-time feedback capabilities and its focus on providing a reactive experience to developers. It offers a simple, clutter-free interface that is highly customizable. Its ability to instantly display the results of code execution allows developers to experiment and iterate quickly, which makes it appealing for learning and prototyping. The IDE supports various programming languages through plugins, making it versatile for different coding needs.

Recommended for

    Light Table is recommended for beginners who appreciate immediate feedback while learning to code, as well as for experienced developers looking to prototype new ideas quickly. It is particularly suited for users who favor minimalistic design and those who are working with languages that have strong plugin support in Light Table.

Analysis of pyvim

Overall verdict

  • Pyvim is a decent, functional Vim clone written in pure Python using the prompt_toolkit library, useful mainly as a demonstration of prompt_toolkit's capabilities rather than as a full-fledged replacement for Vim in daily production use.

Why this product is good

  • Built on prompt_toolkit, showcasing how powerful terminal UIs can be created in Python
  • Implements many core Vim features like modal editing, basic commands, and syntax highlighting
  • Lightweight and easy to install via pip, with readable Python source code
  • Great for developers who want to study or extend a Vim-like editor in Python
  • Cross-platform since it relies on Python rather than C bindings

Recommended for

  • Python developers interested in learning how terminal-based editors work
  • Users who want a hackable, Python-based Vim clone for experimentation
  • Developers exploring prompt_toolkit for building CLI applications
  • Not recommended as a primary editor for professional or heavy-duty coding work due to missing advanced features and plugins compared to real Vim/Neovim

Light Table videos

Cheap Amazon Light Table - Unboxing, Building and review

pyvim videos

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Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Light Table and pyvim)
Text Editors
95 95%
5% 5
IDE
100 100%
0% 0
Photography
0 0%
100% 100
Productivity
100 100%
0% 0

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare Light Table and pyvim

Light Table Reviews

10 Best Notepad++ Alternatives in 2020
Light Table is an IDE and text editor tool for software development. The tool offers fast feedback and allowing instant execution, debugging and access to documentation.
Source: www.guru99.com
10 Best Sublime Text Alternatives in 2019
Light Table is an IDE and text editor tool for software development. The tool offers fast feedback and allowing instant execution, debugging and access to documentation.
Source: www.guru99.com
Top 8 Sublime Text Alternatives You Can Use in 2019
While Light Table has limited language support compared to Sublime Text, it does come with a a few nice touches, such as Auto-complete everywhere, split views and a command palette. It also comes with a good selection of themes, but one of the major negatives of the program is that you can’t view image files in it in spite of the fact that it’s based on a browser platform....
Source: beebom.com

pyvim Reviews

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Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Light Table seems to be more popular. It has been mentiond 14 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

Light Table mentions (14)

  • How Flash Games shaped the video game industry
    Having never used the authoring tool, can you point me towards something to model it after? I think a Bret Victor, "Inventing on Principal" style editor would be perfect, combined with some sort of scratch like Python IDE where each element is defined in terms of its reactive behaviors with other elements on a timeline. https://youtu.be/PUv66718DII?t=634 With some http://lighttable.com/. - Source: Hacker News / over 1 year ago
  • Inline previous results in Emacs Lisp
    For those like me who have never heard of it, I think OP is referring to this: http://lighttable.com. - Source: Hacker News / about 2 years ago
  • GTFL – A Graphical Terminal for Common Lisp
    Http://lighttable.com/ (somewhat tangentially related, I think?) Sorry this is so scattered I need to hit the hay LOL. - Source: Hacker News / over 2 years ago
  • "Stop Writing Dead Programs", a thought-provoking and entertaining talk by Jack Rusher
    He's got a point. I'm surprised he didn't mention Light Table. Source: almost 4 years ago
  • Ask HN: Best Dev Tool pitches of all time?
    There was a massive amount of excitement around Light Table when it was first announced. I remember one or more pretty amazing videos. I don't have link(s) on-hand though. http://lighttable.com/. - Source: Hacker News / about 4 years ago
View more

pyvim mentions (0)

We have not tracked any mentions of pyvim yet. Tracking of pyvim recommendations started around Mar 2021.

What are some alternatives?

When comparing Light Table and pyvim, you can also consider the following products

VS Code - Build and debug modern web and cloud applications, by Microsoft

Textadept - Textadept is a cross-platform text editor that runs on different types of platforms, that allows to control over the application using Lua programming language.

Sublime Text - Sublime Text is a sophisticated text editor for code, html and prose - any kind of text file. You'll love the slick user interface and extraordinary features. Fully customizable with macros, and syntax highlighting for most major languages.

Kakoune - Vim inspired — Faster as in less keystrokes — Multiple selections — Orthogonal design

Vim - Highly configurable text editor built to enable efficient text editing

qemacs (for quick emacs) - Savannah is a central point for development, distribution and maintenance of free software, both GNU and non-GNU.