#VimConf2021: Writing, Editing and World-Building at the speed of thought with Vim

Theena shares how they adapted Vim and Neovim as a primary writing environment for writing novels and world-building.

This is a recording of my talk 'ViWrite: Writing, Editing, and World-Building at the speed of thought, presented on Oct 30, 2021 at the VimConf (vimconf.live/). I am primarily a novelist, and a hobbyist coder at best. Vim wasn't meant for writing and writers, but because Vim's innate power can be extended (often to ridiculous levels - yes, even in your browser - it is often used for documentation purposes by programmers. This got me thinking about adapting Vim as my *primary writing environment*. Eight months of experimenting and constant refining later, I can confidently say that Vim/NeoVim + git in a terminal is the writing environment I've dreamt about all my writing life. Special thanks the organizers of #VimConf2021, particularly ABD and Marcos for the tireless organization and constant updating of the site; The Primegan (youtube.com/channel/UC8ENHE5xdFSwx71u3fDH5Xw) for sharing his knowledge of Vim's ins and outs, and doing so with gusto and passion that it got me, a writer, interested enough to play around with Vim as a serious writing tool six months ago. TJDries (youtube.com/c/TJDeVries) for Telescope (github.com/nvim-telescope/telescope.nvim), which is, in my mind, unintentionally the greatest writer assistant I have ever used, particularly when it comes to world-building. Huge shout out to Bram Moolenar (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bram_Moolenaar) for giving us Vim, and tirelessly maintaining it for three decades (incidentally, Vim turned 30 on Nov 3rd 2021). The incredible eco-system around Vim, given life by truly genius makers of plugins, particularly Tim Pope and the makers of Vim-wiki (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bram_Moolenaar), Neorg (thank you for bringing Org Mode into Vim because Org Mode is the only reason that made me contemplate emacs for a month or so). And the NeoVim (neovim.io/) core team for reimagining Vim as more than a text editor. I am truly grateful to all of you for making the writing environment of my dreams. Special thanks to Primegan for permission to use footage from his Twitch Channel: twitch.tv/theprimeagen Other links: 1. Personal site: theena.net 2. Open Stories (temporary WIP): theena.net/open_stories/ 3. First Utterance (Kindle version): amazon.com/First-Utterance-Miragian-Cycles-Book-ebook/dp/B08… 4. Raw feed of the entire Conference: a) Day 1: twitch.tv/videos/1190279834?filter=all&sort=time b) Day 2: twitch.tv/videos/1190959702?filter=all&sort=time (my talk starts at the 2:02:40 mark) CHAPTERS: