I’m just an editor whore…
I was scanning Planet Python and found Juri Pakaste advising that “When everything else fails, try Emacs”. Like Juri, I’ve been pretty much seduced by Eclipse for much of my Java development, but for simple, throw-away Java code, or for my Python work, I generally use a regular programmer’s text editor. I have to admit, however, that I haven’t stuck faithfully to one favourite tool over the years.
During my PhD, a long, long time ago, I cut my teeth on MicroEmacs, graduating from there to the ‘real’ Emacs and then, for reasons now long forgotten, switching to Vim. Eventually, like Juri, I “fled back to the tender loving embrace of Emacs”. I was doing a lot of document preparation using LaTeX, and I think the lure of Emacs + AucTeX as a LaTeX development environment back then was just too great.
Just lately, though, the magic has gone from the relationship. I’ve begun to realise how important it is to me to have an editor that is easy on the eyes, given the amount of time one spends staring at it. And, frankly, Emacs fonts just don’t cut it. I guess I could have got myself some anti-aliased fonts by grabbing the very latest, Xft-enabled Emacs source from CVS; instead, I ended up giving Vim another try, and I’m happy with my decision. Vim looks great, I find I’m remembering the key presses for a surprising number of commands, and I’ve even discovered a neat plug-in for LaTeX development, called LaTeX-Suite. Goodbye Emacs, until the next time… 
I wonder, am I just weird, or do others suffer from a similarly deplorable lack of loyalty to their text editor?