Besides VSCodium (which isn’t really a fork, it’s just building from the source code of VSCode without the Microsoft stuff), there aren’t any VSCode forks/derivatives that aren’t AI-assisted editors (see Cursor, Windsurf, those are the main two, right?).
That feels a bit weird to me, as many other pieces of software have lots of forks and derivatives (browsers, operating systems, email clients, emulators, PDF viewers, Fediverse clients, etc.). I guess people who would bother to create a fork and doesn’t want to put AI in everything just uses a different editor.
There’s nothing wrong with VSCodium, it’s awesome. My only gripe with it is that the rpm package takes ages to update compared to everything else I use, which is weird. Other than that issue, it runs fine, and I like the flexibility that plugins give me. I just find it odd that there aren’t any other VSCode derivatives/forks.
I write scientific articles with inline R code in Latex (using knitr), so I need syntax highlighting that jumps between two different languages within the document as well as spell checking and advanced (non AI) grammar tools for the text documents. Also I want something that looks kinda minimalistic and neat as a writing interface - there is more writing than coding involved.
I’m sure there’s some wizard somewhere who can do everything I need in Emacs, but I’m not terribly sophisticated. I just want something that works. Sadly, as much as I try to avoid anything Microsoft, VS Codium is the only thing I’ve found that fits my needs in a good way.