- Yes, definitely use lua. You don’t need to learn much, you can learn as you go
- I’d recommend lazy.nvim as a plugin manager
In fact, just start with kickstart.nvim. It is a starter config which is well documented and all in one file. It is a great starting point and you can then build from there. I’d recommend learning how to modularize and start moving stuff for separate concerns into separate files.
Looking good! You should switch to lazy from packer though. It’s simple: