Kakoune is scripted over IPC, not bash scripts. The configuration language has some built in functionality for embedding bash scripts, and for smaller plugins or one-off personal customization, yeah you can do everything in a bash script.
But absolutely nothing forces you to implementing plugins as shell scripts! kak-lsp, which provides great integration with language servers, is written in rust. Peneira, a fuzzy finder tool, is implemented in python. People have written libraries for various languages that make interfacing with kakoune from your language of choice quite convenient.
The decision to make all extension functionality work over IPC instead of an embedded scripting language means everything that the editor is capable of can be controlled by any piece of software over a thoughtfully crafted and well-documented interface. Also the extensions people write for kakoune end up also serving as general purpose utilities that can be integrated into stuff other than kakoune.
I've always considered kakoune's approach to extensibility the main selling point of the editor. It has quite phenomenal plugin support for such a niche editor, and it's way easier to make your own plugin than it is with other editors because of how streamline the API is.
But absolutely nothing forces you to implementing plugins as shell scripts! kak-lsp, which provides great integration with language servers, is written in rust. Peneira, a fuzzy finder tool, is implemented in python. People have written libraries for various languages that make interfacing with kakoune from your language of choice quite convenient.
The decision to make all extension functionality work over IPC instead of an embedded scripting language means everything that the editor is capable of can be controlled by any piece of software over a thoughtfully crafted and well-documented interface. Also the extensions people write for kakoune end up also serving as general purpose utilities that can be integrated into stuff other than kakoune.
I've always considered kakoune's approach to extensibility the main selling point of the editor. It has quite phenomenal plugin support for such a niche editor, and it's way easier to make your own plugin than it is with other editors because of how streamline the API is.