It sounds a lot like you are trying to tell a programmer to stop programming using the keyboard and program using the mouse instead. I think I understand why you are doing that, but I don't see how you can expect to be successful this way.
For 99% of programmers out there, programming IS typing on a keyboard. Clicking around with a mouse is only something that non-expert users (or children, e.g. Scratch users) do, because it is approximately 10x slower to get anything done by laboriously pointing and clicking than by typing. For example, finding the largest file in my home directory through the GUI takes 5 careful targeting operations and 5 clicks, a click-and-drag, and then some scrolling, and then I have to do more dragging to move the window around so I can see what's under it. Using a keyboard I type "ll -S" and I'm done in half a second (and immediately able to issue the next command). You simply can't compete with that.
Even though it isn't the same way you are used to operating, I think it will be necessary to take into account the needs of that audience if you want to bring them on board.
As a thought experiment, what would it take to make the environment comfortably usable with only a keyboard, including discoverability of all the necessary keyboard controls? You could treat it as an accessibility issue; what if the user is unable to use a mouse?
For 99% of programmers out there, programming IS typing on a keyboard. Clicking around with a mouse is only something that non-expert users (or children, e.g. Scratch users) do, because it is approximately 10x slower to get anything done by laboriously pointing and clicking than by typing. For example, finding the largest file in my home directory through the GUI takes 5 careful targeting operations and 5 clicks, a click-and-drag, and then some scrolling, and then I have to do more dragging to move the window around so I can see what's under it. Using a keyboard I type "ll -S" and I'm done in half a second (and immediately able to issue the next command). You simply can't compete with that.
Even though it isn't the same way you are used to operating, I think it will be necessary to take into account the needs of that audience if you want to bring them on board.
As a thought experiment, what would it take to make the environment comfortably usable with only a keyboard, including discoverability of all the necessary keyboard controls? You could treat it as an accessibility issue; what if the user is unable to use a mouse?