Emacs Developers (Including Richard Stallman) Discuss How to Build a More 'Modern' Emacs (lwn.net) 172
LWN.net re-visits the emacs-devel mailing list, where the Emacs 28 development cycle has revived discussions about how to make the text editor more "modern" and attractive to new users:
A default dark theme may not be in the future, leading one to think that there may yet be hope for the world in general. But there does seem to be general agreement that Emacs could benefit from a better, more centralized approach to color themes, rather than having color names hard-coded throughout various Elisp packages. From that, a proper theme engine could be supported, making dark themes and such easily available to those who want them...
Another area where Emacs is insufficiently "modern", it seems, has to do with keyboard and mouse bindings. On the keyboard side, users have come to expect certain actions from certain keystrokes; ^X to cut a selection, ^V to paste it, etc. These bindings are easily had by turning on the Cua mode, but new users tend not to know about this mode or how to enable it. Many participants in the discussion said that this mode should be on by default. That, of course, would break the finger memory of large numbers of existing Emacs users, who would be unlikely to appreciate the disruption. Or, as Richard Stallman put it:
It is not an option to change these basic key bindings to imitate other, newer editors. It would create a different editor that we Emacs users would never switch to. It is unfortunate that the people who implemented the newer editors chose incompatibility with Emacs....
The situation with mouse behavior is similar; as several participants in the discussion pointed out, users of graphical interfaces have come to expect that a right-button click will produce a menu of available actions. In Emacs, instead, that button marks a region ("selection"), with a second click in the same spot yanking ("cutting") the selected text. Many experienced Emacs users have come to like this behavior, but it is surprising to newcomers. The right mouse button with the control key held down does produce a menu defined by the current major mode, but that is evidently not what is being requested here; that menu, some say, should present global actions rather mode-specific ones.
Stallman suggested offering a "reshuffled mode" that would bring the context menu to an unadorned right-button click, and which would add some of the expected basic editing commands there as well. This would be relatively easy to do, he said, since mouse bindings are separate from everything else. Besides, as he noted, the current mouse behavior was derived from "what was the standard in X Windows around 1990"; while one wouldn't want to act in haste, it might just be about time for an update.
Other proposed changes involved "discoverability," including the default enabling of various modes, although to incorporate them into GNU Emacs "would often require the author to sign copyrights over to the Free Software Foundation, which is not something all authors are willing to do..."
Another area where Emacs is insufficiently "modern", it seems, has to do with keyboard and mouse bindings. On the keyboard side, users have come to expect certain actions from certain keystrokes; ^X to cut a selection, ^V to paste it, etc. These bindings are easily had by turning on the Cua mode, but new users tend not to know about this mode or how to enable it. Many participants in the discussion said that this mode should be on by default. That, of course, would break the finger memory of large numbers of existing Emacs users, who would be unlikely to appreciate the disruption. Or, as Richard Stallman put it:
It is not an option to change these basic key bindings to imitate other, newer editors. It would create a different editor that we Emacs users would never switch to. It is unfortunate that the people who implemented the newer editors chose incompatibility with Emacs....
The situation with mouse behavior is similar; as several participants in the discussion pointed out, users of graphical interfaces have come to expect that a right-button click will produce a menu of available actions. In Emacs, instead, that button marks a region ("selection"), with a second click in the same spot yanking ("cutting") the selected text. Many experienced Emacs users have come to like this behavior, but it is surprising to newcomers. The right mouse button with the control key held down does produce a menu defined by the current major mode, but that is evidently not what is being requested here; that menu, some say, should present global actions rather mode-specific ones.
Stallman suggested offering a "reshuffled mode" that would bring the context menu to an unadorned right-button click, and which would add some of the expected basic editing commands there as well. This would be relatively easy to do, he said, since mouse bindings are separate from everything else. Besides, as he noted, the current mouse behavior was derived from "what was the standard in X Windows around 1990"; while one wouldn't want to act in haste, it might just be about time for an update.
Other proposed changes involved "discoverability," including the default enabling of various modes, although to incorporate them into GNU Emacs "would often require the author to sign copyrights over to the Free Software Foundation, which is not something all authors are willing to do..."
Bah, humbug! (Score:3)
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They could make vim emulation mode the default and remove all of the emacs keybindings.
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They could make vim emulation mode the default and remove all of the emacs keybindings.
Yeah but VI running in Emacs? That's tantamount to heresy.
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They could make vim emulation mode the default and remove all of the emacs keybindings.
Yeah but VI running in Emacs? That's tantamount to heresy.
Then it's been heretical for a long time as VI emulation in Emacs (along with a bunch of other editors) has been around for a while. I've been using Emacs since the mid-late 80s and remember VI emulation (before vim) way back then (perhaps the early 90s).
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They could make vim emulation mode the default and remove all of the emacs keybindings.
Yeah but VI running in Emacs? That's tantamount to heresy.
Then it's been heretical for a long time as VI emulation in Emacs (along with a bunch of other editors) has been around for a while. I've been using Emacs since the mid-late 80s and remember VI emulation (before vim) way back then (perhaps the early 90s).
Since the 1980s? ... and you missed the editor "holy wars": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] The "editor holy wars" have been an ongoing nerd joke since since around 1985: https://miro.medium.com/max/14... [medium.com]
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VI rules! Emacs is for dilettantes ...
A big problem I had was knowing Wordstar on DRDOS, before moving to GNU/Linux. The trouble I had with Emacs was hitting Wordstar control key sequences, and getting all sorts of weird effects, because they mean something different in Emacs. There was a Wordstar mode in Emacs, but it was not good enough to avoid these errors. So I changed to Vim, and learned a completely different editing style, which did not collide with my old Wordstar habits. I have pretty much forgotten Wordstar now.
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Back around Win3.0 or 3.1, someone invented a way to use the diamond-based cursor system that Wordstar used, for *every* application in Windows. He made the code free, and published it in PCMag or one of those early magazines. I don't know whether anyone still uses it with those key bindings--I adapted the code to use my own vi-inspired keystrokes, except with the control key, rather than modal: ^H for cursor one character left, ^K for one line up, etc. I still use it today, and it works everywhere excep
Emacs... (Score:5, Funny)
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I'd like to see a Neuralink extension, so I can "type" by just thinking about what I want rather than using a keyboard.
Re: Emacs... (Score:5, Funny)
Modern? (Score:5, Funny)
Oh where to start. Make it available only a docker container for starters. Strip out all the old commands and make new slightly different ones. Make a click through code of conduct so you don't write anything hateful. Implement a new GUI with icons that resemble the Futurama language. The BitBucket icons are a great example of that.
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Aquamacs, it does most of what is discussed and integrates nicely into a Mac environment. Having had to use a stock default Emacs on Linux this past year has reminded me how much I take for granted on the Aquamacs side. To install it, just drag to applications folder. To uninstall, drag to trash. My big wish for it is to be able to re-order tabs, but it's such an advance to even have tabs that I'm ok with that.
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Love it
large numbers of emacs users? (Score:4, Funny)
Oh boy, all 20 of them will have to learn new key bindings. The horror!
Re:large numbers of emacs users? (Score:5, Informative)
A 2016 Stackoverflow survey found that about ~5% of programmers use Emacs as their development environment.
That percentage may have diminished as the old order is displaced by padawans, but is certainly far more than 20.
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Which is more likely:
(a) The programmer uses EMACS
(b) The programmer is about to troll the survey
So, its 5% you say? 4.7% troll and 0.3% for realz?
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(b) The programmer is about to troll the survey
Do you have a Stackoverflow account?
There is no way to post anonymously, and SO's reputation system is more robust than Slashdot's "karma".
Stackoverflow is not a hospitable place for trolls.
I have seen people put their SO id and reputation on their resume. I can't even imagine anyone doing that with their Slashdot account.
Re: large numbers of emacs users? (Score:2)
Always said HR lack technical competence. Hiring based even in part on SO, given its history of wrong code being cut-n-pasted all over the place, kind of proves it.
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Stackoverflow is not a hospitable place for trolls.
Stackoverflow is an online game in which the only goal is accumulating points.
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Of course, I use ed for all my text editing needs, and that's when I'm not using solder [gstatic.com].
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Or more like "how do I exit?" Admittedly, emacs isn't a whole lot better in that regard.
Vim is more ubiquitous. If you want to learn a command line editor, vim is a good choice because it (or at least vi) is found nearly everywhere. On the other hand, if you want to use emacs, you usually have to install it because most of the time it's not installed by default.
Of course, vim has the problem that some programs like git will, by default, dump hapless users into vim, which if you don't know vim, means you'
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Emacs is certainly a bit harder to comprehend at first (in vim once you know i / ESC /
But once you set the keys you want in Emacs, the M-x / apropos / describe-... /
M-x delete-matching-lines / delete-non-matching-lines for instance
The only thing I don't like in Emacs is the regexp, they should implement in-soft a way to easily switch to Perl re.
Simple solution (Score:2)
Next upgrade, save keymap prefs.
Next upgrade, default to cua.
That means all users will have their current defaults, and new users will get the new keymap.
Re: Simple solution (Score:2)
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I think I am among the last in my technical circle to not switch from vim to nano. Seems VI isn't getting much of an infusion of new users, either.
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Coming at it from another angle: what fraction of people are working (sysadmin, coding, editing shell scripts, config files, etc) on shell on servers? If you're doing that, you're probably using vi or emacs (or, in my own weird case, both)? I suppose someone out there probably uses pico to do this for some reason. Not for long is my guess.
If we assume the vi/emacs religious wars are evenly split, then 5% emacs then means 5% more vi, which means the fraction of programmers answering that stack overflow
Re:large numbers of emacs users? (Score:4, Interesting)
Weirdos like me who also write emails in emacs, papers and letters using emacs plus latex, etc can't be all that common.
Perhaps not as uncommon as you think.
I use Emacs for coding and scripting. So all the keybindings are in my muscle-memory. If someone asks me for the key-bindings to split the screen, I can't even answer without putting my hands on the keyboard and watching what my fingers do*. When you know an editor that well, you are not going to switch to some other app for mail or Latex or any other text editing.
*It is ^x2.
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You can't even read; what it says it that of the 20 of us, most would not agree to use new key bindings, and would therefore not learn them.
Re: large numbers of emacs users? (Score:2)
Of course you wouldn't learn new keybondings. Emacs users, old dogs, new tricks, yadda yadda yadda..
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Oh boy, all 20 of them will have to learn new key bindings. The horror!
I will fight you ... ! :-)
[ I've been using Emacs since the mid-late 80s. ]
I just want a text editor... (Score:3)
...that does the job of editing text and no more. I don't need a some kind of half baked OS, a built in programming language hardly anyone ever uses (vim also guilty of this), some kind of user "experience", "smart" code highlighting or a shitty code refactorer that almost always gets it wrong. I want insert, delete, search and replace, load, save and thats it. Anything else can be done much better with other command line tools.
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If you want a minimal text editor, /bin/ed is available.
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"TECO rules"
That's where EMACS began.
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The funny thing is that whatever you're using is probably more like the pejoratives than emacs, which can run on computers so old that only an idiot would think there is a bunch of bloat. It has the same features it had 25 years ago.
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Re: I just want a text editor... (Score:2)
Talk about condemning with false praise â¦
So, 1995 called and wants it's lack of progress back â¦
Also,it's 5x the size of vim, so itis bloated for something from 1995.
Won't be a problem soon, since the old neckbeards are becoming irrelevant and/or dying off.
So just where is the next generation of 1995-aficionados going to come from?
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nano, then.
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The only sane answer. Yeah make the X key backspace, you know because 50 years ago (literally) there was no standard keyboard.
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First thing I do in vim is turn off all the stupid default settings that get in my way and make it a default editor. First thing I do in emacs is copy over my customizations so it's not just a default editor.
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Cheerfully recommend joe - simple keyboard short cuts, the ability to show/hide the help/keyboard shortcuts on the screen, and if you want to go further than a basic text file editor w/o frills it does have syntax highlighting if you enable that. Unfortunately, it isn't likely to be installed by default on most systems (redhat pre-enterprise used to, don't think Debian ever did) but it is in all the relevant repos.
For the "intro to linux admin" course I teach, I insist on students having VERY basic surviva
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Notepad for the win!
Actually, as command line editors go, Microsoft's own EDIT.COM was dead simple to use for new users while still doing everything that you listed. However, if you want to use it, you'll need MS-DOS.
Display choice dialog at first start-up (Score:4, Interesting)
At first start-up, offer choice of :
_Classic Emacs keyboard & mouse bindings
Or
_Windows-inspired keyboard & mouse bindings
With a sentence explaining where to find such setting afterwards.
I do not understand how this isn't evident to everyone.
This way respects experienced users and accomodates users from another UI paradigm.
What am I missing here ?
Re: Display choice dialog at first start-up (Score:2)
Re: Display choice dialog at first start-up (Score:2)
What you're missing is that they were arguing disingenuously, it was just a straw man.
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Have it default to what 99.99999% of users expect. The EMACS diehards will know how to restore the setup they like (or will have to read the docs).
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What am I missing here ?
You're missing that providing users choice is bad UX design.
Sincerely
Millennials.
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Or even better at startup: "Switch to vi: Y/N?"
Just 'Switch to anything else: Y/N?' :)
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"Press Escape and enter :vi to switch to vi, or do anything else to quit"
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Or even better at startup: "Switch to vi: Y/N?"
Or even better at startup: "Switch to vi: Y/Y?" There, fixed that for you.
Or even better at startup: "Switch to vi: Esc:Y
Hmm (Score:2)
First install settings dialogue ... (Score:2)
Make cua a suggested mode in a menu for basic settings on first install (without config present for those settings). Muscle memory problem solved.
Of course that wasn't the problem. The problem is that they want to force new users into their way and can't own up to it.
Use Electron (Score:3, Insightful)
I bet if Emacs was rewritten using Electron, javascript instead of elisp, and normal key bindings instead of the carpal-tunnel-inducing keybindings it would be significantly more popular.
Oh wait, Atom and Visual Studio Code already did this and are hugely popular: https://insights.stackoverflow... [stackoverflow.com]
Emacs had good ideas to make an extensible editor with a built-in programming language, but the world has moved on to use more modern technologies to build such an editor.
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Re: Use Electron (Score:2)
So everyone else is wrong?
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Visual Studio Code is not Visual Studio, although the decision to call them names that are easily confused was reprehensible.
Both are an abomination. Nothing will get me to write editor scripts in Javascript. I use Vi, but given a choice between elisp and Javascript, give me elisp.
Now Vi with python scripts - that sounds nice.
Re: Use Electron (Score:2)
So is emacs. It's 2020, gramps, time to join RMS in irreverence. The world has changed.
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Still, haven't found a better editor. And it's been updated, even in 2020.
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As an actual editor, Visual Studio Code isn't bad. What makes it an abomination is the whole Electron thing and that it's coded primarily in Javascript. So it's slow, buggy, and bloated as all hell. Makes the editors/IDE's that are coded in Java seem slim and fast by comparison, even if they are too an abomination.
I only ever use it because of MicroEmacs (Score:4, Interesting)
Back in the 80s, when personal computers were rather limited, I had an Atari ST. I had been exposed to emacs at work on a unix system, and it was sloooow. But I needed a plain text editor for my atari and I ended up downloading microemacs from some alt.binary newsgroup of Usenet. Binaries on Usenet were uuencoded into ASCII character files that looked to the system like text. You would download them and then uudecode them to get your binary, and that's what I did. And I must say, Micro-Emacs worked pretty well on that Atari. It only had basic functionality, but that was enough to say, write and edit a C program. It resembled emacs to the extent that what it did, it did the emacs way, control A to get to the beginning of a line, control E to get to the end, that kind of thing.
So I got the muscle memory to use basic emacs commands from micro-emacs. Computers got more powerful so that now even home computers can run emacs in a spritely fashion, and so I use emacs for certain things, but only because I retained that muscle memory from micro-emacs. Maybe Stallman and company should take a look at it.
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I tried moving on to other Emacs clones like jove & joe but eventually graphical editors and IDEs meant I had very little reason to be using a complex command line editor at all. These days if I'm editing something in a console I'll probably just fire up vim and vim
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I've gone the other way and pushed vim into every corner of my coding and writing experience. I put some effort into learning the VI way, like how to construct complex commands and move efficiently with the keyboard. This has paid off, in that I don't have to deal with differences across mac, windows and linux, all of which I use every day. I could have gone the emacs route the same way but I didn't.
The block editing features of VIM are really powerful for example, but they really non obvious - you have to
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I have used the mg editor (formerly MicroGnuEmacs) as my principal text editor since its early days circa 1987. I can make the ^H key do what I want, not what dogma insists.
Stripped Linux executable is 172816 bytes long. It starts instantly. I have built it to run on-target in embedded systems. The most exotic/fossilized thing required to build it, is ncurses.
Mg does not work very will on large files; I use one or another ordinary Emacs for plowing through 50MB build logs. In the distant past I hav
Let hem rot (Score:2)
Users who want usability won't use emacs in any case, and the sooner the poor newbies that stumble in understand they're in the wrong place, the better.
Check for .emacs (Score:5, Insightful)
If there are existing emacs preferences in the user's configuration then don't switch behaviors. Don't be such a Dick, Richard.
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If there are existing emacs preferences in the user's configuration then don't switch behaviors.
How do you suggest that the newbie user creates their first .emacs while keeping newbie-friendly bindings?
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Simple (Score:3)
And it is things like that throughout the life of Emacs which lead us to the modern day where it still isn't modern or user-friendly or fit for purpose in a graphical environment.
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If Emacs devs wanted to modernise the editor they wouldn't have let it get into such a terrible state to start with.
I don't know if it's in such a terrible state. It has an active developer community and they've made a lot of improvements over the years.
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So GNU Emacs may have improved over the years but not enough and certainly not sufficiently when so many other programming / developer editors have appeared over the years. I don't think a chang
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Re: Simple (Score:2)
Kids today use ATOM.io and Visual Studio Code node.js electron based editors. They are more flexible and just as powerful and have tons of free add ons with their stores for a t language and debugger imaginable. Emacs is just odd in comparison
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They are more flexible and just as powerful and have tons of free add ons with their stores for a t language and debugger imaginable.
That could actually be a description of Emacs. Except Emacs can also be an OS.
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Let's say you want to learn Rust. In VS Code you open the rust file. VS Code will automatically open the extension store from the marketplace and install RUST autocomplete, syntax highlighter, and even debugger support so you can get the tools you need automatically. Since individuals contribute to it you can choose which add on you want and even see ratings from the community. You can also install emacs keybindings if you want. You can run a shell and Linux and Mac are fully supported just like in emacs.
Yo
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Aquamacs, it does most of what is discussed and integrates nicely into a Mac environment. Having had to use a stock default Emacs on Linux this past year has reminded me how much I take for granted on the Aquamacs side.
In other words, it is modernized. I have not used a better editor that's free or paid, and I've used a lot.
What about concurrency? (Score:5, Insightful)
Emacs in the 90's and today (Score:4, Interesting)
I used emacs in the '90s. I spent many hours tweaking my .emacs file to make it do what I wanted. The only choices in the Unix lab were emacs, vi, and CDE. Nobody liked vi, it was not even perceived as a developer's editor. Almost everybody used CDE and emacs when working on Unix.
You could not get Unix or Linux at home, everyone had windows or DOS. People normally used whatever editor they had in their windows box, and bring their work to school in a floppy disk. Very few people did some actual coding in the Unix boxes, only minor tweaks. CDE was faster and similar to what they had at home, so it was quite popular.
Configuring .emacs was rare. Who wants to learn lisp and spend hours programming emacs? People just wanted to tweak their Makefile or fix a hardcoded path separator in java file. People wanted to get work done, not program their editor, not learn new tools they couldn't use at home.
Fast forward 30 years. You can get emacs in windows and you can install Linux at home. Awesome!
Emacs still requires to be programmed to customize it. Today's lisp market share is even smaller than in the 90s. The user interface has not changed much in those 30 years either.
Consider their main competitor: VS code. It has a user interface that is familiar to most developers. It has advanced editor features out of the box such as IntelliSense, emmet, edit multiple lines at the same time, integration with git, etc.... If you open a file that visual studio does not recognize, it will automatically search for a suitable plugin, download, install, and activate it. You have to do that yourself with emacs. It has a built-in extensions marketplace where you can search for and download extensions. It has a settings area where you can customize your editor, no need to program your editor, no need to learn lisp or functional programming. VS code user interface is quite literally decades ahead of emacs.
Today, if you want a lightweight editor to manage remote servers, vim takes the cake. Emacs is just too slow/bloated for a terminal application. It is usually not even installed. If you want an intuitive graphical text editor for developers, emacs is far behind competitors such as Atom, VS Code, sublime. Emacs is basically being squeezed on both ends.
I think it is healthy for them to have this kind of conversation, but I fear they waited too long to have it. It may be too late: emacs is already the COBOL of text editors.
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yes, you are right, dtpad, the one that came with the CDE desktop environment.
https://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~... [umanitoba.ca]
Make it the fastest editor again. (Score:2)
Disclaimer: Long time no-x cli emacs user here.
It's #2 to Visual Studio Code right now (don't ask me how VS Code achieved that - I don't know). Emacs being a classic heavy-weight CLI editor should lead the pack in performance. It doesn't and that's somewhat meh.
Aside from that scripting should be less of a hassle, perhaps with a modern alternative to Emacs Lisp added in. And there should be a modern, post-steam-age sensible default config of keyboard shortcuts. It's a bit of a drag that I have to systematic
Option on install (Score:2)
Just pop-up a dialog (or a command-line inquiry) at install time asking the user what they want. It sounds like basically two options: Experienced User vs. New User. The dialog/inquiry could just say "see the manual for an explanation of the differences", and of course the pop-up could be disabled for unattended installs.
Or just fork it. Vi has "Vim", Emacs can have Emacsim. Maybe it just needs a new major number like Python 2.x vs. 3.x.
Real programmers ... (Score:2)
Re: Real programmers ...l (Score:2)
"cat > myfile.c" is shorter, so more minimalist, cool, efficient, whatever â¦
It's not like I NEED to see what I typed. :-)
There already is a successor to it. (Score:4, Funny)
If you're looking for a modern, overly engineered text editor that will bring a contemporary computer to its knees, it's Eclipse.
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Any of the current crop of Electron-based editors will do that too.
Perl Regexp ! (Score:3)
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And they provide excellent rehabilitation exercises to those recovering from hand injuries.
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"Emacs key bindings have a logical rationale"
Maximum carpal tunnel syndrome?
"unlike completely arbitrary craziness created by Microsoft."
Microsoft's key shortcuts were designed by committee.. and it wasn't even Microsoft. That cut copy paste stuff was designed by Apple, though.
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That cut copy paste stuff was designed by Apple, though.
Actually, it was designed by Xerox PARC, along with control-Z (undo) and control-P (print), then copied by Apple (except Apple used the "Cmd" key instead of the "Control" key.
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Additionally, CUA didn't come from Microsoft--it was created by IBM in DOS' heyday and used combinations of Ctrl, Shift, Insert, and Delete for Cut, Copy, and Paste.
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That cut copy paste stuff was designed by Apple, though.
Actually, it was designed by Xerox PARC, along with control-Z (undo) and control-P (print), then copied by Apple (except Apple used the "Cmd" key instead of the "Control" key.
And back in the day, everyone called it the 'flower' key.
But my shiny new macbook has both the flower symbol and the word "command" printed on it.
Kids these days.
Re: Worse is better (Score:5, Funny)
At least Sun had the right idea and just put cut/copy/paste buttons on their keyboard.
I'm against adding a bunch of extra specialized keys to standard keyboards. They might crowd out important keys like "SysRq" and "Scroll Lock".
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where are my Meta and Hyper keys?
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At least Sun had the right idea and just put cut/copy/paste buttons on their keyboard.
I'm against adding a bunch of extra specialized keys to standard keyboards. They might crowd out important keys like "SysRq" and "Scroll Lock".
Please mod this funny!
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It has solid 70s rationale.
http://ergoemacs.org/emacs/ema... [ergoemacs.org]
In 2020, not so much.
Re: Worse is better (Score:2)
In 2020, using "cat > filename.ext" makes more sense for short notes and quick scripts.
Re: VIM == "modern emacs" (Score:2)
Surely you're familiar with the idea of "too smart for their own good?" Spending all day driving from one hardware store to another for the perfect special tool when all you need is a screwdriver and a rock? Or just the rock?
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Rock? What's wrong with your fist, you a wimp? Oh, and use your fingernails for flat blade screw drivers.
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Why does an 'editor' have garbage such as eliza in it? Please, PLEASE, remove ELIZA and any/all applications which 'utilize' such idiocy
Next you'll be telling us that the Mayan Calendar Mode is not really helpful in your day to day work!
I think Stallman missed the boat when he did not add a Roman numeral calculator.