Toward a "modern" Emacs [LWN.net]

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Sep 26, 2020 9:35 UTC (Sat) by Sesse (subscriber, #53779)
In reply to: Toward a "modern" Emacs by marcH
Parent article: Toward a "modern" Emacs

>With delusional friends like these, Emacs needs no enemy:
>> "It is unfortunate that the people who implemented the newer editors chose incompatibility with Emacs."

Well, yes. Emacs has a problem: It can cater to new users, or it can cater to RMS' personal preferences. Whether explicitly or implicitly, the project is choosing the latter at almost every turn, and thus can not hope to attract many of the former.

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Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Sep 26, 2020 12:38 UTC (Sat) by pizza (subscriber, #46) [Link] (8 responses)

> Well, yes. Emacs has a problem: It can cater to new users, or it can cater to RMS' personal preferences.

s/RMS/existing users/

and also, s/RMS/existing developers/

Granted, that doesn't invalidate your point. However, RMS's point is also valid; it's not wise to alienate the current user (and more importantly, developer) base, in favor of mythical hordes of new users (and developers) that experience shows us aren't likely to ever materialize.

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Sep 26, 2020 12:46 UTC (Sat) by Sesse (subscriber, #53779) [Link] (7 responses)

No, I really think this is about a much narrower set than “existing users”. Of course, it's not RMS and RMS alone, but I do believe too much weight is put on his opinions compared to the larger group of emacs users who don't care about compatibility with their dotfiles from 1980.

Interestingly enough, since keybindings were discussed; vim has an even higher barrier to entry (I mean, if you think C-k for cut and C-y for paste is bad, how about vim's modes?), yet somehow manages to stay somewhat relevant while emacs is dwindling. (E.g. it ties IntelliJ for #4 in StackOverflow's survey over development tools, with five the popularity of emacs.)

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Sep 26, 2020 17:09 UTC (Sat) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link] (1 responses)

> (I mean, if you think C-k for cut and C-y for paste is bad, how about vim's modes?),

I suspect there's a sizable "niche" of users who like a modal editor. Because it's a bit of a niche there's less room for competition so vim is able to fill it completely (and to your point: probably because they listen to all their users too). I don't think there is any another modal _and_ popular editor. Because this niche is not so small, it ends up #4 on stackoverflow.

My 2 cents.

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Sep 26, 2020 20:30 UTC (Sat) by cpitrat (subscriber, #116459) [Link]

Exactly that. I've been a vim user for the past 20 years but I remember when I switched to Linux and chose between emacs and vim. Emacs seemed just a very complex clone of other editors with different bindings. Vim had a different approach and I could immediately get why it could be considered more attractive.

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Sep 26, 2020 20:26 UTC (Sat) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link] (4 responses)

Vim works fine because you need just a handful of commands to get by for regular tasks. And Vim is also present pretty much everywhere, so you kinda eventually have to learn it just to be able to work through SSH.

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Sep 29, 2020 6:42 UTC (Tue) by dgm (subscriber, #49227) [Link]

Where's the damn +1 button?

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Oct 1, 2020 19:41 UTC (Thu) by ecree (guest, #95790) [Link] (2 responses)

> And Vim is also present pretty much everywhere, so you kinda eventually have to learn it just to be able to work through SSH.

Well, you don't *have* to. You could do what I did and learn ed instead, which means you don't have to look at ugly Vim, and as an additional bonus you get to be insufferably smug. (Well, until someone shows up with butterflies.)

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Oct 1, 2020 20:47 UTC (Thu) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link] (1 responses)

https://www.gnu.org/fun/jokes/ed-msg.en.html

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Oct 1, 2020 20:58 UTC (Thu) by ecree (guest, #95790) [Link]

Yes, that's a classic. The only problem is that gnu seem to have misclassified it under 'jokes' :P

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Sep 26, 2020 19:32 UTC (Sat) by mvar (guest, #82051) [Link] (12 responses)

>Well, yes. Emacs has a problem: It can cater to new users, or it can cater to RMS' personal preferences. Whether explicitly or >implicitly, the project is choosing the latter at almost every turn, and thus can not hope to attract many of the former.

i see that response by rms as more tongue in cheek, meaning that everyone claims that emacs has those weird combinations for copy/cut/paste when actually it predates these by many, many years..So why should emacs adapt and change how it works based on some trend that appeared later? rms is stubborn at times, i just don't think this comment of his is indication of arrogance, it's just stating the facts. On the other hand his stance about the "NO WARRANTY" message in the splash screen (last link in the article), ugh... *sigh*

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Sep 26, 2020 20:49 UTC (Sat) by Sesse (subscriber, #53779) [Link] (11 responses)

> So why should emacs adapt and change how it works based on some trend that appeared later?

In case it's not obvious: Because the Ctrl-X/C/V bindings are clearly _better_. They can be done with the left hand without moving it while the right hand is using the mouse, which is cumbersome for Ctrl-K/Y.

Of course, due to inertia, not everything is worth changing. And Emacs' problem is not first and foremost about those specific bindings. But it is a symptom.

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Sep 27, 2020 2:15 UTC (Sun) by mathstuf (subscriber, #69389) [Link] (4 responses)

Yeah, on a QWERTY keyboard (which is the vast majority, I'll grant that). How is it on other layouts used around the world? As a Vim user, I prefer some mnemonics with things which `y` and `p` go with pretty well. What's the original rationale behind ^K and ^Y (IIRC, it is `kill-line`, but that doesn't sound like a copy at all other than that I know Vim does store the last removed text at the "top" of the paste stack).

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Sep 27, 2020 8:16 UTC (Sun) by Sesse (subscriber, #53779) [Link] (3 responses)

The most common variants I am aware of are QWERTZ (German), where Y and Z have switched places, and AZERTY (French), where A/Q and W/Z are switched. Both touch on Ctrl-Z (undo), but X/C/V are unchanged. I don't honestly know if any of them typically also switch the hotkey for undo around.

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Sep 28, 2020 11:40 UTC (Mon) by pbonzini (subscriber, #60935) [Link] (2 responses)

Well there's Dvorak keyboards.

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Sep 29, 2020 7:32 UTC (Tue) by k8to (guest, #15413) [Link] (1 responses)

As a Dvorak user, I am perfectly happy with cut/copy/paste not being optimized for my keyboard layout.

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Oct 1, 2020 3:21 UTC (Thu) by jasone (subscriber, #2423) [Link]

Same here, but Dvorak layout *would* be an ergonomic problem if my typical workflow involved much reaching for the mouse.

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Sep 27, 2020 6:10 UTC (Sun) by rodgerd (guest, #58896) [Link] (1 responses)

> And Emacs' problem is not first and foremost about those specific bindings.

Indeed, and it's one that seems to expose a fundamental division in both the FSF and the GNU project generally: the people who would like very much to enable the broader world to have the ability to use free software to do the things that matter to them, and the people who are interested in the Cult of Richard.

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Sep 27, 2020 6:40 UTC (Sun) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]

Wait, there are people _not_ part of some cult or another? Neither TV nor Fakebook ever talks about them. This sort of people without loud and simple opinions is too boring to exist anymore.

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Sep 29, 2020 14:57 UTC (Tue) by cry_regarder (subscriber, #50545) [Link] (2 responses)

From my memory, didn't the ctrl-x ctrl-v actions enter muscle memory through the wordstar editors which started in 1979? Whereas EMACS initial release was in 1976 (with heritage from TECO)? Not so far apart.

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Sep 29, 2020 15:59 UTC (Tue) by jem (subscriber, #24231) [Link] (1 responses)

No, Ctrl-x was down in WordStar. Cursor movement keys were in a diamond pattern: Ctrl-e/s/d/x for up, down, right and down, respectively.

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Sep 29, 2020 17:53 UTC (Tue) by cry_regarder (subscriber, #50545) [Link]

Ah thanks! "IIRC" is so often flawed ;-)

Toward a "modern" Emacs

Posted Oct 13, 2020 17:18 UTC (Tue) by debacle (subscriber, #7114) [Link]

> In case it's not obvious: Because the Ctrl-X/C/V bindings are clearly _better_. They can be done with the left hand without moving it while the right hand is using the mouse, which is cumbersome for Ctrl-K/Y.

Or the other way around: It is cumbersome to use the mouse with Emacs key bindings. I assume, that many Emacs users do not use the mouse much. I don't even have one, only a touchpad, centered in front of the space bar.