From: Mario Lang <mlang@blind.guru>
To: emacs-devel@gnu.org
Subject: Re: Emacs is very special regarding UIs
Date: Tue, 15 Sep 2020 10:24:23 +0200 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <87imcfxxag.fsf@blind.guru> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <7wtuw5d5ho.fsf@junk.nocrew.org> (Lars Brinkhoff's message of "Thu, 10 Sep 2020 15:19:15 +0000")
Lars Brinkhoff <lars@nocrew.org> writes:
> Mario Lang wrote:
>> Emacs works with graphical toolkits on all major platforms, but also
>> offers a almost-feature-complete text interface.
>
> Emacs is a manifestation of the ITS user interfaces. They all relied on
> text because that's all that was available back then. They also used
> control characters, Altmode/Escape/Meta, and prefix arguments.
That is the history, yes. However, what I was trying to highlight is
that it actually payed off to insist on keeping compatibility with the
text mode interface even after graphical toolkits were established
already. I guess I am talking about the 90s here.
>> I am seeing Emacs as a platform to write "apps" in Emacs Lisp.
>
> In this sense, Emacs is a Lisp machine. Not surprisingly, those came
> from the same place as ITS: the MIT AI Lab.
Yes. A Lisp Machine with several compatible user interface modalities.
Which is just amazingly helpful to people like me.
I guess this is a case of "accidental accessibility" since many
developers seem to not be aware that they have created a perfect platform
for people who are typically forgotten about these days.
Thanks for that. Emacs is a shining beacon in a dark age of canvases
and decorative user interface design.
BTW, things like EWW make a big difference for me.
It is such a time saver being able to invoke the occasional
link in a mail or rss article and not having to switch to an external
browser. I am hoping the xwidget webview will not hurt development of
EWW too much. Because the webview actually breaks the compatibility
mentioned in this thread. It is only available for toolkit users.
--
CYa,
⡍⠁⠗⠊⠕
prev parent reply other threads:[~2020-09-15 8:24 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 11+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2020-09-08 15:35 Emacs is very special regarding UIs Mario Lang
2020-09-08 16:43 ` T.V Raman
2020-09-10 15:19 ` Lars Brinkhoff
2020-09-10 18:24 ` T.V Raman
2020-09-10 18:50 ` Lars Brinkhoff
2020-09-11 4:18 ` Richard Stallman
2020-09-10 19:36 ` andres.ramirez
2020-09-10 19:49 ` T.V Raman
2020-09-10 19:54 ` Lars Brinkhoff
2020-09-10 21:01 ` andrés ramírez
2020-09-15 8:24 ` Mario Lang [this message]
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