Re: Convert README.org to plain text README while installing package

[chad <yandros@gmail.com>]

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On Tue, Jun 7, 2022 at 7:04 PM Tim Cross <theophilusx@gmail.com> wrote:

> So going back to my original post, which was simply saying that
> implying you would get 784 additional key bindings just because you open
> an org file was misleading because you simply don't get that many
> additional key bindings when you open an org file - in fact, you get
> only about 1/3 of that many.
>

I'll add to this statement: the vast majority of those keybindings aren't
relevant when viewing a read-only org file, which is what we're talking
about here. In fact, I used Org (very lightly) for a few years with exactly
these two extra keybindings: Control-Return and Meta-Return. I also used
Tab to expand/compact headings, so perhaps three, depending on your usage
(I was coming from outline-mode, so this wasn't new.) This is a read/write
usage, not a read-only usage.

Everything else is basically the same. There are a few places where Org
changes the meaning of keys to accommodate Org features, but most of these
are DWIM-ish adaptations, or they're guarded by an Org warning that Org
uses the keys for something else (for example, shift-selection). A few
years in, I discovered that Org would automatically reflow the plain-text
tables I sometimes used, and I learned another use for the Tab key; as near
as I can tell, this feature had been present for months if not years
without ever bothering me.

These days, most of my work involves creative writing and light number
crunching, not coding; as part of that, I use dozens of text files over
several active topics. I keep these in a simple hierarchy of plain Org
files. These load in emacs instantaneously. I search through them using
standard text-searching tools (mostly find and grep, sometimes trying out
things like fd, ack, ripgrep, and deadgrep). I once started reading the Org
manual (several years ago) and bounced off pretty quickly; I haven't been
back in years (although I hear that the manual has improved quite a lot
since then, and it's on my overly-long todo list for "someday".)

I say all this not to try to convince anyone to try Org; in fact, if you're
not already using outline-mode a bunch, then you're probably only
interested in Org if there's a specific use that you'd like for emacs
(agenda, note-keeping, literate programming, etc). That said, there are
people, especially elisp package authors, who use it and like it and will
continue to use it to write package documentation. In the (few) packages
that I personally load, most have a README.org, a few have a README.md, and
none have a plain README.

Put another way, this isn't about encouraging authors to use Org or not;
the authors have chosen already. For people who don't really want to try to
"learn Org": I hear and understand. I've been there myself; time is usually
rarer than interesting ideas to explore. I'm writing this in the hope that
it encourages people to not be afraid of looking at .org files even if you
don't have the time, interest, or inclination to "learn Org", because while
the ocean is indeed (seemingly?) quite deep, the shallow end is quite
comfortable. In the meantime, we can all hope that the arrival of the
"modular Org" is sooner rather than later.

Hope that helps,
~Chad

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