From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Kevin Montuori Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.help Subject: Re: Is Emacs very alive, active and improving? Date: Wed, 28 Aug 2013 22:04:07 -0400 Message-ID: <1377741847.25920.15376337.04B568DB@webmail.messagingengine.com> References: <87r4ddo4yp.fsf@nl106-137-194.student.uu.se> NNTP-Posting-Host: plane.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1377741870 15086 80.91.229.3 (29 Aug 2013 02:04:30 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 29 Aug 2013 02:04:30 +0000 (UTC) To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org Original-X-From: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Thu Aug 29 04:04:33 2013 Return-path: Envelope-to: geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([208.118.235.17]) by plane.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1VErb3-0005S6-Fy for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Thu, 29 Aug 2013 04:04:29 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:39385 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1VErb3-0001dt-20 for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Wed, 28 Aug 2013 22:04:29 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:4830:134:3::10]:58522) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1VErap-0001c6-JV for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Wed, 28 Aug 2013 22:04:20 -0400 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1VEral-00012e-2e for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Wed, 28 Aug 2013 22:04:15 -0400 Original-Received: from out4-smtp.messagingengine.com ([66.111.4.28]:56060) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1VErak-000113-Rn for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Wed, 28 Aug 2013 22:04:11 -0400 Original-Received: from compute1.internal (compute1.nyi.mail.srv.osa [10.202.2.41]) by gateway1.nyi.mail.srv.osa (Postfix) with ESMTP id 3D6B020C73 for ; Wed, 28 Aug 2013 22:04:07 -0400 (EDT) Original-Received: from web4 ([10.202.2.214]) by compute1.internal (MEProxy); Wed, 28 Aug 2013 22:04:07 -0400 DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha1; c=relaxed/relaxed; d= messagingengine.com; h=message-id:from:to:mime-version :content-transfer-encoding:content-type:in-reply-to:references :subject:date; s=smtpout; bh=zWdx+qMdQtdz0qDSuXAFDnjBMNo=; b=AcH PsRz4cnzewxKQqWADPieClaVvpEuZP1ppMGU+cC1FOW4vYIltnuxZ+BRiwaqCpOG pUH1Srz8mTqsYZpMMNRQQUgl6xXZkytW8iWIkYqmAzx+gU/uJ8+NHC88pwqoodxk otnPNSFvjVOmvcKq4tnjvr3hT5/RE67n2SFd/kRU= Original-Received: by web4.nyi.mail.srv.osa (Postfix, from userid 99) id 1999710178D; Wed, 28 Aug 2013 22:04:07 -0400 (EDT) X-Sasl-Enc: ASf2gFjvFBUa5kSSE9LXTxwiV4+mfHXWFnUwUFl+3q6l 1377741847 X-Mailer: MessagingEngine.com Webmail Interface - ajax-be0d4992 In-Reply-To: <87r4ddo4yp.fsf@nl106-137-194.student.uu.se> X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: Genre and OS details not recognized. X-Received-From: 66.111.4.28 X-BeenThere: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14 Precedence: list List-Id: Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.help:93151 Archived-At: On Wed, Aug 28, 2013, at 17:55, Emanuel Berg wrote: > wgreenhouse@riseup.net (W. Greenhouse) writes: > > > I don't think Google Trends is an accurate measure of how many > > people are using Emacs, because Emacs is largely > > self-documenting, not just through the Info manuals but also > > from the dynamically generated documentation from Elisp programs > > themselves. > > I've heard that Emacs is self-documenting numerous times, and, if > this refers to the docstrings of Elisp functions, I have to say > "self-documenting" is stretching the truth. I always took self documenting to mean that what documentation there is (and there's a lot of it!) is installed with the application. There seems to be a trend of documentation wikis or online-only docs (the otherwise very useful Ansible project is a recent example) where you can't trivially download it all or print it easily (or search it with your own tools). Hell ... a beginner can learn to program ("An Introduction to Programming in Emacs Lisp") from the included info docs. None of that diminishes how useful having comments associated with funs and vars is -- I find the unit level documentation excellent and handy when I'm hacking up advice or a fun (or a new mode). That said: the blogs, wikis, and documentation that's available elsewhere are great supplementary material. I'd still be mired in org-mode docs without some nifty examples on the web. (Bill Clemenson's notes about slime also come to mind -- I'm really in debt to the folks who take the time to expound.) k. -- Kevin Montuori montuori@gmail.com