Re: emacs-w3m question

[Alan Mackenzie <acm@muc.de>]

A happy post-USA-election day to you, Xah!

On Thu, Nov 06, 2008 at 06:31:02AM -0800, Xah wrote:
> 2008-11-06

> On Nov 4, 11:25 pm, Xavier Maillard <x...@gnu.org> wrote:
> > Like Chris told, I do not like to leave the "home keys" when typing.
> > My fingers know where to go with few movements and by trying to
> > decrease the risk to get a RSI. That's what matter the most for me. I
> > do not type with my 10 fingers but only 6 and I feel very comfortable
> > like that.

> you don't touch type?

I think, by his description, he does.  "Touch type" meaning "not having
to look at the keyboard to type".

> it pisses me when programers don't touch type.

... amongst quite a lot of other things which piss you off, too.

> it is bizarre that these tech geekers get hotheaded in geeking forums
> about what keybindings should or should not be.

:-)

> like, i spent years thought about issues, such as modernization of
> emacs's interface, its keyboard shortcuts, its terminology ... then
> when i expressed these opinions thru detailed essays of few thousand
> words each, with examples, photos, reference sources, a throng of tech
> geekers think i'm a troll or my opinions are absolutely stupid ...

... No!  Who on earth would think that?  ;-)

> in the past year, i changed my newsgroup behavior so that i actually
> try to reply to every message, then i came to realize thru
> individualistic discussions, that they never used Windows, never used
> Mac, which together are some 96% of world's computers emacs runs on,
> but they insist that emacs UI should be this or that. They don't touch
> type, but insist emacs keybindings should be this or that, none of
> them actually have basic knowledge in the field of user interface or
> human machine interface ... all you hear them say is basically ???emacs
> should not dumb down??? (whatever that means) or ???emacs is not
> MicrosoftWord??? (What the ... is Microsoft?).

Well, this "tech geeker", me (who is possibly your biggest fan amongst
all "tech geekers" ;-), does indeed touch type.  He has also used various
versions of MS Windows extensively, and has dabbled on a Mac from time to
time.

> ------------

> y'know, it's weired, when u work in a day job, and sometimes you go
> over with colleagues and noticed that they dont touch type, you try
> very hard to pretend that you noticed nothing, and you wanted to laugh
> out loud with gasps, but can't.

Yes, it can make one feel so nauseatingly superior, can't it?

> in fact, thinking about this from my personal experience of on and off
> working in the IT industry as day jobs since 1995, _majority_ of
> professional programers don't touch type. Thinking about it, it's quite
> ridiculous.

Indeed.  But somehow, they get their jobs done.  Can't imagine how,
myself.  Maybe hunt-and-peck typing isn't that bad after all.

> A programer celebrity, Steve Yegge (author of js2 javascript mode),
> recently pulled his windpipe on programers who don't know how to touch
> type. Check it out:

> http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2008/09/programmings-dirtiest-little-secret.html

> that thing is what, 10 thousand words? LOL. He's more verbose than me.

Good grief!  I hadn't thought that possible, but you're right.  ;-)

> Who are you Xavier Maillard? I assume you are a emacs developer, and i
> think you probably used emacs for 5 or 10 or more years?

Well, Xah, one thing to consider is that help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org is
moderated.  It might just possibly be that Xavier is one of the
moderators.  Should that be the case, it could be to your advantage to be
nice to him.  In fact, it could be beneficial for you to keep your posts
moderate enough that intervention by a moderator isn't required.  ;-)

> if you are so inclined, let's meet in Second Life. I'm Xah Toll
> inworld.

And you wonder why people think of you as a troll, with a mnemonic like
that.  ;-)

> Best,

And the best to you too, sir!

>   Xah

-- 
Alan Mackenzie (Nuremberg, Germany).