From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Emanuel Berg Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.help Subject: Re: RTF for emacs Date: Thu, 29 May 2014 02:55:09 +0200 Organization: Aioe.org NNTP Server Message-ID: <87bnuho13m.fsf@debian.uxu> References: <87ha4d64r2.fsf@robertthorpeconsulting.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: plane.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1401325227 19395 80.91.229.3 (29 May 2014 01:00:27 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 29 May 2014 01:00:27 +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 May 29 03:00:22 2014 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 1Wpohe-0006gs-EH for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Thu, 29 May 2014 03:00:18 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:45530 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1Wpohe-00067n-3d for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Wed, 28 May 2014 21:00:18 -0400 Original-Path: usenet.stanford.edu!news.tele.dk!news.tele.dk!small.news.tele.dk!newsfeed.xs4all.nl!newsfeed2.news.xs4all.nl!xs4all!news.stack.nl!aioe.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail Original-Newsgroups: gnu.emacs.help Original-Lines: 104 Original-NNTP-Posting-Host: SIvZRMPqRkkTHAHL6NkRuw.user.speranza.aioe.org Original-X-Complaints-To: abuse@aioe.org User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/24.3 (gnu/linux) X-Notice: Filtered by postfilter v. 0.8.2 Cancel-Lock: sha1:8lPiNBKH2vYqb1ijij40nrmiQs4= Mail-Copies-To: never Original-Xref: usenet.stanford.edu gnu.emacs.help:205651 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:97921 Archived-At: James Freer writes: > I just wanted to know if emacs was going to produce a > word processor plugin or whatever. Come to think of it, perhaps that's not a bad idea and some people should have done something to that extent, I'm sure (because there are zillion Emacs projects) - perhaps checkout the Emacs Wiki for "RTF" or "word processor"? Perhaps those projects lost steam with the Org-mode success. Before this thread, I thought Org-mode was sort of the Emacs equivalent of a word processor but turns out it is some sort of markup system which sounds like another markup language to learn - might as well use HTML or LaTeX directly in that case, it would seem... The reason I don't like word processors in general are they typically rely on the mouse, or/and the cursor keys, and/or the "Page Up"/"Page Down" keys, to do cursor movement and scrolling, which I find moronic compared to the Emacs way. Also, they use the CUA keys (Ctrl-C to copy etc.) which I consider inferior to the kill ring (killing and yanking), but not by far by as wide a margin. Also, word processors are not programmable like Emacs and the result produced is proprietary or at best less portable. People tend to fiddle with fonts and margins and God knows what for hours just to have another computer or printer view/print it with other fonts and specifications anyway... > I'm not an IT grad and I don't find emacs easy to > learn. Being an IT grad typically doesn't apply to that as much as those educations are theoretical for the most part, however the same people that are on those educations often have an interest for tools and the practical side to it (or "obsession" perhaps is more to it), so you are both right and wrong. But if you are a practical man with an interest in how you do things, and for computers, Emacs shouldn't be difficult to learn, or acquire a working understanding of, at least. How it works under the hood, the C and Lisp, programmers in general don't understand, only those who have taken special time and interest (lots of both). > I use it for editing prose text as features I love > namely; mid cursor positioning (very useful when > typing pages and pages... irritating in other editors > to constantly type at the bottom of the screen) Interesting. I never thought (or used) that, what is it? I can't say I have a problem typing anywhere but I use a projector so when I have my head straight my eyes are actually at the bottom 4th or 5th of the "screen". > wordstar keybindings (still the most efficient and > still popular with writers) I never heard of WordStar - it doesn't seem to be related to Oracle's StarOffice either because it originated from a program called StarWriter. The Emacs' keybindings for point movement, the C-f, C-b, M-f, M-b, etc. and the whole char/word/line/etc. division is obviously fantastic, one of the things with Emacs that I always mention as it makes typing a whole other experience. > visual line mode (softwrap or whatever you want to > call the equivalent) which few editors do > effectively... I used visual-line-mode in my early Emacs days but then I got more into the "it should look exactly as it is" so I switched to auto-fill-mode. > my other favourite editor is gedit gedit? Isn't that the basic editor you get with GNOME that's hardly more than notepad? > My gripe with emacs is that it takes a lot of > learning. Natural app for the IT graduate. I'd love > to have a LUG group where I could sit down for an > hour with someone and go through a few things to > reduce the learning curve. I think you overestimate the IT graduates. Most IT graduates have horrible taste just like anyone else and they are not passionate about their editors. They just use what's in front of them - Eclipse, for example... Anyway, lacking a LUG you can use this list. It is what it is for. A lot of the loud discussion may concern coding and other advanced topics but it is just what people enjoy to discuss. Very basic questions are just as fine and people enjoy answering them as well. Good luck! -- underground experts united: http://user.it.uu.se/~embe8573