From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: tyler Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.help Subject: Re: How to get rid of *GNU Emacs* buffer on start-up? Date: Thu, 18 Sep 2008 21:39:42 -0300 Message-ID: <87iqst2ckx.fsf@blackbart.sedgenet> References: <873ajzwoqu.fsf@kobe.laptop> <9bceaf08-4a29-4593-be31-13e3b459763d@i20g2000prf.googlegroups.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: lo.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1221784805 4764 80.91.229.12 (19 Sep 2008 00:40:05 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 19 Sep 2008 00:40:05 +0000 (UTC) To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org Original-X-From: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Fri Sep 19 02:41:02 2008 Return-path: Envelope-to: geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([199.232.76.165]) by lo.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.50) id 1KgU3Q-0003b7-CK for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Fri, 19 Sep 2008 02:41:00 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1]:59355 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1KgU2P-0005Xm-0k for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Thu, 18 Sep 2008 20:39:57 -0400 Original-Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1KgU27-0005Xc-8F for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Thu, 18 Sep 2008 20:39:39 -0400 Original-Received: from exim by lists.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1KgU25-0005Wx-G0 for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Thu, 18 Sep 2008 20:39:37 -0400 Original-Received: from [199.232.76.173] (port=37516 helo=monty-python.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1KgU25-0005Wr-CE for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Thu, 18 Sep 2008 20:39:37 -0400 Original-Received: from main.gmane.org ([80.91.229.2]:41747 helo=ciao.gmane.org) by monty-python.gnu.org with esmtps (TLS-1.0:RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA1:32) (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1KgU25-0000gw-IH for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Thu, 18 Sep 2008 20:39:37 -0400 Original-Received: from list by ciao.gmane.org with local (Exim 4.43) id 1KgU22-0002l2-5Q for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Fri, 19 Sep 2008 00:39:34 +0000 Original-Received: from hlfxns0149w-142177122100.ns.aliant.net ([142.177.122.100]) by main.gmane.org with esmtp (Gmexim 0.1 (Debian)) id 1AlnuQ-0007hv-00 for ; Fri, 19 Sep 2008 00:39:34 +0000 Original-Received: from tyler.smith by hlfxns0149w-142177122100.ns.aliant.net with local (Gmexim 0.1 (Debian)) id 1AlnuQ-0007hv-00 for ; Fri, 19 Sep 2008 00:39:34 +0000 X-Injected-Via-Gmane: http://gmane.org/ Original-Lines: 44 Original-X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org X-Gmane-NNTP-Posting-Host: hlfxns0149w-142177122100.ns.aliant.net User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/23.0.60 (gnu/linux) Cancel-Lock: sha1:sxdCcgwE10R6sbGVTVeRSogHaTA= X-detected-operating-system: by monty-python.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 2.6, seldom 2.4 (older, 4) X-BeenThere: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Original-Sender: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Errors-To: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.help:57778 Archived-At: Xah Lee writes: > «I think the existance of the lisp scratch buffer is one of the major > usability problem of emacs that prevents emacs from being widely > adopted by most text editing audience.» Ironically, I just used the scratch buffer as the repository for the text of your previous message. rot13-region doesn't work in the read-only gnus buffers, so I needed to transfer it to a different buffer. I didn't need the scratch buffer to do this, as I could have used a temporary file (see below). But I think the scratch buffer does serve a valid purpose that warrants it's inclusion by default. In my opinion the one design feature that underlies Emacs success is the complete rejection of the distinction between user and developer. The scratch buffer is an extension of this mindset. Emacs assumes that everyone who uses it has a vested interest in understanding, exploring, and tweaking the code, so it is natural to provide the scratch buffer to enable and encourage this. > Emacs does not provide a user level function to create a new buffer. > It has just New, which actually creates a empty file. Most apps's New > command does not work like that. They actually just create a new > buffer, and only when user save it it becomes a file. You are mistaken. I don't know what 'New' is in Emacs, but find-file, when asked to find a file which does not already exist, creates a new buffer that is not associated with a file _unless_ it is saved. I regularly use this feature to create temporary files, which I may decide to save or not as I require. One of the advantages of this approach is that you can choose the mode for the temporary file by giving it an appropriate extension. If I need a buffer to work out some throw-away R code, I can open asdf.R, run the code, and delete the buffer. Cheers, Tyler -- Making back-ups of your legally-purchased DVDs will be illegal under Bill C-61. http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/3072/317/