Re: Learning "my emacs" from the start (was: Generating a listing of all symbols)

[Emanuel Berg <embe8573@student.uu.se>]

Hans BKK <hansbkk@gmail.com> writes:

> I am learning customization before ordinary usage in
> editing very intentionally

Do both at the same time. You are using Emacs when you
customize Emacs. Also, how do you know what makes sense
to configure, and what doesn't, without using the
program to begin with? Seems to me, you are thinking of
implementing an idea from scratch, and then be done
with it. That's very seldom a good way. It is much
better to incorporate configuration in normal usage -
do one improvement every day, instead. It should be an
evolutionary processes, if you will, not a single
Hercules-deed.

> emacs' value as a portable lifetime meta-OS
> dev/org/comms platform is far more important to me
> than its comparatively trivial role as an editor.

Say what?! The *editor* is the thing you use when you
do all those things you mention.

A computer system is data, organized into files. Which
an editor manipulates (as well as creates, deletes,
etc.) The editor is by far the single most important
tool for general computer work.

Emacs isn't exactly an OS in the non-interactive kernel
sense (though you can schedule things with Emacs).

> The whole point to me of bothering with the learning
> curve [1] of a complex platform like emacs is to
> create my own highly-customized version, and the
> keybindings seems (again, to me) to be a logical
> place to start, ideally before getting sucked into
> the vanilla-emacs shift-Alt-Ctrl-Super-Meta-Cmd (IMO
> sorry-but-insane ancient-legacy) default keybindings
> for routine navigation and editing usage.

Some of the Emacs default keybindings are great, for
example the M-f, C-p, etc. for cursor movements.

Some are not so good. Those that are not so good are
either too long (involve lots of keydowns) *or* they
are what I call "far" - so you have to *reach* for
them, and then reset your hands to start typing again.

A third category (that I don't like) is in "non-typing
modes" (e.g., w3m, browsing man-pages) when the whole
keyboard is available (as there isn't any typing) - to
still use long, bulky combinations. Use one letter
keydowns instead! "a" for append, "p" for previous, and
so on.

One of my favourite customization that I setup for
every and all modes (that I use) - just to give an
example how I think it should be, in general - is M-i
and M-k (for scroll up one line, and down one line,
respectively). If you try those out with correct hand
positions, you should notice what minimal hand (finger)
movement they require.

-- 
underground experts united:
http://user.it.uu.se/~embe8573