Re: Editors for TEI

Re: Editors for TEI

[Andreas Roehler]

Wendell Piez wrote:
> Peter,
> 
> At 05:37 PM 1/26/2010, you wrote:
>> Lou and Patrick are both right, of course, in different circumstances.
>> I used to try and tell users that editing text using Emacs isn't
>> difficult, just different (I was wrong: for a beginner, it's difficult
>> :-)
> 
> I think learning Emacs is like learning to pronounce French.
> 
> If you are lucky, you get a chance to do it when a crucial developmental
> window is open. This is probably in your (relative) youth, and probably
> fairly early in your experience with computers, before brain pathways
> have been consolidated. Then it becomes second nature and you don't see
> why anyone can't do it.
> 
> If you're like most of us, you miss the window and you never learn. And
> trying to fake it is frustrating and embarrassing.
> 
> On the other hand, you might know another language, which serves you
> quite nicely despite its purported deficiencies.
> 
> Cheers,
> Wendell
> 
> 
> 
> ======================================================================
> Wendell Piez                            mailto:wapiez@mulberrytech.com
> Mulberry Technologies, Inc.                http://www.mulberrytech.com
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> 

Hi,

sorry for being a little bit serious about it...

See three different causes for Emacs being difficult for beginners - while finally living without seems just no longer acceptable :-)

1) wrong didactic focus of built-in Emacs-tutorials on keys instead of commands or rules
2) the freedom to change and/or extend is a dangerous promess for beginners, and still in later times ;-)
3) Environments for different languages are to build up by hand often

The good news IMHO: All that may be avoided by a better guide for beginners, resp. a delivered customization.


Andreas

--
https://code.launchpad.net/s-x-emacs-werkstatt/

Re: Editors for TEI

[Sean Sieger]

    See three different causes for Emacs being difficult for beginners -
    while finally living without seems just no longer acceptable :-)

    1) wrong didactic focus of built-in Emacs-tutorials on keys instead
    of commands or rules

`C-h t' is a long-cherished command that---if I understand you
correctly---was the _key_ to my affinity for GNU/Emacs:  editing
movement unlike any other that I know of on this planet.  And it is
always and already the tip of my list of things to improve on as
it---editing movement---is what makes my work easier, um, speedier.

    2) the freedom to change and/or extend is a dangerous promess for
    beginners, and still in later times ;-)

Conservation.  To my way of thinking, an important lesson in learning
about learning is that learning is a negative experience.  The larger
the `chunk' to be negated the less pleasant the learning experience.

    3) Environments for different languages are to build up by hand
    often

Like all environments of production.

    The good news IMHO: All that may be avoided by a better guide for
    beginners, resp. a delivered customization.

If I understand `delivered customization' correctly, the suggestion
flies in the face of GNU/Emacs extensibility.  The defaults alone
abstract one away from a perfectly usable, albeit quirky, editor.