RE: Tried to bind Ctrl-c and to kill-ring-save (i.e. copy) and it *sometimes* doesn't work with mouse!?!? Very confusing

[Drew Adams <drew.adams@oracle.com>]

> Also, it is best to drop mouse use entirely, for the same (and
> other) reasons.
>
> If you want to highlight a region, you can use M-h (repeatedly, if
> needed), or you can use C-SPC to set the mark, and then move the
> cursor with, for example, C-n/p.

There you go again.  That's silly  (and irrelevant to the OP question).

It is not "best" to *not* use the mouse to select text, just as it is
not "best" to *use* the mouse to select text.

For some selection use cases, nothing beats the Emacs mouse (which is
not your grandmother's mouse, BTW).  For other use cases, keyboard
selection can be better.

The examples you gave (`M-h' and `C-SPC' + `C-n'...) are not great
arguments for preferring the keyboard to select arbitrary text or even
an arbitrary sexp or a set of contiguous lines.

A better example for your argument might be `C-M-@', but that still
depends on the cursor already being where you want to start the
selection, which is often the case but not always so.  When it is not,
you need to first move it there.

Still, one can reasonably compare (a) repeating `C-M-@' to select
sibling sexps, forward (there is no backward in this case), to (b)
double-clicking the first sexp to select and then clicking `mouse-3' at
the start of a sibling sexp to include (whether the last one in the
series or not and, if not, whether forward or backward - you can extend
the selection by sexps in either direction).

The real point, however, is that it is not necessarily the "best" idea
to advise newbies to adopt your particular preferences as the "best"
way to use Emacs.  It is one thing to say "I prefer XYZ" or "I do it
this way".  It is another thing to preach your way as The One True Way.

All of Emacs might be The One True Way ;-).  But in itself Emacs is
many different ways.  And that's the point of Emacs.

It is extensible and customizable, and its very definition and
features, even out-of-the-box, are themselves the result of extension
and customization by many different people with different preferences,
different ways of working and playing, and different purposes.

Above all editors and programming tools, Emacs offers multiple ways to
skin a cat.  There is no "best" way for everyone and all contexts, and
there is no practical limit to what you can do or how you can interact
with Emacs.

That is the first lesson that Emacs itself teaches.