From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: steinab@ifi.uio.no (Steinar =?iso-8859-1?Q?B=F8rmer?=) Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.help Subject: Re: Making Emacs more newbie friendly Date: Sun, 20 Mar 2005 12:49:27 +0100 Organization: :noitazinagrO Message-ID: <86acoyk054.fsf@pallotta.studby.uio.no> References: <874qf8d3cy.fsf@thalassa.informatimago.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: main.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: sea.gmane.org 1111319799 21699 80.91.229.2 (20 Mar 2005 11:56:39 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@sea.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 20 Mar 2005 11:56:39 +0000 (UTC) Original-X-From: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Sun Mar 20 12:56:39 2005 Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([199.232.76.165]) by ciao.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1DCz29-0005wV-NR for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Sun, 20 Mar 2005 12:55:54 +0100 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1] helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1DCzJ2-0000QF-Im for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Sun, 20 Mar 2005 07:13:20 -0500 Original-Path: shelby.stanford.edu!newsfeed.stanford.edu!newsmi-us.news.garr.it!newsmi-eu.news.garr.it!NewsITBone-GARR!newsserver.news.garr.it!newsserver.cilea.it!univ-lyon1.fr!news.cs.univ-paris8.fr!border1.nntp.ams.giganews.com!border2.nntp.ams.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!uio.no!quimby.gnus.org!not-for-mail Original-Newsgroups: gnu.emacs.help Original-Lines: 38 Original-NNTP-Posting-Host: ti400720a081-13701.bb.online.no Original-X-Trace: quimby.gnus.org 1111319238 21033 85.164.245.133 (20 Mar 2005 11:47:18 GMT) Original-X-Complaints-To: usenet@quimby.gnus.org Original-NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 20 Mar 2005 11:47:18 +0000 (UTC) User-Agent: Gnus/5.110003 (No Gnus v0.3) Emacs/22.0.50 (berkeley-unix) Cancel-Lock: sha1:SKqF7qFufo8E/p8byzuvx1ru0iQ= Original-Xref: shelby.stanford.edu gnu.emacs.help:129465 Original-To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org 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 X-MailScanner-To: geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.help:25021 X-Report-Spam: http://spam.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.help:25021 David Kastrup wrote: | People that don't want to deal with complexity will remain only | marginally longer with Emacs before abandoning it if Emacs gets dumbed | down. I think you're right. The willingness to learn a complicated tool, and the knowledge of the benefits to be had, are what determines the outcome in the end, not how similar the key bindings are to $PREVIOUS_EDITOR. | If we can improve the first month of a newby without souring the last | decade of a seasoned user, we will by all means do so. XEmacs has a newbie-friendly startup help system, where it cycles through a couple of concise, helpful tips pages upon startup. GNU Emacs has this too, but it's shorter and covers fewer of the commands that are likely to be sought by new users. Especially helpful to completely clueless users is the page where XEmacs says: _Useful stuff_ : Things that you should learn rather quickly... C-x C-f: visit a file C-x C-s: save changes C-u: undo changes C-x C-c: exit XEmacs Above this is a line saying: `C-' means the control key, `M-' means the meta key I suggest adding something similiar to GNU Emacs. -- SB