Re: GNU Emacs raison d'etre

[Karl Fogel <kfogel@red-bean.com>]

On 14 May 2020, Richard Stallman wrote:
>  > * Tell newcomers up front that Emacs really starts to be worth it
>  > * after a few years, not a few weeks.
>
>I don't believe that is true.  It is an exaggeration.

Well, it's not a rhetorical exaggeration, in any case.  That is, it is my actual belief, based on observation.  (It could be wrong, of course, but just to be clear, it wasn't an exaggeration for the sake of effect.)

Different people will naturally learn at different rates, depending on their aptitude and environment.  The best environment is to have an Emacs expert nearby in person, who can occasionally watch the newcomer edit and point out faster ways to do things, point out ways to ask Emacs for help, etc.  But even in that kind of environment, with a talented newcomer, I don't think I've seen it take less than approximately a year to get to the point where they are doing better with Emacs than they would have done with some less extensible, less capable text editor.

>  > * Also tell them about the ways in which Emacs may frustrate them
>  > * along the way, and explain that those frustrations are common
>  > * and are sometimes inevitably entangled with the same things that
>  > * make Emacs winning in the long term.
>
>This sounds like a recipe for discouraging people from starting.

To me it is just realistic, and if I were a newcomer I'd want to be informed of it.

>    > I've watched newcomers run into the same obstacles over and
>    > over, and this particular obstacle is always one of the first
>    > they encounter.
>
>Which obstacle is that?  If we can identify specific things that are
>likely to frustrate users, we can work on improving them.  But I can't
>see in your message what that refers to.

It was earlier in the thread:

> One thing that I recall every newcomer experiencing is, at least
> initially, the feeling that Emacs was constantly biting them --
> constantly surprising them with unexpected and confusing behaviors
> that jump out from accidental keystrokes.  Two of the first things I
> always have to teach newcomers are `C-g' and `C-h l' :-).

This property results from the keybinding space being tightly packed, of course -- which is good for experts but rocky for newcomers.

Teaching newcomers how to use these accidental stumbles to their advantage is important, and I always try to do so.  But I find it helps to let them know that it's going to happen often -- that Emacs will react in unexpected ways and surprise them, and that persisting through that initial fog of unexpected reactions is worth the effort.

A perfect analogy is manual ("stick") transmission cars versus automatic transmission cars.  A stick car is harder for a newcomer to drive, but gives an experienced user more control than she would otherwise have.  An automatic transmission car is easier for a newcomer, but frustrating for the expert because it limits (a bit) what she can do.

Does this mean that no one learns to drive stick?  Of course not.  Some people do so by choice -- they make a conscious investment, made with the understanding that driving will be *harder* for a while before there is any discernable payoff.  But they are willing to make that choice because others told them how it would be worth it.  It's not something the user would find out from reading the manual for the car, though.

Best regards,
-Karl