From: Tilman Ahr <tilman.ahr@mailbox.tu-berlin.de>
To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
Subject: Re: .emacs poser
Date: Tue, 17 Dec 2013 07:27:29 +0100 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <8761qo56we.fsf@ID-264037.user.dfncis.de> (raw)
In-Reply-To: 87fvpsp3oy.fsf@nl106-137-194.student.uu.se
Emanuel Berg <embe8573@student.uu.se> writes:
> Dale Snell <ddsnell@frontier.com> writes:
[...]
>> I can't speak for European keyboards.
>
> The US layout is better for programming
[...]
Arguably, but for most layouts and programming languages, that probably
hosds true.
> Semi-colon, and all the brackets, are better placed on the US layout
> keyboard,
I'm not convinced of that, at least for the DE-DE keyboard layout.
> and for whatever language-specific chars you need, there is the
> compose key.
Although I'd *hate* to have to use that to get Ä,Ö,Ü and ß. I use those
*a lot* when writing in German, and the DE-DE layout makes them
accessible by a single Keystroke.
I do have the „dead keys“ option enabled (to make typing the usual
accents for french, at least, feasible without much ado) and remap
CAPSLOCK[1] to the compose key, nonetheless.
> Which by the way is another solution that I think is
> much better than setting this up in Emacs.
Yes. Definitely. But there are (coff, coff) Operating Systems that make
using a compose key hard, if not impossible…
>> and the ever popular copyright (©), trademark (™),
>> and registered trademark signs (®).
>
> Serious?
Depending on the area one works in, and considering how the US civil
justice system works(fsvo), I could see that. Personally, I know how to
create © and ® on my keyboard, how I'd get the [TM] symbol, I have no
Idea. I believe I recall it's trivial with a compose key, and should be
doable without, but I don't need that symbol other than for ironic
remarks on usenet, and there, [TM] does the trick quite satisfactorily.
>> If I need anything more demanding, like en and em
>> dashes,
Those, I use frequently. And real quote marks as demanded by German
typographic conventions. I don't even need the compose key for
them. Other than the en-dash…
>> or primes instead of quotes, I'll fire up a text processor
>
> A word processor? Like OpenOffice or Word?
I'd guess he actually meant a text processor, like TeX/LaTeX
>> and go that way. Of course, in a purely text forum,
>> like this, someone would undoubtedly complain if I
>> were to attach the entire message as a PDF.
>
> Yes. PDF is for things to be *printed*, like manuals,
> or scientific work with need for special notation.
Actually, PDF allows for very neat features used for
on-screen-presentation and even has some rather sophisticated features
for dealing with textual matter. Those are just aspects of that format
that never took off.
So, in everyday use: Yes, it's mainly used as a format for well-defined
visual representation of … data. And in this day and age of the
paperless office, these are usually printed out.
I had a job interview last week where the interviewer had my e-mail with
all the relevant stuff for my application (CV, Certificates, References
and all that) as a PDF on his PCs screen right in front of him, but
still printed it out. On good paper, using a colour ink-jet printer that
went to photo mode, because there was a photo on the CV (most german
employers really appreciate a CV with a decent photo. No idea why). That
whole printout went straight to the bin fifteen minutes later, btw.
>> There are certain organizations that want their
>> documents written in a certain format, which may
>> include Pilcrow and Section marks, and other such
>> things. Happily, I don't deal with those. (Again,
>> I'd use LaTeX or Groff for that.)
>
> Groff! Wow, you are a man (pun) of many surprises. Is
> that used outside of the Unix manpages world?
It used to be. And I remember coming across a couple of projects where
it was used to nicely format simple textual data in an automated way
even a few years ago…
> LaTeX is great obviously. I would drop the word
> processor and use Emacs (or Vim) + LaTeX.
Wellyes. No. For a one-off, one to ten pages, needs to look somewhat
presentable thingie, I'll take LO, thank you. If it actually needs to
look *good*, or be reusable for different documents with a similar
layout (visually orientated), I'll use Scribus, or whatever other
DTP-Software I can get my hands on. (Restaurant menues would be one
example that comes to mind)
If it's about presenting a large(ish) amount of text in a well-typeset,
neat way (Books and the like), or about automating stuff (like
generating invoices from a database), TeX/LaTeX rules supreme.
>> That's limiting yourself. If you need accented
>> characters, learn how to enter them in a general way,
>> not just specific words.
>
> It is not about *ability*, it is about *speed* and
> *ergonomics* and *limiting the mental effort* when
> doing a routine thing, as typing.
Yes. I like abbrev-mode for larger projects. Takes a while to get that
up to speed, but when it's ready, it flies.
> To memorize and type some four or five hit combination just to get a
> goofy char that is (almost) never used doesn't make sense.
That combination of a non-US layout with dead keys makes most of what I
use regularly a breeze. For really rare stuff, Compose works well. It's
not really that hard to remember the more usual combinations.
Footnotes:
[1] I have no idea why anybody would have a use for that key's original
function on anything but a mechanic typewriter. Other than SHOUTING
YOUR LUNGS OUT…
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2013-12-17 6:27 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 52+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2013-12-17 0:01 .emacs poser B. T. Raven
2013-12-17 0:36 ` Emanuel Berg
2013-12-17 1:48 ` Dale Snell
2013-12-17 2:46 ` Drew Adams
[not found] ` <mailman.9443.1387244913.10748.help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
2013-12-17 2:03 ` Emanuel Berg
2013-12-17 2:58 ` Dale Snell
2013-12-17 5:53 ` Jambunathan K
[not found] ` <mailman.9453.1387249112.10748.help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
2013-12-17 3:16 ` Emanuel Berg
2013-12-17 5:32 ` Dale Snell
2013-12-17 6:27 ` Tilman Ahr [this message]
2013-12-17 16:42 ` Emanuel Berg
2013-12-18 2:25 ` Tilman Ahr
2013-12-18 21:17 ` Emanuel Berg
2013-12-18 3:01 ` Yuri Khan
[not found] ` <mailman.9542.1387335681.10748.help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
2013-12-18 21:23 ` Emanuel Berg
2013-12-19 1:13 ` Yuri Khan
[not found] ` <mailman.9626.1387415627.10748.help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
2013-12-20 1:40 ` Emanuel Berg
[not found] ` <mailman.9460.1387258387.10748.help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
2013-12-17 16:17 ` Emanuel Berg
2013-12-17 17:36 ` Dale Snell
[not found] ` <mailman.9507.1387301817.10748.help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
2013-12-17 17:41 ` Emanuel Berg
2013-12-17 3:06 ` Yuri Khan
2013-12-17 15:17 ` Drew Adams
2013-12-18 1:38 ` Yuri Khan
2013-12-17 7:41 ` Kevin Rodgers
2013-12-17 15:24 ` Doug Lewan
[not found] ` <mailman.9465.1387266001.10748.help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
2013-12-17 15:40 ` Sebastien Vauban
2013-12-17 16:29 ` Drew Adams
2013-12-17 16:49 ` Emanuel Berg
2013-12-17 18:20 ` Eli Zaretskii
[not found] ` <mailman.9492.1387293902.10748.help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
2013-12-17 17:14 ` Emanuel Berg
2013-12-17 17:16 ` Emanuel Berg
2013-12-17 19:04 ` Doug Lewan
[not found] ` <mailman.9512.1387307070.10748.help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
2013-12-17 22:42 ` Emanuel Berg
2013-12-17 23:35 ` Doug Lewan
2013-12-17 21:15 ` Joost Kremers
2013-12-17 22:44 ` Emanuel Berg
2013-12-17 23:25 ` Emanuel Berg
2013-12-18 3:22 ` Jambunathan K
[not found] ` <mailman.9544.1387337046.10748.help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
2013-12-18 21:42 ` Emanuel Berg
[not found] ` <mailman.9628.1387418319.10748.help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
2013-12-19 2:52 ` Emanuel Berg
2013-12-19 3:00 ` Emanuel Berg
2013-12-20 5:31 ` Jambunathan K
2013-12-20 5:38 ` Jambunathan K
[not found] ` <mailman.9724.1387517532.10748.help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
2013-12-20 17:52 ` Emanuel Berg
2013-12-27 6:00 ` B. T. Raven
2013-12-27 14:12 ` Yuri Khan
2013-12-27 16:11 ` Drew Adams
[not found] ` <mailman.10526.1388160732.10748.help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
2013-12-29 22:17 ` B. T. Raven
2013-12-29 23:48 ` Drew Adams
2013-12-20 1:52 ` Jambunathan K
2013-12-19 22:24 ` Joost Kremers
2013-12-19 23:16 ` Emanuel Berg
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