Re: Emacs as word processor

[Bastien <bzg@gnu.org>]

Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org> writes:

> Thanks, but you could assume I knew about Org (and use it ;-).

Sorry, I know you have been (and are still?) using Org!

Richard: please try Org-mode and its export facilities, I think it
will help turning the discussion into something more constructive.

>> If (La)TeX is installed on the machine, this will open a PDF file.
>
> Sorry, but this is not WYSIWYG.  WYSIWYG means you see the text you
> type in its final presentation form, or close to that.  It does not
> mean you type into one buffer/window and see the result in another;
> that is a step backwards from user expectations, certainly nowadays.

Of course you're right.

But WYSIWYG as LibreOffice does it solves really two problems: one is
the real WYSIWYG part (to edit a document with rich text formatting),
the other one is a social one (to edit a document as others will see
it.)

With Org-mode, both problems are solved *indirectly*, by allowing to
export your .org file to another popular formats that you can print
and share.

If the purpose is to solve the first problem within the Emacs world,
then enriched-mode is a good place to continue, though I think Org
also solves the problem and is more handy.

If the purpose is to solve the second problem, I think the solution
I proposed comes close.

Finally, solving both problems... well, I don't know.

>> I guess that'd suit most of Richard needs, but it's hard to tell.
>
> Visit etc/enriched.doc to get an idea.

Oops!  Bug: it's opened through DocView with emacs -Q.  I C-c C-c
and could see it -- nice.

> Of course, that file and
> enriched.el are dormant for the last 20 years, so don't expect too
> much.  But it could be a starting point, and the display engine gained
> a lot of functionality that was missing in 1994.

Yes, but this solution is just for Emacs people.

LibreOffice is popular not only because it's WYSIWYG, but also because
it's solves the problem of exchanging documents with Word-people.  At
least that's my guess!

2.5 cents,

-- 
 Bastien