Baby Emacs?

Baby Emacs?

[kj]

I am teaching programming to a few co-workers (research biologists).
Most of them want some recommendation for a text editor.  Of course,
I recommend to them Emacs, but I would prefer to recommend a simpler
version of Emacs, one with fewer features, and also fewer ways to
get confused.  Is there such a thing?

(A different co-worker suggested nano, but it does not look
sufficiently Emacs-like to me.)

TIA!

kynn

Re: Baby Emacs?

[Pascal J. Bourguignon]

kj <no.email@please.post> writes:

> I am teaching programming to a few co-workers (research biologists).
> Most of them want some recommendation for a text editor.  Of course,
> I recommend to them Emacs, but I would prefer to recommend a simpler
> version of Emacs, one with fewer features, and also fewer ways to
> get confused.  Is there such a thing?

Of course there's one:        emacs -Q

With the bonus of a faster launch, and quicker operation in general.



-- 
__Pascal Bourguignon__

Re: Baby Emacs?

[B Smith-Mannschott]

On Fri, Jul 31, 2009 at 19:51, kj<no.email@please.post> wrote:
>
>
>
> I am teaching programming to a few co-workers (research biologists).
> Most of them want some recommendation for a text editor.  Of course,
> I recommend to them Emacs, but I would prefer to recommend a simpler
> version of Emacs, one with fewer features, and also fewer ways to
> get confused.  Is there such a thing?
>
> (A different co-worker suggested nano, but it does not look
> sufficiently Emacs-like to me.)
>

Zile (http://www.gnu.org/software/zile/) is a pretty good ersatz
emacs. It's small and quick to start. I use it for quick and simple
edits.

// ben

Re: Baby Emacs?

[Lennart Borgman]

On Fri, Jul 31, 2009 at 11:22 PM, B
Smith-Mannschott<bsmith.occs@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Fri, Jul 31, 2009 at 19:51, kj<no.email@please.post> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> I am teaching programming to a few co-workers (research biologists).
>> Most of them want some recommendation for a text editor.  Of course,
>> I recommend to them Emacs, but I would prefer to recommend a simpler
>> version of Emacs, one with fewer features, and also fewer ways to
>> get confused.  Is there such a thing?
>>
>> (A different co-worker suggested nano, but it does not look
>> sufficiently Emacs-like to me.)
>>
>
> Zile (http://www.gnu.org/software/zile/) is a pretty good ersatz
> emacs. It's small and quick to start. I use it for quick and simple
> edits.


But Emacs starts in about 1 sec on my old pc if I do "emacs -Q".
Perhaps Zile is quicker and I do not know how fast these people are
... ;-)

Re: Baby Emacs?

[Michael Ekstrand]

kj wrote:
> I am teaching programming to a few co-workers (research biologists).
> Most of them want some recommendation for a text editor.  Of course,
> I recommend to them Emacs, but I would prefer to recommend a simpler
> version of Emacs, one with fewer features, and also fewer ways to
> get confused.  Is there such a thing?

If you really do want a simpler Emacs, I would second the recommendation
of zile.

I question, however, the advisedness of this.  IMO, the major advantage
to using Emacs is its feature set, not its key bindings or a particular
editing model.  If you don't want the feature set, there are other
editors which are easier to learn than Emacs (such as nano, gedit, or
JEdit).

I'd go with a normal Emacs with a sane and simple initial configuration.
 Sure, it has lots of ways to get confused, but it has the real
advantages of Emacs available.

- Michael

Re: Baby Emacs?

[Pascal J. Bourguignon]

Michael Ekstrand <michael@elehack.net> writes:

> kj wrote:
>> I am teaching programming to a few co-workers (research biologists).
>> Most of them want some recommendation for a text editor.  Of course,
>> I recommend to them Emacs, but I would prefer to recommend a simpler
>> version of Emacs, one with fewer features, and also fewer ways to
>> get confused.  Is there such a thing?
>
> If you really do want a simpler Emacs, I would second the recommendation
> of zile.
>
> I question, however, the advisedness of this.  IMO, the major advantage
> to using Emacs is its feature set, not its key bindings or a particular
> editing model.  If you don't want the feature set, there are other
> editors which are easier to learn than Emacs (such as nano, gedit, or
> JEdit).
>
> I'd go with a normal Emacs with a sane and simple initial configuration.
>  Sure, it has lots of ways to get confused, but it has the real
> advantages of Emacs available.

In any case, emacs itself is a simplier emacs.
You only have to learn a few keybindings to be able to use it.

If you have a modern keyboard (ie. with arrow keys) you can skip
cursor movement chords.  So the only remaining key chords you need to
learn to use emacs -Q like you'd use nano are:

C-x C-f     find-file
C-x C-s     save-file
C-x C-k     kill-buffer
C-x C-c     save-buffers-kill-emacs
C-x o       other-window             (sometimes emacs opens 'windows')
C-x 1       delete-other-windows
C-g         cancel                   (cancel the current command)
C-q         escape                   (insert the following literal key chord into the buffer)
C-r         search backward
C-s         search forward
C-w         kill-region              (cut)
M-w         kill-ring-save           (copy)
C-y         yank                     (paste)
C-SPC       set-mark-command

F1 F1       help

All the editing you can do with the arrows, Home, End, PgUp, PgDn, DEL
(or the mouse).


And when you feel ready to use more emacs features, you can read the
tutorial: F1 t  (as explained by the help F1 F1).


Now if you want, we could make a mode that would bind these commands
to other keys (ie. cut C-x, copy C-c, paste C-v, find-file C-o,
save-file C-s, etc ; but you wouldn't learn the standard emacs key
bindings), and that would disable all the other keybindings (but
self-insert-command of course), so that the user who types random key
chords may not entrap himself.

-- 
__Pascal Bourguignon__

Re: Baby Emacs?

[Xah Lee]

On Jul 31, 10:51 am, kj <no.em...@please.post> wrote:
> I am teaching programming to a few co-workers (research biologists).
> Most of them want some recommendation for a text editor.  Of course,
> I recommend to them Emacs, but I would prefer to recommend a simpler
> version of Emacs, one with fewer features, and also fewer ways to
> get confused.  Is there such a thing?
>
> (A different co-worker suggested nano, but it does not look
> sufficiently Emacs-like to me.)
>
> TIA!

if they are on windows, i suggest emacsW32. If they are on mac, then
Aquamacs Emacs.

the following pages might help:

• How To Make Emacs Use Modern User Interface
  http://xahlee.org/emacs/emacs_make_modern.html

• Emacs and Microsoft Windows Tips
  http://xahlee.org/emacs/emacs_mswin.html

  Xah
∑ http://xahlee.org/

☄

Re: Baby Emacs?

[Rugxulo]

Hi,

On Jul 31, 12:51 pm, kj <no.em...@please.post> wrote:
>
> I am teaching programming to a few co-workers (research biologists).
> Most of them want some recommendation for a text editor.  Of course,
> I recommend to them Emacs, but I would prefer to recommend a simpler
> version of Emacs, one with fewer features, and also fewer ways to
> get confused.  Is there such a thing?
>
> (A different co-worker suggested nano, but it does not look
> sufficiently Emacs-like to me.)
>
> TIA!

GNU Emacs is definitely superior to the lighter versions, but it also
takes a lot more space. However, it seems portability is getting less
and less for it. In other words, it really depends on what OS you use,
what features you need, etc.

Small Emacs? Try one of the following:  mg2a, MicroEmacs, JASSPA
MicroEmacs (or NanoEmacs for the ultra simplistic), ZILE, JED, or even
Digital Mars' very weird offshoot of MicroEmacs. However, in all
honesty, I would only truly recommend those if you don't need UTF-8
(although JED does sorta have it now). I don't think GNU Emacs will
confuse them very much, and it does do a lot more (including
emulations for other editors if needed)! Also, JOE doesn't really
count but can mimic Emacs a bit in keypresses.

Re: Baby Emacs?

[Pascal J. Bourguignon]

Rugxulo <rugxulo@gmail.com> writes:

> Hi,
>
> On Jul 31, 12:51 pm, kj <no.em...@please.post> wrote:
>>
>> I am teaching programming to a few co-workers (research biologists).
>> Most of them want some recommendation for a text editor.  Of course,
>> I recommend to them Emacs, but I would prefer to recommend a simpler
>> version of Emacs, one with fewer features, and also fewer ways to
>> get confused.  Is there such a thing?
>>
>> (A different co-worker suggested nano, but it does not look
>> sufficiently Emacs-like to me.)
>>
>> TIA!
>
> GNU Emacs is definitely superior to the lighter versions, but it also
> takes a lot more space. However, it seems portability is getting less
> and less for it. In other words, it really depends on what OS you use,
> what features you need, etc.
>
> Small Emacs? Try one of the following:  mg2a, MicroEmacs, JASSPA
> MicroEmacs (or NanoEmacs for the ultra simplistic), ZILE, JED, or even
> Digital Mars' very weird offshoot of MicroEmacs. However, in all
> honesty, I would only truly recommend those if you don't need UTF-8
> (although JED does sorta have it now). I don't think GNU Emacs will
> confuse them very much, and it does do a lot more (including
> emulations for other editors if needed)! Also, JOE doesn't really
> count but can mimic Emacs a bit in keypresses.

The keypresses are the less interesting thing in emacs.
That's why all these clones are useless.

There's no point in trying to learn emacs keychords, if you don't get
in return the power of emacs lisp programming.  Better stick with a
GUI editor.  There are some 'good' ones.

On the other hand, if you can teach them how to _configure_ and
_parameterize_ emacs with that 'emacs scripting' stuff, you'll win.

http://www.gnu.org/gnu/rms-lisp.html

-- 
__Pascal Bourguignon__