Re: How old are Emacs users?

[Tim X <timx@nospam.dev.null>]

Tyler Smith <tyler.smith@mail.mcgill.ca> writes:

> On 2007-04-27, Peter Lee <pete.a.lee@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> If you don't like any of the extra display stuff.. toolbars, scrollbars..
>>
>> you could use "-Q -D -load ~/.emacs" to avoid the "flicker"
>>
>> On linux I typically `alias e = "emacs -Q -D -load ~/.emacs"`
>> On windows I just make a shortcut for the same.
>
> Neither -Q or -D are recognised options for me, nor can I find
> descriptions of them in the emacs printed manual or man
> pages... lowercase q may be what you're thinking of, but that seems
> unlikely with -load ~/.emacs, and lowercase d doesn't make sense in
> this context.
>

I think these switches are new ones added in CVS emacs 22 and not available with
the stable version, emacs 21.

> This flicker everyone is talking about - is that the brief flash of
> toolbar and repositioning of the emacs frame that occurs in the first
> second or two of booting up? Seems like a lot of bother over something
> so ephemeral. Not that I'd complain if I could eliminate it, but
> hardly something to get excited about.
>

True. However, depending on how far your desired config is different to the
emacs defaults, the flicker can be quite substantial - actually, more than just
a flicker as the frame changes size etc. I found it particularly annoying when
I wanted a different text font and size (larger for the window text, smaller
for menu text, no toolbar, larger geometry etc. 

> The discussion has been very helpful though, as I've now discovered
> initial-frame-alist, which lead to special-display- et al. That's
> going to be very handy when I sort it out to my needs!
>
> Cheers,
>
> Tyler
>
> ps. regarding the topic of this thread: I'm 34, been using emacs for
> twoish years, initially as the best alternative to the MSWindows GUI
> for R on GNU/Linux, now for pretty much everything. I'm a botanist,
> which confuses the compsci people I meet almost as much as my use of
> emacs confuses my botanist colleagues.

Me - 50. vi user from early 80's until 95. Switched to emacs and use it for
almost everything. Did try using emacs in late 80's but just couldn't push
myself to use it long enough to get as productive as I was with vi. Originally
switched to emacs after some bad luck that resulted in losing all but 5% of my
vision, so I am a heavy emacspeak user. Vision now down to less than 1%, so
startup flicker etc, no longer really and issue for me!

Tim
-- 
tcross (at) rapttech dot com dot au