Emanuel Berg writes: > Sharon Kimble writes: > >> I'm involved in a project which involves a lot of >> pasting into emacs From the clipboard, which is >> taking a long time. > > The best answer/method is: don't do it! > > What other program(s) are you using, to/from which you > copy/paste? Have you examined if Emacs can do what > these programs do, in what case you don't have that > problem anymore but can rely on kill/yank instead, > which is much more powerful and fast. Primarily 'zim' and pasting to and from 'JabRef', I'm mostly creating bibtex records from a published bibliography on an article on the web, which I've opened in w3m. I would use 'eew' if I could only find out how to use tabs with it! > > Examples, instead of - use: Thunderbird -> Gnus (what > I remember you already use that), Irssi -> ERC, man > pages with man/less in the shell -> M-x man RET, > Iceweasel/Firefox -> Emacs-w3m. And so on. > >> How can I speed up the cutting and pasting please? > > What do you mean "speed up", exactly? Do you use the > GUI Emacs in X? And in another window, you have > another program with text? Again, the best thing is if > what that program does can be done in Emacs, which is > very likely, and Emacs probably does it better as > well. If this can't be done for whatever reason, you > need a window manager in X with a shortcut to iterate > windows. I use Openbox with which it is possible to > select window with M-TAB (in Emacs' notation). So in > the other program you cut the text. Then hit M-TAB to > go to Emacs. Then hit whatever key you have assigned > to paste it, if it isn't integrated with the kill > ring already, in what case C-y is fine (it doesn't > matter in terms of speed if the "paste from clipboard" > shortcut is as short and close as C-y). By "speed-up" I mean that I have to wait for emacs to catch up with where I've pasted something. Yes, emacs as a GUI along with using the mouse. Knowing that "Openbox" is similar to "fluxbox", exactly *what is* your command in your "keys" page to access emacs again please? I know how to *start* a program, but not how to *access* a currently running program. > > If this is the situation you already have, elaborate > further what you mean by making it faster. > > In general, > > 1) Use Emacs for everything. Almost there. > > 2) Don't use the mouse. I've seen and read about how bad using the mouse is in terms of potential RSI, but I still find it useful. > > 3) Use shortcuts that are short and close. Yes, getting there. > > 4) Integrate Emacs with external programs by setting > up (keyboard) shortcuts to go to and from them. > For example, if the M-TAB window iteration method > isn't fast enough (if you have tons of windows), > setup a shortcut in X (with xbindkeys) to go > directly to the Emacs window, and then setup > another shortcut to go directly to the program from > which you copy text. This isn't difficult to do: > use 'wmctrl'. I can easily utilise the "keys" program in fluxbox, which I had forgotten about. > > Keep on asking until you get it if you get stuck. > Things like this are very important and they are what > makes the difference between fun and productive and > miserable and somewhat less productive, and you don't > want to make that trade. Will do. :) Thanks Sharon. -- A taste of linux = http://www.sharons.org.uk TGmeds = http://www.tgmeds.org.uk Debian 8.0, fluxbox 1.3.7, emacs 24.5.50.2