From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: James Freer Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.help Subject: Re: Emacs users a dying breed? Date: Mon, 25 Jun 2012 00:19:36 +0100 Message-ID: References: <9809cd1a-9086-4022-af79-732fb6149f20@q5g2000pba.googlegroups.com> <87mx3vzqd7.fsf@friendface.i-did-not-set--mail-host-address--so-tickle-me> <87ipejip09.fsf@gnu.org> <4FE453F0.8040304@easy-emacs.de> NNTP-Posting-Host: plane.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 X-Trace: dough.gmane.org 1340581006 26106 80.91.229.3 (24 Jun 2012 23:36:46 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@dough.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 24 Jun 2012 23:36:46 +0000 (UTC) Cc: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org To: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Andreas_R=F6hler?= Original-X-From: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Mon Jun 25 01:36:46 2012 Return-path: Envelope-to: geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([208.118.235.17]) by plane.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1SiwMH-0008Ms-RE for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Mon, 25 Jun 2012 01:36:45 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:48733 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1SiwMH-00008l-JO for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Sun, 24 Jun 2012 19:36:45 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([208.118.235.92]:34348) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1Siw5l-0007Wk-Sx for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Sun, 24 Jun 2012 19:19:43 -0400 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1Siw5k-00038d-0i for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Sun, 24 Jun 2012 19:19:41 -0400 Original-Received: from mail-ey0-f169.google.com ([209.85.215.169]:51263) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1Siw5j-00038N-OG for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Sun, 24 Jun 2012 19:19:39 -0400 Original-Received: by eaan1 with SMTP id n1so1114901eaa.0 for ; Sun, 24 Jun 2012 16:19:37 -0700 (PDT) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=gmail.com; s=20120113; h=mime-version:in-reply-to:references:date:message-id:subject:from:to :cc:content-type; bh=rOe5PC2mLE6m7ofZhPcfrpIgDoJhz0Ka0IhdisBKaWA=; b=F4Gmod9Oqqk+NvfXObPHE6QfYGCRm+tm1n7Cauc6fsq9rxgydTfI8LINN2VD41AkgH zHHZvN8smnG1fqjD/7LRm0j5cgtDLO9ao+w4TfrNVFKL50/KHR0gRGPoc06/xnIic9Pd YyX1WdgQqbDP3pTQCaH7slMDzdESoyCI/WCwK3mVtcdHQE3AttkNTyltlEYqlI6G8HLv Pa2SXzJs6m/jqbdu3jEQ1RS4VFCfRrqQwGmbfH8/45q1UXc3bCflLDkKBc8A+18XPKWA GitjgP0UmLIlR0yNcbZPhdqziyjdXaTBo9Fn1sBCEKX2N8MnHqj0n/MiWgjikfiaxvY1 v8gQ== Original-Received: by 10.14.28.202 with SMTP id g50mr1932292eea.167.1340579977187; Sun, 24 Jun 2012 16:19:37 -0700 (PDT) Original-Received: by 10.14.194.67 with HTTP; Sun, 24 Jun 2012 16:19:36 -0700 (PDT) In-Reply-To: <4FE453F0.8040304@easy-emacs.de> X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: Genre and OS details not recognized. X-Received-From: 209.85.215.169 X-Mailman-Approved-At: Sun, 24 Jun 2012 19:36:41 -0400 X-BeenThere: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14 Precedence: list List-Id: Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.help:85440 Archived-At: > so what does vim better then Emacs? I've just read through this topic's threads. I'd like to make the following points. Firstly i use a text editor for editing writing text as an author of several newsletters not as a programmer. Recently i decided to have a look at emacs and vi/vim as i've been using gedit, bluefish and one or two other GUI editors. Several of you have made the point emacs is declining on google trends... i don't think that's fair. Try vim it is also declining... yet nvi is level and vi is increasing, bluefish decreasing...gedit i can't remember now. How has google trends worked out it's statistics? My uses are different to those of a programmer. I need linebreak [word line wrapping or softwrap i think it's sometimes called], spell checking, word count, auto indent, and bookmarking. Basics in fact and yet few editors that can actually do this. Just Jedit, bluefish, gedit, vim and emacs. Also use alpine for mail so want to use the alternative editor rather than pico. Not that i'm knocking pico - it has a lovely feature that few editors have... when getting towards the bottom of the screen it automatically scrolls up half a screen - for writing that's lovely. Emacs and vim do what i want. Emacs i struggle with as it is still slow if using with alpine and the VM and Rmail take too long to set up [for me... bit like trying to set up Mutt - managed to do it and then forgot what i did and got fed up with it]. For me emacs is large does a lot well and does a lot badly. mg - a light version of emacs doesn't do quite enough. The emacs book is still quite hard to follow and that lets emacs down - i even tried xemacs and it just flickered and it seems they haven't moved forward with that project. VIm it has the vimbook and it's very good - if someone wants to learn they want to get on with it... that is much in it's favour. But i agree with what folk have said - a modal editor is an 'odd animal'. Emacs is a bit like Jedit to many it's impregnable which puts folk off. I wish a lite version of emacs was available that left out some of the bloat to be honest. Forget email, calendar etc things which it does badly. vim/vi gets it's popularity as it's easier to get started on... albeit with this modal setup. I used to use wordstar and so you could say my natural choice would be Joe but it doesn't do bookmarks that well and other things i need. Nano is a very odd set up in that the linebreak works but then you can't convert a file back to continuous lines. What do i use at present while i'm still trying to get used to vim or emacs - pico for email and bluefish. Both vim and emacs development have gone down strange routes and yet both are popular. james