From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.io!.POSTED.ciao.gmane.io!not-for-mail From: Tim Cross Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: Making Emacs popular again with a video Date: Thu, 14 May 2020 17:38:15 +1000 Message-ID: References: <5230692c-c665-a330-7a12-e59fa25d97dd@gmail.com> <70bb51fd-447d-928c-4d69-1c9673a44471@online.de> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="0000000000004a100105a596c82a" Injection-Info: ciao.gmane.io; posting-host="ciao.gmane.io:159.69.161.202"; logging-data="26476"; mail-complaints-to="usenet@ciao.gmane.io" Cc: colinetnathan98@gmail.com, =?UTF-8?Q?Andreas_R=C3=B6hler?= , Richard Stallman , Emacs developers To: Arthur Miller Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane-mx.org@gnu.org Thu May 14 09:39:01 2020 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane-mx.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([209.51.188.17]) by ciao.gmane.io with esmtps (TLS1.2:ECDHE_RSA_AES_256_GCM_SHA384:256) (Exim 4.92) (envelope-from ) id 1jZ8SL-0006lf-C3 for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane-mx.org; Thu, 14 May 2020 09:39:01 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:53578 helo=lists1p.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.90_1) (envelope-from ) id 1jZ8SK-0008U8-El for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane-mx.org; Thu, 14 May 2020 03:39:00 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:470:142:3::10]:46822) by lists.gnu.org with esmtps (TLS1.2:ECDHE_RSA_AES_256_GCM_SHA384:256) (Exim 4.90_1) (envelope-from ) id 1jZ8Rq-0007lr-Do for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Thu, 14 May 2020 03:38:30 -0400 Original-Received: from mail-oi1-x22c.google.com ([2607:f8b0:4864:20::22c]:35912) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtps (TLS1.2:ECDHE_RSA_AES_128_GCM_SHA256:128) (Exim 4.90_1) (envelope-from ) id 1jZ8Rp-0007PI-C0; Thu, 14 May 2020 03:38:30 -0400 Original-Received: by mail-oi1-x22c.google.com with SMTP id x7so22865529oic.3; Thu, 14 May 2020 00:38:28 -0700 (PDT) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=gmail.com; s=20161025; h=mime-version:references:in-reply-to:from:date:message-id:subject:to :cc; bh=4NLOD5EkT4MYEEyBAuB27vnTmQnKCsqGoGf3L/ScoWU=; b=kZHXPi5V4187D78hCCRqu/7R/Dj0i7ud4D62gksFyWOhxZSWMq5LyEVbsk/0+6mrq8 rgfBwCR0rbgZai+Et0ejhYgk460OTe+uzN4SYfJGTsFep7YK35TG1x6IEV9dG5bWY/DA xlRPSQbGM9XpL5CFv3aAVxjF7df4/sjX/KukSSSfYkuKeWZIHAwOYmVGkwpdyNANjmH2 mjOnuibNIwJWMMz+R+Rt9yh/Yke9WmeRzDauuLWrujT125iZVP5VcWtWeJnwd4r0CBjj HV86/ReLs3H0gVjw7tuVdzFcFURsjk4RzrQqIKTiXYtC3RqWUFh6wSetmhV2Aw1bSIiR cd+g== X-Google-DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=1e100.net; s=20161025; h=x-gm-message-state:mime-version:references:in-reply-to:from:date :message-id:subject:to:cc; bh=4NLOD5EkT4MYEEyBAuB27vnTmQnKCsqGoGf3L/ScoWU=; b=N3ikLBNrEyg2QE15BGwjxpR/LJgAl3Djg/igLeomxCOp9fh24oRMylllf8H9j6LoWG JKoe2bLvXOrRDAnJmfwDrsqlF84WP3fj0CdKiHRxC06bROQH25VVuoI0Sf10tkpHATos XgeSOB6ZI3knmGt0b7EAkkslgNgMECjVwHcjNSqCe4yUU/Y7iPTDU491ceFgymCZ9+mG a19B+giBhxBYyXmmpIVJLNk5HDCTn8s5Vp1lzKMhfhooROWgD6yCB1Ah7niU0L8XnrhU yIzhtKsNP1X0Qc7xvK1umKc4odmkjGPiQ/gyb5rHhGh2toNWC4T22kQ7DOyvsg1MGcyM lY+g== X-Gm-Message-State: AGi0PubdzfOKUyRACrmyYrLjXL9yWjWyM/rU3WzjHDn+wyzuLCKF7Y7Q OAkqQ3dqIHlMpn1eH1QdwhG4DT5oxeQwegId2rQ= X-Google-Smtp-Source: APiQypKn3AZkgeV7ysTMl1il9XnX/Vs3DbQMh7dd7omQuR0+8vpFFg3vO/TwMkTUMhp8y5/oyX05+f1sRMOA7l4CaY4= X-Received: by 2002:aca:7503:: with SMTP id q3mr31223567oic.47.1589441907525; Thu, 14 May 2020 00:38:27 -0700 (PDT) In-Reply-To: Received-SPF: pass client-ip=2607:f8b0:4864:20::22c; envelope-from=theophilusx@gmail.com; helo=mail-oi1-x22c.google.com X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: No matching host in p0f cache. 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List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane-mx.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: "Emacs-devel" Xref: news.gmane.io gmane.emacs.devel:250214 Archived-At: --0000000000004a100105a596c82a Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8" On Wed, 13 May 2020 at 18:50, Arthur Miller wrote: > Richard Stallman writes: > > > [[[ To any NSA and FBI agents reading my email: please consider ]]] > > [[[ whether defending the US Constitution against all enemies, ]]] > > [[[ foreign or domestic, requires you to follow Snowden's example. ]]] > > > > > > Do Emacs's current competitors have the same capabilities? > > > They have pretty much everything but "self-documenting", which should > > > maybe be referred as "self-retrospecting" feature. > > > > Do people think it is desirable to delete most of that intro text? > > It is uder 15 lines; perhaps it is harmless to keep it. > > I don't think it is very important issue. It is normal to have a bit > longer introductorty text/description about application. It just does > not need to take screen estate on the welcome screen maybe? > > By the way, I probably wouldn't try to identify Emacs as just a text > editor longer. Personally I see Emacs as en extensible platform, or > system (not in a sense of that joke of operating system), a tool, or > whatever one might wish to call it. I think it has developed and become > usefull much more then just as a text editor. Also I think it might help > if Emacs developed even further in that direction, as a > "multi-tool/swiss army knife" of human-computer interaction? > > I don't use other text editors, so I really don't know how good they are > at other tasks then just text editing. I usually just take a look for > the curiosity sake when a new editor/IDE becomes popular, and then I > usually realize Emacs already has everything I need and just uninstall > the new thing. > > I think this touches on an important point. Emacs is more than an editor. To an extent, the editing aspects of Emacs are not particularly interesting and most of the really great editing features of Emacs have been incorporated into other editors anyway - it is not really a distinguishing features. The key to what makes Emacs is a combination of extensibility and self-documenting. For me, what makes Emacs different from nearly all the alternatives is the ability to create the work environment and work flows I want rather than conforming to the environment and workflows someone else has defined. With a little effort, I can have my projects setup so that all those boring and repetitive tasks are automated using a common framework, language and interface. plus I get a whole lot of unified and consistent tools/commands with that same interface, which makes dealing with the ad hoc stuff faster/easier as well. Unfortunately, this benefit is not going to be universal for all users. If you don't have a need for workflows or if your requirement is just for simple editing of text or if your simply not that interested or are happy to use separate tools and environments etc, your really not going to see a lot of benefit from Emacs over other editors. This makes me think that aiming to make Emacs more popular may be a too generic objective. Perhaps we need to consider who or what group of users we want Emacs to be popular with. Should we be trying to identifyt which 'market' Emacs is going to be most beneficial for and then target that group rather than just tyring to be 'popular' in the more generic sense? -- regards, Tim -- Tim Cross --0000000000004a100105a596c82a Content-Type: text/html; charset="UTF-8" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

On Wed, 13 May 2020 at 18:50, Arthur= Miller <arthur.miller@live.co= m> wrote:
Richard Stallman <rms@= gnu.org> writes:

> [[[ To any NSA and FBI agents reading my email: please consider=C2=A0 = =C2=A0 ]]]
> [[[ whether defending the US Constitution against all enemies,=C2=A0 = =C2=A0 =C2=A0]]]
> [[[ foreign or domestic, requires you to follow Snowden's example.= ]]]
>
>=C2=A0 =C2=A0> > Do Emacs's current competitors have the same= capabilities?
>=C2=A0 =C2=A0> They have pretty much everything but "self-docum= enting", which should
>=C2=A0 =C2=A0> maybe be referred as "self-retrospecting" f= eature.
>
> Do people think it is desirable to delete most of that intro text?
> It is uder 15 lines; perhaps it is harmless to keep it.

I don't think it is very important issue. It is normal to have a bit longer introductorty text/description about application. It just does
not need to take screen estate on the welcome screen maybe?

By the way, I probably wouldn't try to identify Emacs as just a text editor longer. Personally I see Emacs as en extensible platform, or
system (not in a sense of that joke of operating system), a tool, or
whatever one might wish to call it. I think it has developed and become
usefull much more then just as a text editor. Also I think it might help if Emacs developed even further in that direction, as a
"multi-tool/swiss army knife" of human-computer interaction?

I don't use other text editors, so I really don't know how good the= y are
at other tasks then just text editing. I usually just take a look for
the curiosity sake when a new editor/IDE becomes popular, and then I
usually realize Emacs already has everything I need and just uninstall
the new thing.


I think this touches on an = important point. Emacs is more than an editor. To an extent, the editing as= pects of Emacs are not particularly interesting and most of the really grea= t editing features of Emacs have been incorporated into other editors anywa= y - it is not really a distinguishing features. The key to what makes Emacs= is a combination of extensibility and self-documenting. For me, what makes= Emacs different from nearly all the alternatives is the ability to create = the work environment and work flows I want rather than conforming to the en= vironment and workflows someone else has defined. With a little effort, I c= an have my projects setup so that all those boring and repetitive tasks are= automated using a common framework, language and interface. plus I get a w= hole lot of unified and consistent tools/commands with that same interface,= which makes dealing with the ad hoc stuff faster/easier as well.

Unfortunately, this benefit is not going to be univers= al for all users. If you don't have a need for workflows or if your req= uirement is just for simple editing of text or if your simply not that inte= rested or are happy to use separate tools and environments etc, your really= not going to see a lot of benefit from Emacs over other editors. This make= s me think that aiming to make Emacs more popular may be a too generic obje= ctive. Perhaps we need to consider who or what group of users we want Emacs= to be popular with. Should we be trying to identifyt which 'market'= ; Emacs is going to be most beneficial for and then target that group rathe= r than just tyring to be 'popular' in the more generic sense?
=

--
regards,

Tim

=
--
Tim Cross

--0000000000004a100105a596c82a--