Re: Baby Emacs?

[Michael Ekstrand <michael@elehack.net>]

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