Re: (Slightly Off-Topic) Emacs-like Office App

[Joshua Goldberg <joshgold@thresher.cs.indiana.edu>]

Kevin Dziulko <dziulko@klaatu.canisius.edu> writes:

> Target both software developers and casual office users? Good luck with
> that.

Mac OSX seems like a good example of this.  A hood under which you can
get to tweak powerfully (in ways developers are accustomed to and that
work well) on a system that is well-enough designed that even the
developers I know find they don't bother tweaking it nearly as much as
they did with unix.

> One big super app that does everything? I think MS Word attempts
> that (has word processing, drawing, desktop publishing, embedded
> spreadsheets, modes(document templates), extendable with programming
> ...).  The result: enormous, slow, unstable, and all the other
> reasons why people hate microsoft apps. If you want an app that
> performs well, modularity is the key. Many small programs with a
> narrower scope would be easier to create, upkeep, and execute with
> high performace.  

Good points.  I do think a good word-processor can exist, though, that
both programmers and grandpa would be happy with.

 -Josh

(I tweak emacs a lot and love to, but I can certainly imagine having
software that doesn't make me feel like I need to.  I should also
admit that I've never owned or made very heavy use of a Mac--usually
I'm on unix at work.  If I bought a computer though it'd probably be
Mac.)