Making Emacs Popular Again • Hacker News Board

Re: Making Emacs Popular Again

#601

Post by 6c696e7578 » Fri, May 08, 2020, 11:09 AM UTC

dmix wrote: post #488

SkyMarshal wrote: post #478

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't forget: New employee 6 workflow at company X: 1. Install Spacemacs, don't bother fiddling with the config 2. Spend a few hours working through the tutorial or reviewing the excellent docs [1] 3. Work. Become a better developer [2]. [1]: https://www.spacemacs.org/doc/DOCUMENTATION.html [2]: https://blog.osteele.com/2004/11/ides

+1 I was really attached to my vim config but decided to try out SpaceVim [1] (the vim version of SpaceMacs) after a stint using VSCode and after reinstalling my OS (before pulling in my usual vim .git) and I was surprised it was almost the same as what I spent years perfecting but with a far better and logical key mapping scheme that fit neatly across plugins + a nice programming language extension/layer scheme. It'…

Weird. I tried spacevim, via their docker container. First impressions were 100% CPU use after entering:

  int main(

I'll stick to tried and tested vim.

Re: Making Emacs Popular Again

#602

Post by IceDane » Fri, May 08, 2020, 11:12 AM UTC

SkyMarshal wrote: post #478

michaelmrose wrote: post #431

Earlier quoted context omitted.

New employee 3 workflow at company X: 1. Install Emacs 2. Sync existing config via git 3. Work New employee 4 workflow at company X: 1. Install Emacs 2. Spend 2 hours learning default Emacs 3. Work New employee 5 workflow at company X: 1. Install Emacs 2. Spend 1 - 2 hours learning default Emacs 3. Spend 2 - 4 hours googling interesting Emacs packages, in each case going to their GitHub repo to read the directions, a…

Don't forget: New employee 6 workflow at company X: 1. Install Spacemacs, don't bother fiddling with the config 2. Spend a few hours working through the tutorial or reviewing the excellent docs [1] 3. Work. Become a better developer [2]. [1]: https://www.spacemacs.org/doc/DOCUMENTATION.html [2]: https://blog.osteele.com/2004/11/ides

Sorry, but that's not true anymore. The spacemacs project has kind of gone off the rails and it doesn't seem like they have any idea about what they really want to do.

The next release has been coming for several years and it's not yet there. This means that you can either choose between the master branch and get hopelessly outdated stuff or the development branch which is so chaotic that you better be ready for things to break constantly.

I used spacemacs for years, then I tried doom emacs and it took me all of 15 seconds to realize that I should switch.

Re: Making Emacs Popular Again

#603

Post by 101404 » Fri, May 08, 2020, 11:24 AM UTC

diffeomorphism wrote: post #595

101404 wrote: post #559

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In reality, it is very easy in vscode. The difference is, that in vscode it is a easily readable json. Much, much! better than in both emacs and vim. Edit: downvoting doesn't change reality

So which is it: VS Code is maximally unsuited for everyone or the previous argument was nonsense?

Your comment doesn't make sense. What are you trying to say?

Re: Making Emacs Popular Again

#604

Post by hibbelig » Fri, May 08, 2020, 11:30 AM UTC

smt88 wrote: post #429

quadrifoliate wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This view is obviously biased against Emacs, but I don't disagree completely with the premise. As an Emacs user, being "immediately productive" (whatever that means) is not your topmost priority. You mold your Emacs to a workflow unique to you, notice things you are doing often, add elisp functions to change it to make those things easier, and carry them with you from job to job. As your job evolves and changes, you…

> You mold your Emacs to a workflow unique to you, notice things you are doing often, add elisp functions to change it to make those things easier, and carry them with you from job to job. As your job evolves and changes, you maintain and grow your Emacs files over decades, and borrow from someone else's workflows. I've been writing software for ~24 years, and I can understand the need for this in the past. Now, I ju…

I use an IDE for java development because the refactoring is just too useful. But Emacs macros are very useful and I haven’t found something like this in my IDE.

I wonder whether it’s possible to set up lsp-mode for my Java project.

Re: Making Emacs Popular Again

#605

Post by thiht » Fri, May 08, 2020, 11:38 AM UTC

panzerklein wrote: post #584

fluffything wrote: post #569

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a researcher, and I have a git repository for my notes, which I edit using markdown. It supports latex math, tables, cross links, labels, and html if I need to do anything fancy, like inserting images, videos, etc. (youtube embedded video? no problem). I can edit them from any device, and they get sync'ed everywhere via git. I can also read them from everywhere, and markdown renders super nicely. I take markdown…

Can you elaborate, please? How do you use latex, images and cross-links in markdown?

$$ for latex

![]() for images

[]() for links

Re: Making Emacs Popular Again

#606

Post by thiht » Fri, May 08, 2020, 11:42 AM UTC

F-0X wrote: post #18

jrimbault wrote: post #4

> "Perhaps we should implement a mode that puts cosmetics on Emacs so it will appeal to those who judge by the surface of things." I'm sorry to react to first quote, but as I kept reading I kept coming back to it. My thoughts on that : how you present yourself is how you want (and are going) to be judged. In general I think Emacs has been user-hostile, as said here, just by its terminology. Nobody outside a minority…

> And the old "I have suffered therefore the others have to suffer". Actually, its an extremely important point. Tools which optimise for the professional are better than those which do so for the noob. Whenever you can achieve both, do so, but never side with the beginner otherwise. People should learn their tools, and they shouldn't be beginners for long, so making things "friendly" at the cost of rewarding experti…

You can absolutely do both. In VSCode, if I don't know how to perform an action, I just hit Ctrl+Shift+P and the fuzzy search panel with all the possible action shows up, with the associated keyboard shortcut next to it so I can remember it for next time.

In emacs, I have absolutely no idea how to discover features, and if I find something I still have to understand what the M- and C- mean

Re: Making Emacs Popular Again

#607

Post by slightwinder » Fri, May 08, 2020, 11:50 AM UTC

adimitrov wrote: post #579

smt88 wrote: post #429

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You mold your Emacs to a workflow unique to you, notice things you are doing often, add elisp functions to change it to make those things easier, and carry them with you from job to job. As your job evolves and changes, you maintain and grow your Emacs files over decades, and borrow from someone else's workflows. I've been writing software for ~24 years, and I can understand the need for this in the past. Now, I ju…

You can do one thing in JetBrains: edit code. That's it. In Emacs, I read my mail, I organise my agenda, I write technical reports, blog posts, I wrote my entire thesis in org-mode. I collect research notes in Emacs, and a journal. I do my bookkeeping and accounting in Emacs. I write Confluence articles, so I don't have to deal with Confluence's shitty interface. I edit remote files, I edit files via sudo on my machi…

> You can do one thing in JetBrains: edit code. That's it.

No, you can do more, it's just usually people don't have the mindset to do more. And to be fair, JetBrains software is not meant to do that, so it's harder to do it, preventing the people from developing the mindset. It's a loop.

Re: Making Emacs Popular Again

#608

Post by TeMPOraL » Fri, May 08, 2020, 12:02 PM UTC

TheSpiceIsLife wrote: post #491

michaelmrose wrote: post #432

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In order to be more productive of 10s of thousands of hours one only needs to be slightly more productive to justify spending a handful of hours. 1% per 10k hours is worth 100 hours.

Yeah, to some extent, maybe. I appreciate what you’re saying, and I do hate being slowed down in the moment. I’ve got a handcrafted AutoHotKey script and a 22 button gaming mouse fine tuned for 2D CAD / CAM software at work, so while I am definitely in to this sort of customisation... If I’m honest with myself I don’t really get more work done because I end up using the time being unproductive elsewhere. There’s defi…

> because I end up using the time being unproductive elsewhere.

Isn't that literally the point? If you can do your task in 10% less time, and then end up spending that 10% procrastinating on HN, then you still win - the task gets done, and you also get to sneak in something nice. And if you find you'd rather spend that time on something else, or doing more work to finish everything faster, you can choose to do so. Optimizing work gives you choice what to do with the time saved; the default may be that you waste it, but now you have options.

Re: Making Emacs Popular Again

#609

Post by cdrini » Fri, May 08, 2020, 12:03 PM UTC

throwanem wrote: post #564

pantulis wrote: post #552

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. While Spacemacs is an admirable effort, I think it misses the point: Emacs is an editor for power users from another era, so it requires huge effort by the user to become truly productive by todays standards. Trying to create layers upon layers of "friendlines" and eye candy is not going to solve the complexity. I've always said that it's better to grasp Emacs with a vanilla config or a small starter kit and se…

Pretty much, yeah, from what I've seen. Against the shockingly low ambient baseline of "editors that aren't Vim or Emacs", VS Code's highly usable OOTB experience and broad extension ecosystem are enough of an improvement to constitute a real win despite being so poor by comparison with a thoroughly evolved configuration of either of the Two True Editors. I stick with Emacs because, now having invested more than a de…

> I can do a lot of things in seconds that take VS Code users minutes or hours.

Out of curiosity could you provide some examples of some of these?

Re: Making Emacs Popular Again

#610

Post by slightwinder » Fri, May 08, 2020, 12:03 PM UTC

smt88 wrote: post #429

quadrifoliate wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This view is obviously biased against Emacs, but I don't disagree completely with the premise. As an Emacs user, being "immediately productive" (whatever that means) is not your topmost priority. You mold your Emacs to a workflow unique to you, notice things you are doing often, add elisp functions to change it to make those things easier, and carry them with you from job to job. As your job evolves and changes, you…

> You mold your Emacs to a workflow unique to you, notice things you are doing often, add elisp functions to change it to make those things easier, and carry them with you from job to job. As your job evolves and changes, you maintain and grow your Emacs files over decades, and borrow from someone else's workflows. I've been writing software for ~24 years, and I can understand the need for this in the past. Now, I ju…

> Now, I just don't get it. What are emacs users customizing so intensely that no other environment can match it?

I thing it's a bit between exploring the possibilities of your tools, expressing yourself in some "divine art" and procrastinating under the guise of being productive. There is definitly a high amount of good customizing possible with emacs, but from my observation many end also in the trap of over-custimizing, to the point where it becomes harmful. Not to forgotten all the worthless oversmart solutions build in emacs, beacuse emacs gives them the means to do it.

> The level of customization that emacs supports seems unnecessary to me.

Emacs is a platform for textual and programatic interfaces. Similar to web-technologie. As such you can tweak little things, but also build whole apps dedicated to specific usecases with it.

> Can you talk about a few use cases where emacs is just better than an IDE could be?

It's not better than IDE, but similar level as IDE. Just that you are able to do it yourself. With an IDE, if you have a specific demand like integrating some new tool, or handling some specific filetype, you depend on the producer to build it into the IDE. Just recently IDEs have also learned to use plugins, to allow you build some stuff yourself. Ok, recently was 15-20 years ago, but emacs is 40 years old, predating them all.