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Show HN: Devil Mode: A twisted Emacs key translator for modifier-free editing

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Re: Show HN: Devil Mode: A twisted Emacs key translator for modifier-free editing

#21

Post by _a_a_a_ »

munch117 wrote: post #20
_a_a_a_ wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I’m aware of “apropos”, but it also uses antiquated terminology can you clarify 'antiquated' for me please

Yank instead of paste. Frame instead of window. Kill instead of delete. kill-ring-save instead of copy. I was going to add 'visit instead of open', but I guess that bit has changed over the years. C-x C-v no longer invokes 'visit-file'.

While I completely get what you're saying it's not really fair to expect Emacs to be compatible with systems that came after it. If you going to work in Emacs you have to pretty much work on its terms, which I think is fairly reasonable and speaking only for myself, I found very worthwhile.

If you think it would make it more accessible to have certain changes, email the Emacs issue/bug people with constructive suggestions and see what they say; they are extremely responsive (then try doing the same with Apple or Microsoft and see what happens :-) )

Re: Show HN: Devil Mode: A twisted Emacs key translator for modifier-free editing

#22

Post by clircle »

I feel like I'm living in both the golden age of ergonomic keyboards (kinesis, ergodox, etc) and the golden age of modal interfaces for Emacs (evil, devil, boon, meow, etc).

Lots of new and interesting HSI ideas today, at least for us Emacs users.

Re: Show HN: Devil Mode: A twisted Emacs key translator for modifier-free editing

#23

Post by yes_but_no »

Syzygies wrote: post #19

This could be done more cleanly in keyboard firmware. I recovered from a deep dive into mechanical keyboards by trying Topre switches, the obsession killer. I now have four Leopold FC660C keyboards with Hasu FC660C controllers, with custom QMK firmware. After many experiments, I've been won over by making every key near home row a "tap / hold" key. Tap for usual keystroke, hold as a modifier to access a custom keyboa…

Do you mind sharing your qmk config? I'm using homerow for modifiers and combos for symbols, barely using any layers. Though idea of ditching homerow modifiers for layers not crazy since there is no arbitrary modifier need (cmd-c t etc can be thrown into a layer)

Re: Show HN: Devil Mode: A twisted Emacs key translator for modifier-free editing

#25

Post by pk2200 »

Syzygies wrote: post #19

This could be done more cleanly in keyboard firmware. I recovered from a deep dive into mechanical keyboards by trying Topre switches, the obsession killer. I now have four Leopold FC660C keyboards with Hasu FC660C controllers, with custom QMK firmware. After many experiments, I've been won over by making every key near home row a "tap / hold" key. Tap for usual keystroke, hold as a modifier to access a custom keyboa…

Nice! Years ago I added home row chording to a simple text editor I was writing. It worked so well that I wondered why it's not common practice. You should write more about your project! :)

Re: Show HN: Devil Mode: A twisted Emacs key translator for modifier-free editing

#26

Post by msla »

susam wrote: post #14
gumby wrote: post #13

This is an heir to a long history: many keyboards did not have a meta key (in fact had only a seven bit connection to the host) so you could type escape as a way of saying “treat the next keystroke as having its meta bit set”. And escape itself was just a fallback for altmode if all you had was an ascii terminal. On a standard MIT-AI TV keyboard (Knight keyboard) you could type M-Altmode to get a minibuffer and just…

Indeed. A really easy way to test this out on a modern Unix-ish system is to launch a terminal emulator, run cat, and then type Alt+a followed by Esc a. And then for bonus, type Ctrl+[ a. The output should look like this: $ cat ^[a^[a^[a

Interestingly, on my Linux setup, Alt-a gets me this for left and right Alt:

á

Ubuntu 22.04

I set up PrtSc as a compose key and have an .XCompose file, but that still works.

Re: Show HN: Devil Mode: A twisted Emacs key translator for modifier-free editing

#28

Post by SoftTalker »

The postition of the comma key doesn't (to me) feel a lot better than the normal position of the CTRL key. I remap CAPS-LOCK (which I almost never use or want) to CTRL and that works well for me in emacs to reduce finger contortions. It does create minor annoyances when I have to use a computer where this isn't the case, since it's in my muscle memory now.

Re: Show HN: Devil Mode: A twisted Emacs key translator for modifier-free editing

#29

Post by munch117 »

_a_a_a_ wrote: post #21
munch117 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yank instead of paste. Frame instead of window. Kill instead of delete. kill-ring-save instead of copy. I was going to add 'visit instead of open', but I guess that bit has changed over the years. C-x C-v no longer invokes 'visit-file'.

While I completely get what you're saying it's not really fair to expect Emacs to be compatible with systems that came after it. If you going to work in Emacs you have to pretty much work on its terms, which I think is fairly reasonable and speaking only for myself, I found very worthwhile. If you think it would make it more accessible to have certain changes, email the Emacs issue/bug people with constructive sugges…

I'm a happy Emacs user myself. Nobody change anything for my sake.

Re: Show HN: Devil Mode: A twisted Emacs key translator for modifier-free editing

#30

Post by bitwize »

_a_a_a_ wrote: post #21
munch117 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yank instead of paste. Frame instead of window. Kill instead of delete. kill-ring-save instead of copy. I was going to add 'visit instead of open', but I guess that bit has changed over the years. C-x C-v no longer invokes 'visit-file'.

While I completely get what you're saying it's not really fair to expect Emacs to be compatible with systems that came after it. If you going to work in Emacs you have to pretty much work on its terms, which I think is fairly reasonable and speaking only for myself, I found very worthwhile. If you think it would make it more accessible to have certain changes, email the Emacs issue/bug people with constructive sugges…

It absolutely is fair to expect Emacs to use industry standard terminology to avoid confusing users. At this point, keeping the outdated, idiosyncratic terminology and default UI paradigms serves no purpose except unnecessary gatekeeping.

> (then try doing the same with Apple or Microsoft and see what happens :-) )

Microsoft, the authors of Visual Studio Code, the editor most developers use? Whose team has been lauded for being super responsive to developer feedback?

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