(On Topic: GNU && Linux) Emacs

From: Benjamin Stewart 
------------------------------------------------------
I just wanted to say thanks to all those who touted Emacs in the recent
thread about IDEs. I tried it again for the third time, and this time I
think I'm a believer! I've used several editors, and been wrangled by a
couple of different IDEs now, and I've never encountered one that gets out
of my way like Emacs does, and there's no text format it doesn't handle! I'm
mainly using it for Python editing, and it's nice to be able to make a
change to a function, then send it to an interpreter for testing with just a
keystroke, without ever leaving the window. Version Control integration is
also just Done Right (I'm looking at you, Eclipse!). Plus, if I get bored, I
can always M-x dissociated-press whatever I've been working on (or a
chugalug thread), and sit back for some laughs!

So, does anybody have some tips to make it even better?

-- 



                              Benjamin Stewart

                               

===============================================================
From: Bobby 
------------------------------------------------------
M-x butterfly    --- It really works
M-x dunnet      --- If you are into text adventures

Just scanning through my .emacs, there are several things I use that I
really like. Look all of these up on emacswiki.org, there you can find
installation instructions and such: ido, smex, php-mode, php-doc,
auto-complete, reddit, color-theme, multi-term, dired+, buff-menu+, ring+,
tramp, erc, twittering-mode, and emms.

Also, you can install ELPA from tromey.com/elpa/ -- it is a package manager
for emacs lisp packages, and a few of the packages I already mentioned can
be installed through it, making the process much easier. Also, fire up ERC
and join #emacs on freenode, plenty of people will answer your noob
questions there. Good Luck!



===============================================================
From: Dan Lyke 
------------------------------------------------------
On Wed, 20 Jul 2011 08:09:46 -0400
Benjamin Stewart  wrote:

I've recently discovered longlines-mode, haven't made as much use of it
yet as I could, but it looks promising. Other chocolatey goodness from
my .emacs.d/init.el:

;; Make files that Emacs thinks should be executable executable.
;;http://www.masteringemacs.org/articles/2011/01/19/script-files-executable-automatically/
(add-hook 'after-save-hook
'executable-make-buffer-file-executable-if-script-p)


;; My file for local lisp
(setq load-path (cons "~/emacs" load-path))

;; JavaScript mode
(autoload 'js2-mode "js2" nil t)
(add-to-list 'auto-mode-alist '("\.js$" . js2-mode))

;; MediaWiki mode - allows direct editing of Mediawiki files
(require 'mediawiki)

;; Tramp - allows editing of ssh accessible files
(require 'tramp)
(setq tramp-default-method "scp")

;; Bounce parens:
;; http://elfs.livejournal.com/1216037.html

(defun paren-bounce ()  (interactive) 
  (let ((prev-char (char-to-string (preceding-char)))
                (next-char (char-to-string (following-char))))
    (cond ((string-match "[[{(]" prev-char)
                   (backward-sexp 1)) 
                  (t (error "%s" "Not an expression boundary.")))))

(global-set-key [(control ?%)] 'paren-bounce)


===============================================================
From: Stephen Haywood 
------------------------------------------------------
Not to start a flame war but I actually prefer not to learn a whole
new language just to use my text editor. On linux I use nano, on
Windows notepad++ or KomodoEdit.

le-automatically/
))))
dary.")))))

===============================================================
From: James Nylen 
------------------------------------------------------
The tradeoff is that the editors with their own languages are extremely,
extremely powerful once you learn them well.  I know this is true for vim,
and it seems like it's true for emacs as well.




===============================================================
From: Bobby 
------------------------------------------------------
Stephen, if you don't intend on starting a flame war, saying that you have
to "learn a whole new language just to use my text editor" is not the way to
go about it. That is completely false. All you need to know to use Emacs is
how to navigate menus and click on icons. Just as you would with any other
text editor. Using it well means learning the key bindings and customizing
Emacs to fit your work.

You only need to learn Emacs Lisp if you plan on extending Emacs or adding
third-party extensions to Emacs. M-x customize allows you to customize the
environment, and all of the commands can be accessed through the menu
system.



===============================================================
From: Benjamin Stewart 
------------------------------------------------------



Indeed. Here's a sample of what you get for spending an hour in the built-in
Tutorial mode of either vim or emacs (I know and like both, take that editor
warriors!). None of this functionality required me to learn a language per
se, only a command. I'll grant you that the commands are convoluted until
you learn them, but there's built-in help!

* In one command, I can uncomment the next 17 lines of a config file
* In one command, I can search-and-replace every instance of $foo with $bar
* In one command, I can run an external program to check a config-file
without leaving the editor first
* Syntax highlighting on the cli
* Stack based kill-ring "multiple clipboard" (in Emacs)
* Powerful undo: I can get to any point in the file's history, 

===============================================================
From: Dave Brockman 
------------------------------------------------------
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Hash: SHA1


But if you learn a handful of commands in vi, you can edit text files on
any *nix server, over a dial-up SSH session....  I've only ever once
encountered *nix boxes without some flavor of vi, and I had to learn ex.
Or rather how to use the ex commands I knew from vi in a line editor :)

Regards,

dtb

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===============================================================
From: Stephen Haywood 
------------------------------------------------------
Good natured ribbing was my only intent. I know quite well how
powerful emacs and vi are. I've always been too lazy to use them
productively.

e
 to
is
r
g
g
e
vim,
:
it
m
utable-automatically/
char))))
boundary.")))))

===============================================================
From: Kenneth Ratliff 
------------------------------------------------------
I prefer vi for more practical reasons. It's for the same reason I 
prefer perl for doing my scripting. Perl and vi are installed on 
virtually every modern unix by default, so by learning and leveraging 
those tools, I can be just as effective on any platform I'm working 
under. Trying to work on a box that doesn't have the software you're 
used to, and you can't install it, will impact productivity.


===============================================================
From: Dan Lyke 
------------------------------------------------------
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===============================================================
From: Dave Brockman 
------------------------------------------------------
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I never said you couldn't use something else, just pointing out a useful
tidbit :)


When I look back at it now.... it's flat out amazing what little
hardware (486 DX2 66 IIRC, 128 MB, ~200MB SCSI2 HDD, NCR MP-RAS
installed from tape) could run an entire Krogers in the mid 90's.  From
an OS standpoint, they were stripped bare -- no man pages, no vi, no
compiler -- csh, ex and rtools was about it, outside of the application
specific utilities the App team played with :)

Regards,

dtb
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===============================================================
From: Dan Lyke 
------------------------------------------------------
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===============================================================
From: Kenneth Ratliff 
------------------------------------------------------
I think what screws with me the most is that the word 'gig' is now 
attached to numbers when talking about video card memory. We're a long 
ways away from my trusty Voodoo 2