3 ms·
M-x wordstar-mode provides a major mode with WordStar-like key bindings. (I just tried it, although it's been so long since I used wordstar - when I was a kid
by singingfish 10y ago
M-x wordstar-mode provides a major mode with WordStar-like key bindings. (I just tried it, although it's been so long since I used wordstar - when I was a kid - that I've forgotten all the keybindings so couldn't work out how to exit emacs)
- pvg 10y agoRight but it's not the same thing, just some (incomplete) keybindings. Wordstar fundamentally deals with attributed text. It knows what pages are. It has a different UI. Etc, etc. It's Ctrl-K-x, btw.
- tincholio 10y agoAgree on the attributed text (though not on the need of it for writing prose), but Emacs also understands the concept of pages (you can insert page breaks at will by using form-feed characters, ^L)
- pvg 10y agoInserting form feeds is not 'understands the concept of pages'. As to the other thing, I'm not sure 'you don't need that feature' is likely to convince a professional writer/Wordstar user to take up emacs.
- CJefferson 10y agoEmacs doesn't understand pages at all, it just lets you put in page breaks. But it would let you make a page 500 lines long without comment, or checking, and it won't let you preview "page by page".
- flukus 10y agoWould lyx (http://www.lyx.org/ http://www.lyx.org/) be a modern day equivalent then?
- pvg 10y agoNo no, just 'attributed' where the attributes are things like 'bold', it's not a thing that really focuses on structure like LaTeX. There's nothing particularly magical about Wordstar, it's just an early and popular word processor from the 80s. The fact that there are fiction writers still using it probably says less about Wordstar itself and more about the role of tools in creative writing.