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Heh. Emacs/lisp users always make posts like: "look at this great [thing] to completely simplify [thing]" while simultaneously posting 82 steps to get it all w

Heh. Emacs/lisp users always make posts like: "look at this great [thing] to completely simplify [thing]" while simultaneously posting 82 steps to get it all working and automated :)

AceJohnny2 8y ago
Isn't that what so much of what programming is about? Invest all the work once up-front so that the next iterations are trivial?
- Omnius 8y ago
  Something like 80% of software costs are maintenance.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- pixelrevision 8y ago
  Of course and it's fun! :) I also often find myself going through all the steps in one of these articles then when I'm all ready to reap the results of success I move on to something else.
- setr 8y ago
  The trap is when you invest all the work up front.... and the next() call immediately returns StopIteration Which seems to happen quite often when people customize their software, especially up-front, instead of over time. I suppose you could describe it as waterfall-style customization
  - tincholio 8y ago
    This probably goes in waves for many people. When you just start, you're tempted to do all the clever little things you see online, and may end up being a bit lost. Once you've learned a bit more, it becomes second nature to a) make the tweaks you need and b) filter out those you don't. I, for one, enjoy the ability to adapt my editing/workflow as my needs evolve.
JoshMnem 8y ago
"Hacking" isn't pushing buttons on restrictive out-of-the-box solutions that someone else configured for you -- it's tinkering with things to make them work exactly how you want. Customizing editors and operating systems for one's own personal workflow is an enjoyable part of the process.
- peatfreak 8y ago
  Yes, I enjoy it too. I did spend a lot of time doing this when I was a student and during my bachelor years.
Ambrevar 8y ago
It's not really the case here: I did not detail the steps for setting up Org-publish. I detailed some hacks (in the original sense) to extend it to suit my needs. Org-publish is really straightforward and works very well out of the box.
peatfreak 8y ago
> Emacs/lisp users always make posts like: "look at this great [thing] to completely simplify [thing]" while simultaneously posting 82 steps to get it all working and automated :) LOL. As a dyed-in-the-wool Emacs user for 20 years, I have to admit that this is true. On the other hand, it makes me happy that the flagship software project of Free software is still alive and kicking. Moreover, people have been making these comments about Emacs ever since the early 1980's. These days, my .emacs is very minimal and on any new machine my standard setup can be manually recreated in five minutes, mostly using Customize. There is no need for any complicated thing that has to be automatically downloaded and updated in-place from a source control management repository. This is especially important when, for example, you are working in a heavily fortified corporate network, where access to the outside Internet needs to go through strange proxies if it is allowed at all. And in these cases it's usually a stressful environment to begin with, so when your boss -- who doesn't know anything about programming and just wants to see results quickly, dammit -- asks you what you've been doing all day, you don't want to have to explain that you spent all your time figuring out how to get Emacs to work over the corporate proxy.

Heh. Emacs/lisp users always make posts like: "look at this great [thing] to completely simplify [thing]" while simultaneously posting 82 steps to get it all working and automated :)

AceJohnny2 8y ago

Isn't that what so much of what programming is about? Invest all the work once up-front so that the next iterations are trivial?

Omnius 8y ago
Something like 80% of software costs are maintenance.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
pixelrevision 8y ago
Of course and it's fun! :) I also often find myself going through all the steps in one of these articles then when I'm all ready to reap the results of success I move on to something else.
setr 8y ago
The trap is when you invest all the work up front.... and the next() call immediately returns StopIteration Which seems to happen quite often when people customize their software, especially up-front, instead of over time. I suppose you could describe it as waterfall-style customization
- tincholio 8y ago
  This probably goes in waves for many people. When you just start, you're tempted to do all the clever little things you see online, and may end up being a bit lost. Once you've learned a bit more, it becomes second nature to a) make the tweaks you need and b) filter out those you don't. I, for one, enjoy the ability to adapt my editing/workflow as my needs evolve.

JoshMnem 8y ago

"Hacking" isn't pushing buttons on restrictive out-of-the-box solutions that someone else configured for you -- it's tinkering with things to make them work exactly how you want. Customizing editors and operating systems for one's own personal workflow is an enjoyable part of the process.

peatfreak 8y ago
Yes, I enjoy it too. I did spend a lot of time doing this when I was a student and during my bachelor years.

Ambrevar 8y ago

It's not really the case here: I did not detail the steps for setting up Org-publish. I detailed some hacks (in the original sense) to extend it to suit my needs. Org-publish is really straightforward and works very well out of the box.

peatfreak 8y ago

> Emacs/lisp users always make posts like: "look at this great [thing] to completely simplify [thing]" while simultaneously posting 82 steps to get it all working and automated :) LOL. As a dyed-in-the-wool Emacs user for 20 years, I have to admit that this is true. On the other hand, it makes me happy that the flagship software project of Free software is still alive and kicking. Moreover, people have been making these comments about Emacs ever since the early 1980's. These days, my .emacs is very minimal and on any new machine my standard setup can be manually recreated in five minutes, mostly using Customize. There is no need for any complicated thing that has to be automatically downloaded and updated in-place from a source control management repository. This is especially important when, for example, you are working in a heavily fortified corporate network, where access to the outside Internet needs to go through strange proxies if it is allowed at all. And in these cases it's usually a stressful environment to begin with, so when your boss -- who doesn't know anything about programming and just wants to see results quickly, dammit -- asks you what you've been doing all day, you don't want to have to explain that you spent all your time figuring out how to get Emacs to work over the corporate proxy.