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> At the same time, it doesn't add anything useful to editing itself. It's basically scriptable MS Notepad. I don't know, fill-paragraph (M-q), the sexp comman

• gnull 5y ago
  Vim provides a different, more efficient modal language for talking to the editor (which Kakoune further improves). Emacs on the other hand doesn't, it just gives you some ad-hoc shortcuts. Emacs's language is no different from the one of Notepad or VS Code. It's the language of insert mode + scripted shortcuts. Shortcuts can improve your experience, yes, but not in such a fundamental way as a new model of editing. UPD. For example, the Emacs way of dealing with tables in markdown/latex is to have a custom plugin which will have a separate shortcut for each action one might want. As a consequence, you need to remember the keys for each of them. Kakoune, on the other hand, gives you a language that can express most of those operations naturally. And the language is no different than the one you use for other everyday tasks, no need to memorize new shortcuts.
  • gnubison 5y ago
    > it just gives you some ad-hoc shortcuts Give me M-q any day over gqap (or, if you're inside a multiline comment, 3gqq; or, if you're inside a multiline comment starting on the same line as code, just giving up). Edit: though I have to admit that I'm missing 'dt.', 'd/something', etc.
    • cosmojg 5y ago
      Have you tried Evil?
    • karthink 5y ago
      'df.' is simulated with M-z (zap-to-char). There's also a zap-up-to-char command that corresponds to 'dt.', but it's not bound to anything by default. There's no doubt that it's all ad hoc though. 'd/something' is doable with C-s something RET C-w, but it's already getting tedious in comparison.
      • gnubison 5y ago
        Thanks for the tip about zap-up-to-char. > 'd/something' is doable with C-s something RET C-w Doesn't this need to be C-s something C-r RET C-w? Because C-s positions the cursor at the end of the search match.
  • daptaq 5y ago
    > it just gives you some ad-hoc shortcuts What do you mean by ad-hoc? They seem to me be chosen and bound by default, because they are useful in practice. > Kakoune, on the other hand, gives you a language that can express most of those operations naturally. And the language is no different than the one you use for other everyday tasks, no need to memorize new shortcuts. Could you point me to some example? And I am not sure if what you say about Emacs is necessarily true, you could have a minor mode that modifies the default keys to work with text tables. Org-mode's table implementation is a good example for that.
    • gnull 5y ago
      > they are useful in practice Useful, yes, but ad-hoc. > What do you mean by ad-hoc? I mean that in Emacs you have one ready to use action for everything you might want to do. One shortcut covers exactly one use case; if you want more use cases covered, install plugins or write scripts. M-q is an example, it formats the current paragraph. What if I want to format something other that a paragraph? In Emacs, you will need a new shortcut and a new keybinding for that. In Vim-like editors you have some small atomic terms that you can combine to build the actions. You can have a small number of atomic terms, which can be combined in a multitude of ways and therefore cover a multitude of use cases. In Vim the gqap is not a single take it or leave it action, it's a sentence with verb gq and noun ap. If you want the verb to act on something different, you replace the ap part with something else. Think of keybindings as a language you speak to your editor. In Vim the language has a number of words that you can combine to build sentences. In Emacs you have only a given number of ready to use sentences, and you have to memorize each one. This is a big distinction if we're talking about a text editor for efficiency, because it defines the ratio “time spent customizing” / “time saved editing”. > Could you point me to some example? You can cut and paste columns in Markdown tables using Kakoune's multiple selections. Like this: - <a-i>p -- select the paragraph - <a-s><a-;>; -- this creates a cursor at the beginning of each line - <a-f>| -- move cursor to the next pipe symbol (selecting everything as it moves) - <a-.> -- repeat the last move command (do this to select the column you want) - d -- delete the selected (by each of the selection) - <a-f>| (or <a-b>|) -- again to move cursors where you want to paste things - p -- paste the deleted column In this example, I haven't used a single command that I don't normally use while editing, say, Rust or Haskell. And you can manipulate Org, Latex tables with similar commands. In Emacs, you'd need a separate plugin for each of these, wouldn't you? Kakoune.org has more videos where they show what it can do (without plugins).
• lelanthran 5y ago
  > fill-paragraph (M-q), I use C-u-M-q. I prefer that text layout.