3 ms·

> I'd say that's kinda a big selling point of Emacs though: you can write elisp code to make anything you do (not just writing code) less of a pain. I agree in

> I'd say that's kinda a big selling point of Emacs though: you can write elisp code to make anything you do (not just writing code) less of a pain. I agree in principle, but in practice, I find myself writing a lot of ELisp just to work around Emacs' shortcomings. E.g. on macOS, to support dark/light theme switching integrated with the rest of the system, I need an external program[0], a shell script to tell that program to call emacsclient, a LaunchAgent to keep it running, an unholy build of Emacs with all of the GNU-unapproved Cocoa integrations that some kind soul is maintaining, and only THEN a piece of ELisp (which is also calling out to AppleScript) to actually change the theme[1]. And as I wrote this, I realised half of this glue didn't even make it into version control. [0]: https://github.com/cormacrelf/dark-notify https://github.com/cormacrelf/dark-notify [1]: https://github.com/rollcat/dotfiles/blob/7f6a6d7/.emacs.d/init.el#L134 https://github.com/rollcat/dotfiles/blob/7f6a6d7/.emacs.d/in... I've been using Emacs for about 20 years, and with every passing year I just wish there was *less* ELisp for me to think about. The actual useful customisations (like adding the +x bit on shell scripts) are few and far between, most of it is just glue and fixes.

morelisp 4y ago
> a shell script to tell that program to call emacsclient, a LaunchAgent to keep it running, an unholy build of Emacs with all of the GNU-unapproved Cocoa integrations that some kind soul is maintaining, and only THEN a piece of ELisp (which is also calling out to AppleScript) to actually change the theme[1] Why isn't your Emacs session running dark-notify itself, reading its output, and switching accordingly? That seems to remove the need for shell script running emacsclient, the launch agent, and the OSA integration. (But also, I thought ns-do-applescript was stock Emacs? At least I had some ELisp using it and I only ever used emacsformacosox.)
- rollcat 4y ago
  > Why isn't your Emacs session running dark-notify itself, reading its output, and switching accordingly? Thanks for the hint. Maybe I would try that first, if it popped into my head when I was originally writing it; but at this point, it works, and I want less stuff in init.el. Also I will likely reuse the dark-notify script to change the theme in Terminal.app as well, and Terminal.app doesn't have an ELisp runtime. (Also very weird that Apple's own software doesn't properly support this.) > But also, I thought ns-do-applescript was stock Emacs? I don't know. I've switched to macOS only a couple years ago, and the Emacs build I've initially used didn't have it.

morelisp 4y ago

> a shell script to tell that program to call emacsclient, a LaunchAgent to keep it running, an unholy build of Emacs with all of the GNU-unapproved Cocoa integrations that some kind soul is maintaining, and only THEN a piece of ELisp (which is also calling out to AppleScript) to actually change the theme[1] Why isn't your Emacs session running dark-notify itself, reading its output, and switching accordingly? That seems to remove the need for shell script running emacsclient, the launch agent, and the OSA integration. (But also, I thought ns-do-applescript was stock Emacs? At least I had some ELisp using it and I only ever used emacsformacosox.)

rollcat 4y ago
> Why isn't your Emacs session running dark-notify itself, reading its output, and switching accordingly? Thanks for the hint. Maybe I would try that first, if it popped into my head when I was originally writing it; but at this point, it works, and I want less stuff in init.el. Also I will likely reuse the dark-notify script to change the theme in Terminal.app as well, and Terminal.app doesn't have an ELisp runtime. (Also very weird that Apple's own software doesn't properly support this.) > But also, I thought ns-do-applescript was stock Emacs? I don't know. I've switched to macOS only a couple years ago, and the Emacs build I've initially used didn't have it.