4 ms·

Emacs is full of these. In its defense, Emacs predates most modern UI paradigms (including, y'know, Ctl-C/V for copy-paste, or calling things "windows" vs "fra

Emacs is full of these. In its defense, Emacs predates most modern UI paradigms (including, y'know, Ctl-C/V for copy-paste, or calling things "windows" vs "frames"), and is very conservative about updating defaults due to inertia.

Forge36 3y ago
Do you have a list of favorites?
- AceJohnny2 3y ago
  On Mac, assign traditional keybinds to Command/⌘ shortcuts (⌘-C/V for copy-paste, -S for save, etc). Display the current column number in the modeline with (setq column-number-mode t) Delete the selected area when overwriting by enabling (setq delete-selection-mode t) Save sessions (all open buffers/files) automatically on quit with (setq desktop-save-mode t) Display line numbers in the left gutter with (setq global-linum-mode t) Wrap lines (with a convenient icon in the gutter to indicate line continuation) with (setq global-visual-line-mode t). Bonus: linum-mode compatible! Skip that startup screen with (setq inhibit-startup-screen t) Remove the limited and redundant icon toolbar with (setq tool-bar-mode nil) Make emacs automatically refresh buffers whose underlying file has changed (and has no local unsaved modifications) with (setq global-auto-revert-mode t) All of the above variables can also be customized through Emacs' excellent Customize, which is better than individually doing each (setq ...) I wrote above. And these are just from a quick skim of my .emacs file... Decades ago, when a college friend espoused the merits of Emacs, I didn't get it because my first experience with a vanilla setup was so... limited. This is also why people will laud more "batteries-included" distributions like Spacemacs or Doom Emacs.
  - monsieurbanana 3y ago
    I agree that you need to customize Emacs rather heavily before it can be used as a "modern" editor. I'm not a fan of most of your changes though, which highlights how hard it is to have defaults that please everybody in something as complex as Emacs.
  - pvaldes 3y ago
    the desktop-save-mode option is gold... thanks
  - Forge36 3y ago
    Thanks! I added ``` (setq column-number-mode t desktop-save-mode t display-line-numbers t global-auto-revert-mode t) (delete-selection-mode) (global-display-line-numbers-mode) ``` `delete-selection-mode` when set as a variable didn't work. `display-line-numbers` appears to replace `global-linum-mode`
LordShredda 3y ago
Emacs is unbelievably full of them, but at the very least if it's missing a switch you can program it yourself easily (and fix any bugs yourself too). Not sure if that's a pro or a con, but the option is there.
- AceJohnny2 3y ago
  > you can program it yourself easily I consider myself a seasoned programmer, but after a decade I continue to fail to do any significant customization (other than a tidy .emacs leveraging use-package (since before it was cool^H^H integrated by default)). Lisp's syntax is easy, but Emacs' API surface and concepts are bewildering, especially due to its aforementioned mismatch with modern terms.
  - throwaway143829 3y ago
    I found it somewhat hilarious that you wrote a prose sentence with nested parentheses then began the next sentence with "Lisp's syntax is easy"
    - AceJohnny2 3y ago
      (: ;)
pnathan 3y ago
Eh. I think that's just of how emacs IS and the tutorials I remember all dealt with it. I also don't think they were jackasses by default...

Forge36 3y ago

Do you have a list of favorites?

AceJohnny2 3y ago
On Mac, assign traditional keybinds to Command/⌘ shortcuts (⌘-C/V for copy-paste, -S for save, etc). Display the current column number in the modeline with (setq column-number-mode t) Delete the selected area when overwriting by enabling (setq delete-selection-mode t) Save sessions (all open buffers/files) automatically on quit with (setq desktop-save-mode t) Display line numbers in the left gutter with (setq global-linum-mode t) Wrap lines (with a convenient icon in the gutter to indicate line continuation) with (setq global-visual-line-mode t). Bonus: linum-mode compatible! Skip that startup screen with (setq inhibit-startup-screen t) Remove the limited and redundant icon toolbar with (setq tool-bar-mode nil) Make emacs automatically refresh buffers whose underlying file has changed (and has no local unsaved modifications) with (setq global-auto-revert-mode t) All of the above variables can also be customized through Emacs' excellent Customize, which is better than individually doing each (setq ...) I wrote above. And these are just from a quick skim of my .emacs file... Decades ago, when a college friend espoused the merits of Emacs, I didn't get it because my first experience with a vanilla setup was so... limited. This is also why people will laud more "batteries-included" distributions like Spacemacs or Doom Emacs.
- monsieurbanana 3y ago
  I agree that you need to customize Emacs rather heavily before it can be used as a "modern" editor. I'm not a fan of most of your changes though, which highlights how hard it is to have defaults that please everybody in something as complex as Emacs.
- pvaldes 3y ago
  the desktop-save-mode option is gold... thanks
- Forge36 3y ago
  Thanks! I added ``` (setq column-number-mode t desktop-save-mode t display-line-numbers t global-auto-revert-mode t) (delete-selection-mode) (global-display-line-numbers-mode) ``` `delete-selection-mode` when set as a variable didn't work. `display-line-numbers` appears to replace `global-linum-mode`

LordShredda 3y ago

Emacs is unbelievably full of them, but at the very least if it's missing a switch you can program it yourself easily (and fix any bugs yourself too). Not sure if that's a pro or a con, but the option is there.

AceJohnny2 3y ago
> you can program it yourself easily I consider myself a seasoned programmer, but after a decade I continue to fail to do any significant customization (other than a tidy .emacs leveraging use-package (since before it was cool^H^H integrated by default)). Lisp's syntax is easy, but Emacs' API surface and concepts are bewildering, especially due to its aforementioned mismatch with modern terms.
- throwaway143829 3y ago
  I found it somewhat hilarious that you wrote a prose sentence with nested parentheses then began the next sentence with "Lisp's syntax is easy"
  - AceJohnny2 3y ago
    (: ;)

pnathan 3y ago

Eh. I think that's just of how emacs IS and the tutorials I remember all dealt with it. I also don't think they were jackasses by default...