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Re: ::scr Towards a better text editor
On Mon, Oct 01, 2001 at 11:57:26AM +0100, Richard Clamp said:
> Hrm, this old fucker. Okay, let's give it a go.
It's an acid test. If this can be a sensible discussion then that bodes well.
> Again you're already muddling all the types of text into one. Editing
> mail messages != editing code != editing structured data.
True. But Emacs and Vi even worse for this.
OTOH I think applications suck - c.f other thread.
> I think it's a fine tool for the job, when the job is composing
> email.
I agree. But i prefer it to everything else -
> C-x C-f, C-x C-s, and they're similarly terse in vi. Oh, my brain is
> hurting now.
C-x in Nano. I was being obtuse but you know what I meant. Plus key strokes in
Emacs aren't intuitive. In fact Emacs is not intuitive, not even internally.
> > the up arrow goes up, the down arrow goes down
>
> Snap.
Vi, OTOH, doesn't do this unless you're in editor mode. But shirley I'm in a
text editor. I want to be editing stuff. Aaaargh.
Nurse, the restraints, I'm getting loose again.
> Oh good, heavens forbid you'd want to save on screen space by actually
> remembering what you're doing. Editing text couldn't possibly be
> something you'd learn once and use consistently without expending any
> further mental effort on it, that would just be silly.
Fair point, well made. It would be nice to turn them of. Say, by typing M-X :)
What I meant to say was that all the common commands fit onto two lines at the
bottom which makes it easier to start using at first.
> Because it's not an editor for programming with?
True. However I'd like an editor that I can do both in. Or two but with
identical key commands.
> That's okay, people would only waste space writing elite for it, eh?
Not if it was simple enough.
> Exactly what text are you editing? Define the job and the best tool
> will probably make itself known a lot more readily.
I don't think that the best tool exists at the moment. Which is what I'm
asking about. What features should a text editor have and where do you stop
before it gets too bloated?
--
: nature notes for the apocalypse