Emacs power user screencast
platypope.org
platypope.org
I was hoping to see more of that angle in this video, but instead I just saw how emacs can be an IDE. I'd be very interested to just see a couple of classes (or any substantial chunk of code) written by an emacs "power user" without the narration and tutorial.
I've tried to do this, but it ends up being not very interesting. There is too much breadth; you really need to be familiar with all of emacs' features to be able to use them at the right time. For any given editing task, there are probably only a few features that you need. Learning the rest will save you time, but you only need the features occasionally. This means that you have to read the manual -- a screencast isn't going to help you. Practice is also essential. You need to burn the commands into your muscle memory, otherwise you aren't going to be very fast.
Emacs is like a musical instrument. You have to practice, and you're not going to become a virtuoso overnight.
Emacs users don't type or edit text faster than vi-users, they type and edit less text.
Its a hard thing to convince someone that Emacs is a better editor, when it's clearly and obviously worse at editing text.
viper-mode helps emacs be a better text-editor, but it also demonstrates that it is difficult to access that functionality that helps you type less and access the functionality that helps you type faster at the same time- it might not even sure it's possible.
Disclaimer: I wrote a vi-clone in Javascript, and for editing text, I use vi.
Anyway, I was hoping to see other things, but they were mostly clicky plugins, rather than little hidden ways to use emacs. What I found to be pretty powerful with emacs are stuff like using search to navigate, instead of the arrows, or replacing a regex across multiple files (albeit it's a long procedure). And even more so, you can edit these behaviors with eLisp if it's not to your liking. However, I wish there was a distribution package for elisp modules, rather than just cutting and pasting them off the web.
In my experience it took me at least a couple weeks of tinkering to get Emacs working well enough to replace most of the features I constantly use in TextMate.
I can understand how Emacs might not be right for others, but it is perfect for me.
It's zillion times more effective to navigate using find-file or just by jumping to an existing buffer.
Jumping to an existing buffer is fast.
For finding files, I like eproject:
http://github.com/jrockway/eproject/tree/master
For finding tags, I obviously prefer tags table lookups, with imenu for navigating inside files.
You can move to a specific position easier & faster in a mouse. When you're not in raw typing mode, you're mostly browsing and editing. Mice are useful for that, and the time lost in hopping over to the mouse from the keyboard is well worth it.
I can move a mouse very quickly, and I can be very accurate about it. Text cursors are harder to predict, and they jump around (as the page scrolls), making them harder to track than the mouse.
What really sold me on the idea was a good amount of time using a macintosh. A properly mouse-friendly environment makes you appreciate how useful the mouse can be.
Even back on a decent unix, I still love my select and middle-click to paste. Scroll wheels are also pretty wonderful.
Now, it's highly possible that this guy is very proficient at using Emacs, but I'd have preferred a screen cast on the _editing_ features of Emacs over replicating TextMate. For example, I would love to see someone re-do some of the bigger coding screen casts (such as the Ruby on Rails blog engine one) using Emacs. It has the potential to not be useful--I know my Vim configuration is different from the standard and that there are a wide variety of ways to do things, but it might be enlightening to someone like me.
I have to say, aesthetics make a big difference to me. I liked the icons in the project pane (though, with a mouse? Really?) and all, but that environment was far too spartan--uhh, ugly--for me. I use MacVim, and with a bit of color scheme tweaking, a nice font etc. etc. I have a pleasing environment to work in. Note I know you can do the same in Emacs, but the point was MacVim--it's the pretty scroll bars, the OS X anti-aliasing and all that makes it nice. I can't use Vim in a terminal for long periods of time. Obviously, this is definitely just me.
And then make another version of the video that highlights, in slow-motion and with a voiceover that explains what the heck is going on, those features as used in the original video.
I'm always a bit disappointed by screencasts slowly explaining how much faster you can work with the advanced features. Show, don't tell.
Anyway, people worry too much about this. Read the manual and practice the commands "in real life" (even if it means a trip to the manual to refresh your memory), and you'll quickly become able to edit effectively enough to not worry about editing mechanics anymore. It also helps to be a good typist, but that's not very fun to talk about.
Practice makes perfect.
I'm not trying to troll, I just am wondering what the big deal is.