Xno### [at] ezwvcom (G. Berry) writes:

> I don't want to start a long sub-thread about this, but what is so
> great about the practically lengendary "Emacs" editor I keep hearing
> agout? I tried a DOS port of it a long time ago, and found it very
> large and cumbersome to use. Please don't misunderstand me, I'm not
> trying to start a fight. I simply want to know what is the beauty of
> Emacs that I overlooked? So many satisfied users must know something
> about the program that I don't.   :)

  Well... it's big. It's powerful. It's highly customizable and
programmable (in Emacs Lisp). It can do almost anything (it is said that
the only thing it cannot do is make coffee for you): edit files, read mail,
read news, browse the web, display a calendar (with holidays), play games,
access FTP sites just like local directories, edit directories, etc. But
the most relevant characteristics (in the case of POV-Ray in particular and
programming in general) is syntax highlighting, automatic completion,
syntax checking, and calling of external programs (like make or
x-povray). You can do everything from your Emacs, edit your file, launch
POV-Ray, transfer the image on your web page via FTP...

  But, it's big. It's really big. It often uses several megabytes of
memory. And it's sometimes slow (it's interpreted Lisp, even if somewhat
byte-compiled). And its key combinations (shortcuts) sometimes seem really
cryptic to Windows user (ctrl-x ctrl-s for saving a file is not really the
Windows standard, nor is it the Mac one - it tends to be the Unix one,
though).

  Well. I personnally love Emacs, but I can see its drawbacks. I never saw
a better file editor (except vi in the case of very small files you want to
load fast), though.

Roland.

[Followup-To: junk, here is not the place to discuss these things.]

R.
-- 
Les francophones m'appellent Roland Mas,
English speakers call me Rowlannd' Mass,
Nihongode hanasu hitoha [Lolando Masu] to iimasu.
Choisissez ! Take your pick ! Erande kudasai !

Post a reply to this message