🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1197@udccvax1.acs.udel.EDU> fowser@vax1.acs.udel.EDU (Scott Fowser) writes:
>I am interested to know why so many people prefer EMACS to Vi.

[donning flame-pruif jammies]
Oh Ghod, here come the Holy Editor Wars. People, can we keep them on an
information level this time? The man *is* just asking for preferences.

>I decided to try it out, but from what I see in the tutorial, it seems
>that most of the commands must be preceeded by a control or an escape.
>If this is the case, using EMACS sounds quite inconvenient.

Yes, many commands in EMACS must be used in conjunction with control,
escape, meta (where available), or even meta-x. You get used to it after
a while. It helps if you have a keyboard layout that has these keys in
easy striking range.

>One feature about vi that I like is the ability to keep you fingers in
>one place during the whole editing session, whether inserting or
>editing.  Having to press escape to leave insert mode is inconvenient, but
>I define "K" to mean escape from insert mode with
>
>:map! K ^[
>
>In the rare case that you need a K inserted, just put a ^V first.  With
>this your hands can stay in about the same position for almost the
>whole editing session.
>
>I assume EMACS must have some more advanced features that give it an
>advantage over vi in some situations, but the only ones I can see are
>windows and that it is free.  I would be interested in hearing the
>advantages of EMACS for just basic editing, since I am willing to
>switch to EMACS if it really is better.

Some interesting EMACS features:

    Bind any command to any key, including another keymap; this is how
    commands like C-X 4 C-F (find-file-other-window) are created.

    Run an arbitrary UNIX command on an arbitrary region, placing
    output in its place or in another window

    Compile, toss the errors in a *compilation* window (while you edit
    something else), and step from error to error in the source code

    Record a series of keystrokes (as you edit), for later playback;
    these keyboard macros can be named, bound to keys, saved to files,
    and so on.

I use EMACS a lot, for the above features.  But then, I read news with
RN and use VI for quick editing sessions, so you might say that I have
not completely converted to EMACS.

If you really like the VI command structure better, but want to use
EMACS' additional features, there is a VI mode in Emacs. There are also
mail handling tools, news reading tools, and anything else that the
denizens of the network have deemed desirable to have.

(ps- Not all versions of EMACS are free ...)
-- 
   Greg Limes [limes@sun.com]			Illigitimi Non Carborundum