🚀 go-pugleaf

.\" emacs.1, 921202
.\" use troff -ms to format
.\"
.\" Barbara-
.\" 
.\" Here is my first cut at the March column.
.\" 
.\" I have copied the text to a few folks for their comments.
.\" 
.\" -Rich
.\" 
.\" P.S. to "a few folks":
.\"
.\" I only have ~750 words, so please don't suggest major additions.  On
.\" the other hand, please let me know if I've bozed, skipped something
.\" important, etc.	-R
.\"
.\" Copyright 1992, Richard Morin.  All Rights Reserved.
.\"
.\" Calc, Elisp, Emacs, Epoch, Hyperbole, Lemacs, Mule
.\"
.\" archive.cis.ohio-state.edu				* Elisp Archive
.\"	/pub/gnu/emacs/elisp-archive
.\"
.\" etlport.etl.go.jp					* Mule
.\"	/pub/mule
.\"
.\" labrea.stanford.edu					* Lemacs
.\"	/pub/gnu/lucid
.\"
.\" prep.ai.mit.edu					* Calc, Emacs
.\"	/pub/gnu
.\"
.\" cs.uiuc.edu						* Epoch
.\"	/pub/epoch-files/epoch
.\"
.\" wilma.cs.brown.edu					* Hyperbole
.\"	/pub/hyperbole
.\"
.\" "a few folks":
.\"
.\"	andrew@ureview.com barbara@ureview.com
.\"	tower@ai.mit.edu gnu@cygnus.com
.\"	de5@ornl.gov epoch@cs.uiuc.edu
.\" 	bob_weiner@pts.mot.com
.\"	fhp@unipress.com pat@unipress.com msk@unipress.com
.\" 
.TL
The Internet Notebook
.br

.br
Emacs and E-hax...
.AU
By Richard Morin
.LP
Emacs isn't just a text editor.
It's a complete, consistent user environment, supporting multiple windows,
language-specific editing, an extension language, etc.
It is also well on its way to becoming a major religion among UNIX users.
.LP
As a text editor, Emacs is both powerful and flexible.
It supports arbitrary line length, any number of edit buffers, etc.
It handles both ASCII and binary files.
It has mode and buffer specific key bindings,
giving full user control over what each key does.
It can emulate other editors, such as EDT and vi.
.LP
Emacs also works well as a programming environment.
It has syntax-specific support for several languages
(assembler, C, C++, Eiffel, Fortran, Lisp, Modula-2,
Pascal, Sather, Simula, etc.)
It is commonly extended to provide error-tracking and other debug facilities.
.LP
The Emacs extension language (Elisp) is a variant of Lisp.
If you can get past the "insidious parenthetical format", 
you will find it a very powerful programming language.
Others certainly have \(em
there are a \fIvery\fP large number of Elisp tools,
toys, and other hacks (see below).
.SH
GNU Emacs
.LP
This is the definitive freeware Emacs.
It is available by FTP from GNU archives
(\fCprep.ai.mit.edu /pub/gnu\fP and other sites).
The basic Emacs distribution is \fCemacs-18.*.tar.Z\fP.
The Elisp and Emacs manuals are also available
(\fCelisp-manual-*.tar.Z\fP, \fCemacs-manual-*.dvi.Z\fP),
but you are probably better off ordering printed copies from the
Free Software Foundation (FSF; Cambridge, MA).
.LP
GNU Emacs is supported by the FSF.
The FSF also distributes GNU software on tape,
and sells printed manuals for quite a few GNU packages.
No matter how you get GNU software, please send some money to the FSF,
so they can continue their fine development and support efforts.
.SH
Epoch, Lemacs, Mule, etc.
.LP
If you are an X aficionado,
you may be disappointed by the level of mouse support in Version 18.
Version 19 promises to resolve this,
but you may be in too much of a hurry to wait.
If so, consider picking up
Epoch (\fCcs.uiuc.edu /pub/epoch-files/epoch\fP) or
Lucid Emacs ("Lemacs", \fClabrea.stanford.edu /pub/gnu/lucid\fP).
.LP
Epoch can be considered an unofficial preview of Emacs 19;
all of its major features will be included in Emacs 19.
Most of Lemacs' features will be included,
but some (e.g., "active regions") may take a while to show up.
.LP
Emacs has spread, like UNIX, to sites around the world.
The MULtilingual Enhancement to GNU Emacs (Mule) was developed
to support editing in languages other than English.
As you might guess from its Japanese archive location
(\fCetlport.etl.go.jp /pub/mule\fP), Mule is well suited to Japanese.
It also supports other languages,
judging from its collection of (Chinese, Cyrillic, and SiSheng) fonts.
.SH
E-hax
.LP
Elisp, as noted above, is a powerful extension language for Emacs.
The largest archive of Elisp code is at Ohio State University
(\fCarchive.cis.ohio-state.edu /pub/gnu/emacs/elisp-archive\fP).
The summary file (\fCLCD-datafile.Z\fP) contains over 800 entries.
These include games, specialized editing modes, a netnews reader,
assorted text filters, etc.
.LP
As with most grand archives, the versions at OSU may not be totally current.
For instance, the copy of \fChyperbole\fP is almost a year out of date.
Use the version on the archive as a starting point,
then check around, if desired, for a more current version.
.LP
Hyperbole is one of the more adventurous E-hax I've seen.
It is a prototype hypertext system,
in development by Bob Weiner of Brown University
(\fCwilma.cs.brown.edu /pub/hyperbole\fP).
As he describes it:
.QP
Hyperbole is an open, efficient, programmable prototype information
management system with a hypertextual flavor.
It can be used for everyday work on any UNIX-type platform supported by
GNU Emacs. [also Epoch and Lemacs]
It is easy to pick up and use since it introduces only a few new
mechanisms and provides user-level facilities through a menu interface,
for ease of modification.
It includes a mouse interface for browsing documentation in GNU Info format.
.SH
Commercial Support
.LP
UniPress (Edison, NJ) sells a commercial version of Emacs.
It has a somewhat different extension language (Mlisp),
and is tailored to the needs of commercial sites and end users.
Cygnus Support (Mountain View, CA) provides commercial support for a
range of GNU software, including GNU Emacs.
.SH
Acknowledgements
.LP
Much of the material in this column is abstracted from Bob Weiner's
article "For What is GNU Emacs Useful?",
available as \fCwhy-gnu-emacs\fP in the \fChyperbole\fP FTP directory.
I would also like to thank assorted Emacs enthusiasts who looked
over this piece on its way to publication.