Re: Having difficulty turning programmer onto emacs. What to demo? Features?

[Pferor]

dkcombs@panix.com (David Combs) writes:

> Hi there --
>
> Am trying to turn on someone to Emacs (gnu) -- been showing dired (to
> me one of the cooler things), even wdired, (even doctor!), etc.
>
> What suggestions might you have, for getting someone excited about it?
>
> (Of course, he currently uses VI.)
>
> Thanks!
>
> David
>
>

I was a VI user for quite ten years and then I switched to Emacs. I
still use VI in other computers rather than mine, but Emacs is now my
default application.

May be, telling you what it make me switch to Emacs you'll have some
idea where to go from. Of course,... nobody tried to convince me to use
Emacs, it was my own choice, but it may help.

Emacs is not just an editor, it's an incredible platform. The
productivity increases in a very large amount just using Emacs and all
its features. I can do every task inside Emacs (programming, compiling,
instant messaging, multimedia system --emms--, sending/receiving mail,
video editing --GNEVE--, newsgroups,...)

I think you should focus on particular cases; hypothetical problems to
be solved using VI and then using Emacs, and let him compare the results
and decide about what is best.

First begin with small tasks, the complicated ones should scary at
first ("too many keystrokes to remember, etc.") like:

  * Let's search and replace using regular expresions

  * Let's make an HTML table (table-capture,...)

  * Let's code in C (c-mode, flymake,...)

Let him create the scenarios and propose more of those problems, and
show him how you deal with them in Emacs.  Do not focus it as in a "VI
vs. Emacs" war. Just show him another choice.

Show him the Emacs screencasts you can find in:

  * http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/EmacsScreencasts

And at last, show him the power of the mayor and minor modes, i.e. how
the editor adatps to the user, and not viceversa. I think the modes is
by far the best feature.

If he complains about the keybindings, show him /vile/ (VI like Emacs) :-)


-- 
Pferor

--- news://freenews.netfront.net/ - complaints: news@netfront.net ---