Should I start out learning emacs with ErgoEmacs? [closed]

Question

I am just beginning on emacs, and have just completed the tutorial. As a longtime Windows user (I am running emacs on Win7), the shortcuts do feel unintuitive, however I had expected that and was prepared to dedicate time to learning the commands.

However, I recently discovered the ErgoEmacs package, and I was wondering whether I should:

• start out with that, and then transition to normal shortcuts
• use ErgoEmacs 'forever'
• just stick with the normal bindings and then customize them as I see fit once my skills have improved?

Which of those options do you think would make me the most productive over many years of use?

Although I currently use Windows, I am looking to transition to Mac or Linux for daily usage within the next 12 months.

As a side note, would it be recommended for me to install the http://github.com/technomancy/emacs-starter-kit/? Would this conflict with ErgoEmacs at all?

My reason for using emacs is to try out Org-Mode, however I want to use it as my editor for everything in the near future, and probably other things like email, etc.

If anyone could help out with some configuration issues and help with setting up color-theme on Windows, that would be great too - https://superuser.com/questions/167110/how-to-use-emacs-color-theme-on-windows-and-help-with-the-emacs-emacs-d

Answer 1

I don't recommend starting out with ErgoEmacs.

I'd recommend starting out with vanilla Emacs. Give that a try to see if you like it. There has been a fair amount of thought put into the bindings, and the default ones are self-consistent and they behave consistently across the major modes. If you find that you are really unhappy with some bindings, then change them - either by loading features you find you like (ErgoEmacs, CUA mode, (shudder) Viper).

The way you become the most productive with it is to customize it to fit your needs. That can only come with time. I've used Emacs for 17 years now and am still customizing it to improve my workflow. It is naive to think that you'll become most productive with Emacs (or any tool) by simply adopting something like ErgoEmacs.

With respect to ErgoEmacs specifically, the key-bindings are probably easier for someone who has only used simple text editors or used editors with the mouse a lot. By overriding the C-c and C-x prefix maps, you lose access to a ton of functionality that you might not otherwise learn or know about. Additionally, by moving away from standard Emacs terminology, ErgoEmacs sets you up to communicate poorly with others in the Emacs community.

Also, by becoming comfortable with the default bindings for Emacs, you'll not find it as difficult to work in another person's environment when you have to.

ErgoEmacs is one person's opinion on how to be most comfortable with Emacs, you're welcome to use it. I feel it would be rather limiting and confining if you have the goal of being more than a novice user of Emacs.

Answer 2

I disagree with these comments. I've been using Emacs for a mere 15 years, but I moved to the ErgoEmacs keys (haven't used the Windows Binary that they ship) when I developed emacs pinky. The Emacs interface is terrible. Some of that is historical, and some of it is just bad ideas (movement keys should be laid out spatially, not according to their first letter). I don't think ErgoEmacs is perfect, but its a lot lot better. Its also been very well thought out. The Yank/Kill functionality gives you the full power of Emacs (well mostly, but nobody sane can use the parts left out), but provides a saner interface to it. He's also done a good job of overloading some functions so that they do the right thing according to context (capitalisation, remove white spaces, and another one).

I've customised it a little bit for my purposes (its Emacs. That's what its for), and I disabled the C-c/x/v stuff, as I was happy just using M-c/x/v for those. CUA seems to work fine now, but why risk it?

The other thing I'd recommend is moving the ctrl key so that its next to the Alt key. Preferably you should have an Alt and ctrl key on either side of the space bar. This will make a big difference to your hands.