Xah Emacs Blog Archive 2018-06
emacs meetup SF Bay Area, in Oakland, July 7th
next emacs meetup SF Bay Area, in Oakland, July 7th. https://www.meetup.com/Emacs-SF/events/251665595/ mark it in org mode todo! (and i think there's one In Mountain View after, which i'll attend)
again, you can host your own emacs meetup in your area. you can use the site https://www.meetup.com/
to find the date of meeup xyz, i usually go to the site, login, then you can search.
emacs muscle exercise. extract a unicode html table
goto http://unicode.org/emoji/charts/text-style.html there are 3 columns. Extract them so that you have 3 lines of emoji in plain text. (line can be paragraph or list) use any means in emacs or elisp. Or, bonus if you can do it easier outside of emacs.
long lines in emacs true pain
true pain in emacs. sometimes you copy paste a long line into emacs by mistake. e.g. html source of http://unicode.org/emoji/charts/text-style.html then it takes 5 fkg minutes to get out.
ways to avoid shift key
here's the solution i use to avoid Shift key
might try turn on Sticky key in your operating system. (usually under accessibility/disabled-help)
i've tried to ban it completely. Ban Shift Key
currently i use xah-upcase-sentence
Emacs: Upcase Sentences 🚀
and
xah-title-case-region-or-line
Emacs: Change to Title Case 🚀
and
xah-toggle-letter-case
Emacs: Usability Problems of Letter-Case Changing Commands
for most of my upcase needs.
for paren/bracket, i use lead sequence Space e t (dvorak) in Xah Fly Keys. Emacs: Insert Brackets by Pair 🚀
if you are using ergodox, keyboardio, etc that has programable firmware, you can set a thumb key (such as Space Enter Backspace ⌫) to double as Shift when held down. Amir Rajan suggested this:
emacs hangout, Thursday, 28 June, 6pm San Francisco time
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H17PtDCxWmE
please join us. cc @sachac @johnkitchin @howardabrams few persons i love to see, and many others (you!), please do join, hosted by the great @JaafarTrull i met in last hangout and SF meetup.
jeff trull announcement on twitter [ https://twitter.com/JaafarTrull/status/1011810892206358528 accessed: 2018-06-27]
twitter comment [ https://twitter.com/ErgoEmacs/status/1011818010112217088 accessed: 2018-06-27]
reddit comment https://www.reddit.com/r/emacs/comments/8u7lqp/emacs_google_hangout_join_have_fun_chat/
alias outline mode to org mode
(defalias 'outline-mode 'org-mode)
(actually that didn't work for some reason. i haven't had time to find out why)
annoying outline, screws Xah Fly Keys. and, by the way, itself is useless. org-mode is superset + easier keys.
emacs quiz. print string of unicode variation selectors
quick, use emacs to print a string containing U+FE0E to U+FE0F. you can use any emacs ways, or write a emacs lisp function. tips:
now you can get my tutorial by paying me via amazon egift card.
emacs + 3 huge screen + eye tracking + ergodox
streaming live now. https://www.twitch.tv/amirrajan
his tweet. [ https://twitter.com/amirrajan/status/1008041824911536128 accessed: 2018-06-16]
writing a major mode, free form or not
currently fret about whether my xah html mode should be based on: (1) fundamental-mode (2) emacs 26 mhtml mode. With (1), am free to have it however i like. simplicity. but it won't syntax color html from the wild “correctly”. Though, that's not that important.
problem of basing on emacs html-mode or the new mhtml-mode is that, the code becomes EXTREMELY complex. you got 3k lines mucking under it in sgml mode. you don't have control or flexibility, unless u understand those 3k lines
xah-html-mode itself is 3.5k lines. They are text transformation code. Only 0.2k lines are about syntax coloring.
minor update.
base programing language major mode on prog-mode?
in emacs lisp, it's common to hear recommendation that programing language mode should be based on prog-mode. after looking at the code of prog-mode, am not sure it's a very a good idea.
I think there's not that much benefit for doing so. Meanwhile, it limits flexibility of major mode design. Also, just a tiny bit. So overall, either way, i think it's not that useful.
ELisp: Char data type (new page on its own)
ELisp: Syntax Table (updated)
emacs abbrev video tutorial
got a comment. “Nothing works in emacs26-nox”. about my Xah Fly Keys. Sometimes, it's really annoying to do open source.
Emacs: Xah Fly Keys Customization, added a section on how to Change Command Mode Key Depending on Major Mode
starting to casually write about emacs 26 new features.
am starting to casually write about emacs 26 new features.
here's the news file Emacs 26 (Released 2018-06)
am going to edit it as i read it.
one problem of emacs is that its features file, is cryptic. i've used emacs for 20 years now and am reasonable expert at elisp, but half of “NEWS” file i don't understand, without spending lots time digging into each. Same for others who've used emacs for 20+ years.
the problem, is not because oh emacs is so big and powerful. That's what you like to hear. The problem, is actually the writing, and the mind set of the devs. It is written, in a style that makes it incomprehensible.
This is similar to why academic papers (e.g. on computer science, programing language research) are filled with jargons, UNNECESSARILY. Academic papers are that way because, its main function is not to distribute knowledge, but, as part of system to promote the writers, among peers. The culture induced the style. Similar for government bureaucracy papers such as DMV.
for emacs, the problem is, emacs dev has this cult of it being the supreme, lisp machine, oldest, etc. So, the writing style sprung from a mind set of that. Part arrogance, part 30 years old jargons, and part inept geekdom who are unable to communicate to the public.
however, when you read emacs doc, the emacs folks want you to think, it's incomprehensible to you because emacs is extremely advanced.
No, today, emacs is rather one of the least advanced software. A web browser, is a magnitude more complex. Think of its JavaScript compiler, JavaScript runtime system, builtin debugger (the console), networking parts, GUI elements, display system, extension API, etc. Just about any gaming software is a magnitude more complex too. And, Atom editor, Visual Studio, or IntelliJ, all are technically more complex and advanced than emacs.
and by the way, emacs calls its “release notes” as “NEWS”. Another addition to incomprehensibleness.
get emacs 26
now emacs 26 is out. To download prebuilt for Mac, Windows, linux, see
emacs 26.1 window bar transparent problem
problem due to desktop-saved-frameset in desktop save mode file. i guess there's some change between emacs 26.0 and 26.1 causing it.
solution:
- open your
~/.emacs.d/.emacs.desktoplook for the first line containing(setq desktop-saved-frameset …). comment out that line. - Alt+x
desktop-save-modeto turn it off. - restart emacs.
2018-06-07 addendum: apparently, that does not fix it. When you have desktop-save-mode
on and restart ,
the problem comes back. it seems, i have some init that cause emacs to
save something bad about frame config to the desktop-save-mode file. But
note, this did not happen in emacs 26.0.91.
See also: Emacs Init: Restore Opened Files (desktop-save-mode)
am going to San Francisco emacs meetup
woot, am going to emacs meetup this Saturday. Sign up, let's meet https://www.meetup.com/Emacs-SF/events/251056510/ … PS if you are in Mountain View, San Jose area, a friend can pick us up. Else we go by train! pm/email me
reddit announcement https://www.reddit.com/r/emacs/comments/8oyh4a/lets_meet_up_emacs_sf_saturday/
quickly created JavaScript so that you can switch layout between qwerty and dvorak.
feel free to send me modified js code for other layouts.
Xah Emacs Packages (minor update)
Emacs: Convert Chinese/Japanese Full-Width/Half-Width Punctuations 🚀
added a new command xah-convert-fullwidth-chars
goslin emacs in Google Hangout!
emacs Google Hangout
hi everyone, today we have some Google Hangout at 6 pm (California Time), random chat about emacs. if you feel like it, hop on. I think i'll post the google hangout url 10 min before. (haven't done this before)
you can learn about google hangout at https://hangouts.google.com/ i think you need a google/gmail account.
this is informal, of course. Am ackward at social events, but some random emacs chat could be fun. Haven't done this before. Hope the video tech side will go smooth. Drop in 5 min or so to say hi is good. Gotta try it.
so far, we have 4 people counting me. it's gonna be fun.
if you like to join, best to email me xahlee@gmail.com with your email, so i can send you a invite from google calendar. In case i was not able to find out how to do public hangout, then it's just those of use who have invite.
twitter thread here [ https://twitter.com/ErgoEmacs/status/1002599034664570880 accessed: 2018-06-01]