Re: [External] : Re: Gitlab Migration

[Stefan Kangas]

Tim Cross <theophilusx@gmail.com> writes:

> Yes, I think this may be a 'flavour' which has won and can no longer be
> considered a passing fad. The uncommon bindings used by Emacs for cut,
> copy and paste is probably the number one complaint I hear from new
> users. The kill-ring really just provides an enhancement rather than
> a fundamental difference.

Yup.  I don't think I could unlearn some keys (e.g. C-w for
kill-region) without massive pain.  So I'm not sure I will personally
ever bother re-learning after using Emacs for going on two decades.

At the same time, I have no idea why it is the case in 2021 that Emacs
appeases my archaic preference for C-w to the extent that it makes it
the default.  If Emacs would want to change here, it wouldn't impact
me at all if I could easily move the keys back to where I feel they
belong.

> This would probably be a good candidate for the profiles idea. Change
> the default, but have the old behaviour in a 'traditional' profile and
> have the default be the more common CUA bindings.

This would be my ideal future, as well.

> However, part of me
> wishes I'd not become accustomed to those key bindings as it is a
> constant frustration when I'm forced to use a different program which
> I've not been able to tweak - none of which would be necessary if I
> hadn't grown accustomed to Emacs bindings. These are such common and
> frequently used bindings, consistency across applications is probably
> more important than maintaining inconsistent bindings simply to
> highlight fairly subtle differences.

Amen.  I've lost work many times by closing tabs in Firefox when I
actually wanted to paste something.  Learning to mentally switch
context between "Emacs" and "not Emacs" is in this case a trial by
fire.