Emacs Cult Problem: Emacs vs Windows Notepad

By Xah Lee. Date:

On , “Captain Obvious” 〔udode…@users.sourceforge.net〕 wrote:

Yeah, god forbid doing things differently than Windows(r) NotePad does.

One of the emacs cult phenomenon is that whenever some UI improvement is mentioned, the emacs cultist will bring up Windows Notepad. It's like this:

Emacs user: we should be more loving and share resources.

Emacs cultist: why don't you join the communist?

from that point on, no meaningful discussion can be had. It's just emacs vs Windows Notepad, the good vs the evil, the enlightened hackers vs idiots. Like:

Emacs user: emacs undo is making me insane. Is it possible to have traditional undo?

Emacs cultist: if you want Windows Notepad, use that.

Emacs user: emacs keys are so hard to remember. Is it possible to support the conventional keys for copy, cut, open, close, etc as in GNU/Linux apps?

Emacs cultist: Why don't you go use Windows Notepad?

Emacs user: the C- and M- notation is not as intutive as Ctrl+ and Alt+. I understand the historical reasons, perhaps we can make the notation change?

Emacs cultist: if this poses a problem for you, may i suggest Windows Notepad?

Emacs Modernization

  1. Simple Changes Emacs Should Adopt
  2. Why Emacs Keys are Painful
  3. Problems of the Scratch Buffer
  4. M-key Notation vs Alt+key Notation
  5. Menu Problem
  6. Mode Line Problem
  7. cua-mode Problems
  8. kill-buffer Induces Buffer Accumulation
  9. Emacs Form Feed ^L
  10. Inconsistency of Search Features
  11. Single Key to Delete Whole Line
  12. Emacs HTML Mode Sucks
  13. Emacs Does Not Support Viewing Images Files In Windows
  14. Emacs Spell Checker Problems
  15. Adopt HTML as Texinfo Replacement
  16. Support HTML Mail
  17. Problems of “man” Command
  18. Emacs Lisp Mode Syntax Coloring Problem
  19. Emacs Ahk Mode Problems
  20. Problems of Emacs's Manual
  21. Problems of Emacs's Manual; Examples
  22. Emacs: Have You Read Emacs Manual?
  23. Elisp: Ban Syntax Table
  24. Emacs: Make elisp-index-search use Current Symbol
  25. Emacs: Usability Problems of Mode Documentation
  26. Problems of Emacswiki
  27. Emacs GNU Texinfo Problems; Invalid HTML
  28. A Record of Frustration in IT Industry; Disappearing FSF URLs, 2006
  29. Emacs Manual Node Persistency Issues
  30. Emacs: dired-do-query-replace-regex Replace ALL (fixed)
  31. Problems of Emacs Supporting Obsolete Systems
  32. Elisp: Function to Copy/Delete a Dir Recursively (fixed)
  33. Thoughts on Common Lisp Scheme Lisp Based Emacs
  34. Text Editors Popularity and Market Research
  35. Text Editor's Cursor Movement Behavior (emacs, vi, Notepad++)
  36. GNU Emacs Development Inefficiency
  37. Emacs Dev Inefficiency and Emacs Web 2.0?
  38. Letter-Case Commands Usability Problems
  39. Emacs: Select Line, between Quotes, Extend Selection
  40. Emacs: isearch Current Word
  41. Suggestions on Line Wrap Commands
  42. Emacs: Single Key to Delete Whole Line
  43. Emacs Cult Problem: Emacs vs Windows Notepad
  44. Emacs Undo and Emacs Cult Problem

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