On reddit side of internet there is this post. Just wanted to see Lemmy’s answer to that question, so I will start:
I was introduced to Emacs about 15 years ago, but it didn’t click with me at that time. I was young and foolish, laughing all the time “hehe muh parentheses”. At that time I got into world of Vi. Fast forward to today and I use Emacs for almost everything. I started my true journey about three years ago, slowing using it for more and more stuff.
Here is list of stuff I do inside of Emacs:
- it’s my WM (EXWM)
- IRC client (weechat.el)
- RSS reader (elfeed)
- NNTP and email reader (Gnus)
- time tracking, to do tracking, calendar (org-mode)
- note taking (org-roam)
- music and video player (emms with mpv backend)
- mastodon client (mastodon.el)
- wallabag client (wallabage.el)
- file browser (dired) and remote tool with tramp
- shell (eshell)
- code editor (Emacs with LSP)
- git interface (magit)
- documentation browser (devdocs)
- gemini browser (elpher)
- pdf reader (pdf-tools)
- epub reader (nov.el)
- calibre library client (calibredb)
- openstreetmap browser (osm)
- search engines client (engine-mode)
At this point I started to think about Emacs more as an GUI framework with integrated elisp interpreter then code editor.
Going back to original question: what is your story with Emacs?
began using Emacs because of org-mode. Since then I’ve also used Emacs for most my text/code editing needs, general development tools like version control system and rest client and REPL, reading and taking notes from epub and pdf, interacting with the file system (dired), elfeed for notifications like software updates, email, calculator, shell, … I avoid using Emacs for non-productive apps like social media, instant messaging… unless that could be somehow useful to capture information.
At this point I started to think about Emacs more as an GUI framework with integrated elisp interpreter then code editor.
I can’t think like that. Emacs has useful GUI, but it is not a GUI framework; mostly a textual interface framework that happens to have both console and gtk frontends.
I haven’t really learned emacs yet(I wish I could), so I only use it for writing text files in org mode (doom emacs)… but I wish I could use it as mail client, would love to know org-roam, but it is so difficult to learn for me and takes so much time…
If this help you, here and here are to good tutorials that slowly goes into “everything emacs”. My advice is to expand one step at a time, see what works for you and what not.
As to email - mu4e is a good starting point. Most of the setup is actually outside of Emacs (isync and msmtp) and interface is kinda familiar to what you can find in other email clients.
Thanks! These are great resources, as is emacsdocs.org , the thibg is that everything takes so much time to learn…
You learn all life. Just take your time. Emacs won’t go away anytime soon ;)
I don’t remember how and when exactly were I introduced to Emacs. Must have been sometime when I started using Linux 20 years ago.
Vim’s usage of modes and switching between these with esc didn’t work well with me, it still feels clunky.
About Nano I heard later but it has always felt like a rudimentary option.I use Emacs for:
- programming at work and as a hobby (although git I use via command line. with drop-down terminals it works better for me)
- C++
- Python
- STM32
- writing latex documents
At this point I started to think about Emacs more as an GUI framework with integrated elisp interpreter then code editor.
During the editor war there was a joke that Emacs is a very nice operating system but it lacks a proper file editor ;P
- programming at work and as a hobby (although git I use via command line. with drop-down terminals it works better for me)
