I started with a very simple init.el when I started using Emacs. Rather than learning it in a structured manner, I just decided to jump in at whatever end of the pool and figure it out as I go. I may not know Emacs, but I do know what I want out of a general purpose text editor. And bending Emacs to do my will, to do what I want it to do or behave in the manner I want it to behave....
Org mode is slowly spreading its tentacles increasingly becoming something, I cannot live without, to manage my day. And I’m getting pretty consistent with it too! Like you see above, I use dates as my headlines, below which I list the various tasks for the day.1 And that’s where I run into my current itch to scratch. I don’t want to keep typing out the date daily. The computer can do that for me....
Originally published 2021/10/27. Updated to include the .xssessionsrc point I run pretty often into this issue, so this is a checklist for me. Issue being, that I cannot use Compose key sequences to type out the characters I need. Case in point being, the apostrophe ’ and the quote marks “” , ‘’ that I use, all the live long day. Make sure that emacs is running as a service. It runs in your user, so check status with systemctl --user status emacs....
Did I not just write about this, the other day with Emacs? I did, but Pycharm seems to have the same affliction. Pycharm, just like Emacs, stubbornly refuses to accept my Compose key combinations. Which means … you guessed it, no ‘,”,“ or ’ punctuation and all the other affordances, Compose gives me. Considering that I need both, Pycharm as well as Emacs in my life, it behooved me, that I go solve this too....
I want to leave VS Code behind me and move to using Emacs for mostly everything I write in the long haul. Emacs is the editor I use to putter around for any text editing I need to do, but most of my long form writing and coding were done in VS Code. And the more I use it (VS Code, not Emacs), the more uncomfortable I get, no matter how nice and shiny it is....
Whenever Emacs saves a file, it makes a backup of the original. So if I had a file.txt and I make changes and save it, Emacs firsts backs up the original to file.txt~. While I love this functionality, and it has saved me from a pickle more than once, I don’t love the way my folders get polluted with ~ files all over the place. My blog’s drafts folder had hundreds of these....
Unlike #100DaysOfCode, I am not quite giving up on Emacs. Rather that it has turned out to be a habit that has fit in, quite well, and I don’t need this accountability any more. I use it for most of my prose (not code, yet.) This post, is in fact, written in Emacs :) I have not gained any modicum of knowledge by any means. But I have enough muscle memory and immersion, to make sure I will continue using Emacs for most writing I do....
Practiced moving around with the Emacs keys for 30 mins
Learnt all about movement and search today.
Too tired, so just worked my way through the Anki deck for a bit today.