comp.emacs
[Top] [All Lists]

Re: Emacs's M-‹key› Notation vs Alt+‹key› Notation

Subject: Re: Emacs's M-‹key› Notation vs Alt+‹key› Notation
From: Joe Fineman
Date: Tue, 05 Aug 2008 00:22:26 GMT
Newsgroups: comp.emacs, alt.religion.emacs

David Hansen <david.hansen@xxxxxxx> writes:

> On Thu, 31 Jul 2008 23:23:49 -0700 (PDT) "xahlee@xxxxxxxxx"
> <xahlee@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>> Unfortunately, Richard Stallman seems to have been influenced by
>> dumb users. He's actually thinking it's a good idea!
>>
>> http://groups.google.com/group/gnu.emacs.bug/browse_frm/thread/c92887cbc7c6f843/
>
> Now you have to actually implement it, if you want this change.
> Have fun and expect some even longer discussion on emacs-devel.

When I started using Emacs, in 1986, on a Sun 3, I decided that even
C- keys were silly.  After all, C-x & C-h are prefixes, ESC is a
prefix equivalent to M-, so why not make a clean sweep?  I wrote
enough keybindings to make one of the f keys a prefix key equivalent
to C-, and defined f keys equivalent to all the other prefixes.  They
were all in a cluster on the left on that keyboard.  (As for the
mouse, I thought of that as something for emergencies only.)  I kept
up that attitude thru a variety of computers & keyboards, but the
advent of the Web forced me to use the mouse for some things.

Last year, however, I happened on the Kinesis keyboard, which, tho
exorbitantly expensive, puts both C- & M- (Alt) handy to both thumbs.
That caused me to go back to the original Emacs design, with shifted
keys.  Indeed, I have gone the other way & made (e.g.) M-8 equivalent
to C-x 8.  Now, Stallman's original vision is implemented without
acrobatics.
-- 
---  Joe Fineman    joe_f@xxxxxxxxxxx

||:  Lust is like liquor:  There are those it makes cruel & those  :||
||:  it makes kind.                                                :||


<Prev in Thread] Current Thread [Next in Thread>
Privacy Policy