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September 3, 2024

Part Four of My Battles with Emacs

ToolsTools

It is not my fault. I blame Jack Baty for this. He goes on and on about how Org-mode has improved his sex life and given him purpose and direction. Okay, maybe he hasn’t quite said that. But he is enamored with it and I am curious to find out what he is on about.

He rates Org-mode better than Markdown:

Org-mode may be the Betamax of text formats, but if you recall, Beta was the better format. VHS won, but not because it was better. Why would I use a lesser format for my notes than Org-mode? “Everyone uses Markdown” is not an answer.

I gave up on Org-mode because of my problems with Emacs. Some problem with my setup made using a largish file an absolute nightmare. Using a combination of TaskPaper and BBEdit was working fine. I was relatively happy. I came across pprevosemacs-writing-studio Emacs configuration for authors who research, write and publish articles, books and websites..

I started reading the book and that got me intrigued enough to go back to Emacs. This was helped considerably by the consistent evangelism of Jack Baty.

Configuring Emacs

I adopted large sections of the Emacs Writing Studio configuration.

Got rid of some of the elements which seemed unnecessary to me. Got rid of elfeed, I don’t want to access my RSS feeds in Emacs. I use Newsblur for my RSS feeds and that works great. Dumped the stuff with LaTeX. I don’t use that. I will add it back if I need it. I made some additional tweaks:

  1. Changed the configuration to an Org-mode file. Needed to write extensive notes to myself on every little bit I added or deleted. Tangling the Org-mode file to an init.el file is relatively painless.
  2. Introduced General.el to the configuration. Makes it easy to add keyboard commands to Emacs to be happy in both Org-mode and Markdown.
  3. Got rid of all the evil-mode stuff from my previous configuration. I am going to concentrate on learning Emacs and not complicate matters by learning both Emacs and VIM.
  4. Added tab-bar-mode. I am used to tabs.
  5. Changed the Writing Studio configuration for org-capture. Adapted the section from Prot’s GNU Emacs configuration.
  6. Changed the Mode line with help from SophieBosio.emacs.d Sophie’s Emacs configuration
  7. Added Corfu and Cape to the completion tools.
  8. Got rid of Modern Org Style and went back to Make org-mode stars a little more super. I am using a bit of code Jack Baty had provided a few years ago to make Org-bullets look pretty.
  9. Added Olivetti-mode to both Markdown and Org files.
  10. Set the recentf limit to (recentf-max-saved-items 1000).
  11. Changed the font configuration to Custom build of Iosevka from Protesilos, for default and fixed-pitch fonts. Using Lexend - Deca for variable-pitch font.
  12. Added auto-package-update to make that function easier.
  13. Added saveplace to be able to get back to the place I last worked on a file.
  14. Added a function to make all my regular files load into Emacs through a keyboard command if I need it.
  15. Added Default window size and tabs>spaces.

There might be some other additions and deletions to and from the Writing Studio configuration.

Other Observations

  • I had a bit of code in my older configuration which tried to replicate typewriter scrolling by putting my cursor at the middle of the window. Something about that code made Emacs unusable for large files. The performance of Emacs has improved considerably with that code absent. I am going to explore other ways of adding this feature to Emacs. But I am taking it easy in the meantime.
  • I am done with tweaking for a while. Emacs configuration is a time-sink. Making the ideal text editor for yourself is a commendable goal but it has a cost I am not willing to pay. A little addition and some inane mistake and your configuration goes to hell. It is a matter of trying to find out what you did wrong. Immense frustration ensues. Not going to encourage this behavior. Going to tweak only when it is absolutely necessary. I want to write and read in Emacs. Not become an Emacs guru.

Things Still to be Done

  • Need to get org-agenda working. It is not at the moment.
  • Find a solution for typewriter scrolling.
  • Explore writing in Org-mode to see what the fuss is.
  • Explore Denote to figure out whether I need that.

Conclusion

Am happy to be able to use Emacs as my text editor. In combination with TaskPaper it is getting a fair amount of use for the last few weeks. I still miss certain things about BBEdit. The project-based workflow with relevant folders in the sidebar is an UI I am used to. Not having that in Emacs is a little disconcerting. Getting more familiar with dired buffers might make that unnecessary.

Still getting comfortable with the keyboard commands in Emacs. Immersion is going to help with that.

Will keep posting updates to this as we go along.

Note

  • Thanks to Photo by Tyler Lastovich
  • Thanks to Peter Prevos for the Emacs Writing Studio
  • Thanks to Protesilaos Stavrou for everything you do for the Emacs community.
  • Thanks to Jack Baty for being insistent.

macosxguru at the gmail thingie.

Addendum

These were the antecedents to this step:

Emacs
July 6, 2024

LovelyLovely

Links of Note 2024-07-06

macosxguru at the gmail thingie.

Note: Thanks to Alena Koval for the picture.

writing organizing
April 10, 2024

KittyKitty

Links of Note 2024-04-10

macosxguru at the gmail thingie.

Thanks to Photo by Dids

macOS fonts
April 3, 2024

Love the One You’re With Part 1

I download almost every text editor which is released. Every outlining program also gets my interest. Over the years, I have played with and used for significant amounts of time a whole host of programs. The advantage is that I have a lot of fun doing that1. The disadvantage? There are great solutions which I already have access to, which do not get used at all. Am searching for perfection when perfectly all right is right under my nose.

Today I am going to talk about one such solution.

Stepping Back to TaskPaper

TaskPaper IconTaskPaper Icon

I purchased TaskPaper the week it was released, sometime in the Fall of 2007. I updated to version 2 when it was available and then to version 3. It has been on my hard drive for all that time. I have used it off and on. But never concentrated on it enough to make it the main driver for my lists. Instead, I have used dedicated outlining programs like Opal, or OmniOuliner for making and maintaining lists.

Over the years I have moved to a test file focused workflow. TaskPaper files are plain text files which are accessible in any text editor. Moving to TaskPaper and using it for all my lists made sense2.

In TaskPaper, I made an effort to simplify my life, I decided to consolidate a couple of things. My diary and my lists. I changed my “single file for every day diary workflow” to one file for the whole year.

Diary file for the whole yearDiary file for the whole year

I have a few text files which are lists I access regularly. Links for the blog-posts titled, Links of Note, Books to read, Recipes to make, YouTube videos to watch, Computer tasks for a later date, etc.. There are about 20 of these lists. I consolidated all of them into one TaskPaper file.

Bunches of ListsBunches of Lists

Advantages of TaskPaper

  • macOS compliant. Two spaces turn into a period and the first letter of a new sentence is capitalized.
  • Typewriter scrolling. In the theme, you can set where you want the cursor to be.
  • Fast, stable, well-designed software.
  • The ability to concentrate on one part of the outline and not the whole thing. Less distraction that way.
  • Keyboard commands. TaskPaper has those, for everything. Makes using it fun.
  • Can handle large files without any problems.

Two More Features

Go to anything. ⌘P, and you get a dropdown list which lets you go to any project or sub-project in your outline. Fuzzy search window. Fantastic.

Go to anythingGo to anything

Command Palette. ⇧⌘P, and you get to a listing of all the commands available to you. Start typing. Choose the command. Hit return. Like Sublime Text and VSCode.

[Command Palette](/public/Go to anything

TaskPaper Looks After My Lists

TaskPaper is marketed as a program to manage your tasks. It can do that. I am not interested in that part of the product. I use the Reminders app for that. I use TaskPaper as an outlining program and it is fantastic at that.

Why didn’t I use it earlier? I don’t have a good answer for that. Getting distracted by the new shiny is something I seem to be susceptible to. Have to watch out for that impulse and stick to what is working and working well.

An added benefit of sticking to a program? You get to learn the keyboard commands and the muscle memory improves. TaskPaper is going to be handling my lists.

The Song

This is the original version. Stephen Stills

This is the CSN version. CSN

These are some good covers of the same song:

macosxguru at the gmail thingie.

  1. I pretend that it is something I need to do for the blog. But who are we fooling?↩︎

  2. My main machine is a 2011 iMac which runs High Sierra. I can’t use Bike on this machine. Thus TaskPaper was the only choice.↩︎

macOS TaskPaper
January 5, 2024

KittyKitty

Links of Note 2024-01-05

Thanks: To Photo by Pixabay: https://www.pexels.com/photo/orange-tabby-cat-lying-on-floor-290164/

macOS