Editor war in (La)TeXverse! - TeX

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Editor war in (La)TeXverse!

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निरंजन

Why should one use editor X for (La)TeX?

(X stands for your favourite editor.)

comments

transcript

निरंजन replying to barbara beeton

Hmm, I agree. Thanks for elaborating your point.

barbara beeton replying to निरंजन

What I think is important is being able to reliably produce the file that is needed, as efficiently as possible.  I learned TeX directly from members of the TeX Project at Stanford, and as a prerequisite I was required to learn emacs as that was the editor they were using.  Emacs had/has an excellent tutorial, and that was my teaching tool.  Since then, emacs commands have become second nature, and regardless of what input tool I'm using, if I accidentally make a mistake, my fingers automatically   use the emacs correction method, no conscious thought involved.  Have you any idea what that does if you're forced to correct someone else's MS Word file?  Having lost untold hours trying to recover from such disasters, I avoid other input tools whenever I can, and assume that other people are also creatures of habit.

निरंजन replying to Skillmon

Hahaha, yes, of course! I have similar reasons for getting stuck with GNU Emacs and yeah, when somebody asks me my recommendations, my answer is also pretty much similar. I complain about inconsistently indented code a lot, though. I absolutely hate the editors that don't automate this simple requirement.

Skillmon replying to निरंजन

I hope you know that I only do those because of tradition. I'm absolutely indifferent towards Emacs. I just happened to learn VIM "a while" ago and stuck with it, I don't see the benefit to learn Emacs for myself and to anyone asking for editor recommendations I'll always say that I personally use VIM though it's not everybody's cup of tea and they should really consider picking it (but I guess the same is true for Emacs).

निरंजन replying to frougon

I had to learn it for a task at my workplace. I don't use BibTeX as BibLaTeX is a much advanced alternative, but this document is so well written! I really enjoyed that activity because the documentation was so nice. :)

frougon replying to निरंजन

Ah, I didn't know BibTeX used such a language. I encountered RPN in the HP48 series of pocket calculators. My GX was bought around 1996 and is still working. Great calculators.

निरंजन replying to frougon

True, I just tried to write it and ended up having this, hehe. Time to read [TTB](https://www.ctan.org/tex-archive/info/bibtex/tamethebeast) again!

frougon replying to निरंजन

In my book, RPN would rather look like `((((Lisp ELisp or) difficult is) not) !)`. ;-)

निरंजन replying to Skillmon

I enjoy your GNU Emacs-rant so much that I don't even try to cook up comebacks  :joy:

निरंजन replying to frougon

Oh!! RPN?

Skillmon

(or at least something Lisp inspired)

Skillmon replying to frougon

well, I can read it, so that's that. During dayjob one of the development tools shows the syntax tree it derived from the source code in a Lisp dialect.

frougon replying to Skillmon

`(! (not (is (or Lisp ELisp) difficult)))`

Skillmon replying to J...S

with NeoVim you can customise it using Lua, which I find infinitely easier than Lisp (because I know Lua, but have no idea about Lisp, well no idea isn't correct, I have some basic syntax things in my mind, but I never wrote Lisp)

J...S

I felt that vim has better default keybindings. Don't have to leave the home row too much for basic movements. But emacs is more easily customized.

Skillmon replying to निरंजन

and if you had better friends you'd have learned VIM instead.

निरंजन replying to barbara beeton

I agree, but editor wars are not only fun, but also informative, at times. I used to argue with my friend about my then favourite editor, i.e., TeX Studio. He tried to entice me with the feature-set of GNU Emacs. He was successful, of course, but if we had not argued at all, I might not ever have switched.

J...S

I haven't got much experience latexing, but I agree with the last comment.  
I am interested to know what the skills invovlved are though.  
Do you mean that the content is more important than TeX and the editor?

barbara beeton

Well, I do use emacs, but I claim, as the human Editor of TUGboat, that there are certain skills involved that are more important than which computer editor tickles your fingers.

निरंजन

Should we allow multiple posts for this? I already have ~~an~~ two active fellow GNU Emacs users here. :) The other option is to edit existing posts. Anyway the battle is between editors and not between us... :P

0 Answers