Re: Interactive guide for new users

[Eli Zaretskii]

> Date: Sat, 12 Sep 2020 09:31:06 +0000
> From: Gregory Heytings via "Emacs development discussions." 
> <emacs-devel@gnu.org>
> 
> 
> Based on the feedback received so far, I reworked the proposal a bit. 

Thanks for thinking about this.  I have a few minor comments.

> The idea is to create an "initial greeting" that would be bundled with 
> Emacs, and would be executed the first time the first time Emacs is 
> launched (instead of the initial splash screen).

What is the definition of "the first time"? where will we keep the
indication that this is/isn't "the first time"?  Also, will this
affect "emacs -Q" or "emacs -q"?

> SCREEN 1: Welcome!  It seems that this is the first time you run Emacs, 
> would you like to customize its interface and have a short introduction? 
> This will not take you more than three minutes.

I presume this will have a button "Not now" and "Don't show this
again" or somesuch?

> SCREEN 2: "Set the color theme", with a clickable list containing the 
> (currently) 16 built-in themes.  A short code snippet above that list 
> illustrates how code is displayed with each of these themes.

The snippet will only be able to show the buffer text appearance.  For
other UI elements you will need an image.  Would using an image be
better here?

> [It would be nice to have a way to select a default font here, but I
> don't know if that feasible.]

I don't think I understand what you mean by that.  Selection of the
default font _is_ possible, we have in the Options menu.

> SCREEN 4: Choose whether to set some common options that new users might 
> want (because they are common in other text editors).  These are (the 
> order could be improved, and items could be added or removed):

We should carefully construct the list of the options, they shouldn't
just be someone's personal preferences.

> 2. disable tool-bar-mode
> 3. disable scroll-bar-mode

I'd object to these two.  We have just established that the former is
important for newbies.  Scroll bars are presented by many
applications, so why is it important to offer to turn them off here?
let the users decide about these two.

> 6. hl-line-mode

Why is this important? do other IDEs have it by default?

> 8. which-key-mode

I disagree with this one, certainly in its current form.

> 10. save-place-mode and desktop-save-mode

desktop-save-mode slows down startup, so it might not be suitable for
users who start Emacs many times a day.

> 11. (setq uniquify-buffer-name-style 'forward uniquify-min-dir-content 1024)

Why? what's wrong with the defaults here?

> 14. icomplete-mode (or fido-mode?)

Not sure this is a good idea, these modes present complex and
potentially confusing UI.

> 16. display-time-mode

Why?  Any modern desktop has the time displayed somewhere, so this
just occupies space on the mode line.

> SCREEN 6: How to find help.  Short explanation about C-h C-h, C-h m, C-h 
> p, C-h k / C-h w / C-h a, C-h l.

This misses important help commands, we should consider the list
carefully with newbies in mind.  IMO, the various apropos commands are
much more important for them than other help commands.

> SCREEN 8: Thank you. Your choices have been saved in Emacs' configuration 
> file ~/.emacs.d/init.el (or ~/.emacs ?).

What do we do here wrt XDG preferences?

> You can use M-x initial-greeting at any time to go through this
> configuration again.

That command should be on the Help menu.  And I think the name should
be 'introduction-to-emacs' or somesuch.