Re: Emacs Book Vs Emacs Manuals

[Eli Zaretskii]

> Date: Wed, 13 May 2015 09:47:35 +0200
> Cc: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> From:  <tomas@tuxteam.de>
> 
> > I would start by typing "i directory TAB", then see "directory
> > listing" there, and select it.  And there, lo and behold, I'd see
> > this:
> 
> Really good example you got there

It's not me, I just worked the example suggested by Rusi.

>   1. I've been using Emacs for quite a while. I'm perhaps atypical
>      in that I learn in leaps and bounds and not very systematically.
>      It took me several years (three? four?) to learn about "i".
>      Before, I used "s". I shouldn't have been allowed to *touch*
>      Emacs without knowing about Info's "i" (see below for some
>      thoughts on that)

Should probably be added to the end of the tutorial.

>   2. I enter "i folder TAB" and get no entries. Hmmm.

Please make a bug report in any such case.

> Ad 1: I think an intro should blaze a wide track collecting the
> indispensable tools to get up and running (and only hinting at
> alternatives).

I don't think this is practical, for at least 2 reasons:

  . the number of indispensable tools is very large
  . the set of such tools is highly dependent on what you want to do
    in Emacs

> Which are the "indispensable tools" is very much a matter of taste
> and of "current fashion": it will vary over users and time.

Exactly, so it is impractical to have them in an introductory text.

> Heck, I'm an old fart and *even on vi* (which I spell vim) I don't
> "HJKL" but use the cursor keys

And yet the Vim tutorial starts with description of cursor motion.