Re: GNU Emacs raison d'etre

[Karl Fogel]

On 15 May 2020, Drew Adams wrote:
>> A perfect analogy is manual ("stick") transmission cars versus
>> automatic transmission cars.  A stick car is harder for a newcomer to
>> drive, but gives an experienced user more control than she would
>> otherwise have.  An automatic transmission car is easier for a
>> newcomer, but frustrating for the expert because it limits (a bit) what
>> she can do.
>> 
>> Does this mean that no one learns to drive stick?  Of course not.  Some
>> people do so by choice -- they make a conscious investment, made with
>> the understanding that driving will be *harder* for a while before
>> there is any discernable payoff.  But they are willing to make that
>> choice because others told them how it would be worth it.  It's not
>> something the user would find out from reading the manual for the car,
>> though.
>
>The analogy is pretty good (not perfect).  The last
>sentence doesn't correspond to Emacs, though, I think.
>
>You _can_ learn Emacs by reading its manuals and its
>help (`C-h').  Asking Emacs is a good way to learn.
>Maybe not as good as the expert-over-your-shoulder
>method you cited, but pretty good.

Ah, you seem to think I was saying "no one learns how to drive stick by reading 
the manual".

But that's not what I was saying.  I was saying that you don't find out from 
the manual *why* driving stick might be worth it for you -- why it might be 
worth the investment.

Even if the manual were to talk about that, the manual is still not where most 
people would actually *learn* it from.  They would learn it from talking to 
someone who already drives stick, or from reading an article that discusses the 
benefits of driving stick and how it takes some investment to do so, or some 
other source like that.

Learning *the fact that Emacs expects & rewards sustained investment* is 
different from *learning Emacs*.  Learning that you need to make an investment 
is different from making the investment.  I was talking about the former, so I 
think the analogy holds.

Now, the Emacs manual (and web site) can & should talk about how Emacs requires 
some investment, and about how it then rewards that investment.  But we 
shouldn't expect those places to be where most people learn this fact.  It's a 
message that has to be spread via other channels.

Best regards,
-Karl