Emacs for VS 2005 beta 2

[_R]

I'd love to get Emacs/Epsilon emu mode back for the VS code editor.
Is there any way to do this? Apparently 2005b2 has an option for
"Apply the following additional keyboard mapping scheme' and one of
the opts is Emacs. What does that do exactly?

[Oliver Sturm]

_R wrote:

I'd love to get Emacs/Epsilon emu mode back for the VS code editor.

I have written a plugin for CodeRush that implements some of the electric
editing functionality from Emacs for C#. Have a look if you like:
http://www.sturmnet.org/blog/cr-electric-editing/
Oliver Sturm
--
omnibus ex nihilo ducendis sufficit unum
Spaces inserted to prevent google email destruction:
MSN oliver @ sturmnet.org Jabber sturm @ amessage.de
ICQ 27142619 http://www.sturmnet.org/blog

[_R]

On Tue, 30 Aug 2005 03:22:08 -0700, "Oliver Sturm"
<ol****@sturmnet.org> wrote:

_R wrote:

I'd love to get Emacs/Epsilon emu mode back for the VS code editor.

I have written a plugin for CodeRush that implements some of the electric
editing functionality from Emacs for C#. Have a look if you like:
http://www.sturmnet.org/blog/cr-electric-editing/
Oliver Sturm

Now that's a serious editor-oriented page! I'll be taking a much
closer look, especially as I get up to speed on VS2005 (just loaded it
and got my hopes up when I saw the word 'Emacs').

Your page opens up a lot of questions about 'Best Editor.' In
chatting with someone a while back about the unsuitability of MS's own
editor for code editing, they said in passing "Emacs' key mapping
sucks." They were talking about the fact that you don't need mnemonic
prompts for cursor-right, cursor-left, etc. Those will be the first
to develop reflexively. So Emacs' ^f for 'Forward' is essentially a
step back from the old WordStar commands that were 'compass-mapped'
and directly under the left hand.

This hadn't occurred to me because I'm so accustomed to Emacs already.
Still, I can't imagine a more awkward code editor than MS's previous
VS editors, so I was astonished when they eliminated Epsilon/Brief
emulations.

I think the most important things to me are getting a base set of
reflexive keystrokes back and functioning, like ^k for "kill to end of
line." Awkward to try to remap ^k in MS's editor of course, so I've
ended up struggling with the MS mapping.

[Oliver Sturm]

_R wrote:

Now that's a serious editor-oriented page! I'll be taking a much
closer look, especially as I get up to speed on VS2005 (just loaded it
and got my hopes up when I saw the word 'Emacs').
I like the topic :-) But there are two different things there: the quest
for the best text editor page is just a general thing, while the electric
editing project is specifically for VS - one of the most Emacs important
features for me, still missing from standard VS. It's based on CodeRush, a
tool that really does wonders for code editing in VS, without being like
Emacs by itself :-) Look here if you're interested:
http://www.devexpress.com/Products/NET/Coderush/
Your page opens up a lot of questions about 'Best Editor.' In
chatting with someone a while back about the unsuitability of MS's own
editor for code editing, they said in passing "Emacs' key mapping
sucks." They were talking about the fact that you don't need mnemonic
prompts for cursor-right, cursor-left, etc. Those will be the first
to develop reflexively. So Emacs' ^f for 'Forward' is essentially a
step back from the old WordStar commands that were 'compass-mapped'
and directly under the left hand.
Nothing originally WordStar about that, I think. Using traditional vi on
traditional Unix system keyboards worked with a similar metaphor, just by
using the keys for cursor navigation that were under the fingers anyway.
I think the most important things to me are getting a base set of
reflexive keystrokes back and functioning, like ^k for "kill to end of
line." Awkward to try to remap ^k in MS's editor of course, so I've
ended up struggling with the MS mapping.

Good idea for the plugin, I guess :-) But then, it would be easy to do
this as a macro or whatever - simply execute the keystrokes for Shift+End,
Delete.

Anyway, my general opinion is that most people find the approaches most
comfortable that they are most accustomed to. I sometimes make the effort
to try and break out of my own usage patterns, because I believe that's
the way to discover new things. And for code editing, it's really simple
for me: automation, as much as possible. That's something that the old
Emacs C++ mode was already better at than most other programmers' editors
are today.
Oliver Sturm
--
omnibus ex nihilo ducendis sufficit unum
Spaces inserted to prevent google email destruction:
MSN oliver @ sturmnet.org Jabber sturm @ amessage.de
ICQ 27142619 http://www.sturmnet.org/blog

[Javaman59]

Nice to see emacs getting a mention in a Microsoft C# forum! :)

My 2c worth...

1. emacs used to be my editor of choice, and I've developed a lot of C and
Java code in it, but over recent years I've switched to vim. I just like the
"primitive" feel of it, compared with the double key commands for emacs, and
also the fact that vim (or vi) is available anywhere.

2. I do most of my project development within VS, and don't find the
graphical editor, with intellisense, limiting. The only things which really
bug me are the lack of keystrokes for: deleting a whole line; deleting to the
end of a line.

3. I write lots of little C# programs from the command line, in VIM. C#
makes command line programming possible again, where I wouldn't consider
doing the smallest MFC/C++ program without the assistance of visual studio.

4. I've tried to look at Oliver's editors page, but it's timing out at the
moment. I'll take a look some other time. I bet it's interesting!

Ciao,

Javaman

"Oliver Sturm" wrote:

_R wrote:

Now that's a serious editor-oriented page! I'll be taking a much
closer look, especially as I get up to speed on VS2005 (just loaded it
and got my hopes up when I saw the word 'Emacs').

I like the topic :-) But there are two different things there: the quest
for the best text editor page is just a general thing, while the electric
editing project is specifically for VS - one of the most Emacs important
features for me, still missing from standard VS. It's based on CodeRush, a
tool that really does wonders for code editing in VS, without being like
Emacs by itself :-) Look here if you're interested:
http://www.devexpress.com/Products/NET/Coderush/

Your page opens up a lot of questions about 'Best Editor.' In
chatting with someone a while back about the unsuitability of MS's own
editor for code editing, they said in passing "Emacs' key mapping
sucks." They were talking about the fact that you don't need mnemonic
prompts for cursor-right, cursor-left, etc. Those will be the first
to develop reflexively. So Emacs' ^f for 'Forward' is essentially a
step back from the old WordStar commands that were 'compass-mapped'
and directly under the left hand.

Nothing originally WordStar about that, I think. Using traditional vi on
traditional Unix system keyboards worked with a similar metaphor, just by
using the keys for cursor navigation that were under the fingers anyway.

I think the most important things to me are getting a base set of
reflexive keystrokes back and functioning, like ^k for "kill to end of
line." Awkward to try to remap ^k in MS's editor of course, so I've
ended up struggling with the MS mapping.

Good idea for the plugin, I guess :-) But then, it would be easy to do
this as a macro or whatever - simply execute the keystrokes for Shift+End,
Delete.

Anyway, my general opinion is that most people find the approaches most
comfortable that they are most accustomed to. I sometimes make the effort
to try and break out of my own usage patterns, because I believe that's
the way to discover new things. And for code editing, it's really simple
for me: automation, as much as possible. That's something that the old
Emacs C++ mode was already better at than most other programmers' editors
are today.
Oliver Sturm
--
omnibus ex nihilo ducendis sufficit unum
Spaces inserted to prevent google email destruction:
MSN oliver @ sturmnet.org Jabber sturm @ amessage.de
ICQ 27142619 http://www.sturmnet.org/blog

[Javaman59]

Nice to see emacs getting a mention in a Microsoft C# forum! :)

My 2c worth...

1. emacs used to be my editor of choice, and I've developed a lot of C and
Java code in it, but over recent years I've switched to vim. I just like the
"primitive" feel of it, compared with the double key commands for emacs, and
also the fact that vim (or vi) is available anywhere.

2. I do most of my project development within VS, and don't find the
graphical editor, with intellisense, limiting. The only things which really
bug me are the lack of keystrokes for: deleting a whole line; deleting to the
end of a line.

3. I write lots of little C# programs from the command line, in VIM. C#
makes command line programming possible again, where I wouldn't consider
doing the smallest MFC/C++ program without the assistance of visual studio.

4. I've tried to look at Oliver's editors page, but it's timing out at the
moment. I'll take a look some other time. I bet it's interesting!

Ciao,

Javaman

"Oliver Sturm" wrote:

_R wrote:

Now that's a serious editor-oriented page! I'll be taking a much
closer look, especially as I get up to speed on VS2005 (just loaded it
and got my hopes up when I saw the word 'Emacs').

I like the topic :-) But there are two different things there: the quest
for the best text editor page is just a general thing, while the electric
editing project is specifically for VS - one of the most Emacs important
features for me, still missing from standard VS. It's based on CodeRush, a
tool that really does wonders for code editing in VS, without being like
Emacs by itself :-) Look here if you're interested:
http://www.devexpress.com/Products/NET/Coderush/

Your page opens up a lot of questions about 'Best Editor.' In
chatting with someone a while back about the unsuitability of MS's own
editor for code editing, they said in passing "Emacs' key mapping
sucks." They were talking about the fact that you don't need mnemonic
prompts for cursor-right, cursor-left, etc. Those will be the first
to develop reflexively. So Emacs' ^f for 'Forward' is essentially a
step back from the old WordStar commands that were 'compass-mapped'
and directly under the left hand.

Nothing originally WordStar about that, I think. Using traditional vi on
traditional Unix system keyboards worked with a similar metaphor, just by
using the keys for cursor navigation that were under the fingers anyway.

I think the most important things to me are getting a base set of
reflexive keystrokes back and functioning, like ^k for "kill to end of
line." Awkward to try to remap ^k in MS's editor of course, so I've
ended up struggling with the MS mapping.

Good idea for the plugin, I guess :-) But then, it would be easy to do
this as a macro or whatever - simply execute the keystrokes for Shift+End,
Delete.

Anyway, my general opinion is that most people find the approaches most
comfortable that they are most accustomed to. I sometimes make the effort
to try and break out of my own usage patterns, because I believe that's
the way to discover new things. And for code editing, it's really simple
for me: automation, as much as possible. That's something that the old
Emacs C++ mode was already better at than most other programmers' editors
are today.
Oliver Sturm
--
omnibus ex nihilo ducendis sufficit unum
Spaces inserted to prevent google email destruction:
MSN oliver @ sturmnet.org Jabber sturm @ amessage.de
ICQ 27142619 http://www.sturmnet.org/blog

[_R]

On Tue, 30 Aug 2005 11:34:36 -0700, "Oliver Sturm"
<ol****@sturmnet.org> wrote:

http://www.devexpress.com/Products/NET/Coderush/

Thanks for the link.

_R:
I think the most important things to me are getting a base set of
reflexive keystrokes back and functioning, like ^k for "kill to end of
line." Awkward to try to remap ^k in MS's editor of course, so I've
ended up struggling with the MS mapping.

Good idea for the plugin, I guess :-) But then, it would be easy to do
this as a macro or whatever - simply execute the keystrokes for Shift+End,
Delete.

There is built-in functionality for 'kill to end of line' in the MS
editor, but it's tough to map to ^k cause ^k is one of the MS prefixes
for multikey commands. Like trying remapping ^x in Emacs--it would
break a lot of stuff. Unfortunately I use ^k constantly in
Epsilon/Emacs. Tough to do without.

[_R]

On Tue, 30 Aug 2005 11:34:36 -0700, "Oliver Sturm"
<ol****@sturmnet.org> wrote:

http://www.devexpress.com/Products/NET/Coderush/

Thanks for the link.

_R:
I think the most important things to me are getting a base set of
reflexive keystrokes back and functioning, like ^k for "kill to end of
line." Awkward to try to remap ^k in MS's editor of course, so I've
ended up struggling with the MS mapping.

Good idea for the plugin, I guess :-) But then, it would be easy to do
this as a macro or whatever - simply execute the keystrokes for Shift+End,
Delete.

There is built-in functionality for 'kill to end of line' in the MS
editor, but it's tough to map to ^k cause ^k is one of the MS prefixes
for multikey commands. Like trying remapping ^x in Emacs--it would
break a lot of stuff. Unfortunately I use ^k constantly in
Epsilon/Emacs. Tough to do without.

[_R]

On Tue, 30 Aug 2005 18:45:03 -0700, Javaman59
<Ja*******@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote:

1. emacs used to be my editor of choice, and I've developed a lot of C and
Java code in it, but over recent years I've switched to vim. I just like the
"primitive" feel of it, compared with the double key commands for emacs, and
also the fact that vim (or vi) is available anywhere.
I guess there are more 'vi' versions than 'emacs's, but Emacs is
available for lots of platforms as well. I ended up with it via the
Epsilon editor in MSDOS days.
2. I do most of my project development within VS, and don't find the
graphical editor, with intellisense, limiting. The only things which really
bug me are the lack of keystrokes for: deleting a whole line; deleting to the
end of a line.

Exactly my problem. I don't want to edit outside of VS and do without
Intellisense. But I don't understand how programmers with good
touch-typing skills are content to lift their fingers off the asdf /
jkl; keys and move over to the cursor pad. Its a major distraction.
Also, the alpha keys are in the same place on every keyboard.

Bad enough that the CTL and ALT keys have changed position over the
years (CTL key was where the Caps-Lock usuallly is now, and the ALT
key was where the CTL key was. I found that layout much more
practical. Why did they change it?)

Given that I have to type on a few different keyboard layouts, I'd
much prefer that the cursor/delete/kill/etc commands were mapped to
CTL and ALT combos.

By the way, the previous VS editor did have a 'kill entire line'
mapped to ^l (that's L). Unfortunately typing ^l in some other MS
environments is playing keyboard roulette--you never know what's going
to happen.

[_R]

On Tue, 30 Aug 2005 18:45:03 -0700, Javaman59
<Ja*******@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote:

1. emacs used to be my editor of choice, and I've developed a lot of C and
Java code in it, but over recent years I've switched to vim. I just like the
"primitive" feel of it, compared with the double key commands for emacs, and
also the fact that vim (or vi) is available anywhere.
I guess there are more 'vi' versions than 'emacs's, but Emacs is
available for lots of platforms as well. I ended up with it via the
Epsilon editor in MSDOS days.
2. I do most of my project development within VS, and don't find the
graphical editor, with intellisense, limiting. The only things which really
bug me are the lack of keystrokes for: deleting a whole line; deleting to the
end of a line.

Exactly my problem. I don't want to edit outside of VS and do without
Intellisense. But I don't understand how programmers with good
touch-typing skills are content to lift their fingers off the asdf /
jkl; keys and move over to the cursor pad. Its a major distraction.
Also, the alpha keys are in the same place on every keyboard.

Bad enough that the CTL and ALT keys have changed position over the
years (CTL key was where the Caps-Lock usuallly is now, and the ALT
key was where the CTL key was. I found that layout much more
practical. Why did they change it?)

Given that I have to type on a few different keyboard layouts, I'd
much prefer that the cursor/delete/kill/etc commands were mapped to
CTL and ALT combos.

By the way, the previous VS editor did have a 'kill entire line'
mapped to ^l (that's L). Unfortunately typing ^l in some other MS
environments is playing keyboard roulette--you never know what's going
to happen.

[Oliver Sturm]

_R wrote:

Good idea for the plugin, I guess :-) But then, it would be easy to do
this as a macro or whatever - simply execute the keystrokes for Shift+End,
Delete.

There is built-in functionality for 'kill to end of line' in the MS
editor, but it's tough to map to ^k cause ^k is one of the MS prefixes
for multikey commands. Like trying remapping ^x in Emacs--it would
break a lot of stuff. Unfortunately I use ^k constantly in
Epsilon/Emacs. Tough to do without.

Oh, I see. Right - I don't normally use any of the standard multi-key
mappings in VS, CodeRush does away with that :-)
Oliver Sturm
--
omnibus ex nihilo ducendis sufficit unum
Spaces inserted to prevent google email destruction:
MSN oliver @ sturmnet.org Jabber sturm @ amessage.de
ICQ 27142619 http://www.sturmnet.org/blog