Ah, nice. I can’t argue with this (de gustibus non est disputandem). Although I almost feel like you’re making my point for me. For those for whom the ineffable joy of Emacs wizardry isn’t a factor, learning such wizardry is an investment that’s unlikely to pay off. But that’s an empirical question. The joy might even be effable after all, making the whole question empirical: Will you maximize your utility by embracing or eschewing powerful text editors?
I don’t actually have a very strong prediction. I just wanted to make the points that repetitive mindless editing is less costly than it seems and the wizardry is more costly than it seems (modulo the intrinsic joy, as you say). In fact, I just thought of an analogy: the mindless repetitive editing is like doodling during a lecture; creating a macro or other wizardry to avoid the mindless editing is like texting during a lecture. The former leaves your brain engaged with the topic at hand and the latter engages it elsewhere.
You can say that in this analogy it would need to be particularly life-affirming texting. Again, I can’t argue with that. I’m just highlighting the cost. If the cost is worth paying, that’s fine.
Ah, nice. I can’t argue with this (de gustibus non est disputandem). Although I almost feel like you’re making my point for me. For those for whom the ineffable joy of Emacs wizardry isn’t a factor, learning such wizardry is an investment that’s unlikely to pay off. But that’s an empirical question. The joy might even be effable after all, making the whole question empirical: Will you maximize your utility by embracing or eschewing powerful text editors?
I don’t actually have a very strong prediction. I just wanted to make the points that repetitive mindless editing is less costly than it seems and the wizardry is more costly than it seems (modulo the intrinsic joy, as you say). In fact, I just thought of an analogy: the mindless repetitive editing is like doodling during a lecture; creating a macro or other wizardry to avoid the mindless editing is like texting during a lecture. The former leaves your brain engaged with the topic at hand and the latter engages it elsewhere.
You can say that in this analogy it would need to be particularly life-affirming texting. Again, I can’t argue with that. I’m just highlighting the cost. If the cost is worth paying, that’s fine.