Best products from r/emacs

Preface: for some ungodly reason Mass Drop expects people to create an account before showing what the page has.

What is on the page is the description of the keyboard along with everything in the kit.

Here is an image of the web page to fix this so that you can see what keyboard I am talking about: https://minus.com/lE02abi6ORu87.png

It is stupid I know, but that is how they are for some reason.

You don't have to use Facebook to log into it though thankfully.

Alright, so this kit is finally back as an option on Mass Drop after over a month or two of absence, and it is on it's third or fourth Mass Drop group buy, all of which have been successful with no complaints from buyers amazingly.

Ordering it as a group buy is the only way to get this keyboard and it isn't offered anywhere else on the planet.

Everyone who has tried the keyboard is in love with their ErgoDox and how comfortable using the brilliant design is.

The ErgoDox keyboard is an open source hardware, open source software design, which as people who use GPLv3 software I hope you can appreciate how huge that is in light of how unapproachable hardware design has been in the past, plus with the group buy concept instead of the total cost being over 1500 USD (I priced all of this thinking to make my own being very unhappy with the lack of any intelligence present among keyboard manufacturers) it is less than 300 dollars, even after purchasing keycaps, which is huge.

What is brilliant about this keyboard, and I mean absolute genius in a domain defined by the lack there of is that it uses open source hardware with the specifications fully available, open source software for the firmware, the micro controller is very easily modified and installed thanks to their work on the configuration software, it uses all high quality parts including the very popular Cherry MX key switches (the mechanical part of a mechanical keyboard) for excellent tactile feedback and soothing ambient noise through the clickity clackety of the key switches, provides everything you need in the kit, has excellent instructions for assembling them, and allows you to decide on your own term caps, for which there is another group buy for to bring the cost of those way down.

You will absolutely love having thumb keys, which I use for all of my modifier keys and it saves my hands from career ending emacs pinky thankfully. Thumb accessible keys is an absolute boon for the information worker that has long days and nights.

I have liked them ever since experiencing them on a Kinesis Contour Advantage keyboard, and I cannot recommend that design enough.

But wait, there's more: in addition to all of that the keyboard also brilliantly went with not only a mirrored, symmetric layout for the keys and frame, and it also had the insight and genius to go with a split-keyboard layout so that the keyboard can not only accommodate a variety of human sizes, but doing so also ensures that the user can conform to proper ergonomic keyboard uses that entails having the arms and hands orthogonal to the key layout.

And even then, this design has another stroke of genius: removal of the typical function keys and escape key.

I know, you are thinking this is insane I need those.

And yes dear reader, I thought so too, but here is why this is actually a good thing, by not having that row there not only does it save space, it also ensures that you do not have the courage to try and chord the function keys without leaving the home row and anger the tendon gods in the process.

Thanks to the multiple layouts available (more not that below) you don't actually lose access to these, they just move to wherever you have decided to locate them.

This design is the most comfortable and ergonomic keyboard design I have ever seen and it puts the rest f the industry to shame for their hubris that has ruined many a career and been generally bereft of excellence as it makes no sense to design a keyboard this way now that we are not using bloody type writers from middle ages.

I am going to order at least two myself, one to use then a backup in case I can't get it in the future, which is what has happened to another keyboard design I liked and made it impossible to get or very expensive. Also, so I can take one to work and leave another at home.

Anyways, for those of you who do not have electronics experience and are worried about soldering things together or flashing the firmware on the micro-controller, do not be alarmed.

It is quite easy if you have moderately steady hands, plus you will learn a cool skill and hopefully take up the joy of hobby electronics.

You will be able to make your own ham radios and mess around with the great arduino micro-controllers and do all kinds of awesome tricks with sensors in your residence or wherever.

I recommend getting a fine point soldering iron and desoldering pump sucker for picking up solder off the pcb if you need to redo a trace. A soldering iron like this will work fine for this project.

A beautiful person took the time to make a how to assembly video showing the entire process too, which is superb: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x1irVrAl3Ts

This image has the assembly instructions that cover the soldering and other hook ups: https://i1.minus.com/ibeVgc381INcEF.jpg

Here is the configuration page you use to set up the layout and the site generates the hex file you need to upload to the firmware for you, which is the tricky part normally: https://www.massdrop.com/ext

Here's an image mirror of that in case the previous link does not work: https://i.minus.com/ivk3kHgNCgsTl.png

Here is an example modified qwerty layout. https://minus.com/l5Tnw5yL3TuMb.png

There are multiple layers because on this keyboard you can have multiple layouts that you jump up and down through via the L+ and L- keys, which is absolutely brilliant design.

L+ moves up in the layout stack, and L- moves down in the layout stack.

Also, you can configure keys to move up or down through two layers at a time for ever faster switching between layouts.

Having a way to progress through multiple layers of layouts is something I had not thought of in my prototype design and would have sorely missed having such a wonderful feature if I had not seen the ErgoDox keyboard before I had a go at having my own custom layout manufactured.

I really cannot hype this design enough, from quality to its concept to its execution, every aspect is flawless and free as in freedom on top of that.

I hope you all consider grabbing this beautiful product.

I realize it is considerably pricy compared to other keyboards, although within a normal price for ergonomic keyboards, but this is absolutely an investment in your own health and career regardless of your age that will pay for itself.

It is a pittance to pay for compared to the agony that will succeed if you happen to come down with crippling repetitive stress injury (RSI) or carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS).

As someone who has had that, and also as someone who did not take the situation seriously, it is completely devastating and takes months to heal even with great precaution and doing everything possible outside of surgery (which at most will have 80% return of functionality in your hands and ensure that you will be maimed for life in the process).

It is much, much better to go with the ounce of prevention instead of the pound (and months to years) of cure along with hundreds of dollars in the process that entails an slew of treatments.

Even one lost paycheck due to injury will cover the cost of this investment in yourself.

If you choose not to go with this product, at least take the time to invest into researching how to avoid injury and what you can do to give yourself the best chance of staying in the game rather than being sidelined by injury and wasting your own time and brilliance.

Xah has reviews of other keyboards (none of the ErgoDox that I know of though) that are ergonomic options as well. You can find those reviews here: Xah's reviews.

I learned the basics of Lisp from this
book, which you can get online for free. Although it's about Common Lisp you
can translate most of it easily to Elisp, just (require 'cl-lib) and you will
be fine. For another quicker but great introduction to Lisp I recommend
reading the first three chapters of
PAIP

The old Writing Gnu Emacs Extensions
still serves as a good introduction to learn Emacs APIs. I also learned a lot
more about Elisp reading nullprogram.

Reading code of small packages which solve something you are interested in is
another great way to further improve your Elisp skills.

You make an interesting point. Though I have heard of the research you allude to, and of a book that makes a similar argument (Punished by Rewards: The Trouble with Gold Stars, Incentive Plans, A's, Praise, and Other Bribes), I must confess to being a bit skeptical.

If it's true that adding money to the equation makes developers lose motivation, how do you explain all the successful kickstarters out there, all the successfull donation-ware software, or all the successfull commercial software in the world?

Also, specifically on the subject of Magit, do you now expect Magit's lead developer to do less work on Magit now that he's fully funded? I know I personally expect great things now that he can focus completely on Magit without having to worry about money.

About your implication that Emacs developers are writing Emacs code for fun: I'm not sure if that's universally true. I think in most cases they're scratching an itch: they have some problem and they want to solve it, and incidentally also want to share the code with the world. They're not going to suddenly stop having problems they want to solve if they get money, and I don't think they're going to stop actually solving them or sharing the results if they get money either.

On the other hand, I do think there's some truth in what you say. I think the easiest way to turn a fun hobby in to drudgery is to be forced to do it day in and day out, whether you feel like it or not, with loss of control over direction or quality, with having to answer to all sorts of people that don't understand what you do and don't care about, and only care about using you as a tool to make themselves more money -- in short, by turning the hobby in to a stressful job. But as you can see, there are a lot more factors that go in to making a hobby in to a stressful job than merely adding money.

> It is a real Lisp and a good starting point

While not directly related, there are a lot of classic Common Lisp and Scheme books that while not explicitly the same as Emacs Lisp, wrinkle the readers brain in a way that is useful for coding in emacs lisp and becoming a better programmer in general IMO.

All of the texts I have read that are listed on A Scheme Bookshelf and A Lisp Bookshelf have been great reads; also they are excellent texts for reference on how to make great technical literature on par with Donald Knuth's books with respect to quality of presentation.

Writing GNU Emacs Extensions is still mostly relevant, despite its age, which IMO is a testament to how timeless Emacs is.

An Introduction to Emacs Lisp is great, and also included with every Emacs installation.

The keyboard I've used for years, on windows, OSX and solaris machines has been this one: http://www.amazon.com/Genuine-Y-RAQ-DEL2-Bluetooth-Keyboard-M-RBB-DEL4/dp/B01BL4NNZC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1457031055&sr=8-1&keywords=dell+keyboard+raq-del2 . I'm currently using it as my my main input for my Macbook pro that spends all day connected to two external monitors with the lid closed.

I'm not sure if you can buy it anymore, but it appears there's a USB version of it here: http://www.amazon.com/Dell-Enhanced-Black-Keyboard-SK-8115/dp/B00496FELQ/ref=sr_1_2?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1457031155&sr=1-2

It's definitely quiet enough to use in an open plan office, as that's where I am now.

The keyboard I use at home, which is even quieter, is this one: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003VAGXWK?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_search_detailpage

It's fine, but I like the more traditional key feel of the first two - I like keys that have longer action compared to the modern chiclet-style keyboards, and the raised keys of the first two allow me to use the heel of my left hand to hit the ctrl-key. Since the third keyboard has flatter keys, I can't use the heel technique on Ctrl as easily.

I map alt to meta, so I can use the heel and my left thumb for all the emacs operations without taking my fingers off the home row positions.

I agree with the recommendations for SICP - it's great.

In addition to the MIT videos, there are videos from Brian Harvey's SICP class at UC Berkeley. They're available both on YouTube and in iTunes.

However, I'll admit that I found SICP a bit overwhelming at first. For context, I'd been programming (primarily Python) for a couple years, but it was my first exposure to Lisp. I ended up taking a brief break from it to work my way through The Little Schemer and The Seasoned Schemer. It only took a week or two and at the end I was much more comfortable diving into SICP.

Not everyone likes the Schemer books - they're quite distinctive - but I loved them. I found them particularly helpful in really groking recursion and continuations.

Definitely like a triangle. Imagine using a vertical mouse, the hand is almost like a straight line up.

Vertical mouses are not too expensive, this one is my favorite (only $20). I would start with the mouse maybe.

To avoid RSI, you want to avoid much hand movement and keep the hand on the home row keys as much as possible (asdfjkl;), evil mode is very good for this as your hand won't be moving left and right, you'll also want to avoid using your pinky to hit CTRL or moving your hand to hit ESC. This is how hit CTRL

;Default font:

(set-frame-font "Monaco Regular 18")

;Set the background to black:

(set-background-color "black")

You can copy those lines to your scratch buffer ,"C-x b *scratch*", place the cursor at the end of the line and hit "C-x C-e" and they should take immediate effect.

Steve Yegge did a nice post about emacs configuration that is a pretty good intro into how to organize all of your modes.

If you want to harness the true power of emacs, you will have to learn a little lisp. If you've never seen lisp before, I would recommend starting with John McCarthy's original introductory paper. The place to go from there would be
Glickstein's Writing GNU Emacs Extensions. Though some of the particular configuration information is a bit dated, it is a perfect introduction to programming in emacs lisp (elisp). Last but not least, there is the Programming in Emacs Lisp online resource at gnu.org. Hope that helps!

If you like reading about computer history, I really enjoyed Stephen Levy's Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution. (There's a pdf floating around if you google search it, but I don't think it would be good form to directly link it since the book is still in print.) It's a really fascinating look at the early hacker cultures in MIT and Silicon Valley from the late 1950s through the early 1980s.

There's actually an interesting literature on extrinsic vs. intrinsic rewards, and the upshot is often that getting paid for something reduces intrinsic reward, which can be a powerful motivator. Getting small amounts of money could, counterintuitively, actually disincentivize work on Emacs.

There's an interesting book on this phenomenon called Drive: https://www.amazon.com/Drive-Surprising-Truth-About-Motivates/dp/1594484805

> do I have to keep on and believe Emacs is a better env for my needs?

Why did you switch to emacs? What was vim lacking that you feel emacs can offer?

Have you tried using netrw to edit remote files in vim? What about vim's autocomplete didn't work for you?

If you're already comfortable in vim, you might get more mileage out of just learning to use vim more effectively.

If you're determined to switch, just wait for a time when you know things will be a little slow for a week or so, and switch cold turkey. Maybe read a book about it in the mean time. You'll get used to it in no time!

I'm reading through this. It's out of date, but has still been really helpful to me understanding the logic of emacs etc. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Learning-GNU-Emacs-Nutshell-handbook/dp/1565921526/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1518041820&sr=8-3&keywords=emacs+oreilly

It's very cheap, too, which is a big bonus over more modern ones.

Just letting you know, emacs mugs are back in stock. They're even fulfilled by amazon now, so if you have Amazon Prime or an order of $25 or more, it ships for free :-) http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004N1TRLA

The Onyx Boox line of tablets/ereaders are essentially Android machines. They run any Android apps, including their ebook apps, and have been around for a long time, many models with different screen sizes, etc., it can be a little confusing to sort through the different models, some are older, lower resolution.

https://onyxboox.com/

Termux and associated packages should run okay, but do a little checking to confirm, e.g.,:

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=293825

Nova Pro model seems now like the 'goldilocks' boox model, good screen, recent android, not too expensive:

https://www.amazon.com/BOOX-Nova-Pro-Reader-Android/dp/B07L95KPFM/ref=sr_1_3?keywords=boox&qid=1568478565&s=electronics&sr=1-3

I switched to evil/spacemacs a few years ago when my RSI was worsening to see if it helped. It helped for a short time but then my RSI started coming back. Vim keybindings can also cause RSI.

​

However I don't regret learning evil. I really enjoy modal editing. Also, trying out spacemacs exposed me to lots of cool packages I didn't know about before. Though I'm using my own config these days, whenever I'm trying out a new language I usually check the spacemacs config to see what packages are installed there.

​

Over the years I've tried various things that have been more or less helpful for RSI:

- Conquering carpal tunnel syndrome and other repetitive stress injuries

- http://www.workrave.org/

- Voice coding (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SkdfdXWYaI, https://github.com/dictation-toolbox/aenea)

- Mind-body prescription (it's a bit wacky, I don't agree with all of it, but I think there's something to it & a lot of people seem to find it helpful)

- Standing desk

- Back massage (https://www.amazon.com/Tiger-Tail-Ball-Roller-Corded/dp/B0078PX01G/ref=sr_1_4?keywords=ball+rope+back+massage&qid=1558366141&s=gateway&sr=8-4)

- Exercise

You can install spacemacs and other custom configs as a way of discovering what's out there and how to do things, and then put the things you like and understand in your own init.el.

This is a good book to get started: Writing GNU Emacs Extensions: Editor Customizations and Creations with Lisp.

Just go slow, try out lots of configs for ideas, build up your customizations over time.

If you're serious about this, and want to do it right, I'd recommend locating a copy of Writing GNU Emacs Extensions by Bob Glickstein.

While it is a little out of date with respect to recent versions of emacs (some things are easier now, and a few "best practices" have changed), it is still an excellent overview of writing emacs extensions.

I'd be a little cautious about following it's tutorials due to the previously mentioned changes (you will still need to do some additional manual reading), but as far as a starting point and overview of what is involved, I can't think of a better resource.

steps to do are:

1. get current line or url. use bounds-of-thing-at-point from thing-at-point.el.
   
2. use regex to determine which site it is, since your format is different for each site. Use cond for this. You can regex check "stackexchange" or "reddit". The function to use is string-match
   
3. once you know which site it is, use a string-match again to parse it into components. Use match-string to extract the components.
   
4. then just use insert and format to insert it. use delete-region to delete the original.
   
   here's code that's similar to what you want.
   
   (defun xah-amazon-linkify ()
   "Make the current amazon URL or selection into a link.
   
   Examples of amazon product URL formats
   http://www.amazon.com/Cyborg-R-T-Gaming-Mouse/dp/B003CP0BHM/ref=pd_sim_e_1
   http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003CP0BHM
   http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B003CP0BHM/xahh-20
   http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B003CP0BHM/
   http://www.amazon.com/dp/B003CP0BHM?tag=xahhome-20
   http://amzn.to/1F5M1hA
   https://alexa.design/2okfMcj
   
   Example output:
   <a class=\"amz\" href=\"http://www.amazon.com/dp/B003CP0BHM/?tag=xahh-20\" title=\"Cyborg R T Gaming Mouse\">amazon</a>
   
   For info about the Amazon ID in URL, see: URL http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_Standard_Identification_Number'<br /> <br /> URLhttp://ergoemacs.org/emacs/elisp_amazon-linkify.html'
   Version 2017-04-10"
   (interactive)
   (let (($bds (bounds-of-thing-at-point 'url))
   $p1 $p2 $inputText $asin $productName )
   (if (use-region-p)
   (progn (setq $p1 (region-beginning)) (setq $p2 (region-end)))
   (progn (setq $p1 (car $bds)) (setq $p2 (cdr $bds))))
   (setq $inputText (buffer-substring-no-properties $p1 $p2))
   (if (or (string-match "//amzn.to/" $inputText)
   (string-match "//alexa.design/" $inputText))
   (progn (delete-region $p1 $p2)
   (insert (format "<a class=\"amz_search\" href=\"%s\">amazon</a>" $inputText)))
   (progn
   (setq $asin
   (cond
   ((string-match "/dp/\([[:alnum:]]\{10\}\)/?" $inputText) (match-string 1 $inputText))
   ((string-match "/dp/\([[:alnum:]]\{10\}\)\?tag=" $inputText) (match-string 1 $inputText))
   ((string-match "/gp/product/\([[:alnum:]]\{10\}\)" $inputText) (match-string 1 $inputText))
   ((string-match "/ASIN/\([[:alnum:]]\{10\}\)" $inputText) (match-string 1 $inputText))
   ((string-match "/tg/detail/-/\([[:alnum:]]\{10\}\)/" $inputText) (match-string 1 $inputText))
   ((and
   (equal 10 (length $inputText ))
   (string-match "\`\([[:alnum:]]\{10\}\)\'" $inputText))
   $inputText)
   (t (error "no amazon ASIN found"))))
   
   (setq
   $productName
   (replace-regexp-in-string
   "-" " "
   (if (string-match "amazon.com/\([^/]+?\)/dp/" $inputText)
   (progn (match-string 1 $inputText))
   (progn
   (message "no product name found" ))
   ""
   )))
   
   (delete-region $p1 $p2)
   (insert
   "<a class=\"amz\" href=\"http://www.amazon.com/dp/"
   $asin "/?tag=xahh-20\" title=\"" $productName "\">Buy at amazon</a>")
   (search-backward "\">")))))
   
   
   
   

I'd recommend watching Writing Games in Emacs for a simple tic-tac-toe mode and then reading Writing GNU Emacs Extensions which culminates in a crossword mode.