Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!usc!samsung!umich!umeecs!msi.umn.edu!noc.MR.NET!gacvx2.gac.edu!vax1.mankato.msus.edu!vax1.mankato.msus.edu!msucats From: msucats@att1.Mankato.MSUS.EDU (msucats) Newsgroups: comp.unix.amiga Subject: Re: Decent Unix Editors!! (one man's opinion, anyway) Message-ID: Date: 3 May 91 09:31:55 GMT References: <1991Apr25.083732.6664@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG> <1991Apr25.235247.27948@maytag.waterloo.edu><1991Apr28.215137.10531@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG> Organization: Mankato State University Lines: 38 Nntp-Posting-Host: att1.mankato.msus.edu In-reply-to: xanthian@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG's message of 28 Apr 91 21:51:37 GMTLines: 38 In article <1991Apr25.083732.6664@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG>, Kent writes: > The more important point is still not understood, however -- no > commercial product worth its price would be released with a braindead > misfeature like the rape of the backspace key VMS does not allow any obvious kind of remapping of ^H to DEL either. > disabling "out of the box" use of GNU emacs for much of the world, yet > repeated calls over several years to the keepers of GNU emacs have > elicited no change whatever -- this bogosity is graven in stone > because the keyboard of the implementer of GNU emacs happens to have > DEL where over half the keyboards in the world have BS, and that > settles the issue. This isn't a justification, but an explanation: ...however, a good number of hackers in the world use, or have used, systems where DEL means delete-to-the-left and can't be remapped. It was just Un*x's bad luck to allow DEL to do this instead of forcing # upon the user. :-) The standard drives out the configurable. I bet Emacs v19 is shipped with the swap easily available, tho. I was really annoyed by switching back and forth too, until I was forced to settle on a single delete-to-the-left key for all the systems I use. > By this single example do I destroy the claim that the CopyLeft paradigm > of programming has anything useful to offer the software marketplace, and > fully defend George Harrison's right to find emacs less than ideal. By this single example do I destroy the claim that DEC has anything useful to offer the software marketplace, and fully defend your right to complain vigorously to the FSF. Jay Carlson msucats@att1.mankato.msus.edu