jr@LF-SERVER-2.BBN.COM (John Robinson) (06/22/87)
Emacs is "the Extensible, Customizable Self-Documenting Display Editor." For historical info on its underlying philosophy and lessons learned during development, the Emacs manual suggests requesting AI memo 519a from (latest price $2.25): Publications Department Articifical Intelligencs Lab 545 Tech Square Cambridge, MA 02139 This describes the original Emacs, which was a collection of macros written in MIT TECO by Richard M. Stallman (RMS), who also happens to be the author of GNU Emacs and chief GNUissance, etc. Many editors since have borrowed the style (and often the name) of this original Emacs. GNU is probably the most faithful in its replication of detail, though technology has increased its power mightily since, as elisp is a far more elegant extension language that TECO. (If you don't know what TECO is, that's another whole story. For at least a little more background on these programs and RMS, you could read Levy's "Hackers".) /jr jr@bbn.com or jr@bbnccv.uucp Without life, there wouldn't be chemical companies.
rlk@.COM (Robert Krawitz) (06/23/87)
In article <8706221600.AA14467@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU> jr@LF-SERVER-2.BBN.COM (John Robinson) writes:
] GNU is probably the most faithful in its replication of
]detail, though technology has increased its power mightily since, as
]elisp is a far more elegant extension language that TECO.
GNU Emacs is probably about the LEAST faithful in its replication of
detail. It is probably the MOST faithful in its replication of the
spirit of the original emacs (power, extensibility, ease of use...)
This is not, of course, a disadvantage at all; rather, it indicates
that RMS has learned from the shortcomings of the original Emacs and
as a result has made GNU Emacs a far superior editor. Many authors of
alternative emacs-type editors have not learned, and as a result they
have an editor worthy of the late 1970's.
For example, CCA Emacs is truly a clone of the original Emacs. It
looks exactly the same, it has the same "features" such as typeout
windows, one-shot undo, etc. GNU Emacs, on the other hand, uses
ordinary buffers for "typeout", has much more undo capability, and is
overall a much cleaner implementation.
Robert^Z