We at the Applied Research Information Communications team have been working with the GNU Emacs environment for the last several years to produce an integrated productivity environment for information intensive tasks. (We now refer to this as InfoDock.) It is available today on Paging Products Sun and NeXT networks. The only technical support available for the environment right now is our own informal team answers to questions and documentation which you can find in the Boynton Beach library (ask for the InfoComm file cabinet). We are working on a full commercial support contract for the whole environment, if we develop a significant user base locally. This document gives you an overview of why you should consider using the Emacs environment to improve your productivity. For What is GNU Emacs Useful? Bob Weiner Brown University 1/6/91 Written at Brown University with Motorola support. Localized for Motorola PWDG use: 10/05/92 V1.1 Available for unrestricted use and distribution with attribution. * Introduction ============== Although many people in business, technical and academic fields have heard about or even used GNU Emacs in recent years, there remain many misconceptions about what it is and for what tasks it may be used. This document is meant as a brief outline of the salient points that distinguish GNU Emacs from many other related tools available. It does not explain what GNU Emacs is to the wholly uninitiated. For that, you should see the GNU Emacs Manual published by the Free Software Foundation of Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA. GNU Emacs is at heart a framework rather than a single tool. The original emacs idea began as a way to support efficient text editing, but it has grown into much more than that, while still retaining its original goals of efficiency. It can be readily customized to support any number of tasks. GNU Emacs is available for free use and distribution. It is portable to virtually every UNIX platform and OS/2. As part of our productivity improvement, information delivery and application research work, we in Motorola PWDG Applied Research have extended the Emacs environment with a number of significant tools and have customized it to help you achieve high performance results in your work. We hope you take advantage of this work, which is available for free use throughout Motorola. Staffers are available to assist teams who wish to integrate the Emacs framework into their knowledge work processes. Below is a high-level summary of Emacs features. The list of items preceded by plus signs offer a good two page synopsis for management that suggests how Emacs can improve your work environment. All tools share a common editing framework more capable than any commercially available tools. Commercial support is available for GNU Emacs and a number of major corporations rely upon such support. GNU Emacs tools include: + CalendaAppointment Manager - for personal use, no group scheduling + Command Shell - provides convenient, editable access to operating system commands, even from a terminal + Compilation Interface - jumps to source line of any errors + Electronic Mail - reader and composer, 3 different readers from which to choose + Editor - for text, programming, documentation languages; powerful facilities; can interface to version release control systems + Debugger Interface - speeds program debugging and analysis + File Manager - directory browsing and management + File Filter - can apply complex filtering directives in a batch mode + Forms Entry - entry and management of forms-based data + Hypertext Management System - supports rapid information linkage and access, e.g. jump to other files or program identifiers at the touch of a key + Info Manual Browser - efficiently browses online manuals + Lisp Interpreter - for learning and producing production quality code + Menus - a number of tools can be accessed from an effective menu interface whether or not a mouse is available; supports different user skill levels and provides a common interface on terminals and window systems + Network News/Bulletin Boards - reader and article submitter; this may be the only portable UNIX-based newsreader pre-configured for use in the Paging Division + Object-oriented Code Browser - supports the five major OO languages: C++, Objective-C, CLOS (Lisp), Smalltalk, and Eiffel; a graphical Motif-based browser is also available. + Outliner - for both text and program source code + Remote Control of Emacs - other programs can send edit or other requests to an Emacs process, whether they run on the same machine or on another network. + Remote File Editing - files on remote hosts accessible via a network connection can be edited as though they were local (except you specify your user account on the remote machine); this permits editing from your machine to files located on Suns, Apollos, HPs, NeXTs and other TCP/IP-based machines + Rolodex - flexible, fast lookup of record-based information + Scientific calculator - very advanced, can solve problems without programming + Full-text Retrieval - User interface to Wide Area Information Server (WAIS) client-server full text and other media retrieval system + Watch What I Do Automation - stores command sequences for later playback + VI Emulation - to ease transition to Emacs for VI users; other editor emulations can be written * Detailed Emacs Traits ======================= ** Standard, sensible user interface Think of all the programs and associated user interfaces you have had to learn over the years to do each task. Now look at what you can do by mastering a single integrated environment with one consistent user interface. ** Powerful, flexible text editor Interactive filling and justification. Outlining. Unlimited number of edit buffers. Unlimited line lengths. Displays EXACTLY what is in files, including all control and binary codes. Multi-windowed, even from text terminals. Extended UNIX regular expression capabilities. Mode and buffer specific key bindings; full user control over what each key does. Edit on remote machines via ftp. The editor works on the files pretty much as though they are local. Editor lock to prevent unauthorized usage (useful from terminals). ** Programming language editor Syntax-specific support for Lisp, C, C++, Pascal, Fortran, assembler, Eiffel, Sather, Modula-2, Simula, etc. Incremental search (finds matches as you type the search expression). Tags finding (jumps to the definition of functions and variables given a name). Compiler error grep/pattern matching parsing for many language compilers (jumps to source file lines where error or grep expression matches occur). Debugger interface (Permits debugging of C, C++ and Objective-C from within the editor; also cross-debugging of assembler is possible). ** Document editing and formatting Text, outlines, TeX, LaTex, Texinfo, Interleaf TPS, Nroff, Troff, and Scribe support. ** Context Saving Each buffer maintains its own state. A history of major edit locations within each buffer is kept so you can quickly return to any one. As buffers overlay one another in windows, it is simple to return to any desired buffer set. Entire buffer-window configurations may be saved and recalled with a single key. Quitting a special edit mode typically brings you back to where you were before you started. Editing history is saved between sessions; each day you start where you left off. Usually, from day to day you tend to be working on the same set of files so each time you start the editor, the files you were editing last time you quit from the editor will be automatically reloaded. ** Calendar Schedule your own appointments. Look up any date. ** Rolodex (Wrolo) Unlimited, free-form entries. Fast lookup. ** E-Mail ReadeComposer (RMAIL or VM) Very interactive. Reads, files, forwards, replies to, locates, summarizes, and sorts groupings of mail. Two mail readers for users with different backgrounds and tastes to choose among. ** Lisp Interpreter (Emacs Lisp) Helps people learn the language. Contains an interactively steppable debugger. ** News ReadeComposer (GNUS) Powerful USENET net news (bulletin board) reader, like the mail readers. ** Menu interface (Smart Menus) An easy to use menu system for using a number of Emacs tools. ** Directory Editing (Dired) Navigate through directory hierarchies, view files, rename, copy, safely delete, and change permissions on files. ** OS Command Shell Interface (Shell) File name completion (essentially selection of files from a list). Interactive history recall. Editable transcript pads of your command interactions even from terminals. Telnet, cross-system remote login mode. ** Man Page Browsing (Superman and Man-apropos) Quick UNIX manual page interface which simplifies browsing. ** Info: Linked Information Browser (Info) Easy to use, point and click support available. Very fast to find information within an organized body of work. Manuals on a number of tools are available in this format. ** Hypertext Management System (Hyperbole) Easy to construct targeted, interactive information access systems Point and click hypertext buttons in e-mail, network news, and any files Menu based interface ** Learning / Reference Aids Online self-paced tutorial. Online complete reference manual. Printed manual and key binding summaries. See Paging Division library for printed help guides. ** Customizability Source code is available for local customization. 'Watch what I do' type macros are used for simple user customizations. Lisp is used for complex customization requirements. * Platform Issues ================= ** HP Apollo Native DM (Display Manager) and X window implementation; mouse and DM key support. DM keys operate as expected so people can immediately be productive. Many Emacs control key bindings can be made available in the DM environment making them very compatible. Works with BSD UNIX. ** SUN OpenWindows/X window support. ** Other UNIX GNU Emacs runs on virtually all UNIX platforms under X and via character terminals. ** OS/2 A full port of GNU Emacs is available for OS/2, although we do not have it in-house. ** MS DOS A recently released port allows GNU Emacs to run on 386 and 486, DOS-based PCs with a number of limitations. ** Terminals Emacs takes advantage of any UNIX supported display terminal with little change in interface or functionality limitation. Dial-in from home via modem and work much like you can with a direct connection.