Re: [orca-list] Another Suggestion for OpenOffice/Orca Improvement

[Steve Holmes <steve holmesgrown com>]

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I don't know that the text mode apps will rule exclusively all that
much in the future.  Open Office style documents such as word
processing, spreadsheets, slide shows, etc. do have a place for less
technical users.  I think they have their place but at least in linux
we do have the choice and can use whatever floats our boats.  I like
the fact that I can read Office documents produced byothers in OO and
I can use OO to update said files and give them back to those same
users transparently without having to force them to come around to my
way of things.  It's all in flexibility.

On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 01:52:30PM +1000, Jason White wrote:
> On Sun, May 18, 2008 at 08:31:20PM -0700, Steve Holmes wrote:
> > This issue of yous is one that bugged me ever since I started using
> > any GUI based editors.  This is not confined to OO but extends to all
> > Windows based text editors such as NoteTab, NotePad, Ultra Edit, and
> > even Gedit over here on GNOME.  In order to select a block of text,
> > you have to most likely hold down the shift key while arrowing around
> > with the keys; this prevents you from using an alternative command
> > such as search/find to find the end of the block of text you might
> > want.  In emacs, I can begin the block with ctrl-space and then use
> > ctrl-s to find the end of the block I want with specified text and
> > then use the repective command to cut/copy to clipboard.  The same
> > thing can be said for vim.  These GUI type editors need the ability to
> > start marking a block of text and then allow for varied ways to
> > navigate to the other end.  
>
> It's worse than that: they don't allow you to move by sentence or paragraph,
> or to specify numeric prefixes to control the number of
> words/lines/sentences/paragraphs moved over. This is just the start; there are
> many more limitations that you only notice once you've been using a good text
> editor proficiently.
> > I think another contention I have with GUI
> > editors is the concept of line orientation is lost.  But then again,
> > word processors don't really work at a line level anyway; do thay.
>
> Correct, but documents have structure and a good editor would enable you to
> navigate by document element.
>
> When I am editing a LaTeX file in Emacs or Vim (I use both, but more often
> Emacs due to its highly useful Auctex mode), all of the formatting commands
> are included as part of the text of the document. There is no ambiguity
> concerning what the structure of the document is, or what formatting commands
> are specified. If I want to read the file without all that clutter, I can
> convert it to HTML, or even to plain text.
>
> The primary use for a graphical environment by many experienced Linux users is
> simply to enable multiple terminal sessions to be displayed on screen
> simultaneously. To this we can add a Web browser, possibly an audio/video
> player, and perhaps graphics editors as required. However, the primary mode of
> interaction is still through textual tools: the shell, editors such as Emacs
> and Vim, etc.
>
> I wouldn't be surprised if this is still true twenty years from now, although
> I hope by that time the textual tools will be even better, with two more
> decades behind them.
>
> _______________________________________________
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> http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/orca-list
> Visit http://live.gnome.org/Orca for more information on Orca

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