emacs vs vi

[David Dyer-Bennet]

In article <16435 at brl-adm.ARPA>, roberts at cmr.icst.nbs.gov (John Roberts) writes:
> I believe it is possible to create a <500 word summary which will allow a
> complete novice to use vi at a rudimentary level sufficient to create or
> arbitrarily modify any text file (append, insert, delete, save, etc.) I have
> not heard of any such claim made for emacs. 

  Try this, composed on the spot:

To invoke editor on a file: emacs <filename>
To save the file: ^X^S
To exit without saving: ^X^C
Cursor keys move you around.  Typing inserts the characters typed.  Delete
deletes the character to the left of the cursor.
To delete from current position to end of line: ^K
To go to beginning of line: ^A  To end of line: ^E
Backspace invokes help.

  63 words, could be much less if I weren't verbose about the descriptions.
For some levels of novices I should explain what "^K" means, maybe another
10 words.
  Of course, there are many other things I could explain about emacs or vi.
This set of commands goes back to the minimal VI command set posted
a while back, and my minimal emacs set response.  Note that I didn't have
to expend any words explaining the different modes and how to get between
them.-- 
	-- David Dyer-Bennet
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