Emacs

I started using Emacs for the mu4e mail client after using and liking the mu mail indexer on the command line (read more about my mail client setup). Then I got curious about Org Mode and started using it for note taking and task management. I realised that configuring Emacs to my liking would be like second job, which I didn’t have the bandwidth for, so I started using the ‘distribution’ Doom Emacs. It enables Vim bindings everywhere with Evil Mode which, coming from Vim, made it much easier to get up to speed.

The Emacs philosophy is different from Vim‘s, it aims to be the ’everything program’. It is it’s own operating system: a big Lisp machine distinct from the Unix shell I’m used to working in. It’s much more configurable and extensible than Vim – plugins are written in the same language that most of the Editor is itself, Emacs Lisp. A small example of how this results in a seamless experience; in Emacs I have vertico providing fuzzy finding capabilities, which extends to built-in UI elements. For example, M-x will fuzzy match on commands I can execute. In contrast, in Neovim I use telescope to provide fuzzy searching which I have to invoke separately – I still have the normal command prompt with : but I can fuzzy search commands with <leader>fq with this binding:

vim.keymap.set('n', '<leader>fq', require('telescope.builtin').commands)

Neovim might be adding similar extensibility for fuzzy searching. It seems like with things like Evil mode and Neovim’s Lua-focused extensibility the two editors are moving towards each other somewhat.

Emacs can be slow and a bit unwieldy however, so I still use Vim sometimes, like for small edits on remote servers.

You can find my Doom Emacs configuration here.

Below are my working notes on learning and using Emacs. At the top are some open questions – please get in touch if you have an answer!

§TODO LSP from devshells

get lsp environment from nix devshell

§TODO how

§general

• C-b C-x list buffers
• C-b x open buffer
• help:
  • variable C-h v
  • function C-h f
  • key C-h k
• M-x command
• C-x C-e / (gr in evil) evaluate expression selected
• M-: / (SPC ; in doom) evaluate expression from minibuffer
• key binding conventions
• kmacro-edit-macro to edit recorded macro

§email / mu4e

• m move mail
• a v open in firefox
• C compose
• R/W/F/C/E reply/reply-to-all/forward/compose/edit(draft)
• Pr toggle property
  • Ptr mu4e-include-related
• e extract attachments
  • ~/.mailcap for external openers
  • A for more options
• blue/yellow in header view mu4e-unread-face mu4e-flagged-face
• exit composer
  • ZZ / C-c C-c send message
  • ZD / C-c C-d save to drafts and leave
  • ZF attach
  • ZQ / C-c C-k kill the message buffer (the message remains in the draft folder)
  • ZA / C-c C-a attach a file (pro-tip: drag & drop works as well in graphical context)
  • C-c C-; switch the context
• disable include relevant by default
  • https://www.djcbsoftware.nl/code/mu/mu4e/Other-search-functionality.html#Including-related-messages-1
• how to add a filter to a maildir
  • mu4e-search-narrow / with evil-collection, and \ to undo
  • similarly mark pattern
    • https://www.djcbsoftware.nl/code/mu/mu4e/Marking-messages.html
• how to open URL with keyboard shortcut?
  • shr-browse-url
  • RET
  • browse-url-at-point
  • M-RET mu4e--view-browse-url-from-binding
  • gx
• cw wide reply in message view with evil mode
• M-q format paragraph
• . view headers
• how to switch message from plaintext to html with a keyboard shortcut?
• custom account completition?

§doom macs

• SPC h b t which key show all bindings
• C-h in which key to search bindings
• SPC h v help variables
• SPC h o help symbol
• K help
• gd go to definition
• map!
• SPC f s save file
• SPC TAB workspaces
• SPC b buffers
• SPC s search
• gr evaluate lisp
• SPC g g magit
• SPC o m mu4e
• SPC o t terminal
• SPC q s / SPC q l save / load session
• SPC p f file in project
• in minibuffer C-s searches history
• SPC p p opens project in new workspace
• jumplist C-i / C-o not working in terminal?
  • terminal can’t distinguish between Tab and C-i
  • https://github.com/doomemacs/doomemacs/issues/8101
• Why does the help menu not stay opening when switching windows?
  • Doom’s popup window implementation
• How to get into normal mode in emacs minibuffers?
  • (setq evil-collection-setup-minibuffer t)
• how to edit properties in org mode?
  • SPC m o
• how to see org mode agenda?
  • SPC o a
• how to remove icons from mu4e?
• query-replace / query-replace-regex?
  • https://github.com/hungyiloo/hungyi.net/blob/archive-2024/content/posts/doom-emacs-search-replace-project.org
• M-` does menu bar
• C-~ make popup real window
• SPC h w where-is command
• S evil-surround
• spell checker

§org-mode

manual

§time prompt

• - to look at past day, e.g. -sun

§bindings

1. org mode key bindings

   • M-ret add entry
   • M-S-ret todo entry
   • TAB / S-TAB
     • NB S-TAB is bound to org-shifttab instead of org-global-cycle
   • M-LEFT / M-RIGHT / M-UP / M-DOWN / M-S-LEFT / M-S-RIGHT org-meta
   • RET open link

2. evil org keybindings

   • << / >> org-meta
   • vae / vaR
   • [ h / ] h
   • gj / gk / gh / gl
   • S-UP / S-DOWN prev / next item in list

3. doom emacs org mode bindings

   • zc / zo / zO
   • SPC m h (SPC m *) / SPC m i toggle heading / item
   • SPC m d t / org-time-stamp
   • SPC m s S subtree sort
   • SPC m s s subtree sparse
   • SPC m x toggle checkbox SPC u SPC m x add checkbox
   • SPC m + / S-LEFT / S-RIGHT cycle checkboxes
   • SPC n l store link e.g. in email / mu4e
   • SPC m l l insert link
   • C-c RET insert heading C-M-RET insert subheading https://github.com/doomemacs/doomemacs/issues/3306
   • M-S-RET insert todo heading
   • SPC m t / S-LEFT / S-RIGHT TODO
   • SPC m q / C-c C-c (on heading) set tag
   • C-c \ org-match-sparse-tree on tags
   • SPC m o set property
   • C-c C-c on property property action
   • C-c . / SPC m d t / SPC m d T org timestamp
     • SPC u SPC m d t for date time
   • SPC m c clock commands
   • TAB see drawer
   • SPC m s r refile SPC m r R refile reverse
   • SPC X capture
   • SPC m A archive
   • SPC m s a archive tag
   • SPC m a attachment
   • SPC u 3 TAB show 3 level deep headings

§scripting

#+begin_src python
a = [ 1, 2, 3 ]
return a
#+end_src

#+RESULTS:
| 1 | 2 | 3 |

evaluate with RET

§agenda

• how to exclude LOOP todo items from the todo list? org-agenda-filter-by-category / sc / \ on line
• how to filter by tag? org-agenda-filter-by-tag / st / <
• gD select time range

§how to do bibtex citations?

• biblio doom module
• org-cite-insert
• citar-open-notes

§HOLD org-caldav

• https://github.com/dengste/org-caldav/issues/322
• basically, we need a good CLI caldav client
• the mu to mu4e
• but I don’t want to do it
• maybe https://github.com/BartSte/khalorg is promising

§latex

• got a project compiling using doom emacs latex module which pulls in AUCTeX)
• even got a synctex working back and forth with SPC m v and Ctrl+click in evince
• TODO figure out how to use internal pdf viewer (seems like +latex/viewers isn’t respected)
• TODO figure out how to get SPC m v working from another tex file (seems like the master file detection is off)
• may find answers in https://elpa.gnu.org/packages/doc/auctex.html or https://github.com/doomemacs/doomemacs/tree/master/modules/lang/latex
• pdf viewer search highlight https://github.com/vedang/pdf-tools/issues/162

§android

Using doom-emacs in Android Emacs

§ledger-mode

• [[ / ]] next / prev transaction
• SPC m a xact
• TAB completion
• SPC m t clear
• SPC m R reconciliation
• TAB mark transaction cleared (in reconciliation)

§magit

• SPC g C git clone

§how to act on all search matches

• embark-collect (SPC a S)