+ I reccommend GNU Emacs (not Spacemacs, or Doom Emacs) to everyone. If you're just starting to program + then you're at an even bigger advantage if you pickup Emacs early. If you're a battle hardened developer + you should still be using Emacs, though it may be harder to pickup, assuming you've been using modern "IDE's" + for most of your career. I also recommend Emacs to pretty much anyone that processes text often. +
++ Emacs provides the perfect balance of customization, to effectiveness of any editor. I think that it's foolish + to use tools that don't let you mold them to your idea of how to use them. Software tools aren't like traditional + tools like Hammers and Pipe-wrenches, and it's foolish to use them in this way. With Emacs a Secretary, Software Engineer (obviously), + Math Student, Professor, Novelist, etc, can all find ways to implement Emacs into their day-to-day. + Emacs is a tool for empowering people. It's not just a text-processor (though it's really good at that), it's also a journal, + a lisp interpreter, and really, anything you want. +
++ I'm going to focus on Software Developers for the rest of this, seeing as it's who I can relate too most. + Software Developers often get stuck in ruts, I truly think Emacs is the tool to pull you out and keep you out + of said ruts. Emacs will kick you in the rear, and make you cry, and force you to work in a subpar fashion for a long time, + the GNU is not an easy beast to tame. But once you've put in the work, and elevated yourself upon it's reigns, the power you + attain is so incredibly wizard-like that you may very well consider wearing a pointed hat, and robes, at work. +
++ Currently, I use Emacs for everything at work. Compiling, code editing, file-system stuff, docker, git, documentation, etc. + I've used other editors and nothing, comes even close to Emacs. Vim users will probably recoil, but Vim makes you context + switch so often between the terminal and your editor that I really think it doesn't even belong in the same category as Emacs. + What I would recommend to the Emacs novice, is to focus on setting up your workflows 1 flow at a time. For instance, say you want + to work on Perl code. Setup all the Perl related stuff in one-shot and don't worry about making your configuration super ergonomic + and extensible. Just make it work for Perl. Then say, you get a job in Scala, do the same thing, but refactor your configuration + to enable both Perl and Scala nicely, rinse and repeat until your hands bleed. That's really all there is to it, as you find things + you want to improve, improve them one-by-one. Don't rush in and expect to setup a perfect IDE for every language and every workflow. + Emacs really is what you make of it, but you can't really know what to make of it, until you identify the problems you want to solve. +
++ A good way to think of Emacs, is, it's the instrument equivalent of text-processors. +
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