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Comment by kleiba | Hacker News Reader

Fun fact: even pressing three keys at the same time is rare when using Emacs (although there are some three-key combos I use regularly), most shortcuts consist of consecutive key presses.

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I sometimes feel like playing the piano :D But the UX is better than you'd think, there's packages that show you what options you have for what key to press next, and the sequences are generally quite logical (e.g. CTRL-x followed by "p" has all the commands related to projects).

Plus you can always just enter the command instead of using the key stroke for it. Again, the default UX for that is a bit weak, but with a few packages it becomes pretty strong.

> there's packages that show you what options you have for what key to press next

Rejoice! The excellent which-key package that does this comes bundled with Emacs 30! (Emacs 30 will probably be released soon.)

> enter command… default UX is a bit weak

Agreed: the packages Helm, Ivy, and Vertico make this interface much nicer. I use Vertico [1] personally. Though, from Emacs 29, there are some really nice options you can set. I used the following in my Bedrock starter kit [2] to get nicer tab-completion: as soon as you hit TAB twice you'll get bumped into the Completion buffer to select something with your cursor.

Here's the relevant config:

    (setopt completion-auto-help 'always)                  ; Open completion always; `lazy' another option
    (setopt completions-max-height 20)                     ; This is arbitrary
    (setopt completions-detailed t)
    (setopt completions-format 'one-column)
    (setopt completions-group t)
    (setopt completion-auto-select 'second-tab)            ; Much more eager
    ;(setopt completion-auto-select t)                     ; See `C-h v completion-auto-select' for more possible values

There's more configuration options, of course, but this is helpful:

[1]: https://github.com/minad/vertico [2]: https://codeberg.org/ashton314/emacs-bedrock

which-key made it in? Sweet! I've been saying for years it should be in Emacs and turned on by default.

True. I often times find myself typing out the command rather than using some obscure key sequence like C-c C-v n (case in point: https://orgmode.org/manual/Key-bindings-and-Useful-Functions...). Since Emacs does tab completion for the command name too, I personally find that a better UX than using the "shortcut" (if I can remember it at all).

I tend to use search for infrequently used stuff and stuff I'm just trying to learn for the first time, then if I find myself using it several times in a session I look up the keybind to start practicing that. If it sticks, it sticks, and if it doesn't... the search functionality is great!

> the sequences are generally quite logical (e.g. CTRL-x followed by "p" has all the commands related to projects).

They really are not.

Depends on if you count shift. I C-M-% (query-regexp-replace) fairly regularly, and that's 4.

Sure, shift counts. I suppose I would bind it to a more convenient keybinding if I used query-regexp-replace regularly, but note that I didn't say there weren't any such keybindings, just that they're rare.

I assume this varies widely across setups.

    (use-package visual-regexp
      :defer t
      :bind (("C-c r" . vr/replace)
             ("C-c q" . vr/query-replace)
             ("C-r" . vr/isearch-backward)
             ("C-s" . vr/isearch-forward)))

    (use-package visual-regexp-steroids
      :defer t)

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