going back to emacs, again, again

emacs version 28.2

This isn’t the first time I’ve pulled up Emacs and dusted it off, to dive back in again as a daily driver for code writing. The last time I did this was back around the middle of 2020 when I was trying to find a relatively powerful  code editor for Raspbian on an Raspberry Pi. This time I’m writing lots of Python and C++ for embedded work as well as general application programming. I’m even working to add syntax highlighting support for Go Lang and Rust. Right now the syntax highlighting for C++ is just dandy.

Why have I flopped back to Emacs Yet Again? Because I got tired of Visual Studio Code. I have a small, modest development box built around the Minus Forum UM250 with an AMD Ryzen 2500U. It’s a modest machine with a tiny hardware footprint, more than adequate for my uses as long as I’m careful what I run on the system. Most of the time when I’m working the system fan is totally quiet. But recently I started the hear the fan running slowly in the background. I run btop in a terminal, so I started to look at how the system was running, and sure enough, something was constantly pushing the CPU enough that the fan was running slowly. I did a little bit of investigative work and I discovered that if I had the latest version of Visual Studio Code up on the desktop with a project open, the fan would run as if there was a bit of a load on it. As soon as I closed VSCode, the fan stopped turning and btop showed that the CPU usage dropped down to a minimal level. Start up VSCode again, and the load ticked up as did the fan running. VSCode didn’t use to do that.

While there are some plugins I now use for embedded work in VSCode, there’s an awful lot I can do with Emacs. I downloaded the latest source tarball from the Savannah Emacs site, unpacked it, configured it, built it, and installed it. Afterwards I tinkered together an Emacs initialization file (see the listing that follows) to give me a minimal look and functionality that I found satisfying and then away I went. I find it interesting I still have the Emacs keyboard muscle memory, in spite of drifting away from it a number of times over the years. But it’s been a good 30 years since I was first introduced to Emacs, so that counts for something, I suppose.

(setq inhibit-startup-message t)
(setq inhibit-startup-screen t)
(setq global-display-line-numbers-mode t)

(setq gc-cons-threshold 50000000)
(setq large-file-warning-threshold 100000000)

(prefer-coding-system 'utf-8)
(set-default-coding-systems 'utf-8)
(set-terminal-coding-system 'utf-8)
(set-keyboard-coding-system 'utf-8)

(require 'package)
(setq package-enable-at-startup nil)
(add-to-list 'package-archives '("melpa" . "http://melpa.org/packages/"))
(add-to-list 'package-archives '("gnu" . "http://elpa.gnu.org/packages/"))
(package-initialize)

(unless (package-installed-p 'use-package)
  (package-refresh-contents)
  (package-install 'use-package))

(eval-when-compile
  (require 'use-package))

(setq frame-title-format
      '((:eval (if (buffer-file-name)
       (abbreviate-file-name (buffer-file-name))
       "%b"))))

(setq scroll-margin 0
      scroll-conservatively 100000
      scroll-preserve-screen-position 1)

(set-frame-font "Hack 13" nil t)

(use-package doom-themes
  :ensure t
  :config
  (load-theme 'doom-material-dark t)
  (doom-themes-visual-bell-config))

(setq-default tab-width 4
              indent-tabs-mode nil)

(global-set-key (kbd "C-x k") 'kill-this-buffer)

(add-hook 'before-save-hook 'whitespace-cleanup)

(use-package diminish
  :ensure t)

(add-hook 'prog-mode-hook #'display-fill-column-indicator-mode)

(custom-set-variables
 ;; custom-set-variables was added by Custom.
 ;; If you edit it by hand, you could mess it up, so be careful.
 ;; Your init file should contain only one such instance.
 ;; If there is more than one, they won't work right.
 '(cua-mode t)
 '(custom-safe-themes
   '("84d2f9eeb3f82d619ca4bfffe5f157282f4779732f48a5ac1484d94d5ff5b279" default))
 '(font-use-system-font t)
 '(global-display-line-numbers-mode t)
 '(package-selected-packages '(use-package))
 '(save-place-mode t))
(custom-set-faces
 ;; custom-set-faces was added by Custom.
 ;; If you edit it by hand, you could mess it up, so be careful.
 ;; Your init file should contain only one such instance.
 ;; If there is more than one, they won't work right.
 )

My Emacs initialization file is located in ~/.emacs.d/init.el. I’m sure there are other features that I could add, or better plugins for the theme, but right now Emacs is fast and useful, and has a much lesser resource footprint that VSCode. I’m glad I’m back to using it again.

yet another cheesy grift (yacg)

I couldn’t let this one slide on by. This is what the GOP is now.

It’s amazing just how low a level T**** will sink to in his pursuit of money. And how many are willing to literally buy into the con. T****’s latest shameless con is selling NFTs for US$99/NFT.

By the time I finally went and visited the cheesy grift website, it was already SOLD OUT! Of course my first thoughts were just how many and for how much money? And the answers are 45,000 minted on the Ethereum blockchain (not that many), worth about US$4.5 million. And all this from a guy who was actually the 45^th president of the United States. So before it all disappears, I decided to capture my own FTs (Fungable Tokens) to share with all of you. You’re welcome.

The grift that keeps on grifting! Thousands of prizes! None of them really worth anything, just like that JPEG you’ve spent $99 to purchase!

Merry Christmas!

By the way, did you know that NFT also stands for No Fucking Thanks?

Links

Trump NFTs Top Sales Charts as Traders Buy In for the Lulz — https://decrypt.co/117433/donald-trump-nfts-sales-traders-buy-for-lulz