Author Archives: jcs

Disqus Problem Update

Posted on 2025-08-29 by jcs

I think I’ve resolved the Disqus problem. At least I was able to respond to an Irreal comment. If things are indeed resolved, I should be able to respond to your comments as usual.

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🥩 Red Meat Friday: Hell On Earth

Posted on 2025-08-29 by jcs

Did you ever wonder what Hell on earth would look like? Here you go. Imagine having to rely on Windows XP, Windows 3.11, or even MS-DOS to get your daily work done. Imagine waiting 15 minutes for your computer to … Continue reading →

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Fraga: Elevator Pitch

Posted on 2025-08-28 by jcs

As you can probably tell, I’ve become obsessed with Emacs Elevator Pitch posts. I find them particularly instructive because they require the writer to boil down what they like about Emacs to its essence. The latest offering is from Eric … Continue reading →

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Eric MacAdie’s Elevator Pitch

Posted on 2025-08-27 by jcs

Although, as I have said, the Emacs elevator pitch is a difficult challenge, several people have stepped forward to meet it. Eric MacAdie is one of those people and has provided his own contribution. His approach is to offer some … Continue reading →

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A Casual App For Gnuplot

Posted on 2025-08-26 by jcs

I really like Gnuplot. It can take a bit of raw data and produce a first class graph in many different formats. There are two problems: It’s command set is truly baroque and hard to learn I don’t use it … Continue reading →

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Karl Voit: Why Markdown Is A Disaster

Posted on 2025-08-25 by jcs

If you were paying attention to my response to Watts Martin’s post on Markdown, you probably concluded that Karl Voit is not a fan of Markdown. I’ve been following Voit’s views on light weight markup languages and personal information management … Continue reading →

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Disqus Problem

Posted on 2025-08-24 by jcs

I’ve having a problem with Disqus that prevents me from replying to comments on Irreal (or probably from commenting at all with Disqus). Disqus seems aware of the problem so I expect they’ll release a fix shortly. In the mean … Continue reading →

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A Program That Molds To Your Needs II

Posted on 2025-08-24 by jcs

The other day when I wrote about Álvaro Ramírez’s elevator pitch post, I mentioned that one of the things I liked was that his list of unexpected tasks that you could accomplish with Emacs contained links to posts where he … Continue reading →

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The Case For Markdown

Posted on 2025-08-23 by jcs

My old friend and ex colleague Watts Martin has weighed in on the Markdown issue. Martin is a technical writer and novelist who regularly uses Markdown in his work. Lately, he’s become a bit peevish about the periodic spasms of … Continue reading →

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Friesen’s Elevator Pitch

Posted on 2025-08-22 by jcs

Jeremy Friesen, who is hosting this month’s Emacs Carnival, has his own offering for the Elevator Pitch. As I said before [1, 2] the elevator pitch is particularly difficult because you have to make a persuasive case for Emacs in … Continue reading →

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