MarchZealousideal543 over at the Emacs subreddit asks a familiar question: Is it really feasible or even possible for a non-programmer to use Emacs productively? I know I write about this a lot but I find the subject fascinating. MarchZealousideal543 got steered onto Emacs by asking some AI for suggestions and apparently Emacs was the overwhelming recommendation.
There’s nothing very interesting about such questions, of course; the interest is in the comments. There’s the usual ankle biting and nonsense but a lot of the comments are excellent and tell stories of how people from all walks of life—even someone in construction—use Emacs to run their lives, careers, or businesses.
The one thing that many of them say, though, is that you should expect to spend a few weeks getting up to speed with Emacs. Those of us who have been using Emacs for decades and still consider ourselves barely up to speed can only smile. Nevertheless, they all say that the startup time is worth it and that you will soon become proficient.
The other story that came up more than once was how the secretaries at the MIT were introduced to Emacs and given a small write up on how to configure it. Because they didn’t realize they were programming, they soon were soon automating their workflows.
If, like me, you like reading about non-technical people using Emacs, take a look at this reddit post.