this post was submitted on 22 Nov 2023
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How rewarding learning Elisp can be? (alien.top)
submitted 11 months ago by Fate_sc@alien.top to c/emacs
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I'm a new emacs user and I've been using doom emacs for a while now and i'm willing to learn Elisp, but found out that it might not be as easy as it might seem at first, because as i found out, lisp is quite different from other programming languages that i'm used to, especially knowing that i'm not a programmer by any means and my programming knowledge is very little, not mentioning that elisp is pretty old so the learning resources might not be as much as other more popular programming languages

so my question is, Is it worth it?

like what is the level of mastery do i need to achieve to start implementing custom elisp in my configs to enhance my emacs experience?

and how exactly can i improve my emacs experience if i learned elisp?

in other words, how rewarding it would be

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[–] sg2002@alien.top 1 points 11 months ago

Learning Elisp is definitely worth it. If you learn it, you'd be able to immediately improve your workflow in minor ways, the moment you spot any things that can be improved.

In terms of mastery - Lisp is a very easy language to learn, it's just that it's a bit alien to the current C-imperative crowds, so takes maybe 1 month until you'll be able to read it comfortably.

Learning resources are pretty great. Just go through the "An Introduction to Programming in Emacs Lisp". The fact that you're not a professional programmer is even better here, because those get too bored with it quickly. After that you can just read Elisp Reference on the need to know basis. Of course I also highly recommend you learn info too, because there's a reason why us, Emacs people, love doing everything through Emacs. Anyway, a good goal for Elisp knowledge is being able to program in it comfortably without ever needing to google anything, just relying on the Elisp Reference alone.

P.S. Don't listen to all the people(mostly from other Lisp communities) who say that Elisp is clunky and sucks. The fact stands that the Elisp community has produced Emacs and what did all those superior Lisps produce?