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  • Thanks, dired-hide-details-mode is particularly neato. I also learned a few things about marking.
  • > So the filenames could be edited as usual text: with the help of isearch-query-replace-regexp, macros and other cool Emacs features.

    One dired/wdired feature I use all the time is to edit filenames by using multiple cursors. Either that or, as TFA mentions, keyboard macros. It's really powerful.

    The author also has a blog entry about getting rid of use-package:

    https://eugene-andrienko.com/2025-10-10-emacs-ditch-use-pack...

    It's funny because my config is a half-arsed one where it's partially use-package and partially old-school config. It's an old config and at some point I move to use-package and now I moved back to "not use-package" but I mostly kept the part that are using use-package as-is.

    I've got about 3000 to 4000 elisp config lines. And counting...

  • I looked at the ditch use-package post and I didn't see a replacement for my favorite use-package feature: ensure. Did I miss it?
  • Just FYI, dired without any configuring or customizing is pretty rad, especially with wdired-mode for editing filenames. You don't need to read this blog post to benefit from it.

    Also, wgrep-mode for editing files is amazing

  • > Also, wgrep-mode for editing files is amazing

    Emacs is amazing: I'm using it since the nineties and I've got quite the custom config. I've got zero clue has to what wgrep-mode is.

  • I use emacs almost every day, and it's a continual source of frustration that the community seems allergic to sane defaults.

    If the editor ships a built in file manager, that file manager should not require explicit configuration to open e.g. a jpeg in an image viewer by default. We've had `xdg-open` for years now, it's kind of absurd how far behind emacs is in so many ways.

  • surely there is some published copy-paste set of sane defaults noobs can use to get started. at least i hope.
  • The community is allergic to breaking backwards compatibility, which is a lesson that is sorely wanted. Emacs didn't accrue decades of extensions and user customizations by breaking things every couple months like most other software.
  • Unsure what you mean. When I press Enter on an image, it does load it (in Emacs).

    I believe opening within Emacs should be the default - as many Emacs users aim to do everything within Emacs.

    See this submission from a day ago:

    https://en.andros.dev/blog/06bfd107/emacs-is-a-lispboard/

  • I think that’s what many enjoy—and probably why many other steer away from—Emacs: its malleability. It has some defaults that are grounded in some usecase that have persisted for decades, and to change them would take hours of arguing on the mailing list.. or you could just change the defaults yourself to your liking.
  • Pressing “X” with your point at the file should essentially do this, no? Well, at least give you the option to open said file in an external program. Otherwise, yes, pressing “RET” will assume you want to open it in emacs, I think that is sane. But like BeetleB says, I have no issue opening an image in emacs (unless I’m on windows)

    That said, lack of sane defaults elsewhere is indeed a bit frustrating, (see: littering backup and auto save files everywhere. It would be much nicer to throw it in a ‘temp’ directory within .emacs.d or similar)

  • Tangentially related, I wrote https://github.com/xenodium/dwim-shell-command to save all sorts of command invocations (I'm looking at you ffmpeg) and easily batch apply to dired files. Here's a demo video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=77NtPfgr4x0