Post by @andyc
My brain leads me down unexpected rabbit holes fairly often. Today is the turn of #emacs, which I suspect is going to be a lengthy, but hopefully rewarding, rabbit hole.
I've opted to start with the GUI client, mostly because I have a horrible time remembering new shortcuts / commands (thanks to both ADHD and menopause, my memory is shite). Any tips from anyone familiar with it? I'm going to go through the official tutorials etc, but if there are better resources I should know about, I'd be glad to hear them!
@jac@404brain.boo I've used #Emacs for many years but still occasionally revisit the built-in tutorial (C-h t) and have all menus enabled :-)
Don't rush it, spend time getting comfortable with the basics of text editing, moving, scrolling, search, replacing, copy, kill, paste, buffers, commands etc.
[ If you're used to a modal editor (vi), maybe consider the Evil package to provide a familiar environment. ]
You've already had several excellent recommendations for useful resources. I can certainly recommend yet again Prot's videos, Emacs packages and the excellent Modus themes.
I have used starter kits for Emacs (Prelude, Bedrock, Doom) but am in two minds about them. They provide an excellent, polished experience for newcomers but also may include packages you don't want or need. Also, they tend mask the Emacs lisp needed to make configuration changes. Now I prefer to maintain my own Emacs configuration file.
You must also follow @sacha@social.sachachua.com - https://sachachua.com/blog/2026/04/working-on-the-emacs-newbie-experience/
From your requirements, I would certainly investigate orgmode. Again, just don't rush it and get comfortable with the org markup syntax and then maybe experiment with tasks and ToDo lists.
The org-roam and denote packages may well prove to offer similar functionality to Obsidian for knowledge management, journaling and notes.
Chris Maiorana's Emacs for Writers might be of interest - https://chrismaiorana.com/the-emacs-for-writers-handbook-is-available-now-and-ever/
Similarly, Peter Prevos' Writing Studio - https://lucidmanager.org/productivity/configure-emacs/
My favourite Emacs packages that I really miss when using vanilla Emacs on a new machine:
- dired (file manager)
- a marvellous set of packages for completion framework (Vertico, Consult, Marginalia, Orderless)
- jinx - spell checker
Good luck and have fun with Emacs !