Emacs Vanilla or Framework

I have been using Emacs for some months, in my case with the Doom Emacs framework, it has works for me very well, now I would like to know from more experienced people who prefer framework or without, I would appreciate explanations, free as in freedom!

I would call Doom Emacs a distribution rather than a framework. I started out and still use vanilla Emacs. I find it's plenty powerful enough and has consistent keychords with bash (readline). Plus I can comfortably use any Emacs install on say my NAS without spending additional time fiddling with the configuration. I can't really help you to compare to Doom or others, but generally I try to learn the basic versions of whatever I use before using any framework or mod or alteration.

I’ve been using Doom for about 18 months. Not sure if that’s experienced but I still use Doom and intend to continue for the foreseeable future. It’s so much more convenient than rolling my own config. I was a neovim user before using Doom but was able to become just as productive within only a few days of using Doom.

Thank you for your comment!, I think it is a good idea to use it vanilla and give it my own configuration.

I've tried to go 'vanilla' many times, then I spend a lot of time on 'how did Doom Emacs do this?' and realize that Doom Emacs has brilliant code in the backend and I just go back to Doom Emacs and start building my Emacs from there. Doom Emacs code has been vetted many times over by the huge community (Henrik the lead is amazing) who collectively know way more about Emacs than I ever will (its Discord channel is extremely interesting and helpful as well). For Neovim however I rolled out and maintain my own config. But Emacs I see as another beast - especially given the vanilla defaults - for which I really need to build on a distribution such as Doom.

It's a good point, and I feel the same way, doom has made a lot of things easier for me.

Yes, although sometimes I feel that doom has things that I don't use but I don't know when I can use them, and as you say it's a great project, and use 'vanilla' I feel it's challenging and maybe I'll try it in the future while I'm still developing using Doom. :)

Emacs Vanilla+1

I've started using Emacs Prelude. It's kind of like Vanilla Emacs +. It aims to make the out of box experience of Emacs a bit better while still recognizably Emacs

I started with Doom Emacs but then decided to try creating my own configuration from scratch, just configuring things and adding packages as the need arose. While I really like Doom Emacs I am very happy that I did this as I feel my knowledge of Emacs has grown considerably by going through this process. I also feel more in control of Emacs and I'm more comfortable now changing how it works for me.

>'how did Doom Emacs do this? can you elaborate on this quote "'how did Doom Emacs do "

I quite enjoy vanilla Emacs. It does exactly what I have configured it to do, and no more. But if you're enjoying Doom Emacs, then going vanilla may cause you to spend a lot of time recreating the things Doom Emacs does out of the box. If it were me, I'd wait until I had a good reason to switch.

Yeah, I was using vanilla emacs for years and only after trying spacemacs I realized that I was hobbling myself. With vanilla I was not using it to its full potential. I might eventually consider redoing things from vanilla, but spacemacs seems to hit a sweet spot of getting me productive in whatever new project I encounter. And that leaves time to actually learn emacs itself better. And so far there hasn't been a big enough issue for me to redo things again...

When I started using emacs, I went with bbatsov's Prelude and it was awesome, it helped me a lot. But few months ago I decided to create my own config from scratch as a learning exercise. First I basically replicated Prelude, then experimented a bit and it is even more awesome: my emacs is now even more fine-tuned to my tastes and as a extra bonus I have much better understanding of how it works under the hood.

I feel grateful for my time using vanilla Emacs, since I feel like I have a good understanding of how things work "under the hood." That said, after switching to Doom \~2 years ago, I wouldn't go back, since it manages a lot of complexity (keybinds, package installs, UI, etc. etc.) for me. Also, I feel like I've still learned a ton about the "vanilla" features of Emacs even while using Doom, because I read the Emacs manual whenever I want to customize something to my liking.

I use doom emacs. When I will be very confortable with my config and when I do not need any updates from doom comunity , I will switch to vanilla. I plan this to happen in 5 years. So I learn from the giant, then I will go by myself.

1. Start with framework 2. Feel the power 3. Get annoyed by how big and hard to edit it is 4. Go vanilla 5. It's confusing, you don't know enough elisp, return to framework 6. Your config gets more complicated, you get tired of the complexity 7. Make the final plunge to a simple vanilla config as you appreciate emacs' design choices It is the path we must take.

i prefer vanilla because of the extra effort. i'm 63, and in the last 30 years, emacs has helped tremendously with my neuroplasticity. i'm learning new programming languages, creating new lisp functions, and improving my daily life continuously, at an age where my father said, "I'm too old to learn anything new." vanilla emacs and org-mode keep my on my toes.

I feel the same. +1

What turned me towards Doom was the continuous effort needed to keep a decently configured Emacs up-to-date. In college and for a few years after I had my own vanilla Emacs config, but at some point I just wanted Emacs to stay current without a lot of effort from my part. But I have no regrets starting out with vanilla Emacs - I enjoyed all the time I spent playing around :)

Vanilla + your own config. That way you really learn about emacs and how to make it your own instead of just plugging stuff into DOOM emacs and hoping it works with the rest.

this is the way