[Hyperbole-users] ANNOUNCE: GNU Hyperbole 5.14 is released for testing and use

[Robert Weiner]

This mainly updates internal parts of Hyperbole and has the same
feature set at version 5.13.
Follow the installation and update instructions from the prior
announcement of 5.13.  Since
Hyperbole is a regular Emacs package, updating is a simple two step
process of deleting the old version in the package manager and
installing the new one.

Because Hyperbole is a large, multi-functional package, people often
ask why they should use it.
So I am going to start offering a reason or two at a time while we
gather inputs and produce a full list of reasons.

We all have too much information to scan, process, store and retrieve
and Emacs helps us greatly with that.  But everything is discrete and
largely disconnected in Emacs:
  - each command requires learning a separate key binding;
  - each major mode is independent, leading to silos of information in
individual formats;
  - buffers are largely blobs of text without any context.

These features have their benefits as we know but they require a great
deal of mental processing to master and to maintain.  Hyperbole is
meant to augment your Emacs toolset and reduce your cognitive load.
Its context-sensitive Action Key works in dozens and dozens of
contexts, instantly determining a prime action to take based on the
buffer context around point (or other criteria) without much of any
thought on your part.  So from one key, you get the capability of
dozens of keys and over time this just becomes part of your muscle
memory; you press the Action Key and get what you want almost all the
time.  If Hyperbole doesn't handle a context, you simply add a few
lines of code and then it handles it from then forward.  You could
have dozens of custom button types that are recognized within
structured text and the Action Key will activate them all.

So the Action Key lets you just press M-RET all the time and have good
things happen while what we call Implicit Button Types create
structured contexts within existing buffers, allowing you to use these
as hyperlinks or all sort of other button types, e.g. an Action Key
press on bug#12345 takes you right to the discussion of the bug.

This may sound a bit abstract but if you talk to people who have used
Hyperbole for a while, they will tell you that it is hard to part with
once you are used to it.

Enjoy.

Bob