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Keyboard-Friendly Programs

Command-line interface (CLI) programs with keyboard control boost productivity because grabbing the mouse does not interrupt work.

Keyboard-Driven Browsing

Several web browsers are designed for keyboard-driven control.

Hack: Install a browser plugin for keyboard-control, such as Surfingkeys (available for Firefox and Chrome-like browsers).

However, often they present compatibility issues. Mostly, this is the responsibility of the web developers. But from an end user’s perspective, one is better off with a standard browser such as Google Chrome or Firefox. Surfingkeys and similar plugins enable a vim-like control of the web browser, and the hands can remain on the keyboard.

The Editor

For writing scientific texts, we need a suitable editor. I decided on Vim - according to the ‘church of Emacs,’ this is the ‘editor of the beast’ (look for information about the editor war on the internet).

Hack: Use an editor which is usable without a mouse, such as Vim.

If you accidentally entered Emacs, you can leave it with Ctrl+x Ctrl+c.

In case you are not familiar with Vim, you should start the vimtutor (terminal). This command will open Vim and give you a 30-minute introduction on how to use this mighty editor.

Markdown and Pandoc

Why Markdown:

A short introduction to Markdown/Pandoc for academic publishing is given in [@krewinkel_formatting_2017].

  • Plain text files with simple syntax. It can be directly read and edited with many programs.
  • There are both particular Markdown word processors (‘what you see is what you mean’) and generic editors.

Several editors, such as Vim and Emacs, have plugins to work with Markdown.

For example, I’m using the following Plugins in Vim:

  • vim-pandoc/vim-pandoc
  • vim-pandoc/vim-pandoc-syntax
  • ycm-core/YouCompleteMe

Vim has already an integrated spellchecker for many languages.

Unfortunately, grammar checking Plugins such as ‘vim-grammarous’ and ‘vim-LanguageTool’ are too demanding for the Pi 0. Instead, we can check the grammar of the file using gramma or with the online service of Grammarly.

  • preservim/vim-wordy

The handling of references is essential.

The final formatting can be done with Pandoc [@krewinkel_formatting_2017].

PDF Viewer

zathura

Email

  • alot
  • Notmuch
  • offlineimap
  • msmtpq-queue
  • aerc

Asynchronous and Offline Mailing

offlineimap for synchronizing remote IMAP folders with local Maildir folders.

msmtp for sending emails.

You can get queuing capabilities for sending mails by installing https://gitlab.com/lxkl/msmtpq. Instead of sending emails immediately, they are added to the queue by msmtpq-enqueue. Calling msmtpq-flush will ship out all mails.

Alot integrates well with an abook or khard address book.

Additional functions can be easily programmed in Python. The alot developers and community published many code examples and are very helpful in case of questions.

For example, HTML messages can be passed to a graphical browser for rendering them correctly.

Software List

SoftwareTypeDescription
alotEmailCLI-interface for Notmuch, an email database. It can work offline and requires external programs for synchronization. Handles A LOT of mail. [@totzke_alot_2022]
bibmanCitationUses the BibTeX format; manager compatible with LaTeX and markdown/Pandoc.
cadaverWebDAVFile exchange with Cloud client storage such as NextCloud.
kpcliPasswordCompatible with KeePass manager databases.
nsgtk3Web browserEfficient graphical web browser with own renderer.
rangerFile managerMiller columns for display of directories and files.
vimEditorPowerful editor; extensible by plugins; supporting most text and code styles.
vimtutorTutorialStarts the Vim tutorial!
xlinks2Web browserEfficient CLI browser for X with image view.
uzblWeb browserWebKit browser with Vim key bindings and fair memory use.
w3mWeb browserTerminal web browser with image view and vim-style keys.
zathuraPDF viewerUses vim-style keybindings.

CLI-command line interface, GUI-graphical user interface, VIM-vim-style operation.