info-nav: An Ergonomic Info Reading Experience
A few months ago, I released info-nav on MELPA. It's a small package that remixes existing functionality in a novel way to make info documents easier to read in Emacs.
The Idea is Simple
When viewing an info document:
display the table of contents on the left;
display the actual contents on the right.
Make actions in the table of contents window drive navigation on the contents window.
Screencast
The end result is that you don't need to know any keybindings to navigate an info document. Navigation can be 100% mouse driven (even in the terminal).
Installation
(use-package info-nav
:ensure t
:bind (("C-h 3" . info-nav)))Usage
C-h 3
The recommended binding is C-h 3. The reason I chose this was because it reminds me of how C-x 3 splits a window in half. It's also likely to be free and unbound.
M-x info-nav
If you don't want to bind a key, you can just run it via M-x info-nav.
A Special Message for Unix Philosophers
I really want to see Emacs used more as a platform for delivering Elisp applications. With the addition of --init-directory in Emacs 29, this has become easier than ever.What if you love the command line and don't use Emacs, but you still want to read info documents?
Check out nfo.
It is a CLI tool that uses Emacs as a user-friendly replacement for the terminal
infoprogram.I made for people who don't even like Emacs but want to read some docs.