So I have finally switched, not so much because I'm yet convinced Emacs in itself is the better editor but because it certainly does have more powerful extensions. I am still using vim-mode though, perhaps that's part of my problem... but I really don't intend to abandon the modes-approach, so I'll probably stay with it. I'm getting along quite well, but one thing I find really unnerving is the behaviour of the esc key (which I have in the shift-lock position). I'm used to relying on this a lot as more or less a "panic key", which may not be nice but I find allows me to work generally quite a bit less caring about the keystrokes themselves, and thus faster. What I'd like this key to do is just get me out of any minibuffer or special editing mode into a well-defined normal state. Perhaps most importantly, I would like it to not do anything unrelated, Simulate meta. What do I have an alt key for? Close windows I'm not even in at the time. Getting interpreted as the final key in some key sequence. ... Is it possible to turn all that off and make esc an actual escape key? Vim-mode does make it behave kind of as I like in some situations, but when other plugins are involves this often breaks. Alternatively, are there different options that might suit my kind of workflow?