From: Richard Stallman <rms@gnu.org>
To: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>
Cc: 9571@debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: bug#9571: 24.0.50; user option to turn off bidi, please
Date: Sat, 24 Sep 2011 08:28:20 -0400 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <E1R7RLA-0008P2-6R@fencepost.gnu.org> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <83ehz7qbts.fsf@gnu.org> (message from Eli Zaretskii on Fri, 23 Sep 2011 22:48:47 +0300)
> Why are you opposed to a flag to turn bidi display off?
I explained that at length in followups.
Those messages seem to be arguing against maintaining big changes to
implement non-bidi display. I agree with that.
But they don't seem to be an argument against simple code that would
disable the recognition of the bidi specialness of characters.
> If there are [no R2L characters], there is no
> reordering, thus no possibility it can cause confusion.
You are wrong: _all_ characters are displayed in Emacs 24 via the
reordering engine. It's just that plain left-to-right text emerges
from that reordering in its original buffer order. But the reordering
engine doesn't "know" that, it just implements the rules of
reordering.
We are miscommunicating. When I say "no reordering", I'm not talking
about what code is running -- just how the text gets displayed.
When there are no R2L characters, the text will be displayed in L2R order,
which means no reordering in the display.
That will not resolve any confusion. As someone who happened to read
R2L text in Emacs 23 (e.g., in email messages), I can assure you:
seeing R2L text in buffer order confuses even more than seeing results
of slightly incorrect reordering. It makes the reading process very
slow and error prone, even if your command of the language is very
good.
That's an argument not to do your normal editing with such a mode. I
only suggest we provide it as a way to check the order of characters
in the buffer, when needed.
It's not useful for users, believe me. It could be useful to someone
who debugs Emacs display, but there's no need for user option for
that use case.
I am not sure what the best user interface would be.
Perhaps a command to toggle the flag for the current buffer.
Easier maintenance. Emacs display engine is already more complex that
humanly perceptible. Having two divergent engines in one means
unnecessarily complicating maintenance and slowing down development,
I agree with you, but I am not arguing for having two engines.
Only for having a flag.
See the other message for how I suggest implementing it.
--
Dr Richard Stallman
President, Free Software Foundation
51 Franklin St
Boston MA 02110
USA
www.fsf.org www.gnu.org
Skype: No way! That's nonfree (freedom-denying) software.
Use free telephony http://directory.fsf.org/category/tel/
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2011-09-24 12:28 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 57+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2011-09-22 4:18 bug#9571: 24.0.50; user option to turn off bidi, please Drew Adams
2011-09-22 5:49 ` Eli Zaretskii
2011-09-22 12:31 ` Stefan Monnier
2011-09-22 13:13 ` Drew Adams
2011-09-22 21:44 ` Richard Stallman
2011-09-23 4:13 ` Stefan Monnier
2011-09-23 12:31 ` Richard Stallman
2011-09-23 14:46 ` Eli Zaretskii
2011-09-23 14:55 ` Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen
2011-09-23 15:06 ` Eli Zaretskii
2011-09-23 17:36 ` Stefan Monnier
2011-09-23 18:23 ` Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen
2011-09-23 19:44 ` Richard Stallman
2011-09-23 20:09 ` Eli Zaretskii
2011-09-24 3:56 ` Jason Rumney
2011-09-24 12:28 ` Richard Stallman
2011-09-23 9:13 ` Eli Zaretskii
2011-09-23 12:31 ` Richard Stallman
2011-09-23 14:40 ` Eli Zaretskii
2011-09-23 19:44 ` Richard Stallman
2011-09-23 19:48 ` Eli Zaretskii
2011-09-24 12:28 ` Richard Stallman [this message]
2011-09-24 14:04 ` Eli Zaretskii
2011-09-24 17:30 ` Richard Stallman
2011-09-24 19:15 ` Eli Zaretskii
2011-09-24 23:52 ` Richard Stallman
2011-09-23 4:11 ` Stefan Monnier
2011-09-23 8:01 ` Štěpán Němec
2011-09-23 9:21 ` Juanma Barranquero
2011-09-23 10:39 ` Štěpán Němec
2011-09-23 11:01 ` Eli Zaretskii
2011-09-23 16:09 ` Drew Adams
2011-09-23 17:48 ` Eli Zaretskii
2011-09-23 19:03 ` Drew Adams
2011-09-23 19:46 ` Eli Zaretskii
2011-09-23 21:23 ` Drew Adams
2011-09-23 23:21 ` Juanma Barranquero
2011-09-24 0:32 ` Drew Adams
2011-09-24 1:13 ` Juanma Barranquero
2011-09-24 3:46 ` Drew Adams
2011-09-24 8:44 ` Juanma Barranquero
2012-02-22 2:34 ` Glenn Morris
2011-09-24 6:49 ` Eli Zaretskii
2011-09-24 8:46 ` Juanma Barranquero
2011-09-23 20:00 ` Stefan Monnier
2011-09-23 10:18 ` Eli Zaretskii
2011-09-23 11:09 ` Štěpán Němec
2011-09-23 11:45 ` Juanma Barranquero
2011-09-23 13:01 ` Štěpán Němec
2011-09-23 15:03 ` Eli Zaretskii
2011-09-23 17:46 ` Stefan Monnier
2011-09-23 18:24 ` Eli Zaretskii
2011-09-23 19:10 ` Eli Zaretskii
2011-09-23 11:50 ` Eli Zaretskii
2011-09-24 12:28 ` Richard Stallman
2011-09-24 14:13 ` Eli Zaretskii
2011-09-24 3:53 ` Jason Rumney
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