From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.io!.POSTED.blaine.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Richard Stallman Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.bugs Subject: bug#21695: 25.0.50; Change most occurrences of `setq' in Emacs manual to `customize-set-variable'? Really? Date: Sat, 04 Sep 2021 23:43:05 -0400 Message-ID: References: <97d3ff2c-9e72-4004-88a9-08130ac99a74@default> <838s0fpixr.fsf@gnu.org> Reply-To: rms@gnu.org Content-Type: text/plain; charset=Utf-8 Injection-Info: ciao.gmane.io; posting-host="blaine.gmane.org:116.202.254.214"; logging-data="26267"; mail-complaints-to="usenet@ciao.gmane.io" Cc: 21695@debbugs.gnu.org, hmelman@gmail.com To: Eli Zaretskii Original-X-From: bug-gnu-emacs-bounces+geb-bug-gnu-emacs=m.gmane-mx.org@gnu.org Sun Sep 05 05:44:10 2021 Return-path: Envelope-to: geb-bug-gnu-emacs@m.gmane-mx.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([209.51.188.17]) by ciao.gmane.io with esmtps (TLS1.2:ECDHE_RSA_AES_256_GCM_SHA384:256) (Exim 4.92) (envelope-from ) id 1mMj4k-0006dT-C8 for geb-bug-gnu-emacs@m.gmane-mx.org; Sun, 05 Sep 2021 05:44:10 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:60948 helo=lists1p.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.90_1) (envelope-from ) id 1mMj4i-0006O5-6T for geb-bug-gnu-emacs@m.gmane-mx.org; Sat, 04 Sep 2021 23:44:08 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:470:142:3::10]:37382) by lists.gnu.org with esmtps (TLS1.2:ECDHE_RSA_AES_256_GCM_SHA384:256) (Exim 4.90_1) (envelope-from ) id 1mMj4c-0006Ns-82 for bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Sat, 04 Sep 2021 23:44:02 -0400 Original-Received: from debbugs.gnu.org ([209.51.188.43]:37392) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtps (TLS1.2:ECDHE_RSA_AES_128_GCM_SHA256:128) (Exim 4.90_1) (envelope-from ) id 1mMj4c-0006Kg-0U for bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Sat, 04 Sep 2021 23:44:02 -0400 Original-Received: from Debian-debbugs by debbugs.gnu.org with local (Exim 4.84_2) (envelope-from ) id 1mMj4b-0004iS-Ub for bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Sat, 04 Sep 2021 23:44:01 -0400 X-Loop: help-debbugs@gnu.org Resent-From: Richard Stallman Original-Sender: "Debbugs-submit" Resent-CC: bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org Resent-Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2021 03:44:01 +0000 Resent-Message-ID: Resent-Sender: help-debbugs@gnu.org X-GNU-PR-Message: followup 21695 X-GNU-PR-Package: emacs Original-Received: via spool by 21695-submit@debbugs.gnu.org id=B21695.163081339218063 (code B ref 21695); Sun, 05 Sep 2021 03:44:01 +0000 Original-Received: (at 21695) by debbugs.gnu.org; 5 Sep 2021 03:43:12 +0000 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1]:48938 helo=debbugs.gnu.org) by debbugs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.84_2) (envelope-from ) id 1mMj3n-0004hH-TN for submit@debbugs.gnu.org; Sat, 04 Sep 2021 23:43:12 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([209.51.188.92]:49268) by debbugs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.84_2) (envelope-from ) id 1mMj3m-0004h4-Em for 21695@debbugs.gnu.org; Sat, 04 Sep 2021 23:43:10 -0400 Original-Received: from fencepost.gnu.org ([2001:470:142:3::e]:52848) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.90_1) (envelope-from ) id 1mMj3h-0005Q7-7b; Sat, 04 Sep 2021 23:43:05 -0400 Original-Received: from rms by fencepost.gnu.org with local (Exim 4.90_1) (envelope-from ) id 1mMj3h-00018U-1d; Sat, 04 Sep 2021 23:43:05 -0400 In-Reply-To: <838s0fpixr.fsf@gnu.org> (message from Eli Zaretskii on Thu, 02 Sep 2021 09:53:20 +0300) X-BeenThere: debbugs-submit@debbugs.gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.18 Precedence: list X-BeenThere: bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org List-Id: "Bug reports for GNU Emacs, the Swiss army knife of text editors" List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: bug-gnu-emacs-bounces+geb-bug-gnu-emacs=m.gmane-mx.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: "bug-gnu-emacs" Xref: news.gmane.io gmane.emacs.bugs:213449 Archived-At: [[[ To any NSA and FBI agents reading my email: please consider ]]] [[[ whether defending the US Constitution against all enemies, ]]] [[[ foreign or domestic, requires you to follow Snowden's example. ]]] > > Telling people to use customize-set-variable for all 8000 of them > > feels like the tail wagging the dog. > Yes. But I don't see why the numbers matter here. An option which > cannot be usefully change via setq mentions that in its doc string (or > at least it should; if it doesn't, that's a documentation bug), so all > we need to say in the manual is that such options exist, and they > announce the need to use customize-set-variable in their doc string by > such-and-such text. Then the users will have enough information to > figure out which variable needs what method. I agree, that is adequate. So I think we agree on this issue. However, it may be easy to warn if an init file sets one of these variables with setq. If that's easy, I think it would be good to do. It would help users detect and correct these mistakes. Maybe we could arrange to make it work right to set even those variables with setq in init files. Here's a way: after the init files finish, look at the value of the variable, and if it does not equal the default, and this value was not properly installed with the :set method, invoke that variable's :set method. WDYT? -- Dr Richard Stallman (https://stallman.org) Chief GNUisance of the GNU Project (https://gnu.org) Founder, Free Software Foundation (https://fsf.org) Internet Hall-of-Famer (https://internethalloffame.org)