bug#1305: Please disable the audible bell by default, to avoid discouraging newbies in crowded offices and elsewhere

bug#1305: Please disable the audible bell by default, to avoid discouraging newbies in crowded offices and elsewhere

[Jason Spiro]

By default, Emacs makes an audible beep every time the user makes an
error.  It would be great if you could please change the default
either:

1.  To not make any audible or visible bell when the user makes an
error.  (This would be best.)

2.  Or to use a visible bell only.  (This would be an acceptable
alternative.  Plus, Emacs already knows how to show a visible bell.)

If you do not change the default, some Emacs newbies may decide not to
use Emacs, but to use other editors instead, perhaps non-Free ones.
Here are three reasons why they may decide that:

A.  Some users find that the beep is harsh and unpleasant to the ear.

B.  Most apps beep only when something very bad happens.  But Emacs
beeps even upon minor mistakes like scrolling past end of buffer, or
pressing an unassigned key.  It even beeps on non-mistakes like
pressing C-g.  The amount of beeping may make users uncomfortable.

C.  Some Emacs newbies try Emacs for the first time at the office.  At
the office, ten or more people may hear each beep.  The feeling of
having distracted coworkers may make users even more uncomfortable.

You might say, "So newbies should disable the beep themselves".  No.
They may not bother.

You might say, "But if not for the beep, users won't notice errors".
No.  They will notice.  Human eyes notice significant onscreen changes
(perhaps 3 words or more) easily.

Regards,
Jason Spiro

bug#1305: Please disable the audible bell by default, to avoid discouraging newbies in crowded offices and elsewhere

[Xavier Maillard]

Hi,

I do not think it is a good idea to change this. You know, GNU
Emacs is also used by visually impaired and blind users and we
*must* satisfy these user class too. It is not a matter of
newbiness. Plus, resetting this setting is covered by many howto
and resources over the Internet so it should be pretty easy to
disable it for any user.

After that, if users prefer not to use emacs for such thing,
that's okay, go and choose another editor. Any user for any
editor should just RTFM when they start using it. I guess this is
an universal requirement when starting to use any software; emacs
is no exception.

Regards

	Xavier
-- 
http://www.gnu.org
http://www.april.org
http://www.lolica.org

bug#1305: Please disable the audible bell by default, to avoid discouraging newbies in crowded offices and elsewhere

[Jason Spiro]

Hi Xavier,

Re. users with vision loss:  They need a screen reader (Emacspeak
provides that) or a magnifier utility.  But why do they also need
beep-on-error?  I started a thread at
http://news.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.emacspeak.general today to ask if
they really need it.  And if they do need it, remember they're in the
minority.  Will they truly mind searching online to learn how to
enable it?

Re. searching online and reading the documentation:  Users don't want
to waste time on that.  They want to spend their time getting things
done.  Let's make Emacs an editor for getting things done.

-Jason

bug#1305: Please disable the audible bell by default, to avoid discouraging newbies in crowded offices and elsewhere

[Dan Nicolaescu]

"Jason Spiro" <jasonspiro4@gmail.com> writes:

  > By default, Emacs makes an audible beep every time the user makes an
  > error.  It would be great if you could please change the default
  > either:
  > 
  > 1.  To not make any audible or visible bell when the user makes an
  > error.  (This would be best.)
  > 
  > 2.  Or to use a visible bell only.  (This would be an acceptable
  > alternative.  Plus, Emacs already knows how to show a visible bell.)
  > 
  > If you do not change the default, some Emacs newbies may decide not to
  > use Emacs, but to use other editors instead, perhaps non-Free ones.
  > Here are three reasons why they may decide that:
  > 
  > A.  Some users find that the beep is harsh and unpleasant to the ear.
  > 
  > B.  Most apps beep only when something very bad happens.  But Emacs
  > beeps even upon minor mistakes like scrolling past end of buffer, or
  > pressing an unassigned key.  It even beeps on non-mistakes like
  > pressing C-g.  The amount of beeping may make users uncomfortable.
  > 
  > C.  Some Emacs newbies try Emacs for the first time at the office.  At
  > the office, ten or more people may hear each beep.  The feeling of
  > having distracted coworkers may make users even more uncomfortable.

FWIW, I find the beep annoying and useless too.  I disable it in .emacs,
but every time I have to use emacs -Q to debug something it gets on my
nerves....

bug#1305: Please disable the audible bell by default, to avoid discouraging newbies in crowded offices and elsewhere

[Stefan Monnier]

> FWIW, I find the beep annoying and useless too.  I disable it in .emacs,
> but every time I have to use emacs -Q to debug something it gets on my
> nerves....

I hate all forms of beeping.  So I'm definitely in favor of using the
visual bell by default, tho I never dared to propose it, seeing how it's
not even in the "Options" menu.


        Stefan

bug#1305: Please disable the audible bell by default, to avoid discouraging newbies in crowded offices and elsewhere

[Eli Zaretskii]

> Date: Tue, 4 Nov 2008 17:51:13 -0500
> From: "Jason Spiro" <jasonspiro4@gmail.com>
> Cc: 
> 
> By default, Emacs makes an audible beep every time the user makes an
> error.  It would be great if you could please change the default
> either:
> 
> 1.  To not make any audible or visible bell when the user makes an
> error.  (This would be best.)

Many other GUI applications beep under some circumstances that need
user attention.

> B.  Most apps beep only when something very bad happens.  But Emacs
> beeps even upon minor mistakes like scrolling past end of buffer, or
> pressing an unassigned key.  It even beeps on non-mistakes like
> pressing C-g.  The amount of beeping may make users uncomfortable.

Maybe we should simply revisit the places where we bitch-at-user, and
remove the beep from some of them.

But I don't see anything bad in beeping under extreme circumstances,
and don't support disabling it entirely.

> You might say, "But if not for the beep, users won't notice errors".
> No.  They will notice.  Human eyes notice significant onscreen changes
> (perhaps 3 words or more) easily.

The problem is, without the beep, the screen sometimes does not change
at all.  And that is BAD, from the HE point of view, at least IMO.

bug#1305: Please disable the audible bell by default, to avoid discouraging newbies in crowded offices and elsewhere

[Stefan Monnier]

>> By default, Emacs makes an audible beep every time the user makes an
>> error.  It would be great if you could please change the default either:
>> 1.  To not make any audible or visible bell when the user makes an
>> error.  (This would be best.)
> Many other GUI applications beep under some circumstances that need
> user attention.

Actually, in my experience it's very rare for "modern" GUI applications
to beep.

>> B.  Most apps beep only when something very bad happens.  But Emacs
>> beeps even upon minor mistakes like scrolling past end of buffer, or
>> pressing an unassigned key.  It even beeps on non-mistakes like
>> pressing C-g.  The amount of beeping may make users uncomfortable.

> Maybe we should simply revisit the places where we bitch-at-user, and
> remove the beep from some of them.

> But I don't see anything bad in beeping under extreme circumstances,
> and don't support disabling it entirely.

I agree on the principle to beep in extreme circumstances, but since
these are rare (by definition of "extreme"), we should probably attack
from the other side: use the visible-bell by default, and add a new
function that does an actual beep (additionally to the visual bell) and
then try and find the few places where it's warranted.

>> You might say, "But if not for the beep, users won't notice errors".
>> No.  They will notice.  Human eyes notice significant onscreen changes
>> (perhaps 3 words or more) easily.

> The problem is, without the beep, the screen sometimes does not change
> at all.  And that is BAD, from the HE point of view, at least IMO.

That sounds like a bug to me.  In which circumstances does the
visible-bell fail to work?


        Stefan

bug#1305: Please disable the audible bell by default, to avoid discouraging newbies in crowded offices and elsewhere

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca>
> Cc: 1305@emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com,  Jason Spiro <jasonspiro4@gmail.com>,  bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Date: Fri, 07 Nov 2008 09:54:02 -0500
> 
> > The problem is, without the beep, the screen sometimes does not change
> > at all.  And that is BAD, from the HE point of view, at least IMO.
> 
> That sounds like a bug to me.  In which circumstances does the
> visible-bell fail to work?

I didn't mean visible-bell fails to work, I meant if we abolish any
visual or audible signs.  The OP asked as his 1st choice to disable
the beep, not replace it with visible-bell.

bug#1305: Please disable the audible bell by default, to avoid discouraging newbies in crowded offices and elsewhere

[Stefan Monnier]

>> That sounds like a bug to me.  In which circumstances does the
>> visible-bell fail to work?

> I didn't mean visible-bell fails to work, I meant if we abolish any
> visual or audible signs.  The OP asked as his 1st choice to disable
> the beep, not replace it with visible-bell.

Oh, that would be a clear "no", indeed.  Of course we'd replace it with
the visible-bell (and I suspect that OP also intended it that way).


        Stefan

bug#1305: Please disable the audible bell by default, to avoid discouraging newbies in crowded offices and elsewhere

[Xavier Maillard]

   Hi Xavier,

   Re. users with vision loss:  They need a screen reader (Emacspeak
   provides that) or a magnifier utility.  But why do they also need
   beep-on-error?

What if the screen reader is not working correctly ? The visible
bell could be used to check that something, at least, is working.

Regards

	Xavier
-- 
http://www.gnu.org
http://www.april.org
http://www.lolica.org

bug#1305: Please disable the audible bell by default, to avoid discouraging newbies in crowded offices and elsewhere

[Jason Spiro]

2008/11/9 Xavier Maillard <xma@gnu.org> wrote:
> What if the screen reader is not working correctly ? The visible
> bell could be used to check that something, at least, is working.

We could make a function like M-x ring-audible-bell (but you should
choose a better name than that) that would let blind / VI (visually
impaired) users know that Emacs is working.  Or we could design Emacs
so that when they launch Emacs using the command "emacspeak", then C-g
will always ring the audible bell.

This would be slightly more inconvenient for blind / VI users, but IMO
much better for fully sighted users.

bug#1305: Please disable the audible bell by default, to avoid discouraging newbies in crowded offices and elsewhere

[Lennart Borgman]

On Tue, Nov 11, 2008 at 8:15 PM, Jason Spiro <jasonspiro4@gmail.com> wrote:
> This would be slightly more inconvenient for blind / VI users, but IMO
> much better for fully sighted users.

If we think so then maybe we should consider that the impaired users
already have a bigger burden.