Re: Some findings and suggestion about Emacs on w32

["Lennart Borgman" <lennart.borgman.073@student.lu.se>]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Kim F. Storm" <storm@cua.dk>


: "Lennart Borgman" <lennart.borgman.073@student.lu.se> writes:
:
: > 4) Addpm.exe besides changing the registry adds an shortcut to the Start
: > menu in GNU Emacs/Emacs that points to runemacs.exe. This is perhaps not
: > very good? Adding this entry could make a user believe that this is how
: > Emacs should be used. (I believed that for a long time and therefore did
not
: > use Emacs. I wanted to, but it did not gave me the functionality I
needed
: > invoked this way! I needed gnuserv.) I suggest that addpm.exe should not
add
: > this entry.
:
: I completely disagree!
:
: Once you have started emacs (from the start menu), what business do
: you have outside emacs (i.e. in Windoze land)?

Of course you have a point there, but why not have the freedom of working
different ways? Does not that make the learning curve less steep? I have
seen people hesitating to begin using Emacs just because there is too much
to learn to begin with. If we want people to use Emacs I think we should
make it as easy as possible to begin. They will learn more after a while.

Another trouble with this menu entry: What will happen if you start Emacs a
second time from that Start menu entry?

What I would want is that this entry pointed to gnuclientw.exe (or
emacsclient.exe). But there is a trouble with this too. In the case of
gnuclientw.exe gnuserv.el must be started too. But an idea hit me:
gnuserv.el could be started by gnuclientw.exe! The version of gnuclientw.exe
that comes from http://www.wyrdrune.com/ has a switch -e for executing lisp.
I believe this could be used - have to give it a test... - what would you
think of a menu entry like this instead?

BTW the name of the entry is "GNU Emacs". I thought that just "Emacs" was
preferred?


: > 5) Emacs without gnuserv is in my opinion very crippled on w32. Gnuserv
: > should in my opinion be part of Emacs distribution for ms windows. I
suggest
: > the version from http://www.wyrdrune.com/. I suggest that CVS should
include
: > this gnuserv.
:
: Sure, we should include a version of emacsclient which works with emacs'
: new internal emacsserver -- today I guess it will work fine with sockets
: (rather than mailslots which IIRC gnuserv uses).

Can you tell me more about emacsserver/emacsclient? Does it work like
gnuserv or are there big differences?

Is not the main thing to get this kind of functionality working on w32 right
from the distribution, without having to install more things? Since gnuserv
exists and works well on w32 today would it not be good to include it now?
(The gnuserv at wyrdrune uses sockets. I do not know if that is important
here.)

Of course I have nothing against including emacsclient instead if it works!


- Lennart