Re: [CVS] f7, f8 bound..

[Miles Bader <miles@gnu.org>]

On Tue, Sep 03, 2002 at 03:53:28PM +0200, Per Abrahamsen wrote:
> >> I think such a seperation between Lisp and Customize will be both
> >> simpler and more robust, as the two will never interfere with each
> >> other.
> >
> > It sounds more confusing for the user to have two variables which are `the
> > same but different' like that.
> 
> The user will only see one of them, in this case either "global-map"
> if he is a Lisp user, or "Global Key Bindings" if he is a Customize
> user. 

There really isn't such a clean separation between `Lisp users' and
`Customize users'.  A few people only see the customize interface, but most
will see both variables (since they are both really just variables).
The `Lisp world' is a superset of the customize one.

In the rest of your message you seem to really _wish_ there was such a
separation, but there just isn't, and I don't think we can make one either,
without completely changing emacs (and I don't want to change emacs, I think
it's basically fine, despite some rough edges).

Since there isn't such a separation, pretending there is just confuses
people.

> That is a good idea if we believe that the difference between
> the customization needs of a programmer and a non-programmer is merely
> a matter of syntactic sugar.  

You have to work within the reality of emacs, and in emacs, users can see all
variables.  That doesn't make them `programmers'.

> > I think Stefan's exactly right that the _right_ thing to do is something
> > roughly equivalent to `defcustom global-map'.
> 
> Something like 
>   (defkeymap my-mode-map ...)
> generating all three for major and minor modes.

Well, I'd say a macro like that might be a good idea, but it shouldn't
`generate all three', it should just Do The Right Thing for _one_ keymap.

-Miles
-- 
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      for reasons of military security.