Re: Bug #25608 and the comment-cache branch

[Alan Mackenzie <acm@muc.de>]

Hello, Eli.

On Fri, Feb 03, 2017 at 09:41:23 +0200, Eli Zaretskii wrote:
> > Date: Thu, 2 Feb 2017 21:51:54 +0000
> > From: Alan Mackenzie <acm@muc.de>
> > Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org

> > > I say there's too much resistance to doing that from people whose
> > > opinions I respect and trust.  Each time this issue comes up, I see
> > > that resistance being expressed again.

> > Primarily from Stefan.

> Not only Stefan.  Also Dmitry.

I would hope that the substance of these objections would carry more
weight than their authorship.

> > > I hope it's possible to find some kind of compromise or a different
> > > solution that leaves people less unhappy.

> > Compromise with what?

> With the objections, ideas, and suggestions expressed in those
> discussions.

With all due respect, none of these objections and ideas leave room for
compromise.  comment-cache scans comments forwards, the "alternative
patch" Dmitry talks about tries to scan them backwards.  Where is the
scope for compromise?

The objectors do not seem to want compromise - they want comment-cache
to be wholly abandoned.  They object to it for reasons I don't
understand, despite the fact that it elegantly solves a long standing
problem that continues to cause pain on a frequent basis.

If you (or anybody else) could summarize what these objections are, I'd
be very grateful.

Note that there has been NO constructive criticism of comment-cache.
Nobody is pointing out problems it causes or might cause.  Nobody has
looked at the source code to point out potential difficulties or places
where improvements might be made.  Instead, we have ....

And while this is going on, I'm having to deal with perhaps one or two
of these bugs a year in CC Mode, which are time consuming, demoralising
and embarrassing to have to explain to the OPs.  Emacs should be able to
handle parentheses in comments.

What is the problem with comment-cache?

-- 
Alan Mackenzie (Nuremberg, Germany).