From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Paul Eggert Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: [Emacs-diffs] master 9ce1d38: Use curved quotes in core elisp diagnostics Date: Tue, 18 Aug 2015 21:52:17 -0700 Organization: UCLA Computer Science Department Message-ID: <55D40B81.3030805@cs.ucla.edu> References: <20150816160149.9416.80132@vcs.savannah.gnu.org> <55D1043C.3030909@yandex.ru> <20150816225346.GA5367@acm.fritz.box> <55D2C080.2000806@cs.ucla.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: plane.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1439959959 22180 80.91.229.3 (19 Aug 2015 04:52:39 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 19 Aug 2015 04:52:39 +0000 (UTC) Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org To: rms@gnu.org Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Wed Aug 19 06:52:29 2015 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([208.118.235.17]) by plane.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1ZRvMT-0005dX-8d for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Wed, 19 Aug 2015 06:52:29 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:60499 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1ZRvMS-00053S-GV for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Wed, 19 Aug 2015 00:52:28 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:4830:134:3::10]:43115) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1ZRvMO-00052B-CI for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Wed, 19 Aug 2015 00:52:25 -0400 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1ZRvMJ-0008N5-DL for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Wed, 19 Aug 2015 00:52:24 -0400 Original-Received: from zimbra.cs.ucla.edu ([131.179.128.68]:42630) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1ZRvMJ-0008N1-7r; Wed, 19 Aug 2015 00:52:19 -0400 Original-Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by zimbra.cs.ucla.edu (Postfix) with ESMTP id 44D6D160D1E; Tue, 18 Aug 2015 21:52:18 -0700 (PDT) Original-Received: from zimbra.cs.ucla.edu ([127.0.0.1]) by localhost (zimbra.cs.ucla.edu [127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10032) with ESMTP id sEBzrhjIm41P; Tue, 18 Aug 2015 21:52:17 -0700 (PDT) Original-Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by zimbra.cs.ucla.edu (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8ABBA160D91; Tue, 18 Aug 2015 21:52:17 -0700 (PDT) X-Virus-Scanned: amavisd-new at zimbra.cs.ucla.edu Original-Received: from zimbra.cs.ucla.edu ([127.0.0.1]) by localhost (zimbra.cs.ucla.edu [127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10026) with ESMTP id WQ36ABmrYxI0; Tue, 18 Aug 2015 21:52:17 -0700 (PDT) Original-Received: from [192.168.1.9] (pool-100-32-155-148.lsanca.fios.verizon.net [100.32.155.148]) by zimbra.cs.ucla.edu (Postfix) with ESMTPSA id 6CB6B160D1E; Tue, 18 Aug 2015 21:52:17 -0700 (PDT) User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64; rv:31.0) Gecko/20100101 Thunderbird/31.8.0 In-Reply-To: X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 3.x X-Received-From: 131.179.128.68 X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:188930 Archived-At: Richard Stallman wrote: > The issue at hand is doc strings in the source code, not format strings= . True. Sorry about the confusion. > It's a bad practice to copy text from a help buffer into > a doc string in the source code That's a bit like saying it's bad practice to copy from a text file into = a Lisp=20 string. Although such copying can lead to problems because arbitrary tex= t can=20 be misinterpreted in a Lisp string, as a practical matter it's often quit= e=20 convenient to copy snippets of text files into Lisp strings or vice versa= , and=20 it often works well, either because users know the text doesn't have stri= ng=20 escapes or delimiters, or because they repair any glitches that may arise= . And it's not just *Help* buffers. I often cut and paste from documentati= on into=20 code. The Emacs info files have used curved quotes for some time, and it= 's=20 helpful to have these work in doc strings too. As a simple example, the = Elisp=20 manual says this: -- Function: eql value1 value2 This function acts like =E2=80=98eq=E2=80=99 except when both argum= ents are numbers. It compares numbers by type and numeric value,... If I were to write a similar function I might copy some of this into the = new=20 function's doc string and then adapt it, like this: (defun eqfuzz (value1 value2) "Compare two values but use fuzzy comparison on numbers. This function acts like =E2=80=98eq=E2=80=99 except when both argument= s are numbers.... This sort of editing is natural and convenient, and there's no compelling= reason=20 to prohibit it.