Re: select-active-regions

[Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>]

> Date: Sun, 19 Jul 2009 20:36:21 +0100
> From: David De La Harpe Golden <david@harpegolden.net>
> CC: Jason Rumney <jasonr@gnu.org>, cyd@stupidchicken.com, 
>  emacs-devel@gnu.org
> 
> Eli Zaretskii wrote:
> 
> > It's analogous in the sense that killing puts text there and yanking
> > gets text from there.
> > 
> 
> 
> When killing, emacs on X11 places text in
> primary if x-select-enable-primary is t
> clipboard if x-select-enable-clipboard is t
> 
> When yanking, emacs on x11 gets text from
> primary if x-select-enable-primary is t
> clipboard if x-select-enable-clipboard is t

Since Windows only has the clipboard, putting and getting text from
there is the best it can do to emulate X in this regard.

> i.e. If I'm used to select-active-regions working without clobbering the 
> clipboard on X11, why the holy hell should it clobber the clipboard on 
> Windows?

As I explained elsewhere in this thread, Emacs on DOS and Windows
thrashes the clipboard all the time anyway.  So anyone using Emacs on
Windows ought to be accustomed to that already.  I know I am.

> You've missed the option of having it work as on x11 for emacs-emacs 
> interactions (that is _not_ "effectively disabled") but not copying to 
> the clipboard.

If we want such an option to be available to non-X platforms, we
should let users customize it in ways that are not specific to X.
What we have now in that area is horribly system-dependent.  Introduce
a portable customizable option for separating these two features, and
I'm with you.

> I don't know why, other than the possibility you've 
> misunderstood some or all of X11 clipboard, X11 primary, or the purpose 
> of select-active-regions.

Well, I did ask for a detailed explanation.