Re: bidi-display-reordering is now non-nil by default

[David Kastrup <dak@gnu.org>]

Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen <larsi@gnus.org> writes:

> Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca> writes:
>
>> I think it makes sense to change the default value of
>> bidi-paragraph-direction to left-to-right.
>
> Would this mean that a (say) Gnus summary buffer with right-to-left
> subjects would be rendered incorrectly?

No.

With bidi-paragraph-direction left-to-right, material is arranged such
that the occupied area has the left screen border as one limit.  Set
right-to-left, the lines are oriented at the right screen border.  Set
to nil, the first directional character in the paragraph decides where
the paragraph is headed.

The subjects are not the first directional characters in the paragraph
of a summary buffer which consists of lines like

R.+[  12: Stefan Monnier         ] Re: bidi-display-reordering is now non-nil by default

so there is quite little incentive to make bidi-paragraph-direction
nil.  Any R2L material will still appear R2L, but it will cluster itself
to the left of the available area rather than the right.

A setting of anything but left-to-right would only make sense in the
Summary buffer after Gnus was heavily localized, using R2L or
nondirectional characters for its flag display, line counts and so on,
and consequently starting in a somewhat natural way at the right screen
border.

-- 
David Kastrup