Re: select-active-regions, Emacs not X

[Chong Yidong <cyd@stupidchicken.com>]

Andreas Röhler <andreas.roehler@easy-emacs.de> writes:

> IMHO copying everything once got highlighted,  it just the delire :-)
>
> Can't move the cursor without clobbering previous saves.
>
> Emacs is unusable that way.

During cursor motion, only the primary selection is overwritten, and
only if the region is active and transient mark mode is on.  This does
not affect yanking, since that now uses only the clipboard and the
kill-ring.

The convention on X is that the primary selection is transitory; any
mouse drag or shift selection in any X program changes the primary
selection.  For Emacs to overwrite it when the region is active is not
merely reasonable, it is exactly what other applications do.

All in all, your description of the problem is far too vague.  It is
possible that you have some peculiar customizations that lead to the
unusable behavior you complain about, but it is impossible to know
without a more accurate description.