From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: David Kastrup Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: On being web-friendly and why info must die Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2014 10:56:54 +0100 Organization: Organization?!? Message-ID: <87y4qddwd5.fsf@fencepost.gnu.org> References: <20141205123549.GA29331@thyrsus.com> <87ppbqb6s1.fsf@gnu.org> <87h9x2f9me.fsf@fencepost.gnu.org> <87a92uf8ik.fsf@fencepost.gnu.org> <8761dif6ib.fsf@fencepost.gnu.org> NNTP-Posting-Host: plane.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1418378255 6753 80.91.229.3 (12 Dec 2014 09:57:35 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2014 09:57:35 +0000 (UTC) To: emacs-devel@gnu.org Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Fri Dec 12 10:57:28 2014 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 1XzMyW-0002W0-6d for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Fri, 12 Dec 2014 10:57:28 +0100 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:56311 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1XzMyV-0001Kl-PX for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Fri, 12 Dec 2014 04:57:27 -0500 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:4830:134:3::10]:35224) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1XzMyN-0001Jk-Ig for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 12 Dec 2014 04:57:25 -0500 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1XzMyF-00056E-QL for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 12 Dec 2014 04:57:19 -0500 Original-Received: from plane.gmane.org ([80.91.229.3]:51342) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1XzMyF-00055k-JC for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 12 Dec 2014 04:57:11 -0500 Original-Received: from list by plane.gmane.org with local (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1XzMyB-0001yn-Np for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 12 Dec 2014 10:57:08 +0100 Original-Received: from x2f47667.dyn.telefonica.de ([2.244.118.103]) by main.gmane.org with esmtp (Gmexim 0.1 (Debian)) id 1AlnuQ-0007hv-00 for ; Fri, 12 Dec 2014 10:57:07 +0100 Original-Received: from dak by x2f47667.dyn.telefonica.de with local (Gmexim 0.1 (Debian)) id 1AlnuQ-0007hv-00 for ; Fri, 12 Dec 2014 10:57:07 +0100 X-Injected-Via-Gmane: http://gmane.org/ Original-Lines: 45 Original-X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org X-Gmane-NNTP-Posting-Host: x2f47667.dyn.telefonica.de X-Face: 2FEFf>]>q>2iw=B6, xrUubRI>pR&Ml9=ao@P@i)L:\urd*t9M~y1^:+Y]'C0~{mAl`oQuAl \!3KEIp?*w`|bL5qr,H)LFO6Q=qx~iH4DN; i"; /yuIsqbLLCh/!U#X[S~(5eZ41to5f%E@'ELIi$t^ Vc\LWP@J5p^rst0+('>Er0=^1{]M9!p?&:\z]|;&=NP3AhB!B_bi^]Pfkw User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/25.0.50 (gnu/linux) Cancel-Lock: sha1:sK6HIXL4c3NmjcmVbpY4XrAjaNM= X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: Genre and OS details not recognized. X-Received-From: 80.91.229.3 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:179875 Archived-At: Lennart Borgman writes: > On Thu, Dec 11, 2014 at 6:20 PM, David Kastrup wrote: >> >> You were proposing to replace the Info search possibilities with a >> search engine. So it's up to you to explain what you mean. >> >> As for the index not disappearing: it's not accessible from arbitrary >> nodes since it is not even loaded into the browser unless you load the >> "one big page HTML" and then _all_ navigation becomes cumbersome, >> including but not limited to the index. > > So that was the argument. OK. ;-) > > Yes, without a search engine you can't search the html pages. (Or, you > could build an index in JavaScript, but that is a very tough job if > you want to do something useful.) > > Of course you have to search the docs divided into several pages if a > search engine should be of any use. Otherwise you will just get the > same hit all the time. ;-) > > OpenSearchServer (based on Apache Lucene) is very flexible. Maybe you > can't get exactly the incremental search that Info uses now, but you > can get a list of suggestions for every character you type. You can > customize that list. > > And Info does not have a search capability that is close to the usual > web search (implicit) AND operator. > > But there is more you can use, like searching in fields (if the > documents are structured with some fields, of course). So the argument is that a huge flexible heap of complex technology should make users just as happy as straightforward simple working functionality. Make no mistake: this kind of "it does not do what you want, but many other potentially useful things" argument is very common in software engineering. It's sort of the sales point of Texinfo 5 according to the criticism voiced against it here. So the solution is to go Texinfo 5 squared? I don't buy it. -- David Kastrup