Re: OT [was Re: Improving X selection?]

["David De La Harpe Golden" <david.delaharpe.golden@gmail.com>]

On 08/02/2008, Tom Horsley <tom.horsley@ccur.com> wrote:
> On Fri, 8 Feb 2008 02:50:44 +0000
> "David De La Harpe Golden" <david.delaharpe.golden@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > *And, er, then what if the heretic freedesktop.org-scorning user
> > /wants/ selection to affect the clipboard, like an xterm with "select
> > to clipboard" turned on?   The patch handles that situation fine.
>
> Hey, I just had an idea! I wonder if I could convince my X server
> that the "atom" for the CLIPBOARD and PRIMARY properties is the
> same value, then no apps would use two different selections anymore
> and I wouldn't have to try and keep track of them.
>

Shrug. I'm just not sure what's so tricky about "keeping track" of two
different (X11) "selections" (that does _not_ mean "what is currently
visually highlighted" in the X11 context) - if you're an emacs user,
you're probably doing something similar all the time:

Do you have trouble keeping track of active region vs. kill ring in emacs?
That's approximately the distinction between primary and clipboard in
the freedesktop.org model, after all.

Just as it would be annoying to have the active region and kill ring
mixed up, people used to freedesktop.org conventions are annoyed by
the primary and clipboard being mixed up.