From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Richard Stallman Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: Semi-unhelpful error message given when trying to (provide 'CUA-mode) Date: Tue, 23 May 2006 22:18:34 -0400 Message-ID: References: <85fyj4bl8p.fsf@lola.goethe.zz> <20060520.211854.71848142.wl@gnu.org> <85lkswa29b.fsf@lola.goethe.zz> <44701B91.60606@swipnet.se> <44715093.4020906@swipnet.se> <4472AB5F.9090305@swipnet.se> Reply-To: rms@gnu.org NNTP-Posting-Host: main.gmane.org Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-15 X-Trace: sea.gmane.org 1148437245 10716 80.91.229.2 (24 May 2006 02:20:45 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@sea.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 24 May 2006 02:20:45 +0000 (UTC) Cc: acm@muc.de, emacs-devel@gnu.org Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Wed May 24 04:20:43 2006 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([199.232.76.165]) by ciao.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1FiizI-0006bV-Qz for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Wed, 24 May 2006 04:20:41 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1] helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1FiizI-0005ja-8B for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Tue, 23 May 2006 22:20:40 -0400 Original-Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1FiixI-0004wX-6y for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Tue, 23 May 2006 22:18:36 -0400 Original-Received: from exim by lists.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1FiixH-0004vm-5Y for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Tue, 23 May 2006 22:18:35 -0400 Original-Received: from [199.232.76.173] (helo=monty-python.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1FiixH-0004vh-0n for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Tue, 23 May 2006 22:18:35 -0400 Original-Received: from [199.232.76.164] (helo=fencepost.gnu.org) by monty-python.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.52) id 1Fij1c-0006Je-Cg for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Tue, 23 May 2006 22:23:04 -0400 Original-Received: from rms by fencepost.gnu.org with local (Exim 4.34) id 1FiixG-0006VZ-An; Tue, 23 May 2006 22:18:34 -0400 Original-To: =?ISO-8859-15?Q?Jan_Dj=E4rv?= In-reply-to: <4472AB5F.9090305@swipnet.se> (message from =?ISO-8859-15?Q?Jan_Dj=E4rv?= on Tue, 23 May 2006 08:27:43 +0200) X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Original-Sender: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:55172 Archived-At: > You use arrow keys to navigate the menu and enter/return to select an item. > Using the keyboard is the right thing. > > Some X toolkits have conventions for using the keyboard to activate menus > and menu items. I am not sure what they are; do you know? To what extent > do they work with Emacs? Is your patch coherent with them? Could it be? The patch is coherent in that it implements opening menus on F10, which is standard for many toolkits. I see that my words were unclear. The issue I meant to raise is specifically about the use of arrow keys and RET to select menu items. How does that compare with what various X toolkits do? When a menu has been opened there may be more accelerators (like S for Save), so instead of using the arrow to navigate down to Save and then press RET, you can press just S or Alt+S to select Save. That answers the question I meant to ask. My patch does not implement this, but it is quite easy to do in Lesstif/Motif and Gtk+ (harder in Lucid). The thing is to decide which accelerators to use and how to represent them in the current lisp menu structures. Since the motive for this would be compatibility with various toolkits, I think it ought to try to choose the accelerators in the same way that the toolkit in use does it. You say this is "harder in Lucid". Why is that? Do the Lucid menus support navigating within a menu with the keyboard using accelerators? If not, then the arrow key solution you have already implemented is as compatible as any other would be. This is more work, so I have not started to look in to it. I'll will do that after the release though. Ok. Another way to activate menus is with accelerator keys, usually Alt + the first letter in the menu entry (the letter in question is underlined in the menu). I don't think we want this in Emacs, in general. On terminals where Alt is different from Meta, it could be useful to be able to set this up; but that is not very important.