Re: visual-region-mode? (was: delete-selection-mode as default)

[charles@aurox.ch (Charles A. Roelli)]

> From: Yuri Khan <yurivkhan@gmail.com>
> Date: Wed, 12 Sep 2018 12:12:26 +0700
> 
> > > A consistent definition of a transient region would make the mark also
> > > buffer-and-window-local, so that buffer B in windows X and Y could
> > > have completely independently marked regions.
> >
> > In that case, pushing a mark in window X, then switching to window Y
> > and popping the mark would not necessarily place point where the mark
> > was pushed in window X, since window Y might have its own mark.  That
> > could be surprising behavior.  The handling of the mark-ring would
> > also be complicated.
> 
> I thought about it some more.
> 
> We have a notion of mark that is somewhat overloaded. On the one hand,
> there is the mark ring and the global mark ring whose purpose in life
> is to help the user navigate back to positions they visited earlier.
> On the other hand, the mark is used as one of the two delimiters of
> the region.
> 
> It seems to me these two uses of the mark are mutually disjoint, and
> it might be a better model if they were decoupled.

The mark ring and the region are even more tightly coupled: C-u C-SPC
not only jumps to the mark, it also sets the mark from the most recent
mark on the mark ring, effectively restoring the previous region.  It
could be called the "region ring".  And since it so happens that the
boundaries of "regions" are often places of interest to the user,
maybe it makes good sense to combine these two uses of the mark as
delimiter of the region, and the mark as a navigational buoy.