Re: File modes facilities.

[Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>]

> From: Michael Cadilhac <michael.cadilhac-@t-lrde.epita.fr>
> Date: Thu, 20 Oct 2005 00:44:42 +0200
> Cc: Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca>, emacs-devel@gnu.org
> 
> >  > >>   I don't know any  way to change the modes of a  file, or even of the
> >  > >>   current file, within emacs.
> >  > >
> >  > > C-h f set-file-modes RET
> >  > 
> >  >   I meant in an user-friendly way, that's to say, without M-:, and
> >  >   without calculating the mode.
> >
> > In Dired, type M (`dired-do-chmod')?
> 
>   First, it  uses dired,  and I don't  want to  launch a dired  of the
>   current directory to modify current-file modes.
> 
>   Second, it uses the chmod(1) executable, which, beside the fact that
>   another program is called, is not compatible with systems that don't
>   have  that kind  of binary  installed (like  if one  just downloaded
>   a compiled version of emacs for Windows on http://www.crasseux.com)

It sounds like you won't accept any solution except your own ;-)

FWIW, I think the natural place for changing files' modes is in Dired;
a separate interactive command, while I don't object to it, will be
used only by those who prefer command-line UI to GUI.  And I don't see
what's the big deal with ``launching Dired''.

If we want dired-do-chmod to work on systems without an external chmod
command, we can easily modify dired-do-chmod to use set-file-modes.
That's a smaller and easier change than adding a whole new suite of
commands with yet another UI.