From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Eric Abrahamsen Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.help Subject: Re: Why does Emacs lack `backward-delete-word`? Date: Mon, 07 Mar 2016 23:02:02 +0800 Message-ID: <87k2le72mt.fsf@ericabrahamsen.net> References: <8760wzht1e.fsf@robertthorpeconsulting.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: plane.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1457362964 25884 80.91.229.3 (7 Mar 2016 15:02:44 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 7 Mar 2016 15:02:44 +0000 (UTC) To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org Original-X-From: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Mon Mar 07 16:02:35 2016 Return-path: Envelope-to: geh-help-gnu-emacs@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 1acwg4-0004x4-2q for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Mon, 07 Mar 2016 16:02:32 +0100 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:56256 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1acwg3-0002zR-Jo for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Mon, 07 Mar 2016 10:02:31 -0500 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:4830:134:3::10]:54558) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1acwfp-0002z9-Od for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Mon, 07 Mar 2016 10:02:18 -0500 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1acwfl-0007UA-JP for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Mon, 07 Mar 2016 10:02:17 -0500 Original-Received: from plane.gmane.org ([80.91.229.3]:59434) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1acwfl-0007Ty-DM for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Mon, 07 Mar 2016 10:02:13 -0500 Original-Received: from list by plane.gmane.org with local (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1acwfh-0004jG-TN for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Mon, 07 Mar 2016 16:02:10 +0100 Original-Received: from 222.128.160.212 ([222.128.160.212]) by main.gmane.org with esmtp (Gmexim 0.1 (Debian)) id 1AlnuQ-0007hv-00 for ; Mon, 07 Mar 2016 16:02:09 +0100 Original-Received: from eric by 222.128.160.212 with local (Gmexim 0.1 (Debian)) id 1AlnuQ-0007hv-00 for ; Mon, 07 Mar 2016 16:02:09 +0100 X-Injected-Via-Gmane: http://gmane.org/ Original-Lines: 27 Original-X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org X-Gmane-NNTP-Posting-Host: 222.128.160.212 User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/25.1.50 (gnu/linux) Cancel-Lock: sha1:pnmh9IH6Ay29XqeGeyKmGiKGrrc= X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: Genre and OS details not recognized. X-Received-From: 80.91.229.3 X-BeenThere: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14 Precedence: list List-Id: Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.help:109500 Archived-At: Robert Thorpe writes: > Stefan Monnier writes: > >>> I should have been clearer, sorry. `backward-kill-word` kills. I wonder >>> why there is no corresponding command to delete instead. >> >> Emacs's UI generally assumes that the difference between "delete" and >> "kill" is sufficiently minor that the trouble of providing both versions >> is higher than the gain. >> >> IOW, use M-y (or a prefix arg to C-y) to get to the kill you care about. > > As Stefan says, it's not usually necessary. M-y can skip past > irrelevant kills. Also, if you know you're going to add something > useless to the kill ring, then you can just use backspace. Getting rid > of a word with backspace, in the few occasions when it's necessary, > isn't that slow. > > But, in keyboard macros it can be troublesome. If M-y has to be used in > a macro that generally spells trouble. Also, kills are slower than > deletes. For those reasons I define delete-word in the obvious way, > like kill-word but using delete-region instead of kill-region. I don't > bind it to a key though, I just use M-x when I need it, which is only > when using keyboard macros. This is what registers are good for!