Re: emacs mode line suggestions

[Xah <xahlee@gmail.com>]

On Nov 17, 6:33 pm, "B. T. Raven" <ni...@nihilo.net> wrote:
> But if a user is interested in working with Emacs rather than just
> playing with it, she will know the suffix that will trigger the correct
> mode.

You missed the point. When a programer work with multiple langs, and
when he create a buffer for scratch purposes, there is a need to
switch to switch mode.

It is not playing with emacs.

For example, i program in elisp and perl. So, say, i created a buffer
xx for scratch purposes to code some elisp. Then, suddenly my
contractor called and needed some code fixed quickly. I immediatly get
to work, and i want to switch my xx buffer to perl mode, and start
coding perl there.

however, i'm emacs newbie, i dunno that the mode switching command.
So, i click on the majo mode name in the buffer, get a list, then
there i can switch.

> So if there is a programming language Brainfsck, then it's mode
> might be switched to by visiting a file named scratch.ppp.

not quite sure what you mean. I'm guessing what you mean is that the
suffix now may not correspond to the mode. Not so, because switching
mode is a conscious decision, not something happens automatically.

> If this
> worked correctly it would work faster than anything you could do with
> the mouse on the mode line.

remember, the context is ease of use for those who just started to use
emacs, and the context is about the the behavior of clicking the mode
line. The argument in this subthread, is NOT about switching mode in
general. For example, as most emacs users known, you simply switch
mode by Alt+x ‹mode name›.

So, my argument is that clicking on the major mode in the mode line
should pop up a list of commonly used lang's modes.

> Fortunately (or maybe not) you are correct that suffix-mode
> correspondences aren't always intuitive. For instance, I press C-x b and
> then type in a new (temporary)buffer name like scratch.el * The buffer
> is created but it is in Text mode (my default) until I do either C-x C-w
> or M-x emacs-lisp-mode. But if I save it I now have an empty file with
> that name in my default directory, which I will eventually have to
> delete. It would be better (imho) if the buffer switched to the mode
> indicated by the buffer name suffix immediately after creation.
> But it may be that we are wrong about that since, in the context of the
> big picture, it may seem hokey to the developers to give a suffix
> to a temporary buffer name.
>
> * Just for the sake of example. Of course there already is a buffer
> *scratch* set to the correct mode
>
> Ed

  Xah
∑ http://xahlee.org/

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