From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Drew Adams Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: RE: [Emacs-diffs] master 9ce1d38: Use curved quotes in core elisp diagnostics Date: Tue, 18 Aug 2015 13:17:56 -0700 (PDT) Message-ID: <0ac95dde-75ba-464b-90b2-1b19b348473e@default> References: <20150816160149.9416.80132@vcs.savannah.gnu.org> <55D1043C.3030909@yandex.ru> <20150816225346.GA5367@acm.fritz.box> <55D2C080.2000806@cs.ucla.edu> <87wpwt5619.fsf@gnu.org> <55D36CB5.10803@cs.ucla.edu> <878u9879q9.fsf@igel.home> <19BD5D76-06A0-4FC0-A46F-760B2C27D321@gmail.com> <20150818194253.GE2262@acm.fritz.box> NNTP-Posting-Host: plane.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1439929120 26592 80.91.229.3 (18 Aug 2015 20:18:40 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 18 Aug 2015 20:18:40 +0000 (UTC) Cc: emacs-devel To: Alan Mackenzie , Chad Brown Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Tue Aug 18 22:18:28 2015 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@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 1ZRnKz-0001Q8-RW for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Tue, 18 Aug 2015 22:18:25 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:59394 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1ZRnKz-0004de-6H for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Tue, 18 Aug 2015 16:18:25 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:4830:134:3::10]:60934) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1ZRnKg-0004b6-2o for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Tue, 18 Aug 2015 16:18:06 -0400 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1ZRnKa-0005pK-DT for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Tue, 18 Aug 2015 16:18:05 -0400 Original-Received: from aserp1040.oracle.com ([141.146.126.69]:23386) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1ZRnKa-0005p4-7i for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Tue, 18 Aug 2015 16:18:00 -0400 Original-Received: from userv0022.oracle.com (userv0022.oracle.com [156.151.31.74]) by aserp1040.oracle.com (Sentrion-MTA-4.3.2/Sentrion-MTA-4.3.2) with ESMTP id t7IKHwNa014589 (version=TLSv1 cipher=DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA bits=256 verify=OK); Tue, 18 Aug 2015 20:17:58 GMT Original-Received: from aserv0122.oracle.com (aserv0122.oracle.com [141.146.126.236]) by userv0022.oracle.com (8.13.8/8.13.8) with ESMTP id t7IKHv0q010488 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA bits=256 verify=FAIL); Tue, 18 Aug 2015 20:17:58 GMT Original-Received: from abhmp0005.oracle.com (abhmp0005.oracle.com [141.146.116.11]) by aserv0122.oracle.com (8.13.8/8.13.8) with ESMTP id t7IKHvms003653; Tue, 18 Aug 2015 20:17:57 GMT In-Reply-To: <20150818194253.GE2262@acm.fritz.box> X-Priority: 3 X-Mailer: Oracle Beehive Extensions for Outlook 2.0.1.9 (901082) [OL 12.0.6691.5000 (x86)] X-Source-IP: userv0022.oracle.com [156.151.31.74] X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 2.4.x-2.6.x [generic] X-Received-From: 141.146.126.69 X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:188906 Archived-At: > I think you may have misunderstood what the controversy is about. > It's not about adding or not adding support for curly quotes and curly > ellipses in users' documents. It's about whether or not to replace > ` and ' in Emacs's source files' error messages and comments with > curly quotes, for a perceived aesthetic benefit, at the cost of making > those files more difficult to maintain, particularly in environments whic= h > aren't X-windows. AND at the cost of confusing ordinary text quotation (which, naturally, uses curly quotes, both double and single) with mention, within passages of ordinary text, of things that the text wants to talk about: code fragments such as symbols and sexps, as well as key sequences, file names, and URLS. IOW, the kinds of things that are often distinguished from ordinary text by setting them off in a fixed-width font (such as Courier). IOW, regardless of the (important) problems Alan mentions, about difficulty of use, burden of maintenance, misfit with existing code-oriented tools, and complication of user and core code (layers and layers of ugly workarounds) -- i.e., even if those problems were not a problem, it is misguided to treat setting off code etc. using ordinary text quotation. It introduces confusion and is information lossy. > We're _all_ trying to push Emacs forward. It's just we sometimes > don't fully agree what direction forward is. :-) Not to mention the effect on many others who will deal with the consequences without having voiced anything about the direction. (And yes, I'm sure there will be many end users who will not get beyond a first blush of "Look Ma, curly quotes now! How pretty!")