Re: [rudy@gnu.org: Re: [Savannah-hackers] [teirllm@dms.auburn.edu: Re: emacs/src/regex.c]]

[Miles Bader <miles@gnu.org>]

On Sun, Dec 28, 2003 at 08:10:00AM +0200, Eli Zaretskii wrote:
> But I agree it's generally a good idea to allow for a system regex to
> be used, especially if I'm wrong and the issue I mentioned doesn't
> really exist.

I'm not sure what you mean by `system regex', but emacs does certainly depend
on non-standard features of the GNU regex code, namely the interface which
allows searching across the buffer-gap.  So emacs can't use any `system
regex' that doesn't define this interface.

AFAIK, the new regular-expression implementation in glibc actually _has_ that
interface, but it works in a completely stupid (and essentially useless) way,
so emacs shouldn't use it -- but that situation might be hard to detect using
standard autoconf methods.

-Miles
-- 
o The existentialist, not having a pillow, goes everywhere with the book by
  Sullivan, _I am going to spit on your graves_.