From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Alan Mackenzie Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: Documentation of transient-mark-mode is sloppy, wrong, and confused. Date: Thu, 28 May 2009 20:15:29 +0000 Message-ID: <20090528201529.GA4605@muc.de> References: <20090528122927.GA2175@muc.de> <87fxepf9s8.fsf@cyd.mit.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: lo.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1243541715 1449 80.91.229.12 (28 May 2009 20:15:15 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 28 May 2009 20:15:15 +0000 (UTC) Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org To: Chong Yidong Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Thu May 28 22:15:12 2009 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([199.232.76.165]) by lo.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.50) id 1M9m0N-0003vH-Mg for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Thu, 28 May 2009 22:15:12 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1]:59419 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1M9m0N-0005PZ-30 for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Thu, 28 May 2009 16:15:11 -0400 Original-Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1M9lzw-0004q3-CN for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Thu, 28 May 2009 16:14:44 -0400 Original-Received: from exim by lists.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1M9lzr-0004iR-JQ for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Thu, 28 May 2009 16:14:43 -0400 Original-Received: from [199.232.76.173] (port=51598 helo=monty-python.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1M9lzr-0004iA-Ds for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Thu, 28 May 2009 16:14:39 -0400 Original-Received: from colin.muc.de ([193.149.48.1]:3014 helo=mail.muc.de) by monty-python.gnu.org with esmtps (TLS-1.0:DHE_RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA1:32) (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1M9lzq-0005ss-TK for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Thu, 28 May 2009 16:14:39 -0400 Original-Received: (qmail 47833 invoked by uid 3782); 28 May 2009 20:14:34 -0000 Original-Received: from acm.muc.de (pD9E23E19.dip.t-dialin.net [217.226.62.25]) by colin2.muc.de (tmda-ofmipd) with ESMTP; Thu, 28 May 2009 22:14:32 +0200 Original-Received: (qmail 5679 invoked by uid 1000); 28 May 2009 20:15:29 -0000 Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <87fxepf9s8.fsf@cyd.mit.edu> User-Agent: Mutt/1.5.9i X-Delivery-Agent: TMDA/1.1.5 (Fettercairn) X-Primary-Address: acm@muc.de X-detected-operating-system: by monty-python.gnu.org: FreeBSD 4.6-4.9 X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Original-Sender: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:111158 Archived-At: Hi, Yidong! On Thu, May 28, 2009 at 12:54:15PM -0400, Chong Yidong wrote: > Thanks; I've made some changes to the text to address these concerns. > Please take another look. ;-). The essence of my unhappiness is that "active" isn't defined. You've put in a formal @dfn{active}, but weaselled out of actually defining it. You state what happens _when_ the mark is "active", but not what a mark has to do or to be to acquire or to lose the essence of "active"ness. You also haven't defined what a region has to do, be, or become, to be "active". The phrase "when the region is active" occurs several times in the rest of the manual. For the rest of this email, I'm going to presume that the region is "active" exactly whenever the mark is. If the term "active" cannot be defined, it should be purged from the manual and the software, being replaced by terms we can define. Surely? As I see it, an "active" region has three attributes: (i) C-w kills it; (ii) It's highlit; (iii) M-$ checks the spelling of EACH WORD IN THE REGION (as opposed to just the one surrounding point). Now, which of these (or which combination of them) constitutes "active"ness? (i)? I guess it originally was, but due to the default setting of `mark-even-if-inactive', all regions are now active(i) all the time, rendering the entire description redundant and confusing. (ii)? "Active" is a strange way of writing "highlit", but if this is the meaning, then when transient-mark-mode is nil (as described in "Persistent Mark"), the mark is NEVER active(ii). (iii)? This cannot be. The semantic chasm between "check the spelling of lots of words, not just one" and the dictionary meaning of "active" is just too vast. Anyhow, with null t-m-m, the mark is NEVER active(iii). ######################################################################## In *scratch*, disable Transient Mark Mode, write the following line and put the region as indicated: one two threeee ^ ^ | | point mark The mark is now active (since t-m-m is nil). Therefore the region is "active". Execute the command `ispell-word' with M-$; this is a command which supposedly works on the region when the region is "active". It fails to flag the non-word "threeee", suggesting that it regards the region as "inactive". Energise transient transient-mark-mode with C-u C-x C-x, and repeat M-$. It now flags "threeee", as it should have done before. ######################################################################### I assert that the use of "active" in pages "Mark" and "Persistent Mark" and most of the rest of the book, renders them incoherent and meaningless, and that the only way to restore coherence is to get rid of "active". -- Alan Mackenzie (Nuremberg, Germany).