Re: print-circle and describe-variable

["Lennart Borgman (gmail)" <lennart.borgman@gmail.com>]

Eli Zaretskii wrote:
>> Date: Mon, 09 Apr 2007 03:00:46 +0200
>> From: "Lennart Borgman (gmail)" <lennart.borgman@gmail.com>
>> Cc: rms@gnu.org, emacs-devel@gnu.org
>>
>>> I can think of one: too late.
>> But we do believe that print-circle makes it possible to print out 
>> recursive structures, or? And we do not believe that it disturbs 
>> printing out non-recursive structures (except that it gets a bit 
>> slower), or?
>>
>> Could it make much harm then if we let describe-variable use it? And is 
>> it not a bug that Emacs hangs and eats all memory if you try to display 
>> a recursive structure with describe-variable?
> 
> Lennart, there will always be ``one more bug''.  If we strive to
> release Emacs without bugs at all, we will never release!


I am disturbed by this particular bug, but of course recursive 
structures are not that common. However describe-variable is one of the 
few places where print-circle really makes a difference and where the 
chance that it disturbs something is quite small.