bug#73544: smerge key bindings awkward

[Daniel Colascione <dancol@dancol.org>]

On October 17, 2024 1:37:43 PM EDT, Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca> wrote:
>> It's a defect in the user interface.
>
>IIUC the original scenario is:
>
>    C-c ^ n
>    <fix the conflict>
>    C-c ^ n
>
>and here being annoyed that `n` was inserted (after flashing the buffer
>because `C-c ^` is not bound to anything) because that was the last
>conflict and `smerge-mode` turned itself off automatically.
>
>I'm not completely sure what is the exact defect you see here and how
>you suggest to fix it.  E.g. do you also care to "fix" a case like
>
>    emacs foo
>    C-c ^ n
>
>where the user forgot to enable `smerge-mode`?
>
>How 'bout the patch below, which will end up preventing `read-key-sequence`
>from stopping at `C-c ^`?
>
>
>        Stefan
>
>
>diff --git a/lisp/vc/smerge-mode.el b/lisp/vc/smerge-mode.el
>index aad3e302826..fa52286fee7 100644
>--- a/lisp/vc/smerge-mode.el
>+++ b/lisp/vc/smerge-mode.el
>@@ -168,6 +168,10 @@ smerge-command-prefix
> 		 (const :tag "none"  "")
> 		 string))
> 
>+;; Make it so `C-x ^ n' doesn't insert `n' but just signals an error
>+;; when SMerge mode is not enabled.
>+;;;###autoload (global-set-key "\C-c^" (make-sparse-keymap))
>+
> (defvar-keymap smerge-mode-map
>   (key-description smerge-command-prefix) smerge-basic-map)
> 
>

WFM