From: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>
To: Noam Postavsky <npostavs@gmail.com>
Cc: 37507@debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: bug#37507: 26.3; Non-number value for `fill-column' causes wrong-type-arg error for `C-h f'
Date: Wed, 25 Sep 2019 09:37:23 +0300 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <837e5wop98.fsf@gnu.org> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <85lfudjwt0.fsf@gmail.com> (message from Noam Postavsky on Tue, 24 Sep 2019 15:53:15 -0400)
> From: Noam Postavsky <npostavs@gmail.com>
> Date: Tue, 24 Sep 2019 15:53:15 -0400
> Cc: 37507@debbugs.gnu.org
>
> Drew Adams <drew.adams@oracle.com> writes:
>
> > `fill-column' is supposed to have an integer value > 0.
> >
> > But if it has a non-numeric value then other functions can barf, unless
> > they watch out for that.
>
> Shouldn't users just not set it to a non-numeric value then? I'm sure
> you can cause all sort of errors by setting things to invalid values.
>
> > emacs -Q
> >
> > (setq fill-column nil)
>
> Do you mean setq-default (otherwise I can't reproduce)?
I agree that this is a cockpit error. Users who are prone to such
mistakes should use Customize to set values of variables. Users who
use setq-default should know what they are doing.
It is unreasonable to request that we have an explicit test for valid
values in every place that references a variable. Our protection is
that we signal an error, and that should IMO be good enough in cases
such as this one.
P.S. This bug report came from a question on Reddit, where it
received the same responses.
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2019-09-25 6:37 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 6+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2019-09-24 18:23 bug#37507: 26.3; Non-number value for `fill-column' causes wrong-type-arg error for `C-h f' Drew Adams
2019-09-24 18:30 ` Drew Adams
2019-09-24 19:53 ` Noam Postavsky
2019-09-24 20:49 ` Drew Adams
2019-09-25 6:37 ` Eli Zaretskii [this message]
2019-10-19 0:35 ` Stefan Kangas
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