From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.io!.POSTED.blaine.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Eli Zaretskii Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: Context menus and mouse-3 [was: Changes for emacs 28] Date: Wed, 16 Sep 2020 17:13:45 +0300 Message-ID: <83zh5p7qsm.fsf@gnu.org> References: <87k0wwsrj4.fsf@gkayaalp.com> <87h7ryet7n.fsf@mail.linkov.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Injection-Info: ciao.gmane.io; posting-host="blaine.gmane.org:116.202.254.214"; logging-data="7278"; mail-complaints-to="usenet@ciao.gmane.io" Cc: philipk@posteo.net, rms@gnu.org, juri@linkov.net, ghe@sdf.org, arthur.miller@live.com, dgutov@yandex.ru, self@gkayaalp.com, emacs-devel@gnu.org, drew.adams@oracle.com To: Ergus Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane-mx.org@gnu.org Wed Sep 16 16:14:47 2020 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane-mx.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([209.51.188.17]) by ciao.gmane.io with esmtps (TLS1.2:ECDHE_RSA_AES_256_GCM_SHA384:256) (Exim 4.92) (envelope-from ) id 1kIYCs-0001mx-U3 for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane-mx.org; Wed, 16 Sep 2020 16:14:46 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:44596 helo=lists1p.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.90_1) (envelope-from ) id 1kIYCs-0006kf-0t for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane-mx.org; Wed, 16 Sep 2020 10:14:46 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:470:142:3::10]:37758) by lists.gnu.org with esmtps (TLS1.2:ECDHE_RSA_AES_256_GCM_SHA384:256) (Exim 4.90_1) (envelope-from ) id 1kIYCC-0006KK-Si for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Wed, 16 Sep 2020 10:14:07 -0400 Original-Received: from fencepost.gnu.org ([2001:470:142:3::e]:40944) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.90_1) (envelope-from ) id 1kIYC8-0002lI-Mc; Wed, 16 Sep 2020 10:14:00 -0400 Original-Received: from [176.228.60.248] (port=4652 helo=home-c4e4a596f7) by fencepost.gnu.org with esmtpsa (TLS1.2:RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA1:256) (Exim 4.82) (envelope-from ) id 1kIYBl-0006QZ-GH; Wed, 16 Sep 2020 10:13:37 -0400 In-Reply-To: (emacs-devel@gnu.org) X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.23 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane-mx.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: "Emacs-devel" Xref: news.gmane.io gmane.emacs.devel:255873 Archived-At: > Date: Wed, 16 Sep 2020 00:47:38 +0200 > CC: philipk@posteo.net, Richard Stallman , > Göktuğ Kayaalp , > Arthur Miller , Dmitry Gutov , > Gregory Heytings > From: Ergus via "Emacs development discussions." > > On September 15, 2020 10:33:51 PM GMT+02:00, Drew Adams wrote: > >> > read `Mouse Commands' if you haven't > >> > already, and give it a try. > >> > >> Mouse support is poor in Emacs, this is the reason > >> why I don't use the mouse in Emacs. > > > >I disagree that mouse support is poor in Emacs. > > > So you are the only one I know so far with that opinion. He's not the only one. > This is the same problem than undo-redo. Maybe the features are actually better technically speaking or to whom knows all the tricks and trains himself for years; but it worth nothing if the users feel uncomfortable or don't values some of the details that justify complexity in others. (Like hiding the context panel with a control or not having a redo button or not deleting the selection) Or just don't need them. > > There are some "standards" in mouse interaction determined/imposed by most of the gui programing interfaces from visual studio or java to qt5 and gtk. The developers of all the aplications have been following them for years and most of the user are used to them. Emacs didn't invent the effect of the mouse gestures we have now, they closely follow what X applications do, or at least did at the time. Perhaps nowadays those applications and users who are used to those effects are a minority (what with all the "modern" desktops so busy copycat'ing MS-Windows' look and feel), but we still have many users who have these gestures burnt into their muscle memories. Wed cannot just abandon them, even if they are a minority (which is not at all certain). What we _can_ do is to have 2 modes of operation, one each for every one of these two groups of users. This is easy to do technically, all we need is "just" to have someone who'd sit down and design the "other" mode of mouse gestures in some reasonable and logical way. > So this is the "dilema". Or we change a bit (1 binding) to ease the user experience and learning curve OR we expect that all the potential users change their expectations, trainings and don't go to any other editor but use emacs because we pretend we offer a better functionality that they are not aware of and most probably don't need or never learn/use because is complex to remember. There's no dilemma, we can have both modes. > Simple is better than complex. > Complex is better than complicated. And the one you are used to is the best of them all. > The emacs approach with mouse is indeed complicated. I disagree that it's complicated. But we don't have to agree, see above.