From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Emanuel Berg Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.help Subject: Re: Is Emacs very alive, active and improving? Date: Thu, 29 Aug 2013 22:53:14 +0200 Organization: Aioe.org NNTP Server Message-ID: <87d2oww758.fsf@nl106-137-194.student.uu.se> References: <87r4ddo4yp.fsf@nl106-137-194.student.uu.se> NNTP-Posting-Host: plane.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1377809718 20791 80.91.229.3 (29 Aug 2013 20:55:18 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 29 Aug 2013 20:55:18 +0000 (UTC) To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org Original-X-From: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Thu Aug 29 22:55:22 2013 Return-path: Envelope-to: geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([208.118.235.17]) by plane.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1VF9FQ-0001zf-OK for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Thu, 29 Aug 2013 22:55:20 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:45726 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1VF9FQ-00074j-F1 for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Thu, 29 Aug 2013 16:55:20 -0400 Original-Path: usenet.stanford.edu!news.kjsl.com!feeder.erje.net!eu.feeder.erje.net!newsfeed.datemas.de!rt.uk.eu.org!aioe.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail Original-Newsgroups: gnu.emacs.help Original-Lines: 51 Original-NNTP-Posting-Host: VVbyYd/iFZoeWNmD9i++cQ.user.speranza.aioe.org Original-X-Complaints-To: abuse@aioe.org User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/23.4 (gnu/linux) X-Notice: Filtered by postfilter v. 0.8.2 Cancel-Lock: sha1:1IsO2eLkRWkhhC8mJLgeKvVOMfc= Original-Xref: usenet.stanford.edu gnu.emacs.help:200890 X-BeenThere: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14 Precedence: list List-Id: Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.help:93158 Archived-At: wgreenhouse@riseup.net (W. Greenhouse) writes: > Right, I was referring to the describe-* family of commands, the > apropos-* commands, and the > find-function/find-library/find-variable/find-face-definition > commands, as well as the Customize system. I realize that > documentation doesn't write itself, that the parameters of a > function on their own may be rather mysterious, and that > machine-generated documentation generally sucks. Nonetheless, > Emacs provides the user with an unusually rich set of ways of > finding out about the environment's current state and the > workings and customization possibilities of a program, as well > as discovering things you didn't know you were looking for. I > take "self-documenting" to mean "capable of introspection in a > variety of context-useful ways". If we updated the Emacs > one-line description for 2013, we'd probably call it the > "extensible, customizable, introspective editor". Or not--that > makes it sound like a neurotic existentialist writer! Ha ha, no, let's keep "self-documenting". To me, that *sounds* like "you don't have to write documentation, Emacs does that for you, all the while you extend Emacs", but I never was fool enough to believe that (for Emacs, or any system), so I thought it was just an exaggeration of the docstring etc. functionality, and especially its "immediate" update property, or, likewise an exaggeration of the prototypes you get, even if there is no docstring - I guess you could include lots of stuff in "self-documentation", with some imagination - autocompletion, for example (which I never use for speed, only when I don't remember some part of whatever name). I agree the whole framework around the Emacs documentation is great, apart from one thing, that you (or somebody else) possibly can help me with: When I bring up the help for find-file (just an example, this happens all the time), some of the lines are too long. For example, one line looks like this: Interactively, [cut] type RET is the current director That is, "y," has overflowed the width. Is there a way to "fill" all help? I tried to manually change some of the docstrings with line breaks ("\n", same as in C, or otherwise in Elisp strings). That worked, but I'm not going to do that for each and any function (or whatever). -- Emanuel Berg - programmer (hire me! CV below) computer projects: http://user.it.uu.se/~embe8573 internet activity: http://home.student.uu.se/embe8573