Re: kill-region without modifying the kill ring

[Michael Heerdegen <michael_heerdegen@web.de>]

Jim Newton <jimka.issy@gmail.com> writes:

> The problem, as I described above is that every time I press C-w, then
> to get back the text I want to yank, I must press M-y N+1 times.
>
> Here is the sequence.  I copy the region I want to insert with M-w,
> then I start reading through the text in the buffer, every time I
> encounter a string I want to replace with C-y, I have to first delete
> what's there.  So I select the first using M-space a few times, and
> press C-w C-y M-y, then continue to the text I want to remove and
> replace (maybe the same string again, or maybe one slightly
> different), and press M-space (a few times), then C-w C-y M-y M-y,
> next time I have to press C-w C-y M-y M-y M-y
> The 20th time I need to press
> C-w C-y M-y M-y M-y M-y M-y M-y M-y M-y M-y M-y M-y M-y M-y M-y M-y
> M-y M-y M-y M-y M-y
>
> That's why the M-y suggestion does not work.
>
> But the suggestion to use [delete] instead of C-w is a good one.  I
> didn't know I could delete a region with the delete key, i've used C-w
> since 1988.

I know that problem very well.

Some years ago, I also tried to solve this by using deletion instead of
killing.  But I soon dismissed the idea, because

  - there are a bunch of other killing commands (e.g. M-d, C-M-backspace,
  C-k, etc.), and I would need to replace them all with deletion
  commands.

  - even if I did that, I sometimes _want_ to add to the kill ring.
  That complicates the matter again.

But the underlying problem is not killing per se, but the design of the
kill/yank system.  So I ended up by hacking the kill/yank system by
doing more or less the following:

  - after a (persistent) yank, move the yanked piece of text to the
  beginning of the kill ring, and let the yank pointer point to this
  first element

  - for more convenience, let M-y when hit not after a yank, instead of
  raising an error, yank the second element of the kill ring

This implements a different concept of using the kill-ring, changing the
order of kills all of the time reflecting your recent yanks, instead of
the order in which the pieces were actually killed.

So, your workflow from above would become

  kill text to yank

  kill-command, M-y, move to next ocurrance, kill-command, M-y, ...

I used this for a while now and am happy with it.  Of course, killing
still adds to the kill ring, but it doesn't disrupt the above work flow
anymore.  Together with a tool like browse-kill-ring, it perfectly fits
my needs.

I can send you the code if interested.


Regards,

Michael.