From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: "Stephen J. Turnbull" Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: RE: Upcoming loss of usability of Emacs source files and Emacs. Date: Thu, 18 Jun 2015 13:49:44 +0900 Message-ID: <87pp4tfwnr.fsf@uwakimon.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp> References: <20150615142237.GA3517@acm.fritz.box> <87y4jkhqh5.fsf@uwakimon.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp> <557F3C22.4060909@cs.ucla.edu> <5580D356.4050708@cs.ucla.edu> <87si9qonxb.fsf@gnu.org> <87ioamz8if.fsf@petton.fr> <32013464-2300-46c6-ba46-4a3c36bfee5d@default> NNTP-Posting-Host: plane.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1434603016 17601 80.91.229.3 (18 Jun 2015 04:50:16 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 18 Jun 2015 04:50:16 +0000 (UTC) Cc: eggert@cs.ucla.edu, rms@gnu.org, Nicolas Petton , emacs-devel@gnu.org, Tassilo Horn , acm@muc.de To: Drew Adams Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Thu Jun 18 06:50:09 2015 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@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 1Z5RmC-0000og-12 for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Thu, 18 Jun 2015 06:50:08 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:50176 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1Z5RmA-0006vM-Ta for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Thu, 18 Jun 2015 00:50:06 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:4830:134:3::10]:46939) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1Z5Rlw-0006vF-JC for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Thu, 18 Jun 2015 00:49:53 -0400 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1Z5Rlt-0005k1-BU for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Thu, 18 Jun 2015 00:49:52 -0400 Original-Received: from shako.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp ([130.158.97.161]:43862) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1Z5Rlt-0005jR-1V; Thu, 18 Jun 2015 00:49:49 -0400 Original-Received: from uwakimon.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp (uwakimon.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp [130.158.99.156]) (using TLSv1.2 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384 (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by shako.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 1BDEE1C3980; Thu, 18 Jun 2015 13:49:45 +0900 (JST) Original-Received: by uwakimon.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp (Postfix, from userid 1000) id F38DA1A2CA2; Thu, 18 Jun 2015 13:49:44 +0900 (JST) In-Reply-To: <32013464-2300-46c6-ba46-4a3c36bfee5d@default> X-Mailer: VM undefined under 21.5 (beta34) "kale" 83e5c3cd6be6 XEmacs Lucid (x86_64-unknown-linux) X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 3.x X-Received-From: 130.158.97.161 X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14 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.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:187259 Archived-At: Drew Adams writes: > Such code changes are simply tests, to see if you are paying > attention. This approach is, like, waaaaaay more dynamic and > 21st-century than discussing potential changes with arguments > pro & con and offering patches for people to try on their own. Uh, no. Beware who you mock: As far as I can tell on this particular issue I'm in fact *exactly* aligned with Stefan Monnier. I can afford to choose sides, he can't, and that's 100% of the difference in tone between our posts (aside from the fact that I'm an arrogant a-----e[1], and he isn't, but most people can filter that part out). As I've already implied, I think a lot of the changes made to Emacs over the years were ill-considered, and conservatives like you and Alan do a great service by asking that new ones be evaluated more carefully. I think the same about many of the changes that have been vetoed, as well; they were not given the effort in evaluation they deserved. My experience is that some issues cannot be accurately judged in advance, and so gendeken experiments and user polling are very inaccurate. My experience also shows that the people who try patches on their own generally feel strongly one way or the other already, and so rarely change their position yea or any, though they sometimes modify it in one direction or the other. Experiments with defaults (or changing behavior, as in this case) have their cost too, but sometimes the additional accuracy is worth the cost. I believe movement toward exploiting more of the Unicode repertoire for syntax is one such case. I also believe that this experiment will show that this movement is feasible and potentially beneficial, but unlike the conservatives I don't ask anyone to take my word for it in advance. Footnotes: [1] I take full responsibility for those words, and do not put them in anyone else's mouth. I'm not proud of my condition, but I know who I am, and couldn't deny it believably after recent posts anyway.