From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Nix Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: Windows' "split status" Date: Fri, 25 Nov 2011 12:14:49 +0000 Message-ID: <87r50wwg92.fsf@spindle.srvr.nix> References: <87vcqqoekt.fsf@gnu.org> <4EBE4414.10009@gmx.at> <87d3cwr9hc.fsf@gnu.org> <4EBFA0AF.7000608@gmx.at> <87obwgatpy.fsf@gnu.org> <4EBFFBA5.1000309@gmx.at> <87hb26gdx8.fsf@gnu.org> <4EC213EA.4080304@gmx.at> <871ut9n2rr.fsf@gnu.org> <4EC2821C.4020400@gmx.at> <87sjlfxbg1.fsf@spindle.srvr.nix> <4ECCFFF7.1030702@gmx.at> <83ehwyagdw.fsf@gnu.org> <4ECD47BA.7020509@gmx.at> <838vn6a969.fsf@gnu.org> <4ECE15A4.1070808@gmx.at> <4ECF6CE9.2020406@gmx.at> <874nxsxvhd.fsf@spindle.srvr.nix> <83fwhc8kxy.fsf@gnu.org> NNTP-Posting-Host: lo.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain X-Trace: dough.gmane.org 1322223310 29740 80.91.229.12 (25 Nov 2011 12:15:10 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@dough.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 25 Nov 2011 12:15:10 +0000 (UTC) Cc: rudalics@gmx.at, cyd@gnu.org, monnier@iro.umontreal.ca, emacs-devel@gnu.org To: Eli Zaretskii Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Fri Nov 25 13:15:05 2011 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([140.186.70.17]) by lo.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1RTugK-0000qu-W5 for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Fri, 25 Nov 2011 13:15:05 +0100 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:48445 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1RTugJ-0001xE-HE for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Fri, 25 Nov 2011 07:15:03 -0500 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([140.186.70.92]:33711) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1RTugG-0001wr-7c for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 25 Nov 2011 07:15:01 -0500 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1RTugA-0007bJ-IO for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 25 Nov 2011 07:15:00 -0500 Original-Received: from icebox.esperi.org.uk ([81.187.191.129]:37495 helo=mail.esperi.org.uk) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1RTug8-0007ao-Jm; Fri, 25 Nov 2011 07:14:52 -0500 Original-Received: from esperi.org.uk (nix@spindle.srvr.nix [192.168.14.15]) by mail.esperi.org.uk (8.14.5/8.14.5) with ESMTP id pAPCEnsZ006233; Fri, 25 Nov 2011 12:14:49 GMT Original-Received: (from nix@localhost) by esperi.org.uk (8.14.5/8.14.5/Submit) id pAPCEnc4007975; Fri, 25 Nov 2011 12:14:49 GMT Emacs: The Awakening In-Reply-To: <83fwhc8kxy.fsf@gnu.org> (Eli Zaretskii's message of "Fri, 25 Nov 2011 14:07:21 +0200") User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/24.0.91 (gnu/linux) X-DCC-STAT_FI_X86_64_VIRTUAL-Metrics: spindle 1245; Body=5 Fuz1=5 Fuz2=5 X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: Genre and OS details not recognized. X-Received-From: 81.187.191.129 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:146218 Archived-At: On 25 Nov 2011, Eli Zaretskii verbalised: >> From: Nix >> Emacs: resistance is futile; you will be assimilated and byte-compiled. >> Date: Fri, 25 Nov 2011 12:00:30 +0000 >> Cc: Eli Zaretskii , cyd@gnu.org, monnier@iro.umontreal.ca, >> emacs-devel@gnu.org >> >> I thought this was documentation for Lisp developers, not for Emacs >> maintainers. > > It's both, actually. There's no other place to look for documentation > of Emacs internals except the ELisp manuals, because the comments > never tell enough. When you want to change some complex piece of > code, and look for a comprehensive documentation of its contract, the > ELisp manual is the only place you can find something close. Yes indeed. I'm not saying it's not *useful* for Emacs maintainers! > But I don't think this invalidates your point. Quite. Lots of docstrings talk about invariants, because this is really useful. Even something like the description of what `right-char' or `newline' do are invariants. None of them should eschew talking about those invariants simply because they are not atomic from the POV of the Emacs core. Heck, `newline' is written in Lisp: from the POV of the Emacs core, `newline' inserts soft newlines and then later marks them hard, but nonetheless we talk about `newline' always inserting hard newlines. Where this suddenly does become urgent is if we ever find a way to multithread Emacs -- but I strongly suspect that an Emacs with locking fine-grained enough to maintain useful invariants would be unmaintainable, as would an Emacs in which none of those invariants were maintained cross-thread. What we'll need for multithreading is some sort of transactional-memory scheme where Lisp in separate threads sees no change to the state of Emacs from other threads until it (exits|returns to the command loop|executes some special thread-yield function), and even then the only changes it should see are those that have been done in other threads that have reached the same point. -- NULL && (void)