From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Giorgos Keramidas Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: Emacs learning curve Date: Sun, 18 Jul 2010 22:33:57 +0300 Message-ID: <87r5j0twii.fsf@kobe.laptop> References: <10954D02-E217-49F3-8824-757DA34074AB@gmail.com> <83zkxzakr0.fsf@gnu.org> <83pqyva8ms.fsf@gnu.org> NNTP-Posting-Host: lo.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable X-Trace: dough.gmane.org 1279481681 3235 80.91.229.12 (18 Jul 2010 19:34:41 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@dough.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 18 Jul 2010 19:34:41 +0000 (UTC) Cc: Eli Zaretskii , Tom , emacs-devel@gnu.org To: Lennart Borgman Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Sun Jul 18 21:34:39 2010 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([199.232.76.165]) by lo.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1OaZdG-0007r5-5D for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Sun, 18 Jul 2010 21:34:38 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1]:52996 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1OaZdD-0004ie-QI for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Sun, 18 Jul 2010 15:34:35 -0400 Original-Received: from [140.186.70.92] (port=35092 helo=eggs.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1OaZd8-0004iX-IU for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sun, 18 Jul 2010 15:34:31 -0400 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1OaZd6-0002q3-D7 for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sun, 18 Jul 2010 15:34:30 -0400 Original-Received: from igloo.linux.gr ([62.1.205.36]:49905) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1OaZd1-0002pG-AM; Sun, 18 Jul 2010 15:34:23 -0400 X-Hellug-MailScanner-From: keramida@ceid.upatras.gr X-Hellug-MailScanner-SpamCheck: not spam, SpamAssassin (not cached, score=-0.2, required 5, autolearn=not spam, ALL_TRUSTED -1.00, BAYES_50 0.80) X-Hellug-MailScanner: Found to be clean X-Hellug-MailScanner-ID: o6IJY4J6019009 Original-Received: from kobe.laptop (188.4.25.184.dsl.dyn.forthnet.gr [188.4.25.184]) (authenticated bits=128) by igloo.linux.gr (8.14.3/8.14.3/Debian-9.1) with ESMTP id o6IJY4J6019009 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA bits=256 verify=NOT); Sun, 18 Jul 2010 22:34:10 +0300 Original-Received: from kobe.laptop (kobe.laptop [127.0.0.1]) by kobe.laptop (8.14.4/8.14.4) with ESMTP id o6IJXxqj075368 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA bits=256 verify=NO); Sun, 18 Jul 2010 22:33:59 +0300 (EEST) (envelope-from keramida@ceid.upatras.gr) Original-Received: (from keramida@localhost) by kobe.laptop (8.14.4/8.14.4/Submit) id o6IJXwEp075276; Sun, 18 Jul 2010 22:33:58 +0300 (EEST) (envelope-from keramida@ceid.upatras.gr) In-Reply-To: (Lennart Borgman's message of "Sat, 10 Jul 2010 13:41:25 +0200") User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/24.0.50 (berkeley-unix) X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 2.6 (newer, 2) X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Original-Sender: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:127559 Archived-At: On Sat, 10 Jul 2010 13:41:25 +0200, Lennart Borgman wrote: > On Sat, Jul 10, 2010 at 1:17 PM, Eli Zaretskii wrote: >>> From: Tom >>> Date: Sat, 10 Jul 2010 10:36:46 +0000 (UTC) >>> >>> Is there a compelling reason to still use yank/kill, instead of copy/cu= t/paste? >> >> From the Emacs manual: >> >> =A0* Killing:: =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 Killing (cutting) text. >> =A0* Yanking:: =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 Recovering killed text. =A0Moving tex= t. (Pasting.) >> >> and then: >> >> =A0 =A012 Killing and Moving Text >> =A0 =A0************************** >> >> =A0 =A0"Killing" means erasing text and copying it into the "kill ring",= from >> =A0 =A0which you can bring it back into the buffer by "yanking" it. =A0(= Some >> =A0 =A0applications use the terms "cutting" and "pasting" for similar >> =A0 =A0operations.) > > I think it is quite clear from this text that there is no logical > reason any more not to use the common terms copy/cut/paste. Not really, but this hasn't stopped people from arguing about it. There are tunables and functions called `kill-xxx', e.g.: kill-ring kill-ring-max kill-ring-save ... If we change the manual to only use cut/paste then we have to find a new name for `kill-ring', a new name for the associated functions or variables, and we will probably have to go through a period of backwards compatibility that supports both spellings of these options. Then even if we stop supporting the `kill-xxx' names in the trunk of Emacs, there will still be packages out there in the wild that break in amusing ways just because of the rename. Terminology is important, I don't disagree about this point. I do have a few reservations about the statement that kill/yank are less useful than cut/paste though. Both are, after all, just conventions that we have chosen to describe a particular concept. Once you read through the manual *once* you know the useful terms and their meanings, so the main problem of cut/paste =3D kill/yank goes away.