From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: main.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Miles Bader Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: Apropos commands and regexps Date: 17 May 2002 06:58:32 +0900 Sender: emacs-devel-admin@gnu.org Message-ID: <87sn4rdabb.fsf@tc-1-100.kawasaki.gol.ne.jp> References: <5xbsbj9834.fsf@kfs2.cua.dk> <200205150700.g4F70rr16163@aztec.santafe.edu> <87ptzxmz7s.fsf@tc-1-100.kawasaki.gol.ne.jp> <5xoffhoywn.fsf@kfs2.cua.dk> <5xg00r4tlo.fsf@kfs2.cua.dk> Reply-To: Miles Bader NNTP-Posting-Host: localhost.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: main.gmane.org 1021586452 28960 127.0.0.1 (16 May 2002 22:00:52 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@main.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 16 May 2002 22:00:52 +0000 (UTC) Cc: rms@gnu.org, eliz@is.elta.co.il, emacs-devel@gnu.org Return-path: Original-Received: from quimby.gnus.org ([80.91.224.244]) by main.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 3.33 #1 (Debian)) id 178TIp-0007Wz-00 for ; Fri, 17 May 2002 00:00:51 +0200 Original-Received: from fencepost.gnu.org ([199.232.76.164]) by quimby.gnus.org with esmtp (Exim 3.12 #1 (Debian)) id 178TV1-0006aW-00 for ; Fri, 17 May 2002 00:13:27 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1] helo=fencepost.gnu.org) by fencepost.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 3.34 #1 (Debian)) id 178TIp-00022m-00; Thu, 16 May 2002 18:00:51 -0400 Original-Received: from smtp02.fields.gol.com ([203.216.5.132]) by fencepost.gnu.org with smtp (Exim 3.34 #1 (Debian)) id 178THK-0001w7-00; Thu, 16 May 2002 17:59:18 -0400 Original-Received: from tc-2-180.kawasaki.gol.ne.jp ([203.216.25.180] helo=tc-1-100.kawasaki.gol.ne.jp) by smtp02.fields.gol.com with esmtp (Magnetic Fields) id 178THI-00082n-00; Fri, 17 May 2002 06:59:16 +0900 Original-Received: by tc-1-100.kawasaki.gol.ne.jp (Postfix, from userid 1000) id 9A8F630AC; Fri, 17 May 2002 06:58:32 +0900 (JST) Original-To: storm@cua.dk (Kim F. Storm) System-Type: i686-pc-linux-gnu In-Reply-To: <5xg00r4tlo.fsf@kfs2.cua.dk> Original-Lines: 39 X-Abuse-Complaints: abuse@gol.com Errors-To: emacs-devel-admin@gnu.org X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.0.9 Precedence: bulk List-Help: List-Post: List-Subscribe: , List-Id: Emacs development discussions. List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: Xref: main.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:4034 X-Report-Spam: http://spam.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.devel:4034 storm@cua.dk (Kim F. Storm) writes: > > `and' is the defautl for all search engines that I've used, and has the > > advantage of being simple and easy to understand. > > A quick test shows that Google, Yahoo, Lycos uses AND > while Altavista, Excite, AskJeeves uses OR. > > For WEB search engines, I think AND does make sense -- since there > are SOOOO many pages to match. But for a limited universe like > emacs -- which doesn't always use the most obvious terms -- > using AND doesn't make a lot of sense to me. `or' is clearly wrong; even in emacs' `limited' universe, it generates way too many hits. E.g., (apropos "\\(find.*file\\|file.*find\\)") gets about 50 hits, whereas (apropos "\\(find\\|file\\)") gets over 700! Maybe your idea of `at least N matches' is a good compromise. > > No, but it's common practice in writing lists. > > I don't see the relevance, sorry. But of course, we could ignore > commas in case people use them... That's the point. I wasn't suggesting that they be required. > We could put a "button bar" at the top of the apropos output with > the following buttons: > > [Match all words] [anchored match] [search documentation] That seems like a good idea in general; I'd even like the ability to do other sorts of apropos searches, e.g., in a command-apropos buffer, have a button that does a variable-apropos on the same search terms. -Miles -- Saa, shall we dance? (from a dance-class advertisement)