overwrite yank

overwrite yank

[Joe Bloggs]

Hi, I'm sure this is really simple, but I can't find the answer anywhere. 
How can I overwrite from the copy buffer?
I've tried yanking in overwrite-mode but that doesn't work, it just inserts as normal, whereas I want to overwrite.
Thanks.

Re: overwrite yank

[Dieter Wilhelm]

Joe Bloggs <joebloggs@nowhere.invalid> writes:

> Hi, I'm sure this is really simple, but I can't find the answer
> anywhere.  How can I overwrite from the copy buffer?  I've tried
> yanking in overwrite-mode but that doesn't work, it just inserts as
> normal, whereas I want to overwrite.  Thanks.

 Please try "delete-selection-mode" but from your description I'm not
 quite sure that this is what you want.

-- 
    Best wishes

    H. Dieter Wilhelm
    Darmstadt, Germany

RE: overwrite yank

[Drew Adams]

> > Hi, I'm sure this is really simple, but I can't find the answer
> > anywhere.  How can I overwrite from the copy buffer?  I've tried
> > yanking in overwrite-mode but that doesn't work, it just inserts as
> > normal, whereas I want to overwrite.  Thanks.
>
>  Please try "delete-selection-mode" but from your description I'm not
>  quite sure that this is what you want.

No, it won't do what he's asking. I don't know of anything, offhand, that
will. Perhaps someone here will provide some code to do it, as a fun
exercise.

Joe: Out of curiosity, just why do you want to do that?

Re: overwrite yank

[Dieter Wilhelm]

"Drew Adams" <drew.adams@oracle.com> writes:

>> > Hi, I'm sure this is really simple, but I can't find the answer
>> > anywhere.  How can I overwrite from the copy buffer?  I've tried
>> > yanking in overwrite-mode but that doesn't work, it just inserts as
>> > normal, whereas I want to overwrite.  Thanks.
>>
>>  Please try "delete-selection-mode" but from your description I'm not
>>  quite sure that this is what you want.
>
> No, it won't do what he's asking. I don't know of anything, offhand, that
> will. Perhaps someone here will provide some code to do it, as a fun
> exercise.

I thought it implicit that he wanted to overwrite some *selection*
with the stuff from the kill ring.  So you think he wants for example
yanking a line of text and this same line does overwrite the line
where the cursor is (without a region)?

>
> Joe: Out of curiosity, just why do you want to do that?

Yes, why?

-- 
    Best wishes

    H. Dieter Wilhelm
    Darmstadt, Germany

RE: overwrite yank

[Drew Adams]

> I thought it implicit that he wanted to overwrite some *selection*
> with the stuff from the kill ring.  So you think he wants for example
> yanking a line of text and this same line does overwrite the line
> where the cursor is (without a region)?

Yes, that was my interpretation. But I've been wrong before. ;-)

That would seem to be useful: if you can type over existing text, why
couldn't you also yank over existing text?

Re: overwrite yank

[xraysmalevich]

On Sep 27, 11:20 am, "Drew Adams" <drew.ad...@oracle.com> wrote:
> > I thought it implicit that he wanted to overwrite some *selection*
> > with the stuff from the kill ring.  So you think he wants for example
> > yanking a line of text and this same line does overwrite the line
> > where the cursor is (without a region)?
>
> Yes, that was my interpretation. But I've been wrong before. ;-)
>
> That would seem to be useful: if you can type over existing text, why
> couldn't you also yank over existing text?

I'd also like to see this function.

Why do I want to do it? Well, I just do. Trust me.

Re: overwrite yank

[Stefan Monnier]

> Why do I want to do it? Well, I just do. Trust me.

Why do we want to know why you want it?
So as to know *how* to provide the feature.


        Stefan

Re: overwrite yank

[Dieter Wilhelm]

Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca> writes:

>> Why do I want to do it? Well, I just do. Trust me.
>
> Why do we want to know why you want it?
> So as to know *how* to provide the feature.

Yes, or maybe to suggest an alternative method.

-- 
    Best wishes

    H. Dieter Wilhelm
    Darmstadt, Germany

Re: overwrite yank

[Joe Bloggs]

"Drew Adams" <drew.adams@oracle.com> writes:

>> > Hi, I'm sure this is really simple, but I can't find the answer
>> > anywhere.  How can I overwrite from the copy buffer?  I've tried
>> > yanking in overwrite-mode but that doesn't work, it just inserts as
>> > normal, whereas I want to overwrite.  Thanks.
>>
>>  Please try "delete-selection-mode" but from your description I'm not
>>  quite sure that this is what you want.
>
> No, it won't do what he's asking. I don't know of anything, offhand, that
> will. Perhaps someone here will provide some code to do it, as a fun
> exercise.
>
> Joe: Out of curiosity, just why do you want to do that?
Hi, sorry I have been so slow to reply to this thread.
I can't remember exactly what it was I was doing, but I think it was some data manipulation. I needed to replace specific parts of several different lines with one specific part from some other line, all parts being the same length. The job was small enough not to warrant using sed, awk or perl, but a bit of a hassle to have to do lots of deletions or find-replaces. It seemed to me that this feature would/should have been implemented and I might need it again in the future.