Re: line-move-visual

[Joseph Brenner <doom@kzsu.stanford.edu>]

Tim X <timx@nospam.dev.null> writes:
> Uday S Reddy <uDOTsDOTreddy@cs.bham.ac.uk> writes:
>> Tim X wrote:

>>> Your arguments all suggest an environment where interfaces never change.
>>> This just doesn't exist and never has. Frequently improvements and new
>>> functionality require changes to existing interfaces, both programming
>>> and user.
>>
>> That is not quite true.  In the OS & network protocols world, things can never
>> change essentially.  We still live with the possibility of 7bit mail transport
>> even though nobody knows for sure whether there are any 7bit mail transport
>> systems anywhere.  New protocols are designed that work around the limitations
>> of the old protocols.  It has taken Unix some 15 years to figure out how to
>> retrofit Unicode into its byte-oriented view of the world.  Things get messy
>> but that is the price we pay for backward-compatibility.

> I don't disagree, but the mere fact new protocols are developed to
> handle the new as well as theold is in itself a change in the interface.

Now you're playing semantic games.  The subject under discussion is a
decision where the developers intentionally messed with experienced
users on the theory that they can deal with the pain.

That's the kind of change we're talking about.

If someone working on "ls" made a change that broke dired, you might see
the situation differently.

> Citing an example that shows no interface change doesn't really counter
> the arguement, but citing one that has changed would seem to.

Yes, the switch to unicode and utf-8 was difficult to accomplish without
any pain to existing users, because of the nature of utf-8.  Even if
this case, many developers worked hard at making things Just Work, and
they *almost* succeeded.