Re: Bikeshedding go! Why is <M-f4> unbound?

[Stuart Hacking <stuhacking@gmail.com>]

On 13 January 2011 22:18, Drew Adams <drew.adams@oracle.com> wrote:
> What is the reason for Emacs to bind Alt-f4 (or M-f4) to behavior that agrees
> with what Alt-f4 does outside Emacs?
>
> Is the reason for this (a) user convenience?  Or is it (b) because with some
> window mgrs we _cannot_ do otherwise (they always grab Alt-f4)?
>
> If the latter (b) is the only reason, then I don't see that as a good reason to
> force the same restriction on Emacs when used with other window mgrs that do not
> grab it.  If Gnome and KDE forced Emacs to paint everything bright yellow, would
> we think it's appropriate to force the same thing on all other platforms?

If [Alt-F4] quits Emacs in Gnome and KDE then one would expect the
same behaviour in Windows. This is from a user experience point of
view, regardless of whether the event is caught before or after Emacs
sees it. A user unfamiliar with Emacs will go for what they know, and
when it doesn't work they'll go straight back to vim. Is that what you
want? Misery and Suffering? ;-)

> If the reason is instead for user convenience (a), so the same key does the same
> thing inside and outside Emacs, then why stop with this key?  There are lots and
> lots of other window-mgr keys that we could force upon Emacs as default bindings
> - for similar "user convenience".  Shall we do them all?

I don't think it's necessary to implement every default keybinding,
but I think [Alt-F4] has become established enough that it's
worthwhile. Will CUA mode bind things like [Alt-F4]? I have never used
it - Perhaps CUA mode should be used for all of these general purpose
shortcuts?

Personally, I think b) provides a good enough reason: To try and
maintain behavioural consistency across platforms.