From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: main.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Richard Stallman Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: setenv -> locale-coding-system cannot handle ASCII?! Date: Wed, 05 Mar 2003 15:46:04 -0500 Sender: emacs-devel-bounces+emacs-devel=quimby.gnus.org@gnu.org Message-ID: References: <200302250634.PAA27478@etlken.m17n.org> <200302260058.JAA28973@etlken.m17n.org> <200302260211.h1Q2BJl08373@rum.cs.yale.edu> <200302260234.LAA29082@etlken.m17n.org> <200302260252.h1Q2qIK08490@rum.cs.yale.edu> <200302260532.OAA29294@etlken.m17n.org> <20030227000638.GA5470@gnu.org> Reply-To: rms@gnu.org NNTP-Posting-Host: main.gmane.org X-Trace: main.gmane.org 1046897221 31970 80.91.224.249 (5 Mar 2003 20:47:01 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@main.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 5 Mar 2003 20:47:01 +0000 (UTC) Cc: handa@m17n.org Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+emacs-devel=quimby.gnus.org@gnu.org Wed Mar 05 21:46:55 2003 Return-path: Original-Received: from quimby.gnus.org ([80.91.224.244]) by main.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 3.35 #1 (Debian)) id 18qfmx-0008IS-00 for ; Wed, 05 Mar 2003 21:46:55 +0100 Original-Received: from monty-python.gnu.org ([199.232.76.173]) by quimby.gnus.org with esmtp (Exim 3.12 #1 (Debian)) id 18qg6x-0001nL-00 for ; Wed, 05 Mar 2003 22:07:35 +0100 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1] helo=monty-python.gnu.org) by monty-python.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.10.13) id 18qfml-0006mP-02 for emacs-devel@quimby.gnus.org; Wed, 05 Mar 2003 15:46:43 -0500 Original-Received: from list by monty-python.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.10.13) id 18qfmQ-0006SO-00 for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Wed, 05 Mar 2003 15:46:22 -0500 Original-Received: from mail by monty-python.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.10.13) id 18qfmF-0005tz-00 for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Wed, 05 Mar 2003 15:46:16 -0500 Original-Received: from fencepost.gnu.org ([199.232.76.164]) by monty-python.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.10.13) id 18qfmC-0005lQ-00 for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Wed, 05 Mar 2003 15:46:08 -0500 Original-Received: from rms by fencepost.gnu.org with local (Exim 4.10) id 18qfm8-0007vX-00; Wed, 05 Mar 2003 15:46:04 -0500 Original-To: Miles Bader In-reply-to: (message from Miles Bader on 04 Mar 2003 11:48:57 +0900) Original-cc: d.love@dl.ac.uk Original-cc: sds@gnu.org Original-cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org Original-cc: monnier+gnu/emacs@rum.cs.yale.edu X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1b5 Precedence: list List-Id: Emacs development discussions. List-Help: List-Post: List-Subscribe: , List-Archive: List-Unsubscribe: , Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+emacs-devel=quimby.gnus.org@gnu.org Xref: main.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:12111 X-Report-Spam: http://spam.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.devel:12111 > If we wanted to hide from the user the distinction between unibyte and > multibyte buffers, we would have to change the buffer's representation > automatically when inserting characters that don't fit unibyte. That > seems like a bad idea. Well I agree that it would be annoying if your 10-megabyte raw-bytes buffer suddenly got converted because you accidentally inserted a chinese character. :-) However I think that in many cases such a conversion would be OK, and since 99% of the time, people _don't_ mix character sets, it would probably be a win on average. This kind of internally-unibyte buffer would serve only one purpose: efficiency. If we decide to eliminate the current user-level feature of unibyte buffers, then we could implement this efficiency feature if we decide it is worth the effort. Whether to eliminate the current user-level feature is a bigger question. We would want to make sure that we can offer the people who use it a mode of operation that is just as satisfactory.