From: "Richard M. Stallman" <rms@gnu.org>
To: "Juanma Barranquero" <lekktu@gmail.com>
Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org, handa@m17n.org
Subject: Re: Docstring of `decode-coding-string' a bit misleading about insertion in buffer
Date: Mon, 20 Oct 2008 13:04:12 -0400 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <E1KryAu-00029g-VE@fencepost.gnu.org> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <f7ccd24b0810200121g7491defcx5b549c7e96d38bf0@mail.gmail.com> (lekktu@gmail.com)
I would just add "The point does not move." or somesuch.
In Emacs tradition, we treat "point" as a proper name
when it refers to the current editing location.
It should not have an article.
Thus, it is incorrect to write, "The point does not move".
It should be, "Point does not move".
However, that text uses a passive verb, which is also not good.
Documentation is clearer if it avoids the passive voice whenever
possible. So really this should say, "This does not move point."
If you see "the point" anywhere in Emacs documentation or comments,
referring to point, please fix it.
If you come across passive verbs in Emacs documentation or comments,
please see if it is possible to make the text shorter and clearer
using the active voice. Usually that does make an improvement. The
explicit subject required by the active voice often provides important
information which makes the text clearer, too.
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2008-10-20 17:04 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 13+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2008-10-17 14:19 Docstring of `decode-coding-string' a bit misleading about insertion in buffer Juanma Barranquero
2008-10-20 7:04 ` Kenichi Handa
2008-10-20 7:18 ` Juanma Barranquero
2008-10-20 8:12 ` Kenichi Handa
2008-10-20 8:21 ` Juanma Barranquero
2008-10-20 10:43 ` Kenichi Handa
2008-10-21 15:57 ` Eli Zaretskii
2008-10-21 22:47 ` Juanma Barranquero
2008-10-22 1:23 ` Kenichi Handa
2008-10-20 17:04 ` Richard M. Stallman [this message]
2008-10-21 2:53 ` Kenichi Handa
2008-10-21 19:40 ` Richard M. Stallman
2008-10-20 17:04 ` Richard M. Stallman
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