Re: Recentish C-s M-y change

[Richard Stallman <rms@gnu.org>]

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  > > Could we move the new `C-s M-y' functionality somewhere else and retain
  > > the old `C-s M-y' binding?

  > This has been discussed many times, and the most promising solution is
  > to add a single variable that will define whether the user prohibits
  > changing the definitions of traditional keys.

I think that is a bad approach, and here is why.

Various changes are made in the Emacs user interface.  Occasionally
there is one I find inconvenient and want to avoid.  But not all of
them.  Probably not most of them.

I want options to undo the changes I don't like, but I don't
want that to imply rejecting _all_ changes in a blanket way.

Now, if there are people who would like the ability to say, "Give me
the Emacs 26 user interface," I don't object to offering it.  We could
have a mechanism to associate user interface changes with major versions
and then let users choose a version.

But this is not a substitute for letting people disable specific
changes independently -- those changes which need it.  Some changes
are easy to revert by setting a key binding, and they don't need
an option.

We could pay attention to implementing a change, when possible, in a
way that would make it easy to revert by setting a key binding or an
option.  In other words, think in advance about the possibility that
some people may not like the change.



-- 
Dr Richard Stallman
Chief GNUisance of the GNU Project (https://gnu.org)
Founder, Free Software Foundation (https://fsf.org)
Internet Hall-of-Famer (https://internethalloffame.org)