On Sep 17, 2011, at 7:52 PM, Richard Stallman wrote:
> 
> I think you've missed the crucial point about special Isearch commands.
> 
> With ordinary Emacs commands, if you don't know about them and you never
> use them, they do not affect you.  Thus, there is no drawback to having
> thousands of them.
> 
> However, when a control character is special in Isearch and you don't
> know it, it will bite you.  You will type it while in an Isearch,
> expecting it to have its usual meaning, and it will do something else
> instead.

Do you think the usual meaning of C-u is ``exit the modal thing I'm 
doing now''?

The only time I've ever wanted to use C-u in isearch, it either preceded 
a command that would have exited isearch on its own, or I wanted to 
isearch for 6 `-'s, and I did not want it to exit isearch (and was confused 
when it did).

I don't see how a ``user expectation'' argument will ever support making 
C-u exit isearch.  If it's just a matter of a learned interaction, that's 
different.

I hope that helps,
*Chad