Re: Colorful line numbers

[Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca>]

>>> Also seehttps://debbugs.gnu.org/36472.
>> Have you tried to add such a feature for `(n)linum-mode`?
> I didn't: that's not what the diff-hl user was asking for.

But you could add that feature to `diff-hl` for `(n)linum-mode` so
people can at least try it out.

> But I proposed several different technical approaches, every one of which
> has been rejected so far. And not because of the difficulty
> of implementation.
>
> Not sure how implementing any of them in nlinum would help, given that the
> primary complaint was about running Lisp.

I suspect the problem is not "running Lisp" but "running Lisp from the
code that implements `display-line-numbers-mode`", because that code is
deep in the redisplay where running Lisp code can be tricky.

That same problem does not apply to `(n)linum-mode` because their code
is not "deep in redisplay".

> And if we take an alternative approach (display-line-numbers-mode looks up
> text properties in the buffer to determine which face to use), it also
> depends on the intricacies of its implementation. E.g. how to reliably
> redraw when such text properties change.

My hunch is that such changes to text-properties would cause
a rerendering of those lines anyway (the decision whether to re-render
doesn't pay attention to which properties have been changed, IIRC), so
it may end up "just working" without any effort in this respect.
Then again, maybe not.


        Stefan