From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Stefan Monnier Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: Shift selection using interactive spec Date: Sun, 16 Mar 2008 14:40:26 -0400 Message-ID: References: <87k5k69p92.fsf@stupidchicken.com> <200803140408.m2E47hPU014494@sallyv1.ics.uci.edu> <87prtxpekk.fsf@kfs-lx.rd.rdm> <87abl11ilo.fsf@stupidchicken.com> <874pb9koyw.fsf@stupidchicken.com> <87od9gzqv9.fsf@stupidchicken.com> <87bq5gytbi.fsf@stupidchicken.com> <8763vndi0r.fsf@kfs-lx.rd.rdm> <47DC3AB2.9070502@emf.net> <87ejabv7gg.fsf@stupidchicken.com> <47DC79DE.1000201@emf.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: dough.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1205692911 6654 80.91.229.10 (16 Mar 2008 18:41:51 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 16 Mar 2008 18:41:51 +0000 (UTC) Cc: Chong Yidong , Dan Nicolaescu , "Kim F. Storm" , emacs-devel@gnu.org To: Thomas Lord Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Sun Mar 16 19:57:46 2008 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([199.232.76.165]) by dough.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.50) id 1Jay3E-0006sY-Bt for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Sun, 16 Mar 2008 19:57:44 +0100 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1] helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1Jaxnh-0004qY-23 for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Sun, 16 Mar 2008 14:41:41 -0400 Original-Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1JaxmX-0003Ln-KI for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sun, 16 Mar 2008 14:40:29 -0400 Original-Received: from exim by lists.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1JaxmW-0003KW-TD for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sun, 16 Mar 2008 14:40:29 -0400 Original-Received: from [199.232.76.173] (helo=monty-python.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1JaxmW-0003KL-N6 for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sun, 16 Mar 2008 14:40:28 -0400 Original-Received: from ironport2-out.pppoe.ca ([206.248.154.182]) by monty-python.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1JaxmW-0004h1-Bm for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sun, 16 Mar 2008 14:40:28 -0400 X-IronPort-Anti-Spam-Filtered: true X-IronPort-Anti-Spam-Result: ApoEAOYF3UfO+LDw/2dsb2JhbACmR4EK X-IronPort-AV: E=Sophos;i="4.25,509,1199682000"; d="scan'208";a="16114903" Original-Received: from smtp.pppoe.ca ([65.39.196.238]) by ironport2-out.pppoe.ca with ESMTP; 16 Mar 2008 14:40:27 -0400 Original-Received: from pastel.home ([206.248.176.240]) by smtp.pppoe.ca (Internet Mail Server v1.0) with ESMTP id WVE26727; Sun, 16 Mar 2008 14:40:27 -0400 Original-Received: by pastel.home (Postfix, from userid 20848) id DA99D8F77; Sun, 16 Mar 2008 14:40:26 -0400 (EDT) In-Reply-To: <47DC79DE.1000201@emf.net> (Thomas Lord's message of "Sat, 15 Mar 2008 18:37:34 -0700") User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/23.0.60 (gnu/linux) X-detected-kernel: by monty-python.gnu.org: Genre and OS details not recognized. X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Original-Sender: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:92762 Archived-At: > That's a problem because the current mark in Emacs doesn't > traditionally behave anything like the beginning of a "shift-selected" > region. It's a force fit, at best. The addition (by transient-mark-mode) > of an "activated/de-activated" flag is a crude *approximation* > of what users expect, in a situation where no approximating is > necessary. For example, a "right arrow" key-press should simply > *forget*, more or less entirely, the marker at the start of the > highlighted region. That's the default behavior if tentative mark > functionality is added but it's functionality that would require > yet more elisp code if transient-mark-mode were to catch up with > it. I do not follow you, Tom: how would the right arrow magically forget your tentative mark? In what way is that different from setting mark-active to nil? I have the strong impression that you do not know what is the "temporary" form of transient-mark-mode" (this is a transient-mark-mode that's activated until the region is "consumed") and neither do you know about the "only" form of transient-mark-mode (that is a form of transient-mark-mode which is deactivated after the very next command). > What users expect, in the traditional GUI paradigm, is a kind of > mark that doesn't toggle between "activated" and "deactivated" but, > rather, is always active when present but which commands tend to > cause to go away entirely. Let's dub that "the mistake". The > mistake is adding an "active" flag instead of a separate tentative > mark. In what way is it different, really? The problem is how/when to activate/set it and how/when to deactivate/unset it. Whether it's a flag or a mark makes no difference. > It's *because* of the mistake that, for example, Stefan is now > positing the existence of a formal category of "motion commands" > that have to be modified to call a function that dynamically > asserts that they are motion commands. ??? The notion of "motion commands" is needed because the behavior we want is "when a motion command is bound to a non-shifted key but is activated via the shifted of that key, we want the motion to select a region". Try it in your typical GUI editor: S-arrow will select a region, but S-a will just insert an upper-case A. I.e. this need is 100% unrelated to the way the selected region is implemented and when/how it gets de-selected. Stefan