Re: Package initialization

[Helmut Eller <eller.helmut@gmail.com>]

On Sun, Jul 19 2015, Stefan Monnier wrote:

> Since it's a configuration choice, it should not be imposed by the
> autoloads file.  Instead, the way this is normally handled is by making
> a slime-minor-mode, which when enabled does something like
> (slime-setup), and when disabled, undoes it.

SLIME is already a minor mode; I think if we can make it work if users
call (add-hook 'lisp-mode-hook 'slime-mode) in their .emacs.

> The important aspect is that it should be possible to install a package
> without using it, so the autoloads file should only set things up so
> that they *can* be used, but not so that they're automatically used
> without being explicitly requested.

I think that's quite an important guideline that should be stated a bit
more prominently in manual.

It also seems to me that there is a certain conflict between what you
say and this from the manual:

  These autoload definitions are saved to a file named
  ‘NAME-autoloads.el’ in the content directory.  They are typically used
  to autoload the principal user commands defined in the package, but
  they can also perform other tasks, such as adding an element to
  ‘auto-mode-alist’.

Helmut