dot-files

dot-files

[Robert J. Chassell]

Calling dot-files `hidden' is misleading.  They are used for
configuration.  I like seeing them.  That is why I use the default
value of dired-listing-switches "-al".  As David Kastrup says,
dot-files `are supposed to be auxiliary data, not content'.

(I know there is an tradition to call dot-files hidden; but I think it
is and always has been a mistake.)  

I have many more dot-files dot-files in my home directory than I
expected, 922 according to dired running ~/.* .  That number includes
backups for files such as ~/.bashrc and files such as ~/.xinitrc-test
along with its backups.

-- 
    Robert J. Chassell                          GnuPG Key ID: 004B4AC8
    bob@rattlesnake.com                         bob@gnu.org
    http://www.rattlesnake.com                  http://www.teak.cc

Re: dot-files

[Ted Zlatanov]

On Fri, 7 Sep 2007 11:04:12 +0000 (UTC) "Robert J. Chassell" <bob@rattlesnake.com> wrote: 

RJC> Calling dot-files `hidden' is misleading.  They are used for
RJC> configuration.

By convention they are hidden from visual display by default on
Unix-like systems, and don't match '*' shell patterns (AKA "match
everything").  Why is it misleading to state this fact?  Whether they
are used for configuration is the software package's decision and it is
also a convention to use them that way.

Emacs generally uses just a few dot-files in a well-known location for
configuration, so my discussion was about the surprise to current Emacs
users.

Ted

Re: dot-files

[Stefan Monnier]

> Calling dot-files `hidden' is misleading.

That's a possible interpretation, but I think it's not relevant to the
problem at hand anyway.  Let's not get dragged into such
a fruitless discussion.

> They are used for configuration.  I like seeing them.  That is why I use
> the default value of dired-listing-switches "-al".  As David Kastrup says,
> dot-files `are supposed to be auxiliary data, not content'.

Agreed.  dot-files are used for meta-data.  And .emacs-settings very much
qualifies as meta-data.


        Stefan