From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Benjamin Riefenstahl Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: NeXTStep port preferences Date: Sat, 19 Jul 2008 13:18:59 +0200 Message-ID: References: <8966189D-F430-4224-80BA-FA3653642C01@gmail.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: lo.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1216470208 8971 80.91.229.12 (19 Jul 2008 12:23:28 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Sat, 19 Jul 2008 12:23:28 +0000 (UTC) To: emacs-devel@gnu.org Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Sat Jul 19 14:24:15 2008 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([199.232.76.165]) by lo.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.50) id 1KKBTx-0007Y3-QK for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Sat, 19 Jul 2008 14:24:14 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1]:60812 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1KKBT4-0008Lt-Px for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Sat, 19 Jul 2008 08:23:18 -0400 Original-Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1KKBSy-0008Lo-Ty for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sat, 19 Jul 2008 08:23:12 -0400 Original-Received: from exim by lists.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1KKBSq-0008Iw-9H for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sat, 19 Jul 2008 08:23:12 -0400 Original-Received: from [199.232.76.173] (port=59158 helo=monty-python.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1KKBSq-0008In-3y for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sat, 19 Jul 2008 08:23:04 -0400 Original-Received: from [193.99.153.100] (port=2603 helo=blei.turtle-trading.net) by monty-python.gnu.org with esmtps (TLS-1.0:DHE_RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA1:32) (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1KKBSq-00017f-1v for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sat, 19 Jul 2008 08:23:04 -0400 Original-Received: from sueton.benny.turtle-trading.net (sueton.benny.turtle-trading.net [193.99.153.25]) by blei.turtle-trading.net (8.12.10/8.12.10) with ESMTP id m6JAmO68024615; Sat, 19 Jul 2008 12:48:24 +0200 Original-Received: by sueton.benny.turtle-trading.net (Postfix, from userid 501) id 3525919FB88C; Sat, 19 Jul 2008 13:18:59 +0200 (CEST) In-Reply-To: (Adrian Robert's message of "Thu\, 17 Jul 2008 17\:32\:13 +0000 \(UTC\)") User-Agent: Gnus/5.11 (Gnus v5.11) Emacs/22.0.98 (darwin) X-detected-kernel: by monty-python.gnu.org: Linux 2.4-2.6 X-Greylist: delayed 3818 seconds by postgrey-1.27 at monty-python; Sat, 19 Jul 2008 08:23:01 EDT 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:100975 Archived-At: Hi David, Adrian, I have been trying to work with that dialog some and have been mostly frustrated. Some thoughts: - Quick access to the options for default font and modifier keys are usefull for first installation and probably for newbies. - The options to change the cursor are probably not important enough to have here. [If I understand this right, there are new NextStep specific cursor drawing routines in the port. This is not good, I think. If the portable cursor routines are deficient they should be updated for all platforms. I may be missing something here.] - That the dialog stores its stuff in the defaults database is a good feature, because defaults are read before ".emacs" and so this is a good place for the font setting. - I am missing the "Emacs.geometry" option in the defaults database. For me "Emacs.font" and "Emacs.geometry" are the two options that I need in the defaults database, everything else is better in ".emacs". - The font setting mechanism doesn't work unless an Emacs frame is selected. This used to be documented in the readme, but it is still a bug. - The callbacks that the Cocoa dialogs call are not protected in a catch block. If they run into an error, Emacs aborts without a visible error message. I think that the "Preferences..." menu should start a customization buffer, like it does in the Carbon port. This can start with the root of the customize hierarchy or it can be a "New Installation" group with the most important options, if somebody wants to create such a group. If customize does not support having buttons to show the font and color dialogs, that can be added to customize. Adrian Robert writes: > It is also not something easy to maintain outside of GNU Emacs > itself (e.g. in a distribution like Aquamacs) It is not easy to be maintained anywhere. As you notice, it is broken even now, and only part of that is bit-rot. > However, some concessions to platform convention and user > convenience ought to be tolerated on a case-bycase basis depending > on the user-benefit to obtrusiveness ratio. I don't think that a buggy and old-fashioned looking dialog (IMO) is really an asset for anybody, certainly not Mac users. > Otherwise, at least in this case, there's no real reason not to just > use the X11 version on OS X The inconvenience of having to start X11 to edit files or to read mail and probably missing features (e.g. does DnD work from Finder to Emacs?). benny