From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: joakim@verona.se Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: delete-selection-mode Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 19:07:16 +0100 Message-ID: References: <87ocitw2dl.fsf@stupidchicken.com> <201003130001.o2D01FFQ003489@godzilla.ics.uci.edu> <87vdd1yqe4.fsf@stupidchicken.com> <87eijjzrkd.fsf_-_@mail.jurta.org> <874okf8dep.fsf@lola.goethe.zz> NNTP-Posting-Host: lo.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: dough.gmane.org 1268852379 28747 80.91.229.12 (17 Mar 2010 18:59:39 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@dough.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2010 18:59:39 +0000 (UTC) Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org To: David Kastrup Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Wed Mar 17 19:59:31 2010 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 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1NrySn-0007g3-PX for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Wed, 17 Mar 2010 19:59:30 +0100 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1]:38488 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1NrySn-0000XB-5Z for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Wed, 17 Mar 2010 14:59:29 -0400 Original-Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1NrxeX-0000ZO-Qo for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Wed, 17 Mar 2010 14:07:33 -0400 Original-Received: from [140.186.70.92] (port=54706 helo=eggs.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1NrxeU-0000Vj-Kv for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Wed, 17 Mar 2010 14:07:32 -0400 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1NrxeT-0007oz-HM for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Wed, 17 Mar 2010 14:07:30 -0400 Original-Received: from iwfs.imcode.com ([82.115.149.64]:41702 helo=gate.verona.se) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1NrxeP-0007ny-5c; Wed, 17 Mar 2010 14:07:25 -0400 Original-Received: from localhost.localdomain (IDENT:1005@localhost [127.0.0.1]) by gate.verona.se (8.13.4/8.11.4) with ESMTP id o2HI7GNT012354; Wed, 17 Mar 2010 19:07:17 +0100 In-Reply-To: <874okf8dep.fsf@lola.goethe.zz> (David Kastrup's message of "Wed, 17 Mar 2010 11:12:46 +0100") User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/23.1.90 (gnu/linux) X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 2.4-2.6 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:122100 Archived-At: David Kastrup writes: > Juri Linkov writes: > >>>> delete-selection-mode would be the default too, that's what everything >>>> on the desktop does... >> >> I agree with Richard that the primary concern is doing what is useful >> for newcomers. One of the most frequent questions they ask is how to do >> what most other editors do - to replace selected text with a typed >> character or with yanked text, and to delete the region by typing >> without copying it to the kill-ring. >> >> What they are asking for is delete-selection-mode, >> but they can't find it in the documentation because >> the feature name says nothing to beginners, and >> they expect to take this functionality for granted. >> >> Some recent examples of such problems: >> >> http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.help/60992> http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.help/45623> http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.help/42402> >> Is that reason enough to enable delete-selection-mode by default? > > Since it interferes with Emacs-typical editing command sequences, my > vote is "no". > > The question you appear concerned with is more "how can we make > beginners shut up" rather than "how can we make beginners more > productive with Emacs". > > Perhaps we should offer a submenu in "Help" about "Judicious differences > to other editors", with rationales, an introducting section saying "Some > default behaviors we considered useful enough to make them different > from other editors, so we recommend that you try to get acquainted with > the suggested mode of operation before deciding against it", maybe even > with clickable links to customize-variable where you can turn some > feature like delete-selection-mode on (and off again!). > > We could even go as far as to mark some customizable variables as > "voteable" and have a mechanism where you can send all of your personal > voteable settings to emacs-votes@gnu.org. On a related note, I'm often wondering how Emacs-veterans would solve a problem(having used Emacs only since '88 I can only count myself as newbie). This information could be gathered automatically with a command frequency collector that posted to a central repos. If I, as a newbie were wondering how often dak@gnu.org invokes the scrollbar, maybe I would find 0. Maybe I could find out all sorts of interesting things that bother me, like how others jumps to a particular window efficiently(I use windmove on shift-arrows which I'm not completely comfortable with). Maybe people could be persuaded to also post relevant sections of their .emacs to ELPA? Then a new user could quickly try out how various people with mouse centric, or keyboard centric, views where using Emacs, and build their own opinion. -- Joakim Verona