strange behavior of @ in tag searches

strange behavior of @ in tag searches

[Victor A. Stoichita]

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Hi,

I’m a bit puzzled by the behavior of the agenda search when tags 
have hierarchical structure and start with @. I attach two 
minimal examples.

In testfiles.org I have:
--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
#+TAGS: [ @anthro : bib ]

* my anthro 
  task                                               :@anthro:
* my bib 
  task                                                      :bib:
--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

I restrict the search to the buffer and search for the tag 
"@anthro".
I would expect to get the two headings "my anthro task" and "my 
bib task".
Instead, I only get "my bib task".

Now in testfiles2.org I have:
--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
#+TAGS: [ anthro2 : bib2 ]

* my anthro2 
  task                                              :@anthro2:
* my bib2 
  task                                                     :bib2:
--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

Notice that here the parent tag set in the header does not start 
with @ while the tag on "my anthro2 task" starts with @.
When I search for "anthro2" (no @), I would expect to get only "my 
bib2 task". But here I get both headings.

Am I missing something? Does @ have a special meaning in tags?

This is with org mode version 9.4.3. 

Regards,
Victor




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#+TAGS: [ anthro2 : bib2 ]

* my anthro2 task                                              :@anthro2:
* my bib2 task                                                         :bib2:

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#+TAGS: [ @anthro : bib ]

* my anthro task                                                    :@anthro:
* my bib task                                                           :bib:

Re: strange behavior of @ in tag searches

[Victor A. Stoichita]

> Hi,
>
> I’m a bit puzzled by the behavior of the agenda search when tags 
> have
> hierarchical structure and start with @. I attach two
> minimal examples.
>
> In testfiles.org I have:
> --8<---------------cut 
> here---------------start------------->8---
> #+TAGS: [ @anthro : bib ]
>
> * my anthro
>   task                                               :@anthro:
> * my bib
>   task                                                      :bib:
> --8<---------------cut 
> here---------------end--------------->8---
>
> I restrict the search to the buffer and search for the tag 
> "@anthro".
> I would expect to get the two headings "my anthro task" and "my 
> bib
> task".
> Instead, I only get "my bib task".
>
> Now in testfiles2.org I have:
> --8<---------------cut 
> here---------------start------------->8---
> #+TAGS: [ anthro2 : bib2 ]
>
> * my anthro2
>   task                                              :@anthro2:
> * my bib2
>   task                                                     :bib2:
> --8<---------------cut 
> here---------------end--------------->8---
>
> Notice that here the parent tag set in the header does not start 
> with
> @ while the tag on "my anthro2 task" starts with @.
> When I search for "anthro2" (no @), I would expect to get only 
> "my
> bib2 task". But here I get both headings.
>
> Am I missing something? Does @ have a special meaning in tags?
>
> This is with org mode version 9.4.3. 
> Regards,
> Victor

I just realized that with "emacs -Q" both searches yield the 
expected results.
I have emacs 27.1 which ships org-mode 9.3.
Could I have set inadvertently something that changes the meaning 
of @ in tag searches? Or was there a change in that respect 
between 9.3 and 9.4.3?

Re: strange behavior of @ in tag searches

[Ihor Radchenko]

"Victor A. Stoichita" <victor@svictor.net> writes:
> I just realized that with "emacs -Q" both searches yield the 
> expected results.
> I have emacs 27.1 which ships org-mode 9.3.
> Could I have set inadvertently something that changes the meaning 
> of @ in tag searches? Or was there a change in that respect 
> between 9.3 and 9.4.3?

I can reproduce your first recipe on master. However, I simply get no
results on the second recipe (which also should not happen).

For future, to test with custom Org version, you can run emacs like
emacs -Q -L /path/to/your/org-mode/folder/lisp -l org

Best,
Ihor

Re: strange behavior of @ in tag searches

[Kyle Meyer]

Ihor Radchenko writes:

> "Victor A. Stoichita" <victor@svictor.net> writes:
>> I just realized that with "emacs -Q" both searches yield the 
>> expected results.
>> I have emacs 27.1 which ships org-mode 9.3.
>> Could I have set inadvertently something that changes the meaning 
>> of @ in tag searches? Or was there a change in that respect 
>> between 9.3 and 9.4.3?
>
> I can reproduce your first recipe on master. However, I simply get no
> results on the second recipe (which also should not happen).

Hmm, I tried on master (9140a712f) and maint (97f1d8e34) and can't
trigger the issue.

[recipe 1] With the default configuration, I load testfiles.org and,
hopefully following the recipe, run `M-x org-agenda < m @anthro'.  I see

  Headlines with TAGS match: @anthro
  Press ‘C-u r’ to search again
    testfiles:  my anthro task                                                           :@anthro:
    testfiles:  my bib task                                                                  :bib:

[recipe 2] I load testfiles_2.org and run `M-x org-agenda < m anthro2'.
I see

  Headlines with TAGS match: anthro2
  Press ‘C-u r’ to search again
    testfiles_2:my bib2 task                                                                :bib2:

Am I overlooking some detail?

Re: strange behavior of @ in tag searches

[Ihor Radchenko]

Kyle Meyer <kyle@kyleam.com> writes:

> Hmm, I tried on master (9140a712f) and maint (97f1d8e34) and can't
> trigger the issue.
>
> Am I overlooking some detail?

Curious. I tried again and I cannot reproduce both on master and on
master with my config. Sorry for the noise.

Best,
Ihor

Re: strange behavior of @ in tag searches

[Victor A. Stoichita]

>> Hmm, I tried on master (9140a712f) and maint (97f1d8e34) and 
>> can't
>> trigger the issue.
>>
>> Am I overlooking some detail?

Ok, I managed to narrow it down to a particular aspect of my 
init file.
I modify the syntax table for text modes to handle the meaning of 
some characters in French. In fact, te actual modification doesn’t 
seem to matter. The following is enough to trigger the described 
behavior:

--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
(add-hook 'text-mode-hook (lambda ()
   (set-syntax-table (make-syntax-table))))
--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

After this, org-agenda starts behaving weirdly for tags that start 
with @ and use inheritance (behavior described in my first email).

For now, I changed my tags to not use @ any more.
Are there other aspects that I might miss if I alter the syntax 
table on ’text-mode-hook?

Victor

Re: strange behavior of @ in tag searches

[Ihor Radchenko]

"Victor A. Stoichita" <victor@svictor.net> writes:

> I modify the syntax table for text modes to handle the meaning of 
> some characters in French. In fact, te actual modification doesn’t 
> seem to matter. The following is enough to trigger the described 
> behavior:
>
> --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
> (add-hook 'text-mode-hook (lambda ()
>    (set-syntax-table (make-syntax-table))))
> --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

That basically clears _all_ syntax settings in org-mode. It would
interfere with pretty much any major mode that modifies syntax tables...
A better way to modify syntax table is using modify-syntax-entry or you
need to make sure that your code inherits org-mode-syntax-table instead
of creating an empty table.

I just searched through org code and the following syntax table elements
are being used by org:

-*- mode: helm-grep -*-

AG Results for `modify-syntax-entry':

org-element.el:380:    (modify-syntax-entry ?\( "()" table)
org-element.el:381:    (modify-syntax-entry ?\) ")(" table)
org-element.el:383:      (modify-syntax-entry char " " table)))
org-element.el:389:    (modify-syntax-entry ?\[ "(]" table)
org-element.el:390:    (modify-syntax-entry ?\] ")[" table)
org-element.el:392:      (modify-syntax-entry char " " table)))
org-element.el:398:    (modify-syntax-entry ?\{ "(}" table)
org-element.el:399:    (modify-syntax-entry ?\} "){" table)
org-element.el:401:      (modify-syntax-entry char " " table)))
ox.el:6870:	(modify-syntax-entry ?\[ "w"))
org.el:4719:  (modify-syntax-entry ?\" "\"")
org.el:4720:  (modify-syntax-entry ?\\ "_")
org.el:4721:  (modify-syntax-entry ?~ "_")
org.el:4722:  (modify-syntax-entry ?< "(>")
org.el:4723:  (modify-syntax-entry ?> ")<")
org.el:4838:      (modify-syntax-entry (string-to-char (car c)) "w p" st))))
org.el:10927:	(modify-syntax-entry ?@ "w" tag-syntax)
org.el:10928:	(modify-syntax-entry ?_ "w" tag-syntax)

The last two refer to tag groups.

> For now, I changed my tags to not use @ any more.
> Are there other aspects that I might miss if I alter the syntax 
> table on ’text-mode-hook?

I hope the above helps.

Best,
Ihor

Re: strange behavior of @ in tag searches

[Victor A. Stoichita]

Le 24 Dec 2020, Ihor Radchenko <yantar92@gmail.com> a écrit :
> I hope the above helps.

It does indeed. Thank you!

Victor