GNU bug report logs - #14188
24.3.50; ODF files and auto-mode-alist

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From: Stephen Berman <stephen.berman <at> gmx.net>
To: Tassilo Horn <tsdh <at> gnu.org>
Cc: 14188 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: bug#14188: 24.3.50; ODF files and auto-mode-alist
Date: Wed, 17 Apr 2013 20:30:08 +0200

On Wed, 17 Apr 2013 15:43:11 +0200 Tassilo Horn <tsdh <at> gnu.org> wrote:

> Stephen Berman <stephen.berman <at> gmx.net> writes:
>
>> The extension .od[fgpst] for ODF files occurs twice as part of a key
>> in the default value of auto-mode-alist, paired first with
>> archive-mode and later with doc-view-mode-maybe.  As a result,
>> visiting such a file shows the directory-style listing of the archive
>> instead of the files content.  To see the latter, you have to
>> explicitly invoke doc-view-mode.  But if .od[fgpst] is removed from
>> the key paired with archive-mode, then visiting such a file shows the
>> content after conversion, and when you type C-c C-c, it switches to
>> the archive listing, due to magic-fallback-mode-alist.[1] I think this
>> is better behavior.  I can't test files with the other extensions in
>> the problematic entry ("\\.\\(sx[dmicw]\\|od[fgpst]\\|oxt\\)\\'"
>> . archive-mode), so I don't know if the whole entry should be deleted
>> or only "od[fgpst]\\|".
>
> Hm, I think for OpenDocument files, the alternatives of a user wanting
> to view the file using archive-mode and doc-view-mode are equally
> likely.  

That's not the case for me, and I'd be surprised if it were for most
users.  I virtually always want to simply view the document's content in
Emacs.  I guess the only reason to want to open it in archive-mode is to
edit one of the XML source files, but since most or all of these are
formatted as one line, it isn't fun to edit the source.  Usually I edit
ODF files with LibreOffice.

>          doc-view-mode is arguably more heavy-weight, so probably
> archive-mode should stay the default.  

This is a strong argument, though not a knock-out argument, since if
most users are like me, they would toggle to the image anyway, so it
would be an extra step if archive-mode remained the default.  With
doc-view-mode-maybe the default, it's just as easy to toggle to
archive-mode, should you want to (which again, I seldom do).

>                                        But it should be easier and
> obvious to start doc-view-mode from there.
>
> So how about using the PS (PostScript) approach also here?  That is, we
> remove the ODF regexes for doc-view-mode-maybe from auto-mode-alist, and
> in archive-mode we check if the current archive is an ODF file, and if
> so, enable doc-view-minor-mode.
>
> This would message
>
>   Type M-x doc-view-toggle-display to toggle between editing or viewing
>   the document.
>
> thus indicating to the user how he can view the document with doc-view
> instead of editing it as an archive.
>
> Does that sound reasonable?

If the message really were what you wrote, I would find that
unacceptable.  But when I enable doc-view-minor-mode in archive-mode, I
see the message

  Type C-c C-c to toggle between editing or viewing the document.

This is acceptable (i.e., the key binding is IMO a must).  But again,
even better IMO would be to just have doc-view-mode-maybe, falling back
to archive-mode when you type C-c C-c.

Whichever decision you make, I do think you should do the same with MS
OpenXML (.docx, .xlsx) files, too.  (These are currently only paired
with doc-view-mode-maybe.)

Steve Berman

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