Subject: Re: bug#16407: Info-directory-list should always put this Emacs's info direc first

From: Glenn Morris <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 10 Jan 2014 15:11:45 -0500

Eli Zaretskii wrote:

> On a multi-user system, INFOPATH can be customized differently for
> each user, but /usr/share/info is a single directory.  Suppose some
> users want to stay with an older Emacs, while others want the bleeding
> edge.

I don't really get your point. I contend that "Emacs N should show the
manuals for version N", without the user needing to do anything special.
(I'm assuming throughout that each Emacs version is installed in a
separate location, otherwise the info pages stomp all over each other
anyway, as you said.)

For example:

As a user, I have a local software directory /home/me/software, where I
install things. So I have INFOPATH=/home/me/software/info: in my
environment. There is Emacs version N in there. I have other Emacs
versions installed in other places, which I want to use at times. All of
them end up finding the info pages from Emacs version N.

> Experience has taught us that there are too many "fringe cases" when
> Info docs are concerned.  The code to which you pointed was a result
> of prolonged discussions in the past, and many micro-corrections due
> to these fringe cases.

Sorry, I think it's overly complicated for this day-and-age, and could
stand to be simplified.

>> And note that the Mac platform has already behaved as I request for some
>> years. I don't recall seeing any complaints.
>
> This goes both ways: I don't recall complaints about the current
> arrangement, either.

It's me, I'm the complainer! :)

Anyway, my one sentence summary is that it just seems crazy to me that
Emacs does not reliably find its own info pages.