Subject: bug#16617: 24.3.50; REGRESSION: `C-q ?' pops up annoying *Char Help* buffer

From: Drew Adams <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 4 Apr 2014 09:25:19 -0700 (PDT)

> Not sure I agree about '?', but in any case this is NOT the main part
> of Drew's complaints.  He says that help text should not be shown at
> all, ever.

No, I did NOT say that at all.  You seem to have trouble reading the
bug report.  I said that THIS bug is ONLY that the help text is shown
for `?' in contexts where `?' is not a help character.

It's about `?'.  And NOT about all contexts.  And certainly NOT about
no help text "at all, ever".  Those are strawman misrepresentations
of this bug report.

You complain that I repeat myself, but you don't seem to be able to
read what is before your eyes, whether the first time or the Nth time.
Yes, evidently repeating and rephrasing has not helped.  What else
can I do to get you to not misread or misrepresent what I have said
so clearly and explicitly?

I specifically EXCLUDED the case where `?' is a help character from
THIS bug report, even though my personal opinion is that also in
that case, yes, `C-q' should quote it.  Just as it does for `C-h',
when it is a help char (which is most of the time).

Why you would insist upon a different behavior for `C-q ?' versus
`C-q C-h', in contexts where `?' and `C-h' are help chars, is
beyond me.

But asking for the former to be treated like the latter in such
contexts is explicitly NOT part of THIS bug report.  This one is
only about restoring `C-q ?' to quoting when `?' is NOT a help char.

How to get this across to you?  Or do you perhaps hear that message
clearly but stubbornly refuse to acknowledge it, choosing instead
to reject an imaginary, strawman report (Drew "says that help text
should not be shown at all, ever")?

If I really thought, as you claim, that such help text should never
be shown, why would I bother to point out specific problems with
the implementation of that help-text display (e.g., flash/no-see for
nil `pop-up-frames'; non-removal of separate frame for non-nil
`pop-up-frames')?

Those observances are to help you IMPROVE the implementation of
that help-text display.  It is clearly not something that I reject
in general.  But THIS bug is only about that display being
inappropriate in certain contexts (most contexts, as it turns out).
I mentioned such help-text display problems only in passing - you
can ignore them for THIS bug.

> _That_ is certainly not a regression, as Emacs have
> behaved like that since about forever.

I also doubt that that is true.  Certainly in Emacs 20 `C-q ?'
inserts `?' when `?' is not a help char.  IOW, THIS regression is
not present in Emacs 20.

And I don't know a mode to test (e.g. for Emacs 20) whether
`C-q ?' also inserts `?' when `?' is a help char AND the mode is
not read-only.  Do you?

And `grep' does not find "Char Help" anywhere in the Emacs 20 lisp
or C files.

So it's not clear to me that in Emacs 20 `C-q ?' ever shows
"that help text".  Or any help text.  So even beyond THIS
regression, my guess is that NONE of the problems I mentioned
are present in Emacs 20.

The same might even be true for Emacs 21, but I don't have that
version anymore, to test.  As I said in the original bug report,
this regression goes back to at least Emacs 22.  It does not go
back to Emacs 20, and certainly not "about forever".

And it is so unlikely that someone would stumble upon this bug
that I am not surprised if this has not been reported before,
even if the regression has been present since Emacs 22.