GNU bug report logs -
#2058
23.0.60; bewildering behavior when visit new file throw.pdf
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Reported by: "Drew Adams" <drew.adams <at> oracle.com>
Date: Sun, 25 Jan 2009 23:15:03 UTC
Severity: normal
Done: Tassilo Horn <tassilo <at> member.fsf.org>
Bug is archived. No further changes may be made.
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Hi, Tassilo,
On Tue, Jan 27, 2009 at 10:55:40AM +0100, Tassilo Horn wrote:
> "Drew Adams" <drew.adams <at> oracle.com> writes:
> Hi Drew,
> > emacs -Q
> > I did C-x C-f throw.pdf, with no existing file throw.pdf. The ensuing
> > messages and interaction were bewildering.
> Is that really a use-case?
No, it's an error case. The user wanted to visit throw.ldf, which is a
text based document format used only in his own company. But he mistyped
it. He also knows nothing about png images, and really doesn't want to
have to learn.
> > An extremely long message appeared in the echo area:
> > "No image (png) support available or some conversion utility for pdf
> > files is missing. Type C-c C-c to switch to an editing mode or C-c
> > C-t to open a buffer showing the doc as text."
It's particularly long and confusing for a non-existent document. Emacs
shouldn't alarm users.
> > But the new, empty file throw.pdf appeared to be visited with no
> > problem. I tried to type into it. That threw me back to the previous
> > buffer I had been in (Dired), and crazy error msgs were displayed.
> The buffer was in doc-view-mode which has its own keymap, and most
> probably you've hit k or q, which kills/buries the buffer.
What on earth is doc-view-mode? Hmm. C-h f doc-view-mode <CR>. ;-(
> > I tried again, and this time I tried to type `C-c C-t', since the
> > message indicated that that would open the buffer as text. That too
> > led to errors.
> Yeah, in the background it tries to run pdftotext on the pdf, to extract
> the plain text contents.
> > I don't know exactly what happened, but you will, as soon as you try
> > it. ;-)
> Sure. So what's your advice how to handle this situation? Check if the
> file is existent (and non-empty) and if not, print a message and
> fallback to fundamental mode?
Whatever is done, don't force the poor bewildered user to make a
decision. Perform whatever error handling is appropriate and display a
message, and let her get out without further ado.
"... to switch to an editing mode " is particularly bad. It should be
less vague, stating the mode (text mode?).
"... to open a buffer showing the doc as text" would be better as "to
show the doc as text".
> Bye,
> Tassilo
--
Alan Mackenzie (Nürnberg, Germany).
This bug report was last modified 16 years and 167 days ago.
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