Subject: bug#21695: 25.0.50; Change most occurrences of `setq' in Emacs manual to `customize-set-variable'? Really?

From: Gregory Heytings <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2021 10:00:41 +0000

>> The point is not to display unnecessary warnings.  The point is only to 
>> display warnings for custom variables that should not be set with setq 
>> because they have a :set form, or IOW, to display warnings for custom 
>> variables that should be set with customize-set-variables.
>
> I checked most of our uses of :set and agree that they usually behave 
> well-mannered so using `setq' instead is practically always a bug 
> indeed.
>

Thank you.  So this has now been (at least) double-checked.

>
> But if the warnings are not displayed for byte-compiled code I miss who 
> their major addressee would be.
>

Users who use setq in their init files where customize-set-variable should 
be used, and users who use setq interactively (with e.g. M-:) when they 
should have used customize-set-variable instead.  In particular newcomers 
who might be puzzled to see that (setq foo t) does not work as they think 
it should.

Anyway, I don't feel a lot of enthusiasm for that feature, so I think it's 
probably better to let the patch rest in peace.