GNU bug report logs - #22494
still can't search for two spaces

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Message #77 received at 22494 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Drew Adams <drew.adams <at> oracle.com>
To: John Wiegley <johnw <at> gnu.org>
Cc: 22494 <at> debbugs.gnu.org, mbork <at> mbork.pl, rms <at> gnu.org, jidanni <at> jidanni.org
Subject: RE: bug#22494: still can't search for two spaces
Date: Wed, 3 Feb 2016 11:08:08 -0800 (PST)

> > 4. I raised a question about whether lax w-s matching should
> >    be automatically turned OFF if you _paste_ (not type) text
> >    that contains multiple, contiguous w-s chars.
> 
> I think it should be, as with typing them.

Maybe.  But it's easy to copy some text (e.g. non-code) from
some external source (not Emacs), and search for it (by yanking).

You might not even know whether it contains more than one
whitespace char in a row.  And if it does, I'm guessing that
some users might be surprised to see lax whitespace matching
turned off after the yank.

Not a big deal, as long as they are clearly notified, in a
way that they understand _why_ the search mode has changed
(e.g. the search string now contains more than one w-s char
in a row).

But I still have the question of what the right approach is.
There are different possibilities, when someone yanks some
text to add to the search string, regarding the intention
wrt searching for whitespace.

My guess is that whatever behavior we choose some users will
be confused.  This just underlines the importance of letting
the user know (a) that a change in behavior has taken place
and (b) why it has.

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