GNU bug report logs - #23236
25.0.90; Document command remapping in Emacs manual, not just Elisp manual

Previous Next

Full log

Message #17 received at 23236 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Drew Adams <drew.adams <at> oracle.com>
To: Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org>, Drew Adams <drew.adams <at> oracle.com>
Cc: 23236 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: RE: bug#23236: 25.0.90;	Document command remapping in Emacs manual,
 not just Elisp manual
Date: Thu, 7 Apr 2016 10:44:59 -0700 (PDT)

> > > > Search the Emacs manual for "remap".  You will find nothing about
> > > > command remapping.
> > >
> > > Because it's not a user-level feature.
> >
> > I disagree.  Why do you say it is not?  Are users not supposed to
> > remap commands?
> 
> Users that code in Lisp are.  Users that don't aren't.
> 
> > If they are, then what could you possibly mean
> > by saying that doing so is not "user-level"?
> 
> It's not for users who don't write Lisp code.
> 
> > Binding keys is an extremely common end-user task.  (Yes, it is.
> > It is 100% "user-level", in addition to being something that is
> > done in non-user files.)
> 
> And it is virtually impossible without writing Lisp.

You seem to be being quite dogmatic here.

This bug is about users who customize keys.  That includes maybe
99% of Emacs users, I'd guess.  Maybe 90% if you're skeptical.

And a good number of those are end users who do not otherwise
use Emacs Lisp, or use it very little - maybe 50%?  My guess is
that the vast majority of Emacs users who know little or nothing
about Emacs Lisp customize keys.

It doesn't take a Lisp pro to learn to use `global-set-key' in
your init file.  And the proof of that, I'm guessing, is in the
many, many, init files of users who barely know the first thing
about Lisp.  I see this daily in questions posed by end users.

The point is that:

1. End users DO customize keys.  They want to and need to,
   in general.  There is nothing non-end userish about the users
   who customize Emacs keys.  Perhaps the most common customization
   by non-Lisper Emacs end users is key customization.  So yes,
   this is a tiny exception to their non-Lisperness.  By force,
   because there is no alternative to using Lisp to customize keys.

2. As long as they do, which means as long as there is no
   alternative to Lisp for customizing keys, it would be silly
   for Emacs developers to adopt the ostrich-head-in-sand cop-out
   that customizing keys is not for end users, and so it should
   be documented only in the Elisp manual.  And with mention of
   the FACT that they can customize keys and to the FACT that how
   to do this is documented in the Elisp manual - NO POINTER.
   That cop-out does not help anyone, IMO.

IOW, point end users reading the _Emacs_ manual to the relevant
parts of the Elisp manual that tell them how to customize keys.
Please.  Including for command remapping.

Previous Next

GNU bug tracking system
Copyright (C) 1999 Darren O. Benham, 1997,2003 nCipher Corporation Ltd, 1994-97 Ian Jackson.