Subject: bug#24510: 25.1; Info: searching for ` does not find what looks like `

From: Drew Adams <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 29 Apr 2022 15:01:17 +0000

> > My thorough research shows that 99.7% of Emacs users don't see a ‘
> > outside of *Help* and *info*, so doing something special there seems
> > useful.
> >
> >> But still if the user want this only in Info, it's very easy to type
> >> C-s M-s ' `list.
> >
> > That does more than just fold `' with ‘’, though.
> 
> So only folding `' with ‘’ is required?  Then it's easy to do:

Then how does a user actually search only for ‘
or only for ', etc.?

The ability to search with or without folding 
such confusables is needed.

We have that, with `M-s '' (thank you).

But the problem is that users won't necessarily
know that they need to use that to get past the
curly-vs-traditional confusion.  Searching for
` or ' won't find curly quotes by default.

"Confusable" means they might not even notice a
difference between `...' and curly quotes.  And
no, the answer to that Emacs-imposed gotcha is
not to tell users it's their fault for choosing
a font that doesn't make distinguishing them
easier.

If users don't notice a visible difference then
they're likely to get misled - confused.  We've
_done that to them gratuitously_, by imposing 
curly quoting by default - replacing unambiguous
notation with, well, a confusing mess.  Sorry,
but that's the case.

And if we change Info mode to fold these chars by
default then users still won't necessarily know
they're doing that, and so won't they need to, or
even perhaps won't know how to, search unfoldingly
(to coin an adverb).

It might be helpful to (1) document the folding
by default in the mode doc, (2) document a toggle
command for this folding (specifically), and
maybe even (3) show a message in some cases
during search that involves these chars, to let
users know that they are, or are not, folding,
and what that means.

But all such attempts to help users are really
only poor workarounds for the mess we've thrown
at them.

Finally, as I said in an earlier msg, this gotcha
is not limited to Info and Help.

  It's about searching for something, and not
  finding it because you're typing a different
  char - it's about (~semi)confusables, I guess.

The willy-nilly replacement of `...' by curly
quotes has not finished to mess things up.  We're
still quite a ways from cleaning up after it and
helping users navigate it (and work around it).

It was so much simpler - transparent for everyone
- with just `...'.  No ambiguity.  Very Emacsy.
Alas, we've tossed out that baby, with an eye
that mistakenly saw clear bathwater as dirty.