GNU bug report logs - #25292
Ambiguity in doc string of defvar

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Package: emacs;

Reported by: Alan Mackenzie <acm <at> muc.de>

Date: Thu, 29 Dec 2016 18:20:01 UTC

Severity: minor

Done: Alan Mackenzie <acm <at> muc.de>

Bug is archived. No further changes may be made.

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Message #5 received at submit <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Alan Mackenzie <acm <at> muc.de>
To: bug-gnu-emacs <at> gnu.org
Subject: Ambiguity in doc string of defvar
Date: Thu, 29 Dec 2016 18:18:38 +0000

Hello, Emacs.

The doc string for defvar includes this bit:

    The optional argument INITVALUE is evaluated, and used to set
    SYMBOL, only if SYMBOL's value is void.

Supposing SYMBOL's value is bound.  Clearly it does not get set to
INITVALUE.  But in this case is INITVALUE evaluated (and the result
discarded) or not?  The text leaves this ambiguous.  An improvement
would be the appropriate one of the following:

    If SYMBOL's value is void, the optional argument INITVALUE is
    evaluated and used to set SYMBOL.

    INITVALUE is evaluated, and if SYMBOL's value is void, it is used to
    set SYMBOL.

-- 
Alan Mackenzie (Nuremberg, Germany).
This bug report was last modified 8 years and 195 days ago.

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