Subject: bug#26233: 26.0.50; [PATCH] Improve documentation for display-buffer-alist

From: martin rudalics <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 26 Mar 2017 10:38:25 +0200

> 2. I _did_ object at the time.

Sorry, but the time was 2011 and at that time I wrote ...

   Your approach will divide Emacs users into two groups: A wide majority
   that continues to use the old options and a small minority able to write
   their own alist based functions.

... and ...

   Most of what you propose above is easily available in Emacs 23 via
   `special-display-regexps'.  An application would just temporarily add
   the buffer, the function, and the alist to the head of that and get the
   behavior without setting any arguments.  Is it really worth inventing a
   new `display-buffer' in order to resolve such cosmetic issues?

You did not bother to participate in that discussion and so you did not
object at the time.

 > `display-buffer-alist' is notoriously difficult to
 > understand and make use of.  As one example, though I've
 > asked several times how to use it to get the same effect
 > provided by these options I've never gotten a response.
 >
 > That's the first step for Emacs to take, IMO, after
 > undeprecating these options (as well as anything else
 > "special-display", of course, such as
 > `special-display-alist'): State in the doc exactly how
 > they correspond to a special case of using
 > `display-buffer-alist'.  _Show_ the equivalence.

Despite the fact that many years ago I moved these options and the
corresponding functions from C to Elisp, I still don't understand them
and very likely never will.  If you asked me how to obtain a specific
behavior with ‘display-buffer-alist’, I might be able to come up with an
answer.  In any case I deeply regret that I ever got involved in this.

martin