Subject: Re: display-line-numbers set to relative

From: "Franco A. Cortesi" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 23 Dec 2019 01:35:55 -0300

Of course, evil-mode has a <gg> command, meaning "go to nth line", where
the number of line is absolute and could be used with
absolute_line_numbers. But I think nobody commonly uses this <gg> command,
or at least, this command is not needed as relative line numbers allows the
same behavior with the far more used and easier <j> and  <k> commands,
meaning "nex-line" and "previous line". Also moving around with relative
numbers will always be two digits (key presses) while absolute can be quite
higher. I don't understand why relative line numbers are so uncommon.

Le lun. 23 déc. 2019 à 00:49, Franco A. Cortesi <[email-masked]>
a écrit :

> When display-line-numbers is set to 'relative', the number of spaces
> before the digits starts growing (to two) when the current line hits 43 in
> my case. Of course, no other line has more than two digits as the screen
> only has 56 lines in total so the growing of spaces (and columns) is not
> needed at all and of course is undesired. This behavior seems to be
> correctly implemented but for absolute line numbers, where hitting line 43
> means the bottom line is close to start showing numbers with three digits.
>
> The current line always showing the absolute line number is another big
> problem as it will make the number of columns to grow and srink anyway.
> This growing and shrinking could be totally prevented if users were able to
> remove or configure the contents of the current line indicator. If
> configurable, a custom face would be also very good. For example a colored
> "-" indicating the current line would be nice for many users.
>
> Lastly and less important, it would be great to be able to remove the
> space before the first numeric character! To make line-numbers-mode as less
> invasive and noticeable as possible.
>
>
> This feature (relative line numbers) is AWESOME, especially when used with
> evil-mode as it allows to navigate the code VERY fast by prefixing
> next/previous-line commands with exact numbers. No "fast mental math" (when
> using absolute line-numbers) or inaccurate guessings are needed, only
> correct information. But I think the first two issues should be addresed to
> make relative line-numbers really usable without drawbacks.
>
> Thank you for reading.
>