GNU bug report logs - #41097
28.0.50; (dired-toggle-marks) not working after copy

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From: Michael Heerdegen <michael_heerdegen <at> web.de>
To: Drew Adams <drew.adams <at> oracle.com>
Cc: arthur.miller <at> live.com, Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org>, 41097 <at> debbugs.gnu.org, tomasn <at> posteo.net, Jean Louis <bugs <at> gnu.support>
Subject: bug#41097: 28.0.50; (dired-toggle-marks) not working after copy
Date: Mon, 11 May 2020 02:36:29 +0200

Drew Adams <drew.adams <at> oracle.com> writes:

> > Because t toggles marks, and C is not a mark, it's a flag.
>
> This is not true.  Let's please not go there.

But if you think so (and I somewhat agree), isn't then the first
sentence in the docstring that Eli didn't touch:

  "Toggle marks: marked files become unmarked, and vice versa."

even more confusing?  I guess Eli wanted to avoid a sentence like "and
files marked with marks other than the * mark don't count as marked."

But the inconsistency goes much further, we say that commands operate on
the "marked" files, but we mean only the *-marked files.

So I guess the terminology is "marked with" applies to any mark and
"marked" only to files marked with *, and "unmarked" means "doesn't have
any mark".  Oh dear, it's like learning English modal verbs.

I think we can be more specific in the docstring, and I also don't like
to introduce the second term "flag" here since it is somewhat linked to
deletion indeed, and it's meaning is as fluent as "mark" - that doesn't
help.

Ok, would something like this be a compromise?

- Toggle marks: marked files become unmarked, and vice versa.
- Files marked with other flags (such as `D') are not affected.

+ Toggle marks: marked files become unmarked, and vice versa.
+ This means that files marked with `*' are unmarked and files that don't
+ have any mark are marked with `*'.  Files marked with any
+ characters other than `*' are uneffected.

(the term "marker character" is already used in the manual.)


Regards,

Michael.

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