Subject: Re: bug#4869: 23.1.50; weak documentation of prefer-coding-system

From: Juri Linkov <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 06 Nov 2009 03:47:28 +0200

> The function prefer-coding-system does not explain if the CODING-SYSTEM
> argument must be a symbol or a string (or either).
>
> Without seeing a code example, a user might try using a quoted string:
>
>    (prefer-coding-system "utf-8")
>
> In which case, the error message is very confusing (this makes it sound
> as though utf-8 is not supported):
>
>    error: Invalid coding system `utf-8'
>
> At a minimum, the documentation should be made more explicit, and I
> would strongly suggest adding a code example:
>
>    (prefer-coding-system 'utf-8)

Why not allow both?  Some MULE functions allow a symbol and a string.

-- 
Juri Linkov
http://www.jurta.org/emacs/