Subject: bug#5054: Man truncated

From: martin rudalics <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 2010 09:05:47 +0100

> One remaining problem: when `man' can't find a manpage, it signals
 > the error "Can't find the manpage".  But what to do with the displayed
 > empty window that waits for the formatted output?  Maybe to undo
 > the window configuration to its original state?

Conceptually, that would be just as disturbing as popping up a window
after formatting completes.  The user might have already altered the
window configuration in some other respect since formatting started.

 > And what to do
 > with the created frame?  To leave it displaying an empty buffer?

The window (which probably should be dedicated initially to avoid that
some other action steals it before formatting is complete) could first
display some text about the formatting process in progress and a more
detailed text when formatting fails telling the user what the potential
reasons of the failure were and how to get rid of the window or frame
(and implicitly the temporary buffer).

But maybe this part should be written separately so that other packages
waiting for the completion of asynchronous processes could use it too.

martin