Subject: Re: bug#50674: Major mode for etc/AUTHORS with basic font-locking

From: Stefan Kangas <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2021 00:42:54 -0700

Juri Linkov <[email-masked]> writes:

> I really see no difference from etc-authors-mode and e.g.
> etc-fstab-generic-mode defined in generic-x.el by define-generic-mode.
> And still it can be autoloaded like c++-mode-syntax-table used to be autoloaded.

That means that a user will see font-locking in some files, only if she
has first visited AUTHORS.  In a subsequent Emacs session, the user will
be surprised to see that the font-locking is no longer there.

IOW, I can agree to put it in generic-x.el, but only if we autoload some
other modes in there.  Such as the fstab mode.  Otherwise this makes no
sense to me.

A natural first step would be to make those modes load unconditionally,
but that proposal has been rejected; see my last two commits to
generic-x.el.  Perhaps it will be okay to load only some of the modes
unconditionally.

This would also have to be coupled with the necessary documentation
changes to generic-x.el, to explain that this file is not only about
`define-generic-mode'.

Personally, I'd rather create a new file for small modes than go down
this rabbit hole.  generic-x.el is hardly the best library name or
location.