Subject: bug#75530: [PATCH v2 2/3] Remap read-only-mode for Occur modes (bug#75530)

From: Liam Hupfer <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 04 Feb 2025 23:27:20 -0600

Juri Linkov <[email-masked]> writes:

> One particular use case where it’s useful to disable the read-only
> status with ’C-x C-q’ is to use e.g. ’M-x flush-lines’ to further
> narrow down the results displayed in the Occur buffer.
>
>> Not to mention Occur uses text properties to make the
>> line numbers read-only even when the buffer is writable. Maybe that
>> wasn’t the case in 2013.
>
> Indeed, unfortunately this use case was precluded after the change
> that added the read-only property on line numbers was made recently
> on 2022-01-23 in the commit 1bcbca3750d9e8c47bee7ac893b885ade584d783.

Thanks for confirming!

> Maybe we need to revert this change and find another solution.

Seeing as nobody seemed to notice or care that this use case was broken
for three years and two major releases, I’m personally inclined to
proceed further in the direction Lars set previously by considering
Occur and Grep as proper special modes, with special C-x C-q behavior,
like Dired.  I don’t find the rationale particularly compelling that
Occur and Grep buffer contents are more commonly edited as raw text than
Dired.  Not enough to justify the discrepancy, anyway.  With
special-mode’s bindings in mind, I think it makes more sense to change
modes before editing the contents.

I might have to retract that comment about prescribing workflows.  This
series is tweaking defaults, so I guess that’s its whole purpose!  Maybe
others can chime in on their tastes here as well?

Thanks for your input!