Subject: Re: bug#78474: 31.0.50; Wrong char insertion in rxvt

From: Samuel Thibault <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 22 Jul 2025 14:16:02 +0200

Eli Zaretskii, le mar. 22 juil. 2025 14:54:27 +0300, a ecrit:
> > Date: Mon, 21 Jul 2025 18:03:47 +0200
> > From: Samuel Thibault <[email-masked]>
> > Cc: [email-masked], [email-masked], [email-masked],
> > 	[email-masked]
> > 
> > Eli Zaretskii, le lun. 21 juil. 2025 18:58:06 +0300, a ecrit:
> > > > > > That does not exist in terminals, only in graphical sessions
> > > > > 
> > > > > How come?  Screen readers should announce themselves quite prominently
> > > > > to any system, so I'd be very surprised to hear that they are
> > > > > invisible on Linux terminals.
> > > > 
> > > > They really are, since they just read the content from /dev/vcsa.
> > > 
> > > OK, but the reader itself is a program that is loaded into memory,
> > > right?  Can those programs be detected somehow?  Do they leave some
> > > traces somewhere on the system?  E.g., if those programs have known
> > > names, we could scan the processes running on the system and look for
> > > them, if no better method exists.
> > 
> > Do you allow me to puke?
> 
> You can, but it will hardly be useful.
> 
> And frankly, I don't understand the attitude.

I'm sorry, but I also have a hard time understanding the attitude.

This bug is making emacs user have to avoid working in the graphical
desktop environment, because they cannot reliably edit text. And thus
they miss all the graphical tools that everybody else is using. So
they'd have to switch back&forth between textmode and console to do
their work, a very painful experience.

And you are proposing to probe for the existence of a process to decide
the emacs behavior. There has been already half a dozen graphical
screen readers, some of which have even changed name. How can that be
considered a solution when we are talking about just adding one byte...

> The original request was to have an option to disable use of TABs for
> moving the cursor, see

No.

>   https://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=78474#29

*Actually* see the _*original*_ request:

“
Quoting Samuel: "Emacs, instead of sending a rightward cursor movement
(\e[C), sends \009\008 (a tabulation and a leftward cursor movement)"

This char insertion problem confuses assistive technologies for the
visually impaired.
”

Yes. I'm repeating myself. Since you don't seem to be accepting that.

> But now you have changed the request, and are asking to disable the
> TABs by default.

I'm not *asking* for something in particular. I'm asking for a solution
to the *actual* problem, which is \009\008. And not a solution that will
break as soon as somebody creates their own screen reader for their own
use.

Samuel