Subject: bug#9406: 24.0.50; Use M-p/M-n to navigate through the kill ring

From: Juri Linkov <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 31 Aug 2011 12:51:54 +0300

> Using the minibuffer would be indeed a way of doing this, but on
> second thought I think that it would be better to have "in-site"
> replacement of the yanked text (like M-y does now), because:
>
> 1. It would be quicker: It saves you the extra <RET> once you have
> selected the wanted entry.

"In-situ" replacement is quicker indeed but has its own problems:
to undo the last yanked text to the initial state you have to undo
insertions and deletions of all intermediate elements of the kill ring.

So what you propose is like setting `search-ring-update' to t in Isearch.
It's quicker without requiring <RET>, but to revert to the initial search
position you have to undo all search movements for intermediate elements of
the search ring.

> 2. When the killed text is tall (has many lines), the minibuffer would
> show only a small fragment of it.

The minibuffer shows enough multi-line text to recognize the wanted entry.

> Thus, for example if you wanted to yank the third entry from the kill
> ring, all you would have to to is "C-y M-p M-p M-p" and you're done.
> Very quick, very intuitive, very convenient!

With many M-p, one extra <RET> is not a problem.