Re: Proposed new minor mode

[David Kastrup]

Luc Teirlinck <address@hidden> writes:

> Eli Zaretskii wrote:
> 
>    Let the users who need this type "M-x vis-mode-disable RET" or
>    some such.
> 
> Whether we need a binding for this or not is a different matter.
> But it would seem (given the current implementation) that every
> user, even, or I would say especially, a novice user, would need to
> use the command at least once (actually twice, because it needs to
> be disabled again), because otherwise the confusion when killing and
> yanking, printing part of the buffer, using commands like M-x man
> and the like, is going to be too big.

The surprise is not ameliorated by the availability of a command
toggling some visibility.  The novice user caught by surprise will not
think "Oh, I should have called vis-mode-disable in order not get
this".

> The user needs to be aware the text is there, because sooner or
> later he is going to be confronted with it.

And then he will get aware of it.

> If the text were erased, instead of being made invisible, that would
> be a different matter, but that is not how it is currently
> implemented.  I do not know of any plans to implement it that way.

Strange.  I think I read the contention several times that it would
be a good idea to edit the buffer, making the text better match the
appearance.

> Killing and yanking are not just commands for advanced users and
> there are plenty of reasons to kill and yank text from info buffers.

Sure, but if we have an inconsistency there, the solution is to fix it
instead of providing a command nobody would ever think of using,
because it only uglifies the current buffer and does not cause
anything different to be yanked to the destination buffer.

It won't do a harm to have such a mode for debugging info files and
their display, and other invisibility matters, but it would be an
illusion to think that it would be of major interest to novices, or
help them much.

-- 
David Kastrup, Kriemhildstr. 15, 44793 Bochum