Re: [Fwd: Re: beginning-of-defun]

[Richard Stallman]

    > Because it only finds `defun' calls, it fails to find other constructs
    > that define functions or macros.  

    This would be the task of `beginning-of-form' - a more
    abstract utility.

A command that only finds calls to `defun' is not very useful.

    Indeed. Will proceed here. Will it be possible to write a reg-exp which
    matches a functions definition reliable?

Not entirely reliable, I am afraid.  You need to use
syntax-ppss starting from a known top-level expression to find out 
whether a given position is inside a string.

    IMO different meanings of
    `defun' in Emacs are the reason of a major difficulty
    for beginners (at least for non-programmers).

Have you had experience with a lot of beginners that got
confused about this?

I am not yet convinced that we should change it.
Our use of the term "defun" for editing commands
has 30 years of history behind it, and I have not yet
seen evidence that it is a problem.