Re: [h-e-w] Re: info path - I can add to it, but not use it

[Stephen Leake]

"Michael R. Wolf" <address@hidden> writes:

> Thanks to Henrik and Galen.
> 
> Magic.  It worked!!  Is there a preference for "(bbdb)" or
> "(bbdb.info)"?  I used the later.

Hmm. My experience is that the string within the parens must be the
file name. Some info files are named "*.info", some aren't.

> How could I have figured that out myself? I'd scoured the info node
> for Info a whole bunch.

I think I discovered this rule experimentally. It should be in the docs.

> Can someone fold the "update the info/dir" directions into the
> INSTALL file for BBDB?

That would be good. Cygwin has a tool 'install-info' that is helpful
here.

> Why does the process file manipulation? It seems to me that I have
> to remember to remember my updates to the emacs-21.1/info/dir file
> when I get a new version of emacs. That doesn't seem like a
> reasonable maintenance procedure. Is there a way to do it all in
> ~/.emacs, or at least without modifying the distribution files?

This is the general problem of the lack of a "package" tool for emacs.
One solution for NT Emacs is to start using the Cygwin packaging
tools; I have not looked into this at all.

I think it makes sense to use the OS packaging tools for Emacs, rather
than to try to come up with an Emacs-only tool. Emacs is the hub of an
Integrated Development Environment, and many useful packages have
external programs that also need to be installed. An OS package
mechanism can support that better.

-- 
-- Stephe