Re: [h-e-w] Emacs daemon and emacsclientw configuration

[Rob Davenport]

Good points, Eli, as always.   For me, who's used Emacs on Windows for 21 
years, it wasn't that hard to follow (I know - I know - that's not the point) 
but it was interesting to see the --daemon mode work.  Last I tried that years 
ago it didn't.  

And I would also think that Wiki's are not only for making life easier for 
newbies (which it definitely is) but also for collecting shared knowledge for 
the more experienced users as well.   That said - that page could probably 
stand to be marked "for experienced users" or "not for newbies".

And I suppose if people are using the Wiki over the official documentation, 
that indicates a problem with the official documentation somehow, doesn't it?
Either people are conditioned to look at a wiki first, or dislike or find the 
official documentation hard to comprehend or find what they need.   All those 
issues could be addressed by improving the documentation - and/or advertising 
the official documentation pages in the wiki.   Perhaps make adding links to 
the official documentation inside the emacswiki pages?   So when people go to 
the wiki and see a page, they also see the link to the official documentation.  

Rob

-----Original Message-----
From: help-emacs-windows [mailto:address@hidden On Behalf Of Eli Zaretskii
Sent: Tuesday, May 02, 2017 2:40 AM
To: Rob Davenport <address@hidden>
Cc: address@hidden; address@hidden
Subject: Re: [h-e-w] Emacs daemon and emacsclientw configuration

> From: Rob Davenport <address@hidden>
> Date: Mon, 1 May 2017 21:02:47 -0400
> Cc: Sivaram Neelakantan <address@hidden>, 
> address@hidden
> 
> I tried the instructions in the #toc6 link and it worked OK for me. 
> The page says the "-c" parameter was key - opening in a new frame and 
> (somehow) therefore not requiring a filename argument. I don't quite 
> understand but it seems to work.

My main problem with those instructions is that they tell to start the daemon 
before using the emacsclientw shortcut.  When the daemon is already running, 
the use of -a in the emacsclientw command is an unnecessary complication.  My 
other problem with these instructions is that a recipe that produces an empty 
frame will make no sense to many users, which invoke Emacs on specific files 
and expect that file to be visited in the frame that opens.  Having a daemon 
running without showing any frames is yet another feature that could confuse 
many users, who might think that Emacs is not running.

What is the purpose of all these subtleties dumped on the intended audience, 
who are supposed to be newbies that follow "cookbook"
recipes blindly, without understanding what they are doing?

IOW, those instructions seem like some "clever" tricks that are also not easy 
to follow (witness the OP's failure to do so), which is the exact opposite of 
the purpose of the Wiki: to make life easier for the newcomers.  But that's 
what you get for using the Wiki in preference to the official documentation.

Thanks.