RE: how to control isearch for invisible text

[Drew Adams]

    > I have no "actual situation". I was searching through a buffer that
    > had some invisible text (as an overlay), and I wanted to know if
    > there was an isearch option for finding it - that's all. You
    > answered "yes" - thank you.
    >
    > I suggested documenting that option better and making it a toggle in
    > `isearch'. You said it shouldn't be documented better, it shouldn't
    > be a user option after all, and, a fortiori, it shouldn't be toggled
    > in `isearch'.

    What was it that rendered the text invisible in the first place?

I used `dired-details-toggle' (a command in library dired-details.el) to
hide details in Dired (and, as I said, it uses an overlay). It happened that
I wanted to search for something invisible in that context, and I wondered
if there was a search option. That's all - there is nothing special about
that context. A single keystroke can make everything visible anyway, so
there is no special advantage in that context to searching for invisible
text.

    I know search-invisible since preview-latex has to deal with it
    (actually, it is just the XEmacs port, since the Emacs port works with
    display properties instead).  The mode was responsible for hiding
    stuff away, and consequently it was also responsible for letting them
    show up.  Since the behavior of isearch needed fixing, I had to check
    in the source file, anyway.  The details were complicated enough that
    it would have needed quite long and complicated explanations in the
    Elisp manual, for material that would get checked in the code, anyway.

    This is my contact with search-invisible.  Now could you please
    explain what mode rendered parts of your text invisible so that one
    can get an idea whether a global user option makes sense in connection
    with that?

As I said, the context that made me wonder about a possible search option is
irrelevant; there is no special need for searching invisible text in that
context. It occurred to me that it might be useful, generally, to be able to
search invisible text; that's all.

    > I do hope the user option `search-invisible' 1) remains a user
    > option, 2) gets better documented, as it seems useful, and 3) gets
    > an associated toggle in `isearch'.

    Would you please present an actual example where this would be useful?

Sorry, I don't have one, as I already stated in my last message. My crystal
ball tells me it will be useful, but my crystal ball has been wrong before
too. I like being able to toggle isearch options on the fly, and this is
apparently an isearch option (until/unless you kill it).

More importantly, I think the option should be documented - perhaps in the
section on invisible text, if there is to be no isearch toggle for it. If
you want to remove the user option and make it a plain `defvar', that's your
choice; I have no actual example that will dissuade you. End of story.