Re: Add a separate mode for .dir-locals.el

[Alan Mackenzie]

Hello, João.

On Thu, Oct 17, 2019 at 19:19:39 +0100, João Távora wrote:
> Alan Mackenzie <address@hidden> writes:

[ .... ]

> > And making a common ancestor for this new mode and emacs-lisp-mode
> > would be a Bad Thing.  It would fragment e-l-m for no particular
> > gain.

> What exactly do you mean by "fragmentation"?

Something which is a coherent whole and is currently in one place will
be split amongst two, or several, places, leaving it less coherent.

> What is the thing that you can do now that you believe you will not be
> able to do later?

Nothing, of course.  But it will be more difficult, less pleasant, more
frustrating and more error-prone.  Maybe not by a lot, but noticeably
so.

There were several bugs several years ago caused by the introduction of
prog-mode.  And there are now features in major modes where it's not
obvious whether they're implemented in prog-mode or the major mode
itself.  Finding that out is extra work.  That's fragmentation.

> João

-- 
Alan Mackenzie (Nuremberg, Germany).