Re: [Nano-devel] beeps and lengths

[Benno Schulenberg]

On Tue, Aug 4, 2015, at 09:03, Mike Frysinger wrote:
> On 31 Jul 2015 12:10, Benno Schulenberg wrote:
> > Almost all editors beep when trying to move down past the end-of-file,
> > or trying to move up past the beginning-of-file.  Vim, Emacs, Gedit...
> > But not nano nor Pico.  Should nano emulate other editors more?
> 
> as long as all audio bells & visual flashes can be disabled via nanorc,
> then behaving more like others sounds fine.

Currently nano beeps when you hit an unbound key, like Alt+4 or
Alt+;, and on many occasions at the statusbar prompt.  These beeps
cannot be turned off.  So... this is a feature request?  :)

> > However, Pico does beep when trying to scroll a help text beyond the
> > beginning or the end.  nano does not.  Should nano copy Pico in this?
> 
> i'm not sure how useful this is.  if you hit the down arrow and the cursor
> doesn't move, isn't it fairly obvious why that is ?

It's fairly obvious, yes.  But a human likes feedback.  That's why, on
tablets, when you try to scroll beyond what is possible, the window
will move a little bit, and then slide back.  If it did nothing at all,
the user tends to think he did not swipe correctly, or the thing is
stuck, or whatever.  When I type something and the program does
not respond, I tend to think I typed it wrong and hit the key again.

> > Second, when using nano on wide terminals (120 columns or more),
> > I think the ^G help texts get awkward to read.  Pico's help texts
> > have a fixed width of 74 characters.  Would it be a good idea to
> > wrap the help texts (not the key descriptions) at a maximum of
> > around 80 characters, so that the paragraphs don't get too long?
> 
> i've always disliked the help page -- it doesn't behave like the main window
> that you use w/nano everyday.  for example, ^W doesn't work, so i'm left with
> having to read a lot of text instead.

Yes, bug #28994 (https://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?28994).
But this is a big change internally, not something I am going to
attempt any time soon.  And not without an okay from Chris.

> wrapping at 80 cols seems fine since
> there isn't a whole lot of text there.

Good.

Benno

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