Re: edit.m: use current working directory, remove HOME

[Mike Miller]

On Tue, Apr 24, 2012 at 10:32 AM, Ben Abbott <address@hidden> wrote:
>
> On Apr 24, 2012, at 9:47 AM, Mike Miller wrote:
>
>> On Tue, Apr 24, 2012 at 8:58 AM, Ben Abbott <address@hidden> wrote:
>>> On Apr 22, 2012, at 5:49 PM, Mike Miller wrote:
>>>
>>>> I have prepared a new patch to make the edit command consistent wrt
>>>> where files are edited, please take a look at the attached and tell me
>>>> what you think.  The HOME variable is now no longer needed, a warning is
>>>> issued if the user tries to get or set HOME.  The current directory is
>>>> now used wherever HOME was used before, primarily when editing a system
>>>> m-file with no write privileges.
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> mike
>>>> <edit-home.patch>
>>>
>>> I had a thought. Would it be preferred to allow the HOME variable in edit.m 
>>> to be set to a function handle, or a string. That would accommodate both 
>>> those who prefer
>>>
>>>       address@hidden
>>>
>>> ... or ...
>>>
>>>        HOME="~/octave";
>>
>> Sure, I don't have a problem with supporting function handles in
>> principle, but isn't address@hidden effectively overkill for HOME="."?
>
> Ok.
>
>>> Might the same be done for EDITOR ?
>>>
>>>       address@hidden;
>>>
>>> ... or ...
>>>
>>>        EDITOR="gvim";
>>
>> If EDITOR could be a function handle, it should probably take the name
>> of the file to edit as its argument, right?  That would be analogous
>> to the "%s" placeholder that the EDITOR setting currently requires.
>> In that case the the EDITOR() function wouldn't work, but a new
>> function could be made to be the default using @EDITOR.
>
> I'm not sure I'm following.
>
> Are you proposing a rewrite of the EDITOR function ?
>
> How would it interact with edit.m and the built-in edit_history() ?

No, not at all, just pointing out the difference between

    $ env EDITOR=  octave -qf
    octave:1> EDITOR
    ans = emacs
    octave:2> edit get EDITOR
    ans = emacs %s

as in one of the prior edit vs. EDITOR threads.  In edit.m, the EDITOR
setting has a required argument, currently in the form of a sprintf
replacement.  I interpreted your suggestion into something like:

    if (is_function_handle (FUNCTION.EDITOR))
        cmd = FUNCTION.EDITOR (filename);
    else
        cmd = sprintf (FUNCTION.EDITOR, filename);
    endif

-- 
mike