Re: configurable default setup selection (was Re: M-x goto-line binding)

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: jari.aalto@poboxes.com (Jari Aalto+mail.emacs)
> Newsgroups: gnu.emacs.help,gnu.emacs.bug
> Date: 06 Jan 2001 01:24:20 +0200
> 
> Things could be different. (Feature Request)
> 
>     The fellow is welcomed with a lisp buffer (something Like in XEmacs)
>     welcoming him to use the most powerfull thing in the bleeding
>     edge software development.
> 
>     "Now what do you want to do today?" The screen asks:
> 
>         1) Start Emacs in "raw mode" (Advanced users only)
>         2) Select configuration 1 [press for more info]
>         2) Select configuration 2 [press for more info]
>         2) Select configuration 3 [press for more info]
>         2) Select other contributed configuration [press for list]
> 
>     "If you're unsure, select 1"  (The best appealing user drfaults)
> 
>     "Now, do you want to make this selection permanent for next sessions?"
>     "Thank you. To change your selection see CONFIGURE menu."
>     "To get help, see HELP and INFO menu."

FWIW, I think this is an extremely annoying way of greeting the user.
It's one I routinely turn off in any Microsoft software that dares to
annoy me like that when invoked.  I hope Emacs will _never_ do that.

What we should do (IMHO) is to selectively turn on features that most
new users want, and which aren't dangerous in any way, and provide
easy means (through the menu bar's Options menu) to turn on more of
the options easily.

Emacs 21 does the latter, at least for some popular options that
aren't on by default.  I think we plan to enable more features by
default in some future release after 21.1.