bug#24150: 25.1.50; New command: dired-create-empty-file

[Drew Adams]

> I use dired+ and find `diredp-touch-this-file' useful sometimes. It
> might be handy to have that available, with filename prompting, in the
> core dired. But it's not a high-frequency command for me.

Vanilla Emacs has `dired-do-touch', which is bound to `T'
by default.

Dired+ defines `diredp-touch-this-file', which just does
`dired-do-touch' on the file of the current line:
(dired-do-touch 1).

Just `T', with no files marked, gives you the same behavior
as `diredp-touch-this-file'.  The latter is a separate command
because it lets you touch (just) the current file regardless of
whether some files are marked.

Wrt this thread: The Dired touch commands are useful mainly for
updating the file-modified date.  But they do not read a file
name, so they cannot be used to create a new, empty file.

I'm not sure what the use cases are for creating a new, empty file,
but I don't think that using a touch command on any file listed in
Dired has the effect of creating another, new file.  You can use
`M-!' to run a `touch' operating-system command, of course, but
Dired does not currently offer anything for this, AFAIK.