Re: Customize may not be appropriate for older users

[Ehud Karni]

On Mon, 14 Jan 2002 12:21:53 +0100, Francesco Potorti` <address@hidden> wrote:
>
>  Eli.z> Do you really mean to create a directory called ~/.emacs/?
>
> Yes, I believe that a directory .emacs would be a
> good thing, to keep there things like my proposal, the .emacs file if no
> ~/.emacs exists, possibly a compiled .emacs file, possibly the default
> autosave dir, the .gnus file.

I second Francesco idea. It is the standard used by many on UNIX,
including GNU applications (e.g. OpenSSH , Netscape, KDE, GIMP, VNC,
midnight commander). Having a directory has some advantages:
   1. it is the natural place for all Emacs created files (like
      backup files when emacs can not write to the original directory,
      instead of the single "%backup%~").
   2. This will make it easier for users to share there Emacs
      preferences (they need only a single symbolic link).

Of course to make it really good idea, all Emacs packages should use
this directory for their files as default instead of the current names.
e.g. In desktop.el `desktop-basefilename' should be changed from
     ".emacs.desktop" to "desktop" and save it in ~/.emacs
other examples: "~/.emacs.bmk" in bookmark.el, ~/.emacs_<SHELL> in
dirtrack.el, "~/.emacs-flc" in fast-lock.el, "~/.emacs-places" in
saveplace.el, "~/.emacs-server-<SYSNAME>" in server.el.

Ehud.


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