Re: executable-find in files.el

[Michael Albinus]

Richard Stallman <address@hidden> writes:

>     Sorry for being too short. I wanted to say that there should be a
>     general concept for running commands on remote hosts.
>
> I would not say that it is a priority for Emacs to have such a thing.
> I think it would be a difficult thing to do.  However, if you design
> one and the design is good, I would be glad to accept it.
>
> Not now, however.  It should wait for after the release.

OK, I'll come back to this later on.

>     Everywhere there is the need of checking a command for
>     being remote or not, and then to call `process-file' or
>     `call-process'.
>
> I don't understand "checking a command for being remote or not".
> I have no idea what this is talking about.

"checking whether a command will be executed on a local or a remote
host". Stefan pointed already to this inaccuracy of mine.

One could argue that just calling `process-file' should be
sufficient. But it isn't for packages which still want to support
Emacs 21. Supporting `call-process´ for commands on remote hosts would
result in no change for such packages in the best case. 

>     If `call-process' would be able to handle remote
>     commands,
>
> I cannot envision any way in which that could make sense.  I have no
> idea what it would mean for `call-process' to "handle" remote
> commands.

"handle commands to be executed on a remote host".

Best regards, Michael.