Re: address@hidden: RE: cannot find :enable in Elisp manualindex]

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: "Drew Adams" <address@hidden>
> Cc: <address@hidden>, <address@hidden>
> Date: Tue, 29 May 2007 14:03:10 -0700
> 
> Nonsense.

If you want to continue this discussion with me, please stop the
attitude.  I have better things to do with my scarce free time than
talk to someone who thinks that about my opinions.

> 1) Info is not just for Emacs and Emacs Lisp.

But I was talking _only_ about the ELisp manual, and I said that
explicitly.  There's no argument that this is a grave limitation for
some other manuals (and I said that explicitly as well).

> 2) Looking up ":type" as opposed to "type" is in no way analogous to looking
> up "'keymap" as opposed to "keymap". I can't believe that you would suggest
> such a thing.

Well, then maybe we have quite different perceptions of the Emacs Lisp
syntax and semantics.  The colon plays a role that is very similar to
the quote: it is used to mean the literal symbol name as opposed to
the value of the symbol.

> 2: I disagree with you 100% in the case of keywords. Try it. Pick one and
> count how many keystrokes or whatever it takes to get you to a node that
> actually discusses that keyword using both `i' and `s'. The latter wins
> hands down.
> 
> With `i :link', you have to visit 17 index entries out of 20 before you get
> to a node containing :link.

That's not what I'd suggest to do in this situation.  I'd suggest to
type "i link TAB".  Then I see this:

    Possible completions are:
    link, customization keyword    linking files

and it's quite clear that the first one is the one I want.

> Neither `i :enable' nor `i :keymap' in the Elisp manual will _ever_ get you
> to a page with that keyword - they're not indexed at all. Of course, to find
> that out for :keymap, say, you will need to visit all 45 entries and check
> for ":keymap" in each one!

`enable' isn't indexed at all, but "i keymap TAB TAB TAB" immediately
shows 3 different usages of :keymap at the beginning of the list of
completions.  No need to visit 45 entries.

> It's hard to imagine why you would "think index search is so much more
> powerful that `s', _even with the colon problem_."

Well, maybe now you understand that better.