Re: display.texi: (<line>,<col>) isn't documented.

[Juanma Barranquero]

On 6/7/07, Drew Adams <address@hidden> wrote:

> How about:
>
>  column only   -   67x
>  line only     -   234y
>  line & column -   67x234y

Please, don't.

> Advantages:
>
> . Few characters (no wasted space).

More than 234:67

> . It's clear which is horizontal and which is vertical.

Only if you know the (x,y) terminology (i.e.,
technically/scientifically oriented people).

> . x and y are much more universal than L for "line"
>   and C for "column". No need to translate.

I'm not going to defend L and C, but Emacs buffers have rows (lines)
and columns, not x and y coordinates.

> . Lowercase makes the units stand out from the digits.
>   The descender on the `y' makes it easy to spot and
>   disambiguate. (compared with L,C - and l,c suffers
>   from confusing l with 1)

My brain has no trouble parsing 234,67 or 234/67 or 234:67, but
67x234y is just a clump.

> Disadvantages of other proposals:
>
> . (34,67) and 34:67 are not clear about which is
>   horizontal and which is vertical.

No, but many files have much more lines than columns, and it's really
just a convention. Once you've used it for a while, it's automatic.

> . :67 and 234: take longer to parse, to figure out
>   which is horizontal (vs 67x and 234y).

In some universe tangent to mine, surely :)

(BTW, very funny: with a Unicode font you could use U+2192 and U+2193
or some other suitable pointing-looking characters :)

> . Using (234,67) for both horizontal and vertical, but 234L
>   and 67C for one only is more complex, less consistent.

Yes.

            Juanma