Re: [patch] Re: regexp repacement, how to present replacement to user?

[David Kastrup]

Richard Stallman <address@hidden> writes:

>     These functions basically perform part of what `replace-match'
>     does.  The latter substitutes replacement group references (`\N'
>     and `\&') and replaces match in the buffer with the result text.
>     Proposed functions only generate and return that text, without
>     modyfing the buffer.
>
> Yes, I understand that.  I agree that these functions make logical
> sense.
>
> The question is, is this operation sufficiently useful that we
> should add functions to Emacs to do it, and document them?

Well, these sort of operations are sufficiently obscure that one
should add functions for them, I think.  The exact format of the match
data is more or less an implementation detail.  The core manipulation
used here strongly depends on those internals.

So even if it is not used that often, it leaves a bad feeling if some
code outside of the core of Emacs is required for doing this sort of
manipulation.

-- 
David Kastrup