Re: Buffer names with R2L characters

[Stefan Monnier]

> the one that uses Arabic, copy/paste it into *scratch* in Emacs 24
> with bidi-display-reordering turned on, and replace every '<' and '>'
> there with either '-' (a number separator) or a digit.  The result is
> still unreadable gibberish, and in the case of digits it's even less
> readable.

Oh, yes, yuck.  Thanks for the explanation.

> And second, using text properties for overriding bidi properties is
> not a good idea at all, because bidi.c works below the level that pays
> attention to text properties.

I know.

> Bottom line, using the directional control characters is the best way
> of adapting the visual appearance to user expectations when displaying
> plain text.

OK.

>> Indeed, for the buffer names it seems perfectly acceptable since we
>> generate them ourselves and they don't go very far.  I'm not sure why
>> Eli doesn't like this solution.
> I don't like the proliferation of directional marks that this will
> bring.  I hoped that we will need these directional control characters
> only very rarely.  These have problems on TTYs, and even in GUI
> sessions they are visible by default (as thin spaces), so they will
> disrupt the visual appearance and cursor motion.  We will need to have
> them everywhere, e.g. in the prompt displayed by read-buffer and in
> other places, if we want buffer names to look the same in all
> contexts.  But since this is the best available solution, I'm willing
> to try; maybe I'm wrong and the results will not be that bad after
> all.

We should make them display as nothing at all (but obey the
display-table, of course, so they can be made visible when needed).


        Stefan