Re: unclear documentation for directory-sep-char

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: David Kastrup <address@hidden>
> Date: 11 Jan 2003 16:00:54 +0100
> > 
> > If I understand correctly, you have two problems:
> > 
> >   - how to handle file names output by Windows programs
> >   - how to send commands with file names to a Windows shell
> > 
> > I believe the first one can be dealt with by running the file names
> > through expand-file-name, or, if that doesn't work, by simply
> > replacing ?\\ with ?/ conditioned on system-type being windows-nt.
> > 
> > The second problem can be solved by running the file names through
> > convert-standard-file-name.  On Posix systems it's a no-op, while on
> > Windows it will convert forward slashes to backslashes if the shell
> > in use requires that.
> >
> > If the above doesn't help,
> 
> The above helps.  Indeed it helps so much that it is a royal shame it
> is not mentioned in the doc string to directory-sep-char as a reason
> for its deprecation.  At the very least the doc should contain:
> 
> `directory-sep-char' has been deprecated because its support in many
> primitives was unreliable at best, and we see no cases that would not
> be better handled with `convert-standard-file-name' or
> `expand-file-name'.

I agree that the doc string of `directory-sep-char' should be
improved along the lines you suggest.