Re: find-directory-p always returns nil in locate-mode on windows xp

[Luc Teirlinck]

Peter Breton wrote:

   Apparently, the "w" command
   (dired-copy-filename-as-kill, in dired-x) does not
   behave properly in locate-mode when the
   default-directory is not set to "/". This is probably
   a bug in dired-x, but it seems easier to just set the
   default-directory than to go through all the dired
   functions again.

`dired-copy-filename-as-kill' is now (latest CVS) part of dired, that
is, defined in dired.el.  With me, "w" seems to work the same
regardless of the value of default-directory.  Maybe a lot of the
behavior in the *Locate* buffer could depend on the version of locate
one is using.

[bash2.05b.0 ~ 3 1] locate --version
Secure Locate 2.6 - Released May 21, 2001
[bash2.05b.0 ~ 3 2] type -a locate
locate is /usr/bin/locate
locate is /usr/bin/locate

But /usr/bin/locate is just a symlink to /usr/bin/slocate

My *Locate* buffer after M-x locate RET compdir looks like:

------------------------------------------------------------
Matches for compdir:

    /home/teirllm/compdir
    /home/teirllm/compdir/goodCVS
    /home/teirllm/compdir/gogoCVS
    /home/teirllm/compdir/VCS
    /home/teirllm/compdir/blabla
    /home/teirllm/compdir/blabla~

  /home/teirllm/compdir:
  blabla
  blabla~
  gogoCVS
-------------------------------------------------------------

Those last four lines were obtained by doing "i" on
/home/teirllm/compdir.
The one difference I get when setting default-directory to, say,
 ~/ (/home/teirllm/) is that then "i" at that same place yields:

dired-insert-subdir: Attempt to insert a non-directory:
/home/teirllm/home/teirllm/compdir/

I am not desperate for being able to use "i" in the *Locate* buffer,
but that last error message clearly seems to suggest that setting
default-directory to something other than "/" might produce other
trouble, even if I can not immediately find any examples other than
"i".

But for "w" it does not make any difference.
"w" on, say, the first line produces
home/teirllm/compdir , that is the file name minus the leading slash,
regardless of the value of default-directory.  If some function tries
to _expand_ the obtained name using default-directory, then that is
where you want default-directory to be "/".

Note that "i" does not seem to work very well, _even_ if
default-directory is "/".  It somehow did not list "goodCVS" and 
"VCS".  This is strange.  But I am not desperate to use "i" in
*Locate* buffers.

(If you wonder about all these strange names, compdir is just a
directory I only used to debug some problems in directory name
completion and never deleted.)

Sincerely,

Luc.