Re: Why is it not possible to use "nil" any more in init files ?

[Alexandre Oberlin]

Thanks Phillip for your answer.

You wrote:
> > From my perspective, most people who write
> (hated-mode nil)
> are likely to be able to work out what is happening, while someone who
> accidentally writes
> (wanted-mode)
> and later
> (wanted-mode)
> has a more pernicuous problem.

So the toggling functions have been broken too!? Anyway I’d say most such  
users don’t write, they just click/touch.

Now do you mean that for emacs developers too, unlearned user mistakes  
driven interfacing has become the guiding principle? I use *n?x systems  
because I preferred to learn a few things from the start and then know  
what happens and get what I want. Now this is more and more difficult as  
the (supposed) average behaviour of occasional users rules (and constantly  
changes, as well as its perception by new developers). Users who need to  
work productively are getting nervous because they don’t have time to  
spend playing with their configurations at each new release of any piece  
of software. Breaking backward compatibility had always been a NONO, even  
at Microsoft.

IMHO this "intuitive" paradigm is OK for phones/tablets, at least if some  
consensus can be found. And we all know that casual users will more and  
more use phones/tablets, not computers any more. As for the more motivated  
users, they should rather be helped with some good principles and  
tutorials, and not the developers adapt to their initial shortcomings.

Cheers,


Alexandre



On Tue, 25 Nov 2014 14:50:22 +0100, Phillip Lord  
<phillip.lord@newcastle.ac.uk> wrote:

> Clearly, if the interface has changed it runs the risk of breaking some
> statements which were previously fulfilling the programmers intent.
> This, of course, is irritating for those affected, but that doesn't make
> it wrong.
>
> > From my perspective, most people who write
>
> (hated-mode nil)
>
> are likely to be able to work out what is happening, while someone who
> accidentally writes
>
> (wanted-mode)
>
> and later
>
> (wanted-mode)
>
> has a more pernicuous problem.
>
> I always used
>
> (hated-mode 0)
>
> which seems to be more intuitive than passing nil. Perhaps this is why
> the change did not irritate me.
>
>
> Alexandre Oberlin <email_via_web@migo.info> writes:
>
> > Thanks Stefan for this explanation. So IIUC that trick broke some  
> > correct
> > .emacs in order to magically fix some broken ones?
> >
> > Alexandre
> >
> >
> > On Sat, 22 Nov 2014 15:37:04 +0100, Stefan Monnier  
> > <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca>
> > wrote:
> >
> > > > I know that departing from proven approaches for no sensible reason  
> > > > is top
> > > > of the art but is there any kind of other rationale to make the thing  
> > > > not
> > > > backward-compatible?
> > >
> > > Of course, there's a reason: All minor modes since Emacs-23 (IIRC)
> > > should turn themselves ON when called with a nil argument, so you don't
> > > need turn-on-FOO-mode and you can just say:
> > >
> > >    (add-hook 'bar-mode-hook 'foo-mode)
> > >
> > > The better part of this incompatible change is that it silently *fixed*
> > > many people's .emacs since many people already used:
> > >
> > >    (add-hook 'bar-mode-hook 'foo-mode)
> > >
> > > without realizing that this could actually turn the mode OFF in
> > > some cases.
> > >
> > >
> > >         Stefan
> >
> >
> > --


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