Re: Using "Emacs Configure" **and** modifying .emacs

[John Mastro]

Drew Adams <drew.adams@oracle.com> wrote:
>> You could therefore use `customize-set-variable', but my
>> preference is generally to view the variable's definition,
>> see whether a custom setter is defined, and
>> decide if I need to do anything about it.
>
> That's fine.  Extra work, in general, but it shouldn't hurt,
> at least not in the short term.
>
> Not sure why you would prefer that, but it sounds like it is so
> that if you find you can get away with `setq' in some case then
> you prefer to use that.  Is that it?

To be honest, I suppose I just find the whole customize mechanism a bit
ugly. If I need to e.g. call a function to recompute some things after
setting a variable, I'd rather do that directly.

Of course it doesn't generally make sense to give much weight to such a
vague aesthetic concern, but in this case it's cost me very little so
far to humor myself.

> And what if the library changes the `:set' function and you
> upgrade?  I'm not being facetious - I really don't see the
> advantage/motivation.

Something in my configuration would break and eventually I'd realize it
and fix it :)

It's obviously a valid concern, but in practice it's never been an issue
in the 6-7 years I've been using Emacs so far. That's not very long
relative to Emacs, so I admit my practice is likely to allow some sort
of problem at some point.

        John