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From: rbbb@RICE.EDU (David Chase)
Newsgroups: comp.emacs
Subject: Hard-coded uses of key bindings
Message-ID: <960.rbbb.titan@Rice>
Date: Thu, 4-Dec-86 23:22:21 EST
Article-I.D.: Rice.960.rbbb.titan
Posted: Thu Dec  4 23:22:21 1986
Date-Received: Fri, 5-Dec-86 20:49:57 EST
Sender: kjd@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Organization: The ARPA Internet
Lines: 42

If you are in a world where the key binding for "search-forward" is not a
constant, perhaps you should the big step of creating a variable called
"CTRL-S-EQUIVALENT", load terminal-dependent initialization files, and set
it to the CTRL-S equivalent sent by the various terminals.  Obviously, you
must use this variable in all code that expects to read a search character.

Several of us here (Rice graduate students) do this for the function key
maps on a Visual 200, Wyse 75, Sun 2, and IBM RT.  It simplifies life a
lot.

(enter dogma mode)

I must say that code depending upon key bindings has always seemed
phenomenally stupid and unportable to me.  MOST terminals (well, most
terminals that I have used since I stopped punching cards) have a plethora
of function keys, literal shitloads of them.  If you admit the possibility
of using a few prefixes (ESC, ^X, ^C are all good, because they are easy
to type), then there are more function keys then you would ever want to
use.  Now, I realize that it is handy to have all emacses use the same key
bindings so that I will feel immediately at home wherever I go, but 99% of
the time I am using a machine where I have a profile, using a familiar
terminal with a pile of function keys.  It seems that I should make things
as easy as possible in the usual case.  To me, function keys are easier
than control sequences (^X^C, ESC-v, ESC-^V, ^X^V) because there are fewer
keystrokes for me to type.  I realize that my fingers leave the home row
when I use function keys, but I am not exactly comfortable typing at
maximum speed when I type control sequences anyway.  If a terminal has
usurped ^S and ^Q, then I can live without them.  Meta keys are great, but
not all terminals that I use have meta keys so I cannot depend on them.

(leave dogma mode)

David

(reenter dogma mode)

and trailers are stupid, especially when the sender gets sleepy and
appends more than one.  If I wanted to read Zippy-isms, I would read Zippy
comics.  Let's have more subject lines like "freeze frame" (quality, not
quantity).  It's not like there is a line eater for the ends of messages.

(leave dogma mode again)