Change default behavior of gnus-summary-pipe-output?

Change default behavior of gnus-summary-pipe-output?

[Eric Abrahamsen]

Hi all,

There was a bug report recently about the behavior of the output-to-pipe
article command in Gnus (bound to "|"), which by default sends the
treated article to the pipe/process, not the raw article. This was
breaking the direct application of some git patches, because the
treatment was inserting newlines where they didn't belong.

The solution[0] was to use the symbolic prefix "M-i r" before running
the "|" command. That switches to sending the raw article instead. This
is the only article output command that allows the user to toggle
raw/treated.

It seems like piping the raw article should be the default, instead.
That ought to reduce the likelihood that users would run into the
symbolic prefix, too, which I have to assume many people don't know
about and don't use.

So my survey is two part:

1. What do you think about changing the default behavior of the output
to pipe command to use the raw article?
2. How many of you are aware of Gnus' symbolic prefixes, and make use of
them? Looks like only 11 commands use it, mostly around sorting groups,
and a couple of scoring commands.

Thanks!
Eric


[0] https://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=66450#8

Re: Change default behavior of gnus-summary-pipe-output?

[Eric S Fraga]

On Tuesday, 17 Oct 2023 at 09:59, Eric Abrahamsen wrote:
> 1. What do you think about changing the default behavior of the output
> to pipe command to use the raw article?

I would have no problem with changing the default.  I seldom use the
pipe command so I might not be the most appropriate person to vote on
this, mind you.

> 2. How many of you are aware of Gnus' symbolic prefixes, and make use of
> them?

Not aware at all (and I'm not sure I understand the documentation on the
M-i key binding).

-- 
Eric S Fraga via gnus (Emacs 30.0.50 2023-09-14) on Debian 12.1

Re: Change default behavior of gnus-summary-pipe-output?

[Stephen Berman]

On Tue, 17 Oct 2023 18:15:09 +0100 Eric S Fraga <e.fraga@ucl.ac.uk> wrote:

> On Tuesday, 17 Oct 2023 at 09:59, Eric Abrahamsen wrote:
>> 1. What do you think about changing the default behavior of the output
>> to pipe command to use the raw article?
>
> I would have no problem with changing the default.  I seldom use the
> pipe command so I might not be the most appropriate person to vote on
> this, mind you.
>
>> 2. How many of you are aware of Gnus' symbolic prefixes, and make use of
>> them?
>
> Not aware at all (and I'm not sure I understand the documentation on the
> M-i key binding).

The doc string is rather uninformative, but the manual explains it:
(info "(gnus) Symbolic Prefixes").

Steve Berman

Re: Change default behavior of gnus-summary-pipe-output?

[Eric Abrahamsen]

Eric S Fraga <e.fraga@ucl.ac.uk> writes:

> On Tuesday, 17 Oct 2023 at 09:59, Eric Abrahamsen wrote:
>> 1. What do you think about changing the default behavior of the output
>> to pipe command to use the raw article?
>
> I would have no problem with changing the default.  I seldom use the
> pipe command so I might not be the most appropriate person to vote on
> this, mind you.

All data is good data!

>> 2. How many of you are aware of Gnus' symbolic prefixes, and make use of
>> them?
>
> Not aware at all (and I'm not sure I understand the documentation on the
> M-i key binding).

I think the issue was that, for many Gnus commands, the numerical prefix
is used up selecting a number of groups/articles from point. That means
there's no good mechanism for doing what the prefix argument usually is
for, which is "make this command behave a little differently". So the
"symbolic prefix" is for that: in addition to putting in a numerical
prefix, you can put in a symbolic prefix (one character) which can then
make the command behave differently.

I think in the rest of the Emacs world, packages with complex command
invocation are resolving them with things like transient or hydra. But
Gnus has always had its own thing (usually a decade before anyone else)!

Eric

Re: Change default behavior of gnus-summary-pipe-output?

[Eric S Fraga]

Thank you Eric for a great explanation (and to Stephen for pointing me
to the info manual).  It makes sense as does your comment about the rest
of the Emacs world using hydras and the like.
-- 
Eric S Fraga via gnus (Emacs 30.0.50 2023-09-14) on Debian 12.1

Re: Change default behavior of gnus-summary-pipe-output?

[Dan Christensen]

On Oct 17, 2023, Eric Abrahamsen <eric@ericabrahamsen.net> wrote:

> 1. What do you think about changing the default behavior of the output
> to pipe command to use the raw article?

I think it would be better to change the default.

> 2. How many of you are aware of Gnus' symbolic prefixes, and make use of
> them? Looks like only 11 commands use it, mostly around sorting groups,
> and a couple of scoring commands.

I'm aware of them, but have rarely used them.

Dan