Re: Suggestion for "file" mail-backend (was Re: nov and procmail compatability?)

[Kai.Grossjohann@CS.Uni-Dortmund.DE (Kai Großjohann)]

Harry Putnam <reader@newsguy.com> writes:

> Do whatever customizing thing it is and write it to that file.  As Per
> says the whole mass of what emacs knows as done in customize is
> written to the file too.  But with some care you can pick out the new
> stuff, and transfer it wherever.   This is a good technique for elisp
> impaired users, to see what the code is supposed to look like.

Please do not advise people to use copy and paste on Custom-generated
Lisp code.  This might easily lead to people having more than one
custom-set-variables statement, and down that path lies madness.

Explanation of madness:  Suppose you have two custom-set-variables
statements in ~/.emacs, and the second (!) sets some variable foo.
Suppose you use Customize to change that variable, then save your
changes.  Customize will write all variable settings to the first
custom-set-variables statement.  Then, you start Emacs.  The two
custom-set-variables statements are executed, and the second one
wins.

What's the net effect?  You have used Customize to change a variable,
and it didn't work!

Yes, the implementation of Customize should probably be improved, but
right now, that's just the way it is.

kai
-- 
I like BOTH kinds of music.