Re: mm-default-directory not honoured

[Adrian Lanz <lanz@wsl.ch>]

>>>>> On Tue, 05 Oct 2010 19:04:15 +0200
>>>>> Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen <larsi@gnus.org> writes:

    > Adrian Lanz <lanz@wsl.ch> writes:
    >> Since the last update of emacs_snapshot on debian/sid
    >> gnus-mime-save-part does not honour the mm-default-directory set
    >> in .gnus.el.

    > The code is:

    >     (setq file
    >           (read-file-name (or prompt
    > 			      (format "Save MIME part to (default %s): "
    > 				      (or filename "")))
    >                           (or mm-default-directory
    >                           default-directory)
    > 			  (or filename "")))

    > And it works for me.  Could the snapshot be old?

    
Don't think so. I have the snapshots of 01-OCT-2010 on two different
machines (32 Bit and 64 Bit). Same effect on both mchines.

If I instrument mm-save-part for debugging, the above function returns
the filename alone (without directory path). The function call is
(assuming mm-default-directory is "/my-dir/")

(read-file-name "save MIME part to (default foo.bar): " "/my-dir/"
"foo.bar")

and the variable file is "foo.bar". Shouldn't variable file be
"/my-dir/foo.bar"?


Afterwards in line

    (setq mm-default-directory (file-name-directory file))

(file-name-directory file) returns nil and mm-default-directory is set
to nil. Does it really work for you as expected?


BTW, now that I have a look into this code: as a user I never liked the
effect of this line (setq mm-default-directory (file-name-directory
file)).

I think, the user configured default place for saving mime parts
(mm-default-directory) should not be changed on the fly...


In my daily work, mm-default-directory is really the (quick and dirty
and fast and first) place, where I save all my attachments when reading
through the new mail. Later, when I start or continue to work on some
project, I get/copy/move the relevant documents from the
mm-default-directory into the project's directory tree.


From time to time, I save an attachments directly to some other place,
because I have time to do so, and/or because I want the file (only) at
that specific place. But with the above code, the default directory is
lost and all the following attachments get saved to this new
place. Often, I do not realise this immediately. I am getting upset a
couple of days or hours later, when I do not find the documents at the
usual place (mm-default-directory).

Of course, the implemented behaviour can be considered a feature. For
me, it would be nice to have a switch. Something like
"mm-default-directory-fixed" and t would mean do not change
mm-default-directory and nil would indicate the current implementation.

Cheers, Adrian.