This is the mail archive of the
cygwin-apps
mailing list for the Cygwin project.
Re: RFE: Cygw32 GNU Emacs Port
Though just a cygwin user, I use emacs extensively. I would like to
say that I agree with cfg's ideas to make a test package and let it
have a try out. I'm willing to do so. From a strictly user's
viewpoint, emacs should behave the same, only faster and consume less
resources if they don't have to load X11 packages as well, I would
venture.
On Tue, Oct 9, 2012 at 8:16 PM, Daniel Colascione <dancol@dancol.org> wrote:
> On 10/9/12 7:45 PM, Ken Brown wrote:
>> [Redirecting from cygwin to cygwin-apps.]
>
> I sent it to the Cygwin list because the last Emacs thread --- the one
> about mouse support --- was on that list. I thought -apps was for
> release management and such, not general discussion. Apologies.
>
>> It would be easy enough for me to do, assuming it builds without a
>> problem. But I have a couple of qualms about it:
>>
>> 1. This strikes me as going against the spirit of Cygwin, which tries
>> to emulate Linux. Why shouldn't users who want a GUI version of emacs
>> just use emacs-X11, as they would on Linux?
>
> If I wanted to emulate Linux, I'd run VirtualBox. The entire point of
> using Cygwin is to *integrate*, to the greatest extent possible, tools
> from POSIXland into Windows. Making that integration work better has
> been a common theme of everything I've done --- winln, injob, assorted
> other things (including a readline-based PowerShell host), and now
> cygw32 Emacs. I don't think the goal of Cygwin should be to become
> reincarnated POSIX subsystem that, although it might run on the same
> kernel as the Win32 GUI stuff, can't interact with regular Windows
> applications.
>
>> We don't provide Win32 versions of other X11 programs as far as I know.
>
> That's true, but only because most programs don't have a Win32 mode
> that works under Cygwin. There's also precedent in mintty, which we
> provide so that users don't have to run an X11 terminal emulator or
> use the deplorable built-in Windows conhost.
>
>> 2. Because there is so much Windows-specific code in it, I wouldn't
>> feel competent to support it if users have problems. I'm not at all
>> familiar with that kind of programming.
>
> The vast majority of the GUI code is identical to the NT-native Emacs
> port, which has a large userbase and which is well-supported. The
> Cygwin underpinnings are identical to the ones in regular Cygwin
> Emacs. I'll support the little bit of glue that sits between them. If
> I get hit by a bus, just yank the cygw32 port, and we'll be no worse
> off than we were before.
>