Re: Texinfo reputation

[Dr. Arne Babenhauserheide]

Max Nikulin <manikulin@gmail.com> writes:

> On 04/12/2024 01:51, Dr. Arne Babenhauserheide wrote:
>> info --usage <package>
>
> Certainly it is more convenient, but a more universal link is still
>
>     or available locally via: info '(coreutils) ls invocation'

That is pretty hard to memorize, so while it’s universal, it is
inconvenient (so many people won’t know it when they need it).

>> It nowadays also gives a useful answer when
>> looking for a non-existing manual:
>>      info NOTEXISTING
>>      info: No menu item 'NOTEXISTING' in node '(dir)Top'
>
> I prefer this behavior as well. It reminds me another recent thread
> however. "info git" renders the man page in my case.

That’s strange: it renders the Git User Manual for me (an infopage).

> Citations in the following
> message gives a fair summary of that discussion
> <https://lists.debian.org/msgid-search/Z0dZjysfE3HE2nJZ@tuxteam.de>

That boils down to "it’s nice but doesn’t always work". Which is a fair
criticism and something that would be great to address technically
(because it can be addressed that way).

>> You even get very fast full-text search through the manuals.
>
> I do not mind, but the real annoyance for new users is that key
> bindings do not match e.g. "less" ones for next match. Mouse support
> in tkinfo makes its usage significantly more intuitive.

Maybe it would be useful to borrow an idea from nano and show the most
important keybindings in the modeline — or initially in the echo area?

What comes to mind:

CTRL-s (search/next result)
N (next)
L (back)
U (up)
SPACE (scroll down)
< (start of manual)
D (directory of all manuals)

I think those are all I use.
(do you know more?)

Maybe alternatively a short list of common keybindings in the info help
manual (that’s pretty long right now, and it contains "please don’t
start skimming" on the third page).

>> And: info --usage git does not give the invocation page — because that
>> node is missing in the manual. That’s not a problem of texinfo, but an
>> indication that something may be missing:
>> Is there a linter for texinfo that remarks such problems?
>
> Perhaps it is possible to write TeX code that spits a warning/error at
> the end of the document when the "invocation" node is missed.

That would be such a linter, yes. And I think it would be pretty useful.

Best wishes,
Arne
-- 
Unpolitisch sein
heißt politisch sein,
ohne es zu merken.
draketo.de

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