Re: message's docstring

[Juanma Barranquero]

On 11/12/06, David Kastrup <address@hidden> wrote:

> We should not try accommodating obvious bugs, but rather fix them.  Do
> you have any instances where the return value of `message' would
> actually get used without `message' being confused for `format'?

The one that prompted me to look: in server.el there are cases like

 (server-log (message "Restarting server"))

to avoid

 (message "Restarting server")
 (server-log "Restarting server")

or a `let'. Not earthshaking, but useful.

But, as I said, the intended return of the message in `message' is
*quite* intentional:

 if (NILP (args[0])
     || (STRINGP (args[0])
          && SBYTES (args[0]) == 0))
   {
     message (0);
     return args[0];
   }
 else
   {
     register Lisp_Object val;
     val = Fformat (nargs, args);
     message3 (val, SBYTES (val), STRING_MULTIBYTE (val));
     return val;
   }

I vote for keeping it and documenting it. Is a one-line in the
docstring, and the current behavior is at least fifteen years old.

                   /L/e/k/t/u