Re: Can we make set_point_both less expensive?

[Yuri Khan]

On Tue, Mar 17, 2015 at 8:29 PM, Richard Stallman <address@hidden> wrote:

> The reason I implemented 'intangible' was for the sake of editing
> forms.  A form has fields to be edited, and fixed text that shouldn't
> be changed.  But there is no need to put point within the fixed text;
> allowing that seems ugly.

There are in fact plenty of reasons to be able to move point all over
the form. Off the top of my head:

* The user might want to mark and copy some part of the form text.
* The user might want to look up some words of the form text in a dictionary.
* The user might want parts of the form text spoken aloud or displayed
on a Braille terminal.
* Moving the point only through the form fields feels unpredictable;
the user feels out of control.

There is nothing wrong in preventing modification of the form text,
though. There can be convenience bindings such as TAB and S-TAB to
move between fields, SPC and S-SPC to scroll by page, RET to activate
hyperlinks, and SPC and RET to activate buttons.

> 'intangible' did not turn out to be a very good implementation
> of this.  Can anyone do a better job?

The Customize system looks like a working real life example of a form,
but it does not prevent moving the point outside the fields. Does that
mean the original problem 'intangible' was intended to solve is
already solved in a better way?