backup-enable-predicate docs & special treatment of /tmp inelegant

[Dan Jacobson]

info says:
   The default value of the `backup-enable-predicate' variable prevents
backup files being written for files in `/tmp'.

help says:
Predicate that looks at a file name and decides whether to make backups.
Called with an absolute file name as argument, it returns t to enable backup.

but both don't say to the basic user how to stop making /tmp a special
case.  Indeed, it is not as simple as (setq backup-enable-predicate t)
or whatever, so one wouldn't need to spend too much time in the lisp
manual to figure it out, if more advice were given up front. [What Dan
is trying to say here, but is embarrased to admit it, is he can't
figure it out [but didn't try too hard]].

Also is there still point to give /tmp special treatment these days of
bigger disks?  It seems quite inelegant, too OS specific, and often
users would get bitten if they occasionally dabble in /tmp.  Too much
a value judgment on emacs' part.  I recently edited a file on /tmp
expecting that I could do a "diff file file~ > changes" only to
discover that the removed lines were now totally gone from any grasp of
mine, now that I had quit emacs.  My safety net feeling after several
years of use was demolished.  True, one should remember that one is in
/tmp ... but how inelegant.

--------
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go up downloading lots of spam from ISP?
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