RE: Feature request: dired-open-marked-files

[Drew Adams]

> > Dunno what's so controversial. I've always wondered, on the 
> > contrary, why the Dired X features are not loaded and made
> > available by default.
> 
> I've not examined them all in detail; let's just say that 
> some of them seem obviously useful and not dangerous, e.g.,
> `dired-jump' and `dired-do-find-marked-files' (I've seen the
> latter functionality requested several times recently on
> #emacs), whereas others seem less useful, and maybe don't
> merit a keybinding by default (e.g., `dired-man').
> `dired-vm-read-only-folders' probably shouldn't be there, as
> VM isn't distributed with emacs or really all that commonly
> used (and for a long time, didn't even officially support
> non-xemacs).
> 
> But I generally agree with you.  At the least, the split into 
> dired and dired-x seems arbitrary and deserves re-examination.

Now it sounds like we agree. There are some commands that I don't find useful
(for my own needs) - I'd add `dired-info' and `dired-rmail' to those you
mentioned, for instance. Dunno whether someone else might find such commands
useful.

Rather than having a predefined command (e.g. `dired-info', `dired-rmail') - let
alone a key, that just calls an Emacs function (e.g. `info' or `rmail') on the
current file (or the marked files), it might be good to have a key/command that
reads an Emacs function (even a lambda form) to apply to the file(s) - a la `!'
but for an Emacs function instead of a shell command.

The dired/dired-x split was long ago. Looking at the Commentary, it seems it was
not a split but just a decision not to merge dired-x into dired. Back then,
things like load time and memory might also have played a non-negligible role in
such decisions. (Meme combat for dired-aux.el.)