RE: delete-selection-mode

[Drew Adams]

> > Is this true even when the region has been activated by 
> > keyboard commands? If so, perhaps it is a bug.  Perhaps
> > the feature should only apply when you make the region
> > using the mouse.
> 
> I think it should also apply when the region is made using the S-arrow
> keys, as that is another common way of making a region which we have
> provided for those same new users.
> 
> Personally I think that the traditional Emacs way of setting 
> mark should have neither delete-selection nor transient-mark
> by default. 

Please, don't even think about messing with d-s-mode or t-m-mode.

Don't change the default behavior to d-s-mode, if you don't want to.

But do not - please do NOT - change the behavior of d-s-mode (or t-m-mode).
 
> The reason is that Emacs has two distinct uses for the mark -
> as a mark, and as one end of the region.

No, no, no. The mark is *ALWAYS* one of the region. By definition.

Yes, the text within the region is not always used, for some uses of the mark -
e.g. navigation. Yes, there are different uses of the region and the mark.

And yes, for purely navigational uses (e.g. jumping to the mark or a previous
mark position) you sometimes do not need or want the region to be active.

> Transient-mark-mode and delete-selection-mode really
> only apply when the mark is used as one end of the region,

Which is always the case, by definition.

> and get in the way when the intention is to use the mark as a mark.

The region being active can get in the way when you don't want it to be active.
;-) Yes. And that is mainly when you are using the mark navigationally.

Most generalizations of the kind "you don't need the region to be active when"
are wrong _as generalizations_. When you select a sexp using `C-M-@', do you
want the region to be active? It all depends. (But generally, yes, I do.)