Re: lynx-dev jumping out? - 'J' Shortcut files

[Klaus Weide]

On Thu, 1 Apr 1999, Philip Webb wrote:

> 990401 LP & KW debated the meaning/use of jumps files:
> 
> may i start a hare? -- ok, i know March has ended (smile) --
> isn't the whole jumps-file business a piece of antediluviana,
> which would be better dropped from present-day Lynx?

Actually, now that I've played a bit more with it, I can see that it's
useful.

1) It's useful for building menu systems for very inexperiences users
   (including people who have never touched a computer).  It's easier
   to say "press the 'j' key, then type in 'help', then press the ENTER
   key", rather than first teaching folks how to navigate among documents
   ( <- and -> ARE a bit surprising at first).

2) I find it useful also for myself (now that I've finally gone through
   the troube of creating some shortcut file - not that it's THAT
   difficult).  I have defined some shortcuts I can easily remember.
   I can now access some links (and lynxprog: actions) more quickly
   than would be possible if I collected them in a special page
   (bookmarks file, Index file, or similar).  It saves the intermediate
   steps (load special page, find link, navigate to it) that interrupt
   the flow of browsing more than necessary (and also push at least
   one doc out of the cache).

So I find shotcut files are a valuable feature.  They just aren't well
documented in the User Guide, but lynx.cfg and the sample file have
enough info to set everything up.  (There should be some notes on
the syntax for specifying files though, especially since it gets more
nonobvious for non-Unix systems.)

So Philip, try it before you dump it.  Of course if you had a patch
to make compilation optional, I guess that would be welcomed.

   Klaus