Re: messages while the minibuffer is active

[Miles Bader]

Ok, here's a patch the implements `non-destructive messages' while the
minibuffer is active.

I ended up doing it the opposite way from what was discussed before --
instead of appending messages to the minibuffer, I changed the message
routines to *prepend* the minibuffer contents (plus brackets &c]) to the
echo-area buffer when appropriate.  So it's really still just showing
messages in the echo-area by themselves, but they *look* like they're
appended to the minibuffer.

This was quite easy to implement, and leverages existing mechanisms
pretty well, I think.  For instance, the timeout stuff (to re-show the
minibuffer after a message has been displayed for a while) was already
there.  It also seems to deal properly with multibyte issues, although
you can never really tell with that stuff...

The only other thing needed is a user-settable variable to turn it on/off.
Any suggestions for names?
[something like `minibuffer-append-messages-while-active' seems
accurate, but rather long.]

-Miles

minibuf-msgs-1.patch
Description: Patch for non-destructive minibuffer messages