RE: Reference to ‘alist’ in Emacs Lisp Manual without previous explanation

[Drew Adams]

> > I am reading the Emacs Lisp Manual from beginning and
> > sequencially. Found reference to ‘alist’ in section 2.4.12 Hash Table
> > Type without any previous explanation.
> >
> > Either a brief summary should be provided before this, probably near
> > 2.4.6 Cons Cell and List Types or a cross-reference should be added.
> 
> If you are reading the manual in order, you should have read 2.4.6.3
> "Association List Type", where "alist" is explained, before you got to
> 2.4.12.  How come you didn't see that?

Yes, "if".  Aside from whether Pankaj should have
seen that:

People don't necessarily (or even often) read manuals
"in order".

Even when they do, it can help to put important terms
in a glossary, and add links from the glossary to
topics that also define, or otherwise expand on the
terms.

The Emacs manual has a glossary (`g glossary'), but
the Elisp manual doesn't.  It could have one too.

Links from occurrences to glossary entries (or if
no glossary, to a defining topic) can help.  E.g.,
put a glossary link on the first occurrence of a
term in a given topic, especially if understanding
the term is important to understanding that topic.