bjaspan@ATHENA.MIT.EDU ("Barr3y Jaspan") (03/06/91)
My original question turned out to be a little vague, so I'll ask it a different way. If I ask for a doc string for a function that is not bound to any keys, it says to use M-x command. If, on the other hand, I ask for a doc string for a function that is bound to a meta-key sequence, like M-q, it says to use ESC key. ie: (substitute-command-keys "\\[rmail]") "M-x rmail" (substitute-command-keys "\\[fill-paragraph]") "ESC q" This is inconsistent behavior. Either the first one should be reported as "ESC x rmail" or the second should be "M-q". There is nothing inherently special about M-x; at least, there shouldn't be (it just happens to be a widely used default, and an excellent idea). Note that I am not really asking for a description of how the implementation happens to spit out M-x in one case and ESC in the other. I am asking a design question -- why are they reported differently? I don't think they should be; I think both should be reported as "M-whatever". The "meta key" is an abstraction; if your keyboard happens to have a key labelled "meta" or "alt" or "compose" or whatever, you can make it mean meta; if you don't, you can always use ESC and a synonym for meta. Whatever. Barr3y Jaspan, bjaspan@mit.edu