Re: Inhibiting read-only

[Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen]

Stefan Monnier <address@hidden> writes:

> LMI> I'd like to make the eww buffers read-only, but leave text input
> LMI> fields editable.  (And then do processing of the alterations with
> LMI> `insert-behind-hooks' or `after-change-functions'.)
>> That sounds like how the Customize buffers work, yes?
>
> Exactly, they set buffer-read-only to nil but then use
> a before-change-function to signal an error when trying to modify
> a non-text-widget area.

I like `read-only' buffers -- they have an obvious interface.  If the
user decides to switch read-only off (which I sometimes do in otherwise
non-editable buffers) to do some weird ad-hoc editing, there's a
standard, convenient key-stroke for that.

So if there were a `inhibit-read-only' text property, we could avoid
doing all these tricks with `before-change-function' and the like -- we
could just make the buffer read-only, put the text property on the bits
that aren't read-only, and we'd be done.  And there would be less user
confusion.

I can have a go at implementing this if it sounds like a workable idea,
although that part of the code is completely unfamiliar to me...

-- 
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  bloggy blog http://lars.ingebrigtsen.no/