Re: Please do not deprecate perl-mode in favour of cperl-mode

[Paul W. Rankin]

On 2023-12-03 17:07, Eli Zaretskii wrote:
> > C Perl Mode has several quirks that make it behave unlike a normal 
> > Emacs
> > Major mode, including:
> >
> > - unorthodox code indentation
> > - behaviour of TAB on region does not perform indent-region
> > - use of specific faces instead of font-lock-* faces
>
> What if CPerl mode would optionally support the above as well?  Would
> it be acceptable then for you to switch?

I would love to take advantage of whatever CPerl Mode advantages exist 
if CPerl Mode could do the things that Perl Mode does. And I think it 
should be easy and clear to the user how to set these options.

Here's a minimal example of perl code that indents in a way I find 
unexpected in CPerl Mode (e.g. the trailing paren should line up with 
the start of the statement):

    $r->get(
        '/test'
       );


I also found weird behaviour with Electric Pair Mode; when point is at 
`|' here and `{' is inserted, I get `{|}}', which seems incorrect 
because it unbalances the braces (Perl Mode inserts `{|}'):

    $r->get(
        '/test',
        sub {
            |
        }
    );

One more thing...

CPerl Mode has a feature the applies the `underline' face to leading 
whitespace before point and there doesn't appear to be an option to 
disable this. It's not a huge thing, but Whitespace Mode provides this 
feature and it's just a weird addition to hardcode and not use something 
called `cperl-leading-whitespace-face'.

> > I don't wish to dampen the enthusiasm of the originator of this 
> > Perl->C
> > Perl idea, but I would implore you to please first address C Perl 
> > Mode's
> > shortcoming as a 1:1 replacement for Perl Mode before the
> > baby/bathwater? C Perl Mode should at least work as well as Perl Mode
> > before deprecation is considered.
>
> Deprecation doesn't mean removal.  Even obsolete packages are still
> available, and some of them will not be removed.  So if you insist on
> using Perl mode, you will be able to do so for the years to come, even
> if we deprecate and obsolete it.

This is cool. My opinion is that CPerl Mode is (currently) too weird and 
idiosyncratic to be Emacs's default mode for perl (e.g. what the heck is 
`cperl-hairy' or `cperl-fontify-m-as-s'?) and will likely lead to more 
confusion than productivity/joy. But maybe if someone wants to take a 
hard look at CPerl Mode from a user friendliness perspective?