GNU bug report logs -
#26181
Remove etags
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Reported by: Glenn Morris <rgm <at> gnu.org>
Date: Sun, 19 Mar 2017 23:16:01 UTC
Severity: wishlist
Tags: wontfix
Found in version 25.2
Done: Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi <at> gnus.org>
Bug is archived. No further changes may be made.
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(Sun, 19 Mar 2017 23:16:01 GMT)
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Message #3 received at submit <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):
Package: emacs
Severity: wishlist
Version: 25.2
I've never understood why Emacs includes a tags program.
It's not part of the normal remit of a text editor.
This was previously discussed:
http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2007-01/msg00075.html
It sounds like the answer is "historical reasons".
The situation has changed since then in that etags no longer has a
maintainer (IIUC).
I would like to suggest removing etags so that the time saved can be
spent on other things.
Having our own tags program means we can tweak it to work better for our
own code; but conversely it would be better if our code Just Worked with
standard (ie external) tools.
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(Mon, 20 Mar 2017 18:41:02 GMT)
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Message #6 received at 26181 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):
> From: Glenn Morris <rgm <at> gnu.org>
> Date: Sun, 19 Mar 2017 19:15:18 -0400
>
> I would like to suggest removing etags so that the time saved can be
> spent on other things.
What is considered a replacement? The two I know about, GNU Global
and Exuberant ctags, don't have support for some of the languages we
support in etags (e.g., Ada). And Exuberant ctags seems not to be
developed anymore(?).
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(Mon, 20 Mar 2017 20:36:04 GMT)
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Message #9 received at 26181 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):
Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org> writes:
> And Exuberant ctags seems not to be developed anymore(?).
There is an effort to continue development.
https://github.com/universal-ctags/ctags
-ap
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(Tue, 21 Mar 2017 09:04:02 GMT)
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Message #12 received at 26181 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):
On 20.03.2017 01:15, Glenn Morris wrote:
> I've never understood why Emacs includes a tags program.
> It's not part of the normal remit of a text editor.
FWIW, it has been handy when we introduced xref and started treating the
tags a bit more strictly.
> The situation has changed since then in that etags no longer has a
> maintainer (IIUC).
AFAIK Eli is the maintainer now. And it's handy to have for now, at
least until Universal Ctags is widely available across distributions,
handles all languages as well as etags does, and outputs correct entries
WRT implicit/explicit tag names (not 100% sure there is a problem, but
it's something that we had to fix in etags recently, at least).
Having all these conditions satisfied seems to be a .
> Having our own tags program means we can tweak it to work better for our
> own code; but conversely it would be better if our code Just Worked with
> standard (ie external) tools.
The latter might mean learning to use the ctags output (Vim format).
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(Tue, 21 Mar 2017 10:35:01 GMT)
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Message #15 received at 26181 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):
Dmitry Gutov:
>AFAIK Eli is the maintainer now. And it's handy to have for now, at
>least until Universal Ctags is widely available across distributions,
>handles all languages as well as etags does, and outputs correct entries
>WRT implicit/explicit tag names (not 100% sure there is a problem, but
>it's something that we had to fix in etags recently, at least).
I agree. Generally speaking, etags requires little maintenance, being
mature (sorry for not being able to provide even this little maintenance
any more). Certainly less than having to manage an external tool.
Glenn Morris:
>> Having our own tags program means we can tweak it to work better for our
>> own code; but conversely it would be better if our code Just Worked with
>> standard (ie external) tools.
>
>The latter might mean learning to use the ctags output (Vim format).
Only if the above conditions are satisfied, plus having the same amount
of information and not much bigger size.
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(Tue, 21 Mar 2017 15:43:02 GMT)
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Message #18 received at 26181 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):
> From: Dmitry Gutov <dgutov <at> yandex.ru>
> Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2017 11:03:24 +0200
>
> And [etags is] handy to have for now, at least until Universal Ctags
> is widely available across distributions
This indeed seems like the most important prerequisite, because the
command-line options accepted by Universal ctags are incompatible with
those of etags, so supporting both would be a pain.
> > Having our own tags program means we can tweak it to work better for our
> > own code; but conversely it would be better if our code Just Worked with
> > standard (ie external) tools.
>
> The latter might mean learning to use the ctags output (Vim format).
You mean, if we want to support tools beyond Universal ctags?
(Because the latter supports Emacs-compatible TAGS output.) Yes, if
we want to support other tools, we'd need to extend etags.el or rely
on external packages for parsing their tags tables. E.g. GNU Global
doesn't support TAGS format even as an option, AFAIK.
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(Tue, 21 Mar 2017 16:46:02 GMT)
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Message #21 received at 26181 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):
On 21.03.2017 17:42, Eli Zaretskii wrote:
>> The latter might mean learning to use the ctags output (Vim format).
>
> You mean, if we want to support tools beyond Universal ctags?
Not what I meant.
> (Because the latter supports Emacs-compatible TAGS output.)
It officially does, but if etags is no more, the TAGS format has no
reference implementation, and thus becomes less relevant and harder to
conform to.
The Vim tags format is clearly more important to a program like ctags,
so we might want to get to supporting that. It's also more rich, IIUC.
> Yes, if
> we want to support other tools, we'd need to extend etags.el or rely
> on external packages for parsing their tags tables. E.g. GNU Global
> doesn't support TAGS format even as an option, AFAIK.
True. For Global, I think the vast majority of code in etags.el becomes
irrelevant.
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(Wed, 29 Mar 2017 05:15:03 GMT)
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Message #24 received at 26181 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):
>>>>> "GM" == Glenn Morris <rgm <at> gnu.org> writes:
GM> I've never understood why Emacs includes a tags program. It's not part of
GM> the normal remit of a text editor.
That description applies to the majority of what Emacs has become today. :)
ctags is included because it's an auxiliary program to extend the ability of
Emacs to jump around code. That it's not implement in Emacs Lisp, or the C
core of Emacs itself, is really beside the point. For all intents and
purposes, it's part of what Emacs offers to the *user*, and I bet there are
many users who aren't even aware that it's a separate program.
GM> I would like to suggest removing etags so that the time saved can be spent
GM> on other things.
I appreciate your desire to optimize our project management burdens, but this
is better mentioned on emacs-devel than a bug report.
Removing etags will not increase the time spent on other things. You yourself
can ignore etags, and spend your time elsewhere, but as long as someone is
willing to keep working on etags, then by definition that is where they choose
to spend their time. I could take away the opportunity, certainly, but I can't
then allocate the time it would free up.
If no one is maintaining something, *and* no one is using it, that's the time
to consider deprecation and eventual removal.
--
John Wiegley GPG fingerprint = 4710 CF98 AF9B 327B B80F
http://newartisans.com 60E1 46C4 BD1A 7AC1 4BA2
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(Mon, 03 Apr 2017 20:55:02 GMT)
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Message #27 received at 26181 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):
PS I should have suggested this initially, but why not split it off into
a separate project from Emacs? Bundling unrelated packages into one
project is generally bad form.
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(Tue, 04 Apr 2017 16:21:01 GMT)
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Message #30 received at 26181 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):
[[[ To any NSA and FBI agents reading my email: please consider ]]]
[[[ whether defending the US Constitution against all enemies, ]]]
[[[ foreign or domestic, requires you to follow Snowden's example. ]]]
etags exists for Emacs.
--
Dr Richard Stallman
President, Free Software Foundation (gnu.org, fsf.org)
Internet Hall-of-Famer (internethalloffame.org)
Skype: No way! See stallman.org/skype.html.
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(Tue, 08 Feb 2022 06:28:02 GMT)
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Message #33 received at 26181 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):
Richard Stallman <rms <at> gnu.org> writes:
> etags exists for Emacs.
(I'm going through old bug reports that unfortunately weren't resolved
at the time.)
There didn't seem to be much enthusiasm from anybody in removing etags
from Emacs, so I'm therefore closing this bug report.
--
(domestic pets only, the antidote for overdose, milk.)
bloggy blog: http://lars.ingebrigtsen.no
Added tag(s) wontfix.
Request was from
Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi <at> gnus.org>
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(Tue, 08 Feb 2022 06:28:02 GMT)
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bug closed, send any further explanations to
26181 <at> debbugs.gnu.org and Glenn Morris <rgm <at> gnu.org>
Request was from
Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi <at> gnus.org>
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(Tue, 08 Feb 2022 06:28:02 GMT)
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bug archived.
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(Tue, 08 Mar 2022 12:24:15 GMT)
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This bug report was last modified 2 years and 50 days ago.
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