GNU bug report logs - #80143
[PATCH v1] display-time: Add option to customize help echo format

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Message #5 received at submit <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: "Jacob S. Gordon" <jacob.as.gordon <at> gmail.com>
To: bug-gnu-emacs <at> gnu.org
Subject: [PATCH v1] display-time: Add option to customize help echo format
Date: Wed, 07 Jan 2026 00:54:34 -0500

[Message part 1 (text/plain, inline)]

Tags: patch

Hey everyone,

Please find a small patch attached that makes the ‘display-time’ help
echo format a user option (‘display-time-help-echo-format’).

[v1-0001-display-time-Add-option-to-customize-help-echo-format.patch (text/patch, attachment)]

[Message part 3 (text/plain, inline)]

Best,

-- 
Jacob S. Gordon
jacob.as.gordon <at> gmail.com
Please avoid sending me HTML emails and MS Office documents.
https://useplaintext.email/#etiquette

Message #8 received at 80143 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org>
To: "Jacob S. Gordon" <jacob.as.gordon <at> gmail.com>
Cc: 80143 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: Re: bug#80143: [PATCH v1] display-time: Add option to customize help
 echo format
Date: Wed, 07 Jan 2026 15:06:51 +0200

> From: "Jacob S. Gordon" <jacob.as.gordon <at> gmail.com>
> Date: Wed, 07 Jan 2026 00:54:34 -0500
> 
> Please find a small patch attached that makes the ‘display-time’ help
> echo format a user option (‘display-time-help-echo-format’).

Thanks.

However, I wonder: do we really expect users of display-time to be
experts in strftime formats, in order to be able to customize the
display?

Would it perhaps make more sense to provide a user-friendlier
customization facility, whereby the user could choose the individual
%-specs and their order, and Emacs would then concatenate them to the
complete string?  Or at the very least have a few popular pre-cooked
format strings with suitable descriptions, with arbitrary string just
the last resort?

Message #11 received at 80143 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: "Jacob S. Gordon" <jacob.as.gordon <at> gmail.com>
To: Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org>
Cc: 80143 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: bug#80143: [PATCH v2] display-time: Add option to customize help echo
 format
Date: Wed, 7 Jan 2026 17:03:30 -0500

[Message part 1 (text/plain, inline)]

Subject: [PATCH v2] display-time: Add option to customize help echo format

On 2026-01-07 08:06, Eli Zaretskii wrote:
> Would it perhaps make more sense to provide a user-friendlier
> customization facility, whereby the user could choose the individual
> %-specs and their order, and Emacs would then concatenate them to
> the complete string?

That’s a good idea, and might be nice in some other places too.  In v2
one of the customization options is to build a list from some common
building blocks and strings.

> Or at the very least have a few popular pre-cooked format strings
> with suitable descriptions, with arbitrary string just the last
> resort?

I’ve added a few hard-coded choices in v2 as well:

| format       | example                   |
|--------------+---------------------------|
| %a %b %e, %Y | Thu Jan  1, 1970          |
| %A %B %e, %Y | Thursday January  1, 1970 |
| %F (%a)      | 1970-01-01 (Thu)          |
| %F (%A)      | 1970-01-01 (Thursday)     |
| %D (%a)      | 01/01/70 (Thu)            |
| %D (%A)      | 01/01/70 (Thursday)       |
#+TBLFM: $2='(format-time-string $1 0 "UTC")

Best,

-- 
Jacob S. Gordon
jacob.as.gordon <at> gmail.com
Please avoid sending me HTML emails and MS Office documents.
https://useplaintext.email/#etiquette

[v2-0001-display-time-Add-option-to-customize-help-echo-format.patch (text/x-patch, attachment)]

Message #14 received at 80143 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: "Jacob S. Gordon" <jacob.as.gordon <at> gmail.com>
To: Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org>
Cc: 80143 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: Re: bug#80143: [PATCH v2] display-time: Add option to customize help
 echo format
Date: Wed, 7 Jan 2026 18:45:23 -0500

On 2026-01-07 17:03, Jacob S. Gordon wrote:
> On 2026-01-07 08:06, Eli Zaretskii wrote:
>> Would it perhaps make more sense to provide a user-friendlier
>> customization facility, whereby the user could choose the
>> individual %-specs and their order, and Emacs would then
>> concatenate them to the complete string?
> 
> That’s a good idea, and might be nice in some other places too.

After some more thought, it could be useful to have ‘format’ /
‘format-spec’ / ‘format-time’ customization widgets that:

+ have a ‘repeat’-like list interface with ‘[INS]/[DEL]’, but
  concatenate to strings instead,

  + this helps avoid multi-typed options (e.g., string or list of
    strings) and logic when trying to use them,

+ each list element can be a string, or chosen from a list of specs,

+ the specs can be labelled according to some provided data, and the
  full format string can be previewed with the same data.

For example:

  :type '(format-time :data '(0 "UTC"))

could yield entries in the menu to build up the string:

      ‘ 1’ (‘%e’)
     ‘Jan’ (‘%b’)
    ‘1970’ (‘%Y’)
          ⋮
  ‘String’

and the string could be previewed as:

  ‘Jan  1, 1970’ (‘%b %e, %Y’)

-- 
Jacob S. Gordon
jacob.as.gordon <at> gmail.com
Please avoid sending me HTML emails and MS Office documents.
https://useplaintext.email/#etiquette

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