Coding Emacs's M-x in Lisp

[keyist]

http://aaronhawley.livejournal.com/26901.html

[aerique]

I don't know about anything Emacs internals but what a strange remark: "I recently wanted to change how `M-x' works. The command behind it is called `execute-extended-command'. It is written in C. This is disappointing for my desires to tinker, but not all together surprising either. It is a pretty central piece of the Emacs infrastructure."

It being a central piece of infrastructure I would expect it to be written in a higher level language for better maintainability.

[alextp → aerique]

But since it is a pretty stable and simple structure it is written in a lower level language for either stability or performance or opacity.

[jrandom]

    (if (and (not (null suggest-key-bindings))

My C-oriented brain screams bloody murder at this. (I still want to learn Clojure.)

[shaunxcode → jrandom]

It's because you are missing the other part of the and

  (if (and (not (null suggest-key-bindings))
           (null executing-kbd-macro)) 

  if(not(null(suggest-key-bindings)) && null(executing-kbd-macro))

Does that help?

[jrandom → shaunxcode]

No. I mean, I understand it just fine, I just hate the structure of it. Something about it causes revulsion, something that would probably go away if I actually sat down and learned lisp.

[shaunxcode → jrandom]

you'll end up with the inverse problem when you go back to infix notation though - be warned! when I see func(arg) I feel like I am on the inside of a star fruit.