| 1 | Date: Tue, 23 Feb 2199 21:03:50 -0600 |
| 2 | From: Karl Fogel <kfogel@floss.cyclic.com> |
| 3 | To: bug-gnu-emacs@prep.ai.mit.edu |
| 4 | Subject: M-x search-backward-in-time broken... |
| 5 | X-Windows: you'll envy the dead. |
| 6 | |
| 7 | In GNU Emacs 51.70.4 (i9986-unknown-linux-gnu, X toolkit) of Sat Feb 20 2199 on floss |
| 8 | configured using `configure --with-x-toolkit=yes' |
| 9 | |
| 10 | The `search-backward-in-time' function appears to be broken in |
| 11 | Emacs 51.70. |
| 12 | |
| 13 | Unfortunately, I can never seem to start the debugger early |
| 14 | enough to catch the error as it happens. However I have traced the |
| 15 | problem through source by eye, and it looks like `time-forward' can't |
| 16 | handle negative arguments anymore. This is consistent with other |
| 17 | symptoms: for example, `undo' (which since 51.25 has worked by passing |
| 18 | a negative arg to `time-forward') is also broken. However, `do' still |
| 19 | works -- it seems that `time-forward' continues to handle positive |
| 20 | arguments just fine. |
| 21 | |
| 22 | No one here-and-now can figure out how to fix the problem, |
| 23 | because the code for `time-forward' is so hairy. We're using M-x |
| 24 | report-future-emacs-bug to request that you folks include more |
| 25 | comments when you write it (sometime in 2198 as I recall). |
| 26 | |
| 27 | Thanks! |
| 28 | |
| 29 | -Karl Fogel <kfogel@red-bean.com> |
| 30 | |
| 31 | |
| 32 | P.S. You'll be pleased to know that since (time-forward N) still works |
| 33 | for N >= 0, we've used it to pre-emptively update configure.ac. |
| 34 | Emacs now configures and builds on every platform that will ever |
| 35 | be made. It wasn't easy, but at least that's one problem out of |
| 36 | the way for good. If you'd like the patch, just ask. |
| 37 | |