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Interlisp / medley

The main repo for the Medley Interlisp project. Wiki, Issues are here. Other repositories include maiko (the VM implementation) and Interlisp.github.io (web site sources)
https://Interlisp.org
MIT License
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Tedit prompt window messages: when should they be cleared? #1741

Open rmkaplan opened 6 months ago

rmkaplan commented 6 months ago

Tedit writes messages in its prompt window for various reasons--to ask for information from the user and to report the results of particular user actions.

It puts up an abort message, for example, when the user tries to type into a readonly document, error messages of various sorts when it can't complete an action (e.g. a move or copy when the source or destination aren't clear). It also reports what happened with hardcopy, get, and put.

Those messages tend to stay up even if they have become stale because otherwise unremarkable user actions have been successfully carried out, they are only cleared and replaced by a succeeding message.

So the question is, when should they be cleared out because they are no longer needed and perhaps even no longer accurate?

An easy thing to do would be to clear the prompt window whenever a new event is posted to TEdit's undo/redo history list. That happens pretty much every time something is done that changes the document--type/delete a character, change looks, put/get, insert, move, copy. Would that be too soon?

pamoroso commented 6 months ago

If the clearing is a result of changes the user directly initiates or has control over, clearing the prompt window whenever a new event is posted is adequate as the user has a chance to read any messages.