When I use darcs --help with darcs 2.x, I noticed that it automatically pipes output to the pager. I guess this was introduced to allow for an easier navigation of the help text, however from a usability point of view this is a setback as it introduces more annoyances than it helps. Scrolling back to see the output was not an issue even before (in Linux I used Shift-PgUp, Shift-PgDown to go through the text if it was not contained completely in the terminal window. I guess there are similar ways in other operating systems). One could even pipe the output to a pager if needed.
Now, one of the uses of --help is to recall some forgotten options or to find out new options that apply to a given command. As it was, the help output was still on the screen, even after darcs --help was done. I could easily scroll up/down and paste the necessary arguments in the command I was typing. With the new behavior, after I quit the pager, the help text is gone. If I need to lookup more options this way, I need to remember them all because once I close the pager they are no longer visible. While typing them in the command line, if for some reason I forgot one or I still need to consult the help output I can't do it and I have to erase the whole command and type darcs --help again, consult the output, memorize all the stuff and then go back to type the command all over again. IMO, from a usability point of view this is more cumbersome and annoying, with no extra added benefit. The previous behavior could easily emulate the current one by piping the output to a pager if needed, while the current one doesn't seem to be able to emulate the old one because it seems the pager cannot be disabled, or I could not find a way to do it. Can someone please enlighten me if there is a way to disable the pager, or if not could this behavior be revisited and if not reverted, at least provide a way to disable it? -- Dan _______________________________________________ darcs-users mailing list [email protected] http://lists.osuosl.org/mailman/listinfo/darcs-users
