RE: Usability suggestion : completion for M-:

[Drew Adams]

> > I said, "M-TAB or ESC TAB".
> 
> M-TAB is not an option in *most* of recent systems. And, honestly, who
> wants to complete with Esc-Tab ? Drew, could you please try to
> temporarily use *only* ESC-TAB, and tell us how usable you find it.

FYI, I have been using *only* ESC TAB "temporarily" for over 2 decades. I
guess I don't see a problem with it (for me), so far. ;-)

And as Ralf pointed out, you can use `C-M-i' as a chord alternative. 

What is so hard about these bindings? On my standard US PC keyboard, there
is only one key between ESC and TAB. It's true that C-M-i is a 3-key chord
that might require you to stretch a little or use two hands, but is this
really a big deal? 

Is it a big deal for _most_ people, so we should change the default?
(Individuals can always rebind keys.) I doubt it, or we would have changed
the binding long ago.

And I see from Emacs Wiki that you yourself have recently gone to the
trouble of, in effect, making TAB TAB complete a symbol (whenever the code
is already indented) - "using the second tab key press for what is bound to
Alt-Tab". If ESC TAB is so bothersome to you, is TAB TAB really that much
better? (Yes, I realize that your TAB TAB is configurable to do alternative
things, but that is what it seems to do out of the box.)

Why add a third binding for lisp-complete-symbol? Why take away the
possibility of using TAB for something more in line with its use for other
minibuffer input?

And, again, if a different or additional binding is needed for
lisp-complete-symbol, that pertains to Lisp modes generally, not
specifically to M-:.