Re: how to use an external dir-locals file?

[Ted Zlatanov]

On Wed, 20 Mar 2013 18:13:42 -0400 Stefan Monnier <address@hidden> wrote: 

>> I have a dir-locals file which I don't want to call .dir-locals.el (it
>> should not be the default, I just use it for reindenting code in a
>> particular way).  How can I specify it when loading a file if it's not
>> even in the same directory?

SM> There's no such thing.  You might like to M-x report-emacs-bug the
SM> feature request, but please describe more precisely what it should look
SM> like (e.g. I could imagine a special file-local setting which says "use
SM> the settings from dir-locals file <foo>", but I'm not sure if having to
SM> add a file-local setting is good enough for you).

I can implement it, no need for a bug report.

I imagined simply doing a dynamic let-bind around the call initially,
but if it's going to be a feature, then I could make it easier to
associate a dir-locals override with a file (matched by name).  When
there's a match and the override file exists, we just short-circuit the
search for .dir-locals.el and look at the override file instead.  When
the override file doesn't exist, I think we should not look at
.dir-locals.el, but behave as if none were found.

Does that makes sense?  If yes I'll do it.  Or would you rather just see
a let-bind of `dir-locals-file-override' for example?  That would
certainly be easier to implement.

To answer the second question--we want to *reindent* with dir-locals,
but not make them active for everyone by default, as file-locals or in
`.dir-locals.el'.

Ted