Re: [h-e-w] Annoying message in mini-buffer

[Richard M. Heiberger]

Thank you for the information.  I will look at 21.2 as soon as the
windows precompiled version is available.

Since there is no official way to turn the echos off, let me propose
a uniform way to do so.  This is based on my set of functions.

First, I attempted to design my functions for general use.
For example, I use the same name dired-help-echo for the toggle function
and for the variable that controls the function.

Second, the general policy for emacs has been (I believe) to make new
features available and to allow users the option to revert to the previous
status should they choose to.  I, and from the mail, others as well,
prefer not to have the echos always on.

A single function that controlled all echos might have a syntax similar to
(defun echo-toggle (&rest args) .... )
and be used like this
(echo-toggle 'buff-menu nil 'dired nil 'help t)

The argument for turning off the echos is to minimize user confusion.
When I first wrote the list about this 6 months ago, I was confused
because messages that I needed to see were covered by the echos.
Moving the mouse is not a satisfactory solution, as that already
requires the knowledge that the mouse position is responsible for hiding
the messages.  In emacs 20 and the earlier 21.0.something releases, messages
were always visible.  Then when the echos were turned on the messages
ceased being visible unless the user was advanced enough to figure out why.
I would argue that echos off should be the default.

Rich