Re: Relative line numbering and current line

On Sat, Jun 01, 2013 at 01:13:56PM -0400, Grant Farnsworth wrote:
> I've been distressed by the direction the discussion on the addition
> of the absolute line number to the relative line number functionality
> has gone. More specifically, I don't see enough champions of relative
> numbering fighting to keep it useful and economical and I'm afraid the
> discussion with die before fixing the current state of things.
> Perhaps the problem is that relative number users are too small a
> minority to fight for themselves. The addition of the current
> absolute line number to relative line numbering is a serious usability
> regression for relative numbering and I would hate for it to make it
> into 7.4 as it is.

> >From what I can tell, the hasty discussion that added the absolute
> line number to the current relative line columns was motivated by the
> fact that leaving a zero there wastes two characters of screen space
> without any benefit besides looking nice and drawing the eye. Further
> argument is that some people don't have the line number in their
> statusline and may want to know what the current line number is with
> some frequency.

> 1. Taking line numbers out of the status line and ruler line is a
> choice the user can make, and one that I have to think a small number
> of people choose. They aren't forced not to know where they are in
> the file and can easily put that information in the status or ruler
> without any loss of functionality.

> 2. The current line number is not all that important a piece of
> information for a relative line number user. I jump around, copy
> blocks, and do many other things with relative line numbering
> constantly and I have never typed the number of my current line.
> That's what the dot is for. Knowing the line number of nearby lines
> could be useful, but that's one advantage of absolute line numbers
> that relative line number users choose to sacrifice.

> 3. Having that fat number in the numbering column increases its width.
> Instead of wasting two characters of space with a zero, we now waste
> one or two (or more) whole columns all the time and there is no way a
> relative line user can avoid this waste. Relative and absolute
> numbering are both useful, but I chose relative line numbering largely
> because it never occupies more than two columns of screen space while
> absolute numbers suck up way more (and take a different amount of
> space depending on where I am in the file).

> 4. I can live with poor aesthetics, especially if it provides really
> useful functionality, but adding a big fat absolute number to the
> column without any option to remove it is a major visual wart that
> doesn't add significant information or functionality.

> The discussion of how to solve this regression keeps getting shut down
> because people point out that Bram (again hastily, I think) said we
> don't need to provide options for everything, which many have
> interpreted has him being unwilling to fix this problem. But I think
> it is against the spirit of vim that we should remove useful
> functionality (non-wasteful relative line number functionality) that
> people depend on without at least giving them some backwards
> compatibility. I have a hard time imagining who would choose to have
> the absolute line number in that column after using it for a while.
> Those who do must be a small group indeed. The discussion should be
> about whether we want to add an additional option to include the
> current line number in order to benefit this small group, not whether
> or not we need to preserve the existing functionality by adding an
> option to undo the broken-ness that was just recently introduced.

> Adding an absolute line number to relative line numbering sounds like
> a cute idea. I was for it until I started using it. But in practice
> it introduces the downsides of absolute numbering to relative
> numbering without bringing the upsides. It's a pretty serious step
> backwards. Whether it gets reverted or an additional option added to
> use the 0 again doesn't matter to me, as long as vim gets changed back
> to full usefulness without me having to patch my local copy all the
> time. The worst choice would be to leave this wasteful eyesore in
> (and include it in 7.4) with no option for people to remove it besides
> ceasing the use of relative line numbering altogether.

> Let's not benefit the few at the expense of the many.
> Grant

well said -- I agree completely, but the ones who need to get behind
this in order to make it happen seem convinced the zero is useless and
the absolute is cool. They've quoted Bram as saying he doesn't want
another option to control this, and Bram did not contradict that
statement (too busy maybe?).

my opinion is we don't need to create an option for it, we simply need
to revert to the zero and leave it !#@$$@#$#W$! alone

I've modified my copy of screen.c with the attitude "you can't fight
city hall" -- the bad news here is even with the zero back the width
of that field stays huge on a big file, even though it dosn't need to
-- I probably need to dig some more and find where it gets the width
-- dang I hate this

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