Re: [RFC PATCH v1 0/1] Avoid accidentally overwriting macro recording

Benno Schulenberg <[email protected]> Wed, 11 Feb 2026 11:08:51 +0100

Newsgroups	gmane.editors.nano.devel
Message-ID	<[email protected]>

Op 10-02-2026 om 18:21 schreef Charles Mirabile:
> I often accidentally hit the recording toggle instead of invoking the
> macro I just recorded because my fingers have sort of been trained by
> having to hit the start/stop keybind twice.

I'm guessing that the confusion mainly happens because the `record` and
`play` functions are bound to two different symbols on the _same_ key.
How about preventing this accidental typing of `record` by binding it
to a different key, one that is rather hard to type?  Something like:

     unbind M-: main
     bind M-! recordmacro main

Or, if you would like to wean yourself from having start and stop on
the same symbol:

     unbind M-: main
     bind M-{ recordmacro main
     bind M-} recordmacro main

(Of course, both M-{ and M-} would start and stop the recording, but
it would be a nice mnemonic thing.)


> My suggestion/idea is
> that if the user stops the recording immediately after starting it
> such that the recorded macro would be empty, instead of storing the
> empty macro which is essentially useless, just cancel the recording
> and revert the stored macro to whatever the user had saved before.

Storing an empty macro is not useless: it clears an existing macro,
a possibly destructive macro when invoked accidentally.  So I would
rather not make the clearing of a macro impossible.


Benno

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