additional problems with online help (C-c C-v)
Martin Maechler
maechler at stat.math.ethz.ch
Mon Mar 20 10:43:55 CET 2000
{CC'ed to ESS-help ; it is of more general interest}
MHe> Running ESS 5.1.13 with Splus 5.
MHe> I think that there are still some problems with online help. Suppose
MHe> I do the following:
MHe> 1. M-x S+5 to start Splus.
MHe> 2. C-c C-v pnorm
MHe> I then get a buffer that says:
MHe> cat: illegal option -- c
MHe> Usage: cat [-benrstuv] [-|File ...]
I think this is ONLY true,
if you first did M-x S (instead of S+5) and THEN
called C-c C-v pnorm which gave you the above bug
and THEN did your above two things.
Explanation: ESS tries to be smart and *RE*-use all existing help buffers
{in order to save the time to re-format them}.
Unfortunately, this also happens for help buffers with an error message in
them, in the above case it *RE*uses the *help[S](pnorm)* buffer.
WORKAROUND : Just kill an ESS help buffer when "it is wrong".
The same phenomenon happens, e.g., in R {http://www.r-project.org/}
if ask for help about lqs before calling library(lqs).
This will give you an error "no help ... for lqs".
If you then do library(lqs) and ask for help again,
you *seem* to still get the same error -- however, ESS is only reusing the
old *help*[R](lqs) buffer --- if you haven't killed it.
MHe> 3. If I do C-c C-v rnorm, then I get the usual help screen:
{in a new buffer called *help[S](rnorm)*
MHe> Normal (Gaussian) Distribution
MHe> DESCRIPTION:
MHe> Density, cumulative probability, quantiles and random generation for
MHe> the normal (also called Gaussian) distribution.
MHe> USAGE:
MHe> dnorm(x, mean=0, sd=1)
MHe> pnorm(q, mean=0, sd=1)
MHe> qnorm(p, mean=0, sd=1)
MHe> rnorm(n, mean=0, sd=1)
MHe> [snip]
MHe> So, I think that C-c C-v pnorm should also bring this up, but instead
MHe> it gives an error message. Oddly enough, C-c C-v pbeta works even
MHe> though C-c C-v pnorm bombs.
{explanation as before}.
I think ESS should be improved to *NOT* use an *help* buffer at all
when ess-help-... gives an error message...
--> TO DO for the future.
Martin Maechler <maechler at stat.math.ethz.ch> http://stat.ethz.ch/~maechler/
Seminar fuer Statistik, ETH-Zentrum LEO D10 Leonhardstr. 27
ETH (Federal Inst. Technology) 8092 Zurich SWITZERLAND
phone: x-41-1-632-3408 fax: ...-1228 <><
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