R devel - Jun 2008 - (PR#11537) help (using ?) does not handle trailing whitespace

>>>>> "BDR" == Prof Brian Ripley <ripley at
stats.ox.ac.uk>
>>>>>     on Fri, 30 May 2008 22:34:28 +0100 (BST) writes:
    BDR> I think it is ESS that is parsing this as a help
    BDR> request (so it can divert it to an ESS buffer).

    BDR> Looks like this is an ESS issue, not an R one.

yes, indeed,  hence much more belonging the ESS-help mailing
list (or the 'ESS-bugs' e-mail alias).
I'm diverting to that list; please keep follow-ups to this
topic off R-devel.

As most ESS users are aware, ESS is "picking up"
?<...> calls, and indeed then calls help() for these.
In R,  '?' has become different from help() more and more,
and it is currently the most urgent open issue in ESS,
that ESS should become much smarter in dealing with '?', the 
various 'type ? topic' version and new '??', etc.


Martin Maechler, ETH Zurich

    BDR> Using ?"agrep " will fail in R, but that seems correct as
there is no
    BDR> topic "agrep ".


    BDR> On Fri, 30 May 2008, Tim Hesterberg wrote:

    >> By whitespace, I mean either a space or tab (preceding the
newline).
    >> 
    >> I'm using ESS:
    >> ess-version's value is "5.3.6"
    >> GNU Emacs 21.4.1 (i486-pc-linux-gnu, X toolkit, Xaw3d scroll bars)
of
    >> 2007-08-28 on terranova, modified by Debian
    >> 
    >> I have the following in my .emacs:
    >> (load "ess-5.3.6/lisp/ess-site")
    >> (setq ess-tab-always-indent nil)
    >> (setq ess-fancy-comments nil)
    >> 
    >> I have not edited ess-site.el
    >> 
    >> 
    >> On Fri, May 30, 2008 at 12:26 PM, Prof Brian Ripley
    >> <ripley at stats.ox.ac.uk> wrote:
    >>> We don't know how to reproduce this: 'whitespace'
is not specific enough.
    >>> 
    >>> R's tokenizer breaks input at spaces, so a space would
never be part of that
    >>> expression.  And tabs don't even get to the parser in
interactive use, and
    >>> you cannot mean a newline.  So exactly what do you mean by
'whitespace'?
    >>> 
    >>> The character in your email as received here is an ASCII space,
and that is
    >>> used to end the token on all my systems.  That's not to say
that you didn't
    >>> type something else that looks like a space (e.g. a nbspace)
since email
    >>> systems are fickle.
    >>> 
    >>> None of my guesses worked, so we need precise reproduction
instructions.
    >>> 
    >>> On Thu, 29 May 2008, rocket at google.com wrote:
    >>> 
    >>>>> ?agrep
    >>>>> 
    >>>> 
    >>>> Results in:
    >>>> 
    >>>> No documentation for 'agrep ' in specified packages
and libraries:
    >>>> you could try 'help.search("agrep ")'
    >>>> 
    >>>> There is white space after agrep, that ? doesn't
ignore.
    >>>> 
    >>>> 
    >>>> --please do not edit the information below--
    >>>> 
    >>>> Version:
    >>>> platform = i486-pc-linux-gnu
    >>>> arch = i486
    >>>> os = linux-gnu
    >>>> system = i486, linux-gnu
    >>>> status     >>>> major = 2
    >>>> minor = 7.0
    >>>> year = 2008
    >>>> month = 04
    >>>> day = 22
    >>>> svn rev = 45424
    >>>> language = R
    >>>> version.string = R version 2.7.0 (2008-04-22)
    >>>> 
    >>>> Locale:
    >>>> 
    >>>>
LC_CTYPE=en_US;LC_NUMERIC=C;LC_TIME=C;LC_COLLATE=C;LC_MONETARY=C;LC_MESSAGES=en_US;LC_PAPER=en_US;LC_NAME=C;LC_ADDRESS=C;LC_TELEPHONE=C;LC_MEASUREMENT=en_US;LC_IDENTIFICATION=C
    >>>> 
    >>>> Search Path:
    >>>> .GlobalEnv, package:stats, package:graphics,
package:grDevices,
    >>>> package:utils, package:datasets, package:showStructure,
package:Rcode,
    >>>> package:splus2R, package:methods, Autoloads, package:base
    >>>> 
    >>>> ______________________________________________
    >>>> R-devel at r-project.org mailing list
    >>>> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel
    >>>> 
    >>> 
    >>> --
    >>> Brian D. Ripley,                  ripley at stats.ox.ac.uk
    >>> Professor of Applied Statistics, 
http://www.stats.ox.ac.uk/~ripley/
    >>> University of Oxford,             Tel:  +44 1865 272861 (self)
    >>> 1 South Parks Road,                     +44 1865 272866 (PA)
    >>> Oxford OX1 3TG, UK                Fax:  +44 1865 272595
    >>> 
    >> 

    BDR> -- 
    BDR> Brian D. Ripley,                  ripley at stats.ox.ac.uk
    BDR> Professor of Applied Statistics,  http://www.stats.ox.ac.uk/~ripley/
    BDR> University of Oxford,             Tel:  +44 1865 272861 (self)
    BDR> 1 South Parks Road,                     +44 1865 272866 (PA)
    BDR> Oxford OX1 3TG, UK                Fax:  +44 1865 272595

    BDR> ______________________________________________
    BDR> R-devel at r-project.org mailing list
    BDR> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel