[Aptitude-devel] Bug#592836: Bug#592836: hotkey for adding package without "recommends" list?

[Axel Beckert]

Hi,

Harald Dunkel wrote:
> >> Maybe the '&' could be used to ignore the recommended
> >> packages, while '+' includes all recommended packages
> >> as before.

Hrm. "&" has a different meaning in aptitude's CLI where it is a
delimiter for marking a package as automatically or manually
installed. So I'd rather use it as shortcut for "Select for
installation and immediately mark it as automatically installed. That
would be neat, especially if you have the "Automatically advance to
the next item" option enabled.

> > Perhaps the barely visible 'I' can be used for this, I don't know how
> > well it works in practice.
> 
> I don't know a hotkey "I" at all. Not documented, AFAICS.

Yep, I think that's what Manuel meant with "barely visible". I didn't
know that either.

And its current function seems to be "cancel all pending actions and
install only this package and its dependencies". Not sure how often
this is used.

I though would try to avoid changing existing keybindings, even badly
documented ones, if easily avoidable.

My proposition would be -- if possible at all and usable in most
terminals -- Ctrl-Plus, i.e. Ctrl-Shift-Equal on a US keyboard layout.
That would be the current keybinding plus a modifier which should be
easy to remember and to type. I just don't know how easily a Ctrl
modifier can be checked in TUI applications through terminal
emulators, ssh connections, screen, tmux, etc.

> > (It probably should be added to menus and maybe needs better
> > documentation).
> 
> Probably.

It's at least listed
http://aptitude.alioth.debian.org/doc/en/ch02s05s02.html but not on
http://aptitude.alioth.debian.org/doc/en/ch02s02s03.html#pkgCmdInstall
where it should be, too, IMHO. (Plus the menu as Manuel already
mentioned.)

		Regards, Axel
-- 
 ,''`.  |  Axel Beckert <abe at debian.org>, http://people.debian.org/~abe/
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