I would maybe volunteer, but I think this will be a huge effort. First of all I see in vc.el: (require 'dired-aux)) ; for dired-kill-{line,tree} That's missing. So let's compare xemacs dired.el vs. emacs dired.el. Ouch not even close! OK, try compiling emacs dired.el: Compiling file /usr/share/emacs/21.2/lisp/dired.el at Tue Aug 13 14:51:12 2002 While compiling dired-readin: ** function dired-readin used to take 2-3 arguments, now takes 2 ** variable failed bound but not referenced While compiling dired-readin-insert: ** function dired-readin-insert used to take 1-2 arguments, now takes 1 While compiling dired-insert-headerline: ** function dired-insert-headerline used to take 0+ arguments, now takes 1 While compiling dired-revert: ** dired-uncache called with 1 argument, but requires 2 While compiling dired-insert-old-subdirs: ** dired-uncache called with 1 argument, but requires 2 While compiling dired-uncache: ** function dired-uncache used to take 2 arguments, now takes 1 While compiling dired-find-file: ** function dired-find-file used to take 0-1 arguments, now takes 0 While compiling dired-find-file-other-window: ** function dired-find-file-other-window used to take 0-2 arguments, now takes 0 While compiling dired-display-file: ** function dired-display-file used to take 0-1 arguments, now takes 0 While compiling dired-get-filename: ** reference to free variable default-file-name-coding-system While compiling dired-move-to-filename: ** function dired-move-to-filename used to take 0-3 arguments, now takes 0-2 While compiling dired-move-to-end-of-filename: ** function dired-move-to-end-of-filename used to take 0-3 arguments, now takes 0-1 While compiling dired-buffers-for-dir: ** variable pattern bound but not referenced While compiling dired-alist-add-1: ** function dired-alist-add-1 used to take 2-4 arguments, now takes 2 While compiling dired-do-flagged-delete: ** evaluating (< nil 0): (wrong-type-argument number-char-or-marker-p nil) While compiling dired-internal-do-deletions: ** function dired-internal-do-deletions used to take 2-3 arguments, now takes 2 ** dired-log-summary called with 2 arguments, but requires 3 While compiling dired-mark-prompt: ** function dired-mark-prompt used to take 2-3 arguments, now takes 2 While compiling dired-format-columns-of-files: ** function dired-format-columns-of-files used to take 1-2 arguments, now takes 1 While compiling dired-mark-files-in-region: ** function dired-mark-files-in-region used to take 2-3 arguments, now takes 2 While compiling dired-mark: ** function dired-mark used to take 1-2 arguments, now takes 1 While compiling dired-mark-symlinks: ** function dired-mark-symlinks used to take 0-1 arguments, now takes 1 While compiling dired-mark-directories: ** function dired-mark-directories used to take 0-1 arguments, now takes 1 While compiling dired-mark-executables: ** function dired-mark-executables used to take 0-1 arguments, now takes 1 While compiling dired-flag-backup-files: ** function dired-flag-backup-files used to take 0+ arguments, now takes 0-1 While compiling dired-unmark-all-files: ** variable query bound but not referenced While compiling dired-log-summary: ** function dired-log-summary used to take 3 arguments, now takes 2 While compiling dired-sort-set-modeline: ** function dired-sort-set-modeline used to take 0-1 arguments, now takes 0 While compiling dired-sort-other: ** function dired-sort-other used to take 1-3 arguments, now takes 1-2 While compiling the end of the data: ** The following functions are not known to be defined: file-system-info, propertized-buffer-identification, posn-window, event-end, posn-point I think we need someone with a lot more elisp expertise than I have to fix this.

Mike Sperber is the same Mike Sperber who maintains dired. Ville> Applies to me too :( Anyone interested? Not really. One gets the distinct feeling that these Dired changes were not discussed with the upstream maintainer. I get more interested in saying "forget Emacs compatibility" all the time. :-( Hey, Mike, what would it take to provide real Dired with the relevant "features" from the GNU version? -- Institute of Policy and Planning Sciences http://turnbull.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp University of Tsukuba Tennodai 1-1-1 Tsukuba 305-8573 JAPAN My nostalgia for Icon makes me forget about any of the bad things. I don't have much nostalgia for Perl, so its faults I remember. Scott Gilbert c.l.py

Stephen> Hey, Mike, what would it take to provide real Dired with Stephen> the relevant "features" from the GNU version? nbecker> The question, though, is what would it take to keep nbecker> maintaining a seperate version. A volunteer maintainer ... which we have. He is active. He's already offered to help with providing the relevant features. Thus I deduce he has reasons to prefer maintaining the fork over the synch-and-forget strategy. -- Institute of Policy and Planning Sciences http://turnbull.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp University of Tsukuba Tennodai 1-1-1 Tsukuba 305-8573 JAPAN My nostalgia for Icon makes me forget about any of the bad things. I don't have much nostalgia for Perl, so its faults I remember. Scott Gilbert c.l.py

Neal> I would maybe volunteer, but I think this will be a huge effort. Neal> First of all I see Neal> in vc.el: Neal> (require 'dired-aux)) ; for dired-kill-{line,tree} Neal> That's missing. So let's compare xemacs dired.el vs. emacs dired.el. Neal> Ouch not even close! In fact, our Dired is a completely different program from GNU Emacs Dired. (A rewrite, to be more precise.) However, most of the API functionality at least used to be the same. I'll be glad to help with the Dired side of this effort. BTW, I do have a distinct memory of Jan Vronhoof synching vc.el more recently than 1996, not that that helps much. -- Cheers =8-} Mike Friede, Völkerverständigung und überhaupt blabla