Dumbparens is a parenthesis-matching solution for Emacs that actually Just Worksâ„¢ (finally). It replaces and improves on previous packages such as Electric Pair mode, Paredit, and Smartparens. The package is called Dumbparens as a response to Smartparens, which I feel tries to be much too smart for its own good, resulting in a host of bugs, performance issues, and behavior that can only be described as just plain zany (see below). Dumbparens has the design philosophy of: try to do as little as possible, and always do something reasonable.
Documentation will come when the basic features have been implemented.
Usage is as follows. First install with
straight.el:
(straight-use-package
'(dumbparens :host github :repo "raxod502/dumbparens"))
Then type M-x dumbparens-mode or M-x dumbparens-global-mode.
To run the tests, evaluate the contents of dumbparens-tests.el and
then type M-x dumbparens-run-all-tests. Since Dumbparens has a goal
of always doing something reasonable, any unreasonable behavior
will result in a slap on the wrist and a new regression test.
Suppose we enable smartparens-mode and delete-selection-mode, and
we have this buffer of text:
Suppose we enable `smartparens-mode` and `delete-selection-mode`, and
we have this buffer of text
Now suppose we select the entire buffer and type the backslash key
\. What should happen is the region is deleted and replaced with a
backslash:
\
However with smartparens-mode enabled, the following is what we get
instead:
\Suppose we enable `smartparens-mode` and `delete-selection-mode`, and
we have this buffer of text\"\" \(\) \{\} \\(\\)
Okay, to be fair, after you perform a subsequent command in the buffer, everything but the backslash gets deleted, but ... what???