[Eldoc] Disable eldoc in message area, and only show doc details when I invoke eldoc-doc-buffer?

[ianyepan]

The current Eglot default enables eldoc and constantly shows the signature/details of the variable/function under my cursor, which are often multiple lines. This results in a visual distraction IMHO. Especially when I'm moving my cursor around and the echo area just flashes in and out with different documentation. Screenshot:

However, I love the functionality when I can invoke eldoc-doc-buffer manually (currently bound to K) and show the details of function/variable under point in a side buffer, such as:

I was wondering if I can suppress the automatic-showing-in-echo-area-behavior, and only show details when I manually invoke eldoc-doc-buffer? Currently, the only solution I can think is to set eldoc-idle-delay to a massive number, so it's never reached. E.g.

(setq eldoc-idle-delay most-positive-fixnum)

Thought this solution feels like an ugly hack...

[joaotavora]

I think you can try, if using the latest version of eldoc.el.

(setq eldoc-echo-area-prefer-doc-buffer t)

[joaotavora]

No problem, though you should be using a variation on this which is more syntactically correct:

(setq eglot-managed-mode-hook (list (lambda () (eldoc-mode -1))))

Be sure to mark this solved.

[ianyepan]

you should be using a variation on this which is more syntactically correct

Thanks @joaotavora !

Marked as solved.

[ianyepan]

@joaotavora Not to say I have a better understanding in Elisp (I most certainly don't), but doesn't these two lines mean the same thing?

(setq eglot-managed-mode-hook (list (lambda () (eldoc-mode -1))))
; v.s.
(setq eglot-managed-mode-hook '((lambda () (eldoc-mode -1))))

[joaotavora]

They look similar and both work, but the second implies a kind of eval at runtime, and prevents the compiler from seeing the insides of the lambda as code (it sees it simply as data) destroying the possible optimizations, etc. Doesn't make much difference here, but don't put lambdas inside quoted lists, unless you know very well what you are doing.

Here, you should use add-hook (forgot to suggest that):

(add-hook 'eglot-managed-mode-hook (lambda () (eldoc-mode -1)))

[ianyepan]

Here, you should use add-hook (forgot to suggest that)

Cheers, I'll go with this one then.

[dgutov]

First of all, there is a bug in Eglot: it doesn't honor the default value of eldoc-echo-area-use-multiline-p appropriately.

@ianpan870102 Try (setq eldoc-echo-area-use-multiline-p nil) first. That should stop the echo area from resizing and windows from jumping. But still leave a little blinking down there.

Regarding the latter, how would you like if the signature hints did show up in the echo area, but the "hover" tips (like the doc of the identifier at point) did not? All of the remaining blinking seems to come from the latter, and I'm not sure how easy it is to fix in Eglot.

[dgutov]

@ianpan870102 See, there are two different hints which Eglot combines into one here:

• Identifier "on hover" hint, which describes the thing under cursor (or at point, in Emacs's case). The thing can be a constant/class/module, or a method reference.
• Signature help, which helps you know what arguments to write in the current function call. That one is shown when you are in the process of writing said arguments, that is, inside the parentheses.

I suppose Eglot could be a little smarter and, when outside of any parens, would first jump inside parens and request signature help from there. First, that would be non-standard behavior (and Eglot doesn't really know what constitutes "parens" in every supported language), but second, it would be inconsistent. Consider the case of nested calls:

foo(
  bar(1, 2, 3),
  qux
)

When your point is at bar (e.g. at the letter b), which function should you get "signature help" for? The standard behavior is to show it for foo, which I think makes sense.

[joaotavora]

If you are indeed using the latest Eldoc (as installed by package-install, I think it's 1.11.0), it won't be eldoc.el.gz, but rather in another overriding copy of eldoc.el. There you will find this 👇 . The tweak to perform to this is more complex, and involves replacing its first argument eldoc-display-in-echo-area, with something else, call it ianpan87-display-but-only-sometimes that filters out "unwanted" elements in DOCS and then calls eldoc-display-in-echo-area itself on the cleaned up list.

eldoc-display-functions is a variable defined in `eldoc.el'.

Its value is (eldoc-display-in-echo-area eldoc-display-in-buffer)

  This variable may be risky if used as a file-local variable.
  Probably introduced at or before Emacs version 28.1.

Hook of functions tasked with displaying ElDoc results.
Each function is passed two arguments: DOCS and INTERACTIVE. DOCS
is a list (DOC ...) where DOC looks like (STRING :KEY VALUE :KEY2
VALUE2 ...).  STRING is a string containing the documentation's
text and the remainder of DOC is an optional list of
keyword-value pairs denoting additional properties of that
documentation.  For commonly recognized properties, see
`eldoc-documentation-functions'.

INTERACTIVE says if the request to display doc strings came
directly from the user or from ElDoc's automatic mechanisms'.

[back]

[ianyepan]

latest Eldoc (as installed by package-install, I think it's 1.11.0

Oh thanks, didn't realize that.
Potentially a dumb question: how can I override the older eldoc with this newer eldoc I just installed? Emacs seems to be picking the older eldoc still, because when I C-h v some-eldoc-var, or C-h f some-eldoc-func, I'm always guided to the eldoc.el.gz version.

[joaotavora]

If you install Eglot according to the instructions it should happen automatically. From here on, it comes down to your setup, some people use use-package, straight and all kinds of fancy installers. You'll have to provide your setup, and potentially trim it down to the simplest possible where that problem still occurs. You can make a new issue, or a new conversation for just this topic, or you can ask that question in the Emacs bug tracker (I think it's drifting in this discussion topic).

[ianyepan]

Gotcha, but I think I'll stop here -- I don't have dire need to tweak eldoc-display-functions at the moment, so I'm okay with the default version of eldoc.