The PyShell patch does two things that I want to consider separately, and carefully, along with other possible solutions to the perceived problems.

1. Go to end-of-file when entering a letter or number in a read-only text area. In msg110889 Tal says "Note that not only letter/number keys should be passed on." I see the point, but expanding the set seems to me a complication and a move in the wrong direction.  Doing nothing, or maybe beeping, is a normal response to entry in a read-only area. Regardless of what I wrote before, I am not completely comfortable with adding magical behavior.

The fixed key-binding for goto-file-end is cntl-end (command-end). I propose adding <tab> as a synonym. Currently, it sometimes opens a completion box even in read-only areas, where it is useless and annoying. This should be changed anyway, and having it cause the cursor to jump to me seems to fit with its indent behavior.

2. Make <up> and <down> do double duty to both traverse statements in the history and lines within the current statement.  However, the complicated rules to juggle two roles, in msg68299, make my head hurt. I would rather use Shift-, cntl-, or alt- up/down instead.

The fundamental issue, touched on by Cherniavsky Beni in msg67706, is that Python is not a command-line language. It is a statement language. It does not fit well in a command-line terminal where history consists of lines rather than statements. PyShell is a statement terminal designed to fit Python, not a line terminal.

I appreciate this *much* better than 7 years ago.  When I wrote msg66119, I probably was not aware of being able to retrieve statements with Alt-P.