🚀 go-pugleaf

I've recently started using emacs more in text reading applications,
such as rmail, gnus, and info, and I find I'd rather have the mode
line display how much of the message, article, etc., is above the
BOTTOM line of the displayed text (rather than above the top).  

Possible supporting reasons: 
  - It helps me decide whether I want to continue reading to see how
    much more I have to go.  On large screens/windows (e.g. 40-60
    lines), the difference in % location between the top and bottom of
    the displayed portion may be quite a bit, so the % above the top
    is not a very good approximation of % seen so far, especially on
    the first page.
  - The mode line is at the bottom of a buffer-window, so I find it
    natural to interpret figure shown as labeling the location of the
    bottom of the displayed text.

So I poked around a little bit to see if there were any variables I
could set to redefine this, but I didn't find anything obvious.  The
closest thing I found was the documenation ^H v mode-line-format,
which explains that %p in its template shows the % of buffer above the
top window.  However, there doesn't seem to be a replacement option to
display % above the bottom.

Does anyone know of a customization to accomplish this?

If not, perhaps someone would like to take this as a suggestion to
make such a customization possible.  A quick hack to
decode_mode_spec() in xdisp.c might be all that's needed, e.g. adds %P
which displays percent of buffer above bottom of window, or bot, or
all.  (note -- it doesn't display top, as the % location of the bottom
line is useful even on the first page of a msg/article/etc.)

Just an idea.

Cheers,

CarlManning@ai.mit.edu