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1 GNU Emacs NEWS -- history of user-visible changes.
2
3 Copyright (C) 2010-2012 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
4 See the end of the file for license conditions.
5
6 Please send Emacs bug reports to bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org.
7 If possible, use M-x report-emacs-bug.
8
9 This file is about changes in Emacs version 24.
10
11 See files NEWS.23, NEWS.22, NEWS.21, NEWS.20, NEWS.19, NEWS.18,
12 and NEWS.1-17 for changes in older Emacs versions.
13
14 You can narrow news to a specific version by calling `view-emacs-news'
15 with a prefix argument or by typing C-u C-h C-n.
16
17 Temporary note:
18 +++ indicates that the appropriate manual has already been updated.
19 --- means no change in the manuals is called for.
20 When you add a new item, please add it without either +++ or ---
21 so we will look at it and add it to the manual.
22
23 \f
24 * Installation Changes in Emacs 24.3
25
26 ** New configure option '--without-all' to disable additional features.
27 This disables most of the features that are normally enabled by default.
28
29 ** New configure option '--enable-link-time-optimization' to utilize
30 an appropriate feature provided by GCC since version 4.5.0.
31
32 ** New configure option '--enable-gcc-warnings', intended for developers.
33 If building with GCC, this enables compile-time checks that warn about
34 possibly-questionable C code. On a recent GNU system there should be
35 no warnings; on older and on non-GNU systems the generated warnings
36 may be useful.
37
38 ** The configure option '--disable-maintainer-mode' has been removed,
39 as it was confusingly-named and rarely useful.
40
41 ---
42 ** You can use `NO_BIN_LINK=t make install' to prevent the installation
43 overwriting "emacs" in the installation bin/ directory with a link
44 to emacs-VERSION.
45
46 ---
47 ** Emacs uses libtinfo in preference to libncurses, if available.
48
49 ---
50 ** On FreeBSD and NetBSD, configure no longer adds /usr/local/lib and
51 /usr/pkg/lib to the linker search path. You must add them yourself if
52 you want them.
53
54 ---
55 ** On Mac OS X, configure no longer automatically adds the Fink /sw
56 directories to the search path. You must add them yourself if you want them.
57
58 ---
59 ** The standalone scripts rcs-checkin and vcdiff have been removed
60 (from the bin and libexec directories, respectively). The former is
61 no longer relevant, the latter is replaced by lisp (in vc-sccs.el).
62
63 ** The configuration option '--enable-use-lisp-union-type' has been
64 renamed to '--enable-check-lisp-object-type', as the resulting
65 Lisp_Object type no longer uses a union to implement the compile time
66 check that this option enables.
67
68 ---
69 ** The default toolkit has been changed to Gtk+ version 3.
70 If you don't pass --with-x-toolkit to configure or if you pass
71 --with-x-toolkit=gtk or --with-x-toolkit=yes, configure will try to build
72 with Gtk+ version 3, and if that fails, try Gtk+ version 2.
73 You can explicitly require a specific version by passing
74 --with-x-toolkit=gtk2 or --with-x-toolkit=gtk3 to configure.
75
76 \f
77 * Startup Changes in Emacs 24.3
78
79 ** Emacs no longer searches for `leim-list.el' files beneath the standard
80 lisp/ directory. There should not be any there anyway. If you have
81 been adding them there, put them somewhere else, eg site-lisp.
82
83 ---
84 ** The `--no-site-lisp' command line option now works for Nextstep builds.
85
86 \f
87 * Changes in Emacs 24.3
88
89 ** You can now scroll the selected window in most y-or-n prompts.
90 Typing C-v or M-v at a prompt scrolls forward or backward
91 respectively, without leaving the y-or-n prompt.
92
93 ** Help changes
94
95 *** `C-h f' (describe-function) can now perform autoloading.
96 When this command is called for an autoloaded function whose docstring
97 contains a key substitution construct, that function's library is
98 automatically loaded, so that the documentation can be shown
99 correctly. To disable this, set `help-enable-auto-load' to nil.
100
101 *** `C-h f' now reports previously-autoloaded functions as "autoloaded",
102 even after their associated libraries have been loaded (and the
103 autoloads have been redefined as functions).
104
105 ** The function `current-time' now returns extended-format time stamps
106 (HIGH LOW USEC PSEC) that use picosecond resolution; the PSEC
107 component is new. PSEC is typically a multiple of 1000 on current
108 machines. Other functions that use this format, such as
109 file-attributes and format-time-string, have been changed accordingly.
110 Old-format time stamps are still accepted.
111
112 ** The format of timers in timer-list and timer-idle-list is now
113 [TRIGGERED-P HI-SECS LO-SECS USECS REPEAT-DELAY FUNCTION ARGS IDLE-DELAY PSECS].
114 The PSECS slot is new, and uses picosecond resolution. It can be
115 accessed via the new timer--psecs accessor.
116
117 ** Emacs now generates backtraces on fatal errors.
118 On encountering a fatal error, Emacs now outputs a textual description
119 of the fatal signal, and a short backtrace on platforms like glibc
120 that support backtraces.
121
122 ** New functions `system-users', `system-groups' return lists of the user
123 name, group names known to the system (where possible).
124
125 ** If your Emacs was built from a bzr checkout, the new variable
126 `emacs-bzr-version' contains information about which bzr revision was used.
127
128 ** ImageMagick support, if available, is automatically enabled.
129 It is no longer necessary to call `imagemagick-register-types'
130 explicitly to install ImageMagick image types; that function is called
131 automatically at startup, or when customizing a relevant imagemagick-
132 option.
133
134 *** Setting `imagemagick-types-inhibit' to t now disables the use of
135 ImageMagick to view images. You must call imagemagick-register-types
136 afterwards if you do not use customize to change this.
137
138 *** The new variable `imagemagick-enabled-types' also affects which
139 ImageMagick types are treated as images. The function
140 `imagemagick-filter-types' returns the list of types that will be
141 treated as images.
142
143 *** Images displayed via ImageMagick now support transparency and the
144 :background image spec property.
145
146 ** Internationalization changes
147
148 *** New language environment: Persian.
149
150 ** Face underlining can now use a wave.
151 See the "Face Attributes" section of the Elisp manual.
152
153 ** New fringe bitmap exclamation-mark.
154
155 ** String values for `initial-buffer-choice' also apply to emacsclient
156 frames, if emacsclient is only told to open a new frame without
157 specifying any file to visit or expression to evaluate.
158
159 +++
160 ** You can prevent the creation of lock files by setting `create-lockfiles'
161 to nil. Use with caution, and only if you really need to.
162
163 +++
164 ** Using "unibyte: t" in Lisp source files is obsolete.
165 Use "coding: raw-text" instead.
166
167 ** Mode line changes
168
169 *** New option `mode-line-default-help-echo' specifies the help text
170 (shown in a tooltip or in the echo area) for any part of the mode line
171 that does not have its own specialized help text.
172
173 *** You can now click mouse-3 in the coding system indicator to
174 invokes `set-buffer-file-coding-system'.
175
176 +++
177 ** Setting `enable-remote-dir-locals' to non-nil allows directory
178 local variables on remote hosts.
179
180 +++
181 ** `insert-char' is now a command, and `ucs-insert' an obsolete alias
182 for it.
183
184 ** The entry for PCL-CVS has been removed from the Tools menu.
185 The PCL-CVS commands are still available via the keyboard.
186
187 \f
188 * Editing Changes in Emacs 24.3
189
190 ** The `z' key no longer has a binding in most special modes.
191 It used to be bound to `kill-this-buffer', but `z' is too easy to
192 accidentally type.
193
194 ** New option `yank-handled-properties' allows processing of text
195 properties on yanked text, in more ways that are more general than
196 just removing them, as done by `yank-excluded-properties'.
197
198 ** New option `delete-trailing-lines' specifies whether the M-x
199 delete-trailing-whitespace command should delete trailing lines at the
200 end of the buffer. It defaults to t.
201
202 +++
203 ** `C-x r +' is now overloaded to invoke `append-to-register.
204
205 +++
206 ** New option `register-separator' specifies the register containing
207 the text to put between collected texts for use with M-x
208 append-to-register and M-x prepend-to-register.
209
210 ** Search changes
211
212 *** Global `M-s _' starts a symbol (identifier) incremental search,
213 and `M-s _' in Isearch toggles symbol search mode.
214 `M-s c' in Isearch toggles search case-sensitivity.
215
216 *** `M-s SPC' in Isearch toggles whitespace matching mode
217 in both ordinary and regexp incremental search, so that each
218 sequence of spaces in the search string matches any combination
219 of one or more whitespace characters defined by the variable
220 `search-whitespace-regexp'. In ordinary incremental search,
221 `isearch-toggle-lax-whitespace' toggles the value of the variable
222 `isearch-lax-whitespace'. In regexp incremental search, it toggles
223 the value of the variable `isearch-regexp-lax-whitespace'.
224
225 ** query-replace changes
226
227 *** When new option `replace-lax-whitespace' is non-nil,
228 and you enter a space or spaces in the strings or regexps
229 to be replaced, `query-replace' will match any sequence matched
230 by the regexp `search-whitespace-regexp'.
231
232 ** M-x move-to-column, if called interactively with no prefix arg, now
233 prompts for a column number.
234
235 ** `mouse-avoidance-banish-position' can now be used to customize
236 `mouse-avoidance-mode' further.
237
238 ** `C-u M-=' now counts lines/words/characters in the entire buffer.
239
240 ** `C-M-f' and `C-M-b' will now move to the path name separator
241 character when doing minibuffer filename prompts.
242
243 ** `goto-char' is now bound to `M-g c'.
244
245 ** New command `C-x r M-w' (copy-rectangle-as-kill).
246 It copies the region-rectangle as the last rectangle kill.
247
248 ** New input method `vietnamese-vni'.
249
250 \f
251 * Changes in Specialized Modes and Packages in Emacs 24.3
252
253 ** Compilation has a new `compilation-always-kill' configuration variable.
254
255 ** Term changes
256
257 The variables `term-default-fg-color' and `term-default-bg-color' are
258 now deprecated in favor of the `term-face' face, that you can
259 customize. Also, it is now possible to customize how are displayed the
260 ANSI terminal colors and styles by customizing the corresponding
261 `term-color-<COLOR>', `term-color-underline' and `term-color-bold'
262 faces.
263
264 ** CL
265 *** CL's main entry is now (require 'cl-lib).
266 `cl-lib' is like the old `cl' except that it uses the namespace cleanly,
267 i.e. all its definitions have the "cl-" prefix (and internal definitions use
268 the "cl--" prefix).
269
270 If `cl' provided a feature under the name `foo', then `cl-lib' provides it
271 under the name `cl-foo' instead, with the exceptions of the few definitions
272 that had to use `foo*' to avoid conflicts with pre-existing Elisp entities,
273 which have not been renamed to `cl-foo*' but just `cl-foo'.
274
275 The old `cl' is now deprecated and is just a bunch of aliases that
276 provide the old non-prefixed names.
277
278 *** `cl-flet' is not like `flet' (which is deprecated).
279 Instead it obeys the behavior of Common-Lisp's `flet'.
280
281 *** `cl-labels' is slightly different from `labels'.
282 The difference is that it relies on the `lexical-binding' machinery (as opposed
283 to the `lexical-let' machinery used previously) to capture definitions in
284 closures, so such closures will only work if `lexical-binding' is in use.
285
286 *** `progv' was rewritten to use the `let' machinery.
287 A side effect is that vars without corresponding value are bound to nil
288 rather than making them unbound.
289
290 ** Desktop
291
292 *** `desktop-path' no longer includes the "." directory. Desktop
293 files are now located in ~/.emacs.d by default.
294
295 ** Python mode
296
297 A new version of python.el, which provides several new features, including:
298 per-buffer shells, better indentation, Python 3 support, and improved
299 shell-interaction compatible with iPython (and virtually any other
300 text based shell).
301
302 *** Some user options have been replaced/renamed:
303 Old defcustom: | New defcustom:
304 python-indent | python-indent-offset
305 python-guess-indent | python-indent-guess-indent-offset
306 python-pdbtrack-do-tracking-p | python-pdbtrack-activate
307 python-use-skeletons | python-skeleton-autoinsert
308
309 *** Some user options have been removed:
310
311 **** `python-indent-string-contents': Strings are never indented.
312
313 **** `python-honour-comment-indentation':
314 Comments are never considered as indentation markers themselves.
315
316 **** `python-continuation-offset': Indentation is automatically
317 calculated in a pep8 compliant way depending on the context.
318
319 **** `python-shell-prompt-alist', `python-shell-continuation-prompt-alist':
320 Have no direct mapping as the shell interaction is completely different.
321
322 **** `python-python-command', `python-jython-command':
323 Replaced by `python-shell-interpreter'.
324
325 **** `inferior-python-filter-regexp', `python-remove-cwd-from-path',
326 `python-pdbtrack-minor-mode-string', `python-source-modes':
327 No longer relevant.
328
329 *** Some commands have been replaced:
330 Old command | New command
331 python-insert-class | python-skeleton-class
332 python-insert-def | python-skeleton-def
333 python-insert-for | python-skeleton-for
334 python-insert-if | python-skeleton-if
335 python-insert-try/except | python-skeleton-try
336 python-insert-try/finally | python-skeleton-try
337 python-insert-while | python-skeleton-while
338 python-find-function | python-nav-jump-to-defun
339 python-next-statement | python-nav-forward-sentence
340 python-previous-statement | python-nav-backward-sentence
341 python-send-buffer | python-shell-send-buffer
342 python-send-defun | python-shell-send-defun
343 python-send-region | python-shell-send-region
344 python-send-region-and-go | Emulate with python-shell-send-region and
345 python-shell-switch-to-shell
346 python-send-string | python-shell-send-string
347 python-switch-to-python | python-shell-switch-to-shell
348 python-describe-symbol | python-eldoc-at-point
349
350 ** VHDL mode
351
352 *** The free software compiler GHDL is supported (and now the default).
353
354 *** Support for the VHDL-AMS packages has been added/updated.
355
356 *** Updated to the 2002 revision of the VHDL standard.
357
358 *** Accepts \r and \f as whitespace.
359
360 ** SQL Mode
361
362 *** DB2 added `sql-db2-escape-newlines'
363
364 If non-nil, newlines sent to the command interpreter will be escaped
365 by a backslash. The default does not escape the newlines and assumes
366 that the sql statement will be terminated by a semicolon.
367
368 ** Diff mode
369
370 Faces for changes now use the same diff color scheme as in modern VCSes
371 where deletions are displayed in red (new faces `diff-refine-removed'
372 and `smerge-refined-removed' and new definition of `diff-removed'),
373 insertions in green (new faces `diff-refine-added' and
374 `smerge-refined-added' and new definition of `diff-added').
375 The variable `diff-use-changed-face' defines whether to use
376 the face `diff-changed', or `diff-removed' and `diff-added'
377 to highlight changes in context diffs.
378
379 *** The new command `diff-remove-trailing-whitespace' fixes trailing
380 whitespace problems introduced by the diff.
381
382 ** Ediff now uses the same color scheme as Diff mode
383 on high color displays.
384
385 ** Flymake uses fringe bitmaps to indicate errors and warnings.
386 See flymake-fringe-indicator-position, flymake-error-bitmap and
387 flymake-warning-bitmap.
388
389 ** `sh-script'
390 *** Pairing of parens/quotes uses electric-pair-mode instead of skeleton-pair.
391 *** `sh-electric-here-document-mode' now controls auto-insertion of here-docs.
392 *** `sh-use-smie' lets you choose a new indentation and navigation code.
393
394 ** reStructuredText mode
395
396 *** Rebind nearly all keys making room for more keys and complying
397 better to usage in other modes. Describe bindings with C-c C-h.
398
399 *** Major revision of indentation working very similar to other
400 modes. TAB is your friend.
401
402 *** Major revision of filling working fine with most of
403 reStructuredText syntax. Support auto-filling.
404
405 *** Major revision of comment handling.
406
407 *** Major revision of fontification working with `jit-lock-mode'.
408
409 *** Cover reStructuredText syntax more closely. Improve
410 the experience for Sphinx users.
411
412 *** `rst-insert-list' inserts new list or continues existing lists.
413
414 *** Extend correct and improve customization.
415
416 *** Negative prefix argument always works for `rst-adjust'.
417
418 *** Reset window configuration after displaying TOC.
419
420 *** Package version in `rst-version'.
421
422 *** Support `imenu' and `which-func'.
423
424 ** New `derived-mode' filter for Ibuffer, bound to `/ M'.
425 `/ m' is now bound to filter by used-mode, which used to be bound to `/ M'.
426
427 ** Apropos
428
429 *** The faces used by Apropos are now directly customizable.
430 These faces are named `apropos-symbol', `apropos-keybinding', and so on;
431 see the `apropos' Custom group for details.
432
433 **** The old options whose values specified faces to use were removed
434 (i.e. `apropos-symbol-face', `apropos-keybinding-face', etc.).
435
436 ** Buffer Menu
437 This package has been rewritten to use Tabulated List mode.
438
439 *** Option `Buffer-menu-buffer+size-width' is now obsolete.
440 Use `Buffer-menu-name-width' and `Buffer-menu-size-width' instead.
441
442 ** Calendar
443
444 *** You can customize the header text that appears above each calendar month.
445 See the variable `calendar-month-header'.
446
447 *** The calendars produced by cal-html include holidays.
448 Customize cal-html-holidays to change this.
449
450 ** Customize
451
452 *** `custom-reset-button-menu' now defaults to t.
453
454 *** Non-option variables are never matched in `customize-apropos' and
455 `customize-apropos-options' (i.e. the prefix argument does nothing for
456 these commands now).
457
458 ** erc will look up server/channel names via auth-source and use the
459 channel keys found, if any.
460
461 ** Dired
462
463 *** `dired-do-async-shell-command' executes each file sequentially
464 if the command ends in `;' (when operating on multiple files).
465 Otherwise, it executes the command on each file in parallel.
466
467 *** Typing M-n in the minibuffer of `dired-do-chmod', `dired-do-chgrp',
468 `dired-do-chown', `dired-do-touch' pulls the file attributes of the
469 file at point.
470
471 *** When the region is active, `m' (`dired-mark'), `u' (`dired-unmark'),
472 `DEL' (`dired-unmark-backward'), `d' (`dired-flag-file-deletion')
473 mark/unmark/flag all files in the active region.
474
475 *** The minibuffer default for `=' (`dired-diff) has changed.
476 It is now the backup file for the file at point, if one exists.
477 In Transient Mark mode the default is the file at the active mark.
478
479 *** `M-=' is no longer bound to `dired-backup-diff' in Dired buffers.
480 The global binding for `M-=', `count-words-region' is in effect.
481
482 ** Shell
483
484 *** New option `async-shell-command-buffer' specifies what buffer to use
485 for a new asynchronous shell command when the default output buffer
486 `*Async Shell Command*' is already taken by another running command.
487
488 ** FFAP
489
490 *** The option `ffap-url-unwrap-remote' can now be a list of strings,
491 specifying URL types which should be converted to remote file names at
492 the FFAP prompt. The default is now '("ftp").
493
494 ** Follow mode
495
496 *** The obsolete variable `follow-mode-off-hook' has been removed.
497
498 *** Follow mode no longer works by using advice.
499 The option `follow-intercept-processes' has been removed.
500
501 ** The `server-auth-key' variable can be used to set a permanent
502 shared key for Emacs Server.
503
504 ** In Perl mode, new option `perl-indent-parens-as-block' causes non-block
505 closing brackets to be aligned with the line of the opening bracket.
506
507 ** FIXME something happened to ses.el, 2012-04-17.
508
509 ** which-function-mode now applies to all applicable major modes by default.
510
511 ** Tramp
512
513 +++
514 *** The syntax has been extended in order to allow ad-hoc proxy
515 definitions. See the manual for details.
516
517 +++
518 *** Remote processes are now supported also on remote Windows host.
519
520 ** D-Bus
521
522 +++
523 *** New variables `dbus-compiled-version' and `dbus-runtime-version'.
524
525 +++
526 *** The D-Bus object manager interface is implemented.
527
528 +++
529 *** Variables of type :(u)int32 and :(u)int64 accept floating points,
530 if their value does not fit into Emacs's integer range.
531
532 +++
533 *** The function `dbus-call-method' works non-blocking now, it can be
534 interrupted by C-g. `dbus-call-method-non-blocking' is obsolete.
535
536 +++
537 *** Signals can be sent also as unicast message.
538
539 +++
540 *** The argument list of `dbus-register-signal' has been extended,
541 according to the new match rule types of D-Bus. See the manual for
542 details.
543
544 +++
545 *** `dbus-init-bus' supports private connections.
546
547 +++
548 *** There is a new function `dbus-setenv'.
549
550 +++
551 ** notifications.el supports now version 1.2 of the Notifications API.
552 The function `notifications-get-capabilities' returns the supported
553 server properties.
554
555 ** Package Menu
556
557 *** Newly-available packages are listed in the Package Menu as "new",
558 and sorted above the other "available" packages by default.
559
560 ** Tabulated List and packages derived from it
561
562 *** New command `tabulated-list-sort', bound to `S', sorts the column
563 at point, or the Nth column if a numeric prefix argument is given.
564
565 ** URL
566
567 *** Structs made by `url-generic-parse-url' have nil `attributes' slot.
568 Previously, this slot stored semicolon-separated attribute-value pairs
569 appended to some imap URLs, but this is not compatible with RFC 3986.
570 So now the `filename' slot stores the entire path and query components
571 and the `attributes' slot is always nil.
572
573 *** New function `url-encode-url' for encoding a URI string.
574 The `url-retrieve' function now uses this to encode its URL argument,
575 in case that is not properly encoded.
576
577 ** Obsolete packages:
578
579 *** assoc.el
580 In most cases, assoc+member+push+delq work just as well.
581 And in any case it's just a terrible package: ugly semantics, terrible
582 inefficiency, and not namespace-clean.
583
584 *** bruce.el
585
586 *** ledit.el
587
588 *** mailpost.el
589
590 *** mouse-sel.el
591
592 *** patcomp.el
593
594 *** cust-print.el
595
596 \f
597 * New Modes and Packages in Emacs 24.3
598 \f
599 * Incompatible Lisp Changes in Emacs 24.3
600
601 ** (random) by default now returns a different random sequence in
602 every Emacs run. Use (random S), where S is a string, to set the
603 random seed to a value based on S, in order to get a repeatable
604 sequence in later calls.
605
606 ** The function `x-select-font' can return a font spec, instead of a
607 font name as a string. Whether it returns a font spec or a font name
608 depends on the graphical library.
609
610 ** If the NEWTEXT arg to `replace-match' contains a substring "\?",
611 that substring is inserted literally even if the LITERAL arg is
612 non-nil, instead of causing an error to be signaled.
613
614 +++
615 ** Docstrings starting with `*' no longer indicate user options.
616 Only variables defined using `defcustom' are considered user options.
617 The function `user-variable-p' is now an obsolete alias for
618 `custom-variable-p'.
619
620 +++
621 ** The return values of `defalias', `defun' and `defmacro' have changed,
622 and are now undefined. For backwards compatibility, defun and
623 defmacro currently return the name of the newly defined function/macro
624 but this should not be relied upon.
625
626 ** `face-spec-set' no longer sets frame-specific attributes when the
627 third argument is a frame (that usage was obsolete since Emacs 22.2).
628
629 +++
630 ** The arguments of `dbus-register-signal' are no longer just strings,
631 but keywords or keyword-string pairs. The old argument list will
632 still be supported for Emacs 24.x.
633
634 ** Spelling changes.
635 Some Lisp symbols have been renamed to avoid problems with spelling
636 that is incorrect or inconsistent with how Emacs normally spells a word.
637
638 *** Renamed functions
639
640 **** hangul-input-method-inactivate -> hangul-input-method-deactivate
641 **** inactivate-input-method -> deactivate-input-method
642 **** quail-inactivate -> quail-deactivate
643 **** robin-inactivate -> robin-deactivate
644 **** viper-inactivate-input-method -> viper-deactivate-input-method
645 **** viper-inactivate-input-method-action ->
646 viper-deactivate-input-method-action
647 **** ucs-input-inactivate -> ucs-input-deactivate
648
649 *** Renamed hooks
650 The old hooks are still supported for backward compatibility, but they
651 are deprecated and will be removed eventually.
652
653 **** input-method-inactivate-hook -> input-method-deactivate-hook
654 **** robin-inactivate-hook -> robin-deactivate-hook
655 **** quail-inactivate-hook -> quail-deactivate-hook
656
657 *** Renamed Lisp variables
658
659 **** follow-deactive-menu -> follow-inactive-menu
660 **** inactivate-current-input-method-function ->
661 deactivate-current-input-method-function
662
663 ** The following obsolete variables and varaliases have been removed:
664
665 *** `facemenu-unlisted-faces'
666 *** `rmail-decode-mime-charset'
667 *** `last-input-char', `last-command-char', `unread-command-char'.
668
669 \f
670 * Lisp changes in Emacs 24.3
671
672 ** Interpreted files get eagerly macro-expanded during load.
673 This can significantly speed up execution of non-byte-compiled code, but can
674 also bump into harmless and previously unnoticed cyclic dependencies.
675 These should not be fatal: they will simply cause the macro-calls to be left
676 for later expansion (as before), but will also result in a warning describing
677 the cycle.
678
679 ** New minor mode `read-only-mode' to replace toggle-read-only (now obsolete).
680
681 ** New functions `autoloadp' and `autoload-do-load'.
682
683 ** New function `posnp' to test if an object is a `posn'.
684
685 ** `function-get' fetches the property of a function, following aliases.
686
687 ** `toggle-read-only' accepts a second argument specifying whether to
688 print a message, if called from Lisp.
689
690 ** CL-style generalized variables are now in core Elisp.
691 `setf' is autoloaded and `push' and `pop' accept generalized variables.
692
693 ** `defun' also accepts a (declare DECLS) form, like `defmacro'.
694 The interpretation of the DECLS is determined by `defun-declarations-alist'.
695
696 ** `macro-declaration-function' is obsolete, use `macro-declarations-alist'.
697
698 ** New function `set-temporary-overlay-map'.
699
700 ** New macros `setq-local' and `defvar-local'.
701
702 ** New error type and new function `user-error'. Doesn't trigger the debugger.
703
704 ** Debugger
705 *** New option `debugger-bury-or-kill'.
706
707 *** Set `debug-on-message' to enter the debugger when a certain
708 message is displayed in the echo area. This can be useful when trying
709 to work out which code is doing something.
710
711 *** New var `inhibit-debugger', automatically set to prevent accidental
712 recursive invocations.
713
714 +++
715 ** New utility function `buffer-narrowed-p'.
716
717 ** Window changes
718
719 *** The functions get-lru-window, get-mru-window and get-largest-window
720 now accept a third argument to avoid choosing the selected window.
721
722 *** Additional values recognized for option `window-combination-limit'.
723
724 *** New macro `with-temp-buffer-window'.
725
726 *** New options `temp-buffer-resize-frames' and
727 `temp-buffer-resize-regexps'.
728
729 *** `temp-buffer-resize-mode' no longer resizes windows that have been
730 reused.
731
732 *** New function `fit-frame-to-buffer' and new option
733 `fit-frame-to-buffer-bottom-margin'.
734
735 *** New display action functions `display-buffer-below-selected',
736 `display-buffer-at-bottom' and `display-buffer-in-previous-window'.
737
738 *** New display action alist entry `inhibit-switch-frame', if non-nil,
739 tells display action functions to avoid changing which frame is
740 selected.
741
742 *** New display action alist entry `pop-up-frame-parameters', if
743 non-nil, specifies frame parameters to give any newly-created frame.
744
745 *** New display action alist entry `previous-window', if non-nil,
746 specifies window to reuse in `display-buffer-in-previous-window'.
747
748 *** The following variables are obsolete, as they can be replaced by
749 appropriate entries in the `display-buffer-alist' function introduced
750 in Emacs 24.1:
751 +++
752 **** `display-buffer-reuse-frames'
753 **** `special-display-regexps'
754 **** `special-display-frame-alist'
755 **** `special-display-buffer-names'
756 **** `special-display-function'
757 **** `display-buffer-function'
758
759 ** Minibuffer
760
761 *** `read-regexp' has a new argument HISTORY; the first argument PROMPT
762 of `read-regexp' accepts a string ending with a colon and space, and its
763 second argument DEFAULTS can be a list of strings accessible via M-n
764 in the minibuffer ahead of other hard-coded useful regexp-related values.
765 More commands use `read-regexp' now to read their regexp arguments.
766
767 ** Completion
768
769 *** New function `completion-table-with-quoting' to handle completion
770 in the presence of quoting, such as file completion in shell buffers.
771
772 *** New function `completion-table-subvert' to use an existing completion
773 table, but with a different prefix.
774
775 ** Time
776
777 *** `current-time-string' no longer requires that its argument's year
778 must be in the range 1000..9999. It now works with any year supported
779 by the underlying C implementation.
780
781 ** Floating point
782
783 *** When floating point functions such as `log' are given invalid
784 arguments, e.g., (log -1.0), they now uniformly return special values
785 such as NaNs instead of signaling errors. Previously, these functions
786 returned NaNs on some platforms but signaled errors on others. The affected
787 functions are acos, asin, tan, exp, expt, log, log10, sqrt, and mod.
788
789 ** New function file-name-base.
790
791 ** New function `tty-top-frame' returns the topmost frame of a text terminal.
792
793 ** `automount-dir-prefix' is obsolete.
794 ** `buffer-has-markers-at' is obsolete.
795 ** `window-system-version' is obsolete.
796 \f
797 * Changes in Emacs 24.3 on non-free operating systems
798
799 ** New configure.bat options on MS-Windows:
800
801 *** --without-libxml2 omits support for libxml2, even if its presence
802 is detected.
803
804 ** When invoked with the -nw switch to run on the Windows text-mode terminal,
805 Emacs now supports mouse highlight, help-echo (in the echo area), and
806 mouse-autoselect-window.
807
808 ** On MS-Windows Vista and later Emacs now supports symbolic links.
809 \f
810 * Changes in Emacs 24.2
811
812 ** This is mainly a bug-fix release.
813
814 \f
815 * Installation Changes in Emacs 24.1
816
817 ** Emacs can be compiled with Gtk+ 3.0 if you pass --with-x-toolkit=gtk3
818 to configure. Note that other libraries used by Emacs, RSVG and GConf,
819 also depend on Gtk+. You can disable them with --without-rsvg and
820 --without-gconf.
821
822 ** Emacs can be compiled with GnuTLS support.
823 This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
824 found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
825 `--without-gnutls'. See below for GnuTLS features.
826
827 ** Emacs can be compiled with SELinux support.
828 This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
829 found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
830 `--without-selinux'. See below for SELinux features.
831
832 ** Emacs can be compiled with ImageMagick support.
833 This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
834 found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
835 `--without-imagemagick'. See below for ImageMagick features.
836 This feature is not available for the Nextstep or MS ports.
837
838 ** Emacs can be compiled with libxml2 support.
839 This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
840 found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
841 `--without-xml2'. See below for libxml2 features.
842
843 ** By default, the installed Info and man pages are compressed.
844 You can disable this by configuring --without-compress-info.
845
846 ** New configure option --with-wide-int.
847 With it, Emacs integers typically have 62 bits, even on 32-bit machines.
848 On 32-bit hosts, this raises the limit on buffer sizes from about 512 MiB
849 to about 2 GiB.
850
851 ** New configure options: --with-mmdf, --with-mail-unlink, --with-mailhost.
852 These provide no new functionality, they just remove the need to edit
853 lib-src/Makefile by hand in order to use the associated features.
854
855 ** New configure option --enable-use-lisp-union-type.
856 This is only useful for Emacs developers to debug certain types of bugs.
857 This is not a new feature; only the configure flag is new.
858
859 ** The standalone programs digest-doc and sorted-doc are removed.
860 Emacs now uses Lisp commands `doc-file-to-man' and `doc-file-to-info'.
861
862 ** The standalone program `fakemail' is removed.
863 If you need it, feedmail.el provides a superset of the functionality.
864
865 \f
866 * Startup Changes in Emacs 24.1
867
868 ** The --unibyte, --multibyte, --no-multibyte, and --no-unibyte
869 command line arguments, and the EMACS_UNIBYTE environment variable, no
870 longer have any effect. (They were declared obsolete in Emacs 23.)
871
872 ** New command line option `--no-site-lisp' removes site-lisp directories
873 from load-path. -Q now implies this. This option does not affect the
874 EMACSLOADPATH environment variable (and hence has no effect for
875 Nextstep builds).
876
877 \f
878 * Changes in Emacs 24.1
879
880 ** Completion
881
882 *** Many packages now use the `completion-at-point' command,
883 rather than implementing separate completion commands.
884
885 *** `completion-at-point' now handles tags and semantic completion.
886
887 *** Completion in a non-minibuffer now tries to detect the end of completion
888 and pops down the *Completions* buffer accordingly.
889
890 *** New option `completion-cycle-threshold' allows completion cycling.
891
892 *** New option `completion-category-overrides' for overriding the
893 default completion style in certain circumstances.
894
895 *** New completion style `substring'.
896
897 *** Completion of buffer names uses `substring' completion by default.
898
899 *** The option `widget-complete-field' has been removed.
900
901 ** Mail changes
902
903 *** The first time you try sending mail, Emacs asks for a mail method.
904 This is implemented by a new default for `send-mail-function', which
905 is `sendmail-query-once'. This offers to use the smtpmail package, or
906 to use the old defaults relying on external mail facilities
907 (`sendmail-send-it' on GNU/Linux and other Unix-like systems, and
908 `mailclient-send-it' on Windows).
909
910 *** Typing C-c m in the buffer made by M-x report-emacs-bug transfers
911 the report to your desktop's preferred mail client, if there is one.
912 This uses either the "xdg-email" utility, or Mac OS's "open" command.
913
914 *** See Changes in Specialized Modes and Packages for SMTPmail changes
915 and Mail mode changes
916
917 ** Emacs server and client changes
918
919 *** New option `server-port' specifies the port for TCP Emacs servers.
920
921 *** New emacsclient argument -q/--quiet suppresses some status messages.
922
923 *** New emacsclient argument --frame-parameters specifies the frame
924 parameters of any newly-created graphical frame.
925
926 *** If emacsclient shuts down due to Emacs signaling an error,
927 its exit status is 1.
928
929 *** New emacsclient argument --parent-id ID.
930 This opens a client frame in parent X window ID, via XEmbed, similar
931 to the --parent-id argument to Emacs.
932
933 ** Internationalization changes
934
935 *** Emacs now supports display and editing of bidirectional text.
936 Right-to-left (RTL) scripts, such as Arabic, Farsi, and Hebrew, are
937 displayed in the correct visual order as expected by users of those
938 scripts. The display reordering is a "full bidirectionality" class
939 implementation of the Unicode Bidirectional Algorithm (UBA). Buffers
940 with no RTL text should look exactly the same as before.
941
942 **** New buffer-local variable `bidi-display-reordering'.
943 To disable display reordering in a buffer, change this to nil.
944
945 **** New buffer-local variable `bidi-paragraph-direction'.
946 If nil (the default), Emacs determines the base direction of each
947 paragraph from its text, as specified by the UBA. Setting the value
948 to `right-to-left' or `left-to-right' forces a base direction on each
949 paragraph.
950
951 Paragraphs with right-to-left base direction are displayed starting at
952 the right window edge.
953
954 *** Enhanced support for characters with no glyphs in available fonts,
955 or, on text terminals, characters that cannot be encoded by the
956 terminal coding system. The new option `glyphless-char-display-control'
957 specifies how to display them: as a hexadecimal code in a box, a thin
958 1-pixel space, an empty box, etc.
959
960 *** New input methods for Farsi and Bulgarian
961 (farsi-isiri-9147, farsi-transliterate-banan, bulgarian-alt-phonetic).
962
963 *** `nobreak-char-display' now also highlights Unicode hyphen chars
964 (U+2010 and U+2011).
965
966 *** New Hebrew translation of the Emacs Tutorial.
967 Type `C-u C-h t' to choose it in case your language setup doesn't
968 automatically select it.
969
970 ** An Emacs Lisp package manager is now included.
971 This is a convenient way to download and install additional packages,
972 from a package repository at http://elpa.gnu.org.
973
974 *** M-x list-packages shows a list of packages, which can be
975 selected for installation.
976
977 *** New command `describe-package', bound to `C-h P'.
978
979 *** By default, all installed packages are loaded automatically when
980 Emacs starts up. To disable this, set `package-enable-at-startup' to
981 nil. To specify the packages to load, customize `package-load-list'.
982
983 ** Custom theme changes
984
985 *** New command `M-x customize-themes', which provides a convenient
986 interface for enabling and disabling Custom themes.
987
988 *** New option `custom-theme-load-path' is the load path for themes.
989 Emacs no longer looks for Custom themes in `load-path'. The default
990 value of `custom-theme-load-path' says to look for themes in
991 `custom-theme-directory', followed by a subdirectory of
992 `data-directory' named "themes/", which contains a small selection of
993 built-in Custom themes.
994
995 *** New option `custom-safe-themes' records known-safe theme files.
996 If a theme is not in this list, Emacs queries before loading it, and
997 offers to save the theme to `custom-safe-themes' automatically. By
998 default, all themes included in Emacs are treated as safe.
999
1000 ** Improved GTK integration
1001
1002 *** GTK scroll-bars are now placed on the right by default.
1003 The function `set-scroll-bar-mode' can change this.
1004
1005 *** GTK tool bars can have just text, just images or images and text.
1006 Customize `tool-bar-style' to choose the style. On a Gnome desktop,
1007 the default is taken from desktop settings.
1008
1009 *** GTK tool bars can be placed on any edge of the frame.
1010 The frame-parameter tool-bar-position controls this. It takes the
1011 values top, left, right or bottom. The Options => Show/Hide menu has
1012 entries for this.
1013
1014 *** The default colors for selected text (the `region' face) are taken
1015 from the GTK theme when Emacs is built with GTK.
1016
1017 *** Emacs uses GTK tooltips by default if built with GTK.
1018 You can disable this by changing `x-gtk-use-system-tooltips' to nil.
1019
1020 ** Graphical interface changes
1021
1022 *** On graphical displays, the mode-line no longer ends in dashes.
1023 Also, the first dash (which does not indicate anything) is just
1024 displayed as a space.
1025
1026 *** `menu-bar-select-buffer-function' lets you choose another operation
1027 instead of `switch-to-buffer' when selecting an item in the Buffers menu.
1028
1029 *** Lucid menus and dialogs can display antialiased fonts if Emacs is
1030 built with Xft. These fonts can be set via X resources, for example:
1031 Emacs.pane.menubar.font: Courier-12
1032
1033 ** Exiting changes
1034
1035 *** Emacs now calls `kill-emacs' if it receives SIGTERM or SIGHUP,
1036 or if it receives a SIGINT signal in batch mode.
1037
1038 *** `kill-emacs-hook' is now also run in batch mode.
1039 Third-party code which adds to `kill-emacs-hook' should check if they
1040 do the right thing in batch mode.
1041
1042 ** Scrolling changes
1043
1044 *** New scrolling commands `scroll-up-command' and `scroll-down-command'
1045 (bound to C-v/[next] and M-v/[prior]) do not signal errors at top/bottom
1046 of buffer at first key-press (instead they move to top/bottom of buffer)
1047 when `scroll-error-top-bottom' is non-nil.
1048
1049 *** New option `scroll-error-top-bottom' (see above).
1050
1051 *** New scrolling commands `scroll-up-line' and `scroll-down-line'
1052 scroll a line instead of full screen.
1053
1054 *** New property `scroll-command' should be set on a command's symbol to
1055 define it as a scroll command affected by `scroll-preserve-screen-position'.
1056
1057 *** If you customize `scroll-conservatively' to a value greater than 100,
1058 Emacs will never recenter point in the window when it scrolls due to
1059 cursor motion commands or commands that move point (e.f., `M-g M-g').
1060 Previously, you needed to use `most-positive-fixnum' as the value of
1061 `scroll-conservatively' to achieve the same effect.
1062
1063 *** "Aggressive" scrolling now honors the scroll margins.
1064 If you customize `scroll-up-aggressively' or
1065 `scroll-down-aggressively' and move point off the window, Emacs now
1066 scrolls the window so as to avoid positioning point inside the scroll
1067 margin.
1068
1069 ** Basic SELinux support has been added.
1070 This requires Emacs to be linked with libselinux at build time.
1071
1072 *** Emacs preserves the SELinux file context when backing up.
1073 Also, the function `copy-file' has an extra optional argument for
1074 preserving SELinux context, and the return value of `backup-buffer'
1075 now includes the SELinux context.
1076
1077 *** New functions `file-selinux-context' and `set-file-selinux-context'
1078 get and set the SELinux context of a file.
1079
1080 ** Trash changes
1081
1082 *** `delete-by-moving-to-trash' now only affects commands that specify
1083 trashing. This avoids inadvertently trashing temporary files.
1084
1085 *** Calling `delete-file' or `delete-directory' with a prefix argument
1086 now forces true deletion, regardless of `delete-by-moving-to-trash'.
1087
1088 ** File- and directory-local variable changes
1089
1090 *** You can stop directory local vars from applying to subdirectories.
1091 Add an element (subdirs . nil) to the alist portion of any variables
1092 settings to indicate that the section should not apply to
1093 subdirectories.
1094
1095 *** Directory local variables can apply to some file-less buffers.
1096 Affected modes include dired, vc-dir, and log-edit. For example,
1097 adding "(diff-mode . ((mode . whitespace)))" to .dir-locals.el will
1098 turn on `whitespace-mode' for *vc-diff* buffers. Modes should call
1099 `hack-dir-local-variables-non-file-buffer' to support this.
1100
1101 *** Using "mode: MINOR-MODE" to enable a minor mode is deprecated.
1102 Instead, use "eval: (minor-mode 1)".
1103
1104 *** The variable `inhibit-first-line-modes-regexps' has been renamed
1105 to `inhibit-local-variables-regexps'. As the name suggests, it now
1106 applies to ALL file local variables, not just -*- lines. The
1107 associated `inhibit-first-line-modes-suffixes' has been renamed in the
1108 corresponding way.
1109
1110 ** Window changes
1111
1112 *** The `quit-window' command now restores the last buffer displayed
1113 in the quitted window.
1114
1115 *** Resizing an Emacs frame now preserves proportional window sizes,
1116 modulo restrictions like window minimum sizes and fixed-size windows.
1117
1118 *** The behavior of `display-buffer' is now customizable in detail.
1119
1120 **** New option `display-buffer-base-action' specifies a list of
1121 user-determined display "actions" (functions and optional arguments
1122 for choosing the displaying window).
1123
1124 This takes precedence over the default display action, which is
1125 specified by `display-buffer-fallback-action'.
1126
1127 **** New option `display-buffer-alist' maps buffer name regexps to
1128 display actions, taking precedence over `display-buffer-base-action'.
1129
1130 *** New option `window-combination-limit'.
1131 The new option `window-combination-limit' allows to return the space
1132 obtained for resizing or creating a window more reliably to the window
1133 from which such space was obtained.
1134
1135 *** New option `window-combination-resize'.
1136 The new option `window-combination-resize' allows to split a window that
1137 otherwise cannot be split because it's too small by stealing space from
1138 other windows in the same combination. Subsequent resizing or deletion
1139 of the window will resize all windows in the same combination as well.
1140
1141 *** New option `frame-auto-hide-function' lets you choose between
1142 iconifying or deleting a frame when burying a buffer in a dedicated
1143 frame, or quitting a window showing a buffer in a frame of its own.
1144
1145 *** New commands `maximize-window' and `minimize-window'.
1146 These maximize and minimize the size of a window within its frame.
1147
1148 *** New commands `switch-to-prev-buffer' and `switch-to-next-buffer'.
1149 These functions allow to navigate through the live buffers that have
1150 been shown in a specific window.
1151
1152 ** Minibuffer changes
1153
1154 *** The inactive minibuffer has its own major mode `minibuffer-inactive-mode'.
1155 This is handy for minibuffer-only frames, and is also used for the feature
1156 where mouse-1 pops up *Messages*"', which can now easily be changed.
1157
1158 *** Minibuffers set `truncate-lines' to nil.
1159 If you want to change the value to something else, you could use
1160 for example `minibuffer-setup-hook'.
1161
1162 ** `auto-mode-case-fold' is now enabled by default.
1163
1164 ** `backup-by-copying-when-mismatch' now defaults to t.
1165
1166 ** New basic faces `error', `warning', `success'.
1167 These are used to highlight text indicating failure, caution or
1168 successful operation.
1169
1170 ** New option `list-colors-sort' defines the color sort order
1171 for `list-colors-display'.
1172
1173 ** The variable `focus-follows-mouse' now always defaults to nil.
1174
1175 \f
1176 * Editing Changes in Emacs 24.1
1177
1178 ** Search changes
1179
1180 *** C-y in Isearch is now bound to `isearch-yank-kill', instead of
1181 `isearch-yank-line'.
1182
1183 *** M-y in Isearch is now bound to `isearch-yank-pop', instead of
1184 `isearch-yank-kill'.
1185
1186 *** M-s C-e in Isearch is now bound to `isearch-yank-line'.
1187
1188 ** New commands `count-words-region' and `count-words'.
1189
1190 *** M-= is bound to `count-words-region', not `count-lines-region'.
1191 The `count-words-region' command, when called interactively, reports
1192 the number of lines, words, and characters in the region. It is a
1193 superset of the old `count-lines-region', which is now an obsolete
1194 alias for it.
1195
1196 ** The command `just-one-space' (M-SPC), if given a negative argument,
1197 also deletes newlines around point.
1198
1199 ** Deletion changes
1200
1201 *** New option `delete-active-region'.
1202 If non-nil, [delete] and DEL delete the region if it is active and no
1203 prefix argument is given. If set to `kill', those commands kill
1204 instead.
1205
1206 *** New command `delete-forward-char', bound to [delete].
1207 This is meant for interactive use, and obeys `delete-active-region'.
1208 The command `delete-char' does not obey `delete-active-region'.
1209
1210 *** `delete-backward-char' is now a Lisp function.
1211 Apart from obeying `delete-active-region', its behavior is unchanged.
1212 However, the byte compiler now warns if it is called from Lisp; Lisp
1213 callers should use delete-char with a negative argument instead.
1214
1215 *** The option `mouse-region-delete-keys' has been deleted.
1216
1217 ** Selection changes.
1218
1219 The default handling of clipboard and primary selections has been
1220 changed to conform with modern X applications. In short, most
1221 commands for killing and yanking text now use the clipboard, while
1222 mouse commands use the primary selection.
1223
1224 In the following, we provide a list of these changes, followed by a
1225 list of steps to get the old behavior back if you prefer that.
1226
1227 *** `select-active-regions' now defaults to t.
1228 Merely selecting text (e.g. with drag-mouse-1) no longer puts it in
1229 the kill ring. The selected text is put in the primary selection, if
1230 the system possesses a separate primary selection facility (e.g. X).
1231
1232 **** `select-active-regions' also accepts a new value, `only'.
1233 This means to only set the primary selection for temporarily active
1234 regions (usually made by mouse-dragging or shift-selection);
1235 "ordinary" active regions, such as those made with C-SPC followed by
1236 point motion, do not alter the primary selection.
1237
1238 **** `mouse-drag-copy-region' now defaults to nil.
1239
1240 *** mouse-2 is now bound to `mouse-yank-primary'.
1241 This pastes from the primary selection, ignoring the kill-ring.
1242 Previously, mouse-2 was bound to `mouse-yank-at-click'.
1243
1244 *** `x-select-enable-clipboard' now defaults to t on all platforms.
1245
1246 *** `x-select-enable-primary' now defaults to nil.
1247 Thus, commands that kill text or copy it to the kill-ring (such as
1248 M-w, C-w, and C-k) also use the clipboard---not the primary selection.
1249
1250 **** The "Copy", "Cut", and "Paste" items in the "Edit" menu are now
1251 exactly equivalent to M-w, C-w, and C-y respectively.
1252
1253 **** Note that on MS-Windows, `x-select-enable-clipboard' was already
1254 non-nil by default, as Windows does not support the primary selection
1255 between applications.
1256
1257 *** To return to the previous behavior, do the following:
1258
1259 **** Change `select-active-regions' to nil.
1260 **** Change `mouse-drag-copy-region' to t.
1261 **** Change `x-select-enable-primary' to t (on X only).
1262 **** Change `x-select-enable-clipboard' to nil.
1263 **** Bind `mouse-yank-at-click' to mouse-2.
1264
1265 *** Support for X cut buffers has been removed.
1266
1267 *** X clipboard managers are now supported.
1268 To inhibit this, change `x-select-enable-clipboard-manager' to nil.
1269
1270 ** New command `C-x r N' (`rectangle-number-lines') numbers the lines
1271 in the current rectangle. With a prefix argument, this prompts for a
1272 number to count from and for a format string.
1273
1274 ** `redisplay-dont-pause' now defaults to t.
1275 This makes Emacs feel more responsive to editing commands that arrive
1276 at high rate, e.g. if you lean on some key, because stopping redisplay
1277 in the middle (when this variable is nil) forces more expensive
1278 updates later on, and Emacs appears to be unable to keep up.
1279
1280 ** The behavior of <TAB> for active regions in Text mode has changed.
1281 In Text and related modes, typing <TAB> (`indent-for-tab-command')
1282 when the region is active causes Emacs to indent all the lines in the
1283 region, aligning them with the line previous to the first line in the
1284 region (or with the left margin if there is no previous line).
1285
1286 ** When `occur' is called with a prefix argument, matching strings are
1287 collected into the `*Occur*' buffer without line numbers. If there
1288 are parenthesized subexpressions in the specified regexp, `occur'
1289 reads replacement text that may contain \\& and \\N whose convention
1290 follows `replace-match'.
1291
1292 \f
1293 * Changes in Specialized Modes and Packages in Emacs 24.1
1294
1295 ** Archive Mode has basic support for browsing and updating 7z archives.
1296
1297 ** BibTeX mode
1298
1299 *** BibTeX mode now supports biblatex.
1300 Use the variable `bibtex-dialect' to select different BibTeX dialects.
1301 `bibtex-entry-field-alist' is now an obsolete alias for
1302 `bibtex-BibTeX-entry-alist'.
1303
1304 *** New command `bibtex-search-entries', bound to C-c C-a.
1305
1306 *** New `bibtex-entry-format' option `sort-fields', disabled by default.
1307
1308 *** New variable `bibtex-search-entry-globally'.
1309
1310 ** Browse-url
1311
1312 *** New option `browse-url-mailto-function' specifies how to handle "mailto:"s.
1313
1314 *** The default browser used by the package is now the "xdg-open" program,
1315 on platforms that support it. This calls your desktop's preferred browser.
1316
1317 ** Calendar, Diary, and Appt
1318
1319 *** Diary entries can contain non-printing "comments".
1320 See the variable `diary-comment-start'.
1321
1322 *** Appointments can specify their individual warning times.
1323 See the variable `appt-warning-time-regexp'.
1324
1325 *** The function specified by `appt-disp-window-function' may be passed
1326 lists of arguments if multiple appointments are due at similar times.
1327 If you are using a custom function for this, you should update it.
1328
1329 *** New function `diary-hebrew-birthday'.
1330
1331 *** Elements of `calendar-day-abbrev-array' and `calendar-month-abbrev-array'
1332 may no longer be nil, but must all be strings.
1333
1334 *** The obsolete (since Emacs 22.1) method of enabling the appt
1335 package by adding `appt-make-list' to `diary-hook' has been removed.
1336 Use `appt-activate' instead.
1337
1338 *** Some appt variables (obsolete since Emacs 22.1) have been removed:
1339 appt-issue-message (use the function appt-activate)
1340 appt-visible/appt-msg-window (use the variable appt-display-format)
1341
1342 *** Some diary function aliases (obsolete since Emacs 22.1) have been removed:
1343 view-diary-entries, list-diary-entries, show-all-diary-entries
1344
1345 ** CC Mode
1346
1347 *** New feature to "guess" the style in an existing buffer.
1348 The main entry point is M-x c-guess.
1349
1350 *** Java Mode now supports Java 5.0 (Tiger) and 6 (Mustang).
1351
1352 *** `c-beginning-of-defun' and `c-end-of-defun' now respect nested scopes.
1353 Thus C-M-a will, by default, go to the beginning of the immediate function,
1354 not the top level.
1355
1356 *** "Macros with semicolons" can be registered for correct indentation.
1357 Where such a macro ends a line (no semicolon) the next statement is no longer
1358 parsed as a statement continuation.
1359
1360 ** Comint and modes derived from it use the standard completion code.
1361
1362 ** Compilation mode
1363
1364 *** Compilation mode can be used without Font Lock mode.
1365 `compilation-parse-errors-function' is now obsolete.
1366
1367 *** New variable `compilation-filter-start', which is bound while
1368 `compilation-filter-hook' runs. It records the start position of the
1369 text inserted by `compilation-filter'.
1370
1371 *** `compilation-error-screen-columns' and `compilation-first-column'
1372 are obeyed in the editing buffer. So programming language modes can
1373 set them, whereas previously only the value in the *Compilation*
1374 buffer was used.
1375
1376 ** Customize
1377
1378 *** Customize buffers now contain a search field.
1379 The search is performed using `customize-apropos'.
1380 To turn off the search field, set `custom-search-field' to nil.
1381
1382 *** Options in customize group buffers start out hidden if not customized.
1383 Use the arrow to the left of the option name to toggle visibility.
1384
1385 *** custom-buffer-sort-alphabetically now defaults to t.
1386
1387 *** The color widget now has a "Choose" button, which allows you to
1388 choose a color via `list-colors-display'.
1389
1390 ** D-Bus
1391
1392 *** It is now possible to access buses other than the default system
1393 or session bus.
1394
1395 *** The `dbus-register-method' and `dbus-register-property' functions
1396 optionally do not register names.
1397
1398 *** The new function `dbus-register-service' registers a known service
1399 name on a D-Bus without also registering a property or a method.
1400
1401 ** Dired-x
1402
1403 *** C-x C-j (`dired-jump') and C-x 4 C-j (`dired-jump-other-window'),
1404 if called with a prefix argument, read a file name from the minibuffer
1405 instead of using the current buffer.
1406
1407 *** The "dired local variables" feature of Dired-x is obsolete.
1408 The standard directory local variables feature replaces it.
1409
1410 ** ERC changes
1411
1412 *** New options `erc-autojoin-timing' and `erc-autojoin-delay',
1413 controlling attempts to autojoin a channel.
1414
1415 *** New variable `erc-coding-system-precedence': If we use `undecided'
1416 as the server coding system, this variable will then be consulted.
1417 The default is to decode strings that can be decoded as utf-8 as
1418 utf-8, and do the normal `undecided' decoding for the rest.
1419
1420 ** Eshell changes
1421
1422 *** The default value of `eshell-directory-name' has changed
1423 to be an "eshell" directory in `user-emacs-directory'.
1424 The old "~/.eshell/" directory is still used if it exists, though.
1425
1426 ** gdb-mi
1427
1428 *** The M-x gdb command now uses the GDB Machine Interface protocol.
1429 It now supports multithread non-stop debugging and simultaneous
1430 debugging of several threads.
1431
1432 ** Image mode
1433
1434 *** RET (`image-toggle-animation') toggles animation, if applicable.
1435 Animation plays once, unless the option `image-animate-loop' is non-nil.
1436
1437 ** Info
1438
1439 *** New command M-x info-display-manual displays a named Info manual.
1440 If that manual is already visited in some Info buffer, it displays
1441 that buffer. (This is handy if you have many manuals in many *info*
1442 buffers, and don't remember the name of the buffer visiting the manual
1443 you want to consult.) Otherwise, it loads and displays the manual.
1444
1445 *** `e' is now bound to `end-of-buffer' rather than to `Info-edit'.
1446 This is for compatibility with the stand-alone Info reader program,
1447 and also because `Info-edit' is a rarely used command that is disabled
1448 by default.
1449
1450 ** Mail mode changes (not Message mode)
1451
1452 *** New command M-x mail-add-attachment for adding MIME attachments
1453
1454 *** The command M-x mail-attach-file was renamed to M-x mail-insert-file.
1455 (Its name is misleading, since it has nothing to do with MIME
1456 attachments.) The old name is now an obsolete alias to the new name.
1457
1458 ** MH-E has been updated to MH-E version 8.3.1.
1459 See MH-E-NEWS for details.
1460
1461 ** Modula-2 mode provides auto-indentation.
1462
1463 ** mpc.el: Can use pseudo tags of the form tag1|tag2 as a union of two tags.
1464
1465 ** nXML mode no longer binds C-RET to `nxml-complete'.
1466 Completion is now performed via `completion-at-point', bound to C-M-i
1467 or M-TAB. If `nxml-bind-meta-tab-to-complete-flag' is non-nil (the
1468 default), this performs tag completion.
1469
1470 ** Org mode has been updated to version 7.8.09.
1471 See ORG-NEWS for details.
1472
1473 ** Prolog mode has been completely revamped, with lots of additional
1474 functionality such as more intelligent indentation, electricity,
1475 support for more variants, including Mercury, and a lot more.
1476
1477 ** Rmail
1478
1479 *** The command `rmail-epa-decrypt' decrypts OpenPGP data
1480 in the Rmail incoming message.
1481
1482 *** The variable `rmail-message-filter' no longer has any effect.
1483 This change was made in Emacs 23.1 but was not advertised at the time.
1484 Try using `rmail-show-message-hook' instead.
1485
1486 ** Shell mode
1487
1488 *** M-x shell prompts for the shell path name if the default directory
1489 is a remote file name and neither the environment variable $ESHELL nor
1490 the variable `explicit-shell-file-name' is set.
1491
1492 *** TAB is now bound to the standard `completion-at-point' command,
1493 which now implements the pcomplete rules for shell command completion.
1494
1495 ** SMTPmail
1496
1497 *** SMTPmail now uses encrypted connections (via STARTTLS) by default
1498 if the mail server supports them. This uses either built-in GnuTLS
1499 support, or the starttls.el library. Customize `smtpmail-stream-type'
1500 to change this.
1501
1502 *** The variable `smtpmail-auth-credentials' has been removed.
1503 By default, the information is now stored in the file ~/.authinfo.
1504 This was the default value of smtpmail-auth-credentials. If you had
1505 customized smtpmail-auth-credentials to a list of user names and
1506 passwords, those settings are not used. During your first connection
1507 to the smtp server, Emacs will prompt for the user name and password,
1508 and offer to save them to ~/.authinfo. Or you can manually copy the
1509 credentials to ~/.authinfo. For example, if you had
1510
1511 (setq smtpmail-auth-credentials
1512 '(("mail.example.org" 25 "jim" "s!cret")))
1513
1514 then the equivalent line in ~/.authinfo would be
1515
1516 machine mail.example.org port 25 login jim password s!cret
1517
1518 See the auth-source manual for more information, e.g. on encrypting
1519 the credentials file.
1520
1521 *** The variable `smtpmail-starttls-credentials' has been removed.
1522 If you had that set, you need to put
1523
1524 machine smtp.whatever.foo port 25 key "~/.my_smtp_tls.key" cert "~/.my_smtp_tls.cert"
1525
1526 in your ~/.authinfo file instead.
1527
1528 *** SMTPmail defaults to using the address in the From: header as the
1529 SMTP MAIL FROM envelope. To override this, set `mail-envelope-from'
1530 to the address you wish to use instead.
1531
1532 ** SQL mode
1533
1534 *** New options `sql-port', `sql-connection-alist', `sql-send-terminator',
1535 and `sql-oracle-scan-on'.
1536
1537 *** New options controlling prompting for login parameters.
1538 Each supported product has a custom variable `sql-*-login-params',
1539 which is a list of the parameters to be prompted for before a
1540 connection is established.
1541
1542 *** The command `sql-product-interactive' now takes a prefix argument,
1543 which causes it to prompt for an SQL product.
1544
1545 *** Product-specific SQL interactive commands now take prefix arguments.
1546 These commands (`sql-sqlite', `sql-postgres', `sql-mysql', etc.),
1547 given a prefix argument, prompt for a name for the SQL interactive
1548 buffer. This reduces the need for calling `sql-rename-buffer'.
1549
1550 *** SQL interactive modes suppress command continuation prompts, and
1551 replace tabs with spaces. The first change impacts multiple line SQL
1552 statements entered with C-j between each line, statements yanked into
1553 the buffer and statements sent with `sql-send-*' functions. The
1554 second prevents the MySQL and Postgres interpreters from listing
1555 object name completions when sent text via `sql-send-*' functions.
1556
1557 *** New command `sql-connect' starts a predefined SQLi session,
1558 using the login parameters from `sql-connection-alist'.
1559
1560 *** New "Save Connection" menu item in SQLi buffers.
1561 This gathers the login params specified for the SQLi session, if it
1562 was not started by a connection, and saves them as a new connection.
1563
1564 *** New commands for listing database objects and details:
1565 sql-list-all and sql-list-table.
1566
1567 *** An API for manipulating SQL product definitions has been added.
1568
1569 ** TeX modes
1570
1571 *** latex-electric-env-pair-mode keeps \begin..\end matched on the fly.
1572
1573 ** Tramp
1574
1575 *** New inline access method "ksu" (kerberized su).
1576
1577 *** The following access methods are discontinued: "ssh1_old",
1578 "ssh2_old", "scp1_old", "scp2_old", "imap", "imaps" and "fish".
1579
1580 *** The user option `remote-file-name-inhibit-cache' controls whether
1581 remote file attributes are cached for better performance.
1582
1583 *** The option `ange-ftp-binary-file-name-regexp' has changed its
1584 default value to "".
1585
1586 *** Handlers for `file-selinux-context' and `set-file-selinux-context'
1587 for remote machines which support SELinux.
1588
1589 ** New function `url-queue-retrieve', which behaves like url-retrieve,
1590 but with limits (`url-queue-parallel-processes', `url-queue-timeout') on
1591 the degree of parallelism.
1592
1593 ** VC and related modes
1594
1595 *** Support for pulling on distributed version control systems.
1596 The command C-x v + (`vc-pull') runs a "pull" operation, if it is
1597 supported (currently with Bzr, Git, and Mercurial), to update the
1598 current branch and working tree. A prefix argument means to prompt
1599 the user for specifics, e.g. a pull location.
1600
1601 *** `vc-update' is now an alias for `vc-pull'.
1602
1603 *** Support for merging on distributed version control systems.
1604 The command C-x v m (`vc-merge') now runs a "merge" operation, if it
1605 is supported (currently with Bzr, Git, and Mercurial), to merge
1606 changes from another branch into the current one. It prompts for
1607 specifics, e.g. a merge source.
1608
1609 *** New option `vc-revert-show-diff' controls whether `vc-revert'
1610 shows a diff while querying the user. It defaults to t.
1611
1612 *** Log entries in some Log View buffers can be toggled to display a
1613 longer description by typing RET (log-view-toggle-entry-display).
1614 This is currently supported for Bzr, Git, and Mercurial (to support
1615 another backend, define a `log-view-expanded-log-entry-function').
1616 In the Log View buffers made by C-x v L (`vc-print-root-log'), you can
1617 use this to display the full log entry for the revision at point.
1618
1619 *** New command `vc-ediff' allows visual comparison of two revisions
1620 of a file similar to `vc-diff', but using ediff backend.
1621
1622 *** The option `vc-initial-comment' was removed in Emacs 23.2, but
1623 this was not advertised at the time.
1624
1625 *** `vc-toggle-read-only' is an obsolete alias for `toggle-read-only'.
1626 Since Emacs 23, it has done the same thing as `toggle-read-only', but
1627 this was not advertised at the time.
1628
1629 ** Obsolete modes
1630
1631 *** abbrevlist.el
1632
1633 *** erc-hecomplete.el (use erc-pcomplete.el instead)
1634
1635 *** partial-completion-mode (complete.el) is obsolete.
1636 You can get a comparable behavior with:
1637 (setq completion-styles '(partial-completion initials))
1638 (setq completion-pcm-complete-word-inserts-delimiters t)
1639
1640 *** pc-mode.el is obsolete (CUA mode is much more comprehensive).
1641
1642 *** pgg is obsolete (use EasyPG instead).
1643
1644 *** sregex.el is obsolete, since rx.el is a strict superset.
1645
1646 *** s-region.el and pc-select.el are obsolete.
1647 They are superseded by shift-select-mode, enabled by default since 23.1.
1648
1649 *** vc-mcvs.el is obsolete (for lack of a maintainer).
1650
1651 ** Miscellaneous
1652
1653 *** The Landmark game is now invoked with `landmark', not `lm'.
1654 Its functions and variables have been similarly renamed.
1655
1656 *** In `ido-file-completion-map', C-v is no longer bound to `ido-toggle-vc'.
1657 (This interfered with cua-mode.)
1658
1659 *** f90.el has some support for Fortran 2008 syntax.
1660
1661 *** `copyright-fix-years' can optionally convert consecutive years to ranges.
1662
1663 *** New command `nato-region' converts text to NATO phonetic alphabet.
1664
1665 \f
1666 * New Modes and Packages in Emacs 24.1
1667
1668 ** Occur Edit mode applies edits made in *Occur* buffers to the
1669 original buffers. It is bound to "e" in Occur mode.
1670
1671 ** New global minor mode electric-pair-mode.
1672 When enabled, typing an open parenthesis automatically inserts the
1673 matching closing one.
1674
1675 ** New global minor mode electric-indent-mode.
1676 When enabled, typing certain characters triggers reindentation.
1677 Major modes wishing to use this can set electric-indent-chars or
1678 electric-indent-functions.
1679
1680 ** New global minor mode electric-layout-mode.
1681 When enabled, typing certain characters automatically inserts newlines.
1682 Major modes wishing to use this can set electric-layout-rules.
1683
1684 ** tabulated-list.el provides a generic major mode for tabulated data,
1685 from which other modes can be derived.
1686
1687 ** pcase.el provides the ML-style pattern matching macro `pcase'.
1688
1689 ** secrets.el is an implementation of the Secret Service API, an
1690 interface to password managers like GNOME Keyring or KDE Wallet. The
1691 Secret Service API requires D-Bus for communication. The command
1692 `secrets-show-secrets' offers a buffer with a visualization of the
1693 secrets.
1694
1695 ** notifications.el provides an implementation of the Desktop
1696 Notifications API. It requires D-Bus for communication.
1697
1698 ** soap-client.el supports access to SOAP web services from Emacs.
1699 soap-inspect.el is an interactive inspector for SOAP WSDL structures.
1700
1701 ** New generic mode, xmodmap-generic-mode, for xmodmap files.
1702
1703 ** New emacs-lock.el package.
1704 The previous version has been moved to obsolete/old-emacs-lock.el.
1705 Now, there is a proper minor mode `emacs-lock-mode'. Protection
1706 against exiting Emacs and killing the buffer can be set separately.
1707 The mechanism for automatically turning off protection for buffers
1708 with dead inferior processes has been generalized.
1709
1710 \f
1711 * Incompatible Lisp Changes in Emacs 24.1
1712
1713 ** Passing a nil argument to a minor mode function call now ENABLES
1714 the minor mode unconditionally. This is so that you can write e.g.
1715
1716 (add-hook 'text-mode-hook 'foo-mode)
1717
1718 to enable foo-mode in Text mode buffers, removing the need for
1719 `turn-on-foo-mode' style functions. This affects all mode commands
1720 defined by `define-minor-mode'. If called interactively, the mode
1721 command still toggles the minor mode.
1722
1723 ** The return value of `backup-buffer' has changed.
1724 It is now a list of three elements, where the second element is a list
1725 describing the original file's SELinux context. If Emacs or the
1726 system lacks SELinux support, the context list is (nil nil nil nil).
1727 See "Basic SELinux support" above, under "Changes in Emacs 24.1".
1728
1729 ** `char-direction-table' and the `char-direction' function were deleted.
1730 They were buggy and inferior to the new support of bidirectional
1731 editing introduced in Emacs 24. If you need the bidirectional
1732 properties of a character, use `get-char-code-property' with the last
1733 argument `bidi-class'.
1734
1735 ** `copy-directory' now copies the source directory as a subdirectory
1736 of the target directory, if the latter is an existing directory. The
1737 new optional arg COPY-CONTENTS, if non-nil, makes the function copy
1738 the contents directly into a pre-existing target directory.
1739
1740 ** For mouse click input events in the text area, the Y pixel
1741 coordinate in the POSITION list now counts from the top of the text
1742 area, excluding any header line. Previously, it counted from the top
1743 of the header line.
1744
1745 ** Support for "old-style" backquotes, obsolete for 10+ years, has
1746 been further reduced. Now a backquote not followed by a space is
1747 always treated as a "new-style" backquote. Please remove all
1748 "old-style" backquotes from your code. If your code uses backquotes
1749 as documented in the Elisp manual, and compiles without warning, then
1750 you have nothing to do in this regard. Code not following the
1751 appropriate conventions may fail to compile.
1752
1753 The most common cause of trouble seems to be an old-style backquote
1754 followed by a newline. Another cause of trouble is vector notation
1755 for key sequence notation: instead of [(control ,)] and [(control ')],
1756 you should write [(control ?,)] and [(control ?')], which will work in
1757 older Emacsen too.
1758
1759 ** The macro `eval-at-startup' was removed in Emacs 23.2, but this
1760 was not advertised at the time. The function `custom-initialize-delay'
1761 replaced all known uses.
1762
1763 ** `view-buffer' now treats special mode-class in the same way that
1764 `view-file' has since Emacs 22 (i.e. it won't enable View mode if the
1765 major mode is special).
1766
1767 ** Menu and tool bar changes
1768
1769 *** During startup, Emacs no longer adds entries for `menu-bar-lines'
1770 and `tool-bar-lines' to `default-frame-alist' and `initial-frame-alist'.
1771 With these alist entries omitted, `make-frame' checks the value of the
1772 variable `menu-bar-mode'/`tool-bar-mode' to determine whether to create
1773 a menu-bar or tool-bar, respectively. If the alist entries are added,
1774 they override the value of `menu-bar-mode'/`tool-bar-mode'.
1775
1776 *** The menu bar bindings's caches are not used any more.
1777 Use (where-is-internal <def> nil t) instead.
1778
1779 ** Regions created by mouse dragging are now normal active regions,
1780 similar to those created by shift-selection (see Selection changes
1781 above). In previous Emacs versions, these regions were delineated by
1782 `mouse-drag-overlay'; that variable has been removed.
1783
1784 ** The fourth argument of `filter-buffer-substring' has been removed.
1785 If you want to remove text properties from the final result, simply
1786 pass the result through substring-no-properties.
1787
1788 ** cl.el no longer provides `cl-19'.
1789
1790 ** The following obsolete functions and aliases have been removed
1791 (the appropriate new function is given in parentheses; "not needed"
1792 means you can just remove all calls to the function in question):
1793
1794 *** `comint-kill-output' (`comint-delete-output')
1795 *** `decompose-composite-char' (`char-to-string')
1796 *** `outline-visible' (`outline-invisible-p')
1797 *** `internal-find-face' (`facep')
1798 *** `internal-get-face' (`facep and check-face')
1799 *** `frame-update-faces' (not needed)
1800 *** `frame-update-face-colors' (`frame-set-background-mode')
1801 *** `x-frob-font-weight' and `x-frob-font-slant' (`make-face-*' functions)
1802 *** `x-make-font-bold and x-make-font-demibold (`make-face-bold')
1803 *** `x-make-font-italic' and `x-make-font-oblique' (`make-face-italic')
1804 *** `x-make-font-bold-italic' (`make-face-bold-italic')
1805 *** `x-make-font-unbold' (`make-face-unbold')
1806 *** `x-make-font-unitalic' (`make-face-unitalic')
1807 *** `mldrag-drag-mode-line' (`mouse-drag-mode-line')
1808 *** `mldrag-drag-vertical-line' (`mouse-drag-vertical-line')
1809 *** `iswitchb-default-keybindings' (`iswitchb-mode')
1810 *** `char-bytes' (== 1)
1811 *** `isearch-return-char' (`isearch-printing-char')
1812 *** `make-local-hook' (not needed)
1813 *** `set-screen-height' (`set-frame-height')
1814 *** `set-screen-width' (`set-frame-width')
1815
1816 ** The following obsolete variables and varaliases have been removed
1817 (the appropriate new variable is given in parentheses):
1818
1819 *** `checkdoc-minor-keymap' (`checkdoc-minor-mode-map')
1820 *** `vc-header-alist' (`vc-BACKEND-header')
1821 *** `directory-sep-char' (== ?/)
1822 *** `font-lock-defaults-alist' (`font-lock-defaults')
1823 *** `e' (`float-e').
1824
1825 ** The following obsolete files were removed:
1826 sc.el, x-menu.el, rnews.el, rnewspost.el
1827
1828 ** The format of the finder-inf.el file has changed, since the Finder
1829 mechanism is now based on the package system. The variable
1830 `finder-package-info' is replaced by `package--builtins' and
1831 `finder-keywords-hash'.
1832
1833 ** When generating autoloads, `update-directory-autoloads' no longer
1834 assumes every inspected file is in your `load-path'. It instead
1835 generates relative names according to the current `load-path'.
1836
1837 \f
1838 * Lisp changes in Emacs 24.1
1839
1840 ** Code can now use lexical scoping by default instead of dynamic scoping.
1841 The `lexical-binding' variable enables lexical scoping for local
1842 variables. It is typically set via a file-local variable in the first
1843 line of the file, in which case it applies to all the code in that
1844 file.
1845
1846 *** `eval' takes a new optional argument `lexical' to choose the new lexical
1847 binding instead of the old dynamic binding mode.
1848
1849 *** Lexically scoped interpreted functions are represented with a new form
1850 of function value which looks like (closure ENV ARGS &rest BODY).
1851
1852 *** New macro `letrec' to define recursive local functions.
1853
1854 *** `defvar' and `defconst' now mark the variable as special (dynamic).
1855 So do `defcustom' and other forms that call `defvar' as a subroutine.
1856
1857 *** New function `special-variable-p' to check whether a variable is
1858 declared as dynamically bound.
1859
1860 *** The form ((lambda ...) ...) is deprecated.
1861
1862 ** An Emacs Lisp testing tool is now included.
1863 Emacs Lisp developers can use this tool to write automated tests for
1864 their code. See the ERT info manual for details.
1865
1866 ** Changes for bidirectional display and editing
1867
1868 *** New function `current-bidi-paragraph-direction'.
1869 This returns the base direction of the paragraph at point.
1870
1871 *** New function `bidi-string-mark-left-to-right'.
1872 Given a string containing characters from right-to-left scripts, this
1873 function returns another string which can be safely inserted into a
1874 buffer, such that any following text will be always displayed to the
1875 right of that string. (This works by appending an invisible Unicode
1876 "LEFT-TO-RIGHT MARK" character if the argument string might need it.)
1877
1878 This is useful when the buffer has overall left-to-right paragraph
1879 direction and you need to insert a string whose contents are not known
1880 in advance, without disrupting the layout of the line.
1881
1882 ** Window changes
1883
1884 *** Window tree functions are accessible in Elisp.
1885 Functions are provided to return the parent, siblings or child windows
1886 of any window including internal windows (windows not associated with a
1887 buffer) in the window tree.
1888
1889 **** New function `window-valid-p' gives non-nil for live and internal
1890 windows.
1891
1892 **** Window manipulation can deal with internal windows.
1893 Many window handling functions like `split-window', `delete-window', or
1894 `delete-other-windows' as well as the window resizing functions can now
1895 act on any window including internal ones.
1896
1897 *** window-total-height/-width vs window-body-height/-width.
1898 The function `window-height' has been renamed to `window-total-height'
1899 and `window-width' has been renamed to `window-body-width'. The old
1900 names are provided as aliases. Two new functions `window-total-width'
1901 and `window-body-height' are provided.
1902
1903 *** Window parameters specific to window handling functions.
1904 For each window you can specify a parameter to override the default
1905 behavior of a number of functions like `split-window', `delete-window'
1906 and `delete-other-windows'. The variable `ignore-window-parameters'
1907 allows to ignore processing such parameters.
1908
1909 *** New semantics of third argument of `split-window'.
1910 The third argument of `split-window' has been renamed to SIDE and can be
1911 set to any of the values 'below, 'right, 'above, or 'left to make the
1912 new window appear on the corresponding side of the window that shall be
1913 split. Any other value of SIDE will cause `split-window' to split the
1914 window into two side-by-side windows as before.
1915
1916 *** Window resizing functions.
1917 A new standard function for resizing windows called `window-resize' has
1918 been introduced. This and all other functions for resizing windows no
1919 longer delete any windows when they become too small.
1920
1921 *** Deleting the selected window now selects the most recently selected
1922 live window on that frame instead.
1923
1924 *** `adjust-window-trailing-edge' adjustments.
1925 `adjust-window-trailing-edge' can now deal with fixed-size windows and
1926 is able to resize other windows if a window adjacent to the trailing
1927 edge cannot be shrunk any more. This makes its behavior more similar to
1928 that of Emacs 21 without compromising, however, its inability to delete
1929 windows which was introduced in Emacs 22.
1930
1931 *** Window-local buffer lists.
1932 Windows now have local buffer lists. This means that removing a buffer
1933 from display in a window will preferably show the buffer previously
1934 shown in that window with its previous window-start and window-point
1935 positions. This also means that the same buffer may be automatically
1936 shown twice even if it already appears in another window.
1937
1938 *** `switch-to-buffer' has a new optional argument FORCE-SAME-WINDOW,
1939 which if non-nil requires the buffer to be displayed in the currently
1940 selected window, signaling an error otherwise. If nil, another window
1941 can be used, e.g. if the selected one is strongly dedicated.
1942
1943 *** `split-window-vertically' and `split-window-horizontally' renamed
1944 to `split-window-below' and `split-window-right' respectively.
1945 The old names are kept as aliases.
1946
1947 *** Display actions
1948
1949 **** The second arg to `display-buffer' and `pop-to-buffer' is now
1950 named ACTION, and takes a display action of the same form as
1951 `display-buffer-base-action' (see Changes, above). A non-nil,
1952 non-list value is treated specially, as the old meaning.
1953
1954 **** New variable `display-buffer-overriding-action'.
1955
1956 **** The procedure of `display-buffer' etc. to choose a window is
1957 determined by combining `display-buffer-overriding-action',
1958 `display-buffer-alist', the ACTION arg, `display-buffer-base-action',
1959 and `display-buffer-fallback-action'. The second and fourth of these
1960 are user-customizable variables.
1961
1962 See the docstring of `display-buffer' for details.
1963
1964 *** New functions `window-state-get' and `window-state-put'.
1965 These functions allow to save and restore the state of an arbitrary
1966 frame or window as an Elisp object.
1967
1968 ** Completion
1969
1970 *** New variable `completion-extra-properties' used to specify extra
1971 properties of the current completion:
1972 - :annotate-function, same as the old completion-annotate-function.
1973 - :exit-function, function to call after completion took place.
1974
1975 *** Functions on `completion-at-point-functions' can return any of the
1976 properties valid for `completion-extra-properties'.
1977
1978 *** `completion-annotate-function' is obsolete.
1979
1980 *** New `metadata' method for completion tables. The metadata thus returned
1981 can specify various details of the data returned by `all-completions':
1982 - `category' is the kind of objects returned (e.g., `buffer', `file', ...),
1983 used to select a style in completion-category-overrides.
1984 - `annotation-function' to add annotations in *Completions*.
1985 - `display-sort-function' to specify how to sort entries in *Completions*.
1986 - `cycle-sort-function' to specify how to sort entries when cycling.
1987
1988 *** `minibuffer-local-filename-must-match-map' is not used any more.
1989 Instead, the bindings in `minibuffer-local-filename-completion-map'
1990 are combined with `minibuffer-local-must-match-map'.
1991
1992 *** New variable `completing-read-function' allows overriding the
1993 behavior of `completing-read'.
1994
1995 ** `glyphless-char-display' can now distinguish between graphical and
1996 text terminal display, via a char-table entry that is a cons cell.
1997
1998 ** `pre-command-hook'/`post-command-hook' are not reset to nil on error.
1999 Instead, the offending function is removed.
2000
2001 ** New hook types
2002
2003 *** New function `run-hook-wrapped' for running an abnormal hook by
2004 passing the hook functions as arguments to a "wrapping" function.
2005 Like `run-hook-with-args-until-success', it stops at the first
2006 non-nil return value.
2007
2008 *** New macro `with-wrapper-hook' for running an abnormal hook as a
2009 set of "wrapping" filters, similar to around advice.
2010 (A version of this macro was actually added in Emacs 23.2 but was not
2011 advertised at the time.)
2012
2013 ** Debugger changes
2014
2015 *** New macro `condition-case-unless-debug' (this was actually added in
2016 Emacs 23.1 as condition-case-no-debug, but not advertised)
2017
2018 *** The macro `with-demoted-errors' was added in Emacs 23.1, but not advertised.
2019
2020 *** Variable `stack-trace-on-error' removed.
2021
2022 *** The debugger can now "continue" from an error, which means it will
2023 jump to the error handler as if the debugger had not been invoked
2024 instead of jumping all the way to the top-level.
2025
2026 *** Set `debug-on-event' to enter the debugger on events like SIGUSR1.
2027 This can be useful when `inhibit-quit' is set.
2028
2029 ** The new function `server-eval-at' allows evaluation of Lisp forms on
2030 named Emacs server instances.
2031
2032 ** `call-process' and `call-process-region' allow a `(:file "file")' spec
2033 to redirect STDOUT to a file.
2034
2035 ** The function `format-time-string' now supports the %N directive,
2036 for higher-resolution time stamps.
2037
2038 ** New input reading functions
2039
2040 *** New function `read-char-choice' reads a restricted set of
2041 characters, discarding any inputs not inside the set.
2042
2043 *** The command `read-color' now requires a match for a color name
2044 or RGB triplet, instead of signaling an error if the user provides
2045 invalid input.
2046
2047 **** `facemenu-read-color' is now an alias for `read-color'.
2048
2049 ** `image-library-alist' is renamed to `dynamic-library-alist'.
2050 The variable is now used to load all kind of supported dynamic libraries,
2051 not just image libraries. The previous name is still available as an
2052 obsolete alias.
2053
2054 ** Syntax parsing changes
2055
2056 *** New variable `syntax-propertize-function'.
2057 This replaces `font-lock-syntactic-keywords' which is now obsolete.
2058 This allows syntax-table properties to be set independently from font-lock:
2059 just call syntax-propertize to make sure the text is propertized.
2060 Together with this new variable come a new hook
2061 syntax-propertize-extend-region-functions, as well as two helper functions:
2062 syntax-propertize-via-font-lock to reuse old font-lock-syntactic-keywords
2063 as-is; and syntax-propertize-rules which provides a new way to specify
2064 syntactic rules.
2065
2066 *** Syntax tables support a new "comment style c" additionally to style b.
2067
2068 ** New hook `post-self-insert-hook', run after `self-insert-command'.
2069
2070 ** frame-local variables cannot be let-bound any more.
2071
2072 ** Major and minor mode changes
2073
2074 *** `set-auto-mode' now respects mode: local variables at the end of files,
2075 as well as those in the -*- line.
2076
2077 *** `prog-mode' is a new major mode from which programming modes
2078 should be derived.
2079
2080 **** `prog-mode-hook' can be used to enable features for programming
2081 modes, e.g. (add-hook 'prog-mode-hook 'flyspell-prog-mode) to enable
2082 on-the-fly spell checking for comments and strings.
2083
2084 *** New hook `change-major-mode-after-body-hook', run by
2085 `run-mode-hooks' just before any other mode hooks.
2086
2087 *** Enabled globalized minor modes can be disabled in specific major modes.
2088 If the global mode is global-FOO-mode, then run (FOO-mode -1) in the
2089 major mode's hook, where FOO-mode toggles the mode on a per-buffer basis.
2090
2091 *** `define-minor-mode' accepts new keywords :variable, :after-hook.
2092
2093 ** File-handling changes
2094
2095 *** `delete-file' and `delete-directory' now accept optional arg TRASH.
2096 Trashing is performed if TRASH and `delete-by-moving-to-trash' are
2097 both non-nil. Interactively, TRASH defaults to t, unless a prefix
2098 argument is supplied (see Trash changes, above).
2099
2100 *** New file predicates: `file-equal-p', `file-in-directory-p'.
2101
2102 ** Tool-bars can display separators.
2103 Tool-bar separators are handled like menu separators in menu-bar maps,
2104 i.e. via menu entries of the form `(menu-item "--")'.
2105
2106 ** Image API
2107
2108 *** Animated images support (currently animated gifs only).
2109
2110 **** `image-animated-p' returns non-nil if an image can be animated.
2111
2112 **** `image-animate' animates a supplied image spec.
2113
2114 **** `image-animate-timer' returns the timer object for an image that
2115 is being animated.
2116
2117 *** `image-extension-data' has been renamed to `image-metadata'.
2118 The old name is an obsolete alias to the new one.
2119
2120 *** Image mode can view any image type that ImageMagick supports.
2121 This requires Emacs to be built with ImageMagick support.
2122
2123 **** New function `imagemagick-types', defined if ImageMagick support
2124 is enabled, returns a list of image file extensions that your
2125 ImageMagick installation supports.
2126
2127 **** New function `imagemagick-register-types' enables ImageMagick
2128 image types in Image mode and in `create-image' and other helper
2129 functions.
2130
2131 **** New option `imagemagick-types-inhibit' excludes certain
2132 ImageMagick image types from `imagemagick-register-types'.
2133
2134 **** With ImageMagick support, there are extra Image mode commands to
2135 resize and rotate images: `image-transform-fit-to-height',
2136 `image-transform-fit-to-width', `image-transform-set-rotation', and
2137 `image-transform-set-scale'.
2138
2139 ** `compose-mail' now accepts an optional 8th arg, RETURN-ACTION, and
2140 passes it to the mail user agent function. This argument specifies an
2141 action for returning to the caller after finishing with the mail. For
2142 example, this is used by Rmail to optionally delete a mail window.
2143
2144 ** XML and HTML parsing
2145 If Emacs is compiled with libxml2 support, there are two new
2146 functions: `libxml-parse-html-region' (which parses "real world" HTML)
2147 and `libxml-parse-xml-region' (which parses XML). Both return an
2148 Emacs Lisp parse tree.
2149
2150 ** Networking and encryption changes
2151
2152 *** `open-network-stream' can now be used to open an encrypted stream.
2153 It now accepts an optional `:type' parameter for initiating a TLS
2154 connection, directly or via STARTTLS. To do STARTTLS, additional
2155 parameters (`:end-of-command', `:success', `:capabilities-command')
2156 must also be supplied.
2157
2158 *** New library gnutls.el.
2159 The new function `gnutls-available-p' returns non-nil if Emacs is
2160 built with GnuTLS support. The main entry points are
2161 `open-gnutls-stream' and `gnutls-negotiate'. It's easiest to use
2162 these functions through `open-network-stream', because that can
2163 upgrade connections through STARTTLS opportunistically or use plain
2164 SSL, depending on your needs. For debugging, set `gnutls-log-level'
2165 greater than 0.
2166
2167 *** New primitive `secure-hash' that supports many secure hash algorithms:
2168 md5, sha1, sha2, sha224, sha256, sha384, and sha512. The lisp library
2169 sha1.el has been removed. The `sha1' feature is provided by default.
2170
2171 ** Isearch
2172
2173 *** New hook `isearch-update-post-hook' that runs in `isearch-update'.
2174
2175 ** Progress reporters can now "spin".
2176 The MIN-VALUE and MAX-VALUE arguments of `make-progress-reporter' can
2177 now be nil, or omitted. This makes a "non-numeric" reporter. Each
2178 time you call `progress-reporter-update' on that progress reporter,
2179 with a nil or omitted VALUE argument, the reporter message is
2180 displayed with a "spinning bar".
2181
2182 ** New variable `revert-buffer-in-progress-p' is true while a buffer is
2183 being reverted, even if the buffer has a local `revert-buffer-function'.
2184
2185 ** New variables `delayed-warnings-list' and `delayed-warnings-hook'.
2186 If delayed-warnings-list is non-nil, the command loop calls
2187 `delayed-warnings-hook' after `post-command-hook'. At present, this
2188 is only used by Emacs on some platforms to display warnings during
2189 startup, which might otherwise not be noticed. This uses the
2190 functions `display-delayed-warnings' and `collapse-delayed-warnings'.
2191
2192 ** rx.el has a new `group-n' construct for explicitly numbered groups.
2193
2194 ** New function `make-composed-keymap' that constructs a new keymap
2195 from multiple input maps. You can use this to make a keymap that
2196 inherits from multiple maps, eg:
2197 (set-keymap-parent newmap (make-composed-keymap othermap parent))
2198
2199 ** New function `string-prefix-p'.
2200 (This was actually added in Emacs 23.2 but was not advertised at the time.)
2201
2202 ** New reader macro ## that stands for the empty symbol.
2203 This means that the empty symbol can now be read back. Also, #: by itself
2204 (when not immediately followed by a possible symbol character) stands for
2205 an empty uninterned symbol.
2206
2207 ** New math functions `isnan', `copysign', `frexp', `ldexp'.
2208
2209 ** The following functions and variables are obsolete:
2210
2211 *** `tooltip-use-echo-area' is obsolete.
2212 Rather than setting this to t, disable Tooltip mode instead.
2213
2214 *** buffer-substring-filters is obsolete.
2215 Use `filter-buffer-substring-functions' instead.
2216
2217 *** `byte-compile-disable-print-circle' is obsolete.
2218
2219 *** `deferred-action-list' and `deferred-action-function' are obsolete.
2220 Use `post-command-hook' instead.
2221
2222 *** `font-lock-maximum-size' is obsolete.
2223
2224 \f
2225 * Changes in Emacs 24.1 on non-free operating systems
2226
2227 ** On MS Windows, Emacs warns when using the obsolete init file _emacs,
2228 and also when HOME is set to C:\ by default.
2229
2230 ** New configure.bat options
2231
2232 *** --enable-checking builds Emacs with extra runtime checks.
2233
2234 *** --distfiles specifies files to be included in binary distribution.
2235
2236 *** --without-gnutls disables automatic GnuTLS detection.
2237
2238 *** --lib for general library linkage, works with the USER_LIBS build variable.
2239
2240 ** New make target `dist' to create binary distribution for MS Windows.
2241
2242 ** The Lisp function `w32-default-color-map' is now obsolete.
2243 (It is only used internally in the Emacs C code.)
2244
2245 ** Customize ns-auto-hide-menu-bar to have the menu-bar hidden, but
2246 reappear on mouse-over. (Requires OS X 10.6 or later.)
2247
2248 ** On Mac OS X, dragging a file into Emacs visits the file, like on
2249 other platforms, rather than inserting its contents into the buffer.
2250
2251 \f
2252 ----------------------------------------------------------------------
2253 This file is part of GNU Emacs.
2254
2255 GNU Emacs is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
2256 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
2257 the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
2258 (at your option) any later version.
2259
2260 GNU Emacs is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
2261 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
2262 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
2263 GNU General Public License for more details.
2264
2265 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
2266 along with GNU Emacs. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
2267
2268 \f
2269 Local variables:
2270 mode: outline
2271 paragraph-separate: "[ \f]*$"
2272 end: