1 GNU Emacs NEWS -- history of user-visible changes.
3 Copyright (C) 2007 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
4 See the end of the file for license conditions.
6 Please send Emacs bug reports to emacs-pretest-bug@gnu.org.
7 If possible, use M-x report-emacs-bug.
9 This file is about changes in Emacs version 23.
11 See files NEWS.22, NEWS.21, NEWS.20, NEWS.19, NEWS.18, and NEWS.1-17
12 for changes in older Emacs versions.
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.
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.
24 * About external Lisp packages
27 * Installation Changes in Emacs 23.1
29 ** The default X toolkit is now Gtk+, rather than Lucid.
31 ** configure now checks for libgif before libungif when searching for
34 ** Support for systems without alloca has been removed.
36 ** Support for Sun windows has been removed.
38 ** The `emacstool' utility has been removed.
41 * Changes in Emacs 23.1
43 ** Emacs now supports using both X displays and ttys in one session.
44 You can also use any number of different ttys.
46 You can test for the presence of this feature in your Lisp code by
47 testing for the `multi-tty' feature.
49 ** Emacs comes with a new set of icons for Mac OS X.
50 OS-X-style icons (an application icon and a relevant document icon)
51 were contributed by Kentaro Ohkouchi.
52 Source files for these icons can be found in Emacs.app/Contents/Resources.
54 ** Built-in functions (subr) can now have an interactive specification
55 that is not a prompt string. If the `intspec' parameter of a `DEFUN'
56 starts with a `(', the string is evaluated as a Lisp form.
58 ** set-file-modes is now interactive and can take the mode value in
59 symbolic notation thanks to auxiliary functions.
61 ** split-window-preferred-function specifies whether display-buffer should
62 split windows vertically or horizontally.
64 ** Emacsclient has been extended to support opening a new terminal
65 frame. Its behavior has been changed to open a new Emacs frame by
66 default. Use the -c option to get the old behavior of opening files in
67 the currently selected Emacs frame.
69 ** The refcards are now shipped as PDF files.
71 ** Emacs now supports the SVG image format through librsvg2.
73 ** If you set find-file-confirm-nonexistent-file to t, then C-x C-f
74 requires confirmation before opening a non-existent file.
76 ** If the gpm mouse server is running and t-mouse-mode enabled, Emacs uses a
77 Unix socket in a GNU/Linux console to talk to server, rather than faking events
78 using the client program mev. This C level approach provides mouse
79 highlighting, and help echoing in the minibuffer.
81 ** The new variable next-error-recenter specifies how next-error should
82 recenter the visited source file. Its value can be a number (for example,
83 0 for top line, -1 for bottom line), or nil for no recentering.
85 ** The mode-line displays a `@' if the default-directory for the current buffer
86 is on a remote machine, or a hyphen otherwise.
88 ** The mode-line displays a mode menu when mouse-1 is clicked on a minor mode,
89 in the same way as it already did for major modes.
91 ** The new command balance-windows-area balances windows both vertically
94 ** The new command close-display-connection can be used to close a connection
95 to a remote display, e.g. because the display is about to become unreachable.
97 ** The command shell prompts for the default directory, when it is
98 called with a prefix, and the default directory is a remote file name.
99 This is because some file name handlers (like ange-ftp) are not able to
100 run processes remotely.
102 ** The new command `display-time-world' starts an updating time display
103 using several time zones, in a buffer.
105 * Startup Changes in Emacs 23.1
107 ** New user option `initial-buffer-choice' specifies what to display
108 after starting Emacs: startup screen, *scratch* buffer, visiting a
111 ** New alias `argv' for `command-line-args-left'
112 This is a convenience alias, so that one can write `(pop argv)'
113 inside of --eval command line arguments in order to access
116 ** The abbrev file is no longer read at startup in batch mode.
118 * Incompatible Editing Changes in Emacs 23.1
121 * Editing Changes in Emacs 23.1
124 ** M-q now fills the region if the region is active and
125 `transient-mark-mode' is turned on. Otherwise, it fills the current
129 ** M-$ now checks spelling of the region if the region is active and
130 `transient-mark-mode' is turned on. Otherwise, it checks spelling of the
133 ** TAB now indents the region if the region is active and
134 `transient-mark-mode' is turned on.
136 ** C-z now invokes `suspend-frame', C-x C-c now invokes
137 `save-buffers-kill-terminal'.
139 ** New command kill-matching-buffers kills buffers whose name matches a regexp.
141 ** `interprogram-paste-function' can now return one string or a list
142 of strings. In the latter case, Emacs puts the second and following
143 strings on the kill ring.
145 ** Minibuffer changes:
147 *** isearch started in the minibuffer searches in the minibuffer history.
148 Reverse isearch commands (C-r, C-M-r) search in previous minibuffer
149 history elements, and forward isearch commands (C-s, C-M-s) search in
150 next history elements. When the reverse search reaches the first history
151 element, it wraps to the last history element, and the forward search
152 wraps to the first history element. When the search is terminated, the
153 history element containing the search string becomes the current.
156 * New Modes and Packages in Emacs 23.1
158 ** The package doc-view.el has been added. It supports viewing of PDF,
159 PostScript and DVI documents inside an Emacs buffer by converting the
160 document to a set of PNG images first. One can also search for a
161 regular expression in the document. The commentary of the file explains
164 ** A new game called `bubbles' has been added.
166 ** minibuffer-indicate-depth-mode shows the minibuffer depth in the prompt.
168 ** Remember Mode (remember.el) is now included with Emacs. It is a
169 mode for quickly jotting down things to remember. Included with
170 remember.el is a backend that can save notes to a Diary file. Please
171 consult the Remember Manual for usage details.
174 * Changes in Specialized Modes and Packages in Emacs 23.1
176 ** abbrev was rewritten in Elisp and extended with more flexibility.
177 *** New functions: abbrev-get, abbrev-put, abbrev-table-get, abbrev-table-put,
179 *** Special hook `abbrev-expand-functions' obsoletes `pre-abbrev-expand-hook'.
180 *** `make-abbrev-table', `define-abbrev', `define-abbrev-table' all take
181 extra arguments for arbitrary properties.
182 *** New variable `abbrev-minor-mode-table-alist'.
183 *** `local-abbrev-table' can hold a list of abbrev-tables.
184 *** Abbrevs have now the following special properties:
185 `:count', `:system', `:enable-function', `:case-fixed'.
186 *** Abbrev-tables have now the following special properties:
187 `:parents', `:case-fixed', `:enable-function', `:regexp',
188 `abbrev-table-modiff'.
190 ** isearch can now search through multiple ChangeLog files.
191 When running isearch in a ChangeLog file, if the search fails,
192 then another C-s tries searching the previous ChangeLog,
193 if there is one (e.g. go from ChangeLog to ChangeLog.12).
195 This is enabled if isearch-buffers-multi is non-nil.
198 ** In Dired-x, all command guesses for ! are now added to the default
199 list accessible by M-n instead of pushing all guesses temporarily into
202 ** smerge-refine highlights word-level details of changes in conflict.
203 It's used automatically as you move through conflicts, see smerge-auto-refine.
205 ** diff-refine-hunk highlights word-level details of changes in a diff hunk.
206 It's used automatically as you move through hunks, see diff-auto-refine.
208 ** archive-mode has basic support to browse Rar archives.
210 ** talk.el has been extended for multiple tty support.
212 ** compilation-auto-jump-to-first-error tells `compile' to jump to
213 the first error encountered during compilations.
215 ** In the `copyright' package, you can specify your copyright holders' names.
216 Only copyright lines with holders matching copyright-names-regexp will be
217 considered for update.
219 ** eldoc highlights the function argument under point
220 with the face `eldoc-highlight-function-argument'.
223 ** defcustom accepts new keyword arguments, `:safe' and `:risky', which
224 set a variable's `safe-local-variable' and `risky-local-variable' property.
227 *** Clicking on the VC mode-line entry now pops the VC menu.
229 *** The VC mode-line entry now has a tooltip that explains the VC file status.
231 *** VC now supports applying VC operations to a set of files at a time.
233 This enables VC to work much more effectively with changeset-oriented
234 version-control systems such as Subversion, GNU Arch, Mercurial, and
235 Bzr. VC will now pass a multiple-file commit to these systems
236 as a single changeset.
238 ** sgml-electric-tag-pair-mode lets you simultaneously edit matched tag pairs.
240 ** The appearance of superscript and subscript in TeX is more customizable.
241 See the documentation of the variables: tex-fontify-script,
242 tex-font-script-display, tex-suscript-height-ratio, and
243 tex-suscript-height-minimum.
247 *** New `bibtex-entry-format' options `whitespace', `braces', and
248 `string', disabled by default.
250 *** New variable `bibtex-cite-matcher-alist' contains rules to
251 identify cited keys in BibTeX entries, used by `bibtex-find-crossref'.
253 *** Command `bibtex-url' now allows multiple URLs per entry.
258 *** New connection methods.
259 The new methods "plinkx", "plink2", "psftp", "sftp" and "fish" have
260 been introduced. There are also new so-called gateway methods
261 "tunnel" and "socks".
263 *** Multihop syntax has been removed.
264 The pseudo-method "multi" has been removed. Instead of, multi hops
265 can be specified by the new variable `tramp-default-proxies-alist'.
267 *** More default settings.
268 Default values can be set via the variables `tramp-default-user',
269 `tramp-default-user-alist' and `tramp-default-host'.
271 *** Connection information is cached.
272 In order to reduce connection setup, information about used
273 connections are kept persistent in a file. The name of this file is
274 defined in the variable `tramp-persistency-file-name'.
276 *** Control of remote processes.
277 Running processes on a remote host can be controlled by settings in
278 `tramp-remote-path' and `tramp-remote-process-environment'.
280 *** Success of remote copy is checked.
281 When the variable `file-precious-flag' is set, the success of a remote
282 file copy is checked via the file's checksum.
284 ** Miscellaneous programming mode changes
286 *** The file etc/emacs.py now supports both Python 2 and 3, meaning
287 that either version can be used as inferior Python by python.el.
289 *** The variable `fortran-line-length' can change the fixed-form line-length.
292 *** (The increasingly misnamed) F90 mode supports Fortran 2003 syntax.
296 *** comint-mode uses `start-file-process' now (see Lisp Changes).
297 If `default-directory' is a remote file name, subprocesses are started
298 on the corresponding remote system.
300 *** C-x C-q in dired-mode now runs the command wdired-change-to-wdired-mode,
301 and C-x C-q in wdired-mode exits it with asking a question about
304 *** The new command `eshell/info' runs info in an eshell buffer.
307 * Changes in Emacs 23.1 on non-free operating systems
310 ** IPv6 is supported on MS-Windows.
311 Emacs now supports IPv6 on Windows XP and later, and earlier versions
312 of Windows with third party IPv6 stacks installed. Previously IPv6 was
313 supported on other platforms, but not on Windows due to using the winsock
314 1.1 header file, even though Emacs was linking to the winsock 2 library.
317 * Incompatible Lisp Changes in Emacs 23.1
320 ** The function `dired-call-process' has been removed.
322 ** The variable `byte-compile-warnings' can now be a list starting with `not',
323 meaning to disable the specified warnings. The meaning of this list
324 may therefore be the reverse of what you expect (of course, this is
325 only an issue if you make use of the new `not' syntax). Rather than
326 checking/manipulating elements directly, use the new functions
327 `byte-compile-warning-enabled-p', `byte-compile-disable-warning', and
328 `byte-compile-enable-warning.'
330 ** shell.el no longer defines the aliases `dirtrack-toggle' and
331 `dirtrack-mode' for `shell-dirtrack-mode'. These names were removed
332 because they clash with commands provided by dirtrack.el. Use
333 `shell-dirtrack-mode' instead.
336 * Lisp Changes in Emacs 23.1
339 ** A list of default values can be specified for the DEFAULT argument of
340 functions `read-from-minibuffer', `read-string', `read-command',
341 `read-variable', `read-buffer', `completing-read'. Elements of this list
342 are available for inserting into the minibuffer by typing `M-n'.
343 For empty input these functions return the first element of this list.
345 ** `custom-note-var-changed' tells Custom to treat the change in a certain
346 variable as having been made within Custom.
348 ** `frame-inherited-parameters' lets new frames inherit parameters from
351 ** New keymap `input-decode-map' overrides like key-translation-map, but
352 applies before function-key-map. Also it is terminal-local contrary to
353 key-translation-map. Terminal-specific key-sequences are generally added to
354 this map rather than to function-key-map now.
356 ** The new function `read-color' reads a color name using the minibuffer.
358 ** Changes related to multiple tty support.
360 *** $TERM is now set to `dumb' for subprocesses. If you want to know the
361 $TERM inherited by Emacs you will have to look inside initial-environment.
363 *** $DISPLAY is now dynamically inherited from the frame's `display'.
365 *** The `window-system' variable has been made frame-local. The new
366 `initial-window-system' variable contains the `window-system' value
369 *** You can specify a terminal device (`tty' parameter) and a terminal
370 type (`tty-type' parameter) to `make-terminal-frame'.
372 *** The new function `make-frame-on-tty' allows you to create a new
373 frame on another tty device interactively.
375 *** The function `make-frame-on-display' now works during a tty
376 session, and `make-frame-on-tty' works during a graphical session.
378 *** New functions: `delete-tty', `suspend-tty', `resume-tty'.
380 *** A new data type for terminals with functions: `get-device-terminal',
381 `terminal-parameters', `terminal-parameter', `set-terminal-parameter'.
383 *** New hooks: `suspend-tty-functions' and `resume-tty-functions'
384 are called after a tty frame has been suspended or resumed,
385 respectively. The functions are called with the terminal id of the frame
386 being suspended/resumed as a parameter.
388 *** New function: `environment'.
390 *** New variable: `local-function-key-map'.
391 This in addition to the global function-key-map variable that
392 already existed. The global variable is not used directly any more;
393 instead, the local-function-key-map is initialized so as to inherit from
396 *** `initial-environment' holds the environment inherited from Emacs's parent.
398 *** The `keyboard-translate-table' variable and the terminal and
399 keyboard coding systems have been made terminal-local.
401 *** In addition to the global function-key-map, Emacs has terminal-local
402 local-function-key-map variables, and uses them instead of the
403 global keymaps to set up translations and function key sequences
404 relevant to a specific terminal device.
407 ** You can now also pass the value of the `invisible' property to invisible-p
408 to check whether it would cause the text to be invisible. Convenient when
409 checking invisibility of text which has no buffer position
410 (e.g. in before/after-strings).
412 ** Non-breaking space now acts as whitespace.
415 ** In `condition-case', a handler can specify "let the debugger run first".
417 You do this by writing `debug' in the list of conditions to be handled,
424 ** The `require-match' argument to `completing-read' accepts a new value
428 ** The regexp form \(?<num>:<regexp>\) specifies the group number explicitly.
430 ** New function `window-full-width-p' returns t if a window is as wide
433 ** The new function `split-string-and-unquote' does (what?)
435 ** The new function `combine-and-quote-strings' does (what?)
437 ** The new function `image-refresh' refreshes all images associated
438 with a given image specification.
441 ** New variable `user-emacs-directory'.
442 Use this instead of "~/.emacs.d".
445 ** The new function `start-file-process' is similar to `start-process',
446 but obeys file handlers. The file handler is chosen based on
447 `default-directory'. The functions `start-file-process-shell-command'
448 and `process-file-shell-command' are also new; they call internally
449 `start-file-process' and `process-file', respectively.
452 ** `file-remote-p' has new optional parameters IDENTIFICATION and CONNECTED.
453 IDENTIFICATION specifies which part of the remote identifier has to be
454 returned. With CONNECTED passed non-nil, it is checked whether a
455 remote connection has been established already.
457 ** The two new functions `looking-at-p' and `string-match-p' can do
458 the same matching as `looking-at' and `string-match' without changing
461 ** The interactive-form of a function can be added post-facto via the
462 `interactive-form' symbol property. Mostly useful to add complex interactive
463 forms to subroutines.
465 * New Packages for Lisp Programming in Emacs 23.1
467 ** The package isearch-multi.el has been added. It implements a new mode
468 `isearch-buffers-minor-mode' that allows isearch to search through
469 multiple buffers. In this mode a new variable
470 `isearch-buffers-next-buffer-function' defines the function to call
471 to get the next buffer to search in the series of multiple buffers.
473 ** The new package avl-tree.el deals with the AVL tree data structure.
476 ----------------------------------------------------------------------
477 This file is part of GNU Emacs.
479 GNU Emacs is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
480 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
481 the Free Software Foundation; either version 3, or (at your option)
484 GNU Emacs is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
485 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
486 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
487 GNU General Public License for more details.
489 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
490 along with GNU Emacs; see the file COPYING. If not, write to the
491 Free Software Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor,
492 Boston, MA 02110-1301, USA.
497 paragraph-separate: "[
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500 arch-tag: e759449d-88b3-4de4-9900-3a6c3dfa23e2