1 GNU Emacs NEWS -- history of user-visible changes. 2001-03-15
2 Copyright (C) 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
3 See the end for copying conditions.
5 Please send Emacs bug reports to bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org.
6 For older news, see the file ONEWS
9 +++ indicates that the appropriate manual has already been updated.
10 --- means no change in the manuals is called for.
11 When you add a new item, please add it without either +++ or ---
15 * Installation Changes in Emacs 21.3
17 ** Emacs now supports new configure options `--program-prefix',
18 `--program-suffix' and `--program-transform-name' that affect the names of
22 ** Leim is now part of the Emacs distribution.
23 You no longer need to download a separate tarball in order to build
26 ** Support for FreeBSD/Alpha has been added.
29 * Changes in Emacs 21.3
32 ** The new option `Info-scroll-prefer-subnodes' causes Info to behave
33 like the stand-alone Info reader (from the GNU Texinfo package) as far
34 as motion between nodes and their subnodes is concerned. If it is t
35 (the default), Emacs behaves as before when you type SPC in a menu: it
36 visits the subnode pointed to by the first menu entry. If this option
37 is nil, SPC scrolls to the end of the current node, and only then goes
38 to the first menu item, like the stand-alone reader does.
40 This change was already in Emacs 21.1, but wasn't advertised in the
44 ** LDAP support now defaults to ldapsearch from OpenLDAP version 2.
47 ** The new command-line option --color=MODE lets you specify a standard
48 mode for a tty color support. It is meant to be used on character
49 terminals whose capabilities are not set correctly in the terminal
50 database, or with terminal emulators which support colors, but don't
51 set the TERM environment variable to a name of a color-capable
52 terminal. "emacs --color" uses the same color commands as GNU `ls'
53 when invoked with "ls --color", so if your terminal can support colors
54 in "ls --color", it will support "emacs --color" as well. See the
55 user manual for the possible values of the MODE parameter.
58 ** Emacs can now be invoked in full-screen mode on a windowed display.
60 When Emacs is invoked on a window system, the new command-line options
61 `--fullwidth', `--fullheight', and `--fullscreen' produce a frame
62 whose width, height, or both width and height take up the entire
63 screen size. (For now, this works only on GNU and Unix systems, and
64 not with every window manager.)
66 ** Info-index finally offers completion.
68 ** Controlling the left and right fringe widths.
70 The left and right fringe widths can now be controlled by setting the
71 `left-fringe' and `right-fringe' frame parameters to an integer value
72 specifying the width in pixels. Setting the width to 0 effectively
73 removes the corresponding fringe.
75 The actual fringe widths may deviate from the specified widths, since
76 the combined fringe widths must match an integral number of columns.
77 The extra width is distributed evenly between the left and right fringe.
78 For force a specific fringe width, specify the width as a negative
79 integer (if both widths are negative, only the left fringe gets the
82 Setting the width to nil (the default), restores the default fringe
83 width which is the minimum number of pixels necessary to display any
84 of the currently defined fringe bitmaps. The width of the built-in
85 fringe bitmaps is 8 pixels.
87 ** Changes in C-h bindings:
89 C-h e displays the *Messages* buffer.
91 C-h followed by a control character is used for displaying files
94 C-h C-f displays the FAQ.
95 C-h C-e displays the PROBLEMS file.
97 The info-search bindings on C-h C-f, C-h C-k and C-h C-i
98 have been moved to C-h F, C-h K and C-h S.
100 ** C-w in incremental search now grabs either a character or a word,
101 making the decision in a heuristic way. This new job is done by the
102 command `isearch-yank-word-or-char'. To restore the old behavior,
103 bind C-w to `isearch-yank-word' in `isearch-mode-map'.
105 ** In GUD mode when talking to GDB, C-x C-a C-j "jumps" the program
106 counter to the specified source line (the one where point is).
108 ** GUD mode improvements for jdb:
110 *** Search for source files using jdb classpath and class
111 information. Fast startup since there is no need to scan all
112 source files up front. There is also no need to create and maintain
113 lists of source directories to scan. Look at `gud-jdb-use-classpath'
114 and `gud-jdb-classpath' customization variables documentation.
116 *** Supports the standard breakpoint (gud-break, gud-clear)
117 set/clear operations from java source files under the classpath, stack
118 traversal (gud-up, gud-down), and run until current stack finish
121 *** Supports new jdb (Java 1.2 and later) in addition to oldjdb
124 *** The previous method of searching for source files has been
125 preserved in case someone still wants/needs to use it.
126 Set gud-jdb-use-classpath to nil.
128 Added Customization Variables
130 *** gud-jdb-command-name. What command line to use to invoke jdb.
132 *** gud-jdb-use-classpath. Allows selection of java source file searching
133 method: set to t for new method, nil to scan gud-jdb-directories for
134 java sources (previous method).
136 *** gud-jdb-directories. List of directories to scan and search for java
137 classes using the original gud-jdb method (if gud-jdb-use-classpath
142 *** Do not allow debugger output history variable to grow without bounds.
144 ** hide-ifdef-mode now uses overlays rather than selective-display
145 to hide its text. This should be mostly transparent but slightly
146 changes the behavior of motion commands line C-e and C-p.
148 ** In Dired's ! command (dired-do-shell-command), `*' and `?' now
149 control substitution of the file names only when they are surrounded
150 by whitespace. This means you can now use them as shell wildcards
151 too. If you want to use just plain `*' as a wildcard, type `*""'; the
152 doublequotes make no difference in the shell, but they prevent
153 special treatment in `dired-do-shell-command'.
155 ** Unquoted `$' in file names do not signal an error any more when
156 the corresponding environment variable does not exist.
157 Instead, the `$ENVVAR' text is left as is, so that `$$' quoting
158 is only rarely needed.
160 ** jit-lock can now be delayed with `jit-lock-defer-time'.
162 If this variable is non-nil, its value should be the amount of Emacs
163 idle time in seconds to wait before starting fontification. For
164 example, if you set `jit-lock-defer-time' to 0.25, fontification will
165 only happen after 0.25s of idle time.
167 ** If you hit M-C-SPC (mark-sexp) repeatedly, the marked region
168 will now be extended each time, so you can mark the next two sexps with
169 M-C-SPC M-C-SPC, for example.
171 ** In the *Occur* buffer, `o' switches to it in another window, and
172 C-o displays the current line's occurrence in another window without
175 ** When you specify a frame size with --geometry, the size applies to
176 all frames you create. A position specified with --geometry only
177 affects the initial frame.
180 ** M-h (mark-paragraph) now accepts a prefix arg.
181 With positive arg, M-h marks the current and the following paragraphs;
182 if the arg is negative, it marks the current and the preceding
185 ** In Dired, the w command now copies the current line's file name
188 ** The variables dired-free-space-program and dired-free-space-args
189 have been renamed to directory-free-space-program and
190 directory-free-space-args, and they now apply whenever Emacs puts a
191 directory listing into a buffer.
193 ** mouse-wheels can now scroll a specific fraction of the window
194 (rather than a fixed number of lines) and the scrolling is `progressive'.
196 ** The keyboard-coding-system is now automatically set based on
197 your current locale settings. If it turns out that your terminal
198 does not support the encoding implied by your locale (for example,
199 it inserts non-ASCII chars if you hit M-i), you will need to add
201 (set-keyboard-coding-system nil)
203 to your .emacs to revert to the old behavior.
205 ** A new coding system `euc-tw' has been added for traditional Chinese
206 in CNS encoding; it accepts both Big 5 and CNS as input; on saving,
207 Big 5 is then converted to CNS.
210 ** Emacs now reads the standard abbrevs file ~/.abbrev_defs
211 automatically at startup, if it exists. When Emacs offers to save
212 modified buffers, it saves the abbrevs too if they have changed. It
213 can do this either silently or asking for confirmation first,
214 according to the value of `save-abbrevs'.
216 ** Display of hollow cursors now obeys the buffer-local value (if any)
217 of `cursor-in-non-selected-windows' in the buffer that the cursor
220 ** The default values of `tooltip-delay' and `tooltip-hide-delay'
223 ** On terminals whose erase-char is ^H (Backspace), Emacs
224 now uses normal-erase-is-backspace-mode.
228 *** In Prolog, etags creates tags for rules in addition to predicates.
230 *** In Perl, packages are tags. Subroutine tags are named from their
231 package. You can jump to sub tags as you did before, by the sub name, or
232 additionally by looking for package::sub.
234 *** New language PHP: tags are functions, classes and defines. If
235 the --members option is specified to etags, tags are vars also.
238 ** The command line option --no-windows has been changed to
239 --no-window-system. The old one still works, but is deprecated.
241 ** `buffer-menu' and `list-buffers' now list buffers whose names begin
242 with a space, if they visit files.
244 ** You can now customize fill-nobreak-predicate to control where
245 filling can break lines. We provide two sample predicates,
246 fill-single-word-nobreak-p and fill-french-nobreak-p.
248 ** New user option `add-log-always-start-new-record'.
249 When this option is enabled, M-x add-change-log-entry will always
250 start a new record regardless of when the last record is.
252 ** New user option `sgml-xml'.
253 When this option is enabled, SGML tags are inserted in XML style,
254 i.e., there is always a closing tag.
255 When not customized, it becomes buffer-local when it can be inferred
256 from the file name or buffer contents.
258 ** New user option `isearch-resume-enabled'.
259 This option can be disabled, to avoid the normal behaviour of isearch
260 which puts calls to `isearch-resume' in the command history.
262 ** When the *scratch* buffer is recreated, its mode is set from
263 initial-major-mode, which normally is lisp-interaction-mode,
264 instead of using default-major-mode.
266 ** Byte compiler warning and error messages have been brought more
267 in line with the output of other GNU tools.
269 ** Lisp-mode now uses font-lock-doc-face for the docstrings.
271 ** perl-mode has a new variable `perl-indent-continued-arguments'.
273 ** `special-display-buffer-names' and `special-display-regexps' now
274 understand two new boolean pseudo-frame-parameters `same-frame' and
277 ** When pure storage overflows while dumping, Emacs now prints how
278 much pure storage it will approximately need.
280 ** M-x setenv now expands environment variables of the form `$foo' and
281 `${foo}' in the specified new value of the environment variable. To
282 include a `$' in the value, use `$$'.
285 ** File-name completion can now ignore directories.
286 If an element of the list in `completion-ignored-extensions' ends in a
287 slash `/', it indicates a subdirectory that should be ignored when
288 completing file names. Elements of `completion-ignored-extensions'
289 which do not end in a slash are never considered when a completion
290 candidate is a directory.
292 ** New user option `inhibit-startup-buffer-menu'.
293 When loading many files, for instance with `emacs *', Emacs normally
294 displays a buffer menu. This option turns the buffer menu off.
296 ** Rmail now displays 5-digit message ids in its summary buffer.
298 ** When using M-x revert-buffer in a compilation buffer to rerun a
299 compilation, it is now made sure that the compilation buffer is reused
300 in case it has been renamed.
302 ** On MS Windows, the "system caret" now follows the cursor.
303 This enables Emacs to work better with programs that need to track
304 the cursor, for example screen magnifiers and text to speech programs.
306 ** Tooltips now work on MS Windows.
307 See the Emacs 21.1 NEWS entry for tooltips for details.
309 ** Pointing devices with more than 3 buttons are now supported on MS Windows.
310 The new variable `w32-pass-extra-mouse-buttons-to-system' controls
311 whether Emacs should handle the extra buttons itself (the default), or
312 pass them to Windows to be handled with system-wide functions.
315 ** A French translation of the `Emacs Survival Guide' is available.
318 ** A French translation of the Emacs Tutorial is available.
320 ** New modes and packages
323 *** Calc is now part of the Emacs distribution.
325 Calc is an advanced desk calculator and mathematical tool written in
326 Emacs Lisp. Its documentation is in a separate manual; within Emacs,
327 type "C-h i m calc RET" to read that manual. A reference card is
328 available in `etc/calccard.tex' and `etc/calccard.ps'.
331 *** The Emacs Lisp Reference Manual is now part of the distribution.
333 The ELisp reference manual in Info format is built as part of the
334 Emacs build procedure and installed together with the Emacs User
335 Manual. A menu item was added to the menu bar that makes it easy
336 accessible (Help->More Manuals->Emacs Lisp Reference).
338 *** The Introduction to Programming in Emacs Lisp manual is now part of
341 This manual is now part of the standard distribution and is installed,
342 together with the Emacs User Manual, into the Info directory. A menu
343 item was added to the menu bar that makes it easy accessible
344 (Help->More Manuals->Introduction to Emacs Lisp).
346 *** The ruler-mode.el library provides a minor mode for displaying an
347 "active" ruler in the header line. You can use the mouse to visually
348 change the `fill-column', `window-margins' and `tab-stop-list'
351 *** The reveal.el package provides the minor modes `reveal-mode' and
352 `global-reveal-mode' which will make text visible on the fly as you
353 move your cursor into hidden region of the buffer.
354 It should work with any package that uses overlays to hide parts
355 of a buffer, such as outline-minor-mode, hs-minor-mode, hide-ifdef-mode, ...
357 *** master-mode.el implements a minor mode for scrolling a slave
358 buffer without leaving your current buffer, the master buffer.
360 It can be used by sql.el, for example: the SQL buffer is the master
361 and its SQLi buffer is the slave. This allows you to scroll the SQLi
362 buffer containing the output from the SQL buffer containing the
365 This is how to use sql.el and master.el together: the variable
366 sql-buffer contains the slave buffer. It is a local variable in the
369 (add-hook 'sql-mode-hook
372 (master-set-slave sql-buffer))))
373 (add-hook 'sql-set-sqli-hook
375 (master-set-slave sql-buffer))))
378 * Lisp Changes in Emacs 21.3
380 ** New function substring-no-properties.
383 ** New function window-body-height.
385 This is like window-height but does not count the mode line
389 ** You can now make a window as short as one line.
391 A window that is just one line tall does not display either a mode
392 line or a header line, even if the variables `mode-line-format' and
393 `header-line-format' call for them. A window that is two lines tall
394 cannot display both a mode line and a header line at once; if the
395 variables call for both, only the mode line actually appears.
398 ** The new frame parameter `tty-color-mode' specifies the mode to use
399 for color support on character terminal frames. Its value can be a
400 number of colors to support, or a symbol. See the Emacs Lisp
401 Reference manual for more detailed documentation.
403 ** Already true in Emacs 21.1, but not emphasized clearly enough:
405 Multibyte buffers can now faithfully record all 256 character codes
406 from 0 to 255. As a result, most of the past reasons to use unibyte
407 buffers no longer exist. We only know of three reasons to use them
410 1. If you prefer to use unibyte text all of the time.
412 2. For reading files into temporary buffers, when you want to avoid
413 the time it takes to convert the format.
415 3. For binary files where format conversion would be pointless and
418 ** If text has a `keymap' property, that keymap takes precedence
419 over minor mode keymaps.
421 ** A hex escape in a string forces the string to be multibyte.
422 An octal escape makes it unibyte.
424 ** The position after an invisible, intangible character
425 is considered an unacceptable value for point;
426 intangibility processing effectively treats the following character
427 as part of the intangible region even if it is not itself intangible.
429 Thus, point can go before an invisible, intangible region, but not
430 after it. This prevents C-f and C-b from appearing to stand still on
434 ** define-abbrev now accepts an optional argument SYSTEM-FLAG. If
435 non-nil, this marks the abbrev as a "system" abbrev, which means that
436 it won't be stored in the user's abbrevs file if he saves the abbrevs.
437 Major modes that predefine some abbrevs should always specify this
440 ** Support for Mocklisp has been removed.
442 ** The function insert-string is now obsolete.
444 ** The precedence of file-name-handlers has been changed.
445 Instead of blindly choosing the first handler that matches,
446 find-file-name-handler now gives precedence to a file-name handler
447 that matches near the end of the file name. More specifically, the
448 handler whose (match-beginning 0) is the largest is chosen.
449 In case of ties, the old "first matched" rule applies.
451 ** Dense keymaps now handle inheritance correctly.
452 Previously a dense keymap would hide all of the simple-char key
453 bindings of the parent keymap.
455 ** jit-lock obeys a new text-property `jit-lock-defer-multiline'.
456 If a piece of text with that property gets contextually refontified
457 (see jit-lock-defer-contextually), then all of that text will
458 be refontified. This is useful when the syntax of a textual element
459 depends on text several lines further down (and when font-lock-multiline
460 is not appropriate to solve that problem). For example in Perl:
468 Adding/removing the last `e' changes the `bar' from being a piece of
469 text to being a piece of code, so you'd put a jit-lock-defer-multiline
470 property over the second half of the command to force (deferred)
471 refontification of `bar' whenever the `e' is added/removed.
473 ** describe-vector now takes a second argument `describer' which is
474 called to print the entries' values. It defaults to `princ'.
476 ** defcustom and other custom declarations now use a default group
477 (the last group defined in the same file) when no :group was given.
479 ** emacsserver now runs pre-command-hook and post-command-hook when
480 it receives a request from emacsclient.
482 ** The variable `recursive-load-depth-limit' has been deleted.
483 Emacs now signals an error if the same file is loaded with more
484 than 3 levels of nesting.
486 ** The default values of paragraph-start and indent-line-function have
487 been changed to reflect those used in Text mode rather than those used
488 in Indented-Text mode.
490 ** If a major mode function has a non-nil `no-clone-indirect'
491 property, `clone-indirect-buffer' signals an error if you use
494 ** If you set `query-replace-skip-read-only' non-nil,
495 `query-replace' and related functions simply ignore
496 a match if part of it has a read-only property.
498 ** In `replace-match', the replacement text no longer inherits
499 properties from surrounding text.
501 ** New function `buffer-local-value'.
503 - Function: buffer-local-value variable buffer
505 This function returns the buffer-local binding of VARIABLE (a symbol)
506 in buffer BUFFER. If VARIABLE does not have a buffer-local binding in
507 buffer BUFFER, it returns the default value of VARIABLE instead.
509 ** The default value of `paragraph-start' and `indent-line-function' has
510 been changed to reflect the one used in Text mode rather than the one
511 used in Indented Text mode.
513 ** New function `text-clone-create'. Text clones are chunks of text
514 that are kept identical by transparently propagating changes from one
517 ** font-lock can manage arbitrary text-properties beside `face'.
518 *** the FACENAME returned in font-lock-keywords can be a list
519 of the form (face FACE PROP1 VAL1 PROP@ VAL2 ...) so you can set
520 other properties than `face'.
521 *** font-lock-extra-managed-props can be set to make sure those extra
522 properties are automatically cleaned up by font-lock.
524 ** The new function `run-mode-hooks' and the new macro `delay-mode-hooks'
525 are used by define-derived-mode to make sure the mode hook for the
526 parent mode is run at the end of the child mode.
528 ** `provide' and `featurep' now accept an optional second argument
529 to test/provide subfeatures. Also `provide' now checks `after-load-alist'
530 and run any code associated with the provided feature.
532 ** The variable `compilation-parse-errors-filename-function' can
533 be used to transform filenames found in compilation output.
536 ** Functions `file-name-sans-extension' and `file-name-extension' now
537 ignore the leading dots in file names, so that file names such as
538 `.emacs' are treated as extensionless.
540 ** Functions `user-uid' and `user-real-uid' now return floats if the
541 user UID doesn't fit in a Lisp integer. Function `user-full-name'
542 accepts a float as UID parameter.
544 ** `define-key-after' now accepts keys longer than 1.
546 ** `define-derived-mode' now accepts nil as the parent.
548 ** The local variable `no-byte-compile' in elisp files is now obeyed.
550 ** New functions `keymap-prompt' and `current-active-maps'.
552 ** New function `describe-buffer-bindings'.
554 ** New vars `exec-suffixes' and `load-suffixes' used when
555 searching for an executable resp. an elisp file.
557 ** Variable aliases have been implemented
559 - Macro: defvaralias ALIAS-VAR BASE-VAR
561 This defines the symbol ALIAS-VAR as a variable alias for symbol
562 BASE-VAR. This means that retrieving the value of ALIAS-VAR returns
563 the value of BASE-VAR, and changing the value of ALIAS-VAR changes the
566 - Function: indirect-variable VARIABLE
568 This function returns the variable at the end of the chain of aliases
569 of VARIABLE. If VARIABLE is not a symbol, or if VARIABLE is not
570 defined as an alias, the function returns VARIABLE.
572 It might be noteworthy that variables aliases work for all kinds of
573 variables, including buffer-local and frame-local variables.
575 ** Functions from `post-gc-hook' are run at the end of garbage
576 collection. The hook is run with GC inhibited, so use it with care.
578 ** If the second argument to `copy-file' is the name of a directory,
579 the file is copied to that directory instead of signaling an error.
581 ** The variables most-positive-fixnum and most-negative-fixnum
582 have been moved from the CL package to the core.
584 ** On MS Windows, locale-coding-system is used to interact with the OS.
585 The Windows specific variable w32-system-coding-system, which was
586 formerly used for that purpose is now an alias for locale-coding-system.
590 *** The new package syntax.el provides an efficient way to find the
591 current syntactic context (as returned by parse-partial-sexp).
593 *** The TCL package tcl-mode.el was replaced by tcl.el.
594 This was actually done in Emacs-21.1, and was not documented.
596 *** The new package Ibuffer provides a powerful, completely
597 customizable replacement for buff-menu.el.
600 * Installation Changes in Emacs 21.1
602 See the INSTALL file for information on installing extra libraries and
603 fonts to take advantage of the new graphical features and extra
604 charsets in this release.
606 ** Support for GNU/Linux on IA64 machines has been added.
608 ** Support for LynxOS has been added.
610 ** There are new configure options associated with the support for
611 images and toolkit scrollbars. Use the --help option in `configure'
614 ** You can build a 64-bit Emacs for SPARC/Solaris systems which
615 support 64-bit executables and also on Irix 6.5. This increases the
616 maximum buffer size. See etc/MACHINES for instructions. Changes to
617 build on other 64-bit systems should be straightforward modulo any
618 necessary changes to unexec.
620 ** There is a new configure option `--disable-largefile' to omit
621 Unix-98-style support for large files if that is available.
623 ** There is a new configure option `--without-xim' that instructs
624 Emacs to not use X Input Methods (XIM), if these are available.
626 ** `movemail' defaults to supporting POP. You can turn this off using
627 the --without-pop configure option, should that be necessary.
629 ** This version can be built for the Macintosh, but does not implement
630 all of the new display features described below. The port currently
631 lacks unexec, asynchronous processes, and networking support. See the
632 "Emacs and the Mac OS" appendix in the Emacs manual, for the
633 description of aspects specific to the Mac.
635 ** Note that the MS-Windows port does not yet implement various of the
636 new display features described below.
639 * Changes in Emacs 21.1
641 ** Emacs has a new redisplay engine.
643 The new redisplay handles characters of variable width and height.
644 Italic text can be used without redisplay problems. Fonts containing
645 oversized characters, i.e. characters larger than the logical height
646 of a font can be used. Images of various formats can be displayed in
649 ** Emacs has a new face implementation.
651 The new faces no longer fundamentally use X font names to specify the
652 font. Instead, each face has several independent attributes--family,
653 height, width, weight and slant--that it may or may not specify.
654 These attributes can be merged from various faces, and then together
657 Faces are supported on terminals that can display color or fonts.
658 These terminal capabilities are auto-detected. Details can be found
659 under Lisp changes, below.
661 ** Emacs can display faces on TTY frames.
663 Emacs automatically detects terminals that are able to display colors.
664 Faces with a weight greater than normal are displayed extra-bright, if
665 the terminal supports it. Faces with a weight less than normal and
666 italic faces are displayed dimmed, if the terminal supports it.
667 Underlined faces are displayed underlined if possible. Other face
668 attributes such as `overline', `strike-through', and `box' are ignored
671 The command-line options `-fg COLOR', `-bg COLOR', and `-rv' are now
672 supported on character terminals.
674 Emacs automatically remaps all X-style color specifications to one of
675 the colors supported by the terminal. This means you could have the
676 same color customizations that work both on a windowed display and on
677 a TTY or when Emacs is invoked with the -nw option.
679 ** New default font is Courier 12pt under X.
683 Emacs supports playing sound files on GNU/Linux and FreeBSD (Voxware
684 driver and native BSD driver, a.k.a. Luigi's driver). Currently
685 supported file formats are RIFF-WAVE (*.wav) and Sun Audio (*.au).
686 You must configure Emacs with the option `--with-sound=yes' to enable
689 ** Emacs now resizes mini-windows if appropriate.
691 If a message is longer than one line, or minibuffer contents are
692 longer than one line, Emacs can resize the minibuffer window unless it
693 is on a frame of its own. You can control resizing and the maximum
694 minibuffer window size by setting the following variables:
696 - User option: max-mini-window-height
698 Maximum height for resizing mini-windows. If a float, it specifies a
699 fraction of the mini-window frame's height. If an integer, it
700 specifies a number of lines.
704 - User option: resize-mini-windows
706 How to resize mini-windows. If nil, don't resize. If t, always
707 resize to fit the size of the text. If `grow-only', let mini-windows
708 grow only, until they become empty, at which point they are shrunk
711 Default is `grow-only'.
715 Emacs now runs with the LessTif toolkit (see
716 <http://www.lesstif.org>). You will need version 0.92.26, or later.
718 ** LessTif/Motif file selection dialog.
720 When Emacs is configured to use LessTif or Motif, reading a file name
721 from a menu will pop up a file selection dialog if `use-dialog-box' is
724 ** File selection dialog on MS-Windows is supported.
726 When a file is visited by clicking File->Open, the MS-Windows version
727 now pops up a standard file selection dialog where you can select a
728 file to visit. File->Save As also pops up that dialog.
730 ** Toolkit scroll bars.
732 Emacs now uses toolkit scroll bars if available. When configured for
733 LessTif/Motif, it will use that toolkit's scroll bar. Otherwise, when
734 configured for Lucid and Athena widgets, it will use the Xaw3d scroll
735 bar if Xaw3d is available. You can turn off the use of toolkit scroll
736 bars by specifying `--with-toolkit-scroll-bars=no' when configuring
739 When you encounter problems with the Xaw3d scroll bar, watch out how
740 Xaw3d is compiled on your system. If the Makefile generated from
741 Xaw3d's Imakefile contains a `-DNARROWPROTO' compiler option, and your
742 Emacs system configuration file `s/your-system.h' does not contain a
743 define for NARROWPROTO, you might consider adding it. Take
744 `s/freebsd.h' as an example.
746 Alternatively, if you don't have access to the Xaw3d source code, take
747 a look at your system's imake configuration file, for example in the
748 directory `/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/config' (paths are different on
749 different systems). You will find files `*.cf' there. If your
750 system's cf-file contains a line like `#define NeedWidePrototypes NO',
751 add a `#define NARROWPROTO' to your Emacs system configuration file.
753 The reason for this is that one Xaw3d function uses `double' or
754 `float' function parameters depending on the setting of NARROWPROTO.
755 This is not a problem when Imakefiles are used because each system's
756 imake configuration file contains the necessary information. Since
757 Emacs doesn't use imake, this has do be done manually.
761 Emacs supports a tool bar at the top of a frame under X. For details
762 of how to define a tool bar, see the page describing Lisp-level
763 changes. Tool-bar global minor mode controls whether or not it is
764 displayed and is on by default. The appearance of the bar is improved
765 if Emacs has been built with XPM image support. Otherwise monochrome
768 To make the tool bar more useful, we need contributions of extra icons
769 for specific modes (with copyright assignments).
773 Tooltips are small X windows displaying a help string at the current
774 mouse position. The Lisp package `tooltip' implements them. You can
775 turn them off via the user option `tooltip-mode'.
777 Tooltips also provides support for GUD debugging. If activated,
778 variable values can be displayed in tooltips by pointing at them with
779 the mouse in source buffers. You can customize various aspects of the
780 tooltip display in the group `tooltip'.
782 ** Automatic Hscrolling
784 Horizontal scrolling now happens automatically if
785 `automatic-hscrolling' is set (the default). This setting can be
788 If a window is scrolled horizontally with set-window-hscroll, or
789 scroll-left/scroll-right (C-x <, C-x >), this serves as a lower bound
790 for automatic horizontal scrolling. Automatic scrolling will scroll
791 the text more to the left if necessary, but won't scroll the text more
792 to the right than the column set with set-window-hscroll etc.
794 ** When using a windowing terminal, each Emacs window now has a cursor
795 of its own. By default, when a window is selected, the cursor is
796 solid; otherwise, it is hollow. The user-option
797 `cursor-in-non-selected-windows' controls how to display the
798 cursor in non-selected windows. If nil, no cursor is shown, if
799 non-nil a hollow box cursor is shown.
801 ** Fringes to the left and right of windows are used to display
802 truncation marks, continuation marks, overlay arrows and alike. The
803 foreground, background, and stipple of these areas can be changed by
804 customizing face `fringe'.
806 ** The mode line under X is now drawn with shadows by default.
807 You can change its appearance by modifying the face `mode-line'.
808 In particular, setting the `:box' attribute to nil turns off the 3D
809 appearance of the mode line. (The 3D appearance makes the mode line
810 occupy more space, and thus might cause the first or the last line of
811 the window to be partially obscured.)
813 The variable `mode-line-inverse-video', which was used in older
814 versions of emacs to make the mode-line stand out, is now deprecated.
815 However, setting it to nil will cause the `mode-line' face to be
816 ignored, and mode-lines to be drawn using the default text face.
818 ** Mouse-sensitive mode line.
820 Different parts of the mode line have been made mouse-sensitive on all
821 systems which support the mouse. Moving the mouse to a
822 mouse-sensitive part in the mode line changes the appearance of the
823 mouse pointer to an arrow, and help about available mouse actions is
824 displayed either in the echo area, or in the tooltip window if you
827 Currently, the following actions have been defined:
829 - Mouse-1 on the buffer name in the mode line goes to the next buffer.
831 - Mouse-3 on the buffer-name goes to the previous buffer.
833 - Mouse-2 on the read-only or modified status in the mode line (`%' or
834 `*') toggles the status.
836 - Mouse-3 on the mode name displays a minor-mode menu.
840 Emacs can optionally display an hourglass pointer under X. You can
841 turn the display on or off by customizing group `cursor'.
845 M-x blink-cursor-mode toggles a blinking cursor under X and on
846 terminals having terminal capabilities `vi', `vs', and `ve'. Blinking
847 and related parameters like frequency and delay can be customized in
850 ** New font-lock support mode `jit-lock-mode'.
852 This support mode is roughly equivalent to `lazy-lock' but is
853 generally faster. It supports stealth and deferred fontification.
854 See the documentation of the function `jit-lock-mode' for more
857 Font-lock uses jit-lock-mode as default support mode, so you don't
858 have to do anything to activate it.
860 ** The default binding of the Delete key has changed.
862 The new user-option `normal-erase-is-backspace' can be set to
863 determine the effect of the Delete and Backspace function keys.
865 On window systems, the default value of this option is chosen
866 according to the keyboard used. If the keyboard has both a Backspace
867 key and a Delete key, and both are mapped to their usual meanings, the
868 option's default value is set to t, so that Backspace can be used to
869 delete backward, and Delete can be used to delete forward. On
870 keyboards which either have only one key (usually labeled DEL), or two
871 keys DEL and BS which produce the same effect, the option's value is
872 set to nil, and these keys delete backward.
874 If not running under a window system, setting this option accomplishes
875 a similar effect by mapping C-h, which is usually generated by the
876 Backspace key, to DEL, and by mapping DEL to C-d via
877 `keyboard-translate'. The former functionality of C-h is available on
878 the F1 key. You should probably not use this setting on a text-only
879 terminal if you don't have both Backspace, Delete and F1 keys.
881 Programmatically, you can call function normal-erase-is-backspace-mode
882 to toggle the behavior of the Delete and Backspace keys.
884 ** The default for user-option `next-line-add-newlines' has been
885 changed to nil, i.e. C-n will no longer add newlines at the end of a
888 ** The <home> and <end> keys now move to the beginning or end of the
889 current line, respectively. C-<home> and C-<end> move to the
890 beginning and end of the buffer.
892 ** Emacs now checks for recursive loads of Lisp files. If the
893 recursion depth exceeds `recursive-load-depth-limit', an error is
896 ** When an error is signaled during the loading of the user's init
897 file, Emacs now pops up the *Messages* buffer.
899 ** Emacs now refuses to load compiled Lisp files which weren't
900 compiled with Emacs. Set `load-dangerous-libraries' to t to change
903 The reason for this change is an incompatible change in XEmacs's byte
904 compiler. Files compiled with XEmacs can contain byte codes that let
907 ** Toggle buttons and radio buttons in menus.
909 When compiled with LessTif (or Motif) support, Emacs uses toolkit
910 widgets for radio and toggle buttons in menus. When configured for
911 Lucid, Emacs draws radio buttons and toggle buttons similar to Motif.
913 ** The menu bar configuration has changed. The new configuration is
914 more CUA-compliant. The most significant change is that Options is
915 now a separate menu-bar item, with Mule and Customize as its submenus.
917 ** Item Save Options on the Options menu allows saving options set
920 ** Highlighting of trailing whitespace.
922 When `show-trailing-whitespace' is non-nil, Emacs displays trailing
923 whitespace in the face `trailing-whitespace'. Trailing whitespace is
924 defined as spaces or tabs at the end of a line. To avoid busy
925 highlighting when entering new text, trailing whitespace is not
926 displayed if point is at the end of the line containing the
929 ** C-x 5 1 runs the new command delete-other-frames which deletes
930 all frames except the selected one.
932 ** The new user-option `confirm-kill-emacs' can be customized to
933 let Emacs ask for confirmation before exiting.
935 ** The header line in an Info buffer is now displayed as an emacs
936 header-line (which is like a mode-line, but at the top of the window),
937 so that it remains visible even when the buffer has been scrolled.
938 This behavior may be disabled by customizing the option
939 `Info-use-header-line'.
941 ** Polish, Czech, German, and French translations of Emacs' reference card
942 have been added. They are named `pl-refcard.tex', `cs-refcard.tex',
943 `de-refcard.tex' and `fr-refcard.tex'. Postscript files are included.
945 ** An `Emacs Survival Guide', etc/survival.tex, is available.
947 ** A reference card for Dired has been added. Its name is
948 `dired-ref.tex'. A French translation is available in
951 ** C-down-mouse-3 is bound differently. Now if the menu bar is not
952 displayed it pops up a menu containing the items which would be on the
953 menu bar. If the menu bar is displayed, it pops up the major mode
954 menu or the Edit menu if there is no major mode menu.
956 ** Variable `load-path' is no longer customizable through Customize.
958 You can no longer use `M-x customize-variable' to customize `load-path'
959 because it now contains a version-dependent component. You can still
960 use `add-to-list' and `setq' to customize this variable in your
961 `~/.emacs' init file or to modify it from any Lisp program in general.
963 ** C-u C-x = provides detailed information about the character at
964 point in a pop-up window.
966 ** Emacs can now support 'wheeled' mice (such as the MS IntelliMouse)
967 under XFree86. To enable this, use the `mouse-wheel-mode' command, or
968 customize the variable `mouse-wheel-mode'.
970 The variables `mouse-wheel-follow-mouse' and `mouse-wheel-scroll-amount'
971 determine where and by how much buffers are scrolled.
973 ** Emacs' auto-save list files are now by default stored in a
974 sub-directory `.emacs.d/auto-save-list/' of the user's home directory.
975 (On MS-DOS, this subdirectory's name is `_emacs.d/auto-save.list/'.)
976 You can customize `auto-save-list-file-prefix' to change this location.
978 ** The function `getenv' is now callable interactively.
980 ** The new user-option `even-window-heights' can be set to nil
981 to prevent `display-buffer' from evening out window heights.
983 ** The new command M-x delete-trailing-whitespace RET will delete the
984 trailing whitespace within the current restriction. You can also add
985 this function to `write-file-hooks' or `local-write-file-hooks'.
987 ** When visiting a file with M-x find-file-literally, no newlines will
988 be added to the end of the buffer even if `require-final-newline' is
991 ** The new user-option `find-file-suppress-same-file-warnings' can be
992 set to suppress warnings ``X and Y are the same file'' when visiting a
993 file that is already visited under a different name.
995 ** The new user-option `electric-help-shrink-window' can be set to
996 nil to prevent adjusting the help window size to the buffer size.
998 ** New command M-x describe-character-set reads a character set name
999 and displays information about that.
1001 ** The new variable `auto-mode-interpreter-regexp' contains a regular
1002 expression matching interpreters, for file mode determination.
1004 This regular expression is matched against the first line of a file to
1005 determine the file's mode in `set-auto-mode' when Emacs can't deduce a
1006 mode from the file's name. If it matches, the file is assumed to be
1007 interpreted by the interpreter matched by the second group of the
1008 regular expression. The mode is then determined as the mode
1009 associated with that interpreter in `interpreter-mode-alist'.
1011 ** New function executable-make-buffer-file-executable-if-script-p is
1012 suitable as an after-save-hook as an alternative to `executable-chmod'.
1014 ** The most preferred coding-system is now used to save a buffer if
1015 buffer-file-coding-system is `undecided' and it is safe for the buffer
1016 contents. (The most preferred is set by set-language-environment or
1017 by M-x prefer-coding-system.) Thus if you visit an ASCII file and
1018 insert a non-ASCII character from your current language environment,
1019 the file will be saved silently with the appropriate coding.
1020 Previously you would be prompted for a safe coding system.
1022 ** The many obsolete language `setup-...-environment' commands have
1023 been removed -- use `set-language-environment'.
1025 ** The new Custom option `keyboard-coding-system' specifies a coding
1026 system for keyboard input.
1028 ** New variable `inhibit-iso-escape-detection' determines if Emacs'
1029 coding system detection algorithm should pay attention to ISO2022's
1030 escape sequences. If this variable is non-nil, the algorithm ignores
1031 such escape sequences. The default value is nil, and it is
1032 recommended not to change it except for the special case that you
1033 always want to read any escape code verbatim. If you just want to
1034 read a specific file without decoding escape codes, use C-x RET c
1035 (`universal-coding-system-argument'). For instance, C-x RET c latin-1
1036 RET C-x C-f filename RET.
1038 ** Variable `default-korean-keyboard' is initialized properly from the
1039 environment variable `HANGUL_KEYBOARD_TYPE'.
1041 ** New command M-x list-charset-chars reads a character set name and
1042 displays all characters in that character set.
1044 ** M-x set-terminal-coding-system (C-x RET t) now allows CCL-based
1045 coding systems such as cpXXX and cyrillic-koi8.
1047 ** Emacs now attempts to determine the initial language environment
1048 and preferred and locale coding systems systematically from the
1049 LC_ALL, LC_CTYPE, and LANG environment variables during startup.
1051 ** New language environments `Polish', `Latin-8' and `Latin-9'.
1052 Latin-8 and Latin-9 correspond respectively to the ISO character sets
1053 8859-14 (Celtic) and 8859-15 (updated Latin-1, with the Euro sign).
1054 GNU Intlfonts doesn't support these yet but recent X releases have
1055 8859-15. See etc/INSTALL for information on obtaining extra fonts.
1056 There are new Leim input methods for Latin-8 and Latin-9 prefix (only)
1059 ** New language environments `Dutch' and `Spanish'.
1060 These new environments mainly select appropriate translations
1063 ** In Ethiopic language environment, special key bindings for
1064 function keys are changed as follows. This is to conform to "Emacs
1065 Lisp Coding Convention".
1067 new command old-binding
1068 --- ------- -----------
1069 f3 ethio-fidel-to-sera-buffer f5
1070 S-f3 ethio-fidel-to-sera-region f5
1071 C-f3 ethio-fidel-to-sera-mail-or-marker f5
1073 f4 ethio-sera-to-fidel-buffer unchanged
1074 S-f4 ethio-sera-to-fidel-region unchanged
1075 C-f4 ethio-sera-to-fidel-mail-or-marker unchanged
1077 S-f5 ethio-toggle-punctuation f3
1078 S-f6 ethio-modify-vowel f6
1079 S-f7 ethio-replace-space f7
1080 S-f8 ethio-input-special-character f8
1081 S-f9 ethio-replace-space unchanged
1082 C-f9 ethio-toggle-space f2
1084 ** There are new Leim input methods.
1085 New input methods "turkish-postfix", "turkish-alt-postfix",
1086 "greek-mizuochi", "TeX", and "greek-babel" are now part of the Leim
1089 ** The rule of input method "slovak" is slightly changed. Now the
1090 rules for translating "q" and "Q" to "`" (backquote) are deleted, thus
1091 typing them inserts "q" and "Q" respectively. Rules for translating
1092 "=q", "+q", "=Q", and "+Q" to "`" are also deleted. Now, to input
1093 "`", you must type "=q".
1095 ** When your terminal can't display characters from some of the ISO
1096 8859 character sets but can display Latin-1, you can display
1097 more-or-less mnemonic sequences of ASCII/Latin-1 characters instead of
1098 empty boxes (under a window system) or question marks (not under a
1099 window system). Customize the option `latin1-display' to turn this
1102 ** M-; now calls comment-dwim which tries to do something clever based
1103 on the context. M-x kill-comment is now an alias to comment-kill,
1104 defined in newcomment.el. You can choose different styles of region
1105 commenting with the variable `comment-style'.
1107 ** New user options `display-time-mail-face' and
1108 `display-time-use-mail-icon' control the appearance of mode-line mail
1109 indicator used by the display-time package. On a suitable display the
1110 indicator can be an icon and is mouse-sensitive.
1112 ** On window-systems, additional space can be put between text lines
1113 on the display using several methods
1115 - By setting frame parameter `line-spacing' to PIXELS. PIXELS must be
1116 a positive integer, and specifies that PIXELS number of pixels should
1117 be put below text lines on the affected frame or frames.
1119 - By setting X resource `lineSpacing', class `LineSpacing'. This is
1120 equivalent to specifying the frame parameter.
1122 - By specifying `--line-spacing=N' or `-lsp N' on the command line.
1124 - By setting buffer-local variable `line-spacing'. The meaning is
1125 the same, but applies to the a particular buffer only.
1127 ** The new command `clone-indirect-buffer' can be used to create
1128 an indirect buffer that is a twin copy of the current buffer. The
1129 command `clone-indirect-buffer-other-window', bound to C-x 4 c,
1130 does the same but displays the indirect buffer in another window.
1132 ** New user options `backup-directory-alist' and
1133 `make-backup-file-name-function' control the placement of backups,
1134 typically in a single directory or in an invisible sub-directory.
1136 ** New commands iso-iso2sgml and iso-sgml2iso convert between Latin-1
1137 characters and the corresponding SGML (HTML) entities.
1139 ** New X resources recognized
1141 *** The X resource `synchronous', class `Synchronous', specifies
1142 whether Emacs should run in synchronous mode. Synchronous mode
1143 is useful for debugging X problems.
1147 emacs.synchronous: true
1149 *** The X resource `visualClass, class `VisualClass', specifies the
1150 visual Emacs should use. The resource's value should be a string of
1151 the form `CLASS-DEPTH', where CLASS is the name of the visual class,
1152 and DEPTH is the requested color depth as a decimal number. Valid
1153 visual class names are
1162 Visual class names specified as X resource are case-insensitive, i.e.
1163 `pseudocolor', `Pseudocolor' and `PseudoColor' all have the same
1166 The program `xdpyinfo' can be used to list the visual classes
1167 supported on your display, and which depths they have. If
1168 `visualClass' is not specified, Emacs uses the display's default
1173 emacs.visualClass: TrueColor-8
1175 *** The X resource `privateColormap', class `PrivateColormap',
1176 specifies that Emacs should use a private colormap if it is using the
1177 default visual, and that visual is of class PseudoColor. Recognized
1178 resource values are `true' or `on'.
1182 emacs.privateColormap: true
1184 ** Faces and frame parameters.
1186 There are four new faces `scroll-bar', `border', `cursor' and `mouse'.
1187 Setting the frame parameters `scroll-bar-foreground' and
1188 `scroll-bar-background' sets foreground and background color of face
1189 `scroll-bar' and vice versa. Setting frame parameter `border-color'
1190 sets the background color of face `border' and vice versa. Likewise
1191 for frame parameters `cursor-color' and face `cursor', and frame
1192 parameter `mouse-color' and face `mouse'.
1194 Changing frame parameter `font' sets font-related attributes of the
1195 `default' face and vice versa. Setting frame parameters
1196 `foreground-color' or `background-color' sets the colors of the
1197 `default' face and vice versa.
1201 The face `menu' can be used to change colors and font of Emacs' menus.
1203 ** New frame parameter `screen-gamma' for gamma correction.
1205 The new frame parameter `screen-gamma' specifies gamma-correction for
1206 colors. Its value may be nil, the default, in which case no gamma
1207 correction occurs, or a number > 0, usually a float, that specifies
1208 the screen gamma of a frame's display.
1210 PC monitors usually have a screen gamma of 2.2. smaller values result
1211 in darker colors. You might want to try a screen gamma of 1.5 for LCD
1212 color displays. The viewing gamma Emacs uses is 0.4545. (1/2.2).
1214 The X resource name of this parameter is `screenGamma', class
1217 ** Tabs and variable-width text.
1219 Tabs are now displayed with stretch properties; the width of a tab is
1220 defined as a multiple of the normal character width of a frame, and is
1221 independent of the fonts used in the text where the tab appears.
1222 Thus, tabs can be used to line up text in different fonts.
1224 ** Enhancements of the Lucid menu bar
1226 *** The Lucid menu bar now supports the resource "margin".
1228 emacs.pane.menubar.margin: 5
1230 The default margin is 4 which makes the menu bar appear like the
1233 *** Arrows that indicate sub-menus are now drawn with shadows, as in
1236 ** A block cursor can be drawn as wide as the glyph under it under X.
1238 As an example: if a block cursor is over a tab character, it will be
1239 drawn as wide as that tab on the display. To do this, set
1240 `x-stretch-cursor' to a non-nil value.
1242 ** Empty display lines at the end of a buffer may be marked with a
1243 bitmap (this is similar to the tilde displayed by vi and Less).
1245 This behavior is activated by setting the buffer-local variable
1246 `indicate-empty-lines' to a non-nil value. The default value of this
1247 variable is found in `default-indicate-empty-lines'.
1249 ** There is a new "aggressive" scrolling method.
1251 When scrolling up because point is above the window start, if the
1252 value of the buffer-local variable `scroll-up-aggressively' is a
1253 number, Emacs chooses a new window start so that point ends up that
1254 fraction of the window's height from the top of the window.
1256 When scrolling down because point is below the window end, if the
1257 value of the buffer-local variable `scroll-down-aggressively' is a
1258 number, Emacs chooses a new window start so that point ends up that
1259 fraction of the window's height from the bottom of the window.
1261 ** You can now easily create new *Info* buffers using either
1262 M-x clone-buffer, C-u m <entry> RET or C-u g <entry> RET.
1263 M-x clone-buffer can also be used on *Help* and several other special
1266 ** The command `Info-search' now uses a search history.
1268 ** Listing buffers with M-x list-buffers (C-x C-b) now shows
1269 abbreviated file names. Abbreviations can be customized by changing
1270 `directory-abbrev-alist'.
1272 ** A new variable, backup-by-copying-when-privileged-mismatch, gives
1273 the highest file uid for which backup-by-copying-when-mismatch will be
1274 forced on. The assumption is that uids less than or equal to this
1275 value are special uids (root, bin, daemon, etc.--not real system
1276 users) and that files owned by these users should not change ownership,
1277 even if your system policy allows users other than root to edit them.
1279 The default is 200; set the variable to nil to disable the feature.
1281 ** The rectangle commands now avoid inserting undesirable spaces,
1282 notably at the end of lines.
1284 All these functions have been rewritten to avoid inserting unwanted
1285 spaces, and an optional prefix now allows them to behave the old way.
1287 ** The function `replace-rectangle' is an alias for `string-rectangle'.
1289 ** The new command M-x string-insert-rectangle is like `string-rectangle',
1290 but inserts text instead of replacing it.
1292 ** The new command M-x query-replace-regexp-eval acts like
1293 query-replace-regexp, but takes a Lisp expression which is evaluated
1294 after each match to get the replacement text.
1296 ** M-x query-replace recognizes a new command `e' (or `E') that lets
1297 you edit the replacement string.
1299 ** The new command mail-abbrev-complete-alias, bound to `M-TAB'
1300 (if you load the library `mailabbrev'), lets you complete mail aliases
1301 in the text, analogous to lisp-complete-symbol.
1303 ** The variable `echo-keystrokes' may now have a floating point value.
1305 ** If your init file is compiled (.emacs.elc), `user-init-file' is set
1306 to the source name (.emacs.el), if that exists, after loading it.
1308 ** The help string specified for a menu-item whose definition contains
1309 the property `:help HELP' is now displayed under X, on MS-Windows, and
1310 MS-DOS, either in the echo area or with tooltips. Many standard menus
1311 displayed by Emacs now have help strings.
1314 ** New user option `read-mail-command' specifies a command to use to
1315 read mail from the menu etc.
1317 ** The environment variable `EMACSLOCKDIR' is no longer used on MS-Windows.
1318 This environment variable was used when creating lock files. Emacs on
1319 MS-Windows does not use this variable anymore. This change was made
1320 before Emacs 21.1, but wasn't documented until now.
1322 ** Highlighting of mouse-sensitive regions is now supported in the
1323 MS-DOS version of Emacs.
1325 ** The new command `msdos-set-mouse-buttons' forces the MS-DOS version
1326 of Emacs to behave as if the mouse had a specified number of buttons.
1327 This comes handy with mice that don't report their number of buttons
1328 correctly. One example is the wheeled mice, which report 3 buttons,
1329 but clicks on the middle button are not passed to the MS-DOS version
1332 ** Customize changes
1334 *** Customize now supports comments about customized items. Use the
1335 `State' menu to add comments, or give a prefix argument to
1336 M-x customize-set-variable or M-x customize-set-value. Note that
1337 customization comments will cause the customizations to fail in
1338 earlier versions of Emacs.
1340 *** The new option `custom-buffer-done-function' says whether to kill
1341 Custom buffers when you've done with them or just bury them (the
1344 *** If Emacs was invoked with the `-q' or `--no-init-file' options, it
1345 does not allow you to save customizations in your `~/.emacs' init
1346 file. This is because saving customizations from such a session would
1347 wipe out all the other customizationss you might have on your init
1350 ** New features in evaluation commands
1352 *** The commands to evaluate Lisp expressions, such as C-M-x in Lisp
1353 modes, C-j in Lisp Interaction mode, and M-:, now bind the variables
1354 print-level, print-length, and debug-on-error based on the new
1355 customizable variables eval-expression-print-level,
1356 eval-expression-print-length, and eval-expression-debug-on-error.
1358 The default values for the first two of these variables are 12 and 4
1359 respectively, which means that `eval-expression' now prints at most
1360 the first 12 members of a list and at most 4 nesting levels deep (if
1361 the list is longer or deeper than that, an ellipsis `...' is
1364 <RET> or <mouse-2> on the printed text toggles between an abbreviated
1365 printed representation and an unabbreviated one.
1367 The default value of eval-expression-debug-on-error is t, so any error
1368 during evaluation produces a backtrace.
1370 *** The function `eval-defun' (C-M-x) now loads Edebug and instruments
1371 code when called with a prefix argument.
1375 Note: This release contains changes that might not be compatible with
1376 current user setups (although it's believed that these
1377 incompatibilities will only show in very uncommon circumstances).
1378 However, since the impact is uncertain, these changes may be rolled
1379 back depending on user feedback. Therefore there's no forward
1380 compatibility guarantee wrt the new features introduced in this
1383 *** The hardcoded switch to "java" style in Java mode is gone.
1384 CC Mode used to automatically set the style to "java" when Java mode
1385 is entered. This has now been removed since it caused too much
1388 However, to keep backward compatibility to a certain extent, the
1389 default value for c-default-style now specifies the "java" style for
1390 java-mode, but "gnu" for all other modes (as before). So you won't
1391 notice the change if you haven't touched that variable.
1393 *** New cleanups, space-before-funcall and compact-empty-funcall.
1394 Two new cleanups have been added to c-cleanup-list:
1396 space-before-funcall causes a space to be inserted before the opening
1397 parenthesis of a function call, which gives the style "foo (bar)".
1399 compact-empty-funcall causes any space before a function call opening
1400 parenthesis to be removed if there are no arguments to the function.
1401 It's typically useful together with space-before-funcall to get the
1402 style "foo (bar)" and "foo()".
1404 *** Some keywords now automatically trigger reindentation.
1405 Keywords like "else", "while", "catch" and "finally" have been made
1406 "electric" to make them reindent automatically when they continue an
1407 earlier statement. An example:
1409 for (i = 0; i < 17; i++)
1411 res += a[i]->offset;
1414 Here, the "else" should be indented like the preceding "if", since it
1415 continues that statement. CC Mode will automatically reindent it after
1416 the "else" has been typed in full, since it's not until then it's
1417 possible to decide whether it's a new statement or a continuation of
1420 CC Mode uses Abbrev mode to achieve this, which is therefore turned on
1423 *** M-a and M-e now moves by sentence in multiline strings.
1424 Previously these two keys only moved by sentence in comments, which
1425 meant that sentence movement didn't work in strings containing
1426 documentation or other natural language text.
1428 The reason it's only activated in multiline strings (i.e. strings that
1429 contain a newline, even when escaped by a '\') is to avoid stopping in
1430 the short strings that often reside inside statements. Multiline
1431 strings almost always contain text in a natural language, as opposed
1432 to other strings that typically contain format specifications,
1433 commands, etc. Also, it's not that bothersome that M-a and M-e misses
1434 sentences in single line strings, since they're short anyway.
1436 *** Support for autodoc comments in Pike mode.
1437 Autodoc comments for Pike are used to extract documentation from the
1438 source, like Javadoc in Java. Pike mode now recognize this markup in
1439 comment prefixes and paragraph starts.
1441 *** The comment prefix regexps on c-comment-prefix may be mode specific.
1442 When c-comment-prefix is an association list, it specifies the comment
1443 line prefix on a per-mode basis, like c-default-style does. This
1444 change came about to support the special autodoc comment prefix in
1447 *** Better handling of syntactic errors.
1448 The recovery after unbalanced parens earlier in the buffer has been
1449 improved; CC Mode now reports them by dinging and giving a message
1450 stating the offending line, but still recovers and indent the
1451 following lines in a sane way (most of the time). An "else" with no
1452 matching "if" is handled similarly. If an error is discovered while
1453 indenting a region, the whole region is still indented and the error
1454 is reported afterwards.
1456 *** Lineup functions may now return absolute columns.
1457 A lineup function can give an absolute column to indent the line to by
1458 returning a vector with the desired column as the first element.
1460 *** More robust and warning-free byte compilation.
1461 Although this is strictly not a user visible change (well, depending
1462 on the view of a user), it's still worth mentioning that CC Mode now
1463 can be compiled in the standard ways without causing trouble. Some
1464 code have also been moved between the subpackages to enhance the
1465 modularity somewhat. Thanks to Martin Buchholz for doing the
1468 *** c-style-variables-are-local-p now defaults to t.
1469 This is an incompatible change that has been made to make the behavior
1470 of the style system wrt global variable settings less confusing for
1471 non-advanced users. If you know what this variable does you might
1472 want to set it to nil in your .emacs, otherwise you probably don't
1475 Defaulting c-style-variables-are-local-p to t avoids the confusing
1476 situation that occurs when a user sets some style variables globally
1477 and edits both a Java and a non-Java file in the same Emacs session.
1478 If the style variables aren't buffer local in this case, loading of
1479 the second file will cause the default style (either "gnu" or "java"
1480 by default) to override the global settings made by the user.
1482 *** New initialization procedure for the style system.
1483 When the initial style for a buffer is determined by CC Mode (from the
1484 variable c-default-style), the global values of style variables now
1485 take precedence over the values specified by the chosen style. This
1486 is different than the old behavior: previously, the style-specific
1487 settings would override the global settings. This change makes it
1488 possible to do simple configuration in the intuitive way with
1489 Customize or with setq lines in one's .emacs file.
1491 By default, the global value of every style variable is the new
1492 special symbol set-from-style, which causes the value to be taken from
1493 the style system. This means that in effect, only an explicit setting
1494 of a style variable will cause the "overriding" behavior described
1497 Also note that global settings override style-specific settings *only*
1498 when the initial style of a buffer is chosen by a CC Mode major mode
1499 function. When a style is chosen in other ways --- for example, by a
1500 call like (c-set-style "gnu") in a hook, or via M-x c-set-style ---
1501 then the style-specific values take precedence over any global style
1502 values. In Lisp terms, global values override style-specific values
1503 only when the new second argument to c-set-style is non-nil; see the
1504 function documentation for more info.
1506 The purpose of these changes is to make it easier for users,
1507 especially novice users, to do simple customizations with Customize or
1508 with setq in their .emacs files. On the other hand, the new system is
1509 intended to be compatible with advanced users' customizations as well,
1510 such as those that choose styles in hooks or whatnot. This new system
1511 is believed to be almost entirely compatible with current
1512 configurations, in spite of the changed precedence between style and
1513 global variable settings when a buffer's default style is set.
1515 (Thanks to Eric Eide for clarifying this explanation a bit.)
1517 **** c-offsets-alist is now a customizable variable.
1518 This became possible as a result of the new initialization behavior.
1520 This variable is treated slightly differently from the other style
1521 variables; instead of using the symbol set-from-style, it will be
1522 completed with the syntactic symbols it doesn't already contain when
1523 the style is first initialized. This means it now defaults to the
1524 empty list to make all syntactic elements get their values from the
1527 **** Compatibility variable to restore the old behavior.
1528 In case your configuration doesn't work with this change, you can set
1529 c-old-style-variable-behavior to non-nil to get the old behavior back
1532 *** Improvements to line breaking and text filling.
1533 CC Mode now handles this more intelligently and seamlessly wrt the
1534 surrounding code, especially inside comments. For details see the new
1535 chapter about this in the manual.
1537 **** New variable to recognize comment line prefix decorations.
1538 The variable c-comment-prefix-regexp has been added to properly
1539 recognize the line prefix in both block and line comments. It's
1540 primarily used to initialize the various paragraph recognition and
1541 adaptive filling variables that the text handling functions uses.
1543 **** New variable c-block-comment-prefix.
1544 This is a generalization of the now obsolete variable
1545 c-comment-continuation-stars to handle arbitrary strings.
1547 **** CC Mode now uses adaptive fill mode.
1548 This to make it adapt better to the paragraph style inside comments.
1550 It's also possible to use other adaptive filling packages inside CC
1551 Mode, notably Kyle E. Jones' Filladapt mode (http://wonderworks.com/).
1552 A new convenience function c-setup-filladapt sets up Filladapt for use
1555 Note though that the 2.12 version of Filladapt lacks a feature that
1556 causes it to work suboptimally when c-comment-prefix-regexp can match
1557 the empty string (which it commonly does). A patch for that is
1558 available from the CC Mode web site (http://www.python.org/emacs/
1561 **** The variables `c-hanging-comment-starter-p' and
1562 `c-hanging-comment-ender-p', which controlled how comment starters and
1563 enders were filled, are not used anymore. The new version of the
1564 function `c-fill-paragraph' keeps the comment starters and enders as
1565 they were before the filling.
1567 **** It's now possible to selectively turn off auto filling.
1568 The variable c-ignore-auto-fill is used to ignore auto fill mode in
1569 specific contexts, e.g. in preprocessor directives and in string
1572 **** New context sensitive line break function c-context-line-break.
1573 It works like newline-and-indent in normal code, and adapts the line
1574 prefix according to the comment style when used inside comments. If
1575 you're normally using newline-and-indent, you might want to switch to
1578 *** Fixes to IDL mode.
1579 It now does a better job in recognizing only the constructs relevant
1580 to IDL. E.g. it no longer matches "class" as the beginning of a
1581 struct block, but it does match the CORBA 2.3 "valuetype" keyword.
1582 Thanks to Eric Eide.
1584 *** Improvements to the Whitesmith style.
1585 It now keeps the style consistently on all levels and both when
1586 opening braces hangs and when they don't.
1588 **** New lineup function c-lineup-whitesmith-in-block.
1590 *** New lineup functions c-lineup-template-args and c-indent-multi-line-block.
1591 See their docstrings for details. c-lineup-template-args does a
1592 better job of tracking the brackets used as parens in C++ templates,
1593 and is used by default to line up continued template arguments.
1595 *** c-lineup-comment now preserves alignment with a comment on the
1596 previous line. It used to instead preserve comments that started in
1597 the column specified by comment-column.
1599 *** c-lineup-C-comments handles "free form" text comments.
1600 In comments with a long delimiter line at the start, the indentation
1601 is kept unchanged for lines that start with an empty comment line
1602 prefix. This is intended for the type of large block comments that
1603 contain documentation with its own formatting. In these you normally
1604 don't want CC Mode to change the indentation.
1606 *** The `c' syntactic symbol is now relative to the comment start
1607 instead of the previous line, to make integers usable as lineup
1610 *** All lineup functions have gotten docstrings.
1612 *** More preprocessor directive movement functions.
1613 c-down-conditional does the reverse of c-up-conditional.
1614 c-up-conditional-with-else and c-down-conditional-with-else are
1615 variants of these that also stops at "#else" lines (suggested by Don
1618 *** Minor improvements to many movement functions in tricky situations.
1622 *** New variable `dired-recursive-deletes' determines if the delete
1623 command will delete non-empty directories recursively. The default
1624 is, delete only empty directories.
1626 *** New variable `dired-recursive-copies' determines if the copy
1627 command will copy directories recursively. The default is, do not
1628 copy directories recursively.
1630 *** In command `dired-do-shell-command' (usually bound to `!') a `?'
1631 in the shell command has a special meaning similar to `*', but with
1632 the difference that the command will be run on each file individually.
1634 *** The new command `dired-find-alternate-file' (usually bound to `a')
1635 replaces the Dired buffer with the buffer for an alternate file or
1638 *** The new command `dired-show-file-type' (usually bound to `y') shows
1639 a message in the echo area describing what type of file the point is on.
1640 This command invokes the external program `file' do its work, and so
1641 will only work on systems with that program, and will be only as
1642 accurate or inaccurate as it is.
1644 *** Dired now properly handles undo changes of adding/removing `-R'
1647 *** Dired commands that prompt for a destination file now allow the use
1648 of the `M-n' command in the minibuffer to insert the source filename,
1649 which the user can then edit. This only works if there is a single
1650 source file, not when operating on multiple marked files.
1654 The Gnus NEWS entries are short, but they reflect sweeping changes in
1655 four areas: Article display treatment, MIME treatment,
1656 internationalization and mail-fetching.
1658 *** The mail-fetching functions have changed. See the manual for the
1659 many details. In particular, all procmail fetching variables are gone.
1661 If you used procmail like in
1663 (setq nnmail-use-procmail t)
1664 (setq nnmail-spool-file 'procmail)
1665 (setq nnmail-procmail-directory "~/mail/incoming/")
1666 (setq nnmail-procmail-suffix "\\.in")
1668 this now has changed to
1671 '((directory :path "~/mail/incoming/"
1674 More information is available in the info doc at Select Methods ->
1675 Getting Mail -> Mail Sources
1677 *** Gnus is now a MIME-capable reader. This affects many parts of
1678 Gnus, and adds a slew of new commands. See the manual for details.
1679 Separate MIME packages like RMIME, mime-compose etc., will probably no
1680 longer work; remove them and use the native facilities.
1682 The FLIM/SEMI package still works with Emacs 21, but if you want to
1683 use the native facilities, you must remove any mailcap.el[c] that was
1684 installed by FLIM/SEMI version 1.13 or earlier.
1686 *** Gnus has also been multilingualized. This also affects too many
1687 parts of Gnus to summarize here, and adds many new variables. There
1688 are built-in facilities equivalent to those of gnus-mule.el, which is
1689 now just a compatibility layer.
1691 *** gnus-mule.el is now just a compatibility layer over the built-in
1694 *** gnus-auto-select-first can now be a function to be
1695 called to position point.
1697 *** The user can now decide which extra headers should be included in
1698 summary buffers and NOV files.
1700 *** `gnus-article-display-hook' has been removed. Instead, a number
1701 of variables starting with `gnus-treat-' have been added.
1703 *** The Gnus posting styles have been redone again and now work in a
1704 subtly different manner.
1706 *** New web-based backends have been added: nnslashdot, nnwarchive
1707 and nnultimate. nnweb has been revamped, again, to keep up with
1708 ever-changing layouts.
1710 *** Gnus can now read IMAP mail via nnimap.
1712 *** There is image support of various kinds and some sound support.
1714 ** Changes in Texinfo mode.
1716 *** A couple of new key bindings have been added for inserting Texinfo
1720 -------------------------
1724 C-c C-c q @quotation
1726 C-c C-o @<block> ... @end <block>
1729 *** The " key now inserts either " or `` or '' depending on context.
1731 ** Changes in Outline mode.
1733 There is now support for Imenu to index headings. A new command
1734 `outline-headers-as-kill' copies the visible headings in the region to
1735 the kill ring, e.g. to produce a table of contents.
1737 ** Changes to Emacs Server
1739 *** The new option `server-kill-new-buffers' specifies what to do
1740 with buffers when done with them. If non-nil, the default, buffers
1741 are killed, unless they were already present before visiting them with
1742 Emacs Server. If nil, `server-temp-file-regexp' specifies which
1743 buffers to kill, as before.
1745 Please note that only buffers are killed that still have a client,
1746 i.e. buffers visited with `emacsclient --no-wait' are never killed in
1749 ** Both emacsclient and Emacs itself now accept command line options
1750 of the form +LINE:COLUMN in addition to +LINE.
1752 ** Changes to Show Paren mode.
1754 *** Overlays used by Show Paren mode now use a priority property.
1755 The new user option show-paren-priority specifies the priority to
1756 use. Default is 1000.
1758 ** New command M-x check-parens can be used to find unbalanced paren
1759 groups and strings in buffers in Lisp mode (or other modes).
1761 ** Changes to hideshow.el
1763 *** Generalized block selection and traversal
1765 A block is now recognized by its start and end regexps (both strings),
1766 and an integer specifying which sub-expression in the start regexp
1767 serves as the place where a `forward-sexp'-like function can operate.
1768 See the documentation of variable `hs-special-modes-alist'.
1770 *** During incremental search, if Hideshow minor mode is active,
1771 hidden blocks are temporarily shown. The variable `hs-headline' can
1772 be used in the mode line format to show the line at the beginning of
1775 *** User option `hs-hide-all-non-comment-function' specifies a
1776 function to be called at each top-level block beginning, instead of
1777 the normal block-hiding function.
1779 *** The command `hs-show-region' has been removed.
1781 *** The key bindings have changed to fit the Emacs conventions,
1782 roughly imitating those of Outline minor mode. Notably, the prefix
1783 for all bindings is now `C-c @'. For details, see the documentation
1784 for `hs-minor-mode'.
1786 *** The variable `hs-show-hidden-short-form' has been removed, and
1787 hideshow.el now always behaves as if this variable were set to t.
1789 ** Changes to Change Log mode and Add-Log functions
1791 *** If you invoke `add-change-log-entry' from a backup file, it makes
1792 an entry appropriate for the file's parent. This is useful for making
1793 log entries by comparing a version with deleted functions.
1795 **** New command M-x change-log-merge merges another log into the
1798 *** New command M-x change-log-redate fixes any old-style date entries
1801 *** Change Log mode now adds a file's version number to change log
1802 entries if user-option `change-log-version-info-enabled' is non-nil.
1803 Unless the file is under version control the search for a file's
1804 version number is performed based on regular expressions from
1805 `change-log-version-number-regexp-list' which can be customized.
1806 Version numbers are only found in the first 10 percent of a file.
1808 *** Change Log mode now defines its own faces for font-lock highlighting.
1810 ** Changes to cmuscheme
1812 *** The user-option `scheme-program-name' has been renamed
1813 `cmuscheme-program-name' due to conflicts with xscheme.el.
1815 ** Changes in Font Lock
1817 *** The new function `font-lock-remove-keywords' can be used to remove
1818 font-lock keywords from the current buffer or from a specific major mode.
1820 *** Multi-line patterns are now supported. Modes using this, should
1821 set font-lock-multiline to t in their font-lock-defaults.
1823 *** `font-lock-syntactic-face-function' allows major-modes to choose
1824 the face used for each string/comment.
1826 *** A new standard face `font-lock-doc-face'.
1827 Meant for Lisp docstrings, Javadoc comments and other "documentation in code".
1829 ** Changes to Shell mode
1831 *** The `shell' command now accepts an optional argument to specify the buffer
1832 to use, which defaults to "*shell*". When used interactively, a
1833 non-default buffer may be specified by giving the `shell' command a
1834 prefix argument (causing it to prompt for the buffer name).
1836 ** Comint (subshell) changes
1838 These changes generally affect all modes derived from comint mode, which
1839 include shell-mode, gdb-mode, scheme-interaction-mode, etc.
1841 *** Comint now by default interprets some carriage-control characters.
1842 Comint now removes CRs from CR LF sequences, and treats single CRs and
1843 BSs in the output in a way similar to a terminal (by deleting to the
1844 beginning of the line, or deleting the previous character,
1845 respectively). This is achieved by adding `comint-carriage-motion' to
1846 the `comint-output-filter-functions' hook by default.
1848 *** By default, comint no longer uses the variable `comint-prompt-regexp'
1849 to distinguish prompts from user-input. Instead, it notices which
1850 parts of the text were output by the process, and which entered by the
1851 user, and attaches `field' properties to allow emacs commands to use
1852 this information. Common movement commands, notably beginning-of-line,
1853 respect field boundaries in a fairly natural manner. To disable this
1854 feature, and use the old behavior, customize the user option
1855 `comint-use-prompt-regexp-instead-of-fields'.
1857 *** Comint now includes new features to send commands to running processes
1858 and redirect the output to a designated buffer or buffers.
1860 *** The command M-x comint-redirect-send-command reads a command and
1861 buffer name from the mini-buffer. The command is sent to the current
1862 buffer's process, and its output is inserted into the specified buffer.
1864 The command M-x comint-redirect-send-command-to-process acts like
1865 M-x comint-redirect-send-command but additionally reads the name of
1866 the buffer whose process should be used from the mini-buffer.
1868 *** Packages based on comint now highlight user input and program prompts,
1869 and support choosing previous input with mouse-2. To control these features,
1870 see the user-options `comint-highlight-input' and `comint-highlight-prompt'.
1872 *** The new command `comint-write-output' (usually bound to `C-c C-s')
1873 saves the output from the most recent command to a file. With a prefix
1874 argument, it appends to the file.
1876 *** The command `comint-kill-output' has been renamed `comint-delete-output'
1877 (usually bound to `C-c C-o'); the old name is aliased to it for
1880 *** The new function `comint-add-to-input-history' adds commands to the input
1883 *** The new variable `comint-input-history-ignore' is a regexp for
1884 identifying history lines that should be ignored, like tcsh time-stamp
1885 strings, starting with a `#'. The default value of this variable is "^#".
1887 ** Changes to Rmail mode
1889 *** The new user-option rmail-user-mail-address-regexp can be
1890 set to fine tune the identification of the correspondent when
1891 receiving new mail. If it matches the address of the sender, the
1892 recipient is taken as correspondent of a mail. If nil, the default,
1893 `user-login-name' and `user-mail-address' are used to exclude yourself
1896 Usually you don't have to set this variable, except if you collect
1897 mails sent by you under different user names. Then it should be a
1898 regexp matching your mail addresses.
1900 *** The new user-option rmail-confirm-expunge controls whether and how
1901 to ask for confirmation before expunging deleted messages from an
1902 Rmail file. You can choose between no confirmation, confirmation
1903 with y-or-n-p, or confirmation with yes-or-no-p. Default is to ask
1904 for confirmation with yes-or-no-p.
1906 *** RET is now bound in the Rmail summary to rmail-summary-goto-msg,
1909 *** There is a new user option `rmail-digest-end-regexps' that
1910 specifies the regular expressions to detect the line that ends a
1913 *** The new user option `rmail-automatic-folder-directives' specifies
1914 in which folder to put messages automatically.
1916 *** The new function `rmail-redecode-body' allows to fix a message
1917 with non-ASCII characters if Emacs happens to decode it incorrectly
1918 due to missing or malformed "charset=" header.
1920 ** The new user-option `mail-envelope-from' can be used to specify
1921 an envelope-from address different from user-mail-address.
1923 ** The variable mail-specify-envelope-from controls whether to
1924 use the -f option when sending mail.
1926 ** The Rmail command `o' (`rmail-output-to-rmail-file') now writes the
1927 current message in the internal `emacs-mule' encoding, rather than in
1928 the encoding taken from the variable `buffer-file-coding-system'.
1929 This allows to save messages whose characters cannot be safely encoded
1930 by the buffer's coding system, and makes sure the message will be
1931 displayed correctly when you later visit the target Rmail file.
1933 If you want your Rmail files be encoded in a specific coding system
1934 other than `emacs-mule', you can customize the variable
1935 `rmail-file-coding-system' to set its value to that coding system.
1937 ** Changes to TeX mode
1939 *** The default mode has been changed from `plain-tex-mode' to
1942 *** latex-mode now has a simple indentation algorithm.
1944 *** M-f and M-p jump around \begin...\end pairs.
1946 *** Added support for outline-minor-mode.
1948 ** Changes to RefTeX mode
1950 *** RefTeX has new support for index generation. Index entries can be
1951 created with `C-c <', with completion available on index keys.
1952 Pressing `C-c /' indexes the word at the cursor with a default
1953 macro. `C-c >' compiles all index entries into an alphabetically
1954 sorted *Index* buffer which looks like the final index. Entries
1955 can be edited from that buffer.
1957 *** Label and citation key selection now allow to select several
1958 items and reference them together (use `m' to mark items, `a' or
1959 `A' to use all marked entries).
1961 *** reftex.el has been split into a number of smaller files to reduce
1962 memory use when only a part of RefTeX is being used.
1964 *** a new command `reftex-view-crossref-from-bibtex' (bound to `C-c &'
1965 in BibTeX-mode) can be called in a BibTeX database buffer in order
1966 to show locations in LaTeX documents where a particular entry has
1969 ** Emacs Lisp mode now allows multiple levels of outline headings.
1970 The level of a heading is determined from the number of leading
1971 semicolons in a heading line. Toplevel forms starting with a `('
1972 in column 1 are always made leaves.
1974 ** The M-x time-stamp command (most commonly used on write-file-hooks)
1975 has the following new features:
1977 *** The patterns for finding the time stamp and for updating a pattern
1978 may match text spanning multiple lines. For example, some people like
1979 to have the filename and date on separate lines. The new variable
1980 time-stamp-inserts-lines controls the matching for multi-line patterns.
1982 *** More than one time stamp can be updated in the same file. This
1983 feature is useful if you need separate time stamps in a program source
1984 file to both include in formatted documentation and insert in the
1985 compiled binary. The same time-stamp will be written at each matching
1986 pattern. The variable time-stamp-count enables this new feature; it
1989 ** Partial Completion mode now completes environment variables in
1994 *** The command `ispell' now spell-checks a region if
1995 transient-mark-mode is on, and the mark is active. Otherwise it
1996 spell-checks the current buffer.
1998 *** Support for synchronous subprocesses - DOS/Windoze - has been
2001 *** An "alignment error" bug was fixed when a manual spelling
2002 correction is made and re-checked.
2004 *** An Italian, Portuguese, and Slovak dictionary definition has been added.
2006 *** Region skipping performance has been vastly improved in some
2009 *** Spell checking HTML buffers has been improved and isn't so strict
2012 *** The buffer-local words are now always placed on a new line at the
2015 *** Spell checking now works in the MS-DOS version of Emacs.
2017 ** Makefile mode changes
2019 *** The mode now uses the abbrev table `makefile-mode-abbrev-table'.
2021 *** Conditionals and include statements are now highlighted when
2022 Fontlock mode is active.
2026 *** Isearch now puts a call to `isearch-resume' in the command history,
2027 so that searches can be resumed.
2029 *** In Isearch mode, C-M-s and C-M-r are now bound like C-s and C-r,
2030 respectively, i.e. you can repeat a regexp isearch with the same keys
2031 that started the search.
2033 *** In Isearch mode, mouse-2 in the echo area now yanks the current
2034 selection into the search string rather than giving an error.
2036 *** There is a new lazy highlighting feature in incremental search.
2038 Lazy highlighting is switched on/off by customizing variable
2039 `isearch-lazy-highlight'. When active, all matches for the current
2040 search string are highlighted. The current match is highlighted as
2041 before using face `isearch' or `region'. All other matches are
2042 highlighted using face `isearch-lazy-highlight-face' which defaults to
2043 `secondary-selection'.
2045 The extra highlighting makes it easier to anticipate where the cursor
2046 will end up each time you press C-s or C-r to repeat a pending search.
2047 Highlighting of these additional matches happens in a deferred fashion
2048 using "idle timers," so the cycles needed do not rob isearch of its
2049 usual snappy response.
2051 If `isearch-lazy-highlight-cleanup' is set to t, highlights for
2052 matches are automatically cleared when you end the search. If it is
2053 set to nil, you can remove the highlights manually with `M-x
2054 isearch-lazy-highlight-cleanup'.
2058 VC has been overhauled internally. It is now modular, making it
2059 easier to plug-in arbitrary version control backends. (See Lisp
2060 Changes for details on the new structure.) As a result, the mechanism
2061 to enable and disable support for particular version systems has
2062 changed: everything is now controlled by the new variable
2063 `vc-handled-backends'. Its value is a list of symbols that identify
2064 version systems; the default is '(RCS CVS SCCS). When finding a file,
2065 each of the backends in that list is tried in order to see whether the
2066 file is registered in that backend.
2068 When registering a new file, VC first tries each of the listed
2069 backends to see if any of them considers itself "responsible" for the
2070 directory of the file (e.g. because a corresponding subdirectory for
2071 master files exists). If none of the backends is responsible, then
2072 the first backend in the list that could register the file is chosen.
2073 As a consequence, the variable `vc-default-back-end' is now obsolete.
2075 The old variable `vc-master-templates' is also obsolete, although VC
2076 still supports it for backward compatibility. To define templates for
2077 RCS or SCCS, you should rather use the new variables
2078 vc-{rcs,sccs}-master-templates. (There is no such feature under CVS
2079 where it doesn't make sense.)
2081 The variables `vc-ignore-vc-files' and `vc-handle-cvs' are also
2082 obsolete now, you must set `vc-handled-backends' to nil or exclude
2083 `CVS' from the list, respectively, to achieve their effect now.
2087 The variable `vc-checkout-carefully' is obsolete: the corresponding
2088 checks are always done now.
2090 VC Dired buffers are now kept up-to-date during all version control
2093 `vc-diff' output is now displayed in `diff-mode'.
2094 `vc-print-log' uses `log-view-mode'.
2095 `vc-log-mode' (used for *VC-Log*) has been replaced by `log-edit-mode'.
2097 The command C-x v m (vc-merge) now accepts an empty argument as the
2098 first revision number. This means that any recent changes on the
2099 current branch should be picked up from the repository and merged into
2100 the working file (``merge news'').
2102 The commands C-x v s (vc-create-snapshot) and C-x v r
2103 (vc-retrieve-snapshot) now ask for a directory name from which to work
2106 *** Multiple Backends
2108 VC now lets you register files in more than one backend. This is
2109 useful, for example, if you are working with a slow remote CVS
2110 repository. You can then use RCS for local editing, and occasionally
2111 commit your changes back to CVS, or pick up changes from CVS into your
2114 To make this work, the ``more local'' backend (RCS in our example)
2115 should come first in `vc-handled-backends', and the ``more remote''
2116 backend (CVS) should come later. (The default value of
2117 `vc-handled-backends' already has it that way.)
2119 You can then commit changes to another backend (say, RCS), by typing
2120 C-u C-x v v RCS RET (i.e. vc-next-action now accepts a backend name as
2121 a revision number). VC registers the file in the more local backend
2122 if that hasn't already happened, and commits to a branch based on the
2123 current revision number from the more remote backend.
2125 If a file is registered in multiple backends, you can switch to
2126 another one using C-x v b (vc-switch-backend). This does not change
2127 any files, it only changes VC's perspective on the file. Use this to
2128 pick up changes from CVS while working under RCS locally.
2130 After you are done with your local RCS editing, you can commit your
2131 changes back to CVS using C-u C-x v v CVS RET. In this case, the
2132 local RCS archive is removed after the commit, and the log entry
2133 buffer is initialized to contain the entire RCS change log of the file.
2137 There is a new user option, `vc-cvs-stay-local'. If it is `t' (the
2138 default), then VC avoids network queries for files registered in
2139 remote repositories. The state of such files is then only determined
2140 by heuristics and past information. `vc-cvs-stay-local' can also be a
2141 regexp to match against repository hostnames; only files from hosts
2142 that match it are treated locally. If the variable is nil, then VC
2143 queries the repository just as often as it does for local files.
2145 If `vc-cvs-stay-local' is on, then VC also makes local backups of
2146 repository versions. This means that ordinary diffs (C-x v =) and
2147 revert operations (C-x v u) can be done completely locally, without
2148 any repository interactions at all. The name of a local version
2149 backup of FILE is FILE.~REV.~, where REV is the repository version
2150 number. This format is similar to that used by C-x v ~
2151 (vc-version-other-window), except for the trailing dot. As a matter
2152 of fact, the two features can each use the files created by the other,
2153 the only difference being that files with a trailing `.' are deleted
2154 automatically after commit. (This feature doesn't work on MS-DOS,
2155 since DOS disallows more than a single dot in the trunk of a file
2158 If `vc-cvs-stay-local' is on, and there have been changes in the
2159 repository, VC notifies you about it when you actually try to commit.
2160 If you want to check for updates from the repository without trying to
2161 commit, you can either use C-x v m RET to perform an update on the
2162 current file, or you can use C-x v r RET to get an update for an
2163 entire directory tree.
2165 The new user option `vc-cvs-use-edit' indicates whether VC should call
2166 "cvs edit" to make files writeable; it defaults to `t'. (This option
2167 is only meaningful if the CVSREAD variable is set, or if files are
2168 "watched" by other developers.)
2170 The commands C-x v s (vc-create-snapshot) and C-x v r
2171 (vc-retrieve-snapshot) are now also implemented for CVS. If you give
2172 an empty snapshot name to the latter, that performs a `cvs update',
2173 starting at the given directory.
2175 *** Lisp Changes in VC
2177 VC has been restructured internally to make it modular. You can now
2178 add support for arbitrary version control backends by writing a
2179 library that provides a certain set of backend-specific functions, and
2180 then telling VC to use that library. For example, to add support for
2181 a version system named SYS, you write a library named vc-sys.el, which
2182 provides a number of functions vc-sys-... (see commentary at the top
2183 of vc.el for a detailed list of them). To make VC use that library,
2184 you need to put it somewhere into Emacs' load path and add the symbol
2185 `SYS' to the list `vc-handled-backends'.
2187 ** The customizable EDT emulation package now supports the EDT
2188 SUBS command and EDT scroll margins. It also works with more
2189 terminal/keyboard configurations and it now works under XEmacs.
2190 See etc/edt-user.doc for more information.
2192 ** New modes and packages
2194 *** The new global minor mode `minibuffer-electric-default-mode'
2195 automatically hides the `(default ...)' part of minibuffer prompts when
2196 the default is not applicable.
2198 *** Artist is an Emacs lisp package that allows you to draw lines,
2199 rectangles and ellipses by using your mouse and/or keyboard. The
2200 shapes are made up with the ascii characters |, -, / and \.
2204 - Intersecting: When a `|' intersects with a `-', a `+' is
2205 drawn, like this: | \ /
2209 - Rubber-banding: When drawing lines you can interactively see the
2210 result while holding the mouse button down and moving the mouse. If
2211 your machine is not fast enough (a 386 is a bit too slow, but a
2212 pentium is well enough), you can turn this feature off. You will
2213 then see 1's and 2's which mark the 1st and 2nd endpoint of the line
2216 - Arrows: After having drawn a (straight) line or a (straight)
2217 poly-line, you can set arrows on the line-ends by typing < or >.
2219 - Flood-filling: You can fill any area with a certain character by
2222 - Cut copy and paste: You can cut, copy and paste rectangular
2223 regions. Artist also interfaces with the rect package (this can be
2224 turned off if it causes you any trouble) so anything you cut in
2225 artist can be yanked with C-x r y and vice versa.
2227 - Drawing with keys: Everything you can do with the mouse, you can
2228 also do without the mouse.
2230 - Aspect-ratio: You can set the variable artist-aspect-ratio to
2231 reflect the height-width ratio for the font you are using. Squares
2232 and circles are then drawn square/round. Note, that once your
2233 ascii-file is shown with font with a different height-width ratio,
2234 the squares won't be square and the circles won't be round.
2236 - Drawing operations: The following drawing operations are implemented:
2238 lines straight-lines
2240 poly-lines straight poly-lines
2242 text (see-thru) text (overwrite)
2243 spray-can setting size for spraying
2244 vaporize line vaporize lines
2245 erase characters erase rectangles
2247 Straight lines are lines that go horizontally, vertically or
2248 diagonally. Plain lines go in any direction. The operations in
2249 the right column are accessed by holding down the shift key while
2252 It is possible to vaporize (erase) entire lines and connected lines
2253 (rectangles for example) as long as the lines being vaporized are
2254 straight and connected at their endpoints. Vaporizing is inspired
2255 by the drawrect package by Jari Aalto <jari.aalto@poboxes.com>.
2257 - Picture mode compatibility: Artist is picture mode compatible (this
2260 *** The new package Eshell is an operating system command shell
2261 implemented entirely in Emacs Lisp. Use `M-x eshell' to invoke it.
2262 It functions similarly to bash and zsh, and allows running of Lisp
2263 functions and external commands using the same syntax. It supports
2264 history lists, aliases, extended globbing, smart scrolling, etc. It
2265 will work on any platform Emacs has been ported to. And since most of
2266 the basic commands -- ls, rm, mv, cp, ln, du, cat, etc. -- have been
2267 rewritten in Lisp, it offers an operating-system independent shell,
2268 all within the scope of your Emacs process.
2270 *** The new package timeclock.el is a mode is for keeping track of time
2271 intervals. You can use it for whatever purpose you like, but the
2272 typical scenario is to keep track of how much time you spend working
2273 on certain projects.
2275 *** The new package hi-lock.el provides commands to highlight matches
2276 of interactively entered regexps. For example,
2278 M-x highlight-regexp RET clearly RET RET
2280 will highlight all occurrences of `clearly' using a yellow background
2281 face. New occurrences of `clearly' will be highlighted as they are
2282 typed. `M-x unhighlight-regexp RET' will remove the highlighting.
2283 Any existing face can be used for highlighting and a set of
2284 appropriate faces is provided. The regexps can be written into the
2285 current buffer in a form that will be recognized the next time the
2286 corresponding file is read. There are commands to highlight matches
2287 to phrases and to highlight entire lines containing a match.
2289 *** The new package zone.el plays games with Emacs' display when
2292 *** The new package tildify.el allows to add hard spaces or other text
2293 fragments in accordance with the current major mode.
2295 *** The new package xml.el provides a simple but generic XML
2296 parser. It doesn't parse the DTDs however.
2298 *** The comment operations are now provided by the newcomment.el
2299 package which allows different styles of comment-region and should
2300 be more robust while offering the same functionality.
2301 `comment-region' now doesn't always comment a-line-at-a-time, but only
2302 comments the region, breaking the line at point if necessary.
2304 *** The Ebrowse package implements a C++ class browser and tags
2305 facilities tailored for use with C++. It is documented in a
2306 separate Texinfo file.
2308 *** The PCL-CVS package available by either running M-x cvs-examine or
2309 by visiting a CVS administrative directory (with a prefix argument)
2310 provides an alternative interface to VC-dired for CVS. It comes with
2311 `log-view-mode' to view RCS and SCCS logs and `log-edit-mode' used to
2312 enter check-in log messages.
2314 *** The new package called `woman' allows to browse Unix man pages
2315 without invoking external programs.
2317 The command `M-x woman' formats manual pages entirely in Emacs Lisp
2318 and then displays them, like `M-x manual-entry' does. Unlike
2319 `manual-entry', `woman' does not invoke any external programs, so it
2320 is useful on systems such as MS-DOS/MS-Windows where the `man' and
2321 Groff or `troff' commands are not readily available.
2323 The command `M-x woman-find-file' asks for the file name of a man
2324 page, then formats and displays it like `M-x woman' does.
2326 *** The new command M-x re-builder offers a convenient interface for
2327 authoring regular expressions with immediate visual feedback.
2329 The buffer from which the command was called becomes the target for
2330 the regexp editor popping up in a separate window. Matching text in
2331 the target buffer is immediately color marked during the editing.
2332 Each sub-expression of the regexp will show up in a different face so
2333 even complex regexps can be edited and verified on target data in a
2336 On displays not supporting faces the matches instead blink like
2337 matching parens to make them stand out. On such a setup you will
2338 probably also want to use the sub-expression mode when the regexp
2339 contains such to get feedback about their respective limits.
2341 *** glasses-mode is a minor mode that makes
2342 unreadableIdentifiersLikeThis readable. It works as glasses, without
2343 actually modifying content of a buffer.
2345 *** The package ebnf2ps translates an EBNF to a syntactic chart in
2348 Currently accepts ad-hoc EBNF, ISO EBNF and Bison/Yacc.
2350 The ad-hoc default EBNF syntax has the following elements:
2352 ; comment (until end of line)
2356 $A default non-terminal
2357 $"C" default terminal
2358 $?C? default special
2359 A = B. production (A is the header and B the body)
2360 C D sequence (C occurs before D)
2361 C | D alternative (C or D occurs)
2362 A - B exception (A excluding B, B without any non-terminal)
2363 n * A repetition (A repeats n (integer) times)
2364 (C) group (expression C is grouped together)
2365 [C] optional (C may or not occurs)
2366 C+ one or more occurrences of C
2367 {C}+ one or more occurrences of C
2368 {C}* zero or more occurrences of C
2369 {C} zero or more occurrences of C
2370 C / D equivalent to: C {D C}*
2371 {C || D}+ equivalent to: C {D C}*
2372 {C || D}* equivalent to: [C {D C}*]
2373 {C || D} equivalent to: [C {D C}*]
2375 Please, see ebnf2ps documentation for EBNF syntax and how to use it.
2377 *** The package align.el will align columns within a region, using M-x
2378 align. Its mode-specific rules, based on regular expressions,
2379 determine where the columns should be split. In C and C++, for
2380 example, it will align variable names in declaration lists, or the
2381 equal signs of assignments.
2383 *** `paragraph-indent-minor-mode' is a new minor mode supporting
2384 paragraphs in the same style as `paragraph-indent-text-mode'.
2386 *** bs.el is a new package for buffer selection similar to
2387 list-buffers or electric-buffer-list. Use M-x bs-show to display a
2388 buffer menu with this package. See the Custom group `bs'.
2390 *** find-lisp.el is a package emulating the Unix find command in Lisp.
2392 *** calculator.el is a small calculator package that is intended to
2393 replace desktop calculators such as xcalc and calc.exe. Actually, it
2394 is not too small - it has more features than most desktop calculators,
2395 and can be customized easily to get many more functions. It should
2396 not be confused with "calc" which is a much bigger mathematical tool
2397 which answers different needs.
2399 *** The minor modes cwarn-mode and global-cwarn-mode highlights
2400 suspicious C and C++ constructions. Currently, assignments inside
2401 expressions, semicolon following `if', `for' and `while' (except, of
2402 course, after a `do .. while' statement), and C++ functions with
2403 reference parameters are recognized. The modes require font-lock mode
2406 *** smerge-mode.el provides `smerge-mode', a simple minor-mode for files
2407 containing diff3-style conflict markers, such as generated by RCS.
2409 *** 5x5.el is a simple puzzle game.
2411 *** hl-line.el provides `hl-line-mode', a minor mode to highlight the
2412 current line in the current buffer. It also provides
2413 `global-hl-line-mode' to provide the same behaviour in all buffers.
2415 *** ansi-color.el translates ANSI terminal escapes into text-properties.
2417 Please note: if `ansi-color-for-comint-mode' and
2418 `global-font-lock-mode' are non-nil, loading ansi-color.el will
2419 disable font-lock and add `ansi-color-apply' to
2420 `comint-preoutput-filter-functions' for all shell-mode buffers. This
2421 displays the output of "ls --color=yes" using the correct foreground
2422 and background colors.
2424 *** delphi.el provides a major mode for editing the Delphi (Object
2427 *** quickurl.el provides a simple method of inserting a URL based on
2430 *** sql.el provides an interface to SQL data bases.
2432 *** fortune.el uses the fortune program to create mail/news signatures.
2434 *** whitespace.el is a package for warning about and cleaning bogus
2435 whitespace in a file.
2437 *** PostScript mode (ps-mode) is a new major mode for editing PostScript
2438 files. It offers: interaction with a PostScript interpreter, including
2439 (very basic) error handling; fontification, easily customizable for
2440 interpreter messages; auto-indentation; insertion of EPSF templates and
2441 often used code snippets; viewing of BoundingBox; commenting out /
2442 uncommenting regions; conversion of 8bit characters to PostScript octal
2443 codes. All functionality is accessible through a menu.
2445 *** delim-col helps to prettify columns in a text region or rectangle.
2447 Here is an example of columns:
2450 dog pineapple car EXTRA
2451 porcupine strawberry airplane
2453 Doing the following settings:
2455 (setq delimit-columns-str-before "[ ")
2456 (setq delimit-columns-str-after " ]")
2457 (setq delimit-columns-str-separator ", ")
2458 (setq delimit-columns-separator "\t")
2461 Selecting the lines above and typing:
2463 M-x delimit-columns-region
2467 [ horse , apple , bus , ]
2468 [ dog , pineapple , car , EXTRA ]
2469 [ porcupine, strawberry, airplane, ]
2471 delim-col has the following options:
2473 delimit-columns-str-before Specify a string to be inserted
2476 delimit-columns-str-separator Specify a string to be inserted
2477 between each column.
2479 delimit-columns-str-after Specify a string to be inserted
2482 delimit-columns-separator Specify a regexp which separates
2485 delim-col has the following commands:
2487 delimit-columns-region Prettify all columns in a text region.
2488 delimit-columns-rectangle Prettify all columns in a text rectangle.
2490 *** Recentf mode maintains a menu for visiting files that were
2491 operated on recently. User option recentf-menu-filter specifies a
2492 menu filter function to change the menu appearance. For example, the
2493 recent file list can be displayed:
2495 - organized by major modes, directories or user defined rules.
2496 - sorted by file paths, file names, ascending or descending.
2497 - showing paths relative to the current default-directory
2499 The `recentf-filter-changer' menu filter function allows to
2500 dynamically change the menu appearance.
2502 *** elide-head.el provides a mechanism for eliding boilerplate header
2505 *** footnote.el provides `footnote-mode', a minor mode supporting use
2506 of footnotes. It is intended for use with Message mode, but isn't
2507 specific to Message mode.
2509 *** diff-mode.el provides `diff-mode', a major mode for
2510 viewing/editing context diffs (patches). It is selected for files
2511 with extension `.diff', `.diffs', `.patch' and `.rej'.
2513 *** EUDC, the Emacs Unified Directory Client, provides a common user
2514 interface to access directory servers using different directory
2515 protocols. It has a separate manual.
2517 *** autoconf.el provides a major mode for editing configure.in files
2518 for Autoconf, selected automatically.
2520 *** windmove.el provides moving between windows.
2522 *** crm.el provides a facility to read multiple strings from the
2523 minibuffer with completion.
2525 *** todo-mode.el provides management of TODO lists and integration
2526 with the diary features.
2528 *** autoarg.el provides a feature reported from Twenex Emacs whereby
2529 numeric keys supply prefix args rather than self inserting.
2531 *** The function `turn-off-auto-fill' unconditionally turns off Auto
2534 *** pcomplete.el is a library that provides programmable completion
2535 facilities for Emacs, similar to what zsh and tcsh offer. The main
2536 difference is that completion functions are written in Lisp, meaning
2537 they can be profiled, debugged, etc.
2539 *** antlr-mode is a new major mode for editing ANTLR grammar files.
2540 It is automatically turned on for files whose names have the extension
2543 ** Changes in sort.el
2545 The function sort-numeric-fields interprets numbers starting with `0'
2546 as octal and numbers starting with `0x' or `0X' as hexadecimal. The
2547 new user-option sort-numeric-base can be used to specify a default
2550 ** Changes to Ange-ftp
2552 *** Ange-ftp allows you to specify of a port number in remote file
2553 names cleanly. It is appended to the host name, separated by a hash
2554 sign, e.g. `/foo@bar.org#666:mumble'. (This syntax comes from EFS.)
2556 *** If the new user-option `ange-ftp-try-passive-mode' is set, passive
2557 ftp mode will be used if the ftp client supports that.
2559 *** Ange-ftp handles the output of the w32-style clients which
2560 output ^M at the end of lines.
2562 ** The recommended way of using Iswitchb is via the new global minor
2563 mode `iswitchb-mode'.
2565 ** Just loading the msb package doesn't switch on Msb mode anymore.
2566 If you have `(require 'msb)' in your .emacs, please replace it with
2569 ** Flyspell mode has various new options. See the `flyspell' Custom
2572 ** The user option `backward-delete-char-untabify-method' controls the
2573 behavior of `backward-delete-char-untabify'. The following values
2576 `untabify' -- turn a tab to many spaces, then delete one space;
2577 `hungry' -- delete all whitespace, both tabs and spaces;
2578 `all' -- delete all whitespace, including tabs, spaces and newlines;
2579 nil -- just delete one character.
2581 Default value is `untabify'.
2583 [This change was made in Emacs 20.3 but not mentioned then.]
2585 ** In Cperl mode `cperl-invalid-face' should now be a normal face
2586 symbol, not double-quoted.
2588 ** Some packages are declared obsolete, to be removed in a future
2589 version. They are: auto-show, c-mode, hilit19, hscroll, ooutline,
2590 profile, rnews, rnewspost, and sc. Their implementations have been
2591 moved to lisp/obsolete.
2593 ** auto-compression mode is no longer enabled just by loading jka-compr.el.
2594 To control it, set `auto-compression-mode' via Custom or use the
2595 `auto-compression-mode' command.
2597 ** `browse-url-gnome-moz' is a new option for
2598 `browse-url-browser-function', invoking Mozilla in GNOME, and
2599 `browse-url-kde' can be chosen for invoking the KDE browser.
2601 ** The user-option `browse-url-new-window-p' has been renamed to
2602 `browse-url-new-window-flag'.
2604 ** The functions `keep-lines', `flush-lines' and `how-many' now
2605 operate on the active region in Transient Mark mode.
2607 ** `gnus-user-agent' is a new possibility for `mail-user-agent'. It
2608 is like `message-user-agent', but with all the Gnus paraphernalia.
2610 ** The Strokes package has been updated. If your Emacs has XPM
2611 support, you can use it for pictographic editing. In Strokes mode,
2612 use C-mouse-2 to compose a complex stoke and insert it into the
2613 buffer. You can encode or decode a strokes buffer with new commands
2614 M-x strokes-encode-buffer and M-x strokes-decode-buffer. There is a
2615 new command M-x strokes-list-strokes.
2617 ** Hexl contains a new command `hexl-insert-hex-string' which inserts
2618 a string of hexadecimal numbers read from the mini-buffer.
2620 ** Hexl mode allows to insert non-ASCII characters.
2622 The non-ASCII characters are encoded using the same encoding as the
2623 file you are visiting in Hexl mode.
2625 ** Shell script mode changes.
2627 Shell script mode (sh-script) can now indent scripts for shells
2628 derived from sh and rc. The indentation style is customizable, and
2629 sh-script can attempt to "learn" the current buffer's style.
2633 *** In DOS, etags looks for file.cgz if it cannot find file.c.
2635 *** New option --ignore-case-regex is an alternative to --regex. It is now
2636 possible to bind a regexp to a language, by prepending the regexp with
2637 {lang}, where lang is one of the languages that `etags --help' prints out.
2638 This feature is useful especially for regex files, where each line contains
2639 a regular expression. The manual contains details.
2641 *** In C and derived languages, etags creates tags for function
2642 declarations when given the --declarations option.
2644 *** In C++, tags are created for "operator". The tags have the form
2645 "operator+", without spaces between the keyword and the operator.
2647 *** You shouldn't generally need any more the -C or -c++ option: etags
2648 automatically switches to C++ parsing when it meets the `class' or
2649 `template' keywords.
2651 *** Etags now is able to delve at arbitrary deeps into nested structures in
2652 C-like languages. Previously, it was limited to one or two brace levels.
2654 *** New language Ada: tags are functions, procedures, packages, tasks, and
2657 *** In Fortran, `procedure' is not tagged.
2659 *** In Java, tags are created for "interface".
2661 *** In Lisp, "(defstruct (foo", "(defun (operator" and similar constructs
2664 *** In makefiles, tags the targets.
2666 *** In Perl, the --globals option tags global variables. my and local
2667 variables are tagged.
2669 *** New language Python: def and class at the beginning of a line are tags.
2671 *** .ss files are Scheme files, .pdb is Postscript with C syntax, .psw is
2674 ** Changes in etags.el
2676 *** The new user-option tags-case-fold-search can be used to make
2677 tags operations case-sensitive or case-insensitive. The default
2678 is to use the same setting as case-fold-search.
2680 *** You can display additional output with M-x tags-apropos by setting
2681 the new variable tags-apropos-additional-actions.
2683 If non-nil, the variable's value should be a list of triples (TITLE
2684 FUNCTION TO-SEARCH). For each triple, M-x tags-apropos processes
2685 TO-SEARCH and lists tags from it. TO-SEARCH should be an alist,
2686 obarray, or symbol. If it is a symbol, the symbol's value is used.
2688 TITLE is a string to use to label the list of tags from TO-SEARCH.
2690 FUNCTION is a function to call when an entry is selected in the Tags
2691 List buffer. It is called with one argument, the selected symbol.
2693 A useful example value for this variable might be something like:
2695 '(("Emacs Lisp" Info-goto-emacs-command-node obarray)
2696 ("Common Lisp" common-lisp-hyperspec common-lisp-hyperspec-obarray)
2697 ("SCWM" scwm-documentation scwm-obarray))
2699 *** The face tags-tag-face can be used to customize the appearance
2700 of tags in the output of M-x tags-apropos.
2702 *** Setting tags-apropos-verbose to a non-nil value displays the
2703 names of tags files in the *Tags List* buffer.
2705 *** You can now search for tags that are part of the filename itself.
2706 If you have tagged the files topfile.c subdir/subfile.c
2707 /tmp/tempfile.c, you can now search for tags "topfile.c", "subfile.c",
2708 "dir/sub", "tempfile", "tempfile.c". If the tag matches the file name,
2709 point will go to the beginning of the file.
2711 *** Compressed files are now transparently supported if
2712 auto-compression-mode is active. You can tag (with Etags) and search
2713 (with find-tag) both compressed and uncompressed files.
2715 *** Tags commands like M-x tags-search no longer change point
2716 in buffers where no match is found. In buffers where a match is
2717 found, the original value of point is pushed on the marker ring.
2719 ** Fortran mode has a new command `fortran-strip-sequence-nos' to
2720 remove text past column 72. The syntax class of `\' in Fortran is now
2721 appropriate for C-style escape sequences in strings.
2723 ** SGML mode's default `sgml-validate-command' is now `nsgmls'.
2725 ** A new command `view-emacs-problems' (C-h P) displays the PROBLEMS file.
2727 ** The Dabbrev package has a new user-option `dabbrev-ignored-regexps'
2728 containing a list of regular expressions. Buffers matching a regular
2729 expression from that list, are not checked.
2731 ** Emacs can now figure out modification times of remote files.
2732 When you do C-x C-f /user@host:/path/file RET and edit the file,
2733 and someone else modifies the file, you will be prompted to revert
2734 the buffer, just like for the local files.
2736 ** The buffer menu (C-x C-b) no longer lists the *Buffer List* buffer.
2738 ** When invoked with a prefix argument, the command `list-abbrevs' now
2739 displays local abbrevs, only.
2741 ** Refill minor mode provides preliminary support for keeping
2742 paragraphs filled as you modify them.
2744 ** The variable `double-click-fuzz' specifies how much the mouse
2745 may be moved between clicks that are recognized as a pair. Its value
2746 is measured in pixels.
2748 ** The new global minor mode `auto-image-file-mode' allows image files
2749 to be visited as images.
2751 ** Two new user-options `grep-command' and `grep-find-command'
2752 were added to compile.el.
2754 ** Withdrawn packages
2756 *** mldrag.el has been removed. mouse.el provides the same
2757 functionality with aliases for the mldrag functions.
2759 *** eval-reg.el has been obsoleted by changes to edebug.el and removed.
2761 *** ph.el has been obsoleted by EUDC and removed.
2764 * Incompatible Lisp changes
2766 There are a few Lisp changes which are not backwards-compatible and
2767 may require changes to existing code. Here is a list for reference.
2768 See the sections below for details.
2770 ** Since `format' preserves text properties, the idiom
2771 `(format "%s" foo)' no longer works to copy and remove properties.
2772 Use `copy-sequence' to copy the string, then use `set-text-properties'
2773 to remove the properties of the copy.
2775 ** Since the `keymap' text property now has significance, some code
2776 which uses both `local-map' and `keymap' properties (for portability)
2777 may, for instance, give rise to duplicate menus when the keymaps from
2778 these properties are active.
2780 ** The change in the treatment of non-ASCII characters in search
2781 ranges may affect some code.
2783 ** A non-nil value for the LOCAL arg of add-hook makes the hook
2784 buffer-local even if `make-local-hook' hasn't been called, which might
2785 make a difference to some code.
2787 ** The new treatment of the minibuffer prompt might affect code which
2788 operates on the minibuffer.
2790 ** The new character sets `eight-bit-control' and `eight-bit-graphic'
2791 cause `no-conversion' and `emacs-mule-unix' coding systems to produce
2792 different results when reading files with non-ASCII characters
2793 (previously, both coding systems would produce the same results).
2794 Specifically, `no-conversion' interprets each 8-bit byte as a separate
2795 character. This makes `no-conversion' inappropriate for reading
2796 multibyte text, e.g. buffers written to disk in their internal MULE
2797 encoding (auto-saving does that, for example). If a Lisp program
2798 reads such files with `no-conversion', each byte of the multibyte
2799 sequence, including the MULE leading codes such as \201, is treated as
2800 a separate character, which prevents them from being interpreted in
2801 the buffer as multibyte characters.
2803 Therefore, Lisp programs that read files which contain the internal
2804 MULE encoding should use `emacs-mule-unix'. `no-conversion' is only
2805 appropriate for reading truly binary files.
2807 ** Code that relies on the obsolete `before-change-function' and
2808 `after-change-function' to detect buffer changes will now fail. Use
2809 `before-change-functions' and `after-change-functions' instead.
2811 ** Code that uses `concat' with integer args now gets an error, as
2814 ** The function base64-decode-string now always returns a unibyte
2817 ** Not a Lisp incompatibility as such but, with the introduction of
2818 extra private charsets, there is now only one slot free for a new
2819 dimension-2 private charset. User code which tries to add more than
2820 one extra will fail unless you rebuild Emacs with some standard
2821 charset(s) removed; that is probably inadvisable because it changes
2822 the emacs-mule encoding. Also, files stored in the emacs-mule
2823 encoding using Emacs 20 with additional private charsets defined will
2824 probably not be read correctly by Emacs 21.
2826 ** The variable `directory-sep-char' is slated for removal.
2827 Not really a change (yet), but a projected one that you should be
2828 aware of: The variable `directory-sep-char' is deprecated, and should
2829 not be used. It was always ignored on GNU/Linux and Unix systems and
2830 on MS-DOS, but the MS-Windows port tried to support it by adapting the
2831 behavior of certain primitives to the value of this variable. It
2832 turned out that such support cannot be reliable, so it was decided to
2833 remove this variable in the near future. Lisp programs are well
2834 advised not to set it to anything but '/', because any different value
2835 will not have any effect when support for this variable is removed.
2838 * Lisp changes made after edition 2.6 of the Emacs Lisp Manual,
2839 (Display-related features are described in a page of their own below.)
2841 ** Function assq-delete-all replaces function assoc-delete-all.
2843 ** The new function animate-string, from lisp/play/animate.el
2844 allows the animated display of strings.
2846 ** The new function `interactive-form' can be used to obtain the
2847 interactive form of a function.
2849 ** The keyword :set-after in defcustom allows to specify dependencies
2850 between custom options. Example:
2852 (defcustom default-input-method nil
2853 "*Default input method for multilingual text (a string).
2854 This is the input method activated automatically by the command
2855 `toggle-input-method' (\\[toggle-input-method])."
2857 :type '(choice (const nil) string)
2858 :set-after '(current-language-environment))
2860 This specifies that default-input-method should be set after
2861 current-language-environment even if default-input-method appears
2862 first in a custom-set-variables statement.
2864 ** The new hook `kbd-macro-termination-hook' is run at the end of
2865 function execute-kbd-macro. Functions on this hook are called with no
2866 args. The hook is run independent of how the macro was terminated
2867 (signal or normal termination).
2869 ** Functions `butlast' and `nbutlast' for removing trailing elements
2870 from a list are now available without requiring the CL package.
2872 ** The new user-option `even-window-heights' can be set to nil
2873 to prevent `display-buffer' from evening out window heights.
2875 ** The user-option `face-font-registry-alternatives' specifies
2876 alternative font registry names to try when looking for a font.
2878 ** Function `md5' calculates the MD5 "message digest"/"checksum".
2880 ** Function `delete-frame' runs `delete-frame-hook' before actually
2881 deleting the frame. The hook is called with one arg, the frame
2884 ** `add-hook' now makes the hook local if called with a non-nil LOCAL arg.
2886 ** The treatment of non-ASCII characters in search ranges has changed.
2887 If a range in a regular expression or the arg of
2888 skip-chars-forward/backward starts with a unibyte character C and ends
2889 with a multibyte character C2, the range is divided into two: one is
2890 C..?\377, the other is C1..C2, where C1 is the first character of C2's
2893 ** The new function `display-message-or-buffer' displays a message in
2894 the echo area or pops up a buffer, depending on the length of the
2897 ** The new macro `with-auto-compression-mode' allows evaluating an
2898 expression with auto-compression-mode enabled.
2900 ** In image specifications, `:heuristic-mask' has been replaced
2901 with the more general `:mask' property.
2903 ** Image specifications accept more `:conversion's.
2905 ** A `?' can be used in a symbol name without escaping it with a
2908 ** Reading from the mini-buffer now reads from standard input if Emacs
2909 is running in batch mode. For example,
2911 (message "%s" (read t))
2913 will read a Lisp expression from standard input and print the result
2916 ** The argument of `down-list', `backward-up-list', `up-list',
2917 `kill-sexp', `backward-kill-sexp' and `mark-sexp' is now optional.
2919 ** If `display-buffer-reuse-frames' is set, function `display-buffer'
2920 will raise frames displaying a buffer, instead of creating a new
2923 ** Two new functions for removing elements from lists/sequences
2926 - Function: remove ELT SEQ
2928 Return a copy of SEQ with all occurrences of ELT removed. SEQ must be
2929 a list, vector, or string. The comparison is done with `equal'.
2931 - Function: remq ELT LIST
2933 Return a copy of LIST with all occurrences of ELT removed. The
2934 comparison is done with `eq'.
2936 ** The function `delete' now also works with vectors and strings.
2938 ** The meaning of the `:weakness WEAK' argument of make-hash-table
2939 has been changed: WEAK can now have new values `key-or-value' and
2940 `key-and-value', in addition the `nil', `key', `value', and `t'.
2942 ** Function `aset' stores any multibyte character in any string
2943 without signaling "Attempt to change char length of a string". It may
2944 convert a unibyte string to multibyte if necessary.
2946 ** The value of the `help-echo' text property is called as a function
2947 or evaluated, if it is not a string already, to obtain a help string.
2949 ** Function `make-obsolete' now has an optional arg to say when the
2950 function was declared obsolete.
2952 ** Function `plist-member' is renamed from `widget-plist-member' (which is
2953 retained as an alias).
2955 ** Easy-menu's :filter now works as in XEmacs.
2956 It takes the unconverted (i.e. XEmacs) form of the menu and the result
2957 is automatically converted to Emacs' form.
2959 ** The new function `window-list' has been defined
2961 - Function: window-list &optional FRAME WINDOW MINIBUF
2963 Return a list of windows on FRAME, starting with WINDOW. FRAME nil or
2964 omitted means use the selected frame. WINDOW nil or omitted means use
2965 the selected window. MINIBUF t means include the minibuffer window,
2966 even if it isn't active. MINIBUF nil or omitted means include the
2967 minibuffer window only if it's active. MINIBUF neither nil nor t
2968 means never include the minibuffer window.
2970 ** There's a new function `get-window-with-predicate' defined as follows
2972 - Function: get-window-with-predicate PREDICATE &optional MINIBUF ALL-FRAMES DEFAULT
2974 Return a window satisfying PREDICATE.
2976 This function cycles through all visible windows using `walk-windows',
2977 calling PREDICATE on each one. PREDICATE is called with a window as
2978 argument. The first window for which PREDICATE returns a non-nil
2979 value is returned. If no window satisfies PREDICATE, DEFAULT is
2982 Optional second arg MINIBUF t means count the minibuffer window even
2983 if not active. MINIBUF nil or omitted means count the minibuffer iff
2984 it is active. MINIBUF neither t nor nil means not to count the
2985 minibuffer even if it is active.
2987 Several frames may share a single minibuffer; if the minibuffer
2988 counts, all windows on all frames that share that minibuffer count
2989 too. Therefore, if you are using a separate minibuffer frame
2990 and the minibuffer is active and MINIBUF says it counts,
2991 `walk-windows' includes the windows in the frame from which you
2992 entered the minibuffer, as well as the minibuffer window.
2994 ALL-FRAMES is the optional third argument.
2995 ALL-FRAMES nil or omitted means cycle within the frames as specified above.
2996 ALL-FRAMES = `visible' means include windows on all visible frames.
2997 ALL-FRAMES = 0 means include windows on all visible and iconified frames.
2998 ALL-FRAMES = t means include windows on all frames including invisible frames.
2999 If ALL-FRAMES is a frame, it means include windows on that frame.
3000 Anything else means restrict to the selected frame.
3002 ** The function `single-key-description' now encloses function key and
3003 event names in angle brackets. When called with a second optional
3004 argument non-nil, angle brackets won't be printed.
3006 ** If the variable `message-truncate-lines' is bound to t around a
3007 call to `message', the echo area will not be resized to display that
3008 message; it will be truncated instead, as it was done in 20.x.
3009 Default value is nil.
3011 ** The user option `line-number-display-limit' can now be set to nil,
3014 ** The new user option `line-number-display-limit-width' controls
3015 the maximum width of lines in a buffer for which Emacs displays line
3016 numbers in the mode line. The default is 200.
3018 ** `select-safe-coding-system' now also checks the most preferred
3019 coding-system if buffer-file-coding-system is `undecided' and
3020 DEFAULT-CODING-SYSTEM is not specified,
3022 ** The function `subr-arity' provides information about the argument
3023 list of a primitive.
3025 ** `where-is-internal' now also accepts a list of keymaps.
3027 ** The text property `keymap' specifies a key map which overrides the
3028 buffer's local map and the map specified by the `local-map' property.
3029 This is probably what most current uses of `local-map' want, rather
3030 than replacing the local map.
3032 ** The obsolete variables `before-change-function' and
3033 `after-change-function' are no longer acted upon and have been
3034 removed. Use `before-change-functions' and `after-change-functions'
3037 ** The function `apropos-mode' runs the hook `apropos-mode-hook'.
3039 ** `concat' no longer accepts individual integer arguments,
3040 as promised long ago.
3042 ** The new function `float-time' returns the current time as a float.
3044 ** The new variable auto-coding-regexp-alist specifies coding systems
3045 for reading specific files, analogous to auto-coding-alist, but
3046 patterns are checked against file contents instead of file names.
3049 * Lisp changes in Emacs 21.1 (see following page for display-related features)
3051 ** The new package rx.el provides an alternative sexp notation for
3052 regular expressions.
3054 - Function: rx-to-string SEXP
3056 Translate SEXP into a regular expression in string notation.
3060 Translate SEXP into a regular expression in string notation.
3062 The following are valid subforms of regular expressions in sexp
3066 matches string STRING literally.
3069 matches character CHAR literally.
3072 matches any character except a newline.
3075 matches any character
3078 matches any character in SET. SET may be a character or string.
3079 Ranges of characters can be specified as `A-Z' in strings.
3085 matches any character not in SET
3088 matches the empty string, but only at the beginning of a line
3089 in the text being matched
3092 is similar to `line-start' but matches only at the end of a line
3095 matches the empty string, but only at the beginning of the
3096 string being matched against.
3099 matches the empty string, but only at the end of the
3100 string being matched against.
3103 matches the empty string, but only at the beginning of the
3104 buffer being matched against.
3107 matches the empty string, but only at the end of the
3108 buffer being matched against.
3111 matches the empty string, but only at point.
3114 matches the empty string, but only at the beginning or end of a
3118 matches the empty string, but only at the end of a word.
3121 matches the empty string, but only at the beginning or end of a
3124 `(not word-boundary)'
3125 matches the empty string, but not at the beginning or end of a
3129 matches 0 through 9.
3132 matches ASCII control characters.
3135 matches 0 through 9, a through f and A through F.
3138 matches space and tab only.
3141 matches graphic characters--everything except ASCII control chars,
3145 matches printing characters--everything except ASCII control chars
3149 matches letters and digits. (But at present, for multibyte characters,
3150 it matches anything that has word syntax.)
3153 matches letters. (But at present, for multibyte characters,
3154 it matches anything that has word syntax.)
3157 matches ASCII (unibyte) characters.
3160 matches non-ASCII (multibyte) characters.
3163 matches anything lower-case.
3166 matches anything upper-case.
3169 matches punctuation. (But at present, for multibyte characters,
3170 it matches anything that has non-word syntax.)
3173 matches anything that has whitespace syntax.
3176 matches anything that has word syntax.
3179 matches a character with syntax SYNTAX. SYNTAX must be one
3180 of the following symbols.
3182 `whitespace' (\\s- in string notation)
3183 `punctuation' (\\s.)
3186 `open-parenthesis' (\\s()
3187 `close-parenthesis' (\\s))
3188 `expression-prefix' (\\s')
3189 `string-quote' (\\s\")
3190 `paired-delimiter' (\\s$)
3192 `character-quote' (\\s/)
3193 `comment-start' (\\s<)
3194 `comment-end' (\\s>)
3196 `(not (syntax SYNTAX))'
3197 matches a character that has not syntax SYNTAX.
3199 `(category CATEGORY)'
3200 matches a character with category CATEGORY. CATEGORY must be
3201 either a character to use for C, or one of the following symbols.
3203 `consonant' (\\c0 in string notation)
3205 `upper-diacritical-mark' (\\c2)
3206 `lower-diacritical-mark' (\\c3)
3210 `vowel-modifying-diacritical-mark' (\\c7)
3212 `semivowel-lower' (\\c9)
3213 `not-at-end-of-line' (\\c<)
3214 `not-at-beginning-of-line' (\\c>)
3215 `alpha-numeric-two-byte' (\\cA)
3216 `chinse-two-byte' (\\cC)
3217 `greek-two-byte' (\\cG)
3218 `japanese-hiragana-two-byte' (\\cH)
3219 `indian-tow-byte' (\\cI)
3220 `japanese-katakana-two-byte' (\\cK)
3221 `korean-hangul-two-byte' (\\cN)
3222 `cyrillic-two-byte' (\\cY)
3231 `japanese-katakana' (\\ck)
3235 `japanese-roman' (\\cr)
3242 `(not (category CATEGORY))'
3243 matches a character that has not category CATEGORY.
3245 `(and SEXP1 SEXP2 ...)'
3246 matches what SEXP1 matches, followed by what SEXP2 matches, etc.
3248 `(submatch SEXP1 SEXP2 ...)'
3249 like `and', but makes the match accessible with `match-end',
3250 `match-beginning', and `match-string'.
3252 `(group SEXP1 SEXP2 ...)'
3253 another name for `submatch'.
3255 `(or SEXP1 SEXP2 ...)'
3256 matches anything that matches SEXP1 or SEXP2, etc. If all
3257 args are strings, use `regexp-opt' to optimize the resulting
3260 `(minimal-match SEXP)'
3261 produce a non-greedy regexp for SEXP. Normally, regexps matching
3262 zero or more occurrances of something are \"greedy\" in that they
3263 match as much as they can, as long as the overall regexp can
3264 still match. A non-greedy regexp matches as little as possible.
3266 `(maximal-match SEXP)'
3267 produce a greedy regexp for SEXP. This is the default.
3269 `(zero-or-more SEXP)'
3270 matches zero or more occurrences of what SEXP matches.
3273 like `zero-or-more'.
3276 like `zero-or-more', but always produces a greedy regexp.
3279 like `zero-or-more', but always produces a non-greedy regexp.
3281 `(one-or-more SEXP)'
3282 matches one or more occurrences of A.
3288 like `one-or-more', but always produces a greedy regexp.
3291 like `one-or-more', but always produces a non-greedy regexp.
3293 `(zero-or-one SEXP)'
3294 matches zero or one occurrences of A.
3300 like `zero-or-one', but always produces a greedy regexp.
3303 like `zero-or-one', but always produces a non-greedy regexp.
3306 matches N occurrences of what SEXP matches.
3309 matches N to M occurrences of what SEXP matches.
3312 evaluate FORM and insert result. If result is a string,
3316 include REGEXP in string notation in the result.
3318 *** The features `md5' and `overlay' are now provided by default.
3320 *** The special form `save-restriction' now works correctly even if the
3321 buffer is widened inside the save-restriction and changes made outside
3322 the original restriction. Previously, doing this would cause the saved
3323 restriction to be restored incorrectly.
3325 *** The functions `find-charset-region' and `find-charset-string' include
3326 `eight-bit-control' and/or `eight-bit-graphic' in the returned list
3327 when they find 8-bit characters. Previously, they included `ascii' in a
3328 multibyte buffer and `unknown' in a unibyte buffer.
3330 *** The functions `set-buffer-multibyte', `string-as-multibyte' and
3331 `string-as-unibyte' change the byte sequence of a buffer or a string
3332 if it contains a character from the `eight-bit-control' character set.
3334 *** The handling of multibyte sequences in a multibyte buffer is
3335 changed. Previously, a byte sequence matching the pattern
3336 [\200-\237][\240-\377]+ was interpreted as a single character
3337 regardless of the length of the trailing bytes [\240-\377]+. Thus, if
3338 the sequence was longer than what the leading byte indicated, the
3339 extra trailing bytes were ignored by Lisp functions. Now such extra
3340 bytes are independent 8-bit characters belonging to the charset
3343 ** Fontsets are now implemented using char-tables.
3345 A fontset can now be specified for each independent character, for
3346 a group of characters or for a character set rather than just for a
3347 character set as previously.
3349 *** The arguments of the function `set-fontset-font' are changed.
3350 They are NAME, CHARACTER, FONTNAME, and optional FRAME. The function
3351 modifies fontset NAME to use FONTNAME for CHARACTER.
3353 CHARACTER may be a cons (FROM . TO), where FROM and TO are non-generic
3354 characters. In that case FONTNAME is used for all characters in the
3355 range FROM and TO (inclusive). CHARACTER may be a charset. In that
3356 case FONTNAME is used for all character in the charset.
3358 FONTNAME may be a cons (FAMILY . REGISTRY), where FAMILY is the family
3359 name of a font and REGISTRY is a registry name of a font.
3361 *** Variable x-charset-registry has been deleted. The default charset
3362 registries of character sets are set in the default fontset
3365 *** The function `create-fontset-from-fontset-spec' ignores the second
3366 argument STYLE-VARIANT. It never creates style-variant fontsets.
3368 ** The method of composing characters is changed. Now character
3369 composition is done by a special text property `composition' in
3370 buffers and strings.
3372 *** Charset composition is deleted. Emacs never creates a `composite
3373 character' which is an independent character with a unique character
3374 code. Thus the following functions handling `composite characters'
3375 have been deleted: composite-char-component,
3376 composite-char-component-count, composite-char-composition-rule,
3377 composite-char-composition-rule and decompose-composite-char delete.
3378 The variables leading-code-composition and min-composite-char have
3381 *** Three more glyph reference points are added. They can be used to
3382 specify a composition rule. See the documentation of the variable
3383 `reference-point-alist' for more detail.
3385 *** The function `compose-region' takes new arguments COMPONENTS and
3386 MODIFICATION-FUNC. With COMPONENTS, you can specify not only a
3387 composition rule but also characters to be composed. Such characters
3388 may differ between buffer and string text.
3390 *** The function `compose-string' takes new arguments START, END,
3391 COMPONENTS, and MODIFICATION-FUNC.
3393 *** The function `compose-string' puts text property `composition'
3394 directly on the argument STRING instead of returning a new string.
3395 Likewise, the function `decompose-string' just removes text property
3396 `composition' from STRING.
3398 *** The new function `find-composition' returns information about
3399 a composition at a specified position in a buffer or a string.
3401 *** The function `decompose-composite-char' is now labeled as
3404 ** The new coding system `mac-roman' is primarily intended for use on
3405 the Macintosh but may be used generally for Macintosh-encoded text.
3407 ** The new character sets `mule-unicode-0100-24ff',
3408 `mule-unicode-2500-33ff', and `mule-unicode-e000-ffff' have been
3409 introduced for Unicode characters in the range U+0100..U+24FF,
3410 U+2500..U+33FF, U+E000..U+FFFF respectively.
3412 Note that the character sets are not yet unified in Emacs, so
3413 characters which belong to charsets such as Latin-2, Greek, Hebrew,
3414 etc. and the same characters in the `mule-unicode-*' charsets are
3415 different characters, as far as Emacs is concerned. For example, text
3416 which includes Unicode characters from the Latin-2 locale cannot be
3417 encoded by Emacs with ISO 8859-2 coding system.
3419 ** The new coding system `mule-utf-8' has been added.
3420 It provides limited support for decoding/encoding UTF-8 text. For
3421 details, please see the documentation string of this coding system.
3423 ** The new character sets `japanese-jisx0213-1' and
3424 `japanese-jisx0213-2' have been introduced for the new Japanese
3425 standard JIS X 0213 Plane 1 and Plane 2.
3427 ** The new character sets `latin-iso8859-14' and `latin-iso8859-15'
3428 have been introduced.
3430 ** The new character sets `eight-bit-control' and `eight-bit-graphic'
3431 have been introduced for 8-bit characters in the ranges 0x80..0x9F and
3432 0xA0..0xFF respectively. Note that the multibyte representation of
3433 eight-bit-control is never exposed; this leads to an exception in the
3434 emacs-mule coding system, which encodes everything else to the
3435 buffer/string internal representation. Note that to search for
3436 eight-bit-graphic characters in a multibyte buffer, the search string
3437 must be multibyte, otherwise such characters will be converted to
3438 their multibyte equivalent.
3440 ** If the APPEND argument of `write-region' is an integer, it seeks to
3441 that offset in the file before writing.
3443 ** The function `add-minor-mode' has been added for convenience and
3444 compatibility with XEmacs (and is used internally by define-minor-mode).
3446 ** The function `shell-command' now sets the default directory of the
3447 `*Shell Command Output*' buffer to the default directory of the buffer
3448 from which the command was issued.
3450 ** The functions `query-replace', `query-replace-regexp',
3451 `query-replace-regexp-eval' `map-query-replace-regexp',
3452 `replace-string', `replace-regexp', and `perform-replace' take two
3453 additional optional arguments START and END that specify the region to
3456 ** The new function `count-screen-lines' is a more flexible alternative
3457 to `window-buffer-height'.
3459 - Function: count-screen-lines &optional BEG END COUNT-FINAL-NEWLINE WINDOW
3461 Return the number of screen lines in the region between BEG and END.
3462 The number of screen lines may be different from the number of actual
3463 lines, due to line breaking, display table, etc.
3465 Optional arguments BEG and END default to `point-min' and `point-max'
3468 If region ends with a newline, ignore it unless optional third argument
3469 COUNT-FINAL-NEWLINE is non-nil.
3471 The optional fourth argument WINDOW specifies the window used for
3472 obtaining parameters such as width, horizontal scrolling, and so
3473 on. The default is to use the selected window's parameters.
3475 Like `vertical-motion', `count-screen-lines' always uses the current
3476 buffer, regardless of which buffer is displayed in WINDOW. This makes
3477 possible to use `count-screen-lines' in any buffer, whether or not it
3478 is currently displayed in some window.
3480 ** The new function `mapc' is like `mapcar' but doesn't collect the
3481 argument function's results.
3483 ** The functions base64-decode-region and base64-decode-string now
3484 signal an error instead of returning nil if decoding fails. Also,
3485 `base64-decode-string' now always returns a unibyte string (in Emacs
3486 20, it returned a multibyte string when the result was a valid multibyte
3489 ** The function sendmail-user-agent-compose now recognizes a `body'
3490 header in the list of headers passed to it.
3492 ** The new function member-ignore-case works like `member', but
3493 ignores differences in case and text representation.
3495 ** The buffer-local variable cursor-type can be used to specify the
3496 cursor to use in windows displaying a buffer. Values are interpreted
3499 t use the cursor specified for the frame (default)
3500 nil don't display a cursor
3501 `bar' display a bar cursor with default width
3502 (bar . WIDTH) display a bar cursor with width WIDTH
3503 others display a box cursor.
3505 ** The variable open-paren-in-column-0-is-defun-start controls whether
3506 an open parenthesis in column 0 is considered to be the start of a
3507 defun. If set, the default, it is considered a defun start. If not
3508 set, an open parenthesis in column 0 has no special meaning.
3510 ** The new function `string-to-syntax' can be used to translate syntax
3511 specifications in string form as accepted by `modify-syntax-entry' to
3512 the cons-cell form that is used for the values of the `syntax-table'
3513 text property, and in `font-lock-syntactic-keywords'.
3517 (string-to-syntax "()")
3520 ** Emacs' reader supports CL read syntax for integers in bases
3523 *** `#BINTEGER' or `#bINTEGER' reads INTEGER in binary (radix 2).
3524 INTEGER optionally contains a sign.
3531 *** `#OINTEGER' or `#oINTEGER' reads INTEGER in octal (radix 8).
3536 *** `#XINTEGER' or `#xINTEGER' reads INTEGER in hexadecimal (radix 16).
3541 *** `#RADIXrINTEGER' reads INTEGER in radix RADIX, 2 <= RADIX <= 36.
3548 ** The function `documentation-property' now evaluates the value of
3549 the given property to obtain a string if it doesn't refer to etc/DOC
3552 ** If called for a symbol, the function `documentation' now looks for
3553 a `function-documentation' property of that symbol. If it has a non-nil
3554 value, the documentation is taken from that value. If the value is
3555 not a string, it is evaluated to obtain a string.
3557 ** The last argument of `define-key-after' defaults to t for convenience.
3559 ** The new function `replace-regexp-in-string' replaces all matches
3560 for a regexp in a string.
3562 ** `mouse-position' now runs the abnormal hook
3563 `mouse-position-function'.
3565 ** The function string-to-number now returns a float for numbers
3566 that don't fit into a Lisp integer.
3568 ** The variable keyword-symbols-constants-flag has been removed.
3569 Keywords are now always considered constants.
3571 ** The new function `delete-and-extract-region' deletes text and
3574 ** The function `clear-this-command-keys' now also clears the vector
3575 returned by function `recent-keys'.
3577 ** Variables `beginning-of-defun-function' and `end-of-defun-function'
3578 can be used to define handlers for the functions that find defuns.
3579 Major modes can define these locally instead of rebinding C-M-a
3580 etc. if the normal conventions for defuns are not appropriate for the
3583 ** easy-mmode-define-minor-mode now takes an additional BODY argument
3584 and is renamed `define-minor-mode'.
3586 ** If an abbrev has a hook function which is a symbol, and that symbol
3587 has a non-nil `no-self-insert' property, the return value of the hook
3588 function specifies whether an expansion has been done or not. If it
3589 returns nil, abbrev-expand also returns nil, meaning "no expansion has
3592 When abbrev expansion is done by typing a self-inserting character,
3593 and the abbrev has a hook with the `no-self-insert' property, and the
3594 hook function returns non-nil meaning expansion has been done,
3595 then the self-inserting character is not inserted.
3597 ** The function `intern-soft' now accepts a symbol as first argument.
3598 In this case, that exact symbol is looked up in the specified obarray,
3599 and the function's value is nil if it is not found.
3601 ** The new macro `with-syntax-table' can be used to evaluate forms
3602 with the syntax table of the current buffer temporarily set to a
3605 (with-syntax-table TABLE &rest BODY)
3607 Evaluate BODY with syntax table of current buffer set to a copy of
3608 TABLE. The current syntax table is saved, BODY is evaluated, and the
3609 saved table is restored, even in case of an abnormal exit. Value is
3612 ** Regular expressions now support intervals \{n,m\} as well as
3613 Perl's shy-groups \(?:...\) and non-greedy *? +? and ?? operators.
3614 Also back-references like \2 are now considered as an error if the
3615 corresponding subgroup does not exist (or is not closed yet).
3616 Previously it would have been silently turned into `2' (ignoring the `\').
3618 ** The optional argument BUFFER of function file-local-copy has been
3619 removed since it wasn't used by anything.
3621 ** The file name argument of function `file-locked-p' is now required
3622 instead of being optional.
3624 ** The new built-in error `text-read-only' is signaled when trying to
3625 modify read-only text.
3627 ** New functions and variables for locales.
3629 The new variable `locale-coding-system' specifies how to encode and
3630 decode strings passed to low-level message functions like strerror and
3631 time functions like strftime. The new variables
3632 `system-messages-locale' and `system-time-locale' give the system
3633 locales to be used when invoking these two types of functions.
3635 The new function `set-locale-environment' sets the language
3636 environment, preferred coding system, and locale coding system from
3637 the system locale as specified by the LC_ALL, LC_CTYPE, and LANG
3638 environment variables. Normally, it is invoked during startup and need
3639 not be invoked thereafter. It uses the new variables
3640 `locale-language-names', `locale-charset-language-names', and
3641 `locale-preferred-coding-systems' to make its decisions.
3643 ** syntax tables now understand nested comments.
3644 To declare a comment syntax as allowing nesting, just add an `n'
3645 modifier to either of the characters of the comment end and the comment
3648 ** The function `pixmap-spec-p' has been renamed `bitmap-spec-p'
3649 because `bitmap' is more in line with the usual X terminology.
3651 ** New function `propertize'
3653 The new function `propertize' can be used to conveniently construct
3654 strings with text properties.
3656 - Function: propertize STRING &rest PROPERTIES
3658 Value is a copy of STRING with text properties assigned as specified
3659 by PROPERTIES. PROPERTIES is a sequence of pairs PROPERTY VALUE, with
3660 PROPERTY being the name of a text property and VALUE being the
3661 specified value of that property. Example:
3663 (propertize "foo" 'face 'bold 'read-only t)
3665 ** push and pop macros.
3667 Simple versions of the push and pop macros of Common Lisp
3668 are now defined in Emacs Lisp. These macros allow only symbols
3669 as the place that holds the list to be changed.
3671 (push NEWELT LISTNAME) add NEWELT to the front of LISTNAME's value.
3672 (pop LISTNAME) return first elt of LISTNAME, and remove it
3673 (thus altering the value of LISTNAME).
3675 ** New dolist and dotimes macros.
3677 Simple versions of the dolist and dotimes macros of Common Lisp
3678 are now defined in Emacs Lisp.
3680 (dolist (VAR LIST [RESULT]) BODY...)
3681 Execute body once for each element of LIST,
3682 using the variable VAR to hold the current element.
3683 Then return the value of RESULT, or nil if RESULT is omitted.
3685 (dotimes (VAR COUNT [RESULT]) BODY...)
3686 Execute BODY with VAR bound to successive integers running from 0,
3687 inclusive, to COUNT, exclusive.
3688 Then return the value of RESULT, or nil if RESULT is omitted.
3690 ** Regular expressions now support Posix character classes such as
3691 [:alpha:], [:space:] and so on. These must be used within a character
3692 class--for instance, [-[:digit:].+] matches digits or a period
3695 [:digit:] matches 0 through 9
3696 [:cntrl:] matches ASCII control characters
3697 [:xdigit:] matches 0 through 9, a through f and A through F.
3698 [:blank:] matches space and tab only
3699 [:graph:] matches graphic characters--everything except ASCII control chars,
3701 [:print:] matches printing characters--everything except ASCII control chars
3703 [:alnum:] matches letters and digits.
3704 (But at present, for multibyte characters,
3705 it matches anything that has word syntax.)
3706 [:alpha:] matches letters.
3707 (But at present, for multibyte characters,
3708 it matches anything that has word syntax.)
3709 [:ascii:] matches ASCII (unibyte) characters.
3710 [:nonascii:] matches non-ASCII (multibyte) characters.
3711 [:lower:] matches anything lower-case.
3712 [:punct:] matches punctuation.
3713 (But at present, for multibyte characters,
3714 it matches anything that has non-word syntax.)
3715 [:space:] matches anything that has whitespace syntax.
3716 [:upper:] matches anything upper-case.
3717 [:word:] matches anything that has word syntax.
3719 ** Emacs now has built-in hash tables.
3721 The following functions are defined for hash tables:
3723 - Function: make-hash-table ARGS
3725 The argument list ARGS consists of keyword/argument pairs. All arguments
3726 are optional. The following arguments are defined:
3730 TEST must be a symbol specifying how to compare keys. Default is `eql'.
3731 Predefined are `eq', `eql' and `equal'. If TEST is not predefined,
3732 it must have been defined with `define-hash-table-test'.
3736 SIZE must be an integer > 0 giving a hint to the implementation how
3737 many elements will be put in the hash table. Default size is 65.
3739 :rehash-size REHASH-SIZE
3741 REHASH-SIZE specifies by how much to grow a hash table once it becomes
3742 full. If REHASH-SIZE is an integer, add that to the hash table's old
3743 size to get the new size. Otherwise, REHASH-SIZE must be a float >
3744 1.0, and the new size is computed by multiplying REHASH-SIZE with the
3745 old size. Default rehash size is 1.5.
3747 :rehash-threshold THRESHOLD
3749 THRESHOLD must be a float > 0 and <= 1.0 specifying when to resize the
3750 hash table. It is resized when the ratio of (number of entries) /
3751 (size of hash table) is >= THRESHOLD. Default threshold is 0.8.
3755 WEAK must be either nil, one of the symbols `key, `value',
3756 `key-or-value', `key-and-value', or t, meaning the same as
3757 `key-and-value'. Entries are removed from weak tables during garbage
3758 collection if their key and/or value are not referenced elsewhere
3759 outside of the hash table. Default are non-weak hash tables.
3761 - Function: makehash &optional TEST
3763 Similar to make-hash-table, but only TEST can be specified.
3765 - Function: hash-table-p TABLE
3767 Returns non-nil if TABLE is a hash table object.
3769 - Function: copy-hash-table TABLE
3771 Returns a copy of TABLE. Only the table itself is copied, keys and
3774 - Function: hash-table-count TABLE
3776 Returns the number of entries in TABLE.
3778 - Function: hash-table-rehash-size TABLE
3780 Returns the rehash size of TABLE.
3782 - Function: hash-table-rehash-threshold TABLE
3784 Returns the rehash threshold of TABLE.
3786 - Function: hash-table-rehash-size TABLE
3788 Returns the size of TABLE.
3790 - Function: hash-table-test TABLE
3792 Returns the test TABLE uses to compare keys.
3794 - Function: hash-table-weakness TABLE
3796 Returns the weakness specified for TABLE.
3798 - Function: clrhash TABLE
3802 - Function: gethash KEY TABLE &optional DEFAULT
3804 Look up KEY in TABLE and return its associated VALUE or DEFAULT if
3807 - Function: puthash KEY VALUE TABLE
3809 Associate KEY with VALUE in TABLE. If KEY is already associated with
3810 another value, replace the old value with VALUE.
3812 - Function: remhash KEY TABLE
3814 Remove KEY from TABLE if it is there.
3816 - Function: maphash FUNCTION TABLE
3818 Call FUNCTION for all elements in TABLE. FUNCTION must take two
3819 arguments KEY and VALUE.
3821 - Function: sxhash OBJ
3823 Return a hash code for Lisp object OBJ.
3825 - Function: define-hash-table-test NAME TEST-FN HASH-FN
3827 Define a new hash table test named NAME. If NAME is specified as
3828 a test in `make-hash-table', the table created will use TEST-FN for
3829 comparing keys, and HASH-FN to compute hash codes for keys. Test
3830 and hash function are stored as symbol property `hash-table-test'
3831 of NAME with a value of (TEST-FN HASH-FN).
3833 TEST-FN must take two arguments and return non-nil if they are the same.
3835 HASH-FN must take one argument and return an integer that is the hash
3836 code of the argument. The function should use the whole range of
3837 integer values for hash code computation, including negative integers.
3839 Example: The following creates a hash table whose keys are supposed to
3840 be strings that are compared case-insensitively.
3842 (defun case-fold-string= (a b)
3843 (compare-strings a nil nil b nil nil t))
3845 (defun case-fold-string-hash (a)
3846 (sxhash (upcase a)))
3848 (define-hash-table-test 'case-fold 'case-fold-string=
3849 'case-fold-string-hash))
3851 (make-hash-table :test 'case-fold)
3853 ** The Lisp reader handles circular structure.
3855 It now works to use the #N= and #N# constructs to represent
3856 circular structures. For example, #1=(a . #1#) represents
3857 a cons cell which is its own cdr.
3859 ** The Lisp printer handles circular structure.
3861 If you bind print-circle to a non-nil value, the Lisp printer outputs
3862 #N= and #N# constructs to represent circular and shared structure.
3864 ** If the second argument to `move-to-column' is anything but nil or
3865 t, that means replace a tab with spaces if necessary to reach the
3866 specified column, but do not add spaces at the end of the line if it
3867 is too short to reach that column.
3869 ** perform-replace has a new feature: the REPLACEMENTS argument may
3870 now be a cons cell (FUNCTION . DATA). This means to call FUNCTION
3871 after each match to get the replacement text. FUNCTION is called with
3872 two arguments: DATA, and the number of replacements already made.
3874 If the FROM-STRING contains any upper-case letters,
3875 perform-replace also turns off `case-fold-search' temporarily
3876 and inserts the replacement text without altering case in it.
3878 ** The function buffer-size now accepts an optional argument
3879 to specify which buffer to return the size of.
3881 ** The calendar motion commands now run the normal hook
3882 calendar-move-hook after moving point.
3884 ** The new variable small-temporary-file-directory specifies a
3885 directory to use for creating temporary files that are likely to be
3886 small. (Certain Emacs features use this directory.) If
3887 small-temporary-file-directory is nil, they use
3888 temporary-file-directory instead.
3890 ** The variable `inhibit-modification-hooks', if non-nil, inhibits all
3891 the hooks that track changes in the buffer. This affects
3892 `before-change-functions' and `after-change-functions', as well as
3893 hooks attached to text properties and overlay properties.
3895 ** assq-delete-all is a new function that deletes all the
3896 elements of an alist which have a car `eq' to a particular value.
3898 ** make-temp-file provides a more reliable way to create a temporary file.
3900 make-temp-file is used like make-temp-name, except that it actually
3901 creates the file before it returns. This prevents a timing error,
3902 ensuring that no other job can use the same name for a temporary file.
3904 ** New exclusive-open feature in `write-region'
3906 The optional seventh arg is now called MUSTBENEW. If non-nil, it insists
3907 on a check for an existing file with the same name. If MUSTBENEW
3908 is `excl', that means to get an error if the file already exists;
3909 never overwrite. If MUSTBENEW is neither nil nor `excl', that means
3910 ask for confirmation before overwriting, but do go ahead and
3911 overwrite the file if the user gives confirmation.
3913 If the MUSTBENEW argument in `write-region' is `excl',
3914 that means to use a special feature in the `open' system call
3915 to get an error if the file exists at that time.
3916 The error reported is `file-already-exists'.
3918 ** Function `format' now handles text properties.
3920 Text properties of the format string are applied to the result string.
3921 If the result string is longer than the format string, text properties
3922 ending at the end of the format string are extended to the end of the
3925 Text properties from string arguments are applied to the result
3926 string where arguments appear in the result string.
3930 (let ((s1 "hello, %s")
3932 (put-text-property 0 (length s1) 'face 'bold s1)
3933 (put-text-property 0 (length s2) 'face 'italic s2)
3936 results in a bold-face string with an italic `world' at the end.
3938 ** Messages can now be displayed with text properties.
3940 Text properties are handled as described above for function `format'.
3941 The following example displays a bold-face message with an italic
3944 (let ((msg "hello, %s!")
3946 (put-text-property 0 (length msg) 'face 'bold msg)
3947 (put-text-property 0 (length arg) 'face 'italic arg)
3952 Emacs supports playing sound files on GNU/Linux and the free BSDs
3953 (Voxware driver and native BSD driver, aka as Luigi's driver).
3955 Currently supported file formats are RIFF-WAVE (*.wav) and Sun Audio
3956 (*.au). You must configure Emacs with the option `--with-sound=yes'
3957 to enable sound support.
3959 Sound files can be played by calling (play-sound SOUND). SOUND is a
3960 list of the form `(sound PROPERTY...)'. The function is only defined
3961 when sound support is present for the system on which Emacs runs. The
3962 functions runs `play-sound-functions' with one argument which is the
3963 sound to play, before playing the sound.
3965 The following sound properties are supported:
3969 FILE is a file name. If FILE isn't an absolute name, it will be
3970 searched relative to `data-directory'.
3974 DATA is a string containing sound data. Either :file or :data
3975 may be present, but not both.
3979 VOLUME must be an integer in the range 0..100 or a float in the range
3980 0..1. This property is optional.
3984 DEVICE is a string specifying the system device on which to play the
3985 sound. The default device is system-dependent.
3987 Other properties are ignored.
3989 An alternative interface is called as
3990 (play-sound-file FILE &optional VOLUME DEVICE).
3992 ** `multimedia' is a new Finder keyword and Custom group.
3994 ** keywordp is a new predicate to test efficiently for an object being
3997 ** Changes to garbage collection
3999 *** The function garbage-collect now additionally returns the number
4000 of live and free strings.
4002 *** There is a new variable `strings-consed' holding the number of
4003 strings that have been consed so far.
4006 * Lisp-level Display features added after release 2.6 of the Emacs
4009 ** The user-option `resize-mini-windows' controls how Emacs resizes
4012 ** The function `pos-visible-in-window-p' now has a third optional
4013 argument, PARTIALLY. If a character is only partially visible, nil is
4014 returned, unless PARTIALLY is non-nil.
4016 ** On window systems, `glyph-table' is no longer used.
4018 ** Help strings in menu items are now used to provide `help-echo' text.
4020 ** The function `image-size' can be used to determine the size of an
4023 - Function: image-size SPEC &optional PIXELS FRAME
4025 Return the size of an image as a pair (WIDTH . HEIGHT).
4027 SPEC is an image specification. PIXELS non-nil means return sizes
4028 measured in pixels, otherwise return sizes measured in canonical
4029 character units (fractions of the width/height of the frame's default
4030 font). FRAME is the frame on which the image will be displayed.
4031 FRAME nil or omitted means use the selected frame.
4033 ** The function `image-mask-p' can be used to determine if an image
4036 - Function: image-mask-p SPEC &optional FRAME
4038 Return t if image SPEC has a mask bitmap.
4039 FRAME is the frame on which the image will be displayed. FRAME nil
4040 or omitted means use the selected frame.
4042 ** The function `find-image' can be used to find a usable image
4043 satisfying one of a list of specifications.
4045 ** The STRING argument of `put-image' and `insert-image' is now
4048 ** Image specifications may contain the property `:ascent center' (see
4052 * New Lisp-level Display features in Emacs 21.1
4054 ** The function tty-suppress-bold-inverse-default-colors can be used
4055 to make Emacs avoid displaying text with bold black foreground on TTYs.
4057 Some terminals, notably PC consoles, emulate bold text by displaying
4058 text in brighter colors. On such a console, a bold black foreground
4059 is displayed in a gray color. If this turns out to be hard to read on
4060 your monitor---the problem occurred with the mode line on
4061 laptops---you can instruct Emacs to ignore the text's boldness, and to
4062 just display it black instead.
4064 This situation can't be detected automatically. You will have to put
4067 (tty-suppress-bold-inverse-default-colors t)
4071 ** New face implementation.
4073 Emacs faces have been reimplemented from scratch. They don't use XLFD
4074 font names anymore and face merging now works as expected.
4078 Each face can specify the following display attributes:
4080 1. Font family or fontset alias name.
4082 2. Relative proportionate width, aka character set width or set
4083 width (swidth), e.g. `semi-compressed'.
4085 3. Font height in 1/10pt
4087 4. Font weight, e.g. `bold'.
4089 5. Font slant, e.g. `italic'.
4091 6. Foreground color.
4093 7. Background color.
4095 8. Whether or not characters should be underlined, and in what color.
4097 9. Whether or not characters should be displayed in inverse video.
4099 10. A background stipple, a bitmap.
4101 11. Whether or not characters should be overlined, and in what color.
4103 12. Whether or not characters should be strike-through, and in what
4106 13. Whether or not a box should be drawn around characters, its
4107 color, the width of the box lines, and 3D appearance.
4109 Faces are frame-local by nature because Emacs allows to define the
4110 same named face (face names are symbols) differently for different
4111 frames. Each frame has an alist of face definitions for all named
4112 faces. The value of a named face in such an alist is a Lisp vector
4113 with the symbol `face' in slot 0, and a slot for each of the face
4114 attributes mentioned above.
4116 There is also a global face alist `face-new-frame-defaults'. Face
4117 definitions from this list are used to initialize faces of newly
4120 A face doesn't have to specify all attributes. Those not specified
4121 have a nil value. Faces specifying all attributes are called
4126 The display style of a given character in the text is determined by
4127 combining several faces. This process is called `face merging'. Any
4128 aspect of the display style that isn't specified by overlays or text
4129 properties is taken from the `default' face. Since it is made sure
4130 that the default face is always fully-specified, face merging always
4131 results in a fully-specified face.
4133 *** Face realization.
4135 After all face attributes for a character have been determined by
4136 merging faces of that character, that face is `realized'. The
4137 realization process maps face attributes to what is physically
4138 available on the system where Emacs runs. The result is a `realized
4139 face' in form of an internal structure which is stored in the face
4140 cache of the frame on which it was realized.
4142 Face realization is done in the context of the charset of the
4143 character to display because different fonts and encodings are used
4144 for different charsets. In other words, for characters of different
4145 charsets, different realized faces are needed to display them.
4147 Except for composite characters, faces are always realized for a
4148 specific character set and contain a specific font, even if the face
4149 being realized specifies a fontset. The reason is that the result of
4150 the new font selection stage is better than what can be done with
4151 statically defined font name patterns in fontsets.
4153 In unibyte text, Emacs' charsets aren't applicable; function
4154 `char-charset' reports ASCII for all characters, including those >
4155 0x7f. The X registry and encoding of fonts to use is determined from
4156 the variable `face-default-registry' in this case. The variable is
4157 initialized at Emacs startup time from the font the user specified for
4160 Currently all unibyte text, i.e. all buffers with
4161 `enable-multibyte-characters' nil are displayed with fonts of the same
4162 registry and encoding `face-default-registry'. This is consistent
4163 with the fact that languages can also be set globally, only.
4165 **** Clearing face caches.
4167 The Lisp function `clear-face-cache' can be called to clear face caches
4168 on all frames. If called with a non-nil argument, it will also unload
4173 Font selection tries to find the best available matching font for a
4174 given (charset, face) combination. This is done slightly differently
4175 for faces specifying a fontset, or a font family name.
4177 If the face specifies a fontset name, that fontset determines a
4178 pattern for fonts of the given charset. If the face specifies a font
4179 family, a font pattern is constructed. Charset symbols have a
4180 property `x-charset-registry' for that purpose that maps a charset to
4181 an XLFD registry and encoding in the font pattern constructed.
4183 Available fonts on the system on which Emacs runs are then matched
4184 against the font pattern. The result of font selection is the best
4185 match for the given face attributes in this font list.
4187 Font selection can be influenced by the user.
4189 The user can specify the relative importance he gives the face
4190 attributes width, height, weight, and slant by setting
4191 face-font-selection-order (faces.el) to a list of face attribute
4192 names. The default is (:width :height :weight :slant), and means
4193 that font selection first tries to find a good match for the font
4194 width specified by a face, then---within fonts with that width---tries
4195 to find a best match for the specified font height, etc.
4197 Setting `face-font-family-alternatives' allows the user to specify
4198 alternative font families to try if a family specified by a face
4201 Setting `face-font-registry-alternatives' allows the user to specify
4202 all alternative font registry names to try for a face specifying a
4205 Please note that the interpretations of the above two variables are
4208 Setting face-ignored-fonts allows the user to ignore specific fonts.
4213 Emacs can make use of scalable fonts but doesn't do so by default,
4214 since the use of too many or too big scalable fonts may crash XFree86
4217 To enable scalable font use, set the variable
4218 `scalable-fonts-allowed'. A value of nil, the default, means never use
4219 scalable fonts. A value of t means any scalable font may be used.
4220 Otherwise, the value must be a list of regular expressions. A
4221 scalable font may then be used if it matches a regular expression from
4224 (setq scalable-fonts-allowed '("muleindian-2$"))
4226 allows the use of scalable fonts with registry `muleindian-2'.
4228 *** Functions and variables related to font selection.
4230 - Function: x-family-fonts &optional FAMILY FRAME
4232 Return a list of available fonts of family FAMILY on FRAME. If FAMILY
4233 is omitted or nil, list all families. Otherwise, FAMILY must be a
4234 string, possibly containing wildcards `?' and `*'.
4236 If FRAME is omitted or nil, use the selected frame. Each element of
4237 the result is a vector [FAMILY WIDTH POINT-SIZE WEIGHT SLANT FIXED-P
4238 FULL REGISTRY-AND-ENCODING]. FAMILY is the font family name.
4239 POINT-SIZE is the size of the font in 1/10 pt. WIDTH, WEIGHT, and
4240 SLANT are symbols describing the width, weight and slant of the font.
4241 These symbols are the same as for face attributes. FIXED-P is non-nil
4242 if the font is fixed-pitch. FULL is the full name of the font, and
4243 REGISTRY-AND-ENCODING is a string giving the registry and encoding of
4244 the font. The result list is sorted according to the current setting
4245 of the face font sort order.
4247 - Function: x-font-family-list
4249 Return a list of available font families on FRAME. If FRAME is
4250 omitted or nil, use the selected frame. Value is a list of conses
4251 (FAMILY . FIXED-P) where FAMILY is a font family, and FIXED-P is
4252 non-nil if fonts of that family are fixed-pitch.
4254 - Variable: font-list-limit
4256 Limit for font matching. If an integer > 0, font matching functions
4257 won't load more than that number of fonts when searching for a
4258 matching font. The default is currently 100.
4260 *** Setting face attributes.
4262 For the most part, the new face implementation is interface-compatible
4263 with the old one. Old face attribute related functions are now
4264 implemented in terms of the new functions `set-face-attribute' and
4267 Face attributes are identified by their names which are keyword
4268 symbols. All attributes can be set to `unspecified'.
4270 The following attributes are recognized:
4274 VALUE must be a string specifying the font family, e.g. ``courier'',
4275 or a fontset alias name. If a font family is specified, wild-cards `*'
4276 and `?' are allowed.
4280 VALUE specifies the relative proportionate width of the font to use.
4281 It must be one of the symbols `ultra-condensed', `extra-condensed',
4282 `condensed', `semi-condensed', `normal', `semi-expanded', `expanded',
4283 `extra-expanded', or `ultra-expanded'.
4287 VALUE must be either an integer specifying the height of the font to use
4288 in 1/10 pt, a floating point number specifying the amount by which to
4289 scale any underlying face, or a function, which is called with the old
4290 height (from the underlying face), and should return the new height.
4294 VALUE specifies the weight of the font to use. It must be one of the
4295 symbols `ultra-bold', `extra-bold', `bold', `semi-bold', `normal',
4296 `semi-light', `light', `extra-light', `ultra-light'.
4300 VALUE specifies the slant of the font to use. It must be one of the
4301 symbols `italic', `oblique', `normal', `reverse-italic', or
4304 `:foreground', `:background'
4306 VALUE must be a color name, a string.
4310 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be underlined. If
4311 VALUE is t, underline with foreground color of the face. If VALUE is
4312 a string, underline with that color. If VALUE is nil, explicitly
4317 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be overlined. If
4318 VALUE is t, overline with foreground color of the face. If VALUE is a
4319 string, overline with that color. If VALUE is nil, explicitly don't
4324 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be drawn with a line
4325 striking through them. If VALUE is t, use the foreground color of the
4326 face. If VALUE is a string, strike-through with that color. If VALUE
4327 is nil, explicitly don't strike through.
4331 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should have a box drawn
4332 around them. If VALUE is nil, explicitly don't draw boxes. If
4333 VALUE is t, draw a box with lines of width 1 in the foreground color
4334 of the face. If VALUE is a string, the string must be a color name,
4335 and the box is drawn in that color with a line width of 1. Otherwise,
4336 VALUE must be a property list of the form `(:line-width WIDTH
4337 :color COLOR :style STYLE)'. If a keyword/value pair is missing from
4338 the property list, a default value will be used for the value, as
4339 specified below. WIDTH specifies the width of the lines to draw; it
4340 defaults to 1. COLOR is the name of the color to draw in, default is
4341 the foreground color of the face for simple boxes, and the background
4342 color of the face for 3D boxes. STYLE specifies whether a 3D box
4343 should be draw. If STYLE is `released-button', draw a box looking
4344 like a released 3D button. If STYLE is `pressed-button' draw a box
4345 that appears like a pressed button. If STYLE is nil, the default if
4346 the property list doesn't contain a style specification, draw a 2D
4351 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be displayed in
4352 inverse video. VALUE must be one of t or nil.
4356 If VALUE is a string, it must be the name of a file of pixmap data.
4357 The directories listed in the `x-bitmap-file-path' variable are
4358 searched. Alternatively, VALUE may be a list of the form (WIDTH
4359 HEIGHT DATA) where WIDTH and HEIGHT are the size in pixels, and DATA
4360 is a string containing the raw bits of the bitmap. VALUE nil means
4361 explicitly don't use a stipple pattern.
4363 For convenience, attributes `:family', `:width', `:height', `:weight',
4364 and `:slant' may also be set in one step from an X font name:
4368 Set font-related face attributes from VALUE. VALUE must be a valid
4369 XLFD font name. If it is a font name pattern, the first matching font
4370 is used--this is for compatibility with the behavior of previous
4373 For compatibility with Emacs 20, keywords `:bold' and `:italic' can
4374 be used to specify that a bold or italic font should be used. VALUE
4375 must be t or nil in that case. A value of `unspecified' is not allowed."
4377 Please see also the documentation of `set-face-attribute' and
4382 VALUE is the name of a face from which to inherit attributes, or a list
4383 of face names. Attributes from inherited faces are merged into the face
4384 like an underlying face would be, with higher priority than underlying faces.
4386 *** Face attributes and X resources
4388 The following X resource names can be used to set face attributes
4391 Face attribute X resource class
4392 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
4393 :family attributeFamily . Face.AttributeFamily
4394 :width attributeWidth Face.AttributeWidth
4395 :height attributeHeight Face.AttributeHeight
4396 :weight attributeWeight Face.AttributeWeight
4397 :slant attributeSlant Face.AttributeSlant
4398 foreground attributeForeground Face.AttributeForeground
4399 :background attributeBackground . Face.AttributeBackground
4400 :overline attributeOverline Face.AttributeOverline
4401 :strike-through attributeStrikeThrough Face.AttributeStrikeThrough
4402 :box attributeBox Face.AttributeBox
4403 :underline attributeUnderline Face.AttributeUnderline
4404 :inverse-video attributeInverse Face.AttributeInverse
4405 :stipple attributeStipple Face.AttributeStipple
4406 or attributeBackgroundPixmap
4407 Face.AttributeBackgroundPixmap
4408 :font attributeFont Face.AttributeFont
4409 :bold attributeBold Face.AttributeBold
4410 :italic attributeItalic . Face.AttributeItalic
4411 :font attributeFont Face.AttributeFont
4413 *** Text property `face'.
4415 The value of the `face' text property can now be a single face
4416 specification or a list of such specifications. Each face
4417 specification can be
4419 1. A symbol or string naming a Lisp face.
4421 2. A property list of the form (KEYWORD VALUE ...) where each
4422 KEYWORD is a face attribute name, and VALUE is an appropriate value
4423 for that attribute. Please see the doc string of `set-face-attribute'
4424 for face attribute names.
4426 3. Conses of the form (FOREGROUND-COLOR . COLOR) or
4427 (BACKGROUND-COLOR . COLOR) where COLOR is a color name. This is
4428 for compatibility with previous Emacs versions.
4430 ** Support functions for colors on text-only terminals.
4432 The function `tty-color-define' can be used to define colors for use
4433 on TTY and MSDOS frames. It maps a color name to a color number on
4434 the terminal. Emacs defines a couple of common color mappings by
4435 default. You can get defined colors with a call to
4436 `defined-colors'. The function `tty-color-clear' can be
4437 used to clear the mapping table.
4439 ** Unified support for colors independent of frame type.
4441 The new functions `defined-colors', `color-defined-p', `color-values',
4442 and `display-color-p' work for any type of frame. On frames whose
4443 type is neither x nor w32, these functions transparently map X-style
4444 color specifications to the closest colors supported by the frame
4445 display. Lisp programs should use these new functions instead of the
4446 old `x-defined-colors', `x-color-defined-p', `x-color-values', and
4447 `x-display-color-p'. (The old function names are still available for
4448 compatibility; they are now aliases of the new names.) Lisp programs
4449 should no more look at the value of the variable window-system to
4450 modify their color-related behavior.
4452 The primitives `color-gray-p' and `color-supported-p' also work for
4455 ** Platform-independent functions to describe display capabilities.
4457 The new functions `display-mouse-p', `display-popup-menus-p',
4458 `display-graphic-p', `display-selections-p', `display-screens',
4459 `display-pixel-width', `display-pixel-height', `display-mm-width',
4460 `display-mm-height', `display-backing-store', `display-save-under',
4461 `display-planes', `display-color-cells', `display-visual-class', and
4462 `display-grayscale-p' describe the basic capabilities of a particular
4463 display. Lisp programs should call these functions instead of testing
4464 the value of the variables `window-system' or `system-type', or calling
4465 platform-specific functions such as `x-display-pixel-width'.
4467 The new function `display-images-p' returns non-nil if a particular
4468 display can display image files.
4470 ** The minibuffer prompt is now actually inserted in the minibuffer.
4472 This makes it possible to scroll through the prompt, if you want to.
4473 To disallow this completely (like previous versions of emacs), customize
4474 the variable `minibuffer-prompt-properties', and turn on the
4475 `Inviolable' option.
4477 The function minibuffer-prompt-end returns the current position of the
4478 end of the minibuffer prompt, if the minibuffer is current.
4479 Otherwise, it returns zero.
4481 ** New `field' abstraction in buffers.
4483 There is now code to support an abstraction called `fields' in emacs
4484 buffers. A field is a contiguous region of text with the same `field'
4485 property (which can be a text property or an overlay).
4487 Many emacs functions, such as forward-word, forward-sentence,
4488 forward-paragraph, beginning-of-line, etc., stop moving when they come
4489 to the boundary between fields; beginning-of-line and end-of-line will
4490 not let the point move past the field boundary, but other movement
4491 commands continue into the next field if repeated. Stopping at field
4492 boundaries can be suppressed programmatically by binding
4493 `inhibit-field-text-motion' to a non-nil value around calls to these
4496 Now that the minibuffer prompt is inserted into the minibuffer, it is in
4497 a separate field from the user-input part of the buffer, so that common
4498 editing commands treat the user's text separately from the prompt.
4500 The following functions are defined for operating on fields:
4502 - Function: constrain-to-field NEW-POS OLD-POS &optional ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE ONLY-IN-LINE INHIBIT-CAPTURE-PROPERTY
4504 Return the position closest to NEW-POS that is in the same field as OLD-POS.
4506 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
4507 If NEW-POS is nil, then the current point is used instead, and set to the
4508 constrained position if that is different.
4510 If OLD-POS is at the boundary of two fields, then the allowable
4511 positions for NEW-POS depends on the value of the optional argument
4512 ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE: If ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE is nil, then NEW-POS is
4513 constrained to the field that has the same `field' char-property
4514 as any new characters inserted at OLD-POS, whereas if ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE
4515 is non-nil, NEW-POS is constrained to the union of the two adjacent
4516 fields. Additionally, if two fields are separated by another field with
4517 the special value `boundary', then any point within this special field is
4518 also considered to be `on the boundary'.
4520 If the optional argument ONLY-IN-LINE is non-nil and constraining
4521 NEW-POS would move it to a different line, NEW-POS is returned
4522 unconstrained. This useful for commands that move by line, like
4523 C-n or C-a, which should generally respect field boundaries
4524 only in the case where they can still move to the right line.
4526 If the optional argument INHIBIT-CAPTURE-PROPERTY is non-nil, and OLD-POS has
4527 a non-nil property of that name, then any field boundaries are ignored.
4529 Field boundaries are not noticed if `inhibit-field-text-motion' is non-nil.
4531 - Function: delete-field &optional POS
4533 Delete the field surrounding POS.
4534 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
4535 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
4537 - Function: field-beginning &optional POS ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE
4539 Return the beginning of the field surrounding POS.
4540 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
4541 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
4542 If ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE is non-nil and POS is at the beginning of its
4543 field, then the beginning of the *previous* field is returned.
4545 - Function: field-end &optional POS ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE
4547 Return the end of the field surrounding POS.
4548 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
4549 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
4550 If ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE is non-nil and POS is at the end of its field,
4551 then the end of the *following* field is returned.
4553 - Function: field-string &optional POS
4555 Return the contents of the field surrounding POS as a string.
4556 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
4557 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
4559 - Function: field-string-no-properties &optional POS
4561 Return the contents of the field around POS, without text-properties.
4562 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
4563 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
4567 Emacs can now display images. Images are inserted into text by giving
4568 strings or buffer text a `display' text property containing one of
4569 (AREA IMAGE) or IMAGE. The display of the `display' property value
4570 replaces the display of the characters having that property.
4572 If the property value has the form (AREA IMAGE), AREA must be one of
4573 `(margin left-margin)', `(margin right-margin)' or `(margin nil)'. If
4574 AREA is `(margin nil)', IMAGE will be displayed in the text area of a
4575 window, otherwise it will be displayed in the left or right marginal
4578 IMAGE is an image specification.
4580 *** Image specifications
4582 Image specifications are lists of the form `(image PROPS)' where PROPS
4583 is a property list whose keys are keyword symbols. Each
4584 specifications must contain a property `:type TYPE' with TYPE being a
4585 symbol specifying the image type, e.g. `xbm'. Properties not
4586 described below are ignored.
4588 The following is a list of properties all image types share.
4592 ASCENT must be a number in the range 0..100, or the symbol `center'.
4593 If it is a number, it specifies the percentage of the image's height
4594 to use for its ascent.
4596 If not specified, ASCENT defaults to the value 50 which means that the
4597 image will be centered with the base line of the row it appears in.
4599 If ASCENT is `center' the image is vertically centered around a
4600 centerline which is the vertical center of text drawn at the position
4601 of the image, in the manner specified by the text properties and
4602 overlays that apply to the image.
4606 MARGIN must be either a number >= 0 specifying how many pixels to put
4607 as margin around the image, or a pair (X . Y) with X specifying the
4608 horizontal margin and Y specifying the vertical margin. Default is 0.
4612 RELIEF is analogous to the `:relief' attribute of faces. Puts a relief
4617 Apply an image algorithm to the image before displaying it.
4619 ALGO `laplace' or `emboss' means apply a Laplace or ``emboss''
4620 edge-detection algorithm to the image.
4622 ALGO `(edge-detection :matrix MATRIX :color-adjust ADJUST)' means
4623 apply a general edge-detection algorithm. MATRIX must be either a
4624 nine-element list or a nine-element vector of numbers. A pixel at
4625 position x/y in the transformed image is computed from original pixels
4626 around that position. MATRIX specifies, for each pixel in the
4627 neighborhood of x/y, a factor with which that pixel will influence the
4628 transformed pixel; element 0 specifies the factor for the pixel at
4629 x-1/y-1, element 1 the factor for the pixel at x/y-1 etc. as shown
4632 (x-1/y-1 x/y-1 x+1/y-1
4634 x-1/y+1 x/y+1 x+1/y+1)
4636 The resulting pixel is computed from the color intensity of the color
4637 resulting from summing up the RGB values of surrounding pixels,
4638 multiplied by the specified factors, and dividing that sum by the sum
4639 of the factors' absolute values.
4641 Laplace edge-detection currently uses a matrix of
4647 Emboss edge-detection uses a matrix of
4653 ALGO `disabled' means transform the image so that it looks
4658 If MASK is `heuristic' or `(heuristic BG)', build a clipping mask for
4659 the image, so that the background of a frame is visible behind the
4660 image. If BG is not specified, or if BG is t, determine the
4661 background color of the image by looking at the 4 corners of the
4662 image, assuming the most frequently occurring color from the corners is
4663 the background color of the image. Otherwise, BG must be a list `(RED
4664 GREEN BLUE)' specifying the color to assume for the background of the
4667 If MASK is nil, remove a mask from the image, if it has one. Images
4668 in some formats include a mask which can be removed by specifying
4673 Load image from FILE. If FILE is not absolute after expanding it,
4674 search for the image in `data-directory'. Some image types support
4675 building images from data. When this is done, no `:file' property
4676 may be present in the image specification.
4680 Get image data from DATA. (As of this writing, this is not yet
4681 supported for image type `postscript'). Either :file or :data may be
4682 present in an image specification, but not both. All image types
4683 support strings as DATA, some types allow additional types of DATA.
4685 *** Supported image types
4687 **** XBM, image type `xbm'.
4689 XBM images don't require an external library. Additional image
4690 properties supported are
4694 FG must be a string specifying the image foreground color, or nil
4695 meaning to use the default. Default is the frame's foreground.
4699 BG must be a string specifying the image foreground color, or nil
4700 meaning to use the default. Default is the frame's background color.
4702 XBM images can be constructed from data instead of file. In this
4703 case, the image specification must contain the following properties
4704 instead of a `:file' property.
4708 WIDTH specifies the width of the image in pixels.
4712 HEIGHT specifies the height of the image in pixels.
4718 1. a string large enough to hold the bitmap data, i.e. it must
4719 have a size >= (WIDTH + 7) / 8 * HEIGHT
4721 2. a bool-vector of size >= WIDTH * HEIGHT
4723 3. a vector of strings or bool-vectors, one for each line of the
4726 4. a string that's an in-memory XBM file. Neither width nor
4727 height may be specified in this case because these are defined
4730 **** XPM, image type `xpm'
4732 XPM images require the external library `libXpm', package
4733 `xpm-3.4k.tar.gz', version 3.4k or later. Make sure the library is
4734 found when Emacs is configured by supplying appropriate paths via
4735 `--x-includes' and `--x-libraries'.
4737 Additional image properties supported are:
4739 `:color-symbols SYMBOLS'
4741 SYMBOLS must be a list of pairs (NAME . COLOR), with NAME being the
4742 name of color as it appears in an XPM file, and COLOR being an X color
4745 XPM images can be built from memory instead of files. In that case,
4746 add a `:data' property instead of a `:file' property.
4748 The XPM library uses libz in its implementation so that it is able
4749 to display compressed images.
4751 **** PBM, image type `pbm'
4753 PBM images don't require an external library. Color, gray-scale and
4754 mono images are supported. Additional image properties supported for
4759 FG must be a string specifying the image foreground color, or nil
4760 meaning to use the default. Default is the frame's foreground.
4764 BG must be a string specifying the image foreground color, or nil
4765 meaning to use the default. Default is the frame's background color.
4767 **** JPEG, image type `jpeg'
4769 Support for JPEG images requires the external library `libjpeg',
4770 package `jpegsrc.v6a.tar.gz', or later. Additional image properties
4773 **** TIFF, image type `tiff'
4775 Support for TIFF images requires the external library `libtiff',
4776 package `tiff-v3.4-tar.gz', or later. There are no additional image
4779 **** GIF, image type `gif'
4781 Support for GIF images requires the external library `libungif', package
4782 `libungif-4.1.0', or later.
4784 Additional image properties supported are:
4788 INDEX must be an integer >= 0. Load image number INDEX from a
4789 multi-image GIF file. An error is signaled if INDEX is too large.
4791 This could be used to implement limited support for animated GIFs.
4792 For example, the following function displays a multi-image GIF file
4793 at point-min in the current buffer, switching between sub-images
4796 (defun show-anim (file max)
4797 "Display multi-image GIF file FILE which contains MAX subimages."
4798 (display-anim (current-buffer) file 0 max t))
4800 (defun display-anim (buffer file idx max first-time)
4803 (let ((img (create-image file nil nil :index idx)))
4806 (goto-char (point-min))
4807 (unless first-time (delete-char 1))
4808 (insert-image img "x"))
4809 (run-with-timer 0.1 nil 'display-anim buffer file (1+ idx) max nil)))
4811 **** PNG, image type `png'
4813 Support for PNG images requires the external library `libpng',
4814 package `libpng-1.0.2.tar.gz', or later. There are no additional image
4817 **** Ghostscript, image type `postscript'.
4819 Additional image properties supported are:
4823 WIDTH is width of the image in pt (1/72 inch). WIDTH must be an
4824 integer. This is a required property.
4828 HEIGHT specifies the height of the image in pt (1/72 inch). HEIGHT
4829 must be a integer. This is an required property.
4833 BOX must be a list or vector of 4 integers giving the bounding box of
4834 the PS image, analogous to the `BoundingBox' comment found in PS
4835 files. This is an required property.
4837 Part of the Ghostscript interface is implemented in Lisp. See
4842 The variable `image-types' contains a list of those image types
4843 which are supported in the current configuration.
4845 Images are stored in an image cache and removed from the cache when
4846 they haven't been displayed for `image-cache-eviction-delay seconds.
4847 The function `clear-image-cache' can be used to clear the image cache
4848 manually. Images in the cache are compared with `equal', i.e. all
4849 images with `equal' specifications share the same image.
4851 *** Simplified image API, image.el
4853 The new Lisp package image.el contains functions that simplify image
4854 creation and putting images into text. The function `create-image'
4855 can be used to create images. The macro `defimage' can be used to
4856 define an image based on available image types. The functions
4857 `put-image' and `insert-image' can be used to insert an image into a
4862 Windows can now have margins which are used for special text
4865 To give a window margins, either set the buffer-local variables
4866 `left-margin-width' and `right-margin-width', or call
4867 `set-window-margins'. The function `window-margins' can be used to
4868 obtain the current settings. To make `left-margin-width' and
4869 `right-margin-width' take effect, you must set them before displaying
4870 the buffer in a window, or use `set-window-buffer' to force an update
4871 of the display margins.
4873 You can put text in margins by giving it a `display' text property
4874 containing a pair of the form `(LOCATION . VALUE)', where LOCATION is
4875 one of `left-margin' or `right-margin' or nil. VALUE can be either a
4876 string, an image specification or a stretch specification (see later
4881 Emacs displays short help messages in the echo area, when the mouse
4882 moves over a tool-bar item or a piece of text that has a text property
4883 `help-echo'. This feature also applies to strings in the mode line
4884 that have a `help-echo' property.
4886 If the value of the `help-echo' property is a function, that function
4887 is called with three arguments WINDOW, OBJECT and POSITION. WINDOW is
4888 the window in which the help was found.
4890 If OBJECT is a buffer, POS is the position in the buffer where the
4891 `help-echo' text property was found.
4893 If OBJECT is an overlay, that overlay has a `help-echo' property, and
4894 POS is the position in the overlay's buffer under the mouse.
4896 If OBJECT is a string (an overlay string or a string displayed with
4897 the `display' property), POS is the position in that string under the
4900 If the value of the `help-echo' property is neither a function nor a
4901 string, it is evaluated to obtain a help string.
4903 For tool-bar and menu-bar items, their key definition is used to
4904 determine the help to display. If their definition contains a
4905 property `:help FORM', FORM is evaluated to determine the help string.
4906 For tool-bar items without a help form, the caption of the item is
4907 used as help string.
4909 The hook `show-help-function' can be set to a function that displays
4910 the help string differently. For example, enabling a tooltip window
4911 causes the help display to appear there instead of in the echo area.
4913 ** Vertical fractional scrolling.
4915 The display of text in windows can be scrolled smoothly in pixels.
4916 This is useful, for example, for making parts of large images visible.
4918 The function `window-vscroll' returns the current value of vertical
4919 scrolling, a non-negative fraction of the canonical character height.
4920 The function `set-window-vscroll' can be used to set the vertical
4921 scrolling value. Here is an example of how these function might be
4924 (global-set-key [A-down]
4927 (set-window-vscroll (selected-window)
4928 (+ 0.5 (window-vscroll)))))
4929 (global-set-key [A-up]
4932 (set-window-vscroll (selected-window)
4933 (- (window-vscroll) 0.5)))))
4935 ** New hook `fontification-functions'.
4937 Functions from `fontification-functions' are called from redisplay
4938 when it encounters a region of text that is not yet fontified. This
4939 variable automatically becomes buffer-local when set. Each function
4940 is called with one argument, POS.
4942 At least one of the hook functions should fontify one or more
4943 characters starting at POS in the current buffer. It should mark them
4944 as fontified by giving them a non-nil value of the `fontified' text
4945 property. It may be reasonable for these functions to check for the
4946 `fontified' property and not put it back on, but they do not have to.
4948 ** Tool bar support.
4950 Emacs supports a tool bar at the top of a frame under X. The frame
4951 parameter `tool-bar-lines' (X resource "toolBar", class "ToolBar")
4952 controls how may lines to reserve for the tool bar. A zero value
4953 suppresses the tool bar. If the value is non-zero and
4954 `auto-resize-tool-bars' is non-nil the tool bar's size will be changed
4955 automatically so that all tool bar items are visible.
4957 *** Tool bar item definitions
4959 Tool bar items are defined using `define-key' with a prefix-key
4960 `tool-bar'. For example `(define-key global-map [tool-bar item1] ITEM)'
4961 where ITEM is a list `(menu-item CAPTION BINDING PROPS...)'.
4963 CAPTION is the caption of the item, If it's not a string, it is
4964 evaluated to get a string. The caption is currently not displayed in
4965 the tool bar, but it is displayed if the item doesn't have a `:help'
4966 property (see below).
4968 BINDING is the tool bar item's binding. Tool bar items with keymaps as
4969 binding are currently ignored.
4971 The following properties are recognized:
4975 FORM is evaluated and specifies whether the tool bar item is enabled
4980 FORM is evaluated and specifies whether the tool bar item is displayed.
4984 FUNCTION is called with one parameter, the same list BINDING in which
4985 FUNCTION is specified as the filter. The value FUNCTION returns is
4986 used instead of BINDING to display this item.
4988 `:button (TYPE SELECTED)'
4990 TYPE must be one of `:radio' or `:toggle'. SELECTED is evaluated
4991 and specifies whether the button is selected (pressed) or not.
4995 IMAGES is either a single image specification or a vector of four
4996 image specifications. If it is a vector, this table lists the
4997 meaning of each of the four elements:
4999 Index Use when item is
5000 ----------------------------------------
5001 0 enabled and selected
5002 1 enabled and deselected
5003 2 disabled and selected
5004 3 disabled and deselected
5006 If IMAGE is a single image specification, a Laplace edge-detection
5007 algorithm is used on that image to draw the image in disabled state.
5009 `:help HELP-STRING'.
5011 Gives a help string to display for the tool bar item. This help
5012 is displayed when the mouse is moved over the item.
5014 The function `toolbar-add-item' is a convenience function for adding
5015 toolbar items generally, and `tool-bar-add-item-from-menu' can be used
5016 to define a toolbar item with a binding copied from an item on the
5019 The default bindings use a menu-item :filter to derive the tool-bar
5020 dynamically from variable `tool-bar-map' which may be set
5021 buffer-locally to override the global map.
5023 *** Tool-bar-related variables.
5025 If `auto-resize-tool-bar' is non-nil, the tool bar will automatically
5026 resize to show all defined tool bar items. It will never grow larger
5027 than 1/4 of the frame's size.
5029 If `auto-raise-tool-bar-buttons' is non-nil, tool bar buttons will be
5030 raised when the mouse moves over them.
5032 You can add extra space between tool bar items by setting
5033 `tool-bar-button-margin' to a positive integer specifying a number of
5034 pixels, or a pair of integers (X . Y) specifying horizontal and
5035 vertical margins . Default is 1.
5037 You can change the shadow thickness of tool bar buttons by setting
5038 `tool-bar-button-relief' to an integer. Default is 3.
5040 *** Tool-bar clicks with modifiers.
5042 You can bind commands to clicks with control, shift, meta etc. on
5045 (define-key global-map [tool-bar shell]
5046 '(menu-item "Shell" shell
5047 :image (image :type xpm :file "shell.xpm")))
5049 is the original tool bar item definition, then
5051 (define-key global-map [tool-bar S-shell] 'some-command)
5053 makes a binding to run `some-command' for a shifted click on the same
5056 ** Mode line changes.
5058 *** Mouse-sensitive mode line.
5060 The mode line can be made mouse-sensitive by displaying strings there
5061 that have a `local-map' text property. There are three ways to display
5062 a string with a `local-map' property in the mode line.
5064 1. The mode line spec contains a variable whose string value has
5065 a `local-map' text property.
5067 2. The mode line spec contains a format specifier (e.g. `%12b'), and
5068 that format specifier has a `local-map' property.
5070 3. The mode line spec contains a list containing `:eval FORM'. FORM
5071 is evaluated. If the result is a string, and that string has a
5072 `local-map' property.
5074 The same mechanism is used to determine the `face' and `help-echo'
5075 properties of strings in the mode line. See `bindings.el' for an
5078 *** If a mode line element has the form `(:eval FORM)', FORM is
5079 evaluated and the result is used as mode line element.
5081 *** You can suppress mode-line display by setting the buffer-local
5082 variable mode-line-format to nil.
5084 *** A headerline can now be displayed at the top of a window.
5086 This mode line's contents are controlled by the new variable
5087 `header-line-format' and `default-header-line-format' which are
5088 completely analogous to `mode-line-format' and
5089 `default-mode-line-format'. A value of nil means don't display a top
5092 The appearance of top mode lines is controlled by the face
5095 The function `coordinates-in-window-p' returns `header-line' for a
5096 position in the header-line.
5098 ** Text property `display'
5100 The `display' text property is used to insert images into text,
5101 replace text with other text, display text in marginal area, and it is
5102 also used to control other aspects of how text displays. The value of
5103 the `display' property should be a display specification, as described
5104 below, or a list or vector containing display specifications.
5106 *** Replacing text, displaying text in marginal areas
5108 To replace the text having the `display' property with some other
5109 text, use a display specification of the form `(LOCATION STRING)'.
5111 If LOCATION is `(margin left-margin)', STRING is displayed in the left
5112 marginal area, if it is `(margin right-margin)', it is displayed in
5113 the right marginal area, and if LOCATION is `(margin nil)' STRING
5114 is displayed in the text. In the latter case you can also use the
5115 simpler form STRING as property value.
5117 *** Variable width and height spaces
5119 To display a space of fractional width or height, use a display
5120 specification of the form `(LOCATION STRECH)'. If LOCATION is
5121 `(margin left-margin)', the space is displayed in the left marginal
5122 area, if it is `(margin right-margin)', it is displayed in the right
5123 marginal area, and if LOCATION is `(margin nil)' the space is
5124 displayed in the text. In the latter case you can also use the
5125 simpler form STRETCH as property value.
5127 The stretch specification STRETCH itself is a list of the form `(space
5128 PROPS)', where PROPS is a property list which can contain the
5129 properties described below.
5131 The display of the fractional space replaces the display of the
5132 characters having the `display' property.
5136 Specifies that the space width should be WIDTH times the normal
5137 character width. WIDTH can be an integer or floating point number.
5139 - :relative-width FACTOR
5141 Specifies that the width of the stretch should be computed from the
5142 first character in a group of consecutive characters that have the
5143 same `display' property. The computation is done by multiplying the
5144 width of that character by FACTOR.
5148 Specifies that the space should be wide enough to reach HPOS. The
5149 value HPOS is measured in units of the normal character width.
5151 Exactly one of the above properties should be used.
5155 Specifies the height of the space, as HEIGHT, measured in terms of the
5158 - :relative-height FACTOR
5160 The height of the space is computed as the product of the height
5161 of the text having the `display' property and FACTOR.
5165 Specifies that ASCENT percent of the height of the stretch should be
5166 used for the ascent of the stretch, i.e. for the part above the
5167 baseline. The value of ASCENT must be a non-negative number less or
5170 You should not use both `:height' and `:relative-height' together.
5174 A display specification for an image has the form `(LOCATION
5175 . IMAGE)', where IMAGE is an image specification. The image replaces,
5176 in the display, the characters having this display specification in
5177 their `display' text property. If LOCATION is `(margin left-margin)',
5178 the image will be displayed in the left marginal area, if it is
5179 `(margin right-margin)' it will be displayed in the right marginal
5180 area, and if LOCATION is `(margin nil)' the image will be displayed in
5181 the text. In the latter case you can also use the simpler form IMAGE
5182 as display specification.
5184 *** Other display properties
5186 - (space-width FACTOR)
5188 Specifies that space characters in the text having that property
5189 should be displayed FACTOR times as wide as normal; FACTOR must be an
5194 Display text having this property in a font that is smaller or larger.
5196 If HEIGHT is a list of the form `(+ N)', where N is an integer, that
5197 means to use a font that is N steps larger. If HEIGHT is a list of
5198 the form `(- N)', that means to use a font that is N steps smaller. A
5199 ``step'' is defined by the set of available fonts; each size for which
5200 a font is available counts as a step.
5202 If HEIGHT is a number, that means to use a font that is HEIGHT times
5203 as tall as the frame's default font.
5205 If HEIGHT is a symbol, it is called as a function with the current
5206 height as argument. The function should return the new height to use.
5208 Otherwise, HEIGHT is evaluated to get the new height, with the symbol
5209 `height' bound to the current specified font height.
5213 FACTOR must be a number, specifying a multiple of the current
5214 font's height. If it is positive, that means to display the characters
5215 raised. If it is negative, that means to display them lower down. The
5216 amount of raising or lowering is computed without taking account of the
5217 `height' subproperty.
5219 *** Conditional display properties
5221 All display specifications can be conditionalized. If a specification
5222 has the form `(when CONDITION . SPEC)', the specification SPEC applies
5223 only when CONDITION yields a non-nil value when evaluated. During the
5224 evaluation, `object' is bound to the string or buffer having the
5225 conditional display property; `position' and `buffer-position' are
5226 bound to the position within `object' and the buffer position where
5227 the display property was found, respectively. Both positions can be
5228 different when object is a string.
5230 The normal specification consisting of SPEC only is equivalent to
5233 ** New menu separator types.
5235 Emacs now supports more than one menu separator type. Menu items with
5236 item names consisting of dashes only (including zero dashes) are
5237 treated like before. In addition, the following item names are used
5238 to specify other menu separator types.
5240 - `--no-line' or `--space', or `--:space', or `--:noLine'
5242 No separator lines are drawn, but a small space is inserted where the
5245 - `--single-line' or `--:singleLine'
5247 A single line in the menu's foreground color.
5249 - `--double-line' or `--:doubleLine'
5251 A double line in the menu's foreground color.
5253 - `--single-dashed-line' or `--:singleDashedLine'
5255 A single dashed line in the menu's foreground color.
5257 - `--double-dashed-line' or `--:doubleDashedLine'
5259 A double dashed line in the menu's foreground color.
5261 - `--shadow-etched-in' or `--:shadowEtchedIn'
5263 A single line with 3D sunken appearance. This is the form
5264 displayed for item names consisting of dashes only.
5266 - `--shadow-etched-out' or `--:shadowEtchedOut'
5268 A single line with 3D raised appearance.
5270 - `--shadow-etched-in-dash' or `--:shadowEtchedInDash'
5272 A single dashed line with 3D sunken appearance.
5274 - `--shadow-etched-out-dash' or `--:shadowEtchedOutDash'
5276 A single dashed line with 3D raise appearance.
5278 - `--shadow-double-etched-in' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedIn'
5280 Two lines with 3D sunken appearance.
5282 - `--shadow-double-etched-out' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedOut'
5284 Two lines with 3D raised appearance.
5286 - `--shadow-double-etched-in-dash' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedInDash'
5288 Two dashed lines with 3D sunken appearance.
5290 - `--shadow-double-etched-out-dash' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedOutDash'
5292 Two dashed lines with 3D raised appearance.
5294 Under LessTif/Motif, the last four separator types are displayed like
5295 the corresponding single-line separators.
5297 ** New frame parameters for scroll bar colors.
5299 The new frame parameters `scroll-bar-foreground' and
5300 `scroll-bar-background' can be used to change scroll bar colors.
5301 Their value must be either a color name, a string, or nil to specify
5302 that scroll bars should use a default color. For toolkit scroll bars,
5303 default colors are toolkit specific. For non-toolkit scroll bars, the
5304 default background is the background color of the frame, and the
5305 default foreground is black.
5307 The X resource name of these parameters are `scrollBarForeground'
5308 (class ScrollBarForeground) and `scrollBarBackground' (class
5309 `ScrollBarBackground').
5311 Setting these parameters overrides toolkit specific X resource
5312 settings for scroll bar colors.
5314 ** You can set `redisplay-dont-pause' to a non-nil value to prevent
5315 display updates from being interrupted when input is pending.
5317 ** Changing a window's width may now change its window start if it
5318 starts on a continuation line. The new window start is computed based
5319 on the window's new width, starting from the start of the continued
5320 line as the start of the screen line with the minimum distance from
5321 the original window start.
5323 ** The variable `hscroll-step' and the functions
5324 `hscroll-point-visible' and `hscroll-window-column' have been removed
5325 now that proper horizontal scrolling is implemented.
5327 ** Windows can now be made fixed-width and/or fixed-height.
5329 A window is fixed-size if its buffer has a buffer-local variable
5330 `window-size-fixed' whose value is not nil. A value of `height' makes
5331 windows fixed-height, a value of `width' makes them fixed-width, any
5332 other non-nil value makes them both fixed-width and fixed-height.
5334 The following code makes all windows displaying the current buffer
5335 fixed-width and fixed-height.
5337 (set (make-local-variable 'window-size-fixed) t)
5339 A call to enlarge-window on a window gives an error if that window is
5340 fixed-width and it is tried to change the window's width, or if the
5341 window is fixed-height, and it is tried to change its height. To
5342 change the size of a fixed-size window, bind `window-size-fixed'
5343 temporarily to nil, for example
5345 (let ((window-size-fixed nil))
5346 (enlarge-window 10))
5348 Likewise, an attempt to split a fixed-height window vertically,
5349 or a fixed-width window horizontally results in a error.
5351 ** The cursor-type frame parameter is now supported on MS-DOS
5352 terminals. When Emacs starts, it by default changes the cursor shape
5353 to a solid box, as it does on Unix. The `cursor-type' frame parameter
5354 overrides this as it does on Unix, except that the bar cursor is
5355 horizontal rather than vertical (since the MS-DOS display doesn't
5356 support a vertical-bar cursor).
5360 * Emacs 20.7 is a bug-fix release with few user-visible changes
5362 ** It is now possible to use CCL-based coding systems for keyboard
5365 ** ange-ftp now handles FTP security extensions, like Kerberos.
5367 ** Rmail has been extended to recognize more forms of digest messages.
5369 ** Now, most coding systems set in keyboard coding system work not
5370 only for character input, but also in incremental search. The
5371 exceptions are such coding systems that handle 2-byte character sets
5372 (e.g euc-kr, euc-jp) and that use ISO's escape sequence
5373 (e.g. iso-2022-jp). They are ignored in incremental search.
5375 ** Support for Macintosh PowerPC-based machines running GNU/Linux has
5379 * Emacs 20.6 is a bug-fix release with one user-visible change
5381 ** Support for ARM-based non-RISCiX machines has been added.
5385 * Emacs 20.5 is a bug-fix release with no user-visible changes.
5387 ** Not new, but not mentioned before:
5388 M-w when Transient Mark mode is enabled disables the mark.
5390 * Changes in Emacs 20.4
5392 ** Init file may be called .emacs.el.
5394 You can now call the Emacs init file `.emacs.el'.
5395 Formerly the name had to be `.emacs'. If you use the name
5396 `.emacs.el', you can byte-compile the file in the usual way.
5398 If both `.emacs' and `.emacs.el' exist, the latter file
5399 is the one that is used.
5401 ** shell-command, and shell-command-on-region, now return
5402 the exit code of the command (unless it is asynchronous).
5403 Also, you can specify a place to put the error output,
5404 separate from the command's regular output.
5405 Interactively, the variable shell-command-default-error-buffer
5406 says where to put error output; set it to a buffer name.
5407 In calls from Lisp, an optional argument ERROR-BUFFER specifies
5410 When you specify a non-nil error buffer (or buffer name), any error
5411 output is inserted before point in that buffer, with \f\n to separate
5412 it from the previous batch of error output. The error buffer is not
5413 cleared, so error output from successive commands accumulates there.
5415 ** Setting the default value of enable-multibyte-characters to nil in
5416 the .emacs file, either explicitly using setq-default, or via Custom,
5417 is now essentially equivalent to using --unibyte: all buffers
5418 created during startup will be made unibyte after loading .emacs.
5420 ** C-x C-f now handles the wildcards * and ? in file names. For
5421 example, typing C-x C-f c*.c RET visits all the files whose names
5422 match c*.c. To visit a file whose name contains * or ?, add the
5423 quoting sequence /: to the beginning of the file name.
5425 ** The M-x commands keep-lines, flush-lines and count-matches
5426 now have the same feature as occur and query-replace:
5427 if the pattern contains any upper case letters, then
5428 they never ignore case.
5430 ** The end-of-line format conversion feature previously mentioned
5431 under `* Emacs 20.1 changes for MS-DOS and MS-Windows' actually
5432 applies to all operating systems. Emacs recognizes from the contents
5433 of a file what convention it uses to separate lines--newline, CRLF, or
5434 just CR--and automatically converts the contents to the normal Emacs
5435 convention (using newline to separate lines) for editing. This is a
5436 part of the general feature of coding system conversion.
5438 If you subsequently save the buffer, Emacs converts the text back to
5439 the same format that was used in the file before.
5441 You can turn off end-of-line conversion by setting the variable
5442 `inhibit-eol-conversion' to non-nil, e.g. with Custom in the MULE group.
5444 ** The character set property `prefered-coding-system' has been
5445 renamed to `preferred-coding-system', for the sake of correct spelling.
5446 This is a fairly internal feature, so few programs should be affected.
5448 ** Mode-line display of end-of-line format is changed.
5449 The indication of the end-of-line format of the file visited by a
5450 buffer is now more explicit when that format is not the usual one for
5451 your operating system. For example, the DOS-style end-of-line format
5452 is displayed as "(DOS)" on Unix and GNU/Linux systems. The usual
5453 end-of-line format is still displayed as a single character (colon for
5454 Unix, backslash for DOS and Windows, and forward slash for the Mac).
5456 The values of the variables eol-mnemonic-unix, eol-mnemonic-dos,
5457 eol-mnemonic-mac, and eol-mnemonic-undecided, which are strings,
5458 control what is displayed in the mode line for each end-of-line
5459 format. You can now customize these variables.
5461 ** In the previous version of Emacs, tar-mode didn't work well if a
5462 filename contained non-ASCII characters. Now this is fixed. Such a
5463 filename is decoded by file-name-coding-system if the default value of
5464 enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil.
5466 ** The command temp-buffer-resize-mode toggles a minor mode
5467 in which temporary buffers (such as help buffers) are given
5468 windows just big enough to hold the whole contents.
5470 ** If you use completion.el, you must now run the function
5471 dynamic-completion-mode to enable it. Just loading the file
5472 doesn't have any effect.
5474 ** In Flyspell mode, the default is now to make just one Ispell process,
5477 ** If you use iswitchb but do not call (iswitchb-default-keybindings) to
5478 use the default keybindings, you will need to add the following line:
5479 (add-hook 'minibuffer-setup-hook 'iswitchb-minibuffer-setup)
5481 ** Auto-show mode is no longer enabled just by loading auto-show.el.
5482 To control it, set `auto-show-mode' via Custom or use the
5483 `auto-show-mode' command.
5485 ** Handling of X fonts' ascent/descent parameters has been changed to
5486 avoid redisplay problems. As a consequence, compared with previous
5487 versions the line spacing and frame size now differ with some font
5488 choices, typically increasing by a pixel per line. This change
5489 occurred in version 20.3 but was not documented then.
5491 ** If you select the bar cursor style, it uses the frame's
5492 cursor-color, rather than the cursor foreground pixel.
5494 ** In multibyte mode, Rmail decodes incoming MIME messages using the
5495 character set specified in the message. If you want to disable this
5496 feature, set the variable rmail-decode-mime-charset to nil.
5498 ** Not new, but not mentioned previously in NEWS: when you use #! at
5499 the beginning of a file to make it executable and specify an
5500 interpreter program, Emacs looks on the second line for the -*- mode
5501 and variable specification, as well as on the first line.
5503 ** Support for IBM codepage encoding of non-ASCII characters.
5505 The new command M-x codepage-setup creates a special coding system
5506 that can be used to convert text between a specific IBM codepage and
5507 one of the character sets built into Emacs which matches that
5508 codepage. For example, codepage 850 corresponds to Latin-1 character
5509 set, codepage 855 corresponds to Cyrillic-ISO character set, etc.
5511 Windows codepages 1250, 1251 and some others, where Windows deviates
5512 from the corresponding ISO character set, are also supported.
5514 IBM box-drawing characters and other glyphs which don't have
5515 equivalents in the corresponding ISO character set, are converted to
5516 a character defined by dos-unsupported-char-glyph on MS-DOS, and to
5517 `?' on other systems.
5519 IBM codepages are widely used on MS-DOS and MS-Windows, so this
5520 feature is most useful on those platforms, but it can also be used on
5523 Emacs compiled for MS-DOS automatically loads the support for the
5524 current codepage when it starts.
5528 *** When mail is sent using compose-mail (C-x m), and if
5529 `mail-send-nonascii' is set to the new default value `mime',
5530 appropriate MIME headers are added. The headers are added only if
5531 non-ASCII characters are present in the body of the mail, and no other
5532 MIME headers are already present. For example, the following three
5533 headers are added if the coding system used in the *mail* buffer is
5537 Content-type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
5538 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
5540 *** The new variable default-sendmail-coding-system specifies the
5541 default way to encode outgoing mail. This has higher priority than
5542 default-buffer-file-coding-system but has lower priority than
5543 sendmail-coding-system and the local value of
5544 buffer-file-coding-system.
5546 You should not set this variable manually. Instead, set
5547 sendmail-coding-system to specify a fixed encoding for all outgoing
5550 *** When you try to send a message that contains non-ASCII characters,
5551 if the coding system specified by those variables doesn't handle them,
5552 Emacs will ask you to select a suitable coding system while showing a
5553 list of possible coding systems.
5557 *** c-default-style can now take an association list that maps major
5558 modes to style names. When this variable is an alist, Java mode no
5559 longer hardcodes a setting to "java" style. See the variable's
5560 docstring for details.
5562 *** It's now possible to put a list as the offset on a syntactic
5563 symbol. The list is evaluated recursively until a non-nil offset is
5564 found. This is useful to combine several lineup functions to act in a
5565 prioritized order on a single line. However, none of the supplied
5566 lineup functions use this feature currently.
5568 *** New syntactic symbol catch-clause, which is used on the "catch" and
5569 "finally" lines in try-catch constructs in C++ and Java.
5571 *** New cleanup brace-catch-brace on c-cleanup-list, which does for
5572 "catch" lines what brace-elseif-brace does for "else if" lines.
5574 *** The braces of Java anonymous inner classes are treated separately
5575 from the braces of other classes in auto-newline mode. Two new
5576 symbols inexpr-class-open and inexpr-class-close may be used on
5577 c-hanging-braces-alist to control the automatic newlines used for
5580 *** Support for the Pike language added, along with new Pike specific
5581 syntactic symbols: inlambda, lambda-intro-cont
5583 *** Support for Java anonymous classes via new syntactic symbol
5584 inexpr-class. New syntactic symbol inexpr-statement for Pike
5585 support and gcc-style statements inside expressions. New lineup
5586 function c-lineup-inexpr-block.
5588 *** New syntactic symbol brace-entry-open which is used in brace lists
5589 (i.e. static initializers) when a list entry starts with an open
5590 brace. These used to be recognized as brace-list-entry's.
5591 c-electric-brace also recognizes brace-entry-open braces
5592 (brace-list-entry's can no longer be electrified).
5594 *** New command c-indent-line-or-region, not bound by default.
5596 *** `#' is only electric when typed in the indentation of a line.
5598 *** Parentheses are now electric (via the new command c-electric-paren)
5599 for auto-reindenting lines when parens are typed.
5601 *** In "gnu" style, inline-open offset is now set to zero.
5603 *** Uniform handling of the inclass syntactic symbol. The indentation
5604 associated with it is now always relative to the class opening brace.
5605 This means that the indentation behavior has changed in some
5606 circumstances, but only if you've put anything besides 0 on the
5607 class-open syntactic symbol (none of the default styles do that).
5611 *** New functionality for using Gnus as an offline newsreader has been
5612 added. A plethora of new commands and modes have been added. See the
5613 Gnus manual for the full story.
5615 *** The nndraft backend has returned, but works differently than
5616 before. All Message buffers are now also articles in the nndraft
5617 group, which is created automatically.
5619 *** `gnus-alter-header-function' can now be used to alter header
5622 *** `gnus-summary-goto-article' now accept Message-ID's.
5624 *** A new Message command for deleting text in the body of a message
5625 outside the region: `C-c C-v'.
5627 *** You can now post to component group in nnvirtual groups with
5630 *** `nntp-rlogin-program' -- new variable to ease customization.
5632 *** `C-u C-c C-c' in `gnus-article-edit-mode' will now inhibit
5633 re-highlighting of the article buffer.
5635 *** New element in `gnus-boring-article-headers' -- `long-to'.
5637 *** `M-i' symbolic prefix command. See the section "Symbolic
5638 Prefixes" in the Gnus manual for details.
5640 *** `L' and `I' in the summary buffer now take the symbolic prefix
5641 `a' to add the score rule to the "all.SCORE" file.
5643 *** `gnus-simplify-subject-functions' variable to allow greater
5644 control over simplification.
5646 *** `A T' -- new command for fetching the current thread.
5648 *** `/ T' -- new command for including the current thread in the
5651 *** `M-RET' is a new Message command for breaking cited text.
5653 *** \\1-expressions are now valid in `nnmail-split-methods'.
5655 *** The `custom-face-lookup' function has been removed.
5656 If you used this function in your initialization files, you must
5657 rewrite them to use `face-spec-set' instead.
5659 *** Canceling now uses the current select method. Symbolic prefix
5660 `a' forces normal posting method.
5662 *** New command to translate M******** sm*rtq**t*s into proper text
5665 *** For easier debugging of nntp, you can set `nntp-record-commands'
5668 *** nntp now uses ~/.authinfo, a .netrc-like file, for controlling
5669 where and how to send AUTHINFO to NNTP servers.
5671 *** A command for editing group parameters from the summary buffer
5674 *** A history of where mails have been split is available.
5676 *** A new article date command has been added -- `article-date-iso8601'.
5678 *** Subjects can be simplified when threading by setting
5679 `gnus-score-thread-simplify'.
5681 *** A new function for citing in Message has been added --
5682 `message-cite-original-without-signature'.
5684 *** `article-strip-all-blank-lines' -- new article command.
5686 *** A new Message command to kill to the end of the article has
5689 *** A minimum adaptive score can be specified by using the
5690 `gnus-adaptive-word-minimum' variable.
5692 *** The "lapsed date" article header can be kept continually
5693 updated by the `gnus-start-date-timer' command.
5695 *** Web listserv archives can be read with the nnlistserv backend.
5697 *** Old dejanews archives can now be read by nnweb.
5699 *** `gnus-posting-styles' has been re-activated.
5701 ** Changes to TeX and LaTeX mode
5703 *** The new variable `tex-start-options-string' can be used to give
5704 options for the TeX run. The default value causes TeX to run in
5705 nonstopmode. For an interactive TeX run set it to nil or "".
5707 *** The command `tex-feed-input' sends input to the Tex Shell. In a
5708 TeX buffer it is bound to the keys C-RET, C-c RET, and C-c C-m (some
5709 of these keys may not work on all systems). For instance, if you run
5710 TeX interactively and if the TeX run stops because of an error, you
5711 can continue it without leaving the TeX buffer by typing C-RET.
5713 *** The Tex Shell Buffer is now in `compilation-shell-minor-mode'.
5714 All error-parsing commands of the Compilation major mode are available
5715 but bound to keys that don't collide with the shell. Thus you can use
5716 the Tex Shell for command line executions like a usual shell.
5718 *** The commands `tex-validate-region' and `tex-validate-buffer' check
5719 the matching of braces and $'s. The errors are listed in a *Occur*
5720 buffer and you can use C-c C-c or mouse-2 to go to a particular
5723 ** Changes to RefTeX mode
5725 *** The table of contents buffer can now also display labels and
5726 file boundaries in addition to sections. Use `l', `i', and `c' keys.
5728 *** Labels derived from context (the section heading) are now
5729 lowercase by default. To make the label legal in LaTeX, latin-1
5730 characters will lose their accent. All Mule characters will be
5731 removed from the label.
5733 *** The automatic display of cross reference information can also use
5734 a window instead of the echo area. See variable `reftex-auto-view-crossref'.
5736 *** kpsewhich can be used by RefTeX to find TeX and BibTeX files. See the
5737 customization group `reftex-finding-files'.
5739 *** The option `reftex-bibfile-ignore-list' has been renamed to
5740 `reftex-bibfile-ignore-regexps' and indeed can be fed with regular
5743 *** Multiple Selection buffers are now hidden buffers.
5745 ** New/deleted modes and packages
5747 *** The package snmp-mode.el provides major modes for editing SNMP and
5748 SNMPv2 MIBs. It has entries on `auto-mode-alist'.
5750 *** The package sql.el provides a major mode, M-x sql-mode, for
5751 editing SQL files, and M-x sql-interactive-mode for interacting with
5752 SQL interpreters. It has an entry on `auto-mode-alist'.
5754 *** M-x highlight-changes-mode provides a minor mode displaying buffer
5755 changes with a special face.
5757 *** ispell4.el has been deleted. It got in the way of ispell.el and
5758 this was hard to fix reliably. It has long been obsolete -- use
5759 Ispell 3.1 and ispell.el.
5761 * MS-DOS changes in Emacs 20.4
5763 ** Emacs compiled for MS-DOS now supports MULE features better.
5764 This includes support for display of all ISO 8859-N character sets,
5765 conversion to and from IBM codepage encoding of non-ASCII characters,
5766 and automatic setup of the MULE environment at startup. For details,
5767 check out the section `MS-DOS and MULE' in the manual.
5769 The MS-DOS installation procedure automatically configures and builds
5770 Emacs with input method support if it finds an unpacked Leim
5771 distribution when the config.bat script is run.
5773 ** Formerly, the value of lpr-command did not affect printing on
5774 MS-DOS unless print-region-function was set to nil, but now it
5775 controls whether an external program is invoked or output is written
5776 directly to a printer port. Similarly, in the previous version of
5777 Emacs, the value of ps-lpr-command did not affect PostScript printing
5778 on MS-DOS unless ps-printer-name was set to something other than a
5779 string (eg. t or `pipe'), but now it controls whether an external
5780 program is used. (These changes were made so that configuration of
5781 printing variables would be almost identical across all platforms.)
5783 ** In the previous version of Emacs, PostScript and non-PostScript
5784 output was piped to external programs, but because most print programs
5785 available for MS-DOS and MS-Windows cannot read data from their standard
5786 input, on those systems the data to be output is now written to a
5787 temporary file whose name is passed as the last argument to the external
5790 An exception is made for `print', a standard program on Windows NT,
5791 and `nprint', a standard program on Novell Netware. For both of these
5792 programs, the command line is constructed in the appropriate syntax
5793 automatically, using only the value of printer-name or ps-printer-name
5794 as appropriate--the value of the relevant `-switches' variable is
5795 ignored, as both programs have no useful switches.
5797 ** The value of the variable dos-printer (cf. dos-ps-printer), if it has
5798 a value, overrides the value of printer-name (cf. ps-printer-name), on
5799 MS-DOS and MS-Windows only. This has been true since version 20.3, but
5800 was not documented clearly before.
5802 ** All the Emacs games now work on MS-DOS terminals.
5803 This includes Tetris and Snake.
5805 * Lisp changes in Emacs 20.4
5807 ** New functions line-beginning-position and line-end-position
5808 return the position of the beginning or end of the current line.
5809 They both accept an optional argument, which has the same
5810 meaning as the argument to beginning-of-line or end-of-line.
5812 ** find-file and allied functions now have an optional argument
5813 WILDCARD. If this is non-nil, they do wildcard processing,
5814 and visit all files that match the wildcard pattern.
5816 ** Changes in the file-attributes function.
5818 *** The file size returned by file-attributes may be an integer or a float.
5819 It is an integer if the size fits in a Lisp integer, float otherwise.
5821 *** The inode number returned by file-attributes may be an integer (if
5822 the number fits in a Lisp integer) or a cons cell containing two
5825 ** The new function directory-files-and-attributes returns a list of
5826 files in a directory and their attributes. It accepts the same
5827 arguments as directory-files and has similar semantics, except that
5828 file names and attributes are returned.
5830 ** The new function file-attributes-lessp is a helper function for
5831 sorting the list generated by directory-files-and-attributes. It
5832 accepts two arguments, each a list of a file name and its attributes.
5833 It compares the file names of each according to string-lessp and
5836 ** The new function file-expand-wildcards expands a wildcard-pattern
5837 to produce a list of existing files that match the pattern.
5839 ** New functions for base64 conversion:
5841 The function base64-encode-region converts a part of the buffer
5842 into the base64 code used in MIME. base64-decode-region
5843 performs the opposite conversion. Line-breaking is supported
5846 Functions base64-encode-string and base64-decode-string do a similar
5847 job on the text in a string. They return the value as a new string.
5850 The new function process-running-child-p
5851 will tell you if a subprocess has given control of its
5852 terminal to its own child process.
5854 ** interrupt-process and such functions have a new feature:
5855 when the second argument is `lambda', they send a signal
5856 to the running child of the subshell, if any, but if the shell
5857 itself owns its terminal, no signal is sent.
5859 ** There are new widget types `plist' and `alist' which can
5860 be used for customizing variables whose values are plists or alists.
5862 ** easymenu.el Now understands `:key-sequence' and `:style button'.
5863 :included is an alias for :visible.
5865 easy-menu-add-item now understands the values returned by
5866 easy-menu-remove-item and easy-menu-item-present-p. This can be used
5867 to move or copy menu entries.
5869 ** Multibyte editing changes
5871 *** The definitions of sref and char-bytes are changed. Now, sref is
5872 an alias of aref and char-bytes always returns 1. This change is to
5873 make some Emacs Lisp code which works on 20.2 and earlier also
5874 work on the latest Emacs. Such code uses a combination of sref and
5875 char-bytes in a loop typically as below:
5876 (setq char (sref str idx)
5877 idx (+ idx (char-bytes idx)))
5878 The byte-compiler now warns that this is obsolete.
5880 If you want to know how many bytes a specific multibyte character
5881 (say, CH) occupies in a multibyte buffer, use this code:
5882 (charset-bytes (char-charset ch))
5884 *** In multibyte mode, when you narrow a buffer to some region, and the
5885 region is preceded or followed by non-ASCII codes, inserting or
5886 deleting at the head or the end of the region may signal this error:
5888 Byte combining across boundary of accessible buffer text inhibited
5890 This is to avoid some bytes being combined together into a character
5891 across the boundary.
5893 *** The functions find-charset-region and find-charset-string include
5894 `unknown' in the returned list in the following cases:
5895 o The current buffer or the target string is unibyte and
5896 contains 8-bit characters.
5897 o The current buffer or the target string is multibyte and
5898 contains invalid characters.
5900 *** The functions decode-coding-region and encode-coding-region remove
5901 text properties of the target region. Ideally, they should correctly
5902 preserve text properties, but for the moment, it's hard. Removing
5903 text properties is better than preserving them in a less-than-correct
5906 *** prefer-coding-system sets EOL conversion of default coding systems.
5907 If the argument to prefer-coding-system specifies a certain type of
5908 end of line conversion, the default coding systems set by
5909 prefer-coding-system will specify that conversion type for end of line.
5911 *** The new function thai-compose-string can be used to properly
5912 compose Thai characters in a string.
5914 ** The primitive `define-prefix-command' now takes an optional third
5915 argument NAME, which should be a string. It supplies the menu name
5916 for the created keymap. Keymaps created in order to be displayed as
5917 menus should always use the third argument.
5919 ** The meanings of optional second arguments for read-char,
5920 read-event, and read-char-exclusive are flipped. Now the second
5921 arguments are INHERIT-INPUT-METHOD. These functions use the current
5922 input method (if any) if and only if INHERIT-INPUT-METHOD is non-nil.
5924 ** The new function clear-this-command-keys empties out the contents
5925 of the vector that (this-command-keys) returns. This is useful in
5926 programs that read passwords, to prevent the passwords from echoing
5927 inadvertently as part of the next command in certain cases.
5929 ** The new macro `with-temp-message' displays a temporary message in
5930 the echo area, while executing some Lisp code. Like `progn', it
5931 returns the value of the last form, but it also restores the previous
5934 (with-temp-message MESSAGE &rest BODY)
5936 ** The function `require' now takes an optional third argument
5937 NOERROR. If it is non-nil, then there is no error if the
5938 requested feature cannot be loaded.
5940 ** In the function modify-face, an argument of (nil) for the
5941 foreground color, background color or stipple pattern
5942 means to clear out that attribute.
5944 ** The `outer-window-id' frame property of an X frame
5945 gives the window number of the outermost X window for the frame.
5947 ** Temporary buffers made with with-output-to-temp-buffer are now
5948 read-only by default, and normally use the major mode Help mode
5949 unless you put them in some other non-Fundamental mode before the
5950 end of with-output-to-temp-buffer.
5952 ** The new functions gap-position and gap-size return information on
5953 the gap of the current buffer.
5955 ** The new functions position-bytes and byte-to-position provide a way
5956 to convert between character positions and byte positions in the
5959 ** vc.el defines two new macros, `edit-vc-file' and `with-vc-file', to
5960 facilitate working with version-controlled files from Lisp programs.
5961 These macros check out a given file automatically if needed, and check
5962 it back in after any modifications have been made.
5964 * Installation Changes in Emacs 20.3
5966 ** The default value of load-path now includes most subdirectories of
5967 the site-specific directories /usr/local/share/emacs/site-lisp and
5968 /usr/local/share/emacs/VERSION/site-lisp, in addition to those
5969 directories themselves. Both immediate subdirectories and
5970 subdirectories multiple levels down are added to load-path.
5972 Not all subdirectories are included, though. Subdirectories whose
5973 names do not start with a letter or digit are excluded.
5974 Subdirectories named RCS or CVS are excluded. Also, a subdirectory
5975 which contains a file named `.nosearch' is excluded. You can use
5976 these methods to prevent certain subdirectories from being searched.
5978 Emacs finds these subdirectories and adds them to load-path when it
5979 starts up. While it would be cleaner to find the subdirectories each
5980 time Emacs loads a file, that would be much slower.
5982 This feature is an incompatible change. If you have stored some Emacs
5983 Lisp files in a subdirectory of the site-lisp directory specifically
5984 to prevent them from being used, you will need to rename the
5985 subdirectory to start with a non-alphanumeric character, or create a
5986 `.nosearch' file in it, in order to continue to achieve the desired
5989 ** Emacs no longer includes an old version of the C preprocessor from
5990 GCC. This was formerly used to help compile Emacs with C compilers
5991 that had limits on the significant length of an identifier, but in
5992 fact we stopped supporting such compilers some time ago.
5994 * Changes in Emacs 20.3
5996 ** The new command C-x z (repeat) repeats the previous command
5997 including its argument. If you repeat the z afterward,
5998 it repeats the command additional times; thus, you can
5999 perform many repetitions with one keystroke per repetition.
6001 ** Emacs now supports "selective undo" which undoes only within a
6002 specified region. To do this, set point and mark around the desired
6003 region and type C-u C-x u (or C-u C-_). You can then continue undoing
6004 further, within the same region, by repeating the ordinary undo
6005 command C-x u or C-_. This will keep undoing changes that were made
6006 within the region you originally specified, until either all of them
6007 are undone, or it encounters a change which crosses the edge of that
6010 In Transient Mark mode, undoing when a region is active requests
6013 ** If you specify --unibyte when starting Emacs, then all buffers are
6014 unibyte, except when a Lisp program specifically creates a multibyte
6015 buffer. Setting the environment variable EMACS_UNIBYTE has the same
6016 effect. The --no-unibyte option overrides EMACS_UNIBYTE and directs
6017 Emacs to run normally in multibyte mode.
6019 The option --unibyte does not affect the reading of Emacs Lisp files,
6020 though. If you want a Lisp file to be read in unibyte mode, use
6021 -*-unibyte: t;-*- on its first line. That will force Emacs to
6022 load that file in unibyte mode, regardless of how Emacs was started.
6024 ** toggle-enable-multibyte-characters no longer has a key binding and
6025 no longer appears in the menu bar. We've realized that changing the
6026 enable-multibyte-characters variable in an existing buffer is
6027 something that most users not do.
6029 ** You can specify a coding system to use for the next cut or paste
6030 operations through the window system with the command C-x RET X.
6031 The coding system can make a difference for communication with other
6034 C-x RET x specifies a coding system for all subsequent cutting and
6037 ** You can specify the printer to use for commands that do printing by
6038 setting the variable `printer-name'. Just what a printer name looks
6039 like depends on your operating system. You can specify a different
6040 printer for the Postscript printing commands by setting
6043 ** Emacs now supports on-the-fly spell checking by the means of a
6044 minor mode. It is called M-x flyspell-mode. You don't have to remember
6045 any other special commands to use it, and you will hardly notice it
6046 except when you make a spelling error. Flyspell works by highlighting
6047 incorrect words as soon as they are completed or as soon as the cursor
6050 Flyspell mode works with whichever dictionary you have selected for
6051 Ispell in Emacs. In TeX mode, it understands TeX syntax so as not
6052 to be confused by TeX commands.
6054 You can correct a misspelled word by editing it into something
6055 correct. You can also correct it, or accept it as correct, by
6056 clicking on the word with Mouse-2; that gives you a pop-up menu
6057 of various alternative replacements and actions.
6059 Flyspell mode also proposes "automatic" corrections. M-TAB replaces
6060 the current misspelled word with a possible correction. If several
6061 corrections are made possible, M-TAB cycles through them in
6062 alphabetical order, or in order of decreasing likelihood if
6063 flyspell-sort-corrections is nil.
6065 Flyspell mode also flags an error when a word is repeated, if
6066 flyspell-mark-duplications-flag is non-nil.
6068 ** Changes in input method usage.
6070 Now you can use arrow keys (right, left, down, up) for selecting among
6071 the alternatives just the same way as you do by C-f, C-b, C-n, and C-p
6074 You can use the ENTER key to accept the current conversion.
6076 If you type TAB to display a list of alternatives, you can select one
6077 of the alternatives with Mouse-2.
6079 The meaning of the variable `input-method-verbose-flag' is changed so
6080 that you can set it to t, nil, `default', or `complex-only'.
6082 If the value is nil, extra guidance is never given.
6084 If the value is t, extra guidance is always given.
6086 If the value is `complex-only', extra guidance is always given only
6087 when you are using complex input methods such as chinese-py.
6089 If the value is `default' (this is the default), extra guidance is
6090 given in the following case:
6091 o When you are using a complex input method.
6092 o When you are using a simple input method but not in the minibuffer.
6094 If you are using Emacs through a very slow line, setting
6095 input-method-verbose-flag to nil or to complex-only is a good choice,
6096 and if you are using an input method you are not familiar with,
6097 setting it to t is helpful.
6099 The old command select-input-method is now called set-input-method.
6101 In the language environment "Korean", you can use the following
6103 Shift-SPC toggle-korean-input-method
6104 C-F9 quail-hangul-switch-symbol-ksc
6105 F9 quail-hangul-switch-hanja
6106 These key bindings are canceled when you switch to another language
6109 ** The minibuffer history of file names now records the specified file
6110 names, not the entire minibuffer input. For example, if the
6111 minibuffer starts out with /usr/foo/, you might type in /etc/passwd to
6114 /usr/foo//etc/passwd
6116 which stands for the file /etc/passwd.
6118 Formerly, this used to put /usr/foo//etc/passwd in the history list.
6119 Now this puts just /etc/passwd in the history list.
6121 ** If you are root, Emacs sets backup-by-copying-when-mismatch to t
6122 at startup, so that saving a file will be sure to preserve
6123 its owner and group.
6125 ** find-func.el can now also find the place of definition of Emacs
6126 Lisp variables in user-loaded libraries.
6128 ** C-x r t (string-rectangle) now deletes the existing rectangle
6129 contents before inserting the specified string on each line.
6131 ** There is a new command delete-whitespace-rectangle
6132 which deletes whitespace starting from a particular column
6133 in all the lines on a rectangle. The column is specified
6134 by the left edge of the rectangle.
6136 ** You can now store a number into a register with C-u NUMBER C-x r n REG,
6137 increment it by INC with C-u INC C-x r + REG (to increment by one, omit
6138 C-u INC), and insert it in the buffer with C-x r g REG. This is useful
6139 for writing keyboard macros.
6141 ** The new command M-x speedbar displays a frame in which directories,
6142 files, and tags can be displayed, manipulated, and jumped to. The
6143 frame defaults to 20 characters in width, and is the same height as
6144 the frame that it was started from. Some major modes define
6145 additional commands for the speedbar, including Rmail, GUD/GDB, and
6148 ** query-replace-regexp is now bound to C-M-%.
6150 ** In Transient Mark mode, when the region is active, M-x
6151 query-replace and the other replace commands now operate on the region
6154 ** M-x write-region, when used interactively, now asks for
6155 confirmation before overwriting an existing file. When you call
6156 the function from a Lisp program, a new optional argument CONFIRM
6157 says whether to ask for confirmation in this case.
6159 ** If you use find-file-literally and the file is already visited
6160 non-literally, the command asks you whether to revisit the file
6161 literally. If you say no, it signals an error.
6163 ** Major modes defined with the "derived mode" feature
6164 now use the proper name for the mode hook: WHATEVER-mode-hook.
6165 Formerly they used the name WHATEVER-mode-hooks, but that is
6166 inconsistent with Emacs conventions.
6168 ** shell-command-on-region (and shell-command) reports success or
6169 failure if the command produces no output.
6171 ** Set focus-follows-mouse to nil if your window system or window
6172 manager does not transfer focus to another window when you just move
6175 ** mouse-menu-buffer-maxlen has been renamed to
6176 mouse-buffer-menu-maxlen to be consistent with the other related
6177 function and variable names.
6179 ** The new variable auto-coding-alist specifies coding systems for
6180 reading specific files. This has higher priority than
6181 file-coding-system-alist.
6183 ** If you set the variable unibyte-display-via-language-environment to
6184 t, then Emacs displays non-ASCII characters are displayed by
6185 converting them to the equivalent multibyte characters according to
6186 the current language environment. As a result, they are displayed
6187 according to the current fontset.
6189 ** C-q's handling of codes in the range 0200 through 0377 is changed.
6191 The codes in the range 0200 through 0237 are inserted as one byte of
6192 that code regardless of the values of nonascii-translation-table and
6193 nonascii-insert-offset.
6195 For the codes in the range 0240 through 0377, if
6196 enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil and nonascii-translation-table
6197 nor nonascii-insert-offset can't convert them to valid multibyte
6198 characters, they are converted to Latin-1 characters.
6200 ** If you try to find a file that is not read-accessible, you now get
6201 an error, rather than an empty buffer and a warning.
6203 ** In the minibuffer history commands M-r and M-s, an upper case
6204 letter in the regular expression forces case-sensitive search.
6206 ** In the *Help* buffer, cross-references to commands and variables
6207 are inferred and hyperlinked. Use C-h m in Help mode for the relevant
6210 ** M-x apropos-command, with a prefix argument, no longer looks for
6211 user option variables--instead it looks for noninteractive functions.
6213 Meanwhile, the command apropos-variable normally searches for
6214 user option variables; with a prefix argument, it looks at
6215 all variables that have documentation.
6217 ** When you type a long line in the minibuffer, and the minibuffer
6218 shows just one line, automatically scrolling works in a special way
6219 that shows you overlap with the previous line of text. The variable
6220 minibuffer-scroll-overlap controls how many characters of overlap
6221 it should show; the default is 20.
6223 Meanwhile, Resize Minibuffer mode is still available; in that mode,
6224 the minibuffer grows taller (up to a point) as needed to show the whole
6227 ** The new command M-x customize-changed-options lets you customize
6228 all the options whose meanings or default values have changed in
6229 recent Emacs versions. You specify a previous Emacs version number as
6230 argument, and the command creates a customization buffer showing all
6231 the customizable options which were changed since that version.
6232 Newly added options are included as well.
6234 If you don't specify a particular version number argument,
6235 then the customization buffer shows all the customizable options
6236 for which Emacs versions of changes are recorded.
6238 This function is also bound to the Changed Options entry in the
6241 ** When you run M-x grep with a prefix argument, it figures out
6242 the tag around point and puts that into the default grep command.
6244 ** The new command M-* (pop-tag-mark) pops back through a history of
6245 buffer positions from which M-. or other tag-finding commands were
6248 ** The new variable comment-padding specifies the number of spaces
6249 that `comment-region' will insert before the actual text of the comment.
6252 ** In Fortran mode the characters `.', `_' and `$' now have symbol
6253 syntax, not word syntax. Fortran mode now supports `imenu' and has
6254 new commands fortran-join-line (M-^) and fortran-narrow-to-subprogram
6255 (C-x n d). M-q can be used to fill a statement or comment block
6258 ** GUD now supports jdb, the Java debugger, and pdb, the Python debugger.
6260 ** If you set the variable add-log-keep-changes-together to a non-nil
6261 value, the command `C-x 4 a' will automatically notice when you make
6262 two entries in one day for one file, and combine them.
6264 ** You can use the command M-x diary-mail-entries to mail yourself a
6265 reminder about upcoming diary entries. See the documentation string
6266 for a sample shell script for calling this function automatically
6271 *** All you need to do to enable use of the Desktop package, is to set
6272 the variable desktop-enable to t with Custom.
6274 *** Minor modes are now restored. Which minor modes are restored
6275 and how modes are restored is controlled by `desktop-minor-mode-table'.
6277 ** There is no need to do anything special, now, to enable Gnus to
6278 read and post multi-lingual articles.
6280 ** Outline mode has now support for showing hidden outlines when
6281 doing an isearch. In order for this to happen search-invisible should
6282 be set to open (the default). If an isearch match is inside a hidden
6283 outline the outline is made visible. If you continue pressing C-s and
6284 the match moves outside the formerly invisible outline, the outline is
6285 made invisible again.
6287 ** Mail reading and sending changes
6289 *** The Rmail e command now switches to displaying the whole header of
6290 the message before it lets you edit the message. This is so that any
6291 changes you make in the header will not be lost if you subsequently
6294 *** The w command in Rmail, which writes the message body into a file,
6295 now works in the summary buffer as well. (The command to delete the
6296 summary buffer is now Q.) The default file name for the w command, if
6297 the message has no subject, is stored in the variable
6298 rmail-default-body-file.
6300 *** Most of the commands and modes that operate on mail and netnews no
6301 longer depend on the value of mail-header-separator. Instead, they
6302 handle whatever separator the buffer happens to use.
6304 *** If you set mail-signature to a value which is not t, nil, or a string,
6305 it should be an expression. When you send a message, this expression
6306 is evaluated to insert the signature.
6308 *** The new Lisp library feedmail.el (version 8) enhances processing of
6309 outbound email messages. It works in coordination with other email
6310 handling packages (e.g., rmail, VM, gnus) and is responsible for
6311 putting final touches on messages and actually submitting them for
6312 transmission. Users of the emacs program "fakemail" might be
6313 especially interested in trying feedmail.
6315 feedmail is not enabled by default. See comments at the top of
6316 feedmail.el for set-up instructions. Among the bigger features
6317 provided by feedmail are:
6319 **** you can park outgoing messages into a disk-based queue and
6320 stimulate sending some or all of them later (handy for laptop users);
6321 there is also a queue for draft messages
6323 **** you can get one last look at the prepped outbound message and
6324 be prompted for confirmation
6326 **** does smart filling of address headers
6328 **** can generate a MESSAGE-ID: line and a DATE: line; the date can be
6329 the time the message was written or the time it is being sent; this
6330 can make FCC copies more closely resemble copies that recipients get
6332 **** you can specify an arbitrary function for actually transmitting
6333 the message; included in feedmail are interfaces for /bin/[r]mail,
6334 /usr/lib/sendmail, and elisp smtpmail; it's easy to write a new
6335 function for something else (10-20 lines of elisp)
6339 *** The Dired function dired-do-toggle, which toggles marked and unmarked
6340 files, is now bound to "t" instead of "T".
6342 *** dired-at-point has been added to ffap.el. It allows one to easily
6343 run Dired on the directory name at point.
6345 *** Dired has a new command: %g. It searches the contents of
6346 files in the directory and marks each file that contains a match
6347 for a specified regexp.
6351 *** New option vc-ignore-vc-files lets you turn off version control
6354 *** VC Dired has been completely rewritten. It is now much
6355 faster, especially for CVS, and works very similar to ordinary
6358 VC Dired is invoked by typing C-x v d and entering the name of the
6359 directory to display. By default, VC Dired gives you a recursive
6360 listing of all files at or below the given directory which are
6361 currently locked (for CVS, all files not up-to-date are shown).
6363 You can change the listing format by setting vc-dired-recurse to nil,
6364 then it shows only the given directory, and you may also set
6365 vc-dired-terse-display to nil, then it shows all files under version
6366 control plus the names of any subdirectories, so that you can type `i'
6367 on such lines to insert them manually, as in ordinary Dired.
6369 All Dired commands operate normally in VC Dired, except for `v', which
6370 is redefined as the version control prefix. That means you may type
6371 `v l', `v =' etc. to invoke `vc-print-log', `vc-diff' and the like on
6372 the file named in the current Dired buffer line. `v v' invokes
6373 `vc-next-action' on this file, or on all files currently marked.
6375 The new command `v t' (vc-dired-toggle-terse-mode) allows you to
6376 toggle between terse display (only locked files) and full display (all
6377 VC files plus subdirectories). There is also a special command,
6378 `* l', to mark all files currently locked.
6380 Giving a prefix argument to C-x v d now does the same thing as in
6381 ordinary Dired: it allows you to supply additional options for the ls
6382 command in the minibuffer, to fine-tune VC Dired's output.
6384 *** Under CVS, if you merge changes from the repository into a working
6385 file, and CVS detects conflicts, VC now offers to start an ediff
6386 session to resolve them.
6388 Alternatively, you can use the new command `vc-resolve-conflicts' to
6389 resolve conflicts in a file at any time. It works in any buffer that
6390 contains conflict markers as generated by rcsmerge (which is what CVS
6393 *** You can now transfer changes between branches, using the new
6394 command vc-merge (C-x v m). It is implemented for RCS and CVS. When
6395 you invoke it in a buffer under version-control, you can specify
6396 either an entire branch or a pair of versions, and the changes on that
6397 branch or between the two versions are merged into the working file.
6398 If this results in any conflicts, they may be resolved interactively,
6401 ** Changes in Font Lock
6403 *** The face and variable previously known as font-lock-reference-face
6404 are now called font-lock-constant-face to better reflect their typical
6405 use for highlighting constants and labels. (Its face properties are
6406 unchanged.) The variable font-lock-reference-face remains for now for
6407 compatibility reasons, but its value is font-lock-constant-face.
6409 ** Frame name display changes
6411 *** The command set-frame-name lets you set the name of the current
6412 frame. You can use the new command select-frame-by-name to select and
6413 raise a frame; this is mostly useful on character-only terminals, or
6414 when many frames are invisible or iconified.
6416 *** On character-only terminal (not a window system), changing the
6417 frame name is now reflected on the mode line and in the Buffers/Frames
6420 ** Comint (subshell) changes
6422 *** In Comint modes, the commands to kill, stop or interrupt a
6423 subjob now also kill pending input. This is for compatibility
6424 with ordinary shells, where the signal characters do this.
6426 *** There are new commands in Comint mode.
6428 C-c C-x fetches the "next" line from the input history;
6429 that is, the line after the last line you got.
6430 You can use this command to fetch successive lines, one by one.
6432 C-c SPC accumulates lines of input. More precisely, it arranges to
6433 send the current line together with the following line, when you send
6436 C-c C-a if repeated twice consecutively now moves to the process mark,
6437 which separates the pending input from the subprocess output and the
6438 previously sent input.
6440 C-c M-r now runs comint-previous-matching-input-from-input;
6441 it searches for a previous command, using the current pending input
6442 as the search string.
6444 *** New option compilation-scroll-output can be set to scroll
6445 automatically in compilation-mode windows.
6449 *** Multiline macros are now handled, both as they affect indentation,
6450 and as recognized syntax. New syntactic symbol cpp-macro-cont is
6451 assigned to second and subsequent lines of a multiline macro
6454 *** A new style "user" which captures all non-hook-ified
6455 (i.e. top-level) .emacs file variable settings and customizations.
6456 Style "cc-mode" is an alias for "user" and is deprecated. "gnu"
6457 style is still the default however.
6459 *** "java" style now conforms to Sun's JDK coding style.
6461 *** There are new commands c-beginning-of-defun, c-end-of-defun which
6462 are alternatives which you could bind to C-M-a and C-M-e if you prefer
6463 them. They do not have key bindings by default.
6465 *** New and improved implementations of M-a (c-beginning-of-statement)
6466 and M-e (c-end-of-statement).
6468 *** C++ namespace blocks are supported, with new syntactic symbols
6469 namespace-open, namespace-close, and innamespace.
6471 *** File local variable settings of c-file-style and c-file-offsets
6472 makes the style variables local to that buffer only.
6474 *** New indentation functions c-lineup-close-paren,
6475 c-indent-one-line-block, c-lineup-dont-change.
6477 *** Improvements (hopefully!) to the way CC Mode is loaded. You
6478 should now be able to do a (require 'cc-mode) to get the entire
6479 package loaded properly for customization in your .emacs file. A new
6480 variable c-initialize-on-load controls this and is t by default.
6482 ** Changes to hippie-expand.
6484 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-dabbrev-skip-space'. If
6485 non-nil, trailing spaces may be included in the abbreviation to search for,
6486 which then gives the same behavior as the original `dabbrev-expand'.
6488 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-dabbrev-as-symbol'. If
6489 non-nil, characters of syntax '_' is considered part of the word when
6490 expanding dynamically.
6492 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-no-restriction'. If
6493 non-nil, narrowed buffers are widened before they are searched.
6495 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-only-buffers'. If
6496 non-empty, buffers searched are restricted to the types specified in
6497 this list. Useful for example when constructing new special-purpose
6498 expansion functions with `make-hippie-expand-function'.
6500 *** Text properties of the expansion are no longer copied.
6502 ** Changes in BibTeX mode.
6504 *** Any titleword matching a regexp in the new variable
6505 bibtex-autokey-titleword-ignore (case sensitive) is ignored during
6506 automatic key generation. This replaces variable
6507 bibtex-autokey-titleword-first-ignore, which only checked for matches
6508 against the first word in the title.
6510 *** Autokey generation now uses all words from the title, not just
6511 capitalized words. To avoid conflicts with existing customizations,
6512 bibtex-autokey-titleword-ignore is set up such that words starting with
6513 lowerkey characters will still be ignored. Thus, if you want to use
6514 lowercase words from the title, you will have to overwrite the
6515 bibtex-autokey-titleword-ignore standard setting.
6517 *** Case conversion of names and title words for automatic key
6518 generation is more flexible. Variable bibtex-autokey-preserve-case is
6519 replaced by bibtex-autokey-titleword-case-convert and
6520 bibtex-autokey-name-case-convert.
6522 ** Changes in vcursor.el.
6524 *** Support for character terminals is available: there is a new keymap
6525 and the vcursor will appear as an arrow between buffer text. A
6526 variable `vcursor-interpret-input' allows input from the vcursor to be
6527 entered exactly as if typed. Numerous functions, including
6528 `vcursor-compare-windows', have been rewritten to improve consistency
6529 in the selection of windows and corresponding keymaps.
6531 *** vcursor options can now be altered with M-x customize under the
6532 Editing group once the package is loaded.
6534 *** Loading vcursor now does not define keys by default, as this is
6535 generally a bad side effect. Use M-x customize to set
6536 vcursor-key-bindings to t to restore the old behavior.
6538 *** vcursor-auto-disable can be `copy', which turns off copying from the
6539 vcursor, but doesn't disable it, after any non-vcursor command.
6543 *** You can now spell check comments and strings in the current
6544 buffer with M-x ispell-comments-and-strings. Comments and strings
6545 are identified by syntax tables in effect.
6547 *** Generic region skipping implemented.
6548 A single buffer can be broken into a number of regions where text will
6549 and will not be checked. The definitions of the regions can be user
6550 defined. New applications and improvements made available by this
6553 o URLs are automatically skipped
6554 o EMail message checking is vastly improved.
6556 *** Ispell can highlight the erroneous word even on non-window terminals.
6558 ** Changes to RefTeX mode
6560 RefTeX has been updated in order to make it more usable with very
6561 large projects (like a several volume math book). The parser has been
6562 re-written from scratch. To get maximum speed from RefTeX, check the
6563 section `Optimizations' in the manual.
6565 *** New recursive parser.
6567 The old version of RefTeX created a single large buffer containing the
6568 entire multifile document in order to parse the document. The new
6569 recursive parser scans the individual files.
6571 *** Parsing only part of a document.
6573 Reparsing of changed document parts can now be made faster by enabling
6574 partial scans. To use this feature, read the documentation string of
6575 the variable `reftex-enable-partial-scans' and set the variable to t.
6577 (setq reftex-enable-partial-scans t)
6579 *** Storing parsing information in a file.
6581 This can improve startup times considerably. To turn it on, use
6583 (setq reftex-save-parse-info t)
6585 *** Using multiple selection buffers
6587 If the creation of label selection buffers is too slow (this happens
6588 for large documents), you can reuse these buffers by setting
6590 (setq reftex-use-multiple-selection-buffers t)
6592 *** References to external documents.
6594 The LaTeX package `xr' allows to cross-reference labels in external
6595 documents. RefTeX can provide information about the external
6596 documents as well. To use this feature, set up the \externaldocument
6597 macros required by the `xr' package and rescan the document with
6598 RefTeX. The external labels can then be accessed with the `x' key in
6599 the selection buffer provided by `reftex-reference' (bound to `C-c )').
6600 The `x' key also works in the table of contents buffer.
6602 *** Many more labeled LaTeX environments are recognized by default.
6604 The built-in command list now covers all the standard LaTeX commands,
6605 and all of the major packages included in the LaTeX distribution.
6607 Also, RefTeX now understands the \appendix macro and changes
6608 the enumeration of sections in the *toc* buffer accordingly.
6610 *** Mouse support for selection and *toc* buffers
6612 The mouse can now be used to select items in the selection and *toc*
6613 buffers. See also the new option `reftex-highlight-selection'.
6615 *** New keymaps for selection and table of contents modes.
6617 The selection processes for labels and citation keys, and the table of
6618 contents buffer now have their own keymaps: `reftex-select-label-map',
6619 `reftex-select-bib-map', `reftex-toc-map'. The selection processes
6620 have a number of new keys predefined. In particular, TAB lets you
6621 enter a label with completion. Check the on-the-fly help (press `?'
6622 at the selection prompt) or read the Info documentation to find out
6625 *** Support for the varioref package
6627 The `v' key in the label selection buffer toggles \ref versus \vref.
6631 Three new hooks can be used to redefine the way labels, references,
6632 and citations are created. These hooks are
6633 `reftex-format-label-function', `reftex-format-ref-function',
6634 `reftex-format-cite-function'.
6636 *** Citations outside LaTeX
6638 The command `reftex-citation' may also be used outside LaTeX (e.g. in
6639 a mail buffer). See the Info documentation for details.
6641 *** Short context is no longer fontified.
6643 The short context in the label menu no longer copies the
6644 fontification from the text in the buffer. If you prefer it to be
6647 (setq reftex-refontify-context t)
6649 ** file-cache-minibuffer-complete now accepts a prefix argument.
6650 With a prefix argument, it does not try to do completion of
6651 the file name within its directory; it only checks for other
6652 directories that contain the same file name.
6654 Thus, given the file name Makefile, and assuming that a file
6655 Makefile.in exists in the same directory, ordinary
6656 file-cache-minibuffer-complete will try to complete Makefile to
6657 Makefile.in and will therefore never look for other directories that
6658 have Makefile. A prefix argument tells it not to look for longer
6659 names such as Makefile.in, so that instead it will look for other
6660 directories--just as if the name were already complete in its present
6663 ** New modes and packages
6665 *** There is a new alternative major mode for Perl, Cperl mode.
6666 It has many more features than Perl mode, and some people prefer
6667 it, but some do not.
6669 *** There is a new major mode, M-x vhdl-mode, for editing files of VHDL
6672 *** M-x which-function-mode enables a minor mode that displays the
6673 current function name continuously in the mode line, as you move
6676 Which Function mode is effective in major modes which support Imenu.
6678 *** Gametree is a major mode for editing game analysis trees. The author
6679 uses it for keeping notes about his postal Chess games, but it should
6680 be helpful for other two-player games as well, as long as they have an
6681 established system of notation similar to Chess.
6683 *** The new minor mode checkdoc-minor-mode provides Emacs Lisp
6684 documentation string checking for style and spelling. The style
6685 guidelines are found in the Emacs Lisp programming manual.
6687 *** The net-utils package makes some common networking features
6688 available in Emacs. Some of these functions are wrappers around
6689 system utilities (ping, nslookup, etc); others are implementations of
6690 simple protocols (finger, whois) in Emacs Lisp. There are also
6691 functions to make simple connections to TCP/IP ports for debugging and
6694 *** highlight-changes-mode is a minor mode that uses colors to
6695 identify recently changed parts of the buffer text.
6697 *** The new package `midnight' lets you specify things to be done
6698 within Emacs at midnight--by default, kill buffers that you have not
6699 used in a considerable time. To use this feature, customize
6700 the user option `midnight-mode' to t.
6702 *** The file generic-x.el defines a number of simple major modes.
6704 apache-generic-mode: For Apache and NCSA httpd configuration files
6705 samba-generic-mode: Samba configuration files
6706 fvwm-generic-mode: For fvwm initialization files
6707 x-resource-generic-mode: For X resource files
6708 hosts-generic-mode: For hosts files (.rhosts, /etc/hosts, etc)
6709 mailagent-rules-generic-mode: For mailagent .rules files
6710 javascript-generic-mode: For JavaScript files
6711 vrml-generic-mode: For VRML files
6712 java-manifest-generic-mode: For Java MANIFEST files
6713 java-properties-generic-mode: For Java property files
6714 mailrc-generic-mode: For .mailrc files
6716 Platform-specific modes:
6718 prototype-generic-mode: For Solaris/Sys V prototype files
6719 pkginfo-generic-mode: For Solaris/Sys V pkginfo files
6720 alias-generic-mode: For C shell alias files
6721 inf-generic-mode: For MS-Windows INF files
6722 ini-generic-mode: For MS-Windows INI files
6723 reg-generic-mode: For MS-Windows Registry files
6724 bat-generic-mode: For MS-Windows BAT scripts
6725 rc-generic-mode: For MS-Windows Resource files
6726 rul-generic-mode: For InstallShield scripts
6728 * Lisp changes in Emacs 20.3 since the Emacs Lisp Manual was published
6730 ** If you want a Lisp file to be read in unibyte mode,
6731 use -*-unibyte: t;-*- on its first line.
6732 That will force Emacs to read that file in unibyte mode.
6733 Otherwise, the file will be loaded and byte-compiled in multibyte mode.
6735 Thus, each lisp file is read in a consistent way regardless of whether
6736 you started Emacs with --unibyte, so that a Lisp program gives
6737 consistent results regardless of how Emacs was started.
6739 ** The new function assoc-default is useful for searching an alist,
6740 and using a default value if the key is not found there. You can
6741 specify a comparison predicate, so this function is useful for
6742 searching comparing a string against an alist of regular expressions.
6744 ** The functions unibyte-char-to-multibyte and
6745 multibyte-char-to-unibyte convert between unibyte and multibyte
6746 character codes, in a way that is appropriate for the current language
6749 ** The functions read-event, read-char and read-char-exclusive now
6750 take two optional arguments. PROMPT, if non-nil, specifies a prompt
6751 string. SUPPRESS-INPUT-METHOD, if non-nil, says to disable the
6752 current input method for reading this one event.
6754 ** Two new variables print-escape-nonascii and print-escape-multibyte
6755 now control whether to output certain characters as
6756 backslash-sequences. print-escape-nonascii applies to single-byte
6757 non-ASCII characters; print-escape-multibyte applies to multibyte
6758 characters. Both of these variables are used only when printing
6759 in readable fashion (prin1 uses them, princ does not).
6761 * Lisp changes in Emacs 20.3 before the Emacs Lisp Manual was published
6763 ** Compiled Emacs Lisp files made with the modified "MBSK" version
6764 of Emacs 20.2 do not work in Emacs 20.3.
6766 ** Buffer positions are now measured in characters, as they were
6767 in Emacs 19 and before. This means that (forward-char 1)
6768 always increases point by 1.
6770 The function chars-in-region now just subtracts its arguments. It is
6771 considered obsolete. The function char-boundary-p has been deleted.
6773 See below for additional changes relating to multibyte characters.
6775 ** defcustom, defface and defgroup now accept the keyword `:version'.
6776 Use this to specify in which version of Emacs a certain variable's
6777 default value changed. For example,
6779 (defcustom foo-max 34 "*Maximum number of foo's allowed."
6784 (defgroup foo-group nil "The foo group."
6787 If an entire new group is added or the variables in it have the
6788 default values changed, then just add a `:version' to that group. It
6789 is recommended that new packages added to the distribution contain a
6790 `:version' in the top level group.
6792 This information is used to control the customize-changed-options command.
6794 ** It is now an error to change the value of a symbol whose name
6795 starts with a colon--if it is interned in the standard obarray.
6797 However, setting such a symbol to its proper value, which is that
6798 symbol itself, is not an error. This is for the sake of programs that
6799 support previous Emacs versions by explicitly setting these variables
6802 If you set the variable keyword-symbols-constant-flag to nil,
6803 this error is suppressed, and you can set these symbols to any
6806 ** There is a new debugger command, R.
6807 It evaluates an expression like e, but saves the result
6808 in the buffer *Debugger-record*.
6810 ** Frame-local variables.
6812 You can now make a variable local to various frames. To do this, call
6813 the function make-variable-frame-local; this enables frames to have
6814 local bindings for that variable.
6816 These frame-local bindings are actually frame parameters: you create a
6817 frame-local binding in a specific frame by calling
6818 modify-frame-parameters and specifying the variable name as the
6821 Buffer-local bindings take precedence over frame-local bindings.
6822 Thus, if the current buffer has a buffer-local binding, that binding is
6823 active; otherwise, if the selected frame has a frame-local binding,
6824 that binding is active; otherwise, the default binding is active.
6826 It would not be hard to implement window-local bindings, but it is not
6827 clear that this would be very useful; windows tend to come and go in a
6828 very transitory fashion, so that trying to produce any specific effect
6829 through a window-local binding would not be very robust.
6831 ** `sregexq' and `sregex' are two new functions for constructing
6832 "symbolic regular expressions." These are Lisp expressions that, when
6833 evaluated, yield conventional string-based regexps. The symbolic form
6834 makes it easier to construct, read, and maintain complex patterns.
6835 See the documentation in sregex.el.
6837 ** parse-partial-sexp's return value has an additional element which
6838 is used to pass information along if you pass it to another call to
6839 parse-partial-sexp, starting its scan where the first call ended.
6840 The contents of this field are not yet finalized.
6842 ** eval-region now accepts a fourth optional argument READ-FUNCTION.
6843 If it is non-nil, that function is used instead of `read'.
6845 ** unload-feature by default removes the feature's functions from
6846 known hooks to avoid trouble, but a package providing FEATURE can
6847 define a hook FEATURE-unload-hook to be run by unload-feature instead.
6849 ** read-from-minibuffer no longer returns the argument DEFAULT-VALUE
6850 when the user enters empty input. It now returns the null string, as
6851 it did in Emacs 19. The default value is made available in the
6852 history via M-n, but it is not applied here as a default.
6854 The other, more specialized minibuffer-reading functions continue to
6855 return the default value (not the null string) when the user enters
6858 ** The new variable read-buffer-function controls which routine to use
6859 for selecting buffers. For example, if you set this variable to
6860 `iswitchb-read-buffer', iswitchb will be used to read buffer names.
6861 Other functions can also be used if they accept the same arguments as
6862 `read-buffer' and return the selected buffer name as a string.
6864 ** The new function read-passwd reads a password from the terminal,
6865 echoing a period for each character typed. It takes three arguments:
6866 a prompt string, a flag which says "read it twice to make sure", and a
6867 default password to use if the user enters nothing.
6869 ** The variable fill-nobreak-predicate gives major modes a way to
6870 specify not to break a line at certain places. Its value is a
6871 function which is called with no arguments, with point located at the
6872 place where a break is being considered. If the function returns
6873 non-nil, then the line won't be broken there.
6875 ** window-end now takes an optional second argument, UPDATE.
6876 If this is non-nil, then the function always returns an accurate
6877 up-to-date value for the buffer position corresponding to the
6878 end of the window, even if this requires computation.
6880 ** other-buffer now takes an optional argument FRAME
6881 which specifies which frame's buffer list to use.
6882 If it is nil, that means use the selected frame's buffer list.
6884 ** The new variable buffer-display-time, always local in every buffer,
6885 holds the value of (current-time) as of the last time that a window
6886 was directed to display this buffer.
6888 ** It is now meaningful to compare two window-configuration objects
6889 with `equal'. Two window-configuration objects are equal if they
6890 describe equivalent arrangements of windows, in the same frame--in
6891 other words, if they would give the same results if passed to
6892 set-window-configuration.
6894 ** compare-window-configurations is a new function that compares two
6895 window configurations loosely. It ignores differences in saved buffer
6896 positions and scrolling, and considers only the structure and sizes of
6897 windows and the choice of buffers to display.
6899 ** The variable minor-mode-overriding-map-alist allows major modes to
6900 override the key bindings of a minor mode. The elements of this alist
6901 look like the elements of minor-mode-map-alist: (VARIABLE . KEYMAP).
6903 If the VARIABLE in an element of minor-mode-overriding-map-alist has a
6904 non-nil value, the paired KEYMAP is active, and totally overrides the
6905 map (if any) specified for the same variable in minor-mode-map-alist.
6907 minor-mode-overriding-map-alist is automatically local in all buffers,
6908 and it is meant to be set by major modes.
6910 ** The function match-string-no-properties is like match-string
6911 except that it discards all text properties from the result.
6913 ** The function load-average now accepts an optional argument
6914 USE-FLOATS. If it is non-nil, the load average values are returned as
6915 floating point numbers, rather than as integers to be divided by 100.
6917 ** The new variable temporary-file-directory specifies the directory
6918 to use for creating temporary files. The default value is determined
6919 in a reasonable way for your operating system; on GNU and Unix systems
6920 it is based on the TMP and TMPDIR environment variables.
6924 *** easymenu.el now uses the new menu item format and supports the
6925 keywords :visible and :filter. The existing keyword :keys is now
6928 The variable `easy-menu-precalculate-equivalent-keybindings' controls
6929 a new feature which calculates keyboard equivalents for the menu when
6930 you define the menu. The default is t. If you rarely use menus, you
6931 can set the variable to nil to disable this precalculation feature;
6932 then the calculation is done only if you use the menu bar.
6934 *** A new format for menu items is supported.
6936 In a keymap, a key binding that has the format
6937 (STRING . REAL-BINDING) or (STRING HELP-STRING . REAL-BINDING)
6938 defines a menu item. Now a menu item definition may also be a list that
6939 starts with the symbol `menu-item'.
6942 (menu-item ITEM-NAME) or
6943 (menu-item ITEM-NAME REAL-BINDING . ITEM-PROPERTY-LIST)
6944 where ITEM-NAME is an expression which evaluates to the menu item
6945 string, and ITEM-PROPERTY-LIST has the form of a property list.
6946 The supported properties include
6948 :enable FORM Evaluate FORM to determine whether the
6950 :visible FORM Evaluate FORM to determine whether the
6951 item should appear in the menu.
6953 FILTER-FN is a function of one argument,
6954 which will be REAL-BINDING.
6955 It should return a binding to use instead.
6957 DESCRIPTION is a string that describes an equivalent keyboard
6958 binding for REAL-BINDING. DESCRIPTION is expanded with
6959 `substitute-command-keys' before it is used.
6960 :key-sequence KEY-SEQUENCE
6961 KEY-SEQUENCE is a key-sequence for an equivalent
6964 This means that the command normally has no
6965 keyboard equivalent.
6966 :help HELP HELP is the extra help string (not currently used).
6967 :button (TYPE . SELECTED)
6968 TYPE is :toggle or :radio.
6969 SELECTED is a form, to be evaluated, and its
6970 value says whether this button is currently selected.
6972 Buttons are at the moment only simulated by prefixes in the menu.
6973 Eventually ordinary X-buttons may be supported.
6975 (menu-item ITEM-NAME) defines unselectable item.
6979 *** The new event type `mouse-wheel' is generated by a wheel on a
6980 mouse (such as the MS Intellimouse). The event contains a delta that
6981 corresponds to the amount and direction that the wheel is rotated,
6982 which is typically used to implement a scroll or zoom. The format is:
6984 (mouse-wheel POSITION DELTA)
6986 where POSITION is a list describing the position of the event in the
6987 same format as a mouse-click event, and DELTA is a signed number
6988 indicating the number of increments by which the wheel was rotated. A
6989 negative DELTA indicates that the wheel was rotated backwards, towards
6990 the user, and a positive DELTA indicates that the wheel was rotated
6991 forward, away from the user.
6993 As of now, this event type is generated only on MS Windows.
6995 *** The new event type `drag-n-drop' is generated when a group of
6996 files is selected in an application outside of Emacs, and then dragged
6997 and dropped onto an Emacs frame. The event contains a list of
6998 filenames that were dragged and dropped, which are then typically
6999 loaded into Emacs. The format is:
7001 (drag-n-drop POSITION FILES)
7003 where POSITION is a list describing the position of the event in the
7004 same format as a mouse-click event, and FILES is the list of filenames
7005 that were dragged and dropped.
7007 As of now, this event type is generated only on MS Windows.
7009 ** Changes relating to multibyte characters.
7011 *** The variable enable-multibyte-characters is now read-only;
7012 any attempt to set it directly signals an error. The only way
7013 to change this value in an existing buffer is with set-buffer-multibyte.
7015 *** In a string constant, `\ ' now stands for "nothing at all". You
7016 can use it to terminate a hex escape which is followed by a character
7017 that could otherwise be read as part of the hex escape.
7019 *** String indices are now measured in characters, as they were
7020 in Emacs 19 and before.
7022 The function chars-in-string has been deleted.
7023 The function concat-chars has been renamed to `string'.
7025 *** The function set-buffer-multibyte sets the flag in the current
7026 buffer that says whether the buffer uses multibyte representation or
7027 unibyte representation. If the argument is nil, it selects unibyte
7028 representation. Otherwise it selects multibyte representation.
7030 This function does not change the contents of the buffer, viewed
7031 as a sequence of bytes. However, it does change the contents
7032 viewed as characters; a sequence of two bytes which is treated as
7033 one character when the buffer uses multibyte representation
7034 will count as two characters using unibyte representation.
7036 This function sets enable-multibyte-characters to record which
7037 representation is in use. It also adjusts various data in the buffer
7038 (including its markers, overlays and text properties) so that they are
7039 consistent with the new representation.
7041 *** string-make-multibyte takes a string and converts it to multibyte
7042 representation. Most of the time, you don't need to care
7043 about the representation, because Emacs converts when necessary;
7044 however, it makes a difference when you compare strings.
7046 The conversion of non-ASCII characters works by adding the value of
7047 nonascii-insert-offset to each character, or by translating them
7048 using the table nonascii-translation-table.
7050 *** string-make-unibyte takes a string and converts it to unibyte
7051 representation. Most of the time, you don't need to care about the
7052 representation, but it makes a difference when you compare strings.
7054 The conversion from multibyte to unibyte representation
7055 loses information; the only time Emacs performs it automatically
7056 is when inserting a multibyte string into a unibyte buffer.
7058 *** string-as-multibyte takes a string, and returns another string
7059 which contains the same bytes, but treats them as multibyte.
7061 *** string-as-unibyte takes a string, and returns another string
7062 which contains the same bytes, but treats them as unibyte.
7064 *** The new function compare-strings lets you compare
7065 portions of two strings. Unibyte strings are converted to multibyte,
7066 so that a unibyte string can match a multibyte string.
7067 You can specify whether to ignore case or not.
7069 *** assoc-ignore-case now uses compare-strings so that
7070 it can treat unibyte and multibyte strings as equal.
7072 *** Regular expression operations and buffer string searches now
7073 convert the search pattern to multibyte or unibyte to accord with the
7074 buffer or string being searched.
7076 One consequence is that you cannot always use \200-\377 inside of
7077 [...] to match all non-ASCII characters. This does still work when
7078 searching or matching a unibyte buffer or string, but not when
7079 searching or matching a multibyte string. Unfortunately, there is no
7080 obvious choice of syntax to use within [...] for that job. But, what
7081 you want is just to match all non-ASCII characters, the regular
7082 expression [^\0-\177] works for it.
7084 *** Structure of coding system changed.
7086 All coding systems (including aliases and subsidiaries) are named
7087 by symbols; the symbol's `coding-system' property is a vector
7088 which defines the coding system. Aliases share the same vector
7089 as the principal name, so that altering the contents of this
7090 vector affects the principal name and its aliases. You can define
7091 your own alias name of a coding system by the function
7092 define-coding-system-alias.
7094 The coding system definition includes a property list of its own. Use
7095 the new functions `coding-system-get' and `coding-system-put' to
7096 access such coding system properties as post-read-conversion,
7097 pre-write-conversion, character-translation-table-for-decode,
7098 character-translation-table-for-encode, mime-charset, and
7099 safe-charsets. For instance, (coding-system-get 'iso-latin-1
7100 'mime-charset) gives the corresponding MIME-charset parameter
7103 Among the coding system properties listed above, safe-charsets is new.
7104 The value of this property is a list of character sets which this
7105 coding system can correctly encode and decode. For instance:
7106 (coding-system-get 'iso-latin-1 'safe-charsets) => (ascii latin-iso8859-1)
7108 Here, "correctly encode" means that the encoded character sets can
7109 also be handled safely by systems other than Emacs as far as they
7110 are capable of that coding system. Though, Emacs itself can encode
7111 the other character sets and read it back correctly.
7113 *** The new function select-safe-coding-system can be used to find a
7114 proper coding system for encoding the specified region or string.
7115 This function requires a user interaction.
7117 *** The new functions find-coding-systems-region and
7118 find-coding-systems-string are helper functions used by
7119 select-safe-coding-system. They return a list of all proper coding
7120 systems to encode a text in some region or string. If you don't want
7121 a user interaction, use one of these functions instead of
7122 select-safe-coding-system.
7124 *** The explicit encoding and decoding functions, such as
7125 decode-coding-region and encode-coding-string, now set
7126 last-coding-system-used to reflect the actual way encoding or decoding
7129 *** The new function detect-coding-with-language-environment can be
7130 used to detect a coding system of text according to priorities of
7131 coding systems used by some specific language environment.
7133 *** The functions detect-coding-region and detect-coding-string always
7134 return a list if the arg HIGHEST is nil. Thus, if only ASCII
7135 characters are found, they now return a list of single element
7136 `undecided' or its subsidiaries.
7138 *** The new functions coding-system-change-eol-conversion and
7139 coding-system-change-text-conversion can be used to get a different
7140 coding system than what specified only in how end-of-line or text is
7143 *** The new function set-selection-coding-system can be used to set a
7144 coding system for communicating with other X clients.
7146 *** The function `map-char-table' now passes as argument only valid
7147 character codes, plus generic characters that stand for entire
7148 character sets or entire subrows of a character set. In other words,
7149 each time `map-char-table' calls its FUNCTION argument, the key value
7150 either will be a valid individual character code, or will stand for a
7151 range of characters.
7153 *** The new function `char-valid-p' can be used for checking whether a
7154 Lisp object is a valid character code or not.
7156 *** The new function `charset-after' returns a charset of a character
7157 in the current buffer at position POS.
7159 *** Input methods are now implemented using the variable
7160 input-method-function. If this is non-nil, its value should be a
7161 function; then, whenever Emacs reads an input event that is a printing
7162 character with no modifier bits, it calls that function, passing the
7163 event as an argument. Often this function will read more input, first
7164 binding input-method-function to nil.
7166 The return value should be a list of the events resulting from input
7167 method processing. These events will be processed sequentially as
7168 input, before resorting to unread-command-events. Events returned by
7169 the input method function are not passed to the input method function,
7170 not even if they are printing characters with no modifier bits.
7172 The input method function is not called when reading the second and
7173 subsequent events of a key sequence.
7175 *** You can customize any language environment by using
7176 set-language-environment-hook and exit-language-environment-hook.
7178 The hook `exit-language-environment-hook' should be used to undo
7179 customizations that you made with set-language-environment-hook. For
7180 instance, if you set up a special key binding for a specific language
7181 environment by set-language-environment-hook, you should set up
7182 exit-language-environment-hook to restore the normal key binding.
7184 * Changes in Emacs 20.1
7186 ** Emacs has a new facility for customization of its many user
7187 options. It is called M-x customize. With this facility you can look
7188 at the many user options in an organized way; they are grouped into a
7191 M-x customize also knows what sorts of values are legitimate for each
7192 user option and ensures that you don't use invalid values.
7194 With M-x customize, you can set options either for the present Emacs
7195 session or permanently. (Permanent settings are stored automatically
7196 in your .emacs file.)
7198 ** Scroll bars are now on the left side of the window.
7199 You can change this with M-x customize-option scroll-bar-mode.
7201 ** The mode line no longer includes the string `Emacs'.
7202 This makes more space in the mode line for other information.
7204 ** When you select a region with the mouse, it is highlighted
7205 immediately afterward. At that time, if you type the DELETE key, it
7208 The BACKSPACE key, and the ASCII character DEL, do not do this; they
7209 delete the character before point, as usual.
7211 ** In an incremental search the whole current match is highlighted
7212 on terminals which support this. (You can disable this feature
7213 by setting search-highlight to nil.)
7215 ** In the minibuffer, in some cases, you can now use M-n to
7216 insert the default value into the minibuffer as text. In effect,
7217 the default value (if the minibuffer routines know it) is tacked
7218 onto the history "in the future". (The more normal use of the
7219 history list is to use M-p to insert minibuffer input used in the
7222 ** In Text mode, now only blank lines separate paragraphs.
7223 This makes it possible to get the full benefit of Adaptive Fill mode
7224 in Text mode, and other modes derived from it (such as Mail mode).
7225 TAB in Text mode now runs the command indent-relative; this
7226 makes a practical difference only when you use indented paragraphs.
7228 As a result, the old Indented Text mode is now identical to Text mode,
7229 and is an alias for it.
7231 If you want spaces at the beginning of a line to start a paragraph,
7232 use the new mode, Paragraph Indent Text mode.
7234 ** Scrolling changes
7236 *** Scroll commands to scroll a whole screen now preserve the screen
7237 position of the cursor, if scroll-preserve-screen-position is non-nil.
7239 In this mode, if you scroll several screens back and forth, finishing
7240 on the same screen where you started, the cursor goes back to the line
7243 *** If you set scroll-conservatively to a small number, then when you
7244 move point a short distance off the screen, Emacs will scroll the
7245 screen just far enough to bring point back on screen, provided that
7246 does not exceed `scroll-conservatively' lines.
7248 *** The new variable scroll-margin says how close point can come to the
7249 top or bottom of a window. It is a number of screen lines; if point
7250 comes within that many lines of the top or bottom of the window, Emacs
7251 recenters the window.
7253 ** International character set support (MULE)
7255 Emacs now supports a wide variety of international character sets,
7256 including European variants of the Latin alphabet, as well as Chinese,
7257 Devanagari (Hindi and Marathi), Ethiopian, Greek, IPA, Japanese,
7258 Korean, Lao, Russian, Thai, Tibetan, and Vietnamese scripts. These
7259 features have been merged from the modified version of Emacs known as
7260 MULE (for "MULti-lingual Enhancement to GNU Emacs")
7262 Users of these scripts have established many more-or-less standard
7263 coding systems for storing files. Emacs uses a single multibyte
7264 character encoding within Emacs buffers; it can translate from a wide
7265 variety of coding systems when reading a file and can translate back
7266 into any of these coding systems when saving a file.
7268 Keyboards, even in the countries where these character sets are used,
7269 generally don't have keys for all the characters in them. So Emacs
7270 supports various "input methods", typically one for each script or
7271 language, to make it possible to type them.
7273 The Emacs internal multibyte encoding represents a non-ASCII
7274 character as a sequence of bytes in the range 0200 through 0377.
7276 The new prefix key C-x RET is used for commands that pertain
7277 to multibyte characters, coding systems, and input methods.
7279 You can disable multibyte character support as follows:
7281 (setq-default enable-multibyte-characters nil)
7283 Calling the function standard-display-european turns off multibyte
7284 characters, unless you specify a non-nil value for the second
7285 argument, AUTO. This provides compatibility for people who are
7286 already using standard-display-european to continue using unibyte
7287 characters for their work until they want to change.
7291 An input method is a kind of character conversion which is designed
7292 specifically for interactive input. In Emacs, typically each language
7293 has its own input method (though sometimes several languages which use
7294 the same characters can share one input method). Some languages
7295 support several input methods.
7297 The simplest kind of input method works by mapping ASCII letters into
7298 another alphabet. This is how the Greek and Russian input methods
7301 A more powerful technique is composition: converting sequences of
7302 characters into one letter. Many European input methods use
7303 composition to produce a single non-ASCII letter from a sequence which
7304 consists of a letter followed by diacritics. For example, a' is one
7305 sequence of two characters that might be converted into a single
7308 The input methods for syllabic scripts typically use mapping followed
7309 by conversion. The input methods for Thai and Korean work this way.
7310 First, letters are mapped into symbols for particular sounds or tone
7311 marks; then, sequences of these which make up a whole syllable are
7312 mapped into one syllable sign--most often a "composite character".
7314 None of these methods works very well for Chinese and Japanese, so
7315 they are handled specially. First you input a whole word using
7316 phonetic spelling; then, after the word is in the buffer, Emacs
7317 converts it into one or more characters using a large dictionary.
7319 Since there is more than one way to represent a phonetically spelled
7320 word using Chinese characters, Emacs can only guess which one to use;
7321 typically these input methods give you a way to say "guess again" if
7322 the first guess is wrong.
7324 *** The command C-x RET m (toggle-enable-multibyte-characters)
7325 turns multibyte character support on or off for the current buffer.
7327 If multibyte character support is turned off in a buffer, then each
7328 byte is a single character, even codes 0200 through 0377--exactly as
7329 they did in Emacs 19.34. This includes the features for support for
7330 the European characters, ISO Latin-1 and ISO Latin-2.
7332 However, there is no need to turn off multibyte character support to
7333 use ISO Latin-1 or ISO Latin-2; the Emacs multibyte character set
7334 includes all the characters in these character sets, and Emacs can
7335 translate automatically to and from either one.
7337 *** Visiting a file in unibyte mode.
7339 Turning off multibyte character support in the buffer after visiting a
7340 file with multibyte code conversion will display the multibyte
7341 sequences already in the buffer, byte by byte. This is probably not
7344 If you want to edit a file of unibyte characters (Latin-1, for
7345 example), you can do it by specifying `no-conversion' as the coding
7346 system when reading the file. This coding system also turns off
7347 multibyte characters in that buffer.
7349 If you turn off multibyte character support entirely, this turns off
7350 character conversion as well.
7352 *** Displaying international characters on X Windows.
7354 A font for X typically displays just one alphabet or script.
7355 Therefore, displaying the entire range of characters Emacs supports
7356 requires using many fonts.
7358 Therefore, Emacs now supports "fontsets". Each fontset is a
7359 collection of fonts, each assigned to a range of character codes.
7361 A fontset has a name, like a font. Individual fonts are defined by
7362 the X server; fontsets are defined within Emacs itself. But once you
7363 have defined a fontset, you can use it in a face or a frame just as
7364 you would use a font.
7366 If a fontset specifies no font for a certain character, or if it
7367 specifies a font that does not exist on your system, then it cannot
7368 display that character. It will display an empty box instead.
7370 The fontset height and width are determined by the ASCII characters
7371 (that is, by the font in the fontset which is used for ASCII
7374 *** Defining fontsets.
7376 Emacs does not use any fontset by default. Its default font is still
7377 chosen as in previous versions. You can tell Emacs to use a fontset
7378 with the `-fn' option or the `Font' X resource.
7380 Emacs creates a standard fontset automatically according to the value
7381 of standard-fontset-spec. This fontset's short name is
7382 `fontset-standard'. Bold, italic, and bold-italic variants of the
7383 standard fontset are created automatically.
7385 If you specify a default ASCII font with the `Font' resource or `-fn'
7386 argument, a fontset is generated from it. This works by replacing the
7387 FOUNDARY, FAMILY, ADD_STYLE, and AVERAGE_WIDTH fields of the font name
7388 with `*' then using this to specify a fontset. This fontset's short
7389 name is `fontset-startup'.
7391 Emacs checks resources of the form Fontset-N where N is 0, 1, 2...
7392 The resource value should have this form:
7393 FONTSET-NAME, [CHARSET-NAME:FONT-NAME]...
7394 FONTSET-NAME should have the form of a standard X font name, except:
7395 * most fields should be just the wild card "*".
7396 * the CHARSET_REGISTRY field should be "fontset"
7397 * the CHARSET_ENCODING field can be any nickname of the fontset.
7398 The construct CHARSET-NAME:FONT-NAME can be repeated any number
7399 of times; each time specifies the font for one character set.
7400 CHARSET-NAME should be the name of a character set, and FONT-NAME
7401 should specify an actual font to use for that character set.
7403 Each of these fontsets has an alias which is made from the
7404 last two font name fields, CHARSET_REGISTRY and CHARSET_ENCODING.
7405 You can refer to the fontset by that alias or by its full name.
7407 For any character sets that you don't mention, Emacs tries to choose a
7408 font by substituting into FONTSET-NAME. For instance, with the
7410 Emacs*Fontset-0: -*-fixed-medium-r-normal-*-24-*-*-*-*-*-fontset-24
7411 the font for ASCII is generated as below:
7412 -*-fixed-medium-r-normal-*-24-*-ISO8859-1
7413 Here is the substitution rule:
7414 Change CHARSET_REGISTRY and CHARSET_ENCODING to that of the charset
7415 defined in the variable x-charset-registries. For instance, ASCII has
7416 the entry (ascii . "ISO8859-1") in this variable. Then, reduce
7417 sequences of wild cards -*-...-*- with a single wildcard -*-.
7418 (This is to prevent use of auto-scaled fonts.)
7420 The function which processes the fontset resource value to create the
7421 fontset is called create-fontset-from-fontset-spec. You can also call
7422 that function explicitly to create a fontset.
7424 With the X resource Emacs.Font, you can specify a fontset name just
7425 like an actual font name. But be careful not to specify a fontset
7426 name in a wildcard resource like Emacs*Font--that tries to specify the
7427 fontset for other purposes including menus, and they cannot handle
7430 *** The command M-x set-language-environment sets certain global Emacs
7431 defaults for a particular choice of language.
7433 Selecting a language environment typically specifies a default input
7434 method and which coding systems to recognize automatically when
7435 visiting files. However, it does not try to reread files you have
7436 already visited; the text in those buffers is not affected. The
7437 language environment may also specify a default choice of coding
7438 system for new files that you create.
7440 It makes no difference which buffer is current when you use
7441 set-language-environment, because these defaults apply globally to the
7442 whole Emacs session.
7444 For example, M-x set-language-environment RET Latin-1 RET
7445 chooses the Latin-1 character set. In the .emacs file, you can do this
7446 with (set-language-environment "Latin-1").
7448 *** The command C-x RET f (set-buffer-file-coding-system)
7449 specifies the file coding system for the current buffer. This
7450 specifies what sort of character code translation to do when saving
7451 the file. As an argument, you must specify the name of one of the
7452 coding systems that Emacs supports.
7454 *** The command C-x RET c (universal-coding-system-argument)
7455 lets you specify a coding system when you read or write a file.
7456 This command uses the minibuffer to read a coding system name.
7457 After you exit the minibuffer, the specified coding system
7458 is used for *the immediately following command*.
7460 So if the immediately following command is a command to read or
7461 write a file, it uses the specified coding system for that file.
7463 If the immediately following command does not use the coding system,
7464 then C-x RET c ultimately has no effect.
7466 For example, C-x RET c iso-8859-1 RET C-x C-f temp RET
7467 visits the file `temp' treating it as ISO Latin-1.
7469 *** You can specify the coding system for a file using the -*-
7470 construct. Include `coding: CODINGSYSTEM;' inside the -*-...-*-
7471 to specify use of coding system CODINGSYSTEM. You can also
7472 specify the coding system in a local variable list at the end
7475 *** The command C-x RET t (set-terminal-coding-system) specifies
7476 the coding system for terminal output. If you specify a character
7477 code for terminal output, all characters output to the terminal are
7478 translated into that character code.
7480 This feature is useful for certain character-only terminals built in
7481 various countries to support the languages of those countries.
7483 By default, output to the terminal is not translated at all.
7485 *** The command C-x RET k (set-keyboard-coding-system) specifies
7486 the coding system for keyboard input.
7488 Character code translation of keyboard input is useful for terminals
7489 with keys that send non-ASCII graphic characters--for example,
7490 some terminals designed for ISO Latin-1 or subsets of it.
7492 By default, keyboard input is not translated at all.
7494 Character code translation of keyboard input is similar to using an
7495 input method, in that both define sequences of keyboard input that
7496 translate into single characters. However, input methods are designed
7497 to be convenient for interactive use, while the code translations are
7498 designed to work with terminals.
7500 *** The command C-x RET p (set-buffer-process-coding-system)
7501 specifies the coding system for input and output to a subprocess.
7502 This command applies to the current buffer; normally, each subprocess
7503 has its own buffer, and thus you can use this command to specify
7504 translation to and from a particular subprocess by giving the command
7505 in the corresponding buffer.
7507 By default, process input and output are not translated at all.
7509 *** The variable file-name-coding-system specifies the coding system
7510 to use for encoding file names before operating on them.
7511 It is also used for decoding file names obtained from the system.
7513 *** The command C-\ (toggle-input-method) activates or deactivates
7514 an input method. If no input method has been selected before, the
7515 command prompts for you to specify the language and input method you
7518 C-u C-\ (select-input-method) lets you switch to a different input
7519 method. C-h C-\ (or C-h I) describes the current input method.
7521 *** Some input methods remap the keyboard to emulate various keyboard
7522 layouts commonly used for particular scripts. How to do this
7523 remapping properly depends on your actual keyboard layout. To specify
7524 which layout your keyboard has, use M-x quail-set-keyboard-layout.
7526 *** The command C-h C (describe-coding-system) displays
7527 the coding systems currently selected for various purposes, plus
7528 related information.
7530 *** The command C-h h (view-hello-file) displays a file called
7531 HELLO, which has examples of text in many languages, using various
7534 *** The command C-h L (describe-language-support) displays
7535 information about the support for a particular language.
7536 You specify the language as an argument.
7538 *** The mode line now contains a letter or character that identifies
7539 the coding system used in the visited file. It normally follows the
7542 A dash indicates the default state of affairs: no code conversion
7543 (except CRLF => newline if appropriate). `=' means no conversion
7544 whatsoever. The ISO 8859 coding systems are represented by digits
7545 1 through 9. Other coding systems are represented by letters:
7547 A alternativnyj (Russian)
7549 C cn-gb-2312 (Chinese)
7550 C iso-2022-cn (Chinese)
7551 D in-is13194-devanagari (Indian languages)
7552 E euc-japan (Japanese)
7553 I iso-2022-cjk or iso-2022-ss2 (Chinese, Japanese, Korean)
7554 J junet (iso-2022-7) or old-jis (iso-2022-jp-1978-irv) (Japanese)
7555 K euc-korea (Korean)
7558 S shift_jis (Japanese)
7561 V viscii or vscii (Vietnamese)
7562 i iso-2022-lock (Chinese, Japanese, Korean)
7563 k iso-2022-kr (Korean)
7567 When you are using a character-only terminal (not a window system),
7568 two additional characters appear in between the dash and the file
7569 coding system. These two characters describe the coding system for
7570 keyboard input, and the coding system for terminal output.
7572 *** The new variable rmail-file-coding-system specifies the code
7573 conversion to use for RMAIL files. The default value is nil.
7575 When you read mail with Rmail, each message is decoded automatically
7576 into Emacs' internal format. This has nothing to do with
7577 rmail-file-coding-system. That variable controls reading and writing
7578 Rmail files themselves.
7580 *** The new variable sendmail-coding-system specifies the code
7581 conversion for outgoing mail. The default value is nil.
7583 Actually, there are three different ways of specifying the coding system
7586 - If you use C-x RET f in the mail buffer, that takes priority.
7587 - Otherwise, if you set sendmail-coding-system non-nil, that specifies it.
7588 - Otherwise, the default coding system for new files is used,
7589 if that is non-nil. That comes from your language environment.
7590 - Otherwise, Latin-1 is used.
7592 *** The command C-h t (help-with-tutorial) accepts a prefix argument
7593 to specify the language for the tutorial file. Currently, English,
7594 Japanese, Korean and Thai are supported. We welcome additional
7597 ** An easy new way to visit a file with no code or format conversion
7598 of any kind: Use M-x find-file-literally. There is also a command
7599 insert-file-literally which inserts a file into the current buffer
7600 without any conversion.
7602 ** C-q's handling of octal character codes is changed.
7603 You can now specify any number of octal digits.
7604 RET terminates the digits and is discarded;
7605 any other non-digit terminates the digits and is then used as input.
7607 ** There are new commands for looking up Info documentation for
7608 functions, variables and file names used in your programs.
7610 Type M-x info-lookup-symbol to look up a symbol in the buffer at point.
7611 Type M-x info-lookup-file to look up a file in the buffer at point.
7613 Precisely which Info files are used to look it up depends on the major
7614 mode. For example, in C mode, the GNU libc manual is used.
7616 ** M-TAB in most programming language modes now runs the command
7617 complete-symbol. This command performs completion on the symbol name
7618 in the buffer before point.
7620 With a numeric argument, it performs completion based on the set of
7621 symbols documented in the Info files for the programming language that
7624 With no argument, it does completion based on the current tags tables,
7625 just like the old binding of M-TAB (complete-tag).
7627 ** File locking works with NFS now.
7629 The lock file for FILENAME is now a symbolic link named .#FILENAME,
7630 in the same directory as FILENAME.
7632 This means that collision detection between two different machines now
7633 works reasonably well; it also means that no file server or directory
7634 can become a bottleneck.
7636 The new method does have drawbacks. It means that collision detection
7637 does not operate when you edit a file in a directory where you cannot
7638 create new files. Collision detection also doesn't operate when the
7639 file server does not support symbolic links. But these conditions are
7640 rare, and the ability to have collision detection while using NFS is
7641 so useful that the change is worth while.
7643 When Emacs or a system crashes, this may leave behind lock files which
7644 are stale. So you may occasionally get warnings about spurious
7645 collisions. When you determine that the collision is spurious, just
7646 tell Emacs to go ahead anyway.
7648 ** If you wish to use Show Paren mode to display matching parentheses,
7649 it is no longer sufficient to load paren.el. Instead you must call
7652 ** If you wish to use Delete Selection mode to replace a highlighted
7653 selection when you insert new text, it is no longer sufficient to load
7654 delsel.el. Instead you must call the function delete-selection-mode.
7656 ** If you wish to use Partial Completion mode to complete partial words
7657 within symbols or filenames, it is no longer sufficient to load
7658 complete.el. Instead you must call the function partial-completion-mode.
7660 ** If you wish to use uniquify to rename buffers for you,
7661 it is no longer sufficient to load uniquify.el. You must also
7662 set uniquify-buffer-name-style to one of the non-nil legitimate values.
7664 ** Changes in View mode.
7666 *** Several new commands are available in View mode.
7667 Do H in view mode for a list of commands.
7669 *** There are two new commands for entering View mode:
7670 view-file-other-frame and view-buffer-other-frame.
7672 *** Exiting View mode does a better job of restoring windows to their
7675 *** New customization variable view-scroll-auto-exit. If non-nil,
7676 scrolling past end of buffer makes view mode exit.
7678 *** New customization variable view-exits-all-viewing-windows. If
7679 non-nil, view-mode will at exit restore all windows viewing buffer,
7680 not just the selected window.
7682 *** New customization variable view-read-only. If non-nil, visiting a
7683 read-only file automatically enters View mode, and toggle-read-only
7684 turns View mode on or off.
7686 *** New customization variable view-remove-frame-by-deleting controls
7687 how to remove a not needed frame at view mode exit. If non-nil,
7688 delete the frame, if nil make an icon of it.
7690 ** C-x v l, the command to print a file's version control log,
7691 now positions point at the entry for the file's current branch version.
7693 ** C-x v =, the command to compare a file with the last checked-in version,
7694 has a new feature. If the file is currently not locked, so that it is
7695 presumably identical to the last checked-in version, the command now asks
7696 which version to compare with.
7698 ** When using hideshow.el, incremental search can temporarily show hidden
7699 blocks if a match is inside the block.
7701 The block is hidden again if the search is continued and the next match
7702 is outside the block. By customizing the variable
7703 isearch-hide-immediately you can choose to hide all the temporarily
7704 shown blocks only when exiting from incremental search.
7706 By customizing the variable hs-isearch-open you can choose what kind
7707 of blocks to temporarily show during isearch: comment blocks, code
7708 blocks, all of them or none.
7710 ** The new command C-x 4 0 (kill-buffer-and-window) kills the
7711 current buffer and deletes the selected window. It asks for
7714 ** C-x C-w, which saves the buffer into a specified file name,
7715 now changes the major mode according to that file name.
7716 However, the mode will not be changed if
7717 (1) a local variables list or the `-*-' line specifies a major mode, or
7718 (2) the current major mode is a "special" mode,
7719 not suitable for ordinary files, or
7720 (3) the new file name does not particularly specify any mode.
7722 This applies to M-x set-visited-file-name as well.
7724 However, if you set change-major-mode-with-file-name to nil, then
7725 these commands do not change the major mode.
7727 ** M-x occur changes.
7729 *** If the argument to M-x occur contains upper case letters,
7730 it performs a case-sensitive search.
7732 *** In the *Occur* buffer made by M-x occur,
7733 if you type g or M-x revert-buffer, this repeats the search
7734 using the same regular expression and the same buffer as before.
7736 ** In Transient Mark mode, the region in any one buffer is highlighted
7737 in just one window at a time. At first, it is highlighted in the
7738 window where you set the mark. The buffer's highlighting remains in
7739 that window unless you select to another window which shows the same
7740 buffer--then the highlighting moves to that window.
7742 ** The feature to suggest key bindings when you use M-x now operates
7743 after the command finishes. The message suggesting key bindings
7744 appears temporarily in the echo area. The previous echo area contents
7745 come back after a few seconds, in case they contain useful information.
7747 ** Each frame now independently records the order for recently
7748 selected buffers, so that the default for C-x b is now based on the
7749 buffers recently selected in the selected frame.
7751 ** Outline mode changes.
7753 *** Outline mode now uses overlays (this is the former noutline.el).
7755 *** Incremental searches skip over invisible text in Outline mode.
7757 ** When a minibuffer window is active but not the selected window, if
7758 you try to use the minibuffer, you used to get a nested minibuffer.
7759 Now, this not only gives an error, it also cancels the minibuffer that
7762 The motive for this change is so that beginning users do not
7763 unknowingly move away from minibuffers, leaving them active, and then
7766 If you want to be able to have recursive minibuffers, you must
7767 set enable-recursive-minibuffers to non-nil.
7769 ** Changes in dynamic abbrevs.
7771 *** Expanding dynamic abbrevs with M-/ is now smarter about case
7772 conversion. If the expansion has mixed case not counting the first
7773 character, and the abbreviation matches the beginning of the expansion
7774 including case, then the expansion is copied verbatim.
7776 The expansion is also copied verbatim if the abbreviation itself has
7777 mixed case. And using SPC M-/ to copy an additional word always
7778 copies it verbatim except when the previous copied word is all caps.
7780 *** The values of `dabbrev-case-replace' and `dabbrev-case-fold-search'
7781 are no longer Lisp expressions. They have simply three possible
7784 `dabbrev-case-replace' has these three values: nil (don't preserve
7785 case), t (do), or `case-replace' (do like M-x query-replace).
7786 `dabbrev-case-fold-search' has these three values: nil (don't ignore
7787 case), t (do), or `case-fold-search' (do like search).
7789 ** Minibuffer history lists are truncated automatically now to a
7790 certain length. The variable history-length specifies how long they
7791 can be. The default value is 30.
7793 ** Changes in Mail mode.
7795 *** The key C-x m no longer runs the `mail' command directly.
7796 Instead, it runs the command `compose-mail', which invokes the mail
7797 composition mechanism you have selected with the variable
7798 `mail-user-agent'. The default choice of user agent is
7799 `sendmail-user-agent', which gives behavior compatible with the old
7802 C-x 4 m now runs compose-mail-other-window, and C-x 5 m runs
7803 compose-mail-other-frame.
7805 *** While composing a reply to a mail message, from Rmail, you can use
7806 the command C-c C-r to cite just the region from the message you are
7807 replying to. This copies the text which is the selected region in the
7808 buffer that shows the original message.
7810 *** The command C-c C-i inserts a file at the end of the message,
7811 with separator lines around the contents.
7813 *** The command M-x expand-mail-aliases expands all mail aliases
7814 in suitable mail headers. Emacs automatically extracts mail alias
7815 definitions from your mail alias file (e.g., ~/.mailrc). You do not
7816 need to expand mail aliases yourself before sending mail.
7818 *** New features in the mail-complete command.
7820 **** The mail-complete command now inserts the user's full name,
7821 for local users or if that is known. The variable mail-complete-style
7822 controls the style to use, and whether to do this at all.
7823 Its values are like those of mail-from-style.
7825 **** The variable mail-passwd-command lets you specify a shell command
7826 to run to fetch a set of password-entries that add to the ones in
7829 **** The variable mail-passwd-file now specifies a list of files to read
7830 to get the list of user ids. By default, one file is used:
7833 ** You can "quote" a file name to inhibit special significance of
7834 special syntax, by adding `/:' to the beginning. Thus, if you have a
7835 directory named `/foo:', you can prevent it from being treated as a
7836 reference to a remote host named `foo' by writing it as `/:/foo:'.
7838 Emacs uses this new construct automatically when necessary, such as
7839 when you start it with a working directory whose name might otherwise
7840 be taken to be magic.
7842 ** There is a new command M-x grep-find which uses find to select
7843 files to search through, and grep to scan them. The output is
7844 available in a Compile mode buffer, as with M-x grep.
7846 M-x grep now uses the -e option if the grep program supports that.
7847 (-e prevents problems if the search pattern starts with a dash.)
7849 ** In Dired, the & command now flags for deletion the files whose names
7850 suggest they are probably not needed in the long run.
7852 In Dired, * is now a prefix key for mark-related commands.
7854 new key dired.el binding old key
7855 ------- ---------------- -------
7856 * c dired-change-marks c
7858 * * dired-mark-executables * (binding deleted)
7859 * / dired-mark-directories / (binding deleted)
7860 * @ dired-mark-symlinks @ (binding deleted)
7862 * DEL dired-unmark-backward DEL
7863 * ? dired-unmark-all-files C-M-?
7864 * ! dired-unmark-all-marks
7865 * % dired-mark-files-regexp % m
7866 * C-n dired-next-marked-file M-}
7867 * C-p dired-prev-marked-file M-{
7871 *** When Rmail cannot convert your incoming mail into Babyl format, it
7872 saves the new mail in the file RMAILOSE.n, where n is an integer
7873 chosen to make a unique name. This way, Rmail will not keep crashing
7874 each time you run it.
7876 *** In Rmail, the variable rmail-summary-line-count-flag now controls
7877 whether to include the line count in the summary. Non-nil means yes.
7879 *** In Rmail summary buffers, d and C-d (the commands to delete
7880 messages) now take repeat counts as arguments. A negative argument
7881 means to move in the opposite direction.
7883 *** In Rmail, the t command now takes an optional argument which lets
7884 you specify whether to show the message headers in full or pruned.
7886 *** In Rmail, the new command w (rmail-output-body-to-file) writes
7887 just the body of the current message into a file, without the headers.
7888 It takes the file name from the message subject, by default, but you
7889 can edit that file name in the minibuffer before it is actually used
7894 *** nntp.el has been totally rewritten in an asynchronous fashion.
7896 *** Article prefetching functionality has been moved up into
7899 *** Scoring can now be performed with logical operators like
7900 `and', `or', `not', and parent redirection.
7902 *** Article washing status can be displayed in the
7905 *** gnus.el has been split into many smaller files.
7907 *** Suppression of duplicate articles based on Message-ID.
7909 (setq gnus-suppress-duplicates t)
7911 *** New variables for specifying what score and adapt files
7912 are to be considered home score and adapt files. See
7913 `gnus-home-score-file' and `gnus-home-adapt-files'.
7915 *** Groups can inherit group parameters from parent topics.
7917 *** Article editing has been revamped and is now usable.
7919 *** Signatures can be recognized in more intelligent fashions.
7920 See `gnus-signature-separator' and `gnus-signature-limit'.
7922 *** Summary pick mode has been made to look more nn-like.
7923 Line numbers are displayed and the `.' command can be
7924 used to pick articles.
7926 *** Commands for moving the .newsrc.eld from one server to
7927 another have been added.
7929 `M-x gnus-change-server'
7931 *** A way to specify that "uninteresting" fields be suppressed when
7932 generating lines in buffers.
7934 *** Several commands in the group buffer can be undone with
7937 *** Scoring can be done on words using the new score type `w'.
7939 *** Adaptive scoring can be done on a Subject word-by-word basis:
7941 (setq gnus-use-adaptive-scoring '(word))
7943 *** Scores can be decayed.
7945 (setq gnus-decay-scores t)
7947 *** Scoring can be performed using a regexp on the Date header. The
7948 Date is normalized to compact ISO 8601 format first.
7950 *** A new command has been added to remove all data on articles from
7953 `M-x gnus-group-clear-data-on-native-groups'
7955 *** A new command for reading collections of documents
7956 (nndoc with nnvirtual on top) has been added -- `C-M-d'.
7958 *** Process mark sets can be pushed and popped.
7960 *** A new mail-to-news backend makes it possible to post
7961 even when the NNTP server doesn't allow posting.
7963 *** A new backend for reading searches from Web search engines
7964 (DejaNews, Alta Vista, InReference) has been added.
7966 Use the `G w' command in the group buffer to create such
7969 *** Groups inside topics can now be sorted using the standard
7970 sorting functions, and each topic can be sorted independently.
7972 See the commands under the `T S' submap.
7974 *** Subsets of the groups can be sorted independently.
7976 See the commands under the `G P' submap.
7978 *** Cached articles can be pulled into the groups.
7980 Use the `Y c' command.
7982 *** Score files are now applied in a more reliable order.
7984 *** Reports on where mail messages end up can be generated.
7986 `M-x nnmail-split-history'
7988 *** More hooks and functions have been added to remove junk
7989 from incoming mail before saving the mail.
7991 See `nnmail-prepare-incoming-header-hook'.
7993 *** The nnml mail backend now understands compressed article files.
7995 *** To enable Gnus to read/post multi-lingual articles, you must execute
7996 the following code, for instance, in your .emacs.
7998 (add-hook 'gnus-startup-hook 'gnus-mule-initialize)
8000 Then, when you start Gnus, it will decode non-ASCII text automatically
8001 and show appropriate characters. (Note: if you are using gnus-mime
8002 from the SEMI package, formerly known as TM, you should NOT add this
8003 hook to gnus-startup-hook; gnus-mime has its own method of handling
8006 Since it is impossible to distinguish all coding systems
8007 automatically, you may need to specify a choice of coding system for a
8008 particular news group. This can be done by:
8010 (gnus-mule-add-group NEWSGROUP 'CODING-SYSTEM)
8012 Here NEWSGROUP should be a string which names a newsgroup or a tree
8013 of newsgroups. If NEWSGROUP is "XXX.YYY", all news groups under
8014 "XXX.YYY" (including "XXX.YYY.ZZZ") will use the specified coding
8015 system. CODING-SYSTEM specifies which coding system to use (for both
8016 for reading and posting).
8018 CODING-SYSTEM can also be a cons cell of the form
8019 (READ-CODING-SYSTEM . POST-CODING-SYSTEM)
8020 Then READ-CODING-SYSTEM is used when you read messages from the
8021 newsgroups, while POST-CODING-SYSTEM is used when you post messages
8024 Emacs knows the right coding systems for certain newsgroups by
8025 default. Here are some of these default settings:
8027 (gnus-mule-add-group "fj" 'iso-2022-7)
8028 (gnus-mule-add-group "alt.chinese.text" 'hz-gb-2312)
8029 (gnus-mule-add-group "alt.hk" 'hz-gb-2312)
8030 (gnus-mule-add-group "alt.chinese.text.big5" 'cn-big5)
8031 (gnus-mule-add-group "soc.culture.vietnamese" '(nil . viqr))
8033 When you reply by mail to an article, these settings are ignored;
8034 the mail is encoded according to sendmail-coding-system, as usual.
8038 *** If you edit primarily one style of C (or C++, Objective-C, Java)
8039 code, you may want to make the CC Mode style variables have global
8040 values so that you can set them directly in your .emacs file. To do
8041 this, set c-style-variables-are-local-p to nil in your .emacs file.
8042 Note that this only takes effect if you do it *before* cc-mode.el is
8045 If you typically edit more than one style of C (or C++, Objective-C,
8046 Java) code in a single Emacs session, you may want to make the CC Mode
8047 style variables have buffer local values. By default, all buffers
8048 share the same style variable settings; to make them buffer local, set
8049 c-style-variables-are-local-p to t in your .emacs file. Note that you
8050 must do this *before* CC Mode is loaded.
8052 *** The new variable c-indentation-style holds the C style name
8053 of the current buffer.
8055 *** The variable c-block-comments-indent-p has been deleted, because
8056 it is no longer necessary. C mode now handles all the supported styles
8057 of block comments, with no need to say which one you will use.
8059 *** There is a new indentation style "python", which specifies the C
8060 style that the Python developers like.
8062 *** There is a new c-cleanup-list option: brace-elseif-brace.
8063 This says to put ...} else if (...) {... on one line,
8064 just as brace-else-brace says to put ...} else {... on one line.
8068 *** In vc-retrieve-snapshot (C-x v r), if you don't specify a snapshot
8069 name, it retrieves the *latest* versions of all files in the current
8070 directory and its subdirectories (aside from files already locked).
8072 This feature is useful if your RCS directory is a link to a common
8073 master directory, and you want to pick up changes made by other
8076 You can do the same thing for an individual file by typing C-u C-x C-q
8077 RET in a buffer visiting that file.
8079 *** VC can now handle files under CVS that are being "watched" by
8080 other developers. Such files are made read-only by CVS. To get a
8081 writable copy, type C-x C-q in a buffer visiting such a file. VC then
8082 calls "cvs edit", which notifies the other developers of it.
8084 *** vc-version-diff (C-u C-x v =) now suggests reasonable defaults for
8085 version numbers, based on the current state of the file.
8087 ** Calendar changes.
8089 *** A new function, list-holidays, allows you list holidays or
8090 subclasses of holidays for ranges of years. Related menu items allow
8091 you do this for the year of the selected date, or the
8092 following/previous years.
8094 *** There is now support for the Baha'i calendar system. Use `pb' in
8095 the *Calendar* buffer to display the current Baha'i date. The Baha'i
8096 calendar, or "Badi calendar" is a system of 19 months with 19 days
8097 each, and 4 intercalary days (5 during a Gregorian leap year). The
8098 calendar begins May 23, 1844, with each of the months named after a
8099 supposed attribute of God.
8103 There are some new user variables and subgroups for customizing the page
8106 *** Headers & Footers (subgroup)
8108 Some printer systems print a header page and force the first page to
8109 be printed on the back of the header page when using duplex. If your
8110 printer system has this behavior, set variable
8111 `ps-banner-page-when-duplexing' to t.
8113 If variable `ps-banner-page-when-duplexing' is non-nil, it prints a
8114 blank page as the very first printed page. So, it behaves as if the
8115 very first character of buffer (or region) were a form feed ^L (\014).
8117 The variable `ps-spool-config' specifies who is responsible for
8118 setting duplex mode and page size. Valid values are:
8120 lpr-switches duplex and page size are configured by `ps-lpr-switches'.
8121 Don't forget to set `ps-lpr-switches' to select duplex
8122 printing for your printer.
8124 setpagedevice duplex and page size are configured by ps-print using the
8125 setpagedevice PostScript operator.
8127 nil duplex and page size are configured by ps-print *not* using
8128 the setpagedevice PostScript operator.
8130 The variable `ps-spool-tumble' specifies how the page images on
8131 opposite sides of a sheet are oriented with respect to each other. If
8132 `ps-spool-tumble' is nil, ps-print produces output suitable for
8133 bindings on the left or right. If `ps-spool-tumble' is non-nil,
8134 ps-print produces output suitable for bindings at the top or bottom.
8135 This variable takes effect only if `ps-spool-duplex' is non-nil.
8136 The default value is nil.
8138 The variable `ps-header-frame-alist' specifies a header frame
8139 properties alist. Valid frame properties are:
8141 fore-color Specify the foreground frame color.
8142 Value should be a float number between 0.0 (black
8143 color) and 1.0 (white color), or a string which is a
8144 color name, or a list of 3 float numbers which
8145 correspond to the Red Green Blue color scale, each
8146 float number between 0.0 (dark color) and 1.0 (bright
8147 color). The default is 0 ("black").
8149 back-color Specify the background frame color (similar to fore-color).
8150 The default is 0.9 ("gray90").
8152 shadow-color Specify the shadow color (similar to fore-color).
8153 The default is 0 ("black").
8155 border-color Specify the border color (similar to fore-color).
8156 The default is 0 ("black").
8158 border-width Specify the border width.
8161 Any other property is ignored.
8163 Don't change this alist directly; instead use Custom, or the
8164 `ps-value', `ps-get', `ps-put' and `ps-del' functions (see there for
8167 Ps-print can also print footers. The footer variables are:
8168 `ps-print-footer', `ps-footer-offset', `ps-print-footer-frame',
8169 `ps-footer-font-family', `ps-footer-font-size', `ps-footer-line-pad',
8170 `ps-footer-lines', `ps-left-footer', `ps-right-footer' and
8171 `ps-footer-frame-alist'. These variables are similar to those
8172 controlling headers.
8174 *** Color management (subgroup)
8176 If `ps-print-color-p' is non-nil, the buffer's text will be printed in
8179 *** Face Management (subgroup)
8181 If you need to print without worrying about face background colors,
8182 set the variable `ps-use-face-background' which specifies if face
8183 background should be used. Valid values are:
8185 t always use face background color.
8186 nil never use face background color.
8187 (face...) list of faces whose background color will be used.
8189 *** N-up printing (subgroup)
8191 The variable `ps-n-up-printing' specifies the number of pages per
8194 The variable `ps-n-up-margin' specifies the margin in points (pt)
8195 between the sheet border and the n-up printing.
8197 If variable `ps-n-up-border-p' is non-nil, a border is drawn around
8200 The variable `ps-n-up-filling' specifies how the page matrix is filled
8201 on each sheet of paper. Following are the valid values for
8202 `ps-n-up-filling' with a filling example using a 3x4 page matrix:
8204 `left-top' 1 2 3 4 `left-bottom' 9 10 11 12
8208 `right-top' 4 3 2 1 `right-bottom' 12 11 10 9
8212 `top-left' 1 4 7 10 `bottom-left' 3 6 9 12
8216 `top-right' 10 7 4 1 `bottom-right' 12 9 6 3
8220 Any other value is treated as `left-top'.
8222 *** Zebra stripes (subgroup)
8224 The variable `ps-zebra-color' controls the zebra stripes grayscale or
8227 The variable `ps-zebra-stripe-follow' specifies how zebra stripes
8228 continue on next page. Visually, valid values are (the character `+'
8229 to the right of each column indicates that a line is printed):
8231 `nil' `follow' `full' `full-follow'
8232 Current Page -------- ----------- --------- ----------------
8233 1 XXXXX + 1 XXXXXXXX + 1 XXXXXX + 1 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8234 2 XXXXX + 2 XXXXXXXX + 2 XXXXXX + 2 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8235 3 XXXXX + 3 XXXXXXXX + 3 XXXXXX + 3 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8239 7 XXXXX + 7 XXXXXXXX + 7 XXXXXX + 7 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8240 8 XXXXX + 8 XXXXXXXX + 8 XXXXXX + 8 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8241 9 XXXXX + 9 XXXXXXXX + 9 XXXXXX + 9 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8244 -------- ----------- --------- ----------------
8245 Next Page -------- ----------- --------- ----------------
8246 12 XXXXX + 12 + 10 XXXXXX + 10 +
8247 13 XXXXX + 13 XXXXXXXX + 11 XXXXXX + 11 +
8248 14 XXXXX + 14 XXXXXXXX + 12 XXXXXX + 12 +
8249 15 + 15 XXXXXXXX + 13 + 13 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8250 16 + 16 + 14 + 14 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8251 17 + 17 + 15 + 15 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8252 18 XXXXX + 18 + 16 XXXXXX + 16 +
8253 19 XXXXX + 19 XXXXXXXX + 17 XXXXXX + 17 +
8254 20 XXXXX + 20 XXXXXXXX + 18 XXXXXX + 18 +
8257 -------- ----------- --------- ----------------
8259 Any other value is treated as `nil'.
8262 *** Printer management (subgroup)
8264 The variable `ps-printer-name-option' determines the option used by
8265 some utilities to indicate the printer name; it's used only when
8266 `ps-printer-name' is a non-empty string. If you're using the lpr
8267 utility to print, for example, `ps-printer-name-option' should be set
8270 The variable `ps-manual-feed' indicates if the printer requires manual
8271 paper feeding. If it's nil, automatic feeding takes place. If it's
8272 non-nil, manual feeding takes place.
8274 The variable `ps-end-with-control-d' specifies whether C-d (\x04)
8275 should be inserted at end of the generated PostScript. Non-nil means
8278 *** Page settings (subgroup)
8280 If variable `ps-warn-paper-type' is nil, it's *not* treated as an
8281 error if the PostScript printer doesn't have a paper with the size
8282 indicated by `ps-paper-type'; the default paper size will be used
8283 instead. If `ps-warn-paper-type' is non-nil, an error is signaled if
8284 the PostScript printer doesn't support a paper with the size indicated
8285 by `ps-paper-type'. This is used when `ps-spool-config' is set to
8288 The variable `ps-print-upside-down' determines the orientation for
8289 printing pages: nil means `normal' printing, non-nil means
8290 `upside-down' printing (that is, the page is rotated by 180 degrees).
8292 The variable `ps-selected-pages' specifies which pages to print. If
8293 it's nil, all pages are printed. If it's a list, list elements may be
8294 integers specifying a single page to print, or cons cells (FROM . TO)
8295 specifying to print from page FROM to TO. Invalid list elements, that
8296 is integers smaller than one, or elements whose FROM is greater than
8297 its TO, are ignored.
8299 The variable `ps-even-or-odd-pages' specifies how to print even/odd
8300 pages. Valid values are:
8302 nil print all pages.
8304 `even-page' print only even pages.
8306 `odd-page' print only odd pages.
8308 `even-sheet' print only even sheets.
8309 That is, if `ps-n-up-printing' is 1, it behaves like
8310 `even-page', but for values greater than 1, it'll
8311 print only the even sheet of paper.
8313 `odd-sheet' print only odd sheets.
8314 That is, if `ps-n-up-printing' is 1, it behaves like
8315 `odd-page'; but for values greater than 1, it'll print
8316 only the odd sheet of paper.
8318 Any other value is treated as nil.
8320 If you set `ps-selected-pages' (see there for documentation), pages
8321 are filtered by `ps-selected-pages', and then by
8322 `ps-even-or-odd-pages'. For example, if we have:
8324 (setq ps-selected-pages '(1 4 (6 . 10) (12 . 16) 20))
8326 and we combine this with `ps-even-or-odd-pages' and
8327 `ps-n-up-printing', we get:
8329 `ps-n-up-printing' = 1:
8330 `ps-even-or-odd-pages' PAGES PRINTED
8331 nil 1, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 20
8332 even-page 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, 16, 20
8333 odd-page 1, 7, 9, 13, 15
8334 even-sheet 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, 16, 20
8335 odd-sheet 1, 7, 9, 13, 15
8337 `ps-n-up-printing' = 2:
8338 `ps-even-or-odd-pages' PAGES PRINTED
8339 nil 1/4, 6/7, 8/9, 10/12, 13/14, 15/16, 20
8340 even-page 4/6, 8/10, 12/14, 16/20
8341 odd-page 1/7, 9/13, 15
8342 even-sheet 6/7, 10/12, 15/16
8343 odd-sheet 1/4, 8/9, 13/14, 20
8345 *** Miscellany (subgroup)
8347 The variable `ps-error-handler-message' specifies where error handler
8348 messages should be sent.
8350 It is also possible to add a user-defined PostScript prologue code in
8351 front of all generated prologue code by setting the variable
8352 `ps-user-defined-prologue'.
8354 The variable `ps-line-number-font' specifies the font for line numbers.
8356 The variable `ps-line-number-font-size' specifies the font size in
8357 points for line numbers.
8359 The variable `ps-line-number-color' specifies the color for line
8360 numbers. See `ps-zebra-color' for documentation.
8362 The variable `ps-line-number-step' specifies the interval in which
8363 line numbers are printed. For example, if `ps-line-number-step' is set
8364 to 2, the printing will look like:
8376 integer an integer specifying the interval in which line numbers are
8377 printed. If it's smaller than or equal to zero, 1
8380 `zebra' specifies that only the line number of the first line in a
8381 zebra stripe is to be printed.
8383 Any other value is treated as `zebra'.
8385 The variable `ps-line-number-start' specifies the starting point in
8386 the interval given by `ps-line-number-step'. For example, if
8387 `ps-line-number-step' is set to 3, and `ps-line-number-start' is set to
8388 3, the output will look like:
8402 The variable `ps-postscript-code-directory' specifies the directory
8403 where the PostScript prologue file used by ps-print is found.
8405 The variable `ps-line-spacing' determines the line spacing in points,
8406 for ordinary text, when generating PostScript (similar to
8409 The variable `ps-paragraph-spacing' determines the paragraph spacing,
8410 in points, for ordinary text, when generating PostScript (similar to
8413 The variable `ps-paragraph-regexp' specifies the paragraph delimiter.
8415 The variable `ps-begin-cut-regexp' and `ps-end-cut-regexp' specify the
8416 start and end of a region to cut out when printing.
8418 ** hideshow changes.
8420 *** now supports hiding of blocks of single line comments (like // for
8423 *** Support for java-mode added.
8425 *** When doing `hs-hide-all' it is now possible to also hide the comments
8426 in the file if `hs-hide-comments-when-hiding-all' is set.
8428 *** The new function `hs-hide-initial-comment' hides the comments at
8429 the beginning of the files. Finally those huge RCS logs don't stay in your
8430 way! This is run by default when entering the `hs-minor-mode'.
8432 *** Now uses overlays instead of `selective-display', so is more
8433 robust and a lot faster.
8435 *** A block beginning can span multiple lines.
8437 *** The new variable `hs-show-hidden-short-form' if t, directs hideshow
8438 to show only the beginning of a block when it is hidden. See the
8439 documentation for more details.
8441 ** Changes in Enriched mode.
8443 *** When you visit a file in enriched-mode, Emacs will make sure it is
8444 filled to the current fill-column. This behavior is now independent
8445 of the size of the window. When you save the file, the fill-column in
8446 use is stored as well, so that the whole buffer need not be refilled
8447 the next time unless the fill-column is different.
8449 *** use-hard-newlines is now a minor mode. When it is enabled, Emacs
8450 distinguishes between hard and soft newlines, and treats hard newlines
8451 as paragraph boundaries. Otherwise all newlines inserted are marked
8452 as soft, and paragraph boundaries are determined solely from the text.
8458 The variables font-lock-face-attributes, font-lock-display-type and
8459 font-lock-background-mode are now obsolete; the recommended way to specify the
8460 faces to use for Font Lock mode is with M-x customize-group on the new custom
8461 group font-lock-highlighting-faces. If you set font-lock-face-attributes in
8462 your ~/.emacs file, Font Lock mode will respect its value. However, you should
8463 consider converting from setting that variable to using M-x customize.
8465 You can still use X resources to specify Font Lock face appearances.
8467 *** Maximum decoration
8469 Fontification now uses the maximum level of decoration supported by
8470 default. Previously, fontification used a mode-specific default level
8471 of decoration, which is typically the minimum level of decoration
8472 supported. You can set font-lock-maximum-decoration to nil
8473 to get the old behavior.
8477 Support is now provided for Java, Objective-C, AWK and SIMULA modes.
8479 Note that Font Lock mode can be turned on without knowing exactly what modes
8480 support Font Lock mode, via the command global-font-lock-mode.
8482 *** Configurable support
8484 Support for C, C++, Objective-C and Java can be more easily configured for
8485 additional types and classes via the new variables c-font-lock-extra-types,
8486 c++-font-lock-extra-types, objc-font-lock-extra-types and, you guessed it,
8487 java-font-lock-extra-types. These value of each of these variables should be a
8488 list of regexps matching the extra type names. For example, the default value
8489 of c-font-lock-extra-types is ("\\sw+_t") which means fontification follows the
8490 convention that C type names end in _t. This results in slower fontification.
8492 Of course, you can change the variables that specify fontification in whatever
8493 way you wish, typically by adding regexps. However, these new variables make
8494 it easier to make specific and common changes for the fontification of types.
8496 *** Adding highlighting patterns to existing support
8498 You can use the new function font-lock-add-keywords to add your own
8499 highlighting patterns, such as for project-local or user-specific constructs,
8502 For example, to highlight `FIXME:' words in C comments, put:
8504 (font-lock-add-keywords 'c-mode '(("\\<FIXME:" 0 font-lock-warning-face t)))
8510 Font Lock now defines two new faces, font-lock-builtin-face and
8511 font-lock-warning-face. These are intended to highlight builtin keywords,
8512 distinct from a language's normal keywords, and objects that should be brought
8513 to user attention, respectively. Various modes now use these new faces.
8515 *** Changes to fast-lock support mode
8517 The fast-lock package, one of the two Font Lock support modes, can now process
8518 cache files silently. You can use the new variable fast-lock-verbose, in the
8519 same way as font-lock-verbose, to control this feature.
8521 *** Changes to lazy-lock support mode
8523 The lazy-lock package, one of the two Font Lock support modes, can now fontify
8524 according to the true syntactic context relative to other lines. You can use
8525 the new variable lazy-lock-defer-contextually to control this feature. If
8526 non-nil, changes to the buffer will cause subsequent lines in the buffer to be
8527 refontified after lazy-lock-defer-time seconds of idle time. If nil, then only
8528 the modified lines will be refontified; this is the same as the previous Lazy
8529 Lock mode behaviour and the behaviour of Font Lock mode.
8531 This feature is useful in modes where strings or comments can span lines.
8532 For example, if a string or comment terminating character is deleted, then if
8533 this feature is enabled subsequent lines in the buffer will be correctly
8534 refontified to reflect their new syntactic context. Previously, only the line
8535 containing the deleted character would be refontified and you would have to use
8536 the command M-g M-g (font-lock-fontify-block) to refontify some lines.
8538 As a consequence of this new feature, two other variables have changed:
8540 Variable `lazy-lock-defer-driven' is renamed `lazy-lock-defer-on-scrolling'.
8541 Variable `lazy-lock-defer-time' can now only be a time, i.e., a number.
8542 Buffer modes for which on-the-fly deferral applies can be specified via the
8543 new variable `lazy-lock-defer-on-the-fly'.
8545 If you set these variables in your ~/.emacs, then you may have to change those
8548 ** Ada mode changes.
8550 *** There is now better support for using find-file.el with Ada mode.
8551 If you switch between spec and body, the cursor stays in the same
8552 procedure (modulo overloading). If a spec has no body file yet, but
8553 you try to switch to its body file, Ada mode now generates procedure
8556 *** There are two new commands:
8557 - `ada-make-local' : invokes gnatmake on the current buffer
8558 - `ada-check-syntax' : check syntax of current buffer.
8560 The user options `ada-compiler-make', `ada-make-options',
8561 `ada-language-version', `ada-compiler-syntax-check', and
8562 `ada-compile-options' are used within these commands.
8564 *** Ada mode can now work with Outline minor mode. The outline level
8565 is calculated from the indenting, not from syntactic constructs.
8566 Outlining does not work if your code is not correctly indented.
8568 *** The new function `ada-gnat-style' converts the buffer to the style of
8569 formatting used in GNAT. It places two blanks after a comment start,
8570 places one blank between a word end and an opening '(', and puts one
8571 space between a comma and the beginning of a word.
8573 ** Scheme mode changes.
8575 *** Scheme mode indentation now uses many of the facilities of Lisp
8576 mode; therefore, the variables to customize it are the variables used
8577 for Lisp mode which have names starting with `lisp-'. The variables
8578 with names starting with `scheme-' which used to do this no longer
8581 If you want to use different indentation for Scheme and Lisp, this is
8582 still possible, but now you must do it by adding a hook to
8583 scheme-mode-hook, which could work by setting the `lisp-' indentation
8584 variables as buffer-local variables.
8586 *** DSSSL mode is a variant of Scheme mode, for editing DSSSL scripts.
8589 ** Changes to the emacsclient program
8591 *** If a socket can't be found, and environment variables LOGNAME or
8592 USER are set, emacsclient now looks for a socket based on the UID
8593 associated with the name. That is an emacsclient running as root
8594 can connect to an Emacs server started by a non-root user.
8596 *** The emacsclient program now accepts an option --no-wait which tells
8597 it to return immediately without waiting for you to "finish" the
8600 *** The new option --alternate-editor allows to specify an editor to
8601 use if Emacs is not running. The environment variable
8602 ALTERNATE_EDITOR can be used for the same effect; the command line
8603 option takes precedence.
8605 ** M-x eldoc-mode enables a minor mode in which the echo area
8606 constantly shows the parameter list for function being called at point
8607 (in Emacs Lisp and Lisp Interaction modes only).
8609 ** C-x n d now runs the new command narrow-to-defun,
8610 which narrows the accessible parts of the buffer to just
8613 ** Emacs now handles the `--' argument in the standard way; all
8614 following arguments are treated as ordinary file names.
8616 ** On MSDOS and Windows, the bookmark file is now called _emacs.bmk,
8617 and the saved desktop file is now called _emacs.desktop (truncated if
8620 ** When you kill a buffer that visits a file,
8621 if there are any registers that save positions in the file,
8622 these register values no longer become completely useless.
8623 If you try to go to such a register with C-x j, then you are
8624 asked whether to visit the file again. If you say yes,
8625 it visits the file and then goes to the same position.
8627 ** When you visit a file that changes frequently outside Emacs--for
8628 example, a log of output from a process that continues to run--it may
8629 be useful for Emacs to revert the file without querying you whenever
8630 you visit the file afresh with C-x C-f.
8632 You can request this behavior for certain files by setting the
8633 variable revert-without-query to a list of regular expressions. If a
8634 file's name matches any of these regular expressions, find-file and
8635 revert-buffer revert the buffer without asking for permission--but
8636 only if you have not edited the buffer text yourself.
8638 ** set-default-font has been renamed to set-frame-font
8639 since it applies only to the current frame.
8641 ** In TeX mode, you can use the variable tex-main-file to specify the
8642 file for tex-file to run TeX on. (By default, tex-main-file is nil,
8643 and tex-file runs TeX on the current visited file.)
8645 This is useful when you are editing a document that consists of
8646 multiple files. In each of the included files, you can set up a local
8647 variable list which specifies the top-level file of your document for
8648 tex-main-file. Then tex-file will run TeX on the whole document
8649 instead of just the file you are editing.
8653 RefTeX mode is a new minor mode with special support for \label, \ref
8654 and \cite macros in LaTeX documents. RefTeX distinguishes labels of
8655 different environments (equation, figure, ...) and has full support for
8656 multifile documents. To use it, select a buffer with a LaTeX document and
8657 turn the mode on with M-x reftex-mode. Here are the main user commands:
8660 Creates a label semi-automatically. RefTeX is context sensitive and
8661 knows which kind of label is needed.
8663 C-c ) reftex-reference
8664 Offers in a menu all labels in the document, along with context of the
8665 label definition. The selected label is referenced as \ref{LABEL}.
8667 C-c [ reftex-citation
8668 Prompts for a regular expression and displays a list of matching BibTeX
8669 database entries. The selected entry is cited with a \cite{KEY} macro.
8671 C-c & reftex-view-crossref
8672 Views the cross reference of a \ref or \cite command near point.
8675 Shows a table of contents of the (multifile) document. From there you
8676 can quickly jump to every section.
8678 Under X, RefTeX installs a "Ref" menu in the menu bar, with additional
8679 commands. Press `?' to get help when a prompt mentions this feature.
8680 Full documentation and customization examples are in the file
8681 reftex.el. You can use the finder to view the file documentation:
8682 C-h p --> tex --> reftex.el
8684 ** Changes in BibTeX mode.
8686 *** Info documentation is now available.
8688 *** Don't allow parentheses in string constants anymore. This confused
8689 both the BibTeX program and Emacs BibTeX mode.
8691 *** Renamed variable bibtex-mode-user-optional-fields to
8692 bibtex-user-optional-fields.
8694 *** Removed variable bibtex-include-OPTannote
8695 (use bibtex-user-optional-fields instead).
8697 *** New interactive functions to copy and kill fields and complete
8698 entries to the BibTeX kill ring, from where they can be yanked back by
8699 appropriate functions.
8701 *** New interactive functions for repositioning and marking of
8702 entries. They are bound by default to C-M-l and C-M-h.
8704 *** New hook bibtex-clean-entry-hook. It is called after entry has
8707 *** New variable bibtex-field-delimiters, which replaces variables
8708 bibtex-field-{left|right}-delimiter.
8710 *** New variable bibtex-entry-delimiters to determine how entries
8713 *** Allow preinitialization of fields. See documentation of
8714 bibtex-user-optional-fields, bibtex-entry-field-alist, and
8715 bibtex-include-OPTkey for details.
8717 *** Book and InBook entries require either an author or an editor
8718 field. This is now supported by bibtex.el. Alternative fields are
8719 prefixed with `ALT'.
8721 *** New variable bibtex-entry-format, which replaces variable
8722 bibtex-clean-entry-zap-empty-opts and allows specification of many
8723 formatting options performed on cleaning an entry (see variable
8726 *** Even more control on how automatic keys are generated. See
8727 documentation of bibtex-generate-autokey for details. Transcriptions
8728 for foreign languages other than German are now handled, too.
8730 *** New boolean user option bibtex-comma-after-last-field to decide if
8731 comma should be inserted at end of last field.
8733 *** New boolean user option bibtex-align-at-equal-sign to determine if
8734 alignment should be made at left side of field contents or at equal
8735 signs. New user options to control entry layout (e.g. indentation).
8737 *** New function bibtex-fill-entry to realign entries.
8739 *** New function bibtex-reformat to reformat region or buffer.
8741 *** New function bibtex-convert-alien to convert a BibTeX database
8744 *** New function bibtex-complete-key (similar to bibtex-complete-string)
8745 to complete prefix to a key defined in buffer. Mainly useful in
8748 *** New function bibtex-count-entries to count entries in buffer or
8751 *** Added support for imenu.
8753 *** The function `bibtex-validate' now checks current region instead
8754 of buffer if mark is active. Now it shows all errors of buffer in a
8755 `compilation mode' buffer. You can use the normal commands (e.g.
8756 `next-error') for compilation modes to jump to errors.
8758 *** New variable `bibtex-string-file-path' to determine where the files
8759 from `bibtex-string-files' are searched.
8761 ** Iso Accents mode now supports Latin-3 as an alternative.
8763 ** The command next-error now opens blocks hidden by hideshow.
8765 ** The function using-unix-filesystems has been replaced by the
8766 functions add-untranslated-filesystem and remove-untranslated-filesystem.
8767 Each of these functions takes the name of a drive letter or directory
8770 When a filesystem is added as untranslated, all files on it are read
8771 and written in binary mode (no cr/lf translation is performed).
8773 ** browse-url changes
8775 *** New methods for: Grail (browse-url-generic), MMM (browse-url-mmm),
8776 Lynx in a separate xterm (browse-url-lynx-xterm) or in an Emacs window
8777 (browse-url-lynx-emacs), remote W3 (browse-url-w3-gnudoit), generic
8778 non-remote-controlled browsers (browse-url-generic) and associated
8779 customization variables.
8781 *** New commands `browse-url-of-region' and `browse-url'.
8783 *** URLs marked up with <URL:...> (RFC1738) work if broken across
8784 lines. Browsing methods can be associated with URL regexps
8785 (e.g. mailto: URLs) via `browse-url-browser-function'.
8789 *** Clicking Mouse-2 on a brief command description in Ediff control panel
8790 pops up the Info file for this command.
8792 *** There is now a variable, ediff-autostore-merges, which controls whether
8793 the result of a merge is saved in a file. By default, this is done only when
8794 merge is done from a session group (eg, when merging files in two different
8797 *** Since Emacs 19.31 (this hasn't been announced before), Ediff can compare
8798 and merge groups of files residing in different directories, or revisions of
8799 files in the same directory.
8801 *** Since Emacs 19.31, Ediff can apply multi-file patches interactively.
8802 The patches must be in the context format or GNU unified format. (The bug
8803 related to the GNU format has now been fixed.)
8807 *** The startup file is now .viper instead of .vip
8808 *** All variable/function names have been changed to start with viper-
8810 *** C-\ now simulates the meta-key in all Viper states.
8811 *** C-z in Insert state now escapes to Vi for the duration of the next
8812 Viper command. In Vi and Insert states, C-z behaves as before.
8813 *** C-c \ escapes to Vi for one command if Viper is in Insert or Emacs states.
8814 *** _ is no longer the meta-key in Vi state.
8815 *** The variable viper-insert-state-cursor-color can be used to change cursor
8816 color when Viper is in insert state.
8817 *** If search lands the cursor near the top or the bottom of the window,
8818 Viper pulls the window up or down to expose more context. The variable
8819 viper-adjust-window-after-search controls this behavior.
8823 *** In C, C++, Objective C and Java, Etags tags global variables by
8824 default. The resulting tags files are inflated by 30% on average.
8825 Use --no-globals to turn this feature off. Etags can also tag
8826 variables which are members of structure-like constructs, but it does
8827 not by default. Use --members to turn this feature on.
8829 *** C++ member functions are now recognized as tags.
8831 *** Java is tagged like C++. In addition, "extends" and "implements"
8832 constructs are tagged. Files are recognised by the extension .java.
8834 *** Etags can now handle programs written in Postscript. Files are
8835 recognised by the extensions .ps and .pdb (Postscript with C syntax).
8836 In Postscript, tags are lines that start with a slash.
8838 *** Etags now handles Objective C and Objective C++ code. The usual C and
8839 C++ tags are recognized in these languages; in addition, etags
8840 recognizes special Objective C syntax for classes, class categories,
8841 methods and protocols.
8843 *** Etags also handles Cobol. Files are recognised by the extension
8844 .cobol. The tagged lines are those containing a word that begins in
8845 column 8 and ends in a full stop, i.e. anything that could be a
8848 *** Regexps in Etags now support intervals, as in ed or grep. The syntax of
8849 an interval is \{M,N\}, and it means to match the preceding expression
8850 at least M times and as many as N times.
8852 ** The format for specifying a custom format for time-stamp to insert
8853 in files has changed slightly.
8855 With the new enhancements to the functionality of format-time-string,
8856 time-stamp-format will change to be eventually compatible with it.
8857 This conversion is being done in two steps to maintain compatibility
8858 with old time-stamp-format values.
8860 In the new scheme, alternate case is signified by the number-sign
8861 (`#') modifier, rather than changing the case of the format character.
8862 This feature is as yet incompletely implemented for compatibility
8865 In the old time-stamp-format, all numeric fields defaulted to their
8866 natural width. (With format-time-string, each format has a
8867 fixed-width default.) In this version, you can specify the colon
8868 (`:') modifier to a numeric conversion to mean "give me the historical
8869 time-stamp-format width default." Do not use colon if you are
8870 specifying an explicit width, as in "%02d".
8872 Numbers are no longer truncated to the requested width, except in the
8873 case of "%02y", which continues to give a two-digit year. Digit
8874 truncation probably wasn't being used for anything else anyway.
8876 The new formats will work with old versions of Emacs. New formats are
8877 being recommended now to allow time-stamp-format to change in the
8878 future to be compatible with format-time-string. The new forms being
8879 recommended now will continue to work then.
8881 See the documentation string for the variable time-stamp-format for
8884 ** There are some additional major modes:
8886 dcl-mode, for editing VMS DCL files.
8887 m4-mode, for editing files of m4 input.
8888 meta-mode, for editing MetaFont and MetaPost source files.
8890 ** In Shell mode, the command shell-copy-environment-variable lets you
8891 copy the value of a specified environment variable from the subshell
8894 ** New Lisp packages include:
8896 *** battery.el displays battery status for laptops.
8898 *** M-x bruce (named after Lenny Bruce) is a program that might
8899 be used for adding some indecent words to your email.
8901 *** M-x crisp-mode enables an emulation for the CRiSP editor.
8903 *** M-x dirtrack arranges for better tracking of directory changes
8906 *** The new library elint.el provides for linting of Emacs Lisp code.
8907 See the documentation for `elint-initialize', `elint-current-buffer'
8910 *** M-x expand-add-abbrevs defines a special kind of abbrev which is
8911 meant for programming constructs. These abbrevs expand like ordinary
8912 ones, when you type SPC, but only at the end of a line and not within
8913 strings or comments.
8915 These abbrevs can act as templates: you can define places within an
8916 abbrev for insertion of additional text. Once you expand the abbrev,
8917 you can then use C-x a p and C-x a n to move back and forth to these
8918 insertion points. Thus you can conveniently insert additional text
8921 *** filecache.el remembers the location of files so that you
8922 can visit them by short forms of their names.
8924 *** find-func.el lets you find the definition of the user-loaded
8925 Emacs Lisp function at point.
8927 *** M-x handwrite converts text to a "handwritten" picture.
8929 *** M-x iswitchb-buffer is a command for switching to a buffer, much like
8930 switch-buffer, but it reads the argument in a more helpful way.
8932 *** M-x landmark implements a neural network for landmark learning.
8934 *** M-x locate provides a convenient interface to the `locate' program.
8936 *** M4 mode is a new mode for editing files of m4 input.
8938 *** mantemp.el creates C++ manual template instantiations
8939 from the GCC error messages which indicate which instantiations are needed.
8941 *** mouse-copy.el provides a one-click copy and move feature.
8942 You can drag a region with M-mouse-1, and it is automatically
8943 inserted at point. M-Shift-mouse-1 deletes the text from its
8944 original place after inserting the copy.
8946 *** mouse-drag.el lets you do scrolling by dragging Mouse-2
8949 You click the mouse and move; that distance either translates into the
8950 velocity to scroll (with mouse-drag-throw) or the distance to scroll
8951 (with mouse-drag-drag). Horizontal scrolling is enabled when needed.
8953 Enable mouse-drag with:
8954 (global-set-key [down-mouse-2] 'mouse-drag-throw)
8956 (global-set-key [down-mouse-2] 'mouse-drag-drag)
8958 *** mspools.el is useful for determining which mail folders have
8959 mail waiting to be read in them. It works with procmail.
8961 *** Octave mode is a major mode for editing files of input for Octave.
8962 It comes with a facility for communicating with an Octave subprocess.
8966 The ogonek package provides functions for changing the coding of
8967 Polish diacritic characters in buffers. Codings known from various
8968 platforms are supported such as ISO8859-2, Mazovia, IBM Latin2, and
8969 TeX. For example, you can change the coding from Mazovia to
8970 ISO8859-2. Another example is a change of coding from ISO8859-2 to
8971 prefix notation (in which `/a' stands for the aogonek character, for
8972 instance) and vice versa.
8974 To use this package load it using
8975 M-x load-library [enter] ogonek
8976 Then, you may get an explanation by calling one of
8977 M-x ogonek-jak -- in Polish
8978 M-x ogonek-how -- in English
8979 The info specifies the commands and variables provided as well as the
8980 ways of customization in `.emacs'.
8982 *** Interface to ph.
8984 Emacs provides a client interface to CCSO Nameservers (ph/qi)
8986 The CCSO nameserver is used in many universities to provide directory
8987 services about people. ph.el provides a convenient Emacs interface to
8990 *** uce.el is useful for replying to unsolicited commercial email.
8992 *** vcursor.el implements a "virtual cursor" feature.
8993 You can move the virtual cursor with special commands
8994 while the real cursor does not move.
8996 *** webjump.el is a "hot list" package which you can set up
8997 for visiting your favorite web sites.
8999 *** M-x winner-mode is a minor mode which saves window configurations,
9000 so you can move back to other configurations that you have recently used.
9004 Movemail no longer needs to be installed setuid root in order for POP
9005 mail retrieval to function properly. This is because it no longer
9006 supports the RPOP (reserved-port POP) protocol; instead, it uses the
9007 user's POP password to authenticate to the mail server.
9009 This change was made earlier, but not reported in NEWS before.
9011 * Emacs 20.1 changes for MS-DOS and MS-Windows.
9013 ** Changes in handling MS-DOS/MS-Windows text files.
9015 Emacs handles three different conventions for representing
9016 end-of-line: CRLF for MSDOS, LF for Unix and GNU, and CR (used on the
9017 Macintosh). Emacs determines which convention is used in a specific
9018 file based on the contents of that file (except for certain special
9019 file names), and when it saves the file, it uses the same convention.
9021 To save the file and change the end-of-line convention, you can use
9022 C-x RET f (set-buffer-file-coding-system) to specify a different
9023 coding system for the buffer. Then, when you save the file, the newly
9024 specified coding system will take effect. For example, to save with
9025 LF, specify undecided-unix (or some other ...-unix coding system); to
9026 save with CRLF, specify undecided-dos.
9028 * Lisp Changes in Emacs 20.1
9030 ** Byte-compiled files made with Emacs 20 will, in general, work in
9031 Emacs 19 as well, as long as the source code runs in Emacs 19. And
9032 vice versa: byte-compiled files made with Emacs 19 should also run in
9033 Emacs 20, as long as the program itself works in Emacs 20.
9035 ** Windows-specific functions and variables have been renamed
9036 to start with w32- instead of win32-.
9038 In hacker language, calling something a "win" is a form of praise. We
9039 don't want to praise a non-free Microsoft system, so we don't call it
9042 ** Basic Lisp changes
9044 *** A symbol whose name starts with a colon now automatically
9045 evaluates to itself. Therefore such a symbol can be used as a constant.
9047 *** The defined purpose of `defconst' has been changed. It should now
9048 be used only for values that should not be changed whether by a program
9051 The actual behavior of defconst has not been changed.
9053 *** There are new macros `when' and `unless'
9055 (when CONDITION BODY...) is short for (if CONDITION (progn BODY...))
9056 (unless CONDITION BODY...) is short for (if CONDITION nil BODY...)
9058 *** Emacs now defines functions caar, cadr, cdar and cddr with their
9059 usual Lisp meanings. For example, caar returns the car of the car of
9062 *** equal, when comparing strings, now ignores their text properties.
9064 *** The new function `functionp' tests whether an object is a function.
9066 *** arrayp now returns t for char-tables and bool-vectors.
9068 *** Certain primitives which use characters (as integers) now get an
9069 error if the integer is not a valid character code. These primitives
9070 include insert-char, char-to-string, and the %c construct in the
9073 *** The `require' function now insists on adding a suffix, either .el
9074 or .elc, to the file name. Thus, (require 'foo) will not use a file
9075 whose name is just foo. It insists on foo.el or foo.elc.
9077 *** The `autoload' function, when the file name does not contain
9078 either a directory name or the suffix .el or .elc, insists on
9079 adding one of these suffixes.
9081 *** string-to-number now takes an optional second argument BASE
9082 which specifies the base to use when converting an integer.
9083 If BASE is omitted, base 10 is used.
9085 We have not implemented other radices for floating point numbers,
9086 because that would be much more work and does not seem useful.
9088 *** substring now handles vectors as well as strings.
9090 *** The Common Lisp function eql is no longer defined normally.
9091 You must load the `cl' library to define it.
9093 *** The new macro `with-current-buffer' lets you evaluate an expression
9094 conveniently with a different current buffer. It looks like this:
9096 (with-current-buffer BUFFER BODY-FORMS...)
9098 BUFFER is the expression that says which buffer to use.
9099 BODY-FORMS say what to do in that buffer.
9101 *** The new primitive `save-current-buffer' saves and restores the
9102 choice of current buffer, like `save-excursion', but without saving or
9103 restoring the value of point or the mark. `with-current-buffer'
9104 works using `save-current-buffer'.
9106 *** The new macro `with-temp-file' lets you do some work in a new buffer and
9107 write the output to a specified file. Like `progn', it returns the value
9110 *** The new macro `with-temp-buffer' lets you do some work in a new buffer,
9111 which is discarded after use. Like `progn', it returns the value of the
9112 last form. If you wish to return the buffer contents, use (buffer-string)
9115 *** The new function split-string takes a string, splits it at certain
9116 characters, and returns a list of the substrings in between the
9119 For example, (split-string "foo bar lose" " +") returns ("foo" "bar" "lose").
9121 *** The new macro with-output-to-string executes some Lisp expressions
9122 with standard-output set up so that all output feeds into a string.
9123 Then it returns that string.
9125 For example, if the current buffer name is `foo',
9127 (with-output-to-string
9128 (princ "The buffer is ")
9129 (princ (buffer-name)))
9131 returns "The buffer is foo".
9133 ** Non-ASCII characters are now supported, if enable-multibyte-characters
9136 These characters have character codes above 256. When inserted in the
9137 buffer or stored in a string, they are represented as multibyte
9138 characters that occupy several buffer positions each.
9140 *** When enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil, a single character in
9141 a buffer or string can be two or more bytes (as many as four).
9143 Buffers and strings are still made up of unibyte elements;
9144 character positions and string indices are always measured in bytes.
9145 Therefore, moving forward one character can increase the buffer
9146 position by 2, 3 or 4. The function forward-char moves by whole
9147 characters, and therefore is no longer equivalent to
9148 (lambda (n) (goto-char (+ (point) n))).
9150 ASCII characters (codes 0 through 127) are still single bytes, always.
9151 Sequences of byte values 128 through 255 are used to represent
9152 non-ASCII characters. These sequences are called "multibyte
9155 The first byte of a multibyte character is always in the range 128
9156 through 159 (octal 0200 through 0237). These values are called
9157 "leading codes". The second and subsequent bytes are always in the
9158 range 160 through 255 (octal 0240 through 0377). The first byte, the
9159 leading code, determines how many bytes long the sequence is.
9161 *** The function forward-char moves over characters, and therefore
9162 (forward-char 1) may increase point by more than 1 if it moves over a
9163 multibyte character. Likewise, delete-char always deletes a
9164 character, which may be more than one buffer position.
9166 This means that some Lisp programs, which assume that a character is
9167 always one buffer position, need to be changed.
9169 However, all ASCII characters are always one buffer position.
9171 *** The regexp [\200-\377] no longer matches all non-ASCII characters,
9172 because when enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil, these characters
9173 have codes that are not in the range octal 200 to octal 377. However,
9174 the regexp [^\000-\177] does match all non-ASCII characters,
9177 *** The function char-boundary-p returns non-nil if position POS is
9178 between two characters in the buffer (not in the middle of a
9181 When the value is non-nil, it says what kind of character follows POS:
9183 0 if POS is at an ASCII character or at the end of range,
9184 1 if POS is before a 2-byte length multi-byte form,
9185 2 if POS is at a head of 3-byte length multi-byte form,
9186 3 if POS is at a head of 4-byte length multi-byte form,
9187 4 if POS is at a head of multi-byte form of a composite character.
9189 *** The function char-bytes returns how many bytes the character CHAR uses.
9191 *** Strings can contain multibyte characters. The function
9192 `length' returns the string length counting bytes, which may be
9193 more than the number of characters.
9195 You can include a multibyte character in a string constant by writing
9196 it literally. You can also represent it with a hex escape,
9197 \xNNNNNNN..., using as many digits as necessary. Any character which
9198 is not a valid hex digit terminates this construct. If you want to
9199 follow it with a character that is a hex digit, write backslash and
9200 newline in between; that will terminate the hex escape.
9202 *** The function concat-chars takes arguments which are characters
9203 and returns a string containing those characters.
9205 *** The function sref access a multibyte character in a string.
9206 (sref STRING INDX) returns the character in STRING at INDEX. INDEX
9207 counts from zero. If INDEX is at a position in the middle of a
9208 character, sref signals an error.
9210 *** The function chars-in-string returns the number of characters
9211 in a string. This is less than the length of the string, if the
9212 string contains multibyte characters (the length counts bytes).
9214 *** The function chars-in-region returns the number of characters
9215 in a region from BEG to END. This is less than (- END BEG) if the
9216 region contains multibyte characters (the length counts bytes).
9218 *** The function string-to-list converts a string to a list of
9219 the characters in it. string-to-vector converts a string
9220 to a vector of the characters in it.
9222 *** The function store-substring alters part of the contents
9223 of a string. You call it as follows:
9225 (store-substring STRING IDX OBJ)
9227 This says to alter STRING, by storing OBJ starting at index IDX in
9228 STRING. OBJ may be either a character or a (smaller) string.
9229 This function really does alter the contents of STRING.
9230 Since it is impossible to change the length of an existing string,
9231 it is an error if OBJ doesn't fit within STRING's actual length.
9233 *** char-width returns the width (in columns) of the character CHAR,
9234 if it were displayed in the current buffer and the selected window.
9236 *** string-width returns the width (in columns) of the text in STRING,
9237 if it were displayed in the current buffer and the selected window.
9239 *** truncate-string-to-width shortens a string, if necessary,
9240 to fit within a certain number of columns. (Of course, it does
9241 not alter the string that you give it; it returns a new string
9242 which contains all or just part of the existing string.)
9244 (truncate-string-to-width STR END-COLUMN &optional START-COLUMN PADDING)
9246 This returns the part of STR up to column END-COLUMN.
9248 The optional argument START-COLUMN specifies the starting column.
9249 If this is non-nil, then the first START-COLUMN columns of the string
9250 are not included in the resulting value.
9252 The optional argument PADDING, if non-nil, is a padding character to be added
9253 at the beginning and end the resulting string, to extend it to exactly
9254 WIDTH columns. If PADDING is nil, that means do not pad; then, if STRING
9255 is narrower than WIDTH, the value is equal to STRING.
9257 If PADDING and START-COLUMN are both non-nil, and if there is no clean
9258 place in STRING that corresponds to START-COLUMN (because one
9259 character extends across that column), then the padding character
9260 PADDING is added one or more times at the beginning of the result
9261 string, so that its columns line up as if it really did start at
9262 column START-COLUMN.
9264 *** When the functions in the list after-change-functions are called,
9265 the third argument is the number of bytes in the pre-change text, not
9266 necessarily the number of characters. It is, in effect, the
9267 difference in buffer position between the beginning and the end of the
9268 changed text, before the change.
9270 *** The characters Emacs uses are classified in various character
9271 sets, each of which has a name which is a symbol. In general there is
9272 one character set for each script, not for each language.
9274 **** The function charsetp tests whether an object is a character set name.
9276 **** The variable charset-list holds a list of character set names.
9278 **** char-charset, given a character code, returns the name of the character
9279 set that the character belongs to. (The value is a symbol.)
9281 **** split-char, given a character code, returns a list containing the
9282 name of the character set, followed by one or two byte-values
9283 which identify the character within that character set.
9285 **** make-char, given a character set name and one or two subsequent
9286 byte-values, constructs a character code. This is roughly the
9287 opposite of split-char.
9289 **** find-charset-region returns a list of the character sets
9290 of all the characters between BEG and END.
9292 **** find-charset-string returns a list of the character sets
9293 of all the characters in a string.
9295 *** Here are the Lisp facilities for working with coding systems
9296 and specifying coding systems.
9298 **** The function coding-system-list returns a list of all coding
9299 system names (symbols). With optional argument t, it returns a list
9300 of all distinct base coding systems, not including variants.
9301 (Variant coding systems are those like latin-1-dos, latin-1-unix
9302 and latin-1-mac which specify the end-of-line conversion as well
9303 as what to do about code conversion.)
9305 **** coding-system-p tests a symbol to see if it is a coding system
9306 name. It returns t if so, nil if not.
9308 **** file-coding-system-alist specifies which coding systems to use
9309 for certain file names. It works like network-coding-system-alist,
9310 except that the PATTERN is matched against the file name.
9312 Each element has the format (PATTERN . VAL), where PATTERN determines
9313 which file names the element applies to. PATTERN should be a regexp
9314 to match against a file name.
9316 VAL is a coding system, a cons cell containing two coding systems, or
9317 a function symbol. If VAL is a coding system, it is used for both
9318 decoding what received from the network stream and encoding what sent
9319 to the network stream. If VAL is a cons cell containing two coding
9320 systems, the car specifies the coding system for decoding, and the cdr
9321 specifies the coding system for encoding.
9323 If VAL is a function symbol, the function must return a coding system
9324 or a cons cell containing two coding systems, which is used as above.
9326 **** The variable network-coding-system-alist specifies
9327 the coding system to use for network sockets.
9329 Each element has the format (PATTERN . VAL), where PATTERN determines
9330 which network sockets the element applies to. PATTERN should be
9331 either a port number or a regular expression matching some network
9334 VAL is a coding system, a cons cell containing two coding systems, or
9335 a function symbol. If VAL is a coding system, it is used for both
9336 decoding what received from the network stream and encoding what sent
9337 to the network stream. If VAL is a cons cell containing two coding
9338 systems, the car specifies the coding system for decoding, and the cdr
9339 specifies the coding system for encoding.
9341 If VAL is a function symbol, the function must return a coding system
9342 or a cons cell containing two coding systems, which is used as above.
9344 **** process-coding-system-alist specifies which coding systems to use
9345 for certain subprocess. It works like network-coding-system-alist,
9346 except that the PATTERN is matched against the program name used to
9347 start the subprocess.
9349 **** The variable default-process-coding-system specifies the coding
9350 systems to use for subprocess (and net connection) input and output,
9351 when nothing else specifies what to do. The value is a cons cell
9352 (OUTPUT-CODING . INPUT-CODING). OUTPUT-CODING applies to output
9353 to the subprocess, and INPUT-CODING applies to input from it.
9355 **** The variable coding-system-for-write, if non-nil, specifies the
9356 coding system to use for writing a file, or for output to a synchronous
9359 It also applies to any asynchronous subprocess or network connection,
9360 but in a different way: the value of coding-system-for-write when you
9361 start the subprocess or connection affects that subprocess or
9362 connection permanently or until overridden.
9364 The variable coding-system-for-write takes precedence over
9365 file-coding-system-alist, process-coding-system-alist and
9366 network-coding-system-alist, and all other methods of specifying a
9367 coding system for output. But most of the time this variable is nil.
9368 It exists so that Lisp programs can bind it to a specific coding
9369 system for one operation at a time.
9371 **** coding-system-for-read applies similarly to input from
9372 files, subprocesses or network connections.
9374 **** The function process-coding-system tells you what
9375 coding systems(s) an existing subprocess is using.
9376 The value is a cons cell,
9377 (DECODING-CODING-SYSTEM . ENCODING-CODING-SYSTEM)
9378 where DECODING-CODING-SYSTEM is used for decoding output from
9379 the subprocess, and ENCODING-CODING-SYSTEM is used for encoding
9380 input to the subprocess.
9382 **** The function set-process-coding-system can be used to
9383 change the coding systems in use for an existing subprocess.
9385 ** Emacs has a new facility to help users manage the many
9386 customization options. To make a Lisp program work with this facility,
9387 you need to use the new macros defgroup and defcustom.
9389 You use defcustom instead of defvar, for defining a user option
9390 variable. The difference is that you specify two additional pieces of
9391 information (usually): the "type" which says what values are
9392 legitimate, and the "group" which specifies the hierarchy for
9395 Thus, instead of writing
9397 (defvar foo-blurgoze nil
9398 "*Non-nil means that foo will act very blurgozely.")
9400 you would now write this:
9402 (defcustom foo-blurgoze nil
9403 "*Non-nil means that foo will act very blurgozely."
9407 The type `boolean' means that this variable has only
9408 two meaningful states: nil and non-nil. Other type values
9409 describe other possibilities; see the manual for Custom
9410 for a description of them.
9412 The "group" argument is used to specify a group which the option
9413 should belong to. You define a new group like this:
9415 (defgroup ispell nil
9416 "Spell checking using Ispell."
9419 The "group" argument in defgroup specifies the parent group. The root
9420 group is called `emacs'; it should not contain any variables itself,
9421 but only other groups. The immediate subgroups of `emacs' correspond
9422 to the keywords used by C-h p. Under these subgroups come
9423 second-level subgroups that belong to individual packages.
9425 Each Emacs package should have its own set of groups. A simple
9426 package should have just one group; a more complex package should
9427 have a hierarchy of its own groups. The sole or root group of a
9428 package should be a subgroup of one or more of the "keyword"
9429 first-level subgroups.
9431 ** New `widget' library for inserting UI components in buffers.
9433 This library, used by the new custom library, is documented in a
9434 separate manual that accompanies Emacs.
9438 The easy-mmode package provides macros and functions that make
9439 developing minor modes easier. Roughly, the programmer has to code
9440 only the functionality of the minor mode. All the rest--toggles,
9441 predicate, and documentation--can be done in one call to the macro
9442 `easy-mmode-define-minor-mode' (see the documentation). See also
9443 `easy-mmode-define-keymap'.
9445 ** Text property changes
9447 *** The `intangible' property now works on overlays as well as on a
9450 *** The new functions next-char-property-change and
9451 previous-char-property-change scan through the buffer looking for a
9452 place where either a text property or an overlay might change. The
9453 functions take two arguments, POSITION and LIMIT. POSITION is the
9454 starting position for the scan. LIMIT says where to stop the scan.
9456 If no property change is found before LIMIT, the value is LIMIT. If
9457 LIMIT is nil, scan goes to the beginning or end of the accessible part
9458 of the buffer. If no property change is found, the value is the
9459 position of the beginning or end of the buffer.
9461 *** In the `local-map' text property or overlay property, the property
9462 value can now be a symbol whose function definition is a keymap. This
9463 is an alternative to using the keymap itself.
9465 ** Changes in invisibility features
9467 *** Isearch can now temporarily show parts of the buffer which are
9468 hidden by an overlay with a invisible property, when the search match
9469 is inside that portion of the buffer. To enable this the overlay
9470 should have a isearch-open-invisible property which is a function that
9471 would be called having the overlay as an argument, the function should
9472 make the overlay visible.
9474 During incremental search the overlays are shown by modifying the
9475 invisible and intangible properties, if beside this more actions are
9476 needed the overlay should have a isearch-open-invisible-temporary
9477 which is a function. The function is called with 2 arguments: one is
9478 the overlay and the second is nil when it should show the overlay and
9479 t when it should hide it.
9481 *** add-to-invisibility-spec, remove-from-invisibility-spec
9483 Modes that use overlays to hide portions of a buffer should set the
9484 invisible property of the overlay to the mode's name (or another symbol)
9485 and modify the `buffer-invisibility-spec' to include that symbol.
9486 Use `add-to-invisibility-spec' and `remove-from-invisibility-spec' to
9487 manipulate the `buffer-invisibility-spec'.
9488 Here is an example of how to do this:
9490 ;; If we want to display an ellipsis:
9491 (add-to-invisibility-spec '(my-symbol . t))
9492 ;; If you don't want ellipsis:
9493 (add-to-invisibility-spec 'my-symbol)
9496 (overlay-put (make-overlay beginning end) 'invisible 'my-symbol)
9499 ;; When done with the overlays:
9500 (remove-from-invisibility-spec '(my-symbol . t))
9502 (remove-from-invisibility-spec 'my-symbol)
9504 ** Changes in syntax parsing.
9506 *** The syntax-directed buffer-scan functions (such as
9507 `parse-partial-sexp', `forward-word' and similar functions) can now
9508 obey syntax information specified by text properties, if the variable
9509 `parse-sexp-lookup-properties' is non-nil.
9511 If the value of `parse-sexp-lookup-properties' is nil, the behavior
9512 is as before: the syntax-table of the current buffer is always
9513 used to determine the syntax of the character at the position.
9515 When `parse-sexp-lookup-properties' is non-nil, the syntax of a
9516 character in the buffer is calculated thus:
9518 a) if the `syntax-table' text-property of that character
9519 is a cons, this cons becomes the syntax-type;
9521 Valid values of `syntax-table' text-property are: nil, a valid
9522 syntax-table, and a valid syntax-table element, i.e.,
9523 a cons cell of the form (SYNTAX-CODE . MATCHING-CHAR).
9525 b) if the character's `syntax-table' text-property
9526 is a syntax table, this syntax table is used
9527 (instead of the syntax-table of the current buffer) to
9528 determine the syntax type of the character.
9530 c) otherwise the syntax-type is determined by the syntax-table
9531 of the current buffer.
9533 *** The meaning of \s in regular expressions is also affected by the
9534 value of `parse-sexp-lookup-properties'. The details are the same as
9535 for the syntax-directed buffer-scan functions.
9537 *** There are two new syntax-codes, `!' and `|' (numeric values 14
9538 and 15). A character with a code `!' starts a comment which is ended
9539 only by another character with the same code (unless quoted). A
9540 character with a code `|' starts a string which is ended only by
9541 another character with the same code (unless quoted).
9543 These codes are mainly meant for use as values of the `syntax-table'
9546 *** The function `parse-partial-sexp' has new semantics for the sixth
9547 arg COMMENTSTOP. If it is `syntax-table', parse stops after the start
9548 of a comment or a string, or after end of a comment or a string.
9550 *** The state-list which the return value from `parse-partial-sexp'
9551 (and can also be used as an argument) now has an optional ninth
9552 element: the character address of the start of last comment or string;
9553 nil if none. The fourth and eighth elements have special values if the
9554 string/comment is started by a "!" or "|" syntax-code.
9556 *** Since new features of `parse-partial-sexp' allow a complete
9557 syntactic parsing, `font-lock' no longer supports
9558 `font-lock-comment-start-regexp'.
9560 ** Changes in face features
9562 *** The face functions are now unconditionally defined in Emacs, even
9563 if it does not support displaying on a device that supports faces.
9565 *** The function face-documentation returns the documentation string
9566 of a face (or nil if it doesn't have one).
9568 *** The function face-bold-p returns t if a face should be bold.
9569 set-face-bold-p sets that flag.
9571 *** The function face-italic-p returns t if a face should be italic.
9572 set-face-italic-p sets that flag.
9574 *** You can now specify foreground and background colors for text
9575 by adding elements of the form (foreground-color . COLOR-NAME)
9576 and (background-color . COLOR-NAME) to the list of faces in
9577 the `face' property (either the character's text property or an
9580 This means that you no longer need to create named faces to use
9581 arbitrary colors in a Lisp package.
9583 ** Changes in file-handling functions
9585 *** File-access primitive functions no longer discard an extra redundant
9586 directory name from the beginning of the file name. In other words,
9587 they no longer do anything special with // or /~. That conversion
9588 is now done only in substitute-in-file-name.
9590 This makes it possible for a Lisp program to open a file whose name
9593 *** If copy-file is unable to set the date of the output file,
9594 it now signals an error with the condition file-date-error.
9596 *** The inode number returned by file-attributes may be an integer (if
9597 the number fits in a Lisp integer) or a list of integers.
9599 *** insert-file-contents can now read from a special file,
9600 as long as the arguments VISIT and REPLACE are nil.
9602 *** The RAWFILE arg to find-file-noselect, if non-nil, now suppresses
9603 character code conversion as well as other things.
9605 Meanwhile, this feature does work with remote file names
9606 (formerly it did not).
9608 *** Lisp packages which create temporary files should use the TMPDIR
9609 environment variable to decide which directory to put them in.
9611 *** interpreter-mode-alist elements now specify regexps
9612 instead of constant strings.
9614 *** expand-file-name no longer treats `//' or `/~' specially. It used
9615 to delete all the text of a file name up through the first slash of
9616 any `//' or `/~' sequence. Now it passes them straight through.
9618 substitute-in-file-name continues to treat those sequences specially,
9619 in the same way as before.
9621 *** The variable `format-alist' is more general now.
9622 The FROM-FN and TO-FN in a format definition can now be strings
9623 which specify shell commands to use as filters to perform conversion.
9625 *** The new function access-file tries to open a file, and signals an
9626 error if that fails. If the open succeeds, access-file does nothing
9627 else, and returns nil.
9629 *** The function insert-directory now signals an error if the specified
9630 directory cannot be listed.
9632 ** Changes in minibuffer input
9634 *** The functions read-buffer, read-variable, read-command, read-string
9635 read-file-name, read-from-minibuffer and completing-read now take an
9636 additional argument which specifies the default value. If this
9637 argument is non-nil, it should be a string; that string is used in two
9640 It is returned if the user enters empty input.
9641 It is available through the history command M-n.
9643 *** The functions read-string, read-from-minibuffer,
9644 read-no-blanks-input and completing-read now take an additional
9645 argument INHERIT-INPUT-METHOD. If this is non-nil, then the
9646 minibuffer inherits the current input method and the setting of
9647 enable-multibyte-characters from the previously current buffer.
9649 In an interactive spec, you can use M instead of s to read an
9650 argument in this way.
9652 *** All minibuffer input functions discard text properties
9653 from the text you enter in the minibuffer, unless the variable
9654 minibuffer-allow-text-properties is non-nil.
9656 ** Echo area features
9658 *** Clearing the echo area now runs the normal hook
9659 echo-area-clear-hook. Note that the echo area can be used while the
9660 minibuffer is active; in that case, the minibuffer is still active
9661 after the echo area is cleared.
9663 *** The function current-message returns the message currently displayed
9664 in the echo area, or nil if there is none.
9666 ** Keyboard input features
9668 *** tty-erase-char is a new variable that reports which character was
9669 set up as the terminal's erase character when time Emacs was started.
9671 *** num-nonmacro-input-events is the total number of input events
9672 received so far from the terminal. It does not count those generated
9675 ** Frame-related changes
9677 *** make-frame runs the normal hook before-make-frame-hook just before
9678 creating a frame, and just after creating a frame it runs the abnormal
9679 hook after-make-frame-functions with the new frame as arg.
9681 *** The new hook window-configuration-change-hook is now run every time
9682 the window configuration has changed. The frame whose configuration
9683 has changed is the selected frame when the hook is run.
9685 *** Each frame now independently records the order for recently
9686 selected buffers, in its buffer-list frame parameter, so that the
9687 value of other-buffer is now based on the buffers recently displayed
9688 in the selected frame.
9690 *** The value of the frame parameter vertical-scroll-bars
9691 is now `left', `right' or nil. A non-nil value specifies
9692 which side of the window to put the scroll bars on.
9694 ** X Windows features
9696 *** You can examine X resources for other applications by binding
9697 x-resource-class around a call to x-get-resource. The usual value of
9698 x-resource-class is "Emacs", which is the correct value for Emacs.
9700 *** In menus, checkboxes and radio buttons now actually work.
9701 The menu displays the current status of the box or button.
9703 *** The function x-list-fonts now takes an optional fourth argument
9704 MAXIMUM which sets a limit on how many matching fonts to return.
9705 A smaller value of MAXIMUM makes the function faster.
9707 If the only question is whether *any* font matches the pattern,
9708 it is good to supply 1 for this argument.
9710 ** Subprocess features
9712 *** A reminder: it is no longer necessary for subprocess filter
9713 functions and sentinels to do save-match-data, because Emacs does this
9716 *** The new function shell-command-to-string executes a shell command
9717 and returns the output from the command as a string.
9719 *** The new function process-contact returns t for a child process,
9720 and (HOSTNAME SERVICE) for a net connection.
9722 ** An error in running pre-command-hook or post-command-hook
9723 does clear the variable to nil. The documentation was wrong before.
9725 ** In define-key-after, if AFTER is t, the new binding now always goes
9726 at the end of the keymap. If the keymap is a menu, this means it
9727 goes after the other menu items.
9729 ** If you have a program that makes several changes in the same area
9730 of the buffer, you can use the macro combine-after-change-calls
9731 around that Lisp code to make it faster when after-change hooks
9734 The macro arranges to call the after-change functions just once for a
9735 series of several changes--if that seems safe.
9737 Don't alter the variables after-change-functions and
9738 after-change-function within the body of a combine-after-change-calls
9741 ** If you define an abbrev (with define-abbrev) whose EXPANSION
9742 is not a string, then the abbrev does not expand in the usual sense,
9743 but its hook is still run.
9745 ** Normally, the Lisp debugger is not used (even if you have enabled it)
9746 for errors that are handled by condition-case.
9748 If you set debug-on-signal to a non-nil value, then the debugger is called
9749 regardless of whether there is a handler for the condition. This is
9750 useful for debugging problems that happen inside of a condition-case.
9752 This mode of operation seems to be unreliable in other ways. Errors that
9753 are normal and ought to be handled, perhaps in timers or process
9754 filters, will instead invoke the debugger. So don't say you weren't
9757 ** The new variable ring-bell-function lets you specify your own
9758 way for Emacs to "ring the bell".
9760 ** If run-at-time's TIME argument is t, the action is repeated at
9761 integral multiples of REPEAT from the epoch; this is useful for
9762 functions like display-time.
9764 ** You can use the function locate-library to find the precise file
9765 name of a Lisp library. This isn't new, but wasn't documented before.
9767 ** Commands for entering view mode have new optional arguments that
9768 can be used from Lisp. Low-level entrance to and exit from view mode
9769 is done by functions view-mode-enter and view-mode-exit.
9771 ** batch-byte-compile-file now makes Emacs return a nonzero status code
9772 if there is an error in compilation.
9774 ** pop-to-buffer, switch-to-buffer-other-window and
9775 switch-to-buffer-other-frame now accept an additional optional
9776 argument NORECORD, much like switch-to-buffer. If it is non-nil,
9777 they don't put the buffer at the front of the buffer list.
9779 ** If your .emacs file leaves the *scratch* buffer non-empty,
9780 Emacs does not display the startup message, so as to avoid changing
9781 the *scratch* buffer.
9783 ** The new function regexp-opt returns an efficient regexp to match a string.
9784 The arguments are STRINGS and (optionally) PAREN. This function can be used
9785 where regexp matching or searching is intensively used and speed is important,
9786 e.g., in Font Lock mode.
9788 ** The variable buffer-display-count is local to each buffer,
9789 and is incremented each time the buffer is displayed in a window.
9790 It starts at 0 when the buffer is created.
9792 ** The new function compose-mail starts composing a mail message
9793 using the user's chosen mail composition agent (specified with the
9794 variable mail-user-agent). It has variants compose-mail-other-window
9795 and compose-mail-other-frame.
9797 ** The `user-full-name' function now takes an optional parameter which
9798 can either be a number (the UID) or a string (the login name). The
9799 full name of the specified user will be returned.
9801 ** Lisp packages that load files of customizations, or any other sort
9802 of user profile, should obey the variable init-file-user in deciding
9803 where to find it. They should load the profile of the user name found
9804 in that variable. If init-file-user is nil, meaning that the -q
9805 option was used, then Lisp packages should not load the customization
9808 ** format-time-string now allows you to specify the field width
9809 and type of padding. This works as in printf: you write the field
9810 width as digits in the middle of a %-construct. If you start
9811 the field width with 0, it means to pad with zeros.
9813 For example, %S normally specifies the number of seconds since the
9814 minute; %03S means to pad this with zeros to 3 positions, %_3S to pad
9815 with spaces to 3 positions. Plain %3S pads with zeros, because that
9816 is how %S normally pads to two positions.
9818 ** thing-at-point now supports a new kind of "thing": url.
9820 ** imenu.el changes.
9822 You can now specify a function to be run when selecting an
9823 item from menu created by imenu.
9825 An example of using this feature: if we define imenu items for the
9826 #include directives in a C file, we can open the included file when we
9827 select one of those items.
9829 * For older news, see the file ONEWS
9831 ----------------------------------------------------------------------
9832 Copyright information:
9834 Copyright (C) 1999, 2000, 2001 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
9836 Permission is granted to anyone to make or distribute verbatim copies
9837 of this document as received, in any medium, provided that the
9838 copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved,
9839 thus giving the recipient permission to redistribute in turn.
9841 Permission is granted to distribute modified versions
9842 of this document, or of portions of it,
9843 under the above conditions, provided also that they
9844 carry prominent notices stating who last changed them.
9848 paragraph-separate: "[
\f]*$"