1 GNU Emacs NEWS -- history of user-visible changes. 2000-10-12
2 Copyright (C) 1999, 2000 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 * Installation Changes in Emacs 21.1
11 ** Support for GNU/Linux on IA64 machines has been added.
13 ** Support for LynxOS has been added.
15 ** `movemail' defaults to supporting POP. You can turn this off using
16 the --without-pop configure option, should that be necessary.
18 ** There are new configure options associated with the support for
19 images and toolkit scrollbars. Use the --help option in `configure'
22 ** There is a new configure option `--without-xim' that instructs
23 Emacs to not use X Input Methods (XIM), if these are available.
25 ** There is a new configure option `--disable-largefile' to omit
26 Unix-98-style support for large files if that is available.
28 ** You can build a 64-bit Emacs for SPARC/Solaris systems which
29 support 64-bit executables and also on Irix 6.5. This increases the
30 maximum buffer size. See etc/MACHINES for instructions. Changes to
31 build on other 64-bit systems should be straightforward modulo any
32 necessary changes to unexec.
34 ** Note that the MS-Windows port does not yet implement various of the
35 new display features described below.
37 ** This version can be built for the Macintosh, but does not implement
38 all of the new display features described below. The port currently
39 lacks unexec, asynchronous processes, and networking support.
42 * Changes in Emacs 21.1
44 ** The new command M-x delete-trailing-whitespace RET will delete the
45 trailing whitespace within the current restriction. You can also add
46 this function to `write-file-hooks' or `local-write-file-hooks'.
48 ** When visiting a file with M-x find-file-literally, no newlines will
49 be added to the end of the buffer because of `require-final-newline'.
51 ** auto-compression mode is no longer enabled just by loading jka-compr.el.
52 To control it, set `auto-compression-mode' via Custom or use the
53 `auto-compression-mode' command.
55 ** `browse-url-gnome-moz' is a new option for
56 `browse-url-browser-function', invoking Mozilla in GNOME.
59 ** The functions `keep-lines', `flush-lines' and `how-many' now
60 operate on the active region in Transient Mark mode.
62 ** The header line in an Info buffer is now displayed as an emacs header-line
63 (which is like a mode-line, but at the top of the window), so that it
64 remains visible even when the buffer has been scrolled. This behavior
65 may be disabled by customizing the option `Info-use-header-line'.
68 ** `gnus-user-agent' is a new possibility for `mail-user-agent'. It
69 is like `message-user-agent', but with all the Gnus paraphernalia.
72 ** The recommended way of using Iswitchb is via the new global minor
78 The Gnus NEWS entries are short, but they reflect sweeping changes in
79 four areas: Article display treatment, MIME treatment,
80 internationalization and mail-fetching.
82 *** The mail-fetching functions have changed. See the manual for the
83 many details. In particular, all procmail fetching variables are gone.
85 If you used procmail like in
87 (setq nnmail-use-procmail t)
88 (setq nnmail-spool-file 'procmail)
89 (setq nnmail-procmail-directory "~/mail/incoming/")
90 (setq nnmail-procmail-suffix "\\.in")
92 this now has changed to
95 '((directory :path "~/mail/incoming/"
98 More information is available in the info doc at Select Methods ->
99 Getting Mail -> Mail Sources
101 *** Gnus is now a MIME-capable reader. This affects many parts of
102 Gnus, and adds a slew of new commands. See the manual for details.
103 Separate MIME packages like RMIME, SEMI, mime-compose etc., will
104 probably no longer work; remove them and use the native facilities.
106 *** Gnus has also been multilingualized. This also affects too many
107 parts of Gnus to summarize here, and adds many new variables. There
108 are built-in facilities equivalent to those of gnus-mule.el, which is
109 now just a compatibility layer.
111 *** gnus-auto-select-first can now be a function to be
112 called to position point.
114 *** The user can now decide which extra headers should be included in
115 summary buffers and NOV files.
117 *** `gnus-article-display-hook' has been removed. Instead, a number
118 of variables starting with `gnus-treat-' have been added.
120 *** The Gnus posting styles have been redone again and now work in a
121 subtly different manner.
123 *** New web-based backends have been added: nnslashdot, nnwarchive
124 and nnultimate. nnweb has been revamped, again, to keep up with
125 ever-changing layouts.
127 *** Gnus can now read IMAP mail via nnimap.
129 *** There is image support of various kinds and some sound support.
131 ** When your terminal can't display characters from some of the ISO
132 8859 character sets but can display Latin-1, you can display
133 more-or-less mnemonic sequences of ASCII/Latin-1 characters instead of
134 empty boxes (under a window system) or question marks (not under a
135 window system). Customize the option `latin1-display' to turn this
138 ** The new user-option `find-file-suppress-same-file-warnings' can be
139 set to suppress warnings ``X and Y are the same file'' when visiting a
140 file that is already visited under a different name.
142 ** The new user-option `electric-help-shrink-window' can be set to
143 nil to prevent adjusting the help window size to the buffer size.
145 ** Emacs now checks for recursive loads of Lisp files. If the
146 recursion depth exceeds `recursive-load-depth-limit', an error is
149 ** The Strokes package has been updated. If your Emacs has XPM
150 support, you can use it for pictographic editing. In Strokes mode,
151 use C-mouse-2 to compose a complex stoke and insert it into the
152 buffer. You can encode or decode a strokes buffer with new commands
153 M-x strokes-encode-buffer and M-x strokes-decode-buffer. There is a
154 new command M-x strokes-list-strokes.
157 ** New command M-x describe-character-set reads a character set name
158 and displays information about that.
160 ** When an error is signaled during the loading of the user's init
161 file, Emacs now pops up the *Messages* buffer.
163 ** Polish and German translations of Emacs' reference card have been
164 added. They are named `pl-refcard.tex' and `de-refcard.tex'.
165 Postscript files are included.
167 ** A reference card for Dired has been added. Its name is
170 ** The new variable `auto-mode-interpreter-regexp' contains a regular
171 expression matching interpreters, for file mode determination.
173 This regular expression is matched against the first line of a file to
174 determine the file's mode in `set-auto-mode' when Emacs can't deduce a
175 mode from the file's name. If it matches, the file is assumed to be
176 interpreted by the interpreter matched by the second group of the
177 regular expression. The mode is then determined as the mode
178 associated with that interpreter in `interpreter-mode-alist'.
181 ** C-down-mouse-3 is bound differently. Now if the menu bar is not
182 displayed it pops up a menu containing the items which would be on the
183 menu bar. If the menu bar is displayed, it pops up the major mode
184 menu or the Edit menu if there is no major mode menu.
186 ** Variable `load-path' is no longer customizable because it contains
187 a version-dependent component.
189 ** The <delete> function key is now bound to `delete-char' by default.
190 Note that this takes effect only on window systems. On TTYs, Emacs
191 will receive ASCII 127 when the DEL key is pressed. This
192 character is still bound as before.
194 ** Item Save Options on the Options menu allows saving options set
197 ** New function executable-make-buffer-file-executable-if-script-p is
198 suitable as an after-save-hook as an alternative to `executable-chmod'.
201 ** The most preferred coding-system is now used to save a buffer if
202 buffer-file-coding-system is `undecided' and it is safe for the buffer
203 contents. (The most preferred is set by set-language-environment or
204 by M-x prefer-coding-system.) Thus if you visit an ASCII file and
205 insert a non-ASCII character from your current language environment,
206 the file will be saved silently with the appropriate coding.
207 Previously you would be prompted for a safe coding system.
210 ** New variable `inhibit-iso-escape-detection' determines if Emacs'
211 coding system detection algorithm should pay attention to ISO2022's
212 escape sequences. If this variable is non-nil, the algorithm ignores
213 such escape sequences. The default value is nil, and it is
214 recommended not to change it except for the special case that you
215 always want to read any escape code verbatim. If you just want to
216 read a specific file without decoding escape codes, use C-x RET c
217 (`universal-coding-system-argument'). For instance, C-x RET c latin-1
218 RET C-x C-f filename RET.
220 ** Variable `default-korean-keyboard' is initialized properly from the
221 environment variable `HANGUL_KEYBOARD_TYPE'.
224 ** C-u C-x = provides detailed information about the character at
225 point in a pop-up window.
228 ** New command M-x list-charset-chars reads a character set name and
229 displays all characters in that character set.
231 ** M-x set-terminal-coding-system (C-x RET t) now allows CCL-based
232 coding systems such as cpXXX and cyrillic-koi8.
235 ** M-; now calls comment-dwim which tries to do something clever based
236 on the context. M-x kill-comment is now an alias to comment-kill,
237 defined in newcomment.el. You can choose different styles of region
238 commenting with the variable `comment-style'.
241 ** The function `getenv' is now callable interactively.
243 ** The many obsolete language `setup-...-environment' commands have
244 been removed -- use `set-language-environment'.
247 ** New user options `display-time-mail-face' and
248 `display-time-use-mail-icon' control the appearance of mode-line mail
249 indicator used by the display-time package. On a suitable display the
250 indicator can be an icon and is mouse-sensitive.
253 ** Emacs' auto-save list files are now by default stored in a
254 sub-directory `.emacs.d/auto-save-list/' of the user's home directory.
255 (On MS-DOS, this subdirectory's name is `_emacs.d/auto-save.list/'.)
256 You can customize `auto-save-list-prefix' to change this location.
259 ** On window-systems, additional space can be put between text lines
260 on the display using several methods
263 - By setting frame parameter `line-spacing' to PIXELS. PIXELS must be
264 a positive integer, and specifies that PIXELS number of pixels should
265 be put below text lines on the affected frame or frames.
268 - By setting X resource `lineSpacing', class `LineSpacing'. This is
269 equivalent to specifying the frame parameter.
271 - By specifying `--line-spacing=N' or `-lsp N' on the command line.
273 - By setting buffer-local variable `line-spacing'. The meaning is
274 the same, but applies to the a particular buffer only.
277 ** The new command `clone-indirect-buffer' can be used to create
278 an indirect buffer that is a twin copy of the current buffer. The
279 command `clone-indirect-buffer-other-window', bound to C-x 4 c,
280 does the same but displays the indirect buffer in another window.
283 ** New user options `backup-directory-alist' and
284 `make-backup-file-name-function' control the placement of backups,
285 typically in a single directory or in an invisible sub-directory.
287 ** New commands iso-iso2sgml and iso-sgml2iso convert between Latin-1
288 characters and the corresponding SGML (HTML) entities.
291 ** Emacs now refuses to load compiled Lisp files which weren't
292 compiled with Emacs. Set `load-dangerous-libraries' to t to change
295 The reason for this change is an incompatible change in XEmacs' byte
296 compiler. Files compiled with XEmacs can contain byte codes that let
300 ** New X resources recognized
302 *** The X resource `synchronous', class `Synchronous', specifies
303 whether Emacs should run in synchronous mode. Synchronous mode
304 is useful for debugging X problems.
308 emacs.synchronous: true
310 *** The X resource `visualClass, class `VisualClass', specifies the
311 visual Emacs should use. The resource's value should be a string of
312 the form `CLASS-DEPTH', where CLASS is the name of the visual class,
313 and DEPTH is the requested color depth as a decimal number. Valid
314 visual class names are
323 Visual class names specified as X resource are case-insensitive, i.e.
324 `pseudocolor', `Pseudocolor' and `PseudoColor' all have the same
327 The program `xdpyinfo' can be used to list the visual classes
328 supported on your display, and which depths they have. If
329 `visualClass' is not specified, Emacs uses the display's default
334 emacs.visualClass: TrueColor-8
336 *** The X resource `privateColormap', class `PrivateColormap',
337 specifies that Emacs should use a private colormap if it is using the
338 default visual, and that visual is of class PseudoColor. Recognized
339 resource values are `true' or `on'.
343 emacs.privateColormap: true
345 ** The menu bar configuration has changed. The new configuration is
346 more CUA-compliant. The most significant change is that Options is
347 now a separate menu-bar item, with Mule and Customize as its submenus.
349 ** User-option `show-cursor-in-non-selected-windows' controls how to
350 display the cursor in non-selected windows. If nil, no cursor is
351 shown, if non-nil a hollow box cursor is shown. This option can
355 ** The variable `echo-keystrokes' may now have a floating point value.
358 ** C-x 5 1 runs the new command delete-other-frames which deletes
359 all frames except the selected one.
361 ** If your init file is compiled (.emacs.elc), `user-init-file' is set
362 to the source name (.emacs.el), if that exists, after loading it.
364 ** The help string specified for a menu-item whose definition contains
365 the property `:help HELP' is now displayed under X, on MS-Windows, and
366 MS-DOS, either in the echo area or with tooltips. Many standard menus
367 displayed by Emacs now have help strings.
370 ** Highlighting of mouse-sensitive regions is now supported in the
371 MS-DOS version of Emacs.
373 ** New user option `read-mail-command' specifies a command to use to
374 read mail from the menu etc.
377 ** Hexl contains a new command `hexl-insert-hex-string' which inserts
378 a string of hexadecimal numbers read from the mini-buffer.
380 ** Changes in Texinfo mode.
382 *** A couple of new key bindings have been added for inserting Texinfo
386 -------------------------
392 C-c C-o @<block> ... @end <block>
395 *** The " key now inserts either " or `` or '' depending on context.
397 ** Changes in Outline mode.
399 There is now support for Imenu to index headings. A new command
400 `outline-headers-as-kill' copies the visible headings in the region to
401 the kill ring, e.g. to produce a table of contents.
403 ** Changes to Emacs Server
406 *** The new option `server-kill-new-buffers' specifies what to do
407 with buffers when done with them. If non-nil, the default, buffers
408 are killed, unless they were already present before visiting them with
409 Emacs Server. If nil, `server-temp-file-regexp' specifies which
410 buffers to kill, as before.
412 Please note that only buffers are killed that still have a client,
413 i.e. buffers visited with `emacsclient --no-wait' are never killed in
416 ** Changes to Show Paren mode.
418 *** Overlays used by Show Paren mode now use a priority property.
419 The new user option show-paren-priority specifies the priority to
420 use. Default is 1000.
423 ** New command M-x check-parens can be used to find unbalanced paren
424 groups and strings in buffers in Lisp mode (or other modes).
427 ** You can now easily create new *Info* buffers using either
428 M-x clone-buffer, C-u m <entry> RET or C-u g <entry> RET.
429 M-x clone-buffer can also be used on *Help* and several other special
433 ** Emacs can now support 'wheeled' mice (such as the MS IntelliMouse)
434 under XFree86. To enable this, simply put (mwheel-install) in your
437 The variables `mwheel-follow-mouse' and `mwheel-scroll-amount'
438 determine where and by how much buffers are scrolled.
440 ** Listing buffers with M-x list-buffers (C-x C-b) now shows
441 abbreviated file names. Abbreviations can be customized by changing
442 `directory-abbrev-alist'.
444 ** Faces and frame parameters.
446 There are four new faces `scroll-bar', `border', `cursor' and `mouse'.
447 Setting the frame parameters `scroll-bar-foreground' and
448 `scroll-bar-background' sets foreground and background color of face
449 `scroll-bar' and vice versa. Setting frame parameter `border-color'
450 sets the background color of face `border' and vice versa. Likewise
451 for frame parameters `cursor-color' and face `cursor', and frame
452 parameter `mouse-color' and face `mouse'.
454 Changing frame parameter `font' sets font-related attributes of the
455 `default' face and vice versa. Setting frame parameters
456 `foreground-color' or `background-color' sets the colors of the
457 `default' face and vice versa.
462 The face `menu' can be used to change colors and font of Emacs' menus.
463 Setting the font of LessTif/Motif menus is currently not supported;
464 attempts to set the font are ignored in this case.
467 ** New frame parameter `screen-gamma' for gamma correction.
469 The new frame parameter `screen-gamma' specifies gamma-correction for
470 colors. Its value may be nil, the default, in which case no gamma
471 correction occurs, or a number > 0, usually a float, that specifies
472 the screen gamma of a frame's display.
474 PC monitors usually have a screen gamma of 2.2. smaller values result
475 in darker colors. You might want to try a screen gamma of 1.5 for LCD
476 color displays. The viewing gamma Emacs uses is 0.4545. (1/2.2).
478 The X resource name of this parameter is `screenGamma', class
481 ** Emacs has a new redisplay engine.
483 The new redisplay handles characters of variable width and height.
484 Italic text can be used without redisplay problems. Fonts containing
485 oversized characters, i.e. characters larger than the logical height
486 of a font can be used. Images of various formats can be displayed in
489 ** Emacs has a new face implementation.
491 The new faces no longer fundamentally use X font names to specify the
492 font. Instead, each face has several independent attributes--family,
493 height, width, weight and slant--that it may or may not specify.
494 These attributes can be merged from various faces, and then together
497 Faces are supported on terminals that can display color or fonts.
498 These terminal capabilities are auto-detected. Details can be found
499 under Lisp changes, below.
501 ** New default font is Courier 12pt.
504 ** When using a windowing terminal, each Emacs window now has a cursor
505 of its own. When the window is selected, the cursor is solid;
506 otherwise, it is hollow.
508 ** Bitmap areas to the left and right of windows are used to display
509 truncation marks, continuation marks, overlay arrows and alike. The
510 foreground, background, and stipple of these areas can be changed by
511 customizing face `fringe'.
513 ** The mode line under X is now drawn with shadows by default.
514 You can change its appearance by modifying the face `mode-line'.
516 The variable `mode-line-inverse-video', which was used in older
517 versions of emacs to make the mode-line stand out, now defaults to nil,
518 and its use is deprecated.
522 Emacs now runs with the LessTif toolkit (see <http://www.lesstif.org>).
523 You will need a version 0.88.1 or later.
525 ** Toolkit scroll bars.
527 Emacs now uses toolkit scrollbars if available. When configured for
528 LessTif/Motif, it will use that toolkit's scrollbar. Otherwise, when
529 configured for Lucid and Athena widgets, it will use the Xaw3d scroll
530 bar if Xaw3d is available. You can turn off the use of toolkit scroll
531 bars by specifying `--with-toolkit-scroll-bars=no' when configuring
534 When you encounter problems with the Xaw3d scroll bar, watch out how
535 Xaw3d is compiled on your system. If the Makefile generated from
536 Xaw3d's Imakefile contains a `-DNARROWPROTO' compiler option, and your
537 Emacs system configuration file `s/your-system.h' does not contain a
538 define for NARROWPROTO, you might consider adding it. Take
539 `s/freebsd.h' as an example.
541 Alternatively, if you don't have access to the Xaw3d source code, take
542 a look at your system's imake configuration file, for example in the
543 directory `/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/config' (paths are different on
544 different systems). You will find files `*.cf' there. If your
545 system's cf-file contains a line like `#define NeedWidePrototypes NO',
546 add a `#define NARROWPROTO' to your Emacs system configuration file.
548 The reason for this is that one Xaw3d function uses `double' or
549 `float' function parameters depending on the setting of NARROWPROTO.
550 This is not a problem when Imakefiles are used because each system's
551 image configuration file contains the necessary information. Since
552 Emacs doesn't use imake, this has do be done manually.
554 ** Toggle buttons and radio buttons in menus.
556 When compiled with LessTif (or Motif) support, Emacs uses toolkit
557 widgets for radio and toggle buttons in menus. When configured for
558 Lucid, Emacs draws radio buttons and toggle buttons similar to Motif.
561 ** Highlighting of trailing whitespace.
563 When `show-trailing-whitespace' is non-nil, Emacs displays trailing
564 whitespace in the face `trailing-whitespace'. Trailing whitespace is
565 defined as spaces or tabs at the end of a line. To avoid busy
566 highlighting when entering new text, trailing whitespace is not
567 displayed if point is at the end of the line containing the
573 Emacs can optionally display a busy-cursor under X. You can turn the
574 display on or off by customizing group `cursor'.
579 M-x blink-cursor-mode toggles a blinking cursor under X and on
580 terminals having terminal capabilities `vi', `vs', and `ve'. Blinking
581 and related parameters like frequency and delay can be customized in
585 ** New font-lock support mode `jit-lock-mode'.
587 This support mode is roughly equivalent to `lazy-lock' but is
588 generally faster. It supports stealth and deferred fontification.
589 See the documentation of the function `jit-lock-mode' for more
592 Font-lock uses jit-lock-mode as default support mode, so you don't
593 have to do anything to activate it.
595 ** Tabs and variable-width text.
597 Tabs are now displayed with stretch properties; the width of a tab is
598 defined as a multiple of the normal character width of a frame, and is
599 independent of the fonts used in the text where the tab appears.
600 Thus, tabs can be used to line up text in different fonts.
602 ** Enhancements of the Lucid menu bar
605 *** The Lucid menu bar now supports the resource "margin".
607 emacs.pane.menubar.margin: 5
609 The default margin is 4 which makes the menu bar appear like the
612 *** Arrows that indicate sub-menus are now drawn with shadows, as in
616 ** Hscrolling in C code.
618 Horizontal scrolling now happens automatically if
619 `automatic-hscrolling' is set (the default). This setting can be
625 Emacs supports a tool bar at the top of a frame under X. For details
626 of how to define a tool bar, see the page describing Lisp-level
627 changes. Tool-bar global minor mode controls whether or not it is
628 displayed and is on by default. To make the tool bar more useful, we
629 need contributions of extra icons for specific modes (with copyright
633 ** Mouse-sensitive mode line.
635 Different parts of the mode line under X have been made
636 mouse-sensitive. Moving the mouse to a mouse-sensitive part in the mode
637 line changes the appearance of the mouse pointer to an arrow, and help
638 about available mouse actions is displayed either in the echo area, or
639 in the tooltip window if you have enabled one.
641 Currently, the following actions have been defined:
643 - Mouse-1 on the buffer name in the mode line switches between two
646 - Mouse-2 on the buffer-name switches to the next buffer, and
647 M-mouse-2 switches to the previous buffer in the buffer list.
649 - Mouse-3 on the buffer-name displays a buffer menu.
651 - Mouse-2 on the read-only or modified status in the mode line (`%' or
652 `*') toggles the status.
654 - Mouse-3 on the mode name display a minor-mode menu.
656 ** LessTif/Motif file selection dialog.
658 When Emacs is configured to use LessTif or Motif, reading a file name
659 from a menu will pop up a file selection dialog if `use-dialog-box' is
662 ** Emacs can display faces on TTY frames.
664 Emacs automatically detects terminals that are able to display colors.
665 Faces with a weight greater than normal are displayed extra-bright, if
666 the terminal supports it. Faces with a weight less than normal and
667 italic faces are displayed dimmed, if the terminal supports it.
668 Underlined faces are displayed underlined if possible. Other face
669 attributes such as `overline', `strike-through', and `box' are ignored
672 The command-line options `-fg COLOR', `-bg COLOR', and `-rv' are now
673 supported on character terminals.
677 Emacs supports playing sound files on GNU/Linux and FreeBSD (Voxware
678 driver and native BSD driver, a.k.a. Luigi's driver). Currently
679 supported file formats are RIFF-WAVE (*.wav) and Sun Audio (*.au).
682 ** A new variable, backup-by-copying-when-privileged-mismatch, gives
683 the highest file uid for which backup-by-copying-when-mismatch will be
684 forced on. The assumption is that uids less than or equal to this
685 value are special uids (root, bin, daemon, etc.--not real system
686 users) and that files owned by these users should not change ownership,
687 even if your system policy allows users other than root to edit them.
689 The default is 200; set the variable to nil to disable the feature.
692 ** A block cursor can be drawn as wide as the glyph under it under X.
694 As an example: if a block cursor is over a tab character, it will be
695 drawn as wide as that tab on the display. To do this, set
696 `x-stretch-cursor' to a non-nil value.
699 ** Empty display lines at the end of a buffer may be marked with a
700 bitmap (this is similar to the tilde displayed by vi).
702 This behavior is activated by setting the buffer-local variable
703 `indicate-empty-lines' to a non-nil value. The default value of this
704 variable is found in `default-indicate-empty-lines'.
707 ** There is a new "aggressive" scrolling method.
709 When scrolling up because point is above the window start, if the
710 value of the buffer-local variable `scroll-up-aggressively' is a
711 number, Emacs chooses a new window start so that point ends up that
712 fraction of the window's height from the top of the window.
714 When scrolling down because point is below the window end, if the
715 value of the buffer-local variable `scroll-down-aggessively' is a
716 number, Emacs chooses a new window start so that point ends up that
717 fraction of the window's height from the bottom of the window.
719 ** The rectangle commands now avoid inserting undesirable spaces,
720 notably at the end of lines.
722 All these functions have been rewritten to avoid inserting unwanted
723 spaces, and an optional prefix now allows them to behave the old way.
726 There is a new command M-x replace-rectangle.
728 ** The new command M-x query-replace-regexp-eval acts like
729 query-replace-regexp, but takes a Lisp expression which is evaluated
730 after each match to get the replacement text.
733 ** M-x query-replace recognizes a new command `e' (or `E') that lets
734 you edit the replacement string.
736 ** The new command mail-abbrev-complete-alias, bound to `M-TAB', lets
737 you complete mail aliases in the text, analogous to
738 lisp-complete-symbol.
741 ** Emacs now resizes mini-windows if appropriate.
743 If a message is longer than one line, or minibuffer contents are
744 longer than one line, Emacs can resize the minibuffer window unless it
745 is on a frame of its own. You can control resizing and the maximum
746 minibuffer window size by setting the following variables:
748 - User option: max-mini-window-height
750 Maximum height for resizing mini-windows. If a float, it specifies a
751 fraction of the mini-window frame's height. If an integer, it
752 specifies a number of lines.
756 - User option: resize-mini-windows
758 How to resize mini-windows. If nil, don't resize. If t, always
759 resize to fit the size of the text. If `grow-only', let mini-windows
760 grow only, until they become empty, at which point they are shrunk
763 Default is `grow-only'.
765 ** The command `Info-search' now uses a search history.
767 ** Changes to hideshow.el
769 Hideshow is now at version 5.x. It uses a new algorithms for block
770 selection and traversal, includes more isearch support, and has more
771 conventional keybindings.
773 *** Generalized block selection and traversal
775 A block is now recognized by three things: its start and end regexps
776 (both strings), and a match-data selector (an integer) specifying
777 which sub-expression in the start regexp serves as the place where a
778 `forward-sexp'-like function can operate. Hideshow always adjusts
779 point to this sub-expression before calling `hs-forward-sexp-func'
780 (which for most modes evaluates to `forward-sexp').
782 If the match-data selector is not specified, it defaults to zero,
783 i.e., the entire start regexp is valid, w/ no prefix. This is
784 backwards compatible with previous versions of hideshow. Please see
785 the docstring for variable `hs-special-modes-alist' for details.
787 *** Isearch support for updating mode line
789 During incremental search, if Hideshow minor mode is active, hidden
790 blocks are temporarily shown. The variable `hs-headline' records the
791 line at the beginning of the opened block (preceding the hidden
792 portion of the buffer), and the mode line is refreshed. When a block
793 is re-hidden, the variable is set to nil.
795 To show `hs-headline' in the mode line, you may wish to include
796 something like this in your .emacs.
798 (add-hook 'hs-minor-mode-hook
800 (add-to-list 'mode-line-format 'hs-headline)))
802 *** New customization var: `hs-hide-all-non-comment-function'
804 Normally, `hs-hide-all' hides everything, leaving only the
805 header lines of top-level forms (and comments, unless var
806 `hs-hide-comments-when-hiding-all' is non-nil). It does this by
807 moving point to each top-level block beginning and hiding the
808 block there. In some major modes (for example, Java), this
809 behavior results in few blocks left visible, which may not be so
812 You can now set var `hs-hide-all-non-comment-function' to a
813 function to be called at each top-level block beginning, instead
814 of the normal block-hiding function. For example, the following
815 code defines a function to hide one level down and move point
816 appropriately, and then tells hideshow to use the new function.
818 (defun ttn-hs-hide-level-1 ()
821 (setq hs-hide-all-non-comment-function 'ttn-hs-hide-level-1)
823 The name `hs-hide-all-non-comment-function' was chosen to
824 emphasize that this function is not called for comment blocks,
825 only for code blocks.
827 *** Command deleted: `hs-show-region'
829 Historical Note: This command was added to handle "unbalanced
830 parentheses" emergencies back when hideshow.el used selective
831 display for implementation.
833 *** Commands rebound to more conventional keys
835 The hideshow commands used to be bound to keys of the form "C-c
836 LETTER". This is contrary to the Emacs keybinding convention,
837 which reserves that space for user modification. Here are the
838 new bindings (which includes the addition of `hs-toggle-hiding'):
840 hs-hide-block C-c C-h
841 hs-show-block C-c C-s
842 hs-hide-all C-c C-M-h
843 hs-show-all C-c C-M-s
844 hs-hide-level C-c C-l
845 hs-toggle-hiding C-c C-c
846 hs-mouse-toggle-hiding [(shift button-2)]
848 These were chosen to roughly imitate those used by Outline mode.
850 ** Changes to Change Log mode and Add-Log functions
853 *** If you invoke `add-change-log-entry' from a backup file, it makes
854 an entry appropriate for the file's parent. This is useful for making
855 log entries by comparing a version with deleted functions.
858 **** New command M-x change-log-merge merges another log into the
862 *** New command M-x change-log-redate fixes any old-style date entries
866 *** Change Log mode now adds a file's version number to change log
867 entries if user-option `change-log-version-info-enabled' is non-nil.
870 *** Unless the file is under version control the search for a file's
871 version number is performed based on regular expressions from
872 `change-log-version-number-regexp-list' which can be cutomized.
873 Version numbers are only found in the first 10 percent of a file.
875 *** Change Log mode now defines its own faces for font-lock highlighting.
877 ** Changes to cmuscheme
879 *** The user-option `scheme-program-name' has been renamed
880 `cmuscheme-program-name' due to conflicts with xscheme.el.
882 ** Changes in Font Lock
884 *** The new function `font-lock-remove-keywords' can be used to remove
885 font-lock keywords from the current buffer or from a specific major mode.
887 *** multiline patterns are now supported.
889 *** `font-lock-syntactic-face-function' allows major-modes to choose
890 the face used for each string/comment.
892 *** A new standard face `font-lock-doc-face'.
893 Meant for Lisp docstrings, Javadoc comments and other "documentation in code".
895 ** Comint (subshell) changes
897 These changes generally affect all modes derived from comint mode, which
898 include shell-mode, gdb-mode, scheme-interaction-mode, etc.
900 *** By default, comint no longer uses the variable `comint-prompt-regexp'
901 to distinguish prompts from user-input. Instead, it notices which
902 parts of the text were output by the process, and which entered by the
903 user, and attaches `field' properties to allow emacs commands to use
904 this information. Common movement commands, notably beginning-of-line,
905 respect field boundaries in a fairly natural manner. To disable this
906 feature, and use the old behavior, customize the user option
907 `comint-use-prompt-regexp-instead-of-fields'.
909 *** Comint now includes new features to send commands to running processes
910 and redirect the output to a designated buffer or buffers.
912 *** The command M-x comint-redirect-send-command reads a command and
913 buffer name from the mini-buffer. The command is sent to the current
914 buffer's process, and its output is inserted into the specified buffer.
916 The command M-x comint-redirect-send-command-to-process acts like
917 M-x comint-redirect-send-command but additionally reads the name of
918 the buffer whose process should be used from the mini-buffer.
920 *** Packages based on comint now highlight user input and program prompts,
921 and support choosing previous input with mouse-2. To control these features,
922 see the user-options `comint-highlight-input' and `comint-highlight-prompt'.
924 *** The new command `comint-write-output' (usually bound to `C-c C-s')
925 saves the output from the most recent command to a file. With a prefix
926 argument, it appends to the file.
928 *** The command `comint-kill-output' has been renamed `comint-delete-output'
929 (usually bound to `C-c C-o'); the old name is aliased to it for
932 *** The new function `comint-add-to-input-history' adds commands to the input
935 ** Changes to Rmail mode
937 *** The new user-option rmail-rmail-user-mail-address-regexp can be
938 set to fine tune the identification of of the correspondent when
939 receiving new mail. If it matches the address of the sender, the
940 recipient is taken as correspondent of a mail. If nil, the default,
941 `user-login-name' and `user-mail-address' are used to exclude yourself
944 Usually you don't have to set this variable, except if you collect
945 mails sent by you under different user names. Then it should be a
946 regexp matching your mail addresses.
948 *** The new user-option rmail-confirm-expunge controls whether and how
949 to ask for confirmation before expunging deleted messages from an
950 Rmail file. You can choose between no confirmation, confirmation
951 with y-or-n-p, or confirmation with yes-or-no-p. Default is to ask
952 for confirmation with yes-or-no-p.
954 *** RET is now bound in the Rmail summary to rmail-summary-goto-msg,
957 *** There is a new user option `rmail-digest-end-regexps' that
958 specifies the regular expressions to detect the line that ends a
961 *** The new user option `rmail-automatic-folder-directives' specifies
962 in which folder to put messages automatically.
964 ** Changes to TeX mode
966 *** The default mode has been changed from `plain-tex-mode' to
969 *** latex-mode now has a simple indentation algorithm.
971 *** M-f and M-p jump around \begin...\end pairs.
973 *** Added support for outline-minor-mode.
975 ** Changes to RefTeX mode
977 *** RefTeX has new support for index generation. Index entries can be
978 created with `C-c <', with completion available on index keys.
979 Pressing `C-c /' indexes the word at the cursor with a default
980 macro. `C-c >' compiles all index entries into an alphabetically
981 sorted *Index* buffer which looks like the final index. Entries
982 can be edited from that buffer.
984 *** Label and citation key selection now allow to select several
985 items and reference them together (use `m' to mark items, `a' or
986 `A' to use all marked entries).
988 *** reftex.el has been split into a number of smaller files to reduce
989 memory use when only a part of RefTeX is being used.
991 *** a new command `reftex-view-crossref-from-bibtex' (bound to `C-c &'
992 in BibTeX-mode) can be called in a BibTeX database buffer in order
993 to show locations in LaTeX documents where a particular entry has
996 ** Emacs Lisp mode now allows multiple levels of outline headings.
997 The level of a heading is determined from the number of leading
998 semicolons in a heading line. Toplevel forms starting with a `('
999 in column 1 are always made leaves.
1001 ** The M-x time-stamp command (most commonly used on write-file-hooks)
1002 has the following new features:
1004 *** The patterns for finding the time stamp and for updating a pattern
1005 may match text spanning multiple lines. For example, some people like
1006 to have the filename and date on separate lines. The new variable
1007 time-stamp-inserts-lines controls the matching for multi-line patterns.
1009 *** More than one time stamp can be updated in the same file. This
1010 feature is useful if you need separate time stamps in a program source
1011 file to both include in formatted documentation and insert in the
1012 compiled binary. The same time-stamp will be written at each matching
1013 pattern. The variable time-stamp-count enables this new feature; it
1016 ** Partial Completion mode now completes environment variables in
1022 Tooltips are small X windows displaying a help string at the current
1023 mouse position. The Lisp package `tooltip' implements them. You can
1024 turn them off via the user option `tooltip-mode'.
1026 Tooltips also provides support for GUD debugging. If activated,
1027 variable values can be displayed in tooltips by pointing at them with
1028 the mouse in source buffers. You can customize various aspects of the
1029 tooltip display in the group `tooltip'.
1032 ** Customize changes
1034 *** Customize now supports comments about customized items. Use the
1035 `State' menu to add comments. Note that customization comments will
1036 cause the customizations to fail in earlier versions of Emacs.
1038 *** The new option `custom-buffer-done-function' says whether to kill
1039 Custom buffers when you've done with them or just bury them (the
1042 *** The keyword :set-after in defcustom allows to specify dependencies
1043 between custom options. Example:
1045 (defcustom default-input-method nil
1046 "*Default input method for multilingual text (a string).
1047 This is the input method activated automatically by the command
1048 `toggle-input-method' (\\[toggle-input-method])."
1050 :type '(choice (const nil) string)
1051 :set-after '(current-language-environment))
1053 This specifies that default-input-method should be set after
1054 current-language-environment even if default-input-method appears
1055 first in a custom-set-variables statement.
1057 ** New features in evaluation commands
1059 *** The commands to evaluate Lisp expressions, such as C-M-x in Lisp
1060 modes, C-j in Lisp Interaction mode, and M-:, now bind the variables
1061 print-level, print-length, and debug-on-error based on the
1062 customizable variables eval-expression-print-level,
1063 eval-expression-print-length, and eval-expression-debug-on-error.
1065 *** The function `eval-defun' (M-C-x) now loads Edebug and instruments
1066 code when called with a prefix argument.
1071 *** The command `ispell' now spell-checks a region if
1072 transient-mark-mode is on, and the mark is active. Otherwise it
1073 spell-checks the current buffer.
1076 *** Support for synchronous subprocesses - DOS/Windoze - has been
1079 *** An "alignment error" bug was fixed when a manual spelling
1080 correction is made and re-checked.
1082 *** An Italian and a Portuguese dictionary definition has been added.
1084 *** Region skipping performance has been vastly improved in some
1087 *** Spell checking HTML buffers has been improved and isn't so strict
1090 *** The buffer-local words are now always placed on a new line at the
1095 *** New variable `dired-recursive-deletes' determines if the delete
1096 command will delete non-empty directories recursively. The default
1097 is, delete only empty directories.
1099 *** New variable `dired-recursive-copies' determines if the copy
1100 command will copy directories recursively. The default is, do not
1101 copy directories recursively.
1103 *** In command `dired-do-shell-command' (usually bound to `!') a `?'
1104 in the shell command has a special meaning similar to `*', but with
1105 the difference that the command will be run on each file individually.
1107 *** The new command `dired-find-alternate-file' (usually bound to `a')
1108 replaces the Dired buffer with the buffer for an alternate file or
1111 *** The new command `dired-show-file-type' (usually bound to `w') shows
1112 a message in the echo area describing what type of file the point is on.
1113 This command invokes the external program `file' do its work, and so
1114 will only work on systems with that program, and will be only as
1115 accurate or inaccurate as it is.
1117 *** Dired now properly handles undo changes of adding/removing `-R'
1120 *** Dired commands that prompt for a destination file now allow the use
1121 of the `M-n' command in the minibuffer to insert the source filename,
1122 which the user can then edit. This only works if there is a single
1123 source file, not when operating on multiple marked files.
1125 ** The variable mail-specify-envelope-from controls whether to
1126 use the -f option when sending mail.
1130 Note: This release contains changes that might not be compatible with
1131 current user setups (although it's believed that these
1132 incompatibilities will only show in very uncommon circumstances).
1133 However, since the impact is uncertain, these changes may be rolled
1134 back depending on user feedback. Therefore there's no forward
1135 compatibility guarantee wrt the new features introduced in this
1138 *** c-style-variables-are-local-p now defaults to t.
1139 This is an incompatible change that has been made to make the behavior
1140 of the style system wrt global variable settings less confusing for
1141 non-advanced users. If you know what this variable does you might
1142 want to set it to nil in your .emacs, otherwise you probably don't
1145 Defaulting c-style-variables-are-local-p to t avoids the confusing
1146 situation that occurs when a user sets some style variables globally
1147 and edits both a Java and a non-Java file in the same Emacs session.
1148 If the style variables aren't buffer local in this case, loading of
1149 the second file will cause the default style (either "gnu" or "java"
1150 by default) to override the global settings made by the user.
1152 *** New initialization procedure for the style system.
1153 When the initial style for a buffer is determined by CC Mode (from the
1154 variable c-default-style), the global values of style variables now
1155 take precedence over the values specified by the chosen style. This
1156 is different than the old behavior: previously, the style-specific
1157 settings would override the global settings. This change makes it
1158 possible to do simple configuration in the intuitive way with
1159 Customize or with setq lines in one's .emacs file.
1161 By default, the global value of every style variable is the new
1162 special symbol set-from-style, which causes the value to be taken from
1163 the style system. This means that in effect, only an explicit setting
1164 of a style variable will cause the "overriding" behavior described
1167 Also note that global settings override style-specific settings *only*
1168 when the initial style of a buffer is chosen by a CC Mode major mode
1169 function. When a style is chosen in other ways --- for example, by a
1170 call like (c-set-style "gnu") in a hook, or via M-x c-set-style ---
1171 then the style-specific values take precedence over any global style
1172 values. In Lisp terms, global values override style-specific values
1173 only when the new second argument to c-set-style is non-nil; see the
1174 function documentation for more info.
1176 The purpose of these changes is to make it easier for users,
1177 especially novice users, to do simple customizations with Customize or
1178 with setq in their .emacs files. On the other hand, the new system is
1179 intended to be compatible with advanced users' customizations as well,
1180 such as those that choose styles in hooks or whatnot. This new system
1181 is believed to be almost entirely compatible with current
1182 configurations, in spite of the changed precedence between style and
1183 global variable settings when a buffer's default style is set.
1185 (Thanks to Eric Eide for clarifying this explanation a bit.)
1187 **** c-offsets-alist is now a customizable variable.
1188 This became possible as a result of the new initialization behavior.
1190 This variable is treated slightly differently from the other style
1191 variables; instead of using the symbol set-from-style, it will be
1192 completed with the syntactic symbols it doesn't already contain when
1193 the style is first initialized. This means it now defaults to the
1194 empty list to make all syntactic elements get their values from the
1197 **** Compatibility variable to restore the old behavior.
1198 In case your configuration doesn't work with this change, you can set
1199 c-old-style-variable-behavior to non-nil to get the old behavior back
1202 *** Improvements to line breaking and text filling.
1203 CC Mode now handles this more intelligently and seamlessly wrt the
1204 surrounding code, especially inside comments. For details see the new
1205 chapter about this in the manual.
1207 **** New variable to recognize comment line prefix decorations.
1208 The variable c-comment-prefix-regexp has been added to properly
1209 recognize the line prefix in both block and line comments. It's
1210 primarily used to initialize the various paragraph recognition and
1211 adaptive filling variables that the text handling functions uses.
1213 **** New variable c-block-comment-prefix.
1214 This is a generalization of the now obsolete variable
1215 c-comment-continuation-stars to handle arbitrary strings.
1217 **** CC Mode now uses adaptive fill mode.
1218 This to make it adapt better to the paragraph style inside comments.
1220 It's also possible to use other adaptive filling packages inside CC
1221 Mode, notably Kyle E. Jones' Filladapt mode (http://wonderworks.com/).
1222 A new convenience function c-setup-filladapt sets up Filladapt for use
1225 Note though that the 2.12 version of Filladapt lacks a feature that
1226 causes it to work suboptimally when c-comment-prefix-regexp can match
1227 the empty string (which it commonly does). A patch for that is
1228 available from the CC Mode web site (http://www.python.org/emacs/
1231 **** It's now possible to selectively turn off auto filling.
1232 The variable c-ignore-auto-fill is used to ignore auto fill mode in
1233 specific contexts, e.g. in preprocessor directives and in string
1236 **** New context sensitive line break function c-context-line-break.
1237 It works like newline-and-indent in normal code, and adapts the line
1238 prefix according to the comment style when used inside comments. If
1239 you're normally using newline-and-indent, you might want to switch to
1242 *** Fixes to IDL mode.
1243 It now does a better job in recognizing only the constructs relevant
1244 to IDL. E.g. it no longer matches "class" as the beginning of a
1245 struct block, but it does match the CORBA 2.3 "valuetype" keyword.
1246 Thanks to Eric Eide.
1248 *** Improvements to the Whitesmith style.
1249 It now keeps the style consistently on all levels and both when
1250 opening braces hangs and when they don't.
1252 **** New lineup function c-lineup-whitesmith-in-block.
1254 *** New lineup functions c-lineup-template-args and c-indent-multi-line-block.
1255 See their docstrings for details. c-lineup-template-args does a
1256 better job of tracking the brackets used as parens in C++ templates,
1257 and is used by default to line up continued template arguments.
1259 *** c-lineup-comment now preserves alignment with a comment on the
1260 previous line. It used to instead preserve comments that started in
1261 the column specified by comment-column.
1263 *** c-lineup-C-comments handles "free form" text comments.
1264 In comments with a long delimiter line at the start, the indentation
1265 is kept unchanged for lines that start with an empty comment line
1266 prefix. This is intended for the type of large block comments that
1267 contain documentation with its own formatting. In these you normally
1268 don't want CC Mode to change the indentation.
1270 *** The `c' syntactic symbol is now relative to the comment start
1271 instead of the previous line, to make integers usable as lineup
1274 *** All lineup functions have gotten docstrings.
1276 *** More preprocessor directive movement functions.
1277 c-down-conditional does the reverse of c-up-conditional.
1278 c-up-conditional-with-else and c-down-conditional-with-else are
1279 variants of these that also stops at "#else" lines (suggested by Don
1282 *** Minor improvements to many movement functions in tricky situations.
1284 ** Makefile mode changes
1286 *** The mode now uses the abbrev table `makefile-mode-abbrev-table'.
1288 *** Conditionals and include statements are now highlighted when
1289 Fontlock mode is active.
1293 *** Isearch now puts a call to `isearch-resume' in the command history,
1294 so that searches can be resumed.
1296 *** In Isearch mode, M-C-s and M-C-r are now bound like C-s and C-r,
1297 respectively, i.e. you can repeat a regexp isearch with the same keys
1298 that started the search.
1300 *** In Isearch mode, mouse-2 in the echo area now yanks the current
1301 selection into the search string rather than giving an error.
1304 *** There is a new lazy highlighting feature in incremental search.
1306 Lazy highlighting is switched on/off by customizing variable
1307 `isearch-lazy-highlight'. When active, all matches for the current
1308 search string are highlighted. The current match is highlighted as
1309 before using face `isearch' or `region'. All other matches are
1310 highlighted using face `isearch-lazy-highlight-face' which defaults to
1311 `secondary-selection'.
1313 The extra highlighting makes it easier to anticipate where the cursor
1314 will end up each time you press C-s or C-r to repeat a pending search.
1315 Highlighting of these additional matches happens in a deferred fashion
1316 using "idle timers," so the cycles needed do not rob isearch of its
1317 usual snappy response.
1319 If `isearch-lazy-highlight-cleanup' is set to t, highlights for
1320 matches are automatically cleared when you end the search. If it is
1321 set to nil, you can remove the highlights manually with `M-x
1322 isearch-lazy-highlight-cleanup'.
1325 ** Changes in sort.el
1327 The function sort-numeric-fields interprets numbers starting with `0'
1328 as octal and numbers starting with `0x' or `0X' as hexadecimal. The
1329 new user-option sort-numeric-base can be used to specify a default
1332 ** Changes to Ange-ftp
1335 *** Ange-ftp allows you to specify of a port number in remote file
1336 names cleanly. It is appended to the host name, separated by a hash
1337 sign, e.g. `/foo@bar.org#666:mumble'. (This syntax comes from EFS.)
1339 *** If the new user-option `ange-ftp-try-passive-mode' is set, passive
1340 ftp mode will be used if the ftp client supports that.
1342 *** Ange-ftp handles the output of the w32-style clients which
1343 output ^M at the end of lines.
1345 ** Shell script mode changes.
1347 Shell script mode (sh-script) can now indent scripts for shells
1348 derived from sh and rc. The indentation style is customizeable, and
1349 sh-script can attempt to "learn" the current buffer's style.
1353 *** In DOS, etags looks for file.cgz if it cannot find file.c.
1355 *** New option --ignore-case-regex is an alternative to --regex. It is now
1356 possible to bind a regexp to a language, by prepending the regexp with
1357 {lang}, where lang is one of the languages that `etags --help' prints out.
1358 This feature is useful especially for regex files, where each line contains
1359 a regular expression. The manual contains details.
1361 *** In C and derived languages, etags creates tags for function
1362 declarations when given the --declarations option.
1364 *** In C++, tags are created for "operator". The tags have the form
1365 "operator+", without spaces between the keyword and the operator.
1367 *** New language Ada: tags are functions, procedures, packages, tasks, and
1370 *** In Fortran, `procedure' is not tagged.
1372 *** In Java, tags are created for "interface".
1374 *** In Lisp, "(defstruct (foo", "(defun (operator" and similar constructs
1377 *** In Perl, the --globals option tags global variables. my and local
1378 variables are tagged.
1380 *** New language Python: def and class at the beginning of a line are tags.
1382 *** .ss files are Scheme files, .pdb is Postscript with C syntax, .psw is
1386 ** Changes in etags.el
1388 *** The new user-option tags-case-fold-search can be used to make
1389 tags operations case-sensitive or case-insensitive. The default
1390 is to use the same setting as case-fold-search.
1392 *** You can display additional output with M-x tags-apropos by setting
1393 the new variable tags-apropos-additional-actions.
1395 If non-nil, the variable's value should be a list of triples (TITLE
1396 FUNCTION TO-SEARCH). For each triple, M-x tags-apropos processes
1397 TO-SEARCH and lists tags from it. TO-SEARCH should be an alist,
1398 obarray, or symbol. If it is a symbol, the symbol's value is used.
1400 TITLE is a string to use to label the list of tags from TO-SEARCH.
1402 FUNCTION is a function to call when an entry is selected in the Tags
1403 List buffer. It is called with one argument, the selected symbol.
1405 A useful example value for this variable might be something like:
1407 '(("Emacs Lisp" Info-goto-emacs-command-node obarray)
1408 ("Common Lisp" common-lisp-hyperspec common-lisp-hyperspec-obarray)
1409 ("SCWM" scwm-documentation scwm-obarray))
1411 *** The face tags-tag-face can be used to customize the appearance
1412 of tags in the output of M-x tags-apropos.
1414 *** Setting tags-apropos-verbose to a non-nil value displays the
1415 names of tags files in the *Tags List* buffer.
1418 ** Emacs now attempts to determine the initial language environment
1419 and preferred and locale coding systems systematically from the
1420 LC_ALL, LC_CTYPE, and LANG environment variables during startup.
1423 ** New language environments `Polish', `Latin-8' and `Latin-9'.
1424 Latin-8 and Latin-9 correspond respectively to the ISO character sets
1425 8859-14 (Celtic) and 8859-15 (updated Latin-1, with the Euro sign).
1426 GNU Intlfonts doesn't support these yet; there are basic 8859-14 and
1427 8859-15 fonts at <URL:http://czyborra.com/charsets/> and recent X
1428 releases have 8859-15. There are new Latin-8 and Latin-9 prefix
1429 (only) and Polish slash input methods in Leim.
1432 ** Fortran mode has a new command `fortran-strip-sequence-nos' to
1433 remove text past column 72. The syntax class of `\' in Fortran is now
1434 appropriate for C-style escape sequences in strings.
1436 ** SGML mode's default `sgml-validate-command' is now `nsgmls'.
1439 ** A new command `view-emacs-problems' (C-h P) displays the PROBLEMS file.
1442 ** The Dabbrev package has a new user-option `dabbrev-ignored-regexps'
1443 containing a list of regular expressions. Buffers matching a regular
1444 expression from that list, are not checked.
1446 ** Emacs can now figure out modification times of remote files.
1447 When you do C-x C-f /user@host:/path/file RET and edit the file,
1448 and someone else modifies the file, you will be prompted to revert
1449 the buffer, just like for the local files.
1451 ** The buffer menu (C-x C-b) no longer lists the *Buffer List* buffer.
1454 ** When invoked with a prefix argument, the command `list-abbrevs' now
1455 displays local abbrevs, only.
1459 VC has been overhauled internally. It is now modular, making it
1460 easier to plug-in arbitrary version control backends. (See Lisp
1461 Changes for details on the new structure.) As a result, the mechanism
1462 to enable and disable support for particular version systems has
1463 changed: everything is now controlled by the new variable
1464 `vc-handled-backends'. Its value is a list of atoms that identify
1465 version systems; the default is '(RCS CVS SCCS). When finding a file,
1466 each of the backends in that list is tried in order to see whether the
1467 file is registered in that backend.
1469 When registering a new file, VC first tries each of the listed
1470 backends to see if any of them considers itself "responsible" for the
1471 directory of the file (e.g. because a corresponding subdirectory for
1472 master files exists). If none of the backends is responsible, then
1473 the first backend in the list that could register the file is chosen.
1474 As a consequence, the variable `vc-default-back-end' is now obsolete.
1476 The old variable `vc-master-templates' is also obsolete, although VC
1477 still supports it for backward compatibility. To define templates for
1478 RCS or SCCS, you should rather use the new variables
1479 vc-{rcs,sccs}-master-templates. (There is no such feature under CVS
1480 where it doesn't make sense.)
1482 The variables `vc-ignore-vc-files' and `vc-handle-cvs' are also
1483 obsolete now, you must set `vc-handled-backends' to nil or exclude
1484 `CVS' from the list, respectively, to achieve their effect now.
1488 The variable `vc-checkout-carefully' is obsolete: the corresponding
1489 checks are always done now.
1491 VC Dired buffers are now kept up-to-date during all version control
1494 `vc-diff' output is now displayed in `diff-mode'.
1495 `vc-print-log' uses `log-view-mode'.
1496 `vc-log-mode' (used for *VC-Log*) has been replaced by `log-edit-mode'.
1498 The command C-x v m (vc-merge) now accepts an empty argument as the
1499 first revision number. This means that any recent changes on the
1500 current branch should be picked up from the repository and merged into
1501 the working file (``merge news'').
1503 The commands C-x v s (vc-create-snapshot) and C-x v r
1504 (vc-retrieve-snapshot) now ask for a directory name from which to work
1507 *** Multiple Backends
1509 VC now lets you register files in more than one backend. This is
1510 useful, for example, if you are working with a slow remote CVS
1511 repository. You can then use RCS for local editing, and occasionally
1512 commit your changes back to CVS, or pick up changes from CVS into your
1515 To make this work, the ``more local'' backend (RCS in our example)
1516 should come first in `vc-handled-backends', and the ``more remote''
1517 backend (CVS) should come later. (The default value of
1518 `vc-handled-backends' already has it that way.)
1520 If you have a file registered in one backend already, you can register
1521 it in a second one by using C-x v i (vc-register) again.
1522 Alternatively, you can commit changes to another backend (say, RCS),
1523 by typing C-u C-x v v RCS RET (i.e. vc-next-action now accepts a
1524 backend name as a revision number). When using the latter approach,
1525 VC registers the file in the more local backend if that hasn't already
1526 happened, and commits to a branch based on the current revision number
1527 from the more remote backend.
1529 If a file is registered in multiple backends, you can switch to
1530 another one using C-x v b (vc-switch-backend). This does not change
1531 any files, it only changes VC's perspective on the file. Use this to
1532 pick up changes from CVS while working under RCS locally.
1534 After you are done with your local RCS editing, you can commit your
1535 changes back to CVS using C-u C-x v v CVS RET. In this case, the
1536 local RCS archive is removed after the commit, and the log entry
1537 buffer is initialized to contain the entire RCS change log of the file.
1541 There is a new user option, `vc-cvs-stay-local'. If it is `t' (the
1542 default), then VC avoids network queries for files registered in
1543 remote repositories. The state of such files is then only determined
1544 by heuristics and past information. `vc-cvs-stay-local' can also be a
1545 regexp to match against repository hostnames; only files from hosts
1546 that match it are treated locally. If the variable is nil, then VC
1547 queries the repository just as often as it does for local files.
1549 If `vc-cvs-stay-local' is on, then VC also makes local backups of
1550 repository versions. This means that ordinary diffs (C-x v =) and
1551 revert operations (C-x v u) can be done completely locally, without
1552 any repository interactions at all. The name of a local version
1553 backup of FILE is FILE.~REV.~, where REV is the repository version
1554 number. This format is similar to that used by C-x v ~
1555 (vc-version-other-window), except for the trailing dot. As a matter
1556 of fact, the two features can each use the files created by the other,
1557 the only difference being that files with a trailing `.' are deleted
1558 automatically after commit. (This feature doesn't work on MS-DOS,
1559 since DOS disallows more than a single dot in the trunk of a file
1562 If `vc-cvs-stay-local' is on, and there have been changes in the
1563 repository, VC notifies you about it when you actually try to commit.
1564 If you want to check for updates from the repository without trying to
1565 commit, you can either use C-x v m RET to perform an update on the
1566 current file, or you can use C-x v r RET to get an update for an
1567 entire directory tree.
1569 The new user option `vc-cvs-use-edit' indicates whether VC should call
1570 "cvs edit" to make files writeable; it defaults to `t'. (This option
1571 is only meaningful if the CVSREAD variable is set, or if files are
1572 "watched" by other developers.)
1574 The commands C-x v s (vc-create-snapshot) and C-x v r
1575 (vc-retrieve-snapshot) are now also implemented for CVS. If you give
1576 an empty argument to the latter, that performs a `cvs update',
1577 starting at the given directory.
1579 *** Lisp Changes in VC
1581 VC has been restructured internally to make it modular. You can now
1582 add support for arbitrary version control backends by writing a
1583 library that provides a certain set of backend-specific functions, and
1584 then telling VC to use that library. For example, to add support for
1585 a version system named FOO, you write a library named vc-foo.el, which
1586 provides a number of functions vc-foo-... (see commentary at the end
1587 of vc.el for a detailed list of them). To make VC use that library,
1588 you need to put it somewhere into Emacs' load path and add the atom
1589 `FOO' to the list `vc-handled-backends'.
1591 ** New modes and packages
1593 *** Artist is an Emacs lisp package that allows you to draw lines,
1594 rectangles and ellipses by using your mouse and/or keyboard. The
1595 shapes are made up with the ascii characters |, -, / and \.
1599 - Intersecting: When a `|' intersects with a `-', a `+' is
1600 drawn, like this: | \ /
1604 - Rubber-banding: When drawing lines you can interactively see the
1605 result while holding the mouse button down and moving the mouse. If
1606 your machine is not fast enough (a 386 is a bit too slow, but a
1607 pentium is well enough), you can turn this feature off. You will
1608 then see 1's and 2's which mark the 1st and 2nd endpoint of the line
1611 - Arrows: After having drawn a (straight) line or a (straight)
1612 poly-line, you can set arrows on the line-ends by typing < or >.
1614 - Flood-filling: You can fill any area with a certain character by
1617 - Cut copy and paste: You can cut, copy and paste rectangular
1618 regions. Artist also interfaces with the rect package (this can be
1619 turned off if it causes you any trouble) so anything you cut in
1620 artist can be yanked with C-x r y and vice versa.
1622 - Drawing with keys: Everything you can do with the mouse, you can
1623 also do without the mouse.
1625 - Aspect-ratio: You can set the variable artist-aspect-ratio to
1626 reflect the height-width ratio for the font you are using. Squares
1627 and circles are then drawn square/round. Note, that once your
1628 ascii-file is shown with font with a different height-width ratio,
1629 the squares won't be square and the circles won't be round.
1631 - Drawing operations: The following drawing operations are implemented:
1633 lines straight-lines
1635 poly-lines straight poly-lines
1637 text (see-thru) text (overwrite)
1638 spray-can setting size for spraying
1639 vaporize line vaporize lines
1640 erase characters erase rectangles
1642 Straight lines are lines that go horizontally, vertically or
1643 diagonally. Plain lines go in any direction. The operations in
1644 the right column are accessed by holding down the shift key while
1647 It is possible to vaporize (erase) entire lines and connected lines
1648 (rectangles for example) as long as the lines being vaporized are
1649 straight and connected at their endpoints. Vaporizing is inspired
1650 by the drawrect package by Jari Aalto <jari.aalto@poboxes.com>.
1652 - Picture mode compatibility: Artist is picture mode compatible (this
1656 *** The new package Eshell is an operating system command shell
1657 implemented entirely in Emacs Lisp. Use `M-x eshell' to invoke it.
1658 It functions similarly to bash and zsh, and allows running of Lisp
1659 functions and external commands using the same syntax. It supports
1660 history lists, aliases, extended globbing, smart scrolling, etc. It
1661 will work on any platform Emacs has been ported to. And since most of
1662 the basic commands -- ls, rm, mv, cp, ln, du, cat, etc. -- have been
1663 rewritten in Lisp, it offers an operating-system independent shell,
1664 all within the scope of your Emacs process.
1667 *** The new package timeclock.el is a mode is for keeping track of time
1668 intervals. You can use it for whatever purpose you like, but the
1669 typical scenario is to keep track of how much time you spend working
1670 on certain projects.
1673 *** The new package hi-lock.el, text matching interactively entered
1674 regexp's can be highlighted. For example,
1676 M-x highlight-regexp RET clearly RET RET
1678 will highlight all occurrences of `clearly' using a yellow background
1679 face. New occurrences of `clearly' will be highlighted as they are
1680 typed. `M-x unhighlight-regexp RET' will remove the highlighting.
1681 Any existing face can be used for highlighting and a set of
1682 appropriate faces is provided. The regexps can be written into the
1683 current buffer in a form that will be recognized the next time the
1684 corresponding file is read.
1687 *** The new package zone.el plays games with Emacs' display when
1690 *** The new package xml.el provides a simple but generic XML
1691 parser. It doesn't parse the DTDs however.
1693 *** The comment operations are now provided by the newcomment.el
1694 package which allows different styles of comment-region and should
1695 be more robust while offering the same functionality.
1696 `comment-region' now doesn't always comment a-line-at-a-time, but only
1697 comments the region, breaking the line at point if necessary.
1700 *** The Ebrowse package implements a C++ class browser and tags
1701 facilities tailored for use with C++. It is documented in a
1702 separate Texinfo file.
1705 *** The PCL-CVS package available by either running M-x cvs-examine or
1706 by visiting a CVS administrative directory (with a prefix argument)
1707 provides an alternative interface to VC-dired for CVS. It comes with
1708 `log-view-mode' to view RCS and SCCS logs and `log-edit-mode' used to
1709 enter checkin log messages.
1712 *** The new package called `woman' allows to browse Unix man pages
1713 without invoking external programs.
1715 The command `M-x woman' formats manual pages entirely in Emacs Lisp
1716 and then displays them, like `M-x manual-entry' does. Unlike
1717 `manual-entry', `woman' does not invoke any external programs, so it
1718 is useful on systems such as MS-DOS/MS-Windows where the `man' and
1719 Groff or `troff' commands are not readily available.
1721 The command `M-x woman-find-file' asks for the file name of a man
1722 page, then formats and displays it like `M-x woman' does.
1725 *** The new command M-x re-builder offers a convenient interface for
1726 authoring regular expressions with immediate visual feedback.
1728 The buffer from which the command was called becomes the target for
1729 the regexp editor popping up in a separate window. Matching text in
1730 the target buffer is immediately color marked during the editing.
1731 Each sub-expression of the regexp will show up in a different face so
1732 even complex regexps can be edited and verified on target data in a
1735 On displays not supporting faces the matches instead blink like
1736 matching parens to make them stand out. On such a setup you will
1737 probably also want to use the sub-expression mode when the regexp
1738 contains such to get feedback about their respective limits.
1741 *** glasses-mode is a minor mode that makes
1742 unreadableIdentifiersLikeThis readable. It works as glasses, without
1743 actually modifying content of a buffer.
1745 *** The package ebnf2ps translates an EBNF to a syntactic chart in
1748 Currently accepts ad-hoc EBNF, ISO EBNF and Bison/Yacc.
1750 The ad-hoc default EBNF syntax has the following elements:
1752 ; comment (until end of line)
1756 $A default non-terminal
1757 $"C" default terminal
1758 $?C? default special
1759 A = B. production (A is the header and B the body)
1760 C D sequence (C occurs before D)
1761 C | D alternative (C or D occurs)
1762 A - B exception (A excluding B, B without any non-terminal)
1763 n * A repetition (A repeats n (integer) times)
1764 (C) group (expression C is grouped together)
1765 [C] optional (C may or not occurs)
1766 C+ one or more occurrences of C
1767 {C}+ one or more occurrences of C
1768 {C}* zero or more occurrences of C
1769 {C} zero or more occurrences of C
1770 C / D equivalent to: C {D C}*
1771 {C || D}+ equivalent to: C {D C}*
1772 {C || D}* equivalent to: [C {D C}*]
1773 {C || D} equivalent to: [C {D C}*]
1775 Please, see ebnf2ps documentation for EBNF syntax and how to use it.
1777 *** The package align.el will align columns within a region, using M-x
1778 align. Its mode-specific rules, based on regular expressions,
1779 determine where the columns should be split. In C and C++, for
1780 example, it will align variable names in declaration lists, or the
1781 equal signs of assignments.
1784 *** `paragraph-indent-minor-mode' is a new minor mode supporting
1785 paragraphs in the same style as `paragraph-indent-text-mode'.
1788 *** bs.el is a new package for buffer selection similar to
1789 list-buffers or electric-buffer-list. Use M-x bs-show to display a
1790 buffer menu with this package. You can use M-x bs-customize to
1791 customize the package.
1793 *** find-lisp.el is a package emulating the Unix find command in Lisp.
1795 *** calculator.el is a small calculator package that is intended to
1796 replace desktop calculators such as xcalc and calc.exe. Actually, it
1797 is not too small - it has more features than most desktop calculators,
1798 and can be customized easily to get many more functions. It should
1799 not be confused with "calc" which is a much bigger mathematical tool
1800 which answers different needs.
1803 *** The minor modes cwarn-mode and global-cwarn-mode highlights
1804 suspicious C and C++ constructions. Currently, assignments inside
1805 expressions, semicolon following `if', `for' and `while' (except, of
1806 course, after a `do .. while' statement), and C++ functions with
1807 reference parameters are recognized. The modes require font-lock mode
1811 *** smerge-mode.el provides `smerge-mode', a simple minor-mode for files
1812 containing diff3-style conflict markers, such as generated by RCS.
1815 *** 5x5.el is a simple puzzle game.
1818 *** hl-line.el provides a minor mode to highlight the current line.
1820 *** ansi-color.el translates ANSI terminal escapes into text-properties.
1822 Please note: if `ansi-color-for-shell-mode' and
1823 `global-font-lock-mode' are non-nil, loading ansi-color.el will
1824 disable font-lock and add `ansi-color-apply' to
1825 `comint-preoutput-filter-functions' for all shell-mode buffers. This
1826 displays the output of "ls --color=yes" using the correct foreground
1827 and background colors.
1829 *** delphi.el provides a major mode for editing the Delphi (Object
1833 *** quickurl.el provides a simple method of inserting a URL based on
1836 *** sql.el provides an interface to SQL data bases.
1839 *** fortune.el uses the fortune program to create mail/news signatures.
1841 *** whitespace.el ???
1843 *** PostScript mode (ps-mode) is a new major mode for editing PostScript
1844 files. It offers: interaction with a PostScript interpreter, including
1845 (very basic) error handling; fontification, easily customizable for
1846 interpreter messages; auto-indentation; insertion of EPSF templates and
1847 often used code snippets; viewing of BoundingBox; commenting out /
1848 uncommenting regions; conversion of 8bit characters to PostScript octal
1849 codes. All functionality is accessible through a menu.
1851 *** delim-col helps to prettify columns in a text region or rectangle.
1853 Here is an example of columns:
1856 dog pineapple car EXTRA
1857 porcupine strawberry airplane
1859 Doing the following settings:
1861 (setq delimit-columns-str-before "[ ")
1862 (setq delimit-columns-str-after " ]")
1863 (setq delimit-columns-str-separator ", ")
1864 (setq delimit-columns-separator "\t")
1867 Selecting the lines above and typing:
1869 M-x delimit-columns-region
1873 [ horse , apple , bus , ]
1874 [ dog , pineapple , car , EXTRA ]
1875 [ porcupine, strawberry, airplane, ]
1877 delim-col has the following options:
1879 delimit-columns-str-before Specify a string to be inserted
1882 delimit-columns-str-separator Specify a string to be inserted
1883 between each column.
1885 delimit-columns-str-after Specify a string to be inserted
1888 delimit-columns-separator Specify a regexp which separates
1891 delim-col has the following commands:
1893 delimit-columns-region Prettify all columns in a text region.
1894 delimit-columns-rectangle Prettify all columns in a text rectangle.
1897 *** The package recentf.el maintains a menu for visiting files that
1898 were operated on recently.
1900 M-x recentf-mode RET toggles recentf mode.
1902 M-x customize-variable RET recentf-mode RET can be used to enable
1903 recentf at Emacs startup.
1905 M-x customize-variable RET recentf-menu-filter RET to specify a menu
1906 filter function to change the menu appearance. For example, the recent
1907 file list can be displayed:
1909 - organized by major modes, directories or user defined rules.
1910 - sorted by file pathes, file names, ascending or descending.
1911 - showing pathes relative to the current default-directory
1913 The `recentf-filter-changer' menu filter function allows to
1914 dynamically change the menu appearance.
1916 *** elide-head.el provides a mechanism for eliding boilerplate header
1920 *** footnote.el provides `footnote-mode', a minor mode supporting use
1921 of footnotes. It is intended for use with Message mode, but isn't
1922 specific to Message mode.
1925 *** diff-mode.el provides `diff-mode', a major mode for
1926 viewing/editing context diffs (patches). It is selected for files
1927 with extension `.diff', `.diffs', `.patch' and `.rej'.
1930 *** EUDC, the Emacs Unified Directory Client, provides a common user
1931 interface to access directory servers using different directory
1932 protocols. It has a separate manual.
1934 *** autoconf.el provides a major mode for editing configure.in files
1935 for Autoconf, selected automatically.
1938 *** windmove.el provides moving between windows.
1940 *** crm.el provides a facility to read multiple strings from the
1941 minibuffer with completion.
1943 *** todo-mode.el provides management of TODO lists and integration
1944 with the diary features.
1946 *** autoarg.el provides a feature reported from Twenex Emacs whereby
1947 numeric keys supply prefix args rather than self inserting.
1949 *** The function `turn-off-auto-fill' unconditionally turns off Auto
1952 *** gnus-mule.el is now just a compatibility layer over the built-in
1955 *** pcomplete.el is a library that provides programmable completion
1956 facilities for Emacs, similar to what zsh and tcsh offer. The main
1957 difference is that completion functions are written in Lisp, meaning
1958 they can be profiled, debugged, etc.
1961 ** Refill minor mode provides preliminary support for keeping
1962 paragraphs filled as you modify them.
1965 ** The new global minor mode `auto-image-file-mode' allows image files
1966 to be visited as images.
1968 ** Withdrawn packages
1970 *** mldrag.el has been removed. mouse.el provides the same
1971 functionality with aliases for the mldrag functions.
1973 *** eval-reg.el has been obsoleted by changes to edebug.el and removed.
1975 *** ph.el has been obsoleted by EUDC and removed.
1978 * Incompatible Lisp changes
1980 There are a few Lisp changes which are not backwards-compatible and
1981 may require changes to existing code. Here is a list for reference.
1983 ** Since `format' preserves text properties, the idiom
1984 `(format %s foo)' no longer works to remove properties.
1986 ** Since the `keymap' text property now has significance, some code
1987 which uses both `local-map' and `keymap' properties (for portability)
1988 may, for instance, give rise to duplicate menus when the keymaps from
1989 these properties are active.
1991 ** The change in the treatment of non_ASCII characters in search
1992 ranges may affect some code.
1994 * Lisp changes made after edition 2.6 of the Emacs Lisp Manual,
1995 (Display-related features are described in a page of their own below.)
1998 ** The user-option `face-font-registry-alternatives' specifies
1999 alternative font registry names to try when looking for a font.
2001 ** Function `md5' calculates the MD5 "message digest"/"checksum",
2002 currently using the `md5sum' program.
2004 ** Function `delete-frame' runs `delete-frame-hook' before actually
2005 deleting the frame. The hook is called with one arg, the frame
2008 ** `add-hook' now makes the hook local if called with a non-nil LOCAL arg.
2011 ** The treatment of non-ASCII characters in search ranges has changed.
2012 If a range in a regular expression or the arg of
2013 skip-chars-forward/backward starts with a unibyte character C and ends
2014 with a multibyte character C2, the range is divided into two: one is
2015 C..?\377, the other is C1..C2, where C1 is the first character of C2's
2019 ** The new function `display-message-or-buffer' displays a message in
2020 the echo area or pops up a buffer, depending on the length of the
2023 ** The new macro `with-auto-compression-mode' allows evaluating an
2024 expression with auto-compression-mode enabled.
2026 ** In image specifications, `:heuristic-mask' has been replaced
2027 with the more general `:mask' property.
2029 ** Image specifications accept more `:algorithm's.
2031 ** A `?' can be used in a symbol name without escaping it with a
2035 ** Reading from the mini-buffer now reads from standard input if Emacs
2036 is running in batch mode. For example,
2038 (message "%s" (read t))
2040 will read a Lisp expression from standard input and print the result
2044 ** The argument of `down-list', `backward-up-list', `up-list',
2045 `kill-sexp', `backward-kill-sexp' and `mark-sexp' is now optional.
2047 ** If `display-buffer-reuse-frames' is set, function `display-buffer'
2048 will raise frames displaying a buffer, instead of creating a new
2052 ** Two new functions for removing elements from lists/sequences
2055 - Function: remove ELT SEQ
2057 Return a copy of SEQ with all occurences of ELT removed. SEQ must be
2058 a list, vector, or string. The comparison is done with `equal'.
2060 - Function: remq ELT LIST
2062 Return a copy of LIST with all occurences of ELT removed. The
2063 comparison is done with `eq'.
2065 ** The function `delete' now also works with vectors and strings.
2067 ** The meaning of the `:weakness WEAK' argument of make-hash-table
2071 ** Function `aset' stores any multibyte character in any string
2072 without signaling "Attempt to change char length of a string". It may
2073 convert a unibyte string to multibyte if necessary.
2075 ** The value of the `help-echo' text property is called as a function
2076 or evaluated, if it is not a string already, to obtain a help string.
2078 ** Function `make-obsolete' now has an optional arg to say when the
2079 function was declared obsolete.
2081 ** Function `plist-member' is renamed from `widget-plist-member' (which is
2082 retained as an alias).
2084 ** Easy-menu's :filter now works as in XEmacs.
2085 It takes the unconverted (i.e. XEmacs) form of the menu and the result
2086 is automatically converted to Emacs' form.
2088 ** The new function `window-list' has been defined
2090 - Function: window-list &optional FRAME WINDOW MINIBUF
2092 Return a list of windows on FRAME, starting with WINDOW. FRAME nil or
2093 omitted means use the selected frame. WINDOW nil or omitted means use
2094 the selected window. MINIBUF t means include the minibuffer window,
2095 even if it isn't active. MINIBUF nil or omitted means include the
2096 minibuffer window only if it's active. MINIBUF neither nil nor t
2097 means never include the minibuffer window.
2099 ** There's a new function `some-window' defined as follows
2101 - Function: some-window PREDICATE &optional MINIBUF ALL-FRAMES DEFAULT
2103 Return a window satisfying PREDICATE.
2105 This function cycles through all visible windows using `walk-windows',
2106 calling PREDICATE on each one. PREDICATE is called with a window as
2107 argument. The first window for which PREDICATE returns a non-nil
2108 value is returned. If no window satisfies PREDICATE, DEFAULT is
2111 Optional second arg MINIBUF t means count the minibuffer window even
2112 if not active. MINIBUF nil or omitted means count the minibuffer iff
2113 it is active. MINIBUF neither t nor nil means not to count the
2114 minibuffer even if it is active.
2116 Several frames may share a single minibuffer; if the minibuffer
2117 counts, all windows on all frames that share that minibuffer count
2118 too. Therefore, if you are using a separate minibuffer frame
2119 and the minibuffer is active and MINIBUF says it counts,
2120 `walk-windows' includes the windows in the frame from which you
2121 entered the minibuffer, as well as the minibuffer window.
2123 ALL-FRAMES is the optional third argument.
2124 ALL-FRAMES nil or omitted means cycle within the frames as specified above.
2125 ALL-FRAMES = `visible' means include windows on all visible frames.
2126 ALL-FRAMES = 0 means include windows on all visible and iconified frames.
2127 ALL-FRAMES = t means include windows on all frames including invisible frames.
2128 If ALL-FRAMES is a frame, it means include windows on that frame.
2129 Anything else means restrict to the selected frame.
2131 ** The function `single-key-description' now encloses function key and
2132 event names in angle brackets. When called with a second optional
2133 argument non-nil, angle brackets won't be printed.
2135 ** If the variable `message-truncate-lines' is bound to t around a
2136 call to `message', the echo area will not be resized to display that
2137 message; it will be truncated instead, as it was done in 20.x.
2138 Default value is nil.
2140 ** The user option `line-number-display-limit' can now be set to nil,
2143 ** `select-safe-coding-system' now also checks the most preferred
2144 coding-system if buffer-file-coding-system is `undecided' and
2145 DEFAULT-CODING-SYSTEM is not specified,
2147 ** The function `subr-arity' provides information on the argument list
2150 ** `where-is-internal' now also accepts a list of keymaps.
2152 ** The text property `keymap' specifies a key map which overrides the
2153 buffer's local map and the map specified by the `local-map' property.
2154 This is probably what most current uses of `local-map' want, rather
2155 than replacing the local map.
2157 ** The obsolete variables before-change-function and
2158 after-change-function are no longer acted upon and have been removed.
2160 ** The function `apropos-mode' runs the hook `apropos-mode-hook'.
2163 ** `concat' no longer accepts individual integer arguments,
2164 as promised long ago.
2166 ** The new function `float-time' returns the current time as a float.
2168 * Lisp changes in Emacs 21.1 (see following page for display-related features)
2170 Note that +++ before an item means the Lisp manual has been updated.
2171 --- means that I have decided it does not need to be in the Lisp manual.
2172 When you add a new item, please add it without either +++ or ---
2173 so I will know I still need to look at it -- rms.
2175 *** The special form `save-restriction' now works correctly even if the
2176 buffer is widened inside the save-restriction and changes made outside
2177 the original restriction. Previously, doing this would cause the saved
2178 restriction to be restored incorrectly.
2180 *** The functions `find-charset-region' and `find-charset-string' include
2181 `eight-bit-control' and/or `eight-bit-graphic' in the returned list
2182 when it finds 8-bit characters. Previously, it included `ascii' in a
2183 multibyte buffer and `unknown' in a unibyte buffer.
2185 *** The functions `set-buffer-modified', `string-as-multibyte' and
2186 `string-as-unibyte' change the byte sequence of a buffer if it
2187 contains a character from the `eight-bit-control' character set.
2189 *** The handling of multibyte sequences in a multibyte buffer is
2190 changed. Previously, a byte sequence matching the pattern
2191 [\200-\237][\240-\377]+ was interpreted as a single character
2192 regardless of the length of the trailing bytes [\240-\377]+. Thus, if
2193 the sequence was longer than what the leading byte indicated, the
2194 extra trailing bytes were ignored by Lisp functions. Now such extra
2195 bytes are independent 8-bit characters belonging to the charset
2198 ** Fontsets are now implemented using char-tables.
2200 A fontset can now be specified for for each independent character, for
2201 a group of characters or for a character set rather than just for a
2202 character set as previously.
2204 *** The arguments of the function `set-fontset-font' are changed.
2205 They are NAME, CHARACTER, FONTNAME, and optional FRAME. The function
2206 modifies fontset NAME to use FONTNAME for CHARACTER.
2208 CHARACTER may be a cons (FROM . TO), where FROM and TO are non-generic
2209 characters. In that case FONTNAME is used for all characters in the
2210 range FROM and TO (inclusive). CHARACTER may be a charset. In that
2211 case FONTNAME is used for all character in the charset.
2213 FONTNAME may be a cons (FAMILY . REGISTRY), where FAMILY is the family
2214 name of a font and REGSITRY is a registry name of a font.
2216 *** Variable x-charset-registry has been deleted. The default charset
2217 registries of character sets are set in the default fontset
2220 *** The function `create-fontset-from-fontset-spec' ignores the second
2221 argument STYLE-VARIANT. It never creates style-variant fontsets.
2223 ** The method of composing characters is changed. Now character
2224 composition is done by a special text property `composition' in
2225 buffers and strings.
2227 *** Charset composition is deleted. Emacs never creates a `composite
2228 character' which is an independent character with a unique character
2229 code. Thus the following functions handling `composite characters'
2230 have been deleted: composite-char-component,
2231 composite-char-component-count, composite-char-composition-rule,
2232 composite-char-composition-rule and decompose-composite-char delete.
2233 The variables leading-code-composition and min-composite-char have
2236 *** Three more glyph reference points are added. They can be used to
2237 specify a composition rule. See the documentation of the variable
2238 `reference-point-alist' for more detail.
2240 *** The function `compose-region' takes new arguments COMPONENTS and
2241 MODIFICATION-FUNC. With COMPONENTS, you can specify not only a
2242 composition rule but also characters to be composed. Such characters
2243 may differ between buffer and string text.
2245 *** The function `compose-string' takes new arguments START, END,
2246 COMPONENTS, and MODIFICATION-FUNC.
2248 *** The function `compose-string' puts text property `composition'
2249 directly on the argument STRING instead of returning a new string.
2250 Likewise, the function `decompose-string' just removes text property
2251 `composition' from STRING.
2253 *** The new function `find-composition' returns information about
2254 a composition at a specified position in a buffer or a string.
2256 *** The function `decompose-composite-char' is now labeled as
2259 ** The new character sets `mule-unicode-0100-24ff',
2260 `mule-unicode-2500-33ff', and `mule-unicode-e000-ffff' are introduced
2261 for Unicode characters in the range U+0100..U+24FF, U+2500..U+33FF,
2262 U+E000..U+FFFF respectively.
2264 ** The new character sets `japanese-jisx0213-1' and
2265 `japanese-jisx0213-2' are introduced for the new Japanese standard JIS
2266 X 0213 Plane 1 and Plane 2.
2269 ** The new character sets `eight-bit-control' and `eight-bit-graphic'
2270 are introduced for 8-bit characters in the ranges 0x80..0x9F and
2271 0xA0..0xFF respectively.
2274 ** If the APPEND argument of `write-region' is an integer, it seeks to
2275 that offset in the file before writing.
2277 ** The function `add-minor-mode' has been added for convenience and
2278 compatibility with XEmacs (and is used internally by define-minor-mode).
2280 ** The function `shell-command' now sets the default directory of the
2281 `*Shell Command Output*' buffer to the default directory of the buffer
2282 from which the command was issued.
2284 ** The functions `query-replace', `query-replace-regexp',
2285 `query-replace-regexp-eval' `map-query-replace-regexp',
2286 `replace-string', `replace-regexp', and `perform-replace' take two
2287 additional optional arguments START and END that specify the region to
2290 ** The new function `count-screen-lines' is a more flexible alternative
2291 to `window-buffer-height'.
2293 - Function: count-screen-lines &optional BEG END COUNT-FINAL-NEWLINE WINDOW
2295 Return the number of screen lines in the region between BEG and END.
2296 The number of screen lines may be different from the number of actual
2297 lines, due to line breaking, display table, etc.
2299 Optional arguments BEG and END default to `point-min' and `point-max'
2302 If region ends with a newline, ignore it unless optinal third argument
2303 COUNT-FINAL-NEWLINE is non-nil.
2305 The optional fourth argument WINDOW specifies the window used for
2306 obtaining parameters such as width, horizontal scrolling, and so
2307 on. The default is to use the selected window's parameters.
2309 Like `vertical-motion', `count-screen-lines' always uses the current
2310 buffer, regardless of which buffer is displayed in WINDOW. This makes
2311 possible to use `count-screen-lines' in any buffer, whether or not it
2312 is currently displayed in some window.
2314 ** The new function `mapc' is like `mapcar' but doesn't collect the
2315 argument function's results.
2317 ** The functions base64-decode-region and base64-decode-string now
2318 signal an error instead of returning nil if decoding fails.
2320 ** The function sendmail-user-agent-compose now recognizes a `body'
2321 header in the list of headers passed to it.
2323 ** The new function member-ignore-case works like `member', but
2324 ignores differences in case and text representation.
2326 ** The buffer-local variable cursor-type can be used to specify the
2327 cursor to use in windows displaying a buffer. Values are interpreted
2330 t use the cursor specified for the frame (default)
2331 nil don't display a cursor
2332 `bar' display a bar cursor with default width
2333 (bar . WIDTH) display a bar cursor with width WIDTH
2334 others display a box cursor.
2336 ** The variable open-paren-in-column-0-is-defun-start controls whether
2337 an open parenthesis in column 0 is considered to be the start of a
2338 defun. If set, the default, it is considered a defun start. If not
2339 set, an open parenthesis in column 0 has no special meaning.
2341 ** The new function `string-to-syntax' can be used to translate syntax
2342 specifications in string form as accepted by `modify-syntax-entry' to
2343 the cons-cell form that is used for the values of the `syntax-table'
2344 text property, and in `font-lock-syntactic-keywords'.
2348 (string-to-syntax "()")
2351 ** Emacs' reader supports CL read syntax for integers in bases
2354 *** `#BINTEGER' or `#bINTEGER' reads INTEGER in binary (radix 2).
2355 INTEGER optionally contains a sign.
2362 *** `#OINTEGER' or `#oINTEGER' reads INTEGER in octal (radix 8).
2367 *** `#XINTEGER' or `#xINTEGER' reads INTEGER in hexadecimal (radix 16).
2372 *** `#RADIXrINTEGER' reads INTEGER in radix RADIX, 2 <= RADIX <= 36.
2379 ** The function `documentation-property' now evaluates the value of
2380 the given property to obtain a string if it doesn't refer to etc/DOC
2383 ** If called for a symbol, the function `documentation' now looks for
2384 a `function-documentation' property of that symbol. If it has a non-nil
2385 value, the documentation is taken from that value. If the value is
2386 not a string, it is evaluated to obtain a string.
2389 ** The last argument of `define-key-after' defaults to t for convenience.
2391 ** The new function `replace-regexp-in-string' replaces all matches
2392 for a regexp in a string.
2394 ** `mouse-position' now runs the abnormal hook
2395 `mouse-position-function'.
2397 ** The function string-to-number now returns a float for numbers
2398 that don't fit into a Lisp integer.
2400 ** The variable keyword-symbols-constants-flag has been removed.
2401 Keywords are now always considered constants.
2404 ** The new function `delete-and-extract-region' deletes text and
2407 ** The function `clear-this-command-keys' now also clears the vector
2408 returned by function `recent-keys'.
2411 ** Variables `beginning-of-defun-function' and `end-of-defun-function'
2412 can be used to define handlers for the functions that find defuns.
2413 Major modes can define these locally instead of rebinding M-C-a
2414 etc. if the normal conventions for defuns are not appropriate for the
2418 ** easy-mmode-define-minor-mode now takes an additional BODY argument
2419 and is renamed `define-minor-mode'.
2422 ** If an abbrev has a hook function which is a symbol, and that symbol
2423 has a non-nil `no-self-insert' property, the return value of the hook
2424 function specifies whether an expansion has been done or not. If it
2425 returns nil, abbrev-expand also returns nil, meaning "no expansion has
2428 When abbrev expansion is done by typing a self-inserting character,
2429 and the abbrev has a hook with the `no-self-insert' property, and the
2430 hook function returns non-nil meaning expansion has been done,
2431 then the self-inserting character is not inserted.
2434 ** The function `intern-soft' now accepts a symbol as first argument.
2435 In this case, that exact symbol is looked up in the specified obarray,
2436 and the function's value is nil if it is not found.
2439 ** The new macro `with-syntax-table' can be used to evaluate forms
2440 with the syntax table of the current buffer temporarily set to a
2443 (with-syntax-table TABLE &rest BODY)
2445 Evaluate BODY with syntax table of current buffer set to a copy of
2446 TABLE. The current syntax table is saved, BODY is evaluated, and the
2447 saved table is restored, even in case of an abnormal exit. Value is
2451 ** Regular expressions now support intervals \{n,m\} as well as
2452 Perl's shy-groups \(?:...\) and non-greedy *? +? and ?? operators.
2453 Also backreferences like \2 are now considered as an error if the
2454 corresponding subgroup does not exist (or is not closed yet).
2455 Previously it would have been silently turned into `2' (ignoring the `\').
2458 ** The optional argument BUFFER of function file-local-copy has been
2459 removed since it wasn't used by anything.
2462 ** The file name argument of function `file-locked-p' is now required
2463 instead of being optional.
2466 ** The new built-in error `text-read-only' is signaled when trying to
2467 modify read-only text.
2470 ** New functions and variables for locales.
2472 The new variable `locale-coding-system' specifies how to encode and
2473 decode strings passed to low-level message functions like strerror and
2474 time functions like strftime. The new variables
2475 `system-messages-locale' and `system-time-locale' give the system
2476 locales to be used when invoking these two types of functions.
2478 The new function `set-locale-environment' sets the language
2479 environment, preferred coding system, and locale coding system from
2480 the system locale as specified by the LC_ALL, LC_CTYPE, and LANG
2481 environment variables. Normally, it is invoked during startup and need
2482 not be invoked thereafter. It uses the new variables
2483 `locale-language-names', `locale-charset-language-names', and
2484 `locale-preferred-coding-systems' to make its decisions.
2487 ** syntax tables now understand nested comments.
2488 To declare a comment syntax as allowing nesting, just add an `n'
2489 modifier to either of the characters of the comment end and the comment
2493 ** The function `pixmap-spec-p' has been renamed `bitmap-spec-p'
2494 because `bitmap' is more in line with the usual X terminology.
2497 ** New function `propertize'
2499 The new function `propertize' can be used to conveniently construct
2500 strings with text properties.
2502 - Function: propertize STRING &rest PROPERTIES
2504 Value is a copy of STRING with text properties assigned as specified
2505 by PROPERTIES. PROPERTIES is a sequence of pairs PROPERTY VALUE, with
2506 PROPERTY being the name of a text property and VALUE being the
2507 specified value of that property. Example:
2509 (propertize "foo" 'face 'bold 'read-only t)
2512 ** push and pop macros.
2514 Simple versions of the push and pop macros of Common Lisp
2515 are now defined in Emacs Lisp. These macros allow only symbols
2516 as the place that holds the list to be changed.
2518 (push NEWELT LISTNAME) add NEWELT to the front of LISTNAME's value.
2519 (pop LISTNAME) return first elt of LISTNAME, and remove it
2520 (thus altering the value of LISTNAME).
2522 ** New dolist and dotimes macros.
2524 Simple versions of the dolist and dotimes macros of Common Lisp
2525 are now defined in Emacs Lisp.
2527 (dolist (VAR LIST [RESULT]) BODY...)
2528 Execute body once for each element of LIST,
2529 using the variable VAR to hold the current element.
2530 Then return the value of RESULT, or nil if RESULT is omitted.
2532 (dotimes (VAR COUNT [RESULT]) BODY...)
2533 Execute BODY with VAR bound to successive integers running from 0,
2534 inclusive, to COUNT, exclusive.
2535 Then return the value of RESULT, or nil if RESULT is omitted.
2538 ** Regular expressions now support Posix character classes such
2539 as [:alpha:], [:space:] and so on.
2541 [:digit:] matches 0 through 9
2542 [:cntrl:] matches ASCII control characters
2543 [:xdigit:] matches 0 through 9, a through f and A through F.
2544 [:blank:] matches space and tab only
2545 [:graph:] matches graphic characters--everything except ASCII control chars,
2547 [:print:] matches printing characters--everything except ASCII control chars
2549 [:alnum:] matches letters and digits.
2550 (But at present, for multibyte characters,
2551 it matches anything that has word syntax.)
2552 [:alpha:] matches letters.
2553 (But at present, for multibyte characters,
2554 it matches anything that has word syntax.)
2555 [:ascii:] matches ASCII (unibyte) characters.
2556 [:nonascii:] matches non-ASCII (multibyte) characters.
2557 [:lower:] matches anything lower-case.
2558 [:punct:] matches punctuation.
2559 (But at present, for multibyte characters,
2560 it matches anything that has non-word syntax.)
2561 [:space:] matches anything that has whitespace syntax.
2562 [:upper:] matches anything upper-case.
2563 [:word:] matches anything that has word syntax.
2566 ** Emacs now has built-in hash tables.
2568 The following functions are defined for hash tables:
2570 - Function: make-hash-table ARGS
2572 The argument list ARGS consists of keyword/argument pairs. All arguments
2573 are optional. The following arguments are defined:
2577 TEST must be a symbol specifying how to compare keys. Default is `eql'.
2578 Predefined are `eq', `eql' and `equal'. If TEST is not predefined,
2579 it must have been defined with `define-hash-table-test'.
2583 SIZE must be an integer > 0 giving a hint to the implementation how
2584 many elements will be put in the hash table. Default size is 65.
2586 :rehash-size REHASH-SIZE
2588 REHASH-SIZE specifies by how much to grow a hash table once it becomes
2589 full. If REHASH-SIZE is an integer, add that to the hash table's old
2590 size to get the new size. Otherwise, REHASH-SIZE must be a float >
2591 1.0, and the new size is computed by multiplying REHASH-SIZE with the
2592 old size. Default rehash size is 1.5.
2594 :rehash-threshold THRESHOLD
2596 THRESHOLD must be a float > 0 and <= 1.0 specifying when to resize the
2597 hash table. It is resized when the ratio of (number of entries) /
2598 (size of hash table) is >= THRESHOLD. Default threshold is 0.8.
2602 WEAK must be either nil, one of the symbols `key, `value',
2603 `key-or-value', `key-and-value', or t, meaning the same as
2604 `key-and-value'. Entries are removed from weak tables during garbage
2605 collection if their key and/or value are not referenced elsewhere
2606 outside of the hash table. Default are non-weak hash tables.
2608 - Function: makehash &optional TEST
2610 Similar to make-hash-table, but only TEST can be specified.
2612 - Function: hash-table-p TABLE
2614 Returns non-nil if TABLE is a hash table object.
2616 - Function: copy-hash-table TABLE
2618 Returns a copy of TABLE. Only the table itself is copied, keys and
2621 - Function: hash-table-count TABLE
2623 Returns the number of entries in TABLE.
2625 - Function: hash-table-rehash-size TABLE
2627 Returns the rehash size of TABLE.
2629 - Function: hash-table-rehash-threshold TABLE
2631 Returns the rehash threshold of TABLE.
2633 - Function: hash-table-rehash-size TABLE
2635 Returns the size of TABLE.
2637 - Function: hash-table-test TABLE
2639 Returns the test TABLE uses to compare keys.
2641 - Function: hash-table-weakness TABLE
2643 Returns the weakness specified for TABLE.
2645 - Function: clrhash TABLE
2649 - Function: gethash KEY TABLE &optional DEFAULT
2651 Look up KEY in TABLE and return its associated VALUE or DEFAULT if
2654 - Function: puthash KEY VALUE TABLE
2656 Associate KEY with VALUE in TABLE. If KEY is already associated with
2657 another value, replace the old value with VALUE.
2659 - Function: remhash KEY TABLE
2661 Remove KEY from TABLE if it is there.
2663 - Function: maphash FUNCTION TABLE
2665 Call FUNCTION for all elements in TABLE. FUNCTION must take two
2666 arguments KEY and VALUE.
2668 - Function: sxhash OBJ
2670 Return a hash code for Lisp object OBJ.
2672 - Function: define-hash-table-test NAME TEST-FN HASH-FN
2674 Define a new hash table test named NAME. If NAME is specified as
2675 a test in `make-hash-table', the table created will use TEST-FN for
2676 comparing keys, and HASH-FN to compute hash codes for keys. Test
2677 and hash function are stored as symbol property `hash-table-test'
2678 of NAME with a value of (TEST-FN HASH-FN).
2680 TEST-FN must take two arguments and return non-nil if they are the same.
2682 HASH-FN must take one argument and return an integer that is the hash
2683 code of the argument. The function should use the whole range of
2684 integer values for hash code computation, including negative integers.
2686 Example: The following creates a hash table whose keys are supposed to
2687 be strings that are compared case-insensitively.
2689 (defun case-fold-string= (a b)
2690 (compare-strings a nil nil b nil nil t))
2692 (defun case-fold-string-hash (a)
2693 (sxhash (upcase a)))
2695 (define-hash-table-test 'case-fold 'case-fold-string=
2696 'case-fold-string-hash))
2698 (make-hash-table :test 'case-fold)
2701 ** The Lisp reader handles circular structure.
2703 It now works to use the #N= and #N# constructs to represent
2704 circular structures. For example, #1=(a . #1#) represents
2705 a cons cell which is its own cdr.
2708 ** The Lisp printer handles circular structure.
2710 If you bind print-circle to a non-nil value, the Lisp printer outputs
2711 #N= and #N# constructs to represent circular and shared structure.
2714 ** If the second argument to `move-to-column' is anything but nil or
2715 t, that means replace a tab with spaces if necessary to reach the
2716 specified column, but do not add spaces at the end of the line if it
2717 is too short to reach that column.
2720 ** perform-replace has a new feature: the REPLACEMENTS argument may
2721 now be a cons cell (FUNCTION . DATA). This means to call FUNCTION
2722 after each match to get the replacement text. FUNCTION is called with
2723 two arguments: DATA, and the number of replacements already made.
2725 If the FROM-STRING contains any upper-case letters,
2726 perform-replace also turns off `case-fold-search' temporarily
2727 and inserts the replacement text without altering case in it.
2730 ** The function buffer-size now accepts an optional argument
2731 to specify which buffer to return the size of.
2734 ** The calendar motion commands now run the normal hook
2735 calendar-move-hook after moving point.
2738 ** The new variable small-temporary-file-directory specifies a
2739 directory to use for creating temporary files that are likely to be
2740 small. (Certain Emacs features use this directory.) If
2741 small-temporary-file-directory is nil, they use
2742 temporary-file-directory instead.
2745 ** The variable `inhibit-modification-hooks', if non-nil, inhibits all
2746 the hooks that track changes in the buffer. This affects
2747 `before-change-functions' and `after-change-functions', as well as
2748 hooks attached to text properties and overlay properties.
2751 ** assoc-delete-all is a new function that deletes all the
2752 elements of an alist which have a particular value as the car.
2755 ** make-temp-file provides a more reliable way to create a temporary file.
2757 make-temp-file is used like make-temp-name, except that it actually
2758 creates the file before it returns. This prevents a timing error,
2759 ensuring that no other job can use the same name for a temporary file.
2762 ** New exclusive-open feature in `write-region'
2764 The optional seventh arg is now called MUSTBENEW. If non-nil, it insists
2765 on a check for an existing file with the same name. If MUSTBENEW
2766 is `excl', that means to get an error if the file already exists;
2767 never overwrite. If MUSTBENEW is neither nil nor `excl', that means
2768 ask for confirmation before overwriting, but do go ahead and
2769 overwrite the file if the user gives confirmation.
2771 If the MUSTBENEW argument in `write-region' is `excl',
2772 that means to use a special feature in the `open' system call
2773 to get an error if the file exists at that time.
2774 The error reported is `file-already-exists'.
2777 ** Function `format' now handles text properties.
2779 Text properties of the format string are applied to the result string.
2780 If the result string is longer than the format string, text properties
2781 ending at the end of the format string are extended to the end of the
2784 Text properties from string arguments are applied to the result
2785 string where arguments appear in the result string.
2789 (let ((s1 "hello, %s")
2791 (put-text-property 0 (length s1) 'face 'bold s1)
2792 (put-text-property 0 (length s2) 'face 'italic s2)
2795 results in a bold-face string with an italic `world' at the end.
2798 ** Messages can now be displayed with text properties.
2800 Text properties are handled as described above for function `format'.
2801 The following example displays a bold-face message with an italic
2804 (let ((msg "hello, %s!")
2806 (put-text-property 0 (length msg) 'face 'bold msg)
2807 (put-text-property 0 (length arg) 'face 'italic arg)
2813 Emacs supports playing sound files on GNU/Linux and the free BSDs
2814 (Voxware driver and native BSD driver, aka as Luigi's driver).
2816 Currently supported file formats are RIFF-WAVE (*.wav) and Sun Audio
2817 (*.au). You must configure Emacs with the option `--with-sound=yes'
2818 to enable sound support.
2820 Sound files can be played by calling (play-sound SOUND). SOUND is a
2821 list of the form `(sound PROPERTY...)'. The function is only defined
2822 when sound support is present for the system on which Emacs runs. The
2823 functions runs `play-sound-functions' with one argument which is the
2824 sound to play, before playing the sound.
2826 The following sound properties are supported:
2830 FILE is a file name. If FILE isn't an absolute name, it will be
2831 searched relative to `data-directory'.
2835 DATA is a string containing sound data. Either :file or :data
2836 may be present, but not both.
2840 VOLUME must be an integer in the range 0..100 or a float in the range
2841 0..1. This property is optional.
2845 DEVICE is a string specifying the system device on which to play the
2846 sound. The default device is system-dependent.
2848 Other properties are ignored.
2850 An alternative interface is called as
2851 (play-sound-file FILE &optional VOLUME DEVICE).
2853 ** `multimedia' is a new Finder keyword and Custom group.
2855 ** keywordp is a new predicate to test efficiently for an object being
2858 ** Changes to garbage collection
2860 *** The function garbage-collect now additionally returns the number
2861 of live and free strings.
2863 *** There is a new variable `strings-consed' holding the number of
2864 strings that have been consed so far.
2867 * Lisp-level Display features added after release 2.6 of the Emacs
2871 ** The user-option `resize-mini-windows' controls how Emacs resizes
2874 ** The function `pos-visible-in-window-p' now has a third argument, FULLY.
2875 If FULLY is non-nil, then locations that are partially obscured aren't
2878 ** On window systems, `glyph-table' is no longer used.
2881 ** Help strings in menu items are now used to provide `help-echo' text.
2883 ** The function `image-size' can be used to determine the size of an
2886 - Function: image-size SPEC &optional PIXELS FRAME
2888 Return the size of an image as a pair (WIDTH . HEIGHT).
2890 SPEC is an image specification. PIXELS non-nil means return sizes
2891 measured in pixels, otherwise return sizes measured in canonical
2892 character units (fractions of the width/height of the frame's default
2893 font). FRAME is the frame on which the image will be displayed.
2894 FRAME nil or omitted means use the selected frame.
2896 ** The function `image-mask-p' can be used to determine if an image
2899 - Function: image-mask-p SPEC &optional FRAME
2901 Return t if image SPEC has a mask bitmap.
2902 FRAME is the frame on which the image will be displayed. FRAME nil
2903 or omitted means use the selected frame.
2906 ** The function `find-image' can be used to find a usable image
2907 satisfying one of a list of specifications.
2910 ** The STRING argument of `put-image' and `insert-image' is now
2914 ** Image specifications may contain the property `:ascent center' (see
2918 * New Lisp-level Display features in Emacs 21.1
2920 Note that +++ before an item means the Lisp manual has been updated.
2921 --- means that I have decided it does not need to be in the Lisp manual.
2922 When you add a new item, please add it without either +++ or ---
2923 so I will know I still need to look at it -- rms.
2925 ** The function tty-suppress-bold-inverse-default-colors can be used
2926 to make Emacs avoid displaying text with bold black foreground on TTYs.
2928 Some terminals, notably PC consoles, emulate bold text by displaying
2929 text in brighter colors. On such a console, a bold black foreground
2930 is displayed in a gray color. If this turns out to be hard to read on
2931 your monitor---the problem occurred with the mode line on
2932 laptops---you can instruct Emacs to ignore the text's boldness, and to
2933 just display it black instead.
2935 This situation can't be detected automatically. You will have to put
2938 (tty-suppress-bold-inverse-default-colors t)
2942 ** New face implementation.
2944 Emacs faces have been reimplemented from scratch. They don't use XLFD
2945 font names anymore and face merging now works as expected.
2950 Each face can specify the following display attributes:
2952 1. Font family or fontset alias name.
2954 2. Relative proportionate width, aka character set width or set
2955 width (swidth), e.g. `semi-compressed'.
2957 3. Font height in 1/10pt
2959 4. Font weight, e.g. `bold'.
2961 5. Font slant, e.g. `italic'.
2963 6. Foreground color.
2965 7. Background color.
2967 8. Whether or not characters should be underlined, and in what color.
2969 9. Whether or not characters should be displayed in inverse video.
2971 10. A background stipple, a bitmap.
2973 11. Whether or not characters should be overlined, and in what color.
2975 12. Whether or not characters should be strike-through, and in what
2978 13. Whether or not a box should be drawn around characters, its
2979 color, the width of the box lines, and 3D appearance.
2981 Faces are frame-local by nature because Emacs allows to define the
2982 same named face (face names are symbols) differently for different
2983 frames. Each frame has an alist of face definitions for all named
2984 faces. The value of a named face in such an alist is a Lisp vector
2985 with the symbol `face' in slot 0, and a slot for each each of the face
2986 attributes mentioned above.
2988 There is also a global face alist `face-new-frame-defaults'. Face
2989 definitions from this list are used to initialize faces of newly
2992 A face doesn't have to specify all attributes. Those not specified
2993 have a nil value. Faces specifying all attributes are called
2999 The display style of a given character in the text is determined by
3000 combining several faces. This process is called `face merging'. Any
3001 aspect of the display style that isn't specified by overlays or text
3002 properties is taken from the `default' face. Since it is made sure
3003 that the default face is always fully-specified, face merging always
3004 results in a fully-specified face.
3007 *** Face realization.
3009 After all face attributes for a character have been determined by
3010 merging faces of that character, that face is `realized'. The
3011 realization process maps face attributes to what is physically
3012 available on the system where Emacs runs. The result is a `realized
3013 face' in form of an internal structure which is stored in the face
3014 cache of the frame on which it was realized.
3016 Face realization is done in the context of the charset of the
3017 character to display because different fonts and encodings are used
3018 for different charsets. In other words, for characters of different
3019 charsets, different realized faces are needed to display them.
3021 Except for composite characters, faces are always realized for a
3022 specific character set and contain a specific font, even if the face
3023 being realized specifies a fontset. The reason is that the result of
3024 the new font selection stage is better than what can be done with
3025 statically defined font name patterns in fontsets.
3027 In unibyte text, Emacs' charsets aren't applicable; function
3028 `char-charset' reports ASCII for all characters, including those >
3029 0x7f. The X registry and encoding of fonts to use is determined from
3030 the variable `face-default-registry' in this case. The variable is
3031 initialized at Emacs startup time from the font the user specified for
3034 Currently all unibyte text, i.e. all buffers with
3035 `enable-multibyte-characters' nil are displayed with fonts of the same
3036 registry and encoding `face-default-registry'. This is consistent
3037 with the fact that languages can also be set globally, only.
3040 **** Clearing face caches.
3042 The Lisp function `clear-face-cache' can be called to clear face caches
3043 on all frames. If called with a non-nil argument, it will also unload
3049 Font selection tries to find the best available matching font for a
3050 given (charset, face) combination. This is done slightly differently
3051 for faces specifying a fontset, or a font family name.
3053 If the face specifies a fontset name, that fontset determines a
3054 pattern for fonts of the given charset. If the face specifies a font
3055 family, a font pattern is constructed. Charset symbols have a
3056 property `x-charset-registry' for that purpose that maps a charset to
3057 an XLFD registry and encoding in the font pattern constructed.
3059 Available fonts on the system on which Emacs runs are then matched
3060 against the font pattern. The result of font selection is the best
3061 match for the given face attributes in this font list.
3063 Font selection can be influenced by the user.
3065 The user can specify the relative importance he gives the face
3066 attributes width, height, weight, and slant by setting
3067 face-font-selection-order (faces.el) to a list of face attribute
3068 names. The default is (:width :height :weight :slant), and means
3069 that font selection first tries to find a good match for the font
3070 width specified by a face, then---within fonts with that width---tries
3071 to find a best match for the specified font height, etc.
3073 Setting `face-font-family-alternatives' allows the user to specify
3074 alternative font families to try if a family specified by a face
3075 doesn't exist. Likewise, `face-font-registry-alternatives' allows to
3076 specify alternative font registry names to try.
3081 Emacs can make use of scalable fonts but doesn't do so by default,
3082 since the use of too many or too big scalable fonts may crash XFree86
3085 To enable scalable font use, set the variable
3086 `scalable-fonts-allowed'. A value of nil, the default, means never use
3087 scalable fonts. A value of t means any scalable font may be used.
3088 Otherwise, the value must be a list of regular expressions. A
3089 scalable font may then be used if it matches a regular expression from
3092 (setq scalable-fonts-allowed '("muleindian-2$"))
3094 allows the use of scalable fonts with registry `muleindian-2'.
3097 *** Functions and variables related to font selection.
3099 - Function: x-family-fonts &optional FAMILY FRAME
3101 Return a list of available fonts of family FAMILY on FRAME. If FAMILY
3102 is omitted or nil, list all families. Otherwise, FAMILY must be a
3103 string, possibly containing wildcards `?' and `*'.
3105 If FRAME is omitted or nil, use the selected frame. Each element of
3106 the result is a vector [FAMILY WIDTH POINT-SIZE WEIGHT SLANT FIXED-P
3107 FULL REGISTRY-AND-ENCODING]. FAMILY is the font family name.
3108 POINT-SIZE is the size of the font in 1/10 pt. WIDTH, WEIGHT, and
3109 SLANT are symbols describing the width, weight and slant of the font.
3110 These symbols are the same as for face attributes. FIXED-P is non-nil
3111 if the font is fixed-pitch. FULL is the full name of the font, and
3112 REGISTRY-AND-ENCODING is a string giving the registry and encoding of
3113 the font. The result list is sorted according to the current setting
3114 of the face font sort order.
3116 - Function: x-font-family-list
3118 Return a list of available font families on FRAME. If FRAME is
3119 omitted or nil, use the selected frame. Value is a list of conses
3120 (FAMILY . FIXED-P) where FAMILY is a font family, and FIXED-P is
3121 non-nil if fonts of that family are fixed-pitch.
3123 - Variable: font-list-limit
3125 Limit for font matching. If an integer > 0, font matching functions
3126 won't load more than that number of fonts when searching for a
3127 matching font. The default is currently 100.
3130 *** Setting face attributes.
3132 For the most part, the new face implementation is interface-compatible
3133 with the old one. Old face attribute related functions are now
3134 implemented in terms of the new functions `set-face-attribute' and
3137 Face attributes are identified by their names which are keyword
3138 symbols. All attributes can be set to `unspecified'.
3140 The following attributes are recognized:
3144 VALUE must be a string specifying the font family, e.g. ``courier'',
3145 or a fontset alias name. If a font family is specified, wild-cards `*'
3146 and `?' are allowed.
3150 VALUE specifies the relative proportionate width of the font to use.
3151 It must be one of the symbols `ultra-condensed', `extra-condensed',
3152 `condensed', `semi-condensed', `normal', `semi-expanded', `expanded',
3153 `extra-expanded', or `ultra-expanded'.
3157 VALUE must be either an integer specifying the height of the font to use
3158 in 1/10 pt, a floating point number specifying the amount by which to
3159 scale any underlying face, or a function, which is called with the old
3160 height (from the underlying face), and should return the new height.
3164 VALUE specifies the weight of the font to use. It must be one of the
3165 symbols `ultra-bold', `extra-bold', `bold', `semi-bold', `normal',
3166 `semi-light', `light', `extra-light', `ultra-light'.
3170 VALUE specifies the slant of the font to use. It must be one of the
3171 symbols `italic', `oblique', `normal', `reverse-italic', or
3174 `:foreground', `:background'
3176 VALUE must be a color name, a string.
3180 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be underlined. If
3181 VALUE is t, underline with foreground color of the face. If VALUE is
3182 a string, underline with that color. If VALUE is nil, explicitly
3187 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be overlined. If
3188 VALUE is t, overline with foreground color of the face. If VALUE is a
3189 string, overline with that color. If VALUE is nil, explicitly don't
3194 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be drawn with a line
3195 striking through them. If VALUE is t, use the foreground color of the
3196 face. If VALUE is a string, strike-through with that color. If VALUE
3197 is nil, explicitly don't strike through.
3201 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should have a box drawn
3202 around them. If VALUE is nil, explicitly don't draw boxes. If
3203 VALUE is t, draw a box with lines of width 1 in the foreground color
3204 of the face. If VALUE is a string, the string must be a color name,
3205 and the box is drawn in that color with a line width of 1. Otherwise,
3206 VALUE must be a property list of the form `(:line-width WIDTH
3207 :color COLOR :style STYLE)'. If a keyword/value pair is missing from
3208 the property list, a default value will be used for the value, as
3209 specified below. WIDTH specifies the width of the lines to draw; it
3210 defaults to 1. COLOR is the name of the color to draw in, default is
3211 the foreground color of the face for simple boxes, and the background
3212 color of the face for 3D boxes. STYLE specifies whether a 3D box
3213 should be draw. If STYLE is `released-button', draw a box looking
3214 like a released 3D button. If STYLE is `pressed-button' draw a box
3215 that appears like a pressed button. If STYLE is nil, the default if
3216 the property list doesn't contain a style specification, draw a 2D
3221 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be displayed in
3222 inverse video. VALUE must be one of t or nil.
3226 If VALUE is a string, it must be the name of a file of pixmap data.
3227 The directories listed in the `x-bitmap-file-path' variable are
3228 searched. Alternatively, VALUE may be a list of the form (WIDTH
3229 HEIGHT DATA) where WIDTH and HEIGHT are the size in pixels, and DATA
3230 is a string containing the raw bits of the bitmap. VALUE nil means
3231 explicitly don't use a stipple pattern.
3233 For convenience, attributes `:family', `:width', `:height', `:weight',
3234 and `:slant' may also be set in one step from an X font name:
3238 Set font-related face attributes from VALUE. VALUE must be a valid
3239 XLFD font name. If it is a font name pattern, the first matching font
3240 is used--this is for compatibility with the behavior of previous
3243 For compatibility with Emacs 20, keywords `:bold' and `:italic' can
3244 be used to specify that a bold or italic font should be used. VALUE
3245 must be t or nil in that case. A value of `unspecified' is not allowed."
3247 Please see also the documentation of `set-face-attribute' and
3252 VALUE is the name of a face from which to inherit attributes, or a list
3253 of face names. Attributes from inherited faces are merged into the face
3254 like an underlying face would be, with higher priority than underlying faces.
3256 *** Face attributes and X resources
3258 The following X resource names can be used to set face attributes
3261 Face attribute X resource class
3262 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
3263 :family attributeFamily . Face.AttributeFamily
3264 :width attributeWidth Face.AttributeWidth
3265 :height attributeHeight Face.AttributeHeight
3266 :weight attributeWeight Face.AttributeWeight
3267 :slant attributeSlant Face.AttributeSlant
3268 foreground attributeForeground Face.AttributeForeground
3269 :background attributeBackground . Face.AttributeBackground
3270 :overline attributeOverline Face.AttributeOverline
3271 :strike-through attributeStrikeThrough Face.AttributeStrikeThrough
3272 :box attributeBox Face.AttributeBox
3273 :underline attributeUnderline Face.AttributeUnderline
3274 :inverse-video attributeInverse Face.AttributeInverse
3275 :stipple attributeStipple Face.AttributeStipple
3276 or attributeBackgroundPixmap
3277 Face.AttributeBackgroundPixmap
3278 :font attributeFont Face.AttributeFont
3279 :bold attributeBold Face.AttributeBold
3280 :italic attributeItalic . Face.AttributeItalic
3281 :font attributeFont Face.AttributeFont
3284 *** Text property `face'.
3286 The value of the `face' text property can now be a single face
3287 specification or a list of such specifications. Each face
3288 specification can be
3290 1. A symbol or string naming a Lisp face.
3292 2. A property list of the form (KEYWORD VALUE ...) where each
3293 KEYWORD is a face attribute name, and VALUE is an appropriate value
3294 for that attribute. Please see the doc string of `set-face-attribute'
3295 for face attribute names.
3297 3. Conses of the form (FOREGROUND-COLOR . COLOR) or
3298 (BACKGROUND-COLOR . COLOR) where COLOR is a color name. This is
3299 for compatibility with previous Emacs versions.
3302 ** Support functions for colors on text-only terminals.
3304 The function `tty-color-define' can be used to define colors for use
3305 on TTY and MSDOS frames. It maps a color name to a color number on
3306 the terminal. Emacs defines a couple of common color mappings by
3307 default. You can get defined colors with a call to
3308 `defined-colors'. The function `tty-color-clear' can be
3309 used to clear the mapping table.
3311 ** Unified support for colors independent of frame type.
3313 The new functions `defined-colors', `color-defined-p', `color-values',
3314 and `display-color-p' work for any type of frame. On frames whose
3315 type is neither x nor w32, these functions transparently map X-style
3316 color specifications to the closest colors supported by the frame
3317 display. Lisp programs should use these new functions instead of the
3318 old `x-defined-colors', `x-color-defined-p', `x-color-values', and
3319 `x-display-color-p'. (The old function names are still available for
3320 compatibility; they are now aliases of the new names.) Lisp programs
3321 should no more look at the value of the variable window-system to
3322 modify their color-related behavior.
3324 The primitives `color-gray-p' and `color-supported-p' also work for
3327 ** Platform-independent functions to describe display capabilities.
3329 The new functions `display-mouse-p', `display-popup-menus-p',
3330 `display-graphic-p', `display-selections-p', `display-screens',
3331 `display-pixel-width', `display-pixel-height', `display-mm-width',
3332 `display-mm-height', `display-backing-store', `display-save-under',
3333 `display-planes', `display-color-cells', `display-visual-class', and
3334 `display-grayscale-p' describe the basic capabilities of a particular
3335 display. Lisp programs should call these functions instead of testing
3336 the value of the variables `window-system' or `system-type', or calling
3337 platform-specific functions such as `x-display-pixel-width'.
3340 ** The minibuffer prompt is now actually inserted in the minibuffer.
3342 This makes it possible to scroll through the prompt, if you want to.
3343 To disallow this completely (like previous versions of emacs), customize
3344 the variable `minibuffer-prompt-properties', and turn on the
3345 `Inviolable' option.
3347 The function minubuffer-prompt-end returns the current position of the
3348 end of the minibuffer prompt, if the minibuffer is current.
3349 Otherwise, it returns zero.
3351 ** New `field' abstraction in buffers.
3353 There is now code to support an abstraction called `fields' in emacs
3354 buffers. A field is a contiguous region of text with the same `field'
3355 property (which can be a text property or an overlay).
3357 Many emacs functions, such as forward-word, forward-sentence,
3358 forward-paragraph, beginning-of-line, etc., stop moving when they come
3359 to the boundary between fields; beginning-of-line and end-of-line will
3360 not let the point move past the field boundary, but other movement
3361 commands continue into the next field if repeated. Stopping at field
3362 boundaries can be suppressed programmatically by binding
3363 `inhibit-field-text-motion' to a non-nil value around calls to these
3366 Now that the minibuffer prompt is inserted into the minibuffer, it is in
3367 a separate field from the user-input part of the buffer, so that common
3368 editing commands treat the user's text separately from the prompt.
3370 The following functions are defined for operating on fields:
3372 - Function: constrain-to-field NEW-POS OLD-POS &optional ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE ONLY-IN-LINE INHIBIT-CAPTURE-PROPERTY
3374 Return the position closest to NEW-POS that is in the same field as OLD-POS.
3376 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
3377 If NEW-POS is nil, then the current point is used instead, and set to the
3378 constrained position if that is is different.
3380 If OLD-POS is at the boundary of two fields, then the allowable
3381 positions for NEW-POS depends on the value of the optional argument
3382 ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE: If ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE is nil, then NEW-POS is
3383 constrained to the field that has the same `field' char-property
3384 as any new characters inserted at OLD-POS, whereas if ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE
3385 is non-nil, NEW-POS is constrained to the union of the two adjacent
3386 fields. Additionally, if two fields are separated by another field with
3387 the special value `boundary', then any point within this special field is
3388 also considered to be `on the boundary'.
3390 If the optional argument ONLY-IN-LINE is non-nil and constraining
3391 NEW-POS would move it to a different line, NEW-POS is returned
3392 unconstrained. This useful for commands that move by line, like
3393 C-n or C-a, which should generally respect field boundaries
3394 only in the case where they can still move to the right line.
3396 If the optional argument INHIBIT-CAPTURE-PROPERTY is non-nil, and OLD-POS has
3397 a non-nil property of that name, then any field boundaries are ignored.
3399 Field boundaries are not noticed if `inhibit-field-text-motion' is non-nil.
3401 - Function: delete-field &optional POS
3403 Delete the field surrounding POS.
3404 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
3405 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
3407 - Function: field-beginning &optional POS ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE
3409 Return the beginning of the field surrounding POS.
3410 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
3411 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
3412 If ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE is non-nil and POS is at the beginning of its
3413 field, then the beginning of the *previous* field is returned.
3415 - Function: field-end &optional POS ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE
3417 Return the end of the field surrounding POS.
3418 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
3419 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
3420 If ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE is non-nil and POS is at the end of its field,
3421 then the end of the *following* field is returned.
3423 - Function: field-string &optional POS
3425 Return the contents of the field surrounding POS as a string.
3426 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
3427 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
3429 - Function: field-string-no-properties &optional POS
3431 Return the contents of the field around POS, without text-properties.
3432 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
3433 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
3438 Emacs can now display images. Images are inserted into text by giving
3439 strings or buffer text a `display' text property containing one of
3440 (AREA IMAGE) or IMAGE. The display of the `display' property value
3441 replaces the display of the characters having that property.
3443 If the property value has the form (AREA IMAGE), AREA must be one of
3444 `(margin left-margin)', `(margin right-margin)' or `(margin nil)'. If
3445 AREA is `(margin nil)', IMAGE will be displayed in the text area of a
3446 window, otherwise it will be displayed in the left or right marginal
3449 IMAGE is an image specification.
3451 *** Image specifications
3453 Image specifications are lists of the form `(image PROPS)' where PROPS
3454 is a property list whose keys are keyword symbols. Each
3455 specifications must contain a property `:type TYPE' with TYPE being a
3456 symbol specifying the image type, e.g. `xbm'. Properties not
3457 described below are ignored.
3459 The following is a list of properties all image types share.
3463 ASCENT must be a number in the range 0..100, or the symbol `center'.
3464 If it is a number, it specifies the percentage of the image's height
3465 to use for its ascent.
3467 If not specified, ASCENT defaults to the value 50 which means that the
3468 image will be centered with the base line of the row it appears in.
3470 If ASCENT is `center' the image is vertically centered around a
3471 centerline which is the vertical center of text drawn at the position
3472 of the image, in the manner specified by the text properties and
3473 overlays that apply to the image.
3477 MARGIN must be a number >= 0 specifying how many pixels to put as
3478 margin around the image. Default is 0.
3482 RELIEF is analogous to the `:relief' attribute of faces. Puts a relief
3487 Apply an image algorithm to the image before displaying it.
3489 ALGO `laplace' or `emboss' means apply a Laplace or ``emboss''
3490 edge-detection algorithm to the image.
3492 ALGO `(edge-detection :matrix MATRIX :color-adjust ADJUST)' means
3493 apply a general edge-detection algorithm. MATRIX must be either a
3494 nine-element list or a nine-element vector of numbers. A pixel at
3495 position x/y in the transformed image is computed from original pixels
3496 around that position. MATRIX specifies, for each pixel in the
3497 neighborhood of x/y, a factor with which that pixel will influence the
3498 transformed pixel; element 0 specifies the factor for the pixel at
3499 x-1/y-1, element 1 the factor for the pixel at x/y-1 etc. as shown
3502 (x-1/y-1 x/y-1 x+1/y-1
3504 x-1/y+1 x/y+1 x+1/y+1)
3506 The resulting pixel is computed from the color intensity of the color
3507 resulting from summing up the RGB values of surrounding pixels,
3508 multiplied by the specified factors, and dividing that sum by the sum
3509 of the factors' absolute values.
3511 Laplace edge-detection currently uses a matrix of
3517 Emboss edge-detection uses a matrix of
3523 ALGO `disabled' means transform the image so that it looks
3528 If MASK is `heuristic' or `(heuristic BG)', build a clipping mask for
3529 the image, so that the background of a frame is visible behind the
3530 image. If BG is not specified, or if BG is t, determine the
3531 background color of the image by looking at the 4 corners of the
3532 image, assuming the most frequently occuring color from the corners is
3533 the background color of the image. Otherwise, BG must be a list `(RED
3534 GREEN BLUE)' specifying the color to assume for the background of the
3537 If MASK is nil, remove a mask from the image, if it has one. Images
3538 in some formats include a mask which can be removed by specifying
3543 Load image from FILE. If FILE is not absolute after expanding it,
3544 search for the image in `data-directory'. Some image types support
3545 building images from data. When this is done, no `:file' property
3546 may be present in the image specification.
3550 Get image data from DATA. (As of this writing, this is not yet
3551 supported for image type `postscript'). Either :file or :data may be
3552 present in an image specification, but not both. All image types
3553 support strings as DATA, some types allow additional types of DATA.
3555 *** Supported image types
3557 **** XBM, image type `xbm'.
3559 XBM images don't require an external library. Additional image
3560 properties supported are
3564 FG must be a string specifying the image foreground color. Default
3565 is the frame's foreground.
3569 BG must be a string specifying the image foreground color. Default is
3570 the frame's background color.
3572 XBM images can be constructed from data instead of file. In this
3573 case, the image specification must contain the following properties
3574 instead of a `:file' property.
3578 WIDTH specifies the width of the image in pixels.
3582 HEIGHT specifies the height of the image in pixels.
3588 1. a string large enough to hold the bitmap data, i.e. it must
3589 have a size >= (WIDTH + 7) / 8 * HEIGHT
3591 2. a bool-vector of size >= WIDTH * HEIGHT
3593 3. a vector of strings or bool-vectors, one for each line of the
3596 4. a string that's an in-memory XBM file. Neither width nor
3597 height may be specified in this case because these are defined
3600 **** XPM, image type `xpm'
3602 XPM images require the external library `libXpm', package
3603 `xpm-3.4k.tar.gz', version 3.4k or later. Make sure the library is
3604 found when Emacs is configured by supplying appropriate paths via
3605 `--x-includes' and `--x-libraries'.
3607 Additional image properties supported are:
3609 `:color-symbols SYMBOLS'
3611 SYMBOLS must be a list of pairs (NAME . COLOR), with NAME being the
3612 name of color as it appears in an XPM file, and COLOR being an X color
3615 XPM images can be built from memory instead of files. In that case,
3616 add a `:data' property instead of a `:file' property.
3618 The XPM library uses libz in its implementation so that it is able
3619 to display compressed images.
3621 **** PBM, image type `pbm'
3623 PBM images don't require an external library. Color, gray-scale and
3624 mono images are supported. Additional image properties supported for
3629 FG must be a string specifying the image foreground color. Default
3630 is the frame's foreground.
3634 BG must be a string specifying the image foreground color. Default is
3635 the frame's background color.
3637 **** JPEG, image type `jpeg'
3639 Support for JPEG images requires the external library `libjpeg',
3640 package `jpegsrc.v6a.tar.gz', or later. Additional image properties
3643 **** TIFF, image type `tiff'
3645 Support for TIFF images requires the external library `libtiff',
3646 package `tiff-v3.4-tar.gz', or later. There are no additional image
3649 **** GIF, image type `gif'
3651 Support for GIF images requires the external library `libungif', package
3652 `libungif-4.1.0', or later.
3654 Additional image properties supported are:
3658 INDEX must be an integer >= 0. Load image number INDEX from a
3659 multi-image GIF file. An error is signalled if INDEX is too large.
3661 This could be used to implement limited support for animated GIFs.
3662 For example, the following function displays a multi-image GIF file
3663 at point-min in the current buffer, switching between sub-images
3666 (defun show-anim (file max)
3667 "Display multi-image GIF file FILE which contains MAX subimages."
3668 (display-anim (current-buffer) file 0 max t))
3670 (defun display-anim (buffer file idx max first-time)
3673 (let ((img (create-image file nil nil :index idx)))
3676 (goto-char (point-min))
3677 (unless first-time (delete-char 1))
3678 (insert-image img "x"))
3679 (run-with-timer 0.1 nil 'display-anim buffer file (1+ idx) max nil)))
3681 **** PNG, image type `png'
3683 Support for PNG images requires the external library `libpng',
3684 package `libpng-1.0.2.tar.gz', or later. There are no additional image
3687 **** Ghostscript, image type `postscript'.
3689 Additional image properties supported are:
3693 WIDTH is width of the image in pt (1/72 inch). WIDTH must be an
3694 integer. This is a required property.
3698 HEIGHT specifies the height of the image in pt (1/72 inch). HEIGHT
3699 must be a integer. This is an required property.
3703 BOX must be a list or vector of 4 integers giving the bounding box of
3704 the PS image, analogous to the `BoundingBox' comment found in PS
3705 files. This is an required property.
3707 Part of the Ghostscript interface is implemented in Lisp. See
3712 The variable `image-types' contains a list of those image types
3713 which are supported in the current configuration.
3715 Images are stored in an image cache and removed from the cache when
3716 they haven't been displayed for `image-cache-eviction-delay seconds.
3717 The function `clear-image-cache' can be used to clear the image cache
3718 manually. Images in the cache are compared with `equal', i.e. all
3719 images with `equal' specifications share the same image.
3721 *** Simplified image API, image.el
3723 The new Lisp package image.el contains functions that simplify image
3724 creation and putting images into text. The function `create-image'
3725 can be used to create images. The macro `defimage' can be used to
3726 define an image based on available image types. The functions
3727 `put-image' and `insert-image' can be used to insert an image into a
3733 Windows can now have margins which are used for special text
3736 To give a window margins, either set the buffer-local variables
3737 `left-margin-width' and `right-margin-width', or call
3738 `set-window-margins'. The function `window-margins' can be used to
3739 obtain the current settings. To make `left-margin-width' and
3740 `right-margin-width' take effect, you must set them before displaying
3741 the buffer in a window, or use `set-window-buffer' to force an update
3742 of the display margins.
3744 You can put text in margins by giving it a `display' text property
3745 containing a pair of the form `(LOCATION . VALUE)', where LOCATION is
3746 one of `left-margin' or `right-margin' or nil. VALUE can be either a
3747 string, an image specification or a stretch specification (see later
3753 Emacs displays short help messages in the echo area, when the mouse
3754 moves over a tool-bar item or a piece of text that has a text property
3755 `help-echo'. This feature also applies to strings in the mode line
3756 that have a `help-echo' property.
3758 If the value of the `help-echo' property is a function, that function
3759 is called with three arguments WINDOW, OBJECT and POSITION. WINDOW is
3760 the window in which the help was found.
3762 If OBJECT is a buffer, POS is the position in the buffer where the
3763 `help-echo' text property was found.
3765 If OBJECT is an overlay, that overlay has a `help-echo' property, and
3766 POS is the position in the overlay's buffer under the mouse.
3768 If OBJECT is a string (an overlay string or a string displayed with
3769 the `display' property), POS is the position in that string under the
3772 If the value of the `help-echo' property is neither a function nor a
3773 string, it is evaluated to obtain a help string.
3775 For tool-bar and menu-bar items, their key definition is used to
3776 determine the help to display. If their definition contains a
3777 property `:help FORM', FORM is evaluated to determine the help string.
3778 For tool-bar items without a help form, the caption of the item is
3779 used as help string.
3781 The hook `show-help-function' can be set to a function that displays
3782 the help string differently. For example, enabling a tooltip window
3783 causes the help display to appear there instead of in the echo area.
3786 ** Vertical fractional scrolling.
3788 The display of text in windows can be scrolled smoothly in pixels.
3789 This is useful, for example, for making parts of large images visible.
3791 The function `window-vscroll' returns the current value of vertical
3792 scrolling, a non-negative fraction of the canonical character height.
3793 The function `set-window-vscroll' can be used to set the vertical
3794 scrolling value. Here is an example of how these function might be
3797 (global-set-key [A-down]
3800 (set-window-vscroll (selected-window)
3801 (+ 0.5 (window-vscroll)))))
3802 (global-set-key [A-up]
3805 (set-window-vscroll (selected-window)
3806 (- (window-vscroll) 0.5)))))
3809 ** New hook `fontification-functions'.
3811 Functions from `fontification-functions' are called from redisplay
3812 when it encounters a region of text that is not yet fontified. This
3813 variable automatically becomes buffer-local when set. Each function
3814 is called with one argument, POS.
3816 At least one of the hook functions should fontify one or more
3817 characters starting at POS in the current buffer. It should mark them
3818 as fontified by giving them a non-nil value of the `fontified' text
3819 property. It may be reasonable for these functions to check for the
3820 `fontified' property and not put it back on, but they do not have to.
3823 ** Tool bar support.
3825 Emacs supports a tool bar at the top of a frame under X. The frame
3826 parameter `tool-bar-lines' (X resource "toolBar", class "ToolBar")
3827 controls how may lines to reserve for the tool bar. A zero value
3828 suppresses the tool bar. If the value is non-zero and
3829 `auto-resize-tool-bars' is non-nil the tool bar's size will be changed
3830 automatically so that all tool bar items are visible.
3832 *** Tool bar item definitions
3834 Tool bar items are defined using `define-key' with a prefix-key
3835 `tool-bar'. For example `(define-key global-map [tool-bar item1] ITEM)'
3836 where ITEM is a list `(menu-item CAPTION BINDING PROPS...)'.
3838 CAPTION is the caption of the item, If it's not a string, it is
3839 evaluated to get a string. The caption is currently not displayed in
3840 the tool bar, but it is displayed if the item doesn't have a `:help'
3841 property (see below).
3843 BINDING is the tool bar item's binding. Tool bar items with keymaps as
3844 binding are currently ignored.
3846 The following properties are recognized:
3850 FORM is evaluated and specifies whether the tool bar item is enabled
3855 FORM is evaluated and specifies whether the tool bar item is displayed.
3859 FUNCTION is called with one parameter, the same list BINDING in which
3860 FUNCTION is specified as the filter. The value FUNCTION returns is
3861 used instead of BINDING to display this item.
3863 `:button (TYPE SELECTED)'
3865 TYPE must be one of `:radio' or `:toggle'. SELECTED is evaluated
3866 and specifies whether the button is selected (pressed) or not.
3870 IMAGES is either a single image specification or a vector of four
3871 image specifications. If it is a vector, this table lists the
3872 meaning of each of the four elements:
3874 Index Use when item is
3875 ----------------------------------------
3876 0 enabled and selected
3877 1 enabled and deselected
3878 2 disabled and selected
3879 3 disabled and deselected
3881 If IMAGE is a single image specification, a Laplace edge-detection
3882 algorithm is used on that image to draw the image in disabled state.
3884 `:help HELP-STRING'.
3886 Gives a help string to display for the tool bar item. This help
3887 is displayed when the mouse is moved over the item.
3889 The function `toolbar-add-item' is a convenience function for adding
3890 toolbar items generally, and `tool-bar-add-item-from-menu' can be used
3891 to define a toolbar item with a binding copied from an item on the
3894 The default bindings use a menu-item :filter to derive the tool-bar
3895 dynamically from variable `tool-bar-map' which may be set
3896 buffer-locally to override the global map.
3898 *** Tool-bar-related variables.
3900 If `auto-resize-tool-bar' is non-nil, the tool bar will automatically
3901 resize to show all defined tool bar items. It will never grow larger
3902 than 1/4 of the frame's size.
3904 If `auto-raise-tool-bar-buttons' is non-nil, tool bar buttons will be
3905 raised when the mouse moves over them.
3907 You can add extra space between tool bar items by setting
3908 `tool-bar-button-margin' to a positive integer specifying a number of
3909 pixels. Default is 1.
3911 You can change the shadow thickness of tool bar buttons by setting
3912 `tool-bar-button-relief' to an integer. Default is 3.
3914 *** Tool-bar clicks with modifiers.
3916 You can bind commands to clicks with control, shift, meta etc. on
3919 (define-key global-map [tool-bar shell]
3920 '(menu-item "Shell" shell
3921 :image (image :type xpm :file "shell.xpm")))
3923 is the original tool bar item definition, then
3925 (define-key global-map [tool-bar S-shell] 'some-command)
3927 makes a binding to run `some-command' for a shifted click on the same
3930 ** Mode line changes.
3933 *** Mouse-sensitive mode line.
3935 The mode line can be made mouse-sensitive by displaying strings there
3936 that have a `local-map' text property. There are three ways to display
3937 a string with a `local-map' property in the mode line.
3939 1. The mode line spec contains a variable whose string value has
3940 a `local-map' text property.
3942 2. The mode line spec contains a format specifier (e.g. `%12b'), and
3943 that format specifier has a `local-map' property.
3945 3. The mode line spec contains a list containing `:eval FORM'. FORM
3946 is evaluated. If the result is a string, and that string has a
3947 `local-map' property.
3949 The same mechanism is used to determine the `face' and `help-echo'
3950 properties of strings in the mode line. See `bindings.el' for an
3953 *** If a mode line element has the form `(:eval FORM)', FORM is
3954 evaluated and the result is used as mode line element.
3957 *** You can suppress mode-line display by setting the buffer-local
3958 variable mode-line-format to nil.
3961 *** A headerline can now be displayed at the top of a window.
3963 This mode line's contents are controlled by the new variable
3964 `header-line-format' and `default-header-line-format' which are
3965 completely analogous to `mode-line-format' and
3966 `default-mode-line-format'. A value of nil means don't display a top
3969 The appearance of top mode lines is controlled by the face
3972 The function `coordinates-in-window-p' returns `header-line' for a
3973 position in the header-line.
3976 ** Text property `display'
3978 The `display' text property is used to insert images into text,
3979 replace text with other text, display text in marginal area, and it is
3980 also used to control other aspects of how text displays. The value of
3981 the `display' property should be a display specification, as described
3982 below, or a list or vector containing display specifications.
3984 *** Replacing text, displaying text in marginal areas
3986 To replace the text having the `display' property with some other
3987 text, use a display specification of the form `(LOCATION STRING)'.
3989 If LOCATION is `(margin left-margin)', STRING is displayed in the left
3990 marginal area, if it is `(margin right-margin)', it is displayed in
3991 the right marginal area, and if LOCATION is `(margin nil)' STRING
3992 is displayed in the text. In the latter case you can also use the
3993 simpler form STRING as property value.
3995 *** Variable width and height spaces
3997 To display a space of fractional width or height, use a display
3998 specification of the form `(LOCATION STRECH)'. If LOCATION is
3999 `(margin left-margin)', the space is displayed in the left marginal
4000 area, if it is `(margin right-margin)', it is displayed in the right
4001 marginal area, and if LOCATION is `(margin nil)' the space is
4002 displayed in the text. In the latter case you can also use the
4003 simpler form STRETCH as property value.
4005 The stretch specification STRETCH itself is a list of the form `(space
4006 PROPS)', where PROPS is a property list which can contain the
4007 properties described below.
4009 The display of the fractional space replaces the display of the
4010 characters having the `display' property.
4014 Specifies that the space width should be WIDTH times the normal
4015 character width. WIDTH can be an integer or floating point number.
4017 - :relative-width FACTOR
4019 Specifies that the width of the stretch should be computed from the
4020 first character in a group of consecutive characters that have the
4021 same `display' property. The computation is done by multiplying the
4022 width of that character by FACTOR.
4026 Specifies that the space should be wide enough to reach HPOS. The
4027 value HPOS is measured in units of the normal character width.
4029 Exactly one of the above properties should be used.
4033 Specifies the height of the space, as HEIGHT, measured in terms of the
4036 - :relative-height FACTOR
4038 The height of the space is computed as the product of the height
4039 of the text having the `display' property and FACTOR.
4043 Specifies that ASCENT percent of the height of the stretch should be
4044 used for the ascent of the stretch, i.e. for the part above the
4045 baseline. The value of ASCENT must be a non-negative number less or
4048 You should not use both `:height' and `:relative-height' together.
4052 A display specification for an image has the form `(LOCATION
4053 . IMAGE)', where IMAGE is an image specification. The image replaces,
4054 in the display, the characters having this display specification in
4055 their `display' text property. If LOCATION is `(margin left-margin)',
4056 the image will be displayed in the left marginal area, if it is
4057 `(margin right-margin)' it will be displayed in the right marginal
4058 area, and if LOCATION is `(margin nil)' the image will be displayed in
4059 the text. In the latter case you can also use the simpler form IMAGE
4060 as display specification.
4062 *** Other display properties
4064 - (space-width FACTOR)
4066 Specifies that space characters in the text having that property
4067 should be displayed FACTOR times as wide as normal; FACTOR must be an
4072 Display text having this property in a font that is smaller or larger.
4074 If HEIGHT is a list of the form `(+ N)', where N is an integer, that
4075 means to use a font that is N steps larger. If HEIGHT is a list of
4076 the form `(- N)', that means to use a font that is N steps smaller. A
4077 ``step'' is defined by the set of available fonts; each size for which
4078 a font is available counts as a step.
4080 If HEIGHT is a number, that means to use a font that is HEIGHT times
4081 as tall as the frame's default font.
4083 If HEIGHT is a symbol, it is called as a function with the current
4084 height as argument. The function should return the new height to use.
4086 Otherwise, HEIGHT is evaluated to get the new height, with the symbol
4087 `height' bound to the current specified font height.
4091 FACTOR must be a number, specifying a multiple of the current
4092 font's height. If it is positive, that means to display the characters
4093 raised. If it is negative, that means to display them lower down. The
4094 amount of raising or lowering is computed without taking account of the
4095 `height' subproperty.
4097 *** Conditional display properties
4099 All display specifications can be conditionalized. If a specification
4100 has the form `(:when CONDITION . SPEC)', the specification SPEC
4101 applies only when CONDITION yields a non-nil value when evaluated.
4102 During evaluattion, point is temporarily set to the end position of
4103 the text having the `display' property.
4105 The normal specification consisting of SPEC only is equivalent to
4109 ** New menu separator types.
4111 Emacs now supports more than one menu separator type. Menu items with
4112 item names consisting of dashes only (including zero dashes) are
4113 treated like before. In addition, the following item names are used
4114 to specify other menu separator types.
4116 - `--no-line' or `--space', or `--:space', or `--:noLine'
4118 No separator lines are drawn, but a small space is inserted where the
4121 - `--single-line' or `--:singleLine'
4123 A single line in the menu's foreground color.
4125 - `--double-line' or `--:doubleLine'
4127 A double line in the menu's foreground color.
4129 - `--single-dashed-line' or `--:singleDashedLine'
4131 A single dashed line in the menu's foreground color.
4133 - `--double-dashed-line' or `--:doubleDashedLine'
4135 A double dashed line in the menu's foreground color.
4137 - `--shadow-etched-in' or `--:shadowEtchedIn'
4139 A single line with 3D sunken appearance. This is the the form
4140 displayed for item names consisting of dashes only.
4142 - `--shadow-etched-out' or `--:shadowEtchedOut'
4144 A single line with 3D raised appearance.
4146 - `--shadow-etched-in-dash' or `--:shadowEtchedInDash'
4148 A single dashed line with 3D sunken appearance.
4150 - `--shadow-etched-out-dash' or `--:shadowEtchedOutDash'
4152 A single dashed line with 3D raise appearance.
4154 - `--shadow-double-etched-in' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedIn'
4156 Two lines with 3D sunken appearance.
4158 - `--shadow-double-etched-out' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedOut'
4160 Two lines with 3D raised appearance.
4162 - `--shadow-double-etched-in-dash' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedInDash'
4164 Two dashed lines with 3D sunken appearance.
4166 - `--shadow-double-etched-out-dash' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedOutDash'
4168 Two dashed lines with 3D raised appearance.
4170 Under LessTif/Motif, the last four separator types are displayed like
4171 the corresponding single-line separators.
4174 ** New frame parameters for scroll bar colors.
4176 The new frame parameters `scroll-bar-foreground' and
4177 `scroll-bar-background' can be used to change scroll bar colors.
4178 Their value must be either a color name, a string, or nil to specify
4179 that scroll bars should use a default color. For toolkit scroll bars,
4180 default colors are toolkit specific. For non-toolkit scroll bars, the
4181 default background is the background color of the frame, and the
4182 default foreground is black.
4184 The X resource name of these parameters are `scrollBarForeground'
4185 (class ScrollBarForeground) and `scrollBarBackground' (class
4186 `ScrollBarBackground').
4188 Setting these parameters overrides toolkit specific X resource
4189 settings for scroll bar colors.
4192 ** You can set `redisplay-dont-pause' to a non-nil value to prevent
4193 display updates from being interrupted when input is pending.
4196 ** Changing a window's width may now change its window start if it
4197 starts on a continuation line. The new window start is computed based
4198 on the window's new width, starting from the start of the continued
4199 line as the start of the screen line with the minimum distance from
4200 the original window start.
4203 ** The variable `hscroll-step' and the functions
4204 `hscroll-point-visible' and `hscroll-window-column' have been removed
4205 now that proper horizontal scrolling is implemented.
4208 ** Windows can now be made fixed-width and/or fixed-height.
4210 A window is fixed-size if its buffer has a buffer-local variable
4211 `window-size-fixed' whose value is not nil. A value of `height' makes
4212 windows fixed-height, a value of `width' makes them fixed-width, any
4213 other non-nil value makes them both fixed-width and fixed-height.
4215 The following code makes all windows displaying the current buffer
4216 fixed-width and fixed-height.
4218 (set (make-local-variable 'window-size-fixed) t)
4220 A call to enlarge-window on a window gives an error if that window is
4221 fixed-width and it is tried to change the window's width, or if the
4222 window is fixed-height, and it is tried to change its height. To
4223 change the size of a fixed-size window, bind `window-size-fixed'
4224 temporarily to nil, for example
4226 (let ((window-size-fixed nil))
4227 (enlarge-window 10))
4229 Likewise, an attempt to split a fixed-height window vertically,
4230 or a fixed-width window horizontally results in a error.
4232 ** The cursor-type frame parameter is now supported on MS-DOS
4233 terminals. When Emacs starts, it by default changes the cursor shape
4234 to a solid box, as it does on Unix. The `cursor-type' frame parameter
4235 overrides this as it does on Unix, except that the bar cursor is
4236 horizontal rather than vertical (since the MS-DOS display doesn't
4237 support a vertical-bar cursor).
4241 * Emacs 20.7 is a bug-fix release with few user-visible changes
4243 ** It is now possible to use CCL-based coding systems for keyboard
4246 ** ange-ftp now handles FTP security extensions, like Kerberos.
4248 ** Rmail has been extended to recognize more forms of digest messages.
4250 ** Now, most coding systems set in keyboard coding system work not
4251 only for character input, but also in incremental search. The
4252 exceptions are such coding systems that handle 2-byte character sets
4253 (e.g euc-kr, euc-jp) and that use ISO's escape sequence
4254 (e.g. iso-2022-jp). They are ignored in incremental search.
4256 ** Support for Macintosh PowerPC-based machines running GNU/Linux has
4260 * Emacs 20.6 is a bug-fix release with one user-visible change
4262 ** Support for ARM-based non-RISCiX machines has been added.
4265 * Emacs 20.5 is a bug-fix release with no user-visible changes.
4267 ** Not new, but not mentioned before:
4268 M-w when Transient Mark mode is enabled disables the mark.
4270 * Changes in Emacs 20.4
4272 ** Init file may be called .emacs.el.
4274 You can now call the Emacs init file `.emacs.el'.
4275 Formerly the name had to be `.emacs'. If you use the name
4276 `.emacs.el', you can byte-compile the file in the usual way.
4278 If both `.emacs' and `.emacs.el' exist, the latter file
4279 is the one that is used.
4281 ** shell-command, and shell-command-on-region, now return
4282 the exit code of the command (unless it is asynchronous).
4283 Also, you can specify a place to put the error output,
4284 separate from the command's regular output.
4285 Interactively, the variable shell-command-default-error-buffer
4286 says where to put error output; set it to a buffer name.
4287 In calls from Lisp, an optional argument ERROR-BUFFER specifies
4290 When you specify a non-nil error buffer (or buffer name), any error
4291 output is inserted before point in that buffer, with \f\n to separate
4292 it from the previous batch of error output. The error buffer is not
4293 cleared, so error output from successive commands accumulates there.
4295 ** Setting the default value of enable-multibyte-characters to nil in
4296 the .emacs file, either explicitly using setq-default, or via Custom,
4297 is now essentially equivalent to using --unibyte: all buffers
4298 created during startup will be made unibyte after loading .emacs.
4300 ** C-x C-f now handles the wildcards * and ? in file names. For
4301 example, typing C-x C-f c*.c RET visits all the files whose names
4302 match c*.c. To visit a file whose name contains * or ?, add the
4303 quoting sequence /: to the beginning of the file name.
4305 ** The M-x commands keep-lines, flush-lines and count-matches
4306 now have the same feature as occur and query-replace:
4307 if the pattern contains any upper case letters, then
4308 they never ignore case.
4310 ** The end-of-line format conversion feature previously mentioned
4311 under `* Emacs 20.1 changes for MS-DOS and MS-Windows' actually
4312 applies to all operating systems. Emacs recognizes from the contents
4313 of a file what convention it uses to separate lines--newline, CRLF, or
4314 just CR--and automatically converts the contents to the normal Emacs
4315 convention (using newline to separate lines) for editing. This is a
4316 part of the general feature of coding system conversion.
4318 If you subsequently save the buffer, Emacs converts the text back to
4319 the same format that was used in the file before.
4321 You can turn off end-of-line conversion by setting the variable
4322 `inhibit-eol-conversion' to non-nil, e.g. with Custom in the MULE group.
4324 ** The character set property `prefered-coding-system' has been
4325 renamed to `preferred-coding-system', for the sake of correct spelling.
4326 This is a fairly internal feature, so few programs should be affected.
4328 ** Mode-line display of end-of-line format is changed.
4329 The indication of the end-of-line format of the file visited by a
4330 buffer is now more explicit when that format is not the usual one for
4331 your operating system. For example, the DOS-style end-of-line format
4332 is displayed as "(DOS)" on Unix and GNU/Linux systems. The usual
4333 end-of-line format is still displayed as a single character (colon for
4334 Unix, backslash for DOS and Windows, and forward slash for the Mac).
4336 The values of the variables eol-mnemonic-unix, eol-mnemonic-dos,
4337 eol-mnemonic-mac, and eol-mnemonic-undecided, which are strings,
4338 control what is displayed in the mode line for each end-of-line
4339 format. You can now customize these variables.
4341 ** In the previous version of Emacs, tar-mode didn't work well if a
4342 filename contained non-ASCII characters. Now this is fixed. Such a
4343 filename is decoded by file-name-coding-system if the default value of
4344 enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil.
4346 ** The command temp-buffer-resize-mode toggles a minor mode
4347 in which temporary buffers (such as help buffers) are given
4348 windows just big enough to hold the whole contents.
4350 ** If you use completion.el, you must now run the function
4351 dynamic-completion-mode to enable it. Just loading the file
4352 doesn't have any effect.
4354 ** In Flyspell mode, the default is now to make just one Ispell process,
4357 ** If you use iswitchb but do not call (iswitchb-default-keybindings) to
4358 use the default keybindings, you will need to add the following line:
4359 (add-hook 'minibuffer-setup-hook 'iswitchb-minibuffer-setup)
4361 ** Auto-show mode is no longer enabled just by loading auto-show.el.
4362 To control it, set `auto-show-mode' via Custom or use the
4363 `auto-show-mode' command.
4365 ** Handling of X fonts' ascent/descent parameters has been changed to
4366 avoid redisplay problems. As a consequence, compared with previous
4367 versions the line spacing and frame size now differ with some font
4368 choices, typically increasing by a pixel per line. This change
4369 occurred in version 20.3 but was not documented then.
4371 ** If you select the bar cursor style, it uses the frame's
4372 cursor-color, rather than the cursor foreground pixel.
4374 ** In multibyte mode, Rmail decodes incoming MIME messages using the
4375 character set specified in the message. If you want to disable this
4376 feature, set the variable rmail-decode-mime-charset to nil.
4378 ** Not new, but not mentioned previously in NEWS: when you use #! at
4379 the beginning of a file to make it executable and specify an
4380 interpreter program, Emacs looks on the second line for the -*- mode
4381 and variable specification, as well as on the first line.
4383 ** Support for IBM codepage encoding of non-ASCII characters.
4385 The new command M-x codepage-setup creates a special coding system
4386 that can be used to convert text between a specific IBM codepage and
4387 one of the character sets built into Emacs which matches that
4388 codepage. For example, codepage 850 corresponds to Latin-1 character
4389 set, codepage 855 corresponds to Cyrillic-ISO character set, etc.
4391 Windows codepages 1250, 1251 and some others, where Windows deviates
4392 from the corresponding ISO character set, are also supported.
4394 IBM box-drawing characters and other glyphs which don't have
4395 equivalents in the corresponding ISO character set, are converted to
4396 a character defined by dos-unsupported-char-glyph on MS-DOS, and to
4397 `?' on other systems.
4399 IBM codepages are widely used on MS-DOS and MS-Windows, so this
4400 feature is most useful on those platforms, but it can also be used on
4403 Emacs compiled for MS-DOS automatically loads the support for the
4404 current codepage when it starts.
4408 *** When mail is sent using compose-mail (C-x m), and if
4409 `mail-send-nonascii' is set to the new default value `mime',
4410 appropriate MIME headers are added. The headers are added only if
4411 non-ASCII characters are present in the body of the mail, and no other
4412 MIME headers are already present. For example, the following three
4413 headers are added if the coding system used in the *mail* buffer is
4417 Content-type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
4418 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
4420 *** The new variable default-sendmail-coding-system specifies the
4421 default way to encode outgoing mail. This has higher priority than
4422 default-buffer-file-coding-system but has lower priority than
4423 sendmail-coding-system and the local value of
4424 buffer-file-coding-system.
4426 You should not set this variable manually. Instead, set
4427 sendmail-coding-system to specify a fixed encoding for all outgoing
4430 *** When you try to send a message that contains non-ASCII characters,
4431 if the coding system specified by those variables doesn't handle them,
4432 Emacs will ask you to select a suitable coding system while showing a
4433 list of possible coding systems.
4437 *** c-default-style can now take an association list that maps major
4438 modes to style names. When this variable is an alist, Java mode no
4439 longer hardcodes a setting to "java" style. See the variable's
4440 docstring for details.
4442 *** It's now possible to put a list as the offset on a syntactic
4443 symbol. The list is evaluated recursively until a non-nil offset is
4444 found. This is useful to combine several lineup functions to act in a
4445 prioritized order on a single line. However, none of the supplied
4446 lineup functions use this feature currently.
4448 *** New syntactic symbol catch-clause, which is used on the "catch" and
4449 "finally" lines in try-catch constructs in C++ and Java.
4451 *** New cleanup brace-catch-brace on c-cleanup-list, which does for
4452 "catch" lines what brace-elseif-brace does for "else if" lines.
4454 *** The braces of Java anonymous inner classes are treated separately
4455 from the braces of other classes in auto-newline mode. Two new
4456 symbols inexpr-class-open and inexpr-class-close may be used on
4457 c-hanging-braces-alist to control the automatic newlines used for
4460 *** Support for the Pike language added, along with new Pike specific
4461 syntactic symbols: inlambda, lambda-intro-cont
4463 *** Support for Java anonymous classes via new syntactic symbol
4464 inexpr-class. New syntactic symbol inexpr-statement for Pike
4465 support and gcc-style statements inside expressions. New lineup
4466 function c-lineup-inexpr-block.
4468 *** New syntactic symbol brace-entry-open which is used in brace lists
4469 (i.e. static initializers) when a list entry starts with an open
4470 brace. These used to be recognized as brace-list-entry's.
4471 c-electric-brace also recognizes brace-entry-open braces
4472 (brace-list-entry's can no longer be electrified).
4474 *** New command c-indent-line-or-region, not bound by default.
4476 *** `#' is only electric when typed in the indentation of a line.
4478 *** Parentheses are now electric (via the new command c-electric-paren)
4479 for auto-reindenting lines when parens are typed.
4481 *** In "gnu" style, inline-open offset is now set to zero.
4483 *** Uniform handling of the inclass syntactic symbol. The indentation
4484 associated with it is now always relative to the class opening brace.
4485 This means that the indentation behavior has changed in some
4486 circumstances, but only if you've put anything besides 0 on the
4487 class-open syntactic symbol (none of the default styles do that).
4491 *** New functionality for using Gnus as an offline newsreader has been
4492 added. A plethora of new commands and modes have been added. See the
4493 Gnus manual for the full story.
4495 *** The nndraft backend has returned, but works differently than
4496 before. All Message buffers are now also articles in the nndraft
4497 group, which is created automatically.
4499 *** `gnus-alter-header-function' can now be used to alter header
4502 *** `gnus-summary-goto-article' now accept Message-ID's.
4504 *** A new Message command for deleting text in the body of a message
4505 outside the region: `C-c C-v'.
4507 *** You can now post to component group in nnvirtual groups with
4510 *** `nntp-rlogin-program' -- new variable to ease customization.
4512 *** `C-u C-c C-c' in `gnus-article-edit-mode' will now inhibit
4513 re-highlighting of the article buffer.
4515 *** New element in `gnus-boring-article-headers' -- `long-to'.
4517 *** `M-i' symbolic prefix command. See the section "Symbolic
4518 Prefixes" in the Gnus manual for details.
4520 *** `L' and `I' in the summary buffer now take the symbolic prefix
4521 `a' to add the score rule to the "all.SCORE" file.
4523 *** `gnus-simplify-subject-functions' variable to allow greater
4524 control over simplification.
4526 *** `A T' -- new command for fetching the current thread.
4528 *** `/ T' -- new command for including the current thread in the
4531 *** `M-RET' is a new Message command for breaking cited text.
4533 *** \\1-expressions are now valid in `nnmail-split-methods'.
4535 *** The `custom-face-lookup' function has been removed.
4536 If you used this function in your initialization files, you must
4537 rewrite them to use `face-spec-set' instead.
4539 *** Cancelling now uses the current select method. Symbolic prefix
4540 `a' forces normal posting method.
4542 *** New command to translate M******** sm*rtq**t*s into proper text
4545 *** For easier debugging of nntp, you can set `nntp-record-commands'
4548 *** nntp now uses ~/.authinfo, a .netrc-like file, for controlling
4549 where and how to send AUTHINFO to NNTP servers.
4551 *** A command for editing group parameters from the summary buffer
4554 *** A history of where mails have been split is available.
4556 *** A new article date command has been added -- `article-date-iso8601'.
4558 *** Subjects can be simplified when threading by setting
4559 `gnus-score-thread-simplify'.
4561 *** A new function for citing in Message has been added --
4562 `message-cite-original-without-signature'.
4564 *** `article-strip-all-blank-lines' -- new article command.
4566 *** A new Message command to kill to the end of the article has
4569 *** A minimum adaptive score can be specified by using the
4570 `gnus-adaptive-word-minimum' variable.
4572 *** The "lapsed date" article header can be kept continually
4573 updated by the `gnus-start-date-timer' command.
4575 *** Web listserv archives can be read with the nnlistserv backend.
4577 *** Old dejanews archives can now be read by nnweb.
4579 *** `gnus-posting-styles' has been re-activated.
4581 ** Changes to TeX and LaTeX mode
4583 *** The new variable `tex-start-options-string' can be used to give
4584 options for the TeX run. The default value causes TeX to run in
4585 nonstopmode. For an interactive TeX run set it to nil or "".
4587 *** The command `tex-feed-input' sends input to the Tex Shell. In a
4588 TeX buffer it is bound to the keys C-RET, C-c RET, and C-c C-m (some
4589 of these keys may not work on all systems). For instance, if you run
4590 TeX interactively and if the TeX run stops because of an error, you
4591 can continue it without leaving the TeX buffer by typing C-RET.
4593 *** The Tex Shell Buffer is now in `compilation-shell-minor-mode'.
4594 All error-parsing commands of the Compilation major mode are available
4595 but bound to keys that don't collide with the shell. Thus you can use
4596 the Tex Shell for command line executions like a usual shell.
4598 *** The commands `tex-validate-region' and `tex-validate-buffer' check
4599 the matching of braces and $'s. The errors are listed in a *Occur*
4600 buffer and you can use C-c C-c or mouse-2 to go to a particular
4603 ** Changes to RefTeX mode
4605 *** The table of contents buffer can now also display labels and
4606 file boundaries in addition to sections. Use `l', `i', and `c' keys.
4608 *** Labels derived from context (the section heading) are now
4609 lowercase by default. To make the label legal in LaTeX, latin-1
4610 characters will lose their accent. All Mule characters will be
4611 removed from the label.
4613 *** The automatic display of cross reference information can also use
4614 a window instead of the echo area. See variable `reftex-auto-view-crossref'.
4616 *** kpsewhich can be used by RefTeX to find TeX and BibTeX files. See the
4617 customization group `reftex-finding-files'.
4619 *** The option `reftex-bibfile-ignore-list' has been renamed to
4620 `reftex-bibfile-ignore-regexps' and indeed can be fed with regular
4623 *** Multiple Selection buffers are now hidden buffers.
4625 ** New/deleted modes and packages
4627 *** The package snmp-mode.el provides major modes for editing SNMP and
4628 SNMPv2 MIBs. It has entries on `auto-mode-alist'.
4630 *** The package sql.el provides a major mode, M-x sql-mode, for
4631 editing SQL files, and M-x sql-interactive-mode for interacting with
4632 SQL interpreters. It has an entry on `auto-mode-alist'.
4634 *** M-x highlight-changes-mode provides a minor mode displaying buffer
4635 changes with a special face.
4637 *** ispell4.el has been deleted. It got in the way of ispell.el and
4638 this was hard to fix reliably. It has long been obsolete -- use
4639 Ispell 3.1 and ispell.el.
4641 * MS-DOS changes in Emacs 20.4
4643 ** Emacs compiled for MS-DOS now supports MULE features better.
4644 This includes support for display of all ISO 8859-N character sets,
4645 conversion to and from IBM codepage encoding of non-ASCII characters,
4646 and automatic setup of the MULE environment at startup. For details,
4647 check out the section `MS-DOS and MULE' in the manual.
4649 The MS-DOS installation procedure automatically configures and builds
4650 Emacs with input method support if it finds an unpacked Leim
4651 distribution when the config.bat script is run.
4653 ** Formerly, the value of lpr-command did not affect printing on
4654 MS-DOS unless print-region-function was set to nil, but now it
4655 controls whether an external program is invoked or output is written
4656 directly to a printer port. Similarly, in the previous version of
4657 Emacs, the value of ps-lpr-command did not affect PostScript printing
4658 on MS-DOS unless ps-printer-name was set to something other than a
4659 string (eg. t or `pipe'), but now it controls whether an external
4660 program is used. (These changes were made so that configuration of
4661 printing variables would be almost identical across all platforms.)
4663 ** In the previous version of Emacs, PostScript and non-PostScript
4664 output was piped to external programs, but because most print programs
4665 available for MS-DOS and MS-Windows cannot read data from their standard
4666 input, on those systems the data to be output is now written to a
4667 temporary file whose name is passed as the last argument to the external
4670 An exception is made for `print', a standard program on Windows NT,
4671 and `nprint', a standard program on Novell Netware. For both of these
4672 programs, the command line is constructed in the appropriate syntax
4673 automatically, using only the value of printer-name or ps-printer-name
4674 as appropriate--the value of the relevant `-switches' variable is
4675 ignored, as both programs have no useful switches.
4677 ** The value of the variable dos-printer (cf. dos-ps-printer), if it has
4678 a value, overrides the value of printer-name (cf. ps-printer-name), on
4679 MS-DOS and MS-Windows only. This has been true since version 20.3, but
4680 was not documented clearly before.
4682 ** All the Emacs games now work on MS-DOS terminals.
4683 This includes Tetris and Snake.
4685 * Lisp changes in Emacs 20.4
4687 ** New functions line-beginning-position and line-end-position
4688 return the position of the beginning or end of the current line.
4689 They both accept an optional argument, which has the same
4690 meaning as the argument to beginning-of-line or end-of-line.
4692 ** find-file and allied functions now have an optional argument
4693 WILDCARD. If this is non-nil, they do wildcard processing,
4694 and visit all files that match the wildcard pattern.
4696 ** Changes in the file-attributes function.
4698 *** The file size returned by file-attributes may be an integer or a float.
4699 It is an integer if the size fits in a Lisp integer, float otherwise.
4701 *** The inode number returned by file-attributes may be an integer (if
4702 the number fits in a Lisp integer) or a cons cell containing two
4705 ** The new function directory-files-and-attributes returns a list of
4706 files in a directory and their attributes. It accepts the same
4707 arguments as directory-files and has similar semantics, except that
4708 file names and attributes are returned.
4710 ** The new function file-attributes-lessp is a helper function for
4711 sorting the list generated by directory-files-and-attributes. It
4712 accepts two arguments, each a list of a file name and its atttributes.
4713 It compares the file names of each according to string-lessp and
4716 ** The new function file-expand-wildcards expands a wildcard-pattern
4717 to produce a list of existing files that match the pattern.
4719 ** New functions for base64 conversion:
4721 The function base64-encode-region converts a part of the buffer
4722 into the base64 code used in MIME. base64-decode-region
4723 performs the opposite conversion. Line-breaking is supported
4726 Functions base64-encode-string and base64-decode-string do a similar
4727 job on the text in a string. They return the value as a new string.
4730 The new function process-running-child-p
4731 will tell you if a subprocess has given control of its
4732 terminal to its own child process.
4734 ** interrupt-process and such functions have a new feature:
4735 when the second argument is `lambda', they send a signal
4736 to the running child of the subshell, if any, but if the shell
4737 itself owns its terminal, no signal is sent.
4739 ** There are new widget types `plist' and `alist' which can
4740 be used for customizing variables whose values are plists or alists.
4742 ** easymenu.el Now understands `:key-sequence' and `:style button'.
4743 :included is an alias for :visible.
4745 easy-menu-add-item now understands the values returned by
4746 easy-menu-remove-item and easy-menu-item-present-p. This can be used
4747 to move or copy menu entries.
4749 ** Multibyte editing changes
4751 *** The definitions of sref and char-bytes are changed. Now, sref is
4752 an alias of aref and char-bytes always returns 1. This change is to
4753 make some Emacs Lisp code which works on 20.2 and earlier also
4754 work on the latest Emacs. Such code uses a combination of sref and
4755 char-bytes in a loop typically as below:
4756 (setq char (sref str idx)
4757 idx (+ idx (char-bytes idx)))
4758 The byte-compiler now warns that this is obsolete.
4760 If you want to know how many bytes a specific multibyte character
4761 (say, CH) occupies in a multibyte buffer, use this code:
4762 (charset-bytes (char-charset ch))
4764 *** In multibyte mode, when you narrow a buffer to some region, and the
4765 region is preceded or followed by non-ASCII codes, inserting or
4766 deleting at the head or the end of the region may signal this error:
4768 Byte combining across boundary of accessible buffer text inhibitted
4770 This is to avoid some bytes being combined together into a character
4771 across the boundary.
4773 *** The functions find-charset-region and find-charset-string include
4774 `unknown' in the returned list in the following cases:
4775 o The current buffer or the target string is unibyte and
4776 contains 8-bit characters.
4777 o The current buffer or the target string is multibyte and
4778 contains invalid characters.
4780 *** The functions decode-coding-region and encode-coding-region remove
4781 text properties of the target region. Ideally, they should correctly
4782 preserve text properties, but for the moment, it's hard. Removing
4783 text properties is better than preserving them in a less-than-correct
4786 *** prefer-coding-system sets EOL conversion of default coding systems.
4787 If the argument to prefer-coding-system specifies a certain type of
4788 end of line conversion, the default coding systems set by
4789 prefer-coding-system will specify that conversion type for end of line.
4791 *** The new function thai-compose-string can be used to properly
4792 compose Thai characters in a string.
4794 ** The primitive `define-prefix-command' now takes an optional third
4795 argument NAME, which should be a string. It supplies the menu name
4796 for the created keymap. Keymaps created in order to be displayed as
4797 menus should always use the third argument.
4799 ** The meanings of optional second arguments for read-char,
4800 read-event, and read-char-exclusive are flipped. Now the second
4801 arguments are INHERIT-INPUT-METHOD. These functions use the current
4802 input method (if any) if and only if INHERIT-INPUT-METHOD is non-nil.
4804 ** The new function clear-this-command-keys empties out the contents
4805 of the vector that (this-command-keys) returns. This is useful in
4806 programs that read passwords, to prevent the passwords from echoing
4807 inadvertently as part of the next command in certain cases.
4809 ** The new macro `with-temp-message' displays a temporary message in
4810 the echo area, while executing some Lisp code. Like `progn', it
4811 returns the value of the last form, but it also restores the previous
4814 (with-temp-message MESSAGE &rest BODY)
4816 ** The function `require' now takes an optional third argument
4817 NOERROR. If it is non-nil, then there is no error if the
4818 requested feature cannot be loaded.
4820 ** In the function modify-face, an argument of (nil) for the
4821 foreground color, background color or stipple pattern
4822 means to clear out that attribute.
4824 ** The `outer-window-id' frame property of an X frame
4825 gives the window number of the outermost X window for the frame.
4827 ** Temporary buffers made with with-output-to-temp-buffer are now
4828 read-only by default, and normally use the major mode Help mode
4829 unless you put them in some other non-Fundamental mode before the
4830 end of with-output-to-temp-buffer.
4832 ** The new functions gap-position and gap-size return information on
4833 the gap of the current buffer.
4835 ** The new functions position-bytes and byte-to-position provide a way
4836 to convert between character positions and byte positions in the
4839 ** vc.el defines two new macros, `edit-vc-file' and `with-vc-file', to
4840 facilitate working with version-controlled files from Lisp programs.
4841 These macros check out a given file automatically if needed, and check
4842 it back in after any modifications have been made.
4844 * Installation Changes in Emacs 20.3
4846 ** The default value of load-path now includes most subdirectories of
4847 the site-specific directories /usr/local/share/emacs/site-lisp and
4848 /usr/local/share/emacs/VERSION/site-lisp, in addition to those
4849 directories themselves. Both immediate subdirectories and
4850 subdirectories multiple levels down are added to load-path.
4852 Not all subdirectories are included, though. Subdirectories whose
4853 names do not start with a letter or digit are excluded.
4854 Subdirectories named RCS or CVS are excluded. Also, a subdirectory
4855 which contains a file named `.nosearch' is excluded. You can use
4856 these methods to prevent certain subdirectories from being searched.
4858 Emacs finds these subdirectories and adds them to load-path when it
4859 starts up. While it would be cleaner to find the subdirectories each
4860 time Emacs loads a file, that would be much slower.
4862 This feature is an incompatible change. If you have stored some Emacs
4863 Lisp files in a subdirectory of the site-lisp directory specifically
4864 to prevent them from being used, you will need to rename the
4865 subdirectory to start with a non-alphanumeric character, or create a
4866 `.nosearch' file in it, in order to continue to achieve the desired
4869 ** Emacs no longer includes an old version of the C preprocessor from
4870 GCC. This was formerly used to help compile Emacs with C compilers
4871 that had limits on the significant length of an identifier, but in
4872 fact we stopped supporting such compilers some time ago.
4874 * Changes in Emacs 20.3
4876 ** The new command C-x z (repeat) repeats the previous command
4877 including its argument. If you repeat the z afterward,
4878 it repeats the command additional times; thus, you can
4879 perform many repetitions with one keystroke per repetition.
4881 ** Emacs now supports "selective undo" which undoes only within a
4882 specified region. To do this, set point and mark around the desired
4883 region and type C-u C-x u (or C-u C-_). You can then continue undoing
4884 further, within the same region, by repeating the ordinary undo
4885 command C-x u or C-_. This will keep undoing changes that were made
4886 within the region you originally specified, until either all of them
4887 are undone, or it encounters a change which crosses the edge of that
4890 In Transient Mark mode, undoing when a region is active requests
4893 ** If you specify --unibyte when starting Emacs, then all buffers are
4894 unibyte, except when a Lisp program specifically creates a multibyte
4895 buffer. Setting the environment variable EMACS_UNIBYTE has the same
4896 effect. The --no-unibyte option overrides EMACS_UNIBYTE and directs
4897 Emacs to run normally in multibyte mode.
4899 The option --unibyte does not affect the reading of Emacs Lisp files,
4900 though. If you want a Lisp file to be read in unibyte mode, use
4901 -*-unibyte: t;-*- on its first line. That will force Emacs to
4902 load that file in unibyte mode, regardless of how Emacs was started.
4904 ** toggle-enable-multibyte-characters no longer has a key binding and
4905 no longer appears in the menu bar. We've realized that changing the
4906 enable-multibyte-characters variable in an existing buffer is
4907 something that most users not do.
4909 ** You can specify a coding system to use for the next cut or paste
4910 operations through the window system with the command C-x RET X.
4911 The coding system can make a difference for communication with other
4914 C-x RET x specifies a coding system for all subsequent cutting and
4917 ** You can specify the printer to use for commands that do printing by
4918 setting the variable `printer-name'. Just what a printer name looks
4919 like depends on your operating system. You can specify a different
4920 printer for the Postscript printing commands by setting
4923 ** Emacs now supports on-the-fly spell checking by the means of a
4924 minor mode. It is called M-x flyspell-mode. You don't have to remember
4925 any other special commands to use it, and you will hardly notice it
4926 except when you make a spelling error. Flyspell works by highlighting
4927 incorrect words as soon as they are completed or as soon as the cursor
4930 Flyspell mode works with whichever dictionary you have selected for
4931 Ispell in Emacs. In TeX mode, it understands TeX syntax so as not
4932 to be confused by TeX commands.
4934 You can correct a misspelled word by editing it into something
4935 correct. You can also correct it, or accept it as correct, by
4936 clicking on the word with Mouse-2; that gives you a pop-up menu
4937 of various alternative replacements and actions.
4939 Flyspell mode also proposes "automatic" corrections. M-TAB replaces
4940 the current misspelled word with a possible correction. If several
4941 corrections are made possible, M-TAB cycles through them in
4942 alphabetical order, or in order of decreasing likelihood if
4943 flyspell-sort-corrections is nil.
4945 Flyspell mode also flags an error when a word is repeated, if
4946 flyspell-mark-duplications-flag is non-nil.
4948 ** Changes in input method usage.
4950 Now you can use arrow keys (right, left, down, up) for selecting among
4951 the alternatives just the same way as you do by C-f, C-b, C-n, and C-p
4954 You can use the ENTER key to accept the current conversion.
4956 If you type TAB to display a list of alternatives, you can select one
4957 of the alternatives with Mouse-2.
4959 The meaning of the variable `input-method-verbose-flag' is changed so
4960 that you can set it to t, nil, `default', or `complex-only'.
4962 If the value is nil, extra guidance is never given.
4964 If the value is t, extra guidance is always given.
4966 If the value is `complex-only', extra guidance is always given only
4967 when you are using complex input methods such as chinese-py.
4969 If the value is `default' (this is the default), extra guidance is
4970 given in the following case:
4971 o When you are using a complex input method.
4972 o When you are using a simple input method but not in the minibuffer.
4974 If you are using Emacs through a very slow line, setting
4975 input-method-verbose-flag to nil or to complex-only is a good choice,
4976 and if you are using an input method you are not familiar with,
4977 setting it to t is helpful.
4979 The old command select-input-method is now called set-input-method.
4981 In the language environment "Korean", you can use the following
4983 Shift-SPC toggle-korean-input-method
4984 C-F9 quail-hangul-switch-symbol-ksc
4985 F9 quail-hangul-switch-hanja
4986 These key bindings are canceled when you switch to another language
4989 ** The minibuffer history of file names now records the specified file
4990 names, not the entire minibuffer input. For example, if the
4991 minibuffer starts out with /usr/foo/, you might type in /etc/passwd to
4994 /usr/foo//etc/passwd
4996 which stands for the file /etc/passwd.
4998 Formerly, this used to put /usr/foo//etc/passwd in the history list.
4999 Now this puts just /etc/passwd in the history list.
5001 ** If you are root, Emacs sets backup-by-copying-when-mismatch to t
5002 at startup, so that saving a file will be sure to preserve
5003 its owner and group.
5005 ** find-func.el can now also find the place of definition of Emacs
5006 Lisp variables in user-loaded libraries.
5008 ** C-x r t (string-rectangle) now deletes the existing rectangle
5009 contents before inserting the specified string on each line.
5011 ** There is a new command delete-whitespace-rectangle
5012 which deletes whitespace starting from a particular column
5013 in all the lines on a rectangle. The column is specified
5014 by the left edge of the rectangle.
5016 ** You can now store a number into a register with C-u NUMBER C-x r n REG,
5017 increment it by INC with C-u INC C-x r + REG (to increment by one, omit
5018 C-u INC), and insert it in the buffer with C-x r g REG. This is useful
5019 for writing keyboard macros.
5021 ** The new command M-x speedbar displays a frame in which directories,
5022 files, and tags can be displayed, manipulated, and jumped to. The
5023 frame defaults to 20 characters in width, and is the same height as
5024 the frame that it was started from. Some major modes define
5025 additional commands for the speedbar, including Rmail, GUD/GDB, and
5028 ** query-replace-regexp is now bound to C-M-%.
5030 ** In Transient Mark mode, when the region is active, M-x
5031 query-replace and the other replace commands now operate on the region
5034 ** M-x write-region, when used interactively, now asks for
5035 confirmation before overwriting an existing file. When you call
5036 the function from a Lisp program, a new optional argument CONFIRM
5037 says whether to ask for confirmation in this case.
5039 ** If you use find-file-literally and the file is already visited
5040 non-literally, the command asks you whether to revisit the file
5041 literally. If you say no, it signals an error.
5043 ** Major modes defined with the "derived mode" feature
5044 now use the proper name for the mode hook: WHATEVER-mode-hook.
5045 Formerly they used the name WHATEVER-mode-hooks, but that is
5046 inconsistent with Emacs conventions.
5048 ** shell-command-on-region (and shell-command) reports success or
5049 failure if the command produces no output.
5051 ** Set focus-follows-mouse to nil if your window system or window
5052 manager does not transfer focus to another window when you just move
5055 ** mouse-menu-buffer-maxlen has been renamed to
5056 mouse-buffer-menu-maxlen to be consistent with the other related
5057 function and variable names.
5059 ** The new variable auto-coding-alist specifies coding systems for
5060 reading specific files. This has higher priority than
5061 file-coding-system-alist.
5063 ** If you set the variable unibyte-display-via-language-environment to
5064 t, then Emacs displays non-ASCII characters are displayed by
5065 converting them to the equivalent multibyte characters according to
5066 the current language environment. As a result, they are displayed
5067 according to the current fontset.
5069 ** C-q's handling of codes in the range 0200 through 0377 is changed.
5071 The codes in the range 0200 through 0237 are inserted as one byte of
5072 that code regardless of the values of nonascii-translation-table and
5073 nonascii-insert-offset.
5075 For the codes in the range 0240 through 0377, if
5076 enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil and nonascii-translation-table
5077 nor nonascii-insert-offset can't convert them to valid multibyte
5078 characters, they are converted to Latin-1 characters.
5080 ** If you try to find a file that is not read-accessible, you now get
5081 an error, rather than an empty buffer and a warning.
5083 ** In the minibuffer history commands M-r and M-s, an upper case
5084 letter in the regular expression forces case-sensitive search.
5086 ** In the *Help* buffer, cross-references to commands and variables
5087 are inferred and hyperlinked. Use C-h m in Help mode for the relevant
5090 ** M-x apropos-command, with a prefix argument, no longer looks for
5091 user option variables--instead it looks for noninteractive functions.
5093 Meanwhile, the command apropos-variable normally searches for
5094 user option variables; with a prefix argument, it looks at
5095 all variables that have documentation.
5097 ** When you type a long line in the minibuffer, and the minibuffer
5098 shows just one line, automatically scrolling works in a special way
5099 that shows you overlap with the previous line of text. The variable
5100 minibuffer-scroll-overlap controls how many characters of overlap
5101 it should show; the default is 20.
5103 Meanwhile, Resize Minibuffer mode is still available; in that mode,
5104 the minibuffer grows taller (up to a point) as needed to show the whole
5107 ** The new command M-x customize-changed-options lets you customize
5108 all the options whose meanings or default values have changed in
5109 recent Emacs versions. You specify a previous Emacs version number as
5110 argument, and the command creates a customization buffer showing all
5111 the customizable options which were changed since that version.
5112 Newly added options are included as well.
5114 If you don't specify a particular version number argument,
5115 then the customization buffer shows all the customizable options
5116 for which Emacs versions of changes are recorded.
5118 This function is also bound to the Changed Options entry in the
5121 ** When you run M-x grep with a prefix argument, it figures out
5122 the tag around point and puts that into the default grep command.
5124 ** The new command M-* (pop-tag-mark) pops back through a history of
5125 buffer positions from which M-. or other tag-finding commands were
5128 ** The new variable comment-padding specifies the number of spaces
5129 that `comment-region' will insert before the actual text of the comment.
5132 ** In Fortran mode the characters `.', `_' and `$' now have symbol
5133 syntax, not word syntax. Fortran mode now supports `imenu' and has
5134 new commands fortran-join-line (M-^) and fortran-narrow-to-subprogram
5135 (C-x n d). M-q can be used to fill a statement or comment block
5138 ** GUD now supports jdb, the Java debugger, and pdb, the Python debugger.
5140 ** If you set the variable add-log-keep-changes-together to a non-nil
5141 value, the command `C-x 4 a' will automatically notice when you make
5142 two entries in one day for one file, and combine them.
5144 ** You can use the command M-x diary-mail-entries to mail yourself a
5145 reminder about upcoming diary entries. See the documentation string
5146 for a sample shell script for calling this function automatically
5151 *** All you need to do to enable use of the Desktop package, is to set
5152 the variable desktop-enable to t with Custom.
5154 *** Minor modes are now restored. Which minor modes are restored
5155 and how modes are restored is controlled by `desktop-minor-mode-table'.
5157 ** There is no need to do anything special, now, to enable Gnus to
5158 read and post multi-lingual articles.
5160 ** Outline mode has now support for showing hidden outlines when
5161 doing an isearch. In order for this to happen search-invisible should
5162 be set to open (the default). If an isearch match is inside a hidden
5163 outline the outline is made visible. If you continue pressing C-s and
5164 the match moves outside the formerly invisible outline, the outline is
5165 made invisible again.
5167 ** Mail reading and sending changes
5169 *** The Rmail e command now switches to displaying the whole header of
5170 the message before it lets you edit the message. This is so that any
5171 changes you make in the header will not be lost if you subsequently
5174 *** The w command in Rmail, which writes the message body into a file,
5175 now works in the summary buffer as well. (The command to delete the
5176 summary buffer is now Q.) The default file name for the w command, if
5177 the message has no subject, is stored in the variable
5178 rmail-default-body-file.
5180 *** Most of the commands and modes that operate on mail and netnews no
5181 longer depend on the value of mail-header-separator. Instead, they
5182 handle whatever separator the buffer happens to use.
5184 *** If you set mail-signature to a value which is not t, nil, or a string,
5185 it should be an expression. When you send a message, this expression
5186 is evaluated to insert the signature.
5188 *** The new Lisp library feedmail.el (version 8) enhances processing of
5189 outbound email messages. It works in coordination with other email
5190 handling packages (e.g., rmail, VM, gnus) and is responsible for
5191 putting final touches on messages and actually submitting them for
5192 transmission. Users of the emacs program "fakemail" might be
5193 especially interested in trying feedmail.
5195 feedmail is not enabled by default. See comments at the top of
5196 feedmail.el for set-up instructions. Among the bigger features
5197 provided by feedmail are:
5199 **** you can park outgoing messages into a disk-based queue and
5200 stimulate sending some or all of them later (handy for laptop users);
5201 there is also a queue for draft messages
5203 **** you can get one last look at the prepped outbound message and
5204 be prompted for confirmation
5206 **** does smart filling of address headers
5208 **** can generate a MESSAGE-ID: line and a DATE: line; the date can be
5209 the time the message was written or the time it is being sent; this
5210 can make FCC copies more closely resemble copies that recipients get
5212 **** you can specify an arbitrary function for actually transmitting
5213 the message; included in feedmail are interfaces for /bin/[r]mail,
5214 /usr/lib/sendmail, and elisp smtpmail; it's easy to write a new
5215 function for something else (10-20 lines of elisp)
5219 *** The Dired function dired-do-toggle, which toggles marked and unmarked
5220 files, is now bound to "t" instead of "T".
5222 *** dired-at-point has been added to ffap.el. It allows one to easily
5223 run Dired on the directory name at point.
5225 *** Dired has a new command: %g. It searches the contents of
5226 files in the directory and marks each file that contains a match
5227 for a specified regexp.
5231 *** New option vc-ignore-vc-files lets you turn off version control
5234 *** VC Dired has been completely rewritten. It is now much
5235 faster, especially for CVS, and works very similar to ordinary
5238 VC Dired is invoked by typing C-x v d and entering the name of the
5239 directory to display. By default, VC Dired gives you a recursive
5240 listing of all files at or below the given directory which are
5241 currently locked (for CVS, all files not up-to-date are shown).
5243 You can change the listing format by setting vc-dired-recurse to nil,
5244 then it shows only the given directory, and you may also set
5245 vc-dired-terse-display to nil, then it shows all files under version
5246 control plus the names of any subdirectories, so that you can type `i'
5247 on such lines to insert them manually, as in ordinary Dired.
5249 All Dired commands operate normally in VC Dired, except for `v', which
5250 is redefined as the version control prefix. That means you may type
5251 `v l', `v =' etc. to invoke `vc-print-log', `vc-diff' and the like on
5252 the file named in the current Dired buffer line. `v v' invokes
5253 `vc-next-action' on this file, or on all files currently marked.
5255 The new command `v t' (vc-dired-toggle-terse-mode) allows you to
5256 toggle between terse display (only locked files) and full display (all
5257 VC files plus subdirectories). There is also a special command,
5258 `* l', to mark all files currently locked.
5260 Giving a prefix argument to C-x v d now does the same thing as in
5261 ordinary Dired: it allows you to supply additional options for the ls
5262 command in the minibuffer, to fine-tune VC Dired's output.
5264 *** Under CVS, if you merge changes from the repository into a working
5265 file, and CVS detects conflicts, VC now offers to start an ediff
5266 session to resolve them.
5268 Alternatively, you can use the new command `vc-resolve-conflicts' to
5269 resolve conflicts in a file at any time. It works in any buffer that
5270 contains conflict markers as generated by rcsmerge (which is what CVS
5273 *** You can now transfer changes between branches, using the new
5274 command vc-merge (C-x v m). It is implemented for RCS and CVS. When
5275 you invoke it in a buffer under version-control, you can specify
5276 either an entire branch or a pair of versions, and the changes on that
5277 branch or between the two versions are merged into the working file.
5278 If this results in any conflicts, they may be resolved interactively,
5281 ** Changes in Font Lock
5283 *** The face and variable previously known as font-lock-reference-face
5284 are now called font-lock-constant-face to better reflect their typical
5285 use for highlighting constants and labels. (Its face properties are
5286 unchanged.) The variable font-lock-reference-face remains for now for
5287 compatibility reasons, but its value is font-lock-constant-face.
5289 ** Frame name display changes
5291 *** The command set-frame-name lets you set the name of the current
5292 frame. You can use the new command select-frame-by-name to select and
5293 raise a frame; this is mostly useful on character-only terminals, or
5294 when many frames are invisible or iconified.
5296 *** On character-only terminal (not a window system), changing the
5297 frame name is now reflected on the mode line and in the Buffers/Frames
5300 ** Comint (subshell) changes
5302 *** In Comint modes, the commands to kill, stop or interrupt a
5303 subjob now also kill pending input. This is for compatibility
5304 with ordinary shells, where the signal characters do this.
5306 *** There are new commands in Comint mode.
5308 C-c C-x fetches the "next" line from the input history;
5309 that is, the line after the last line you got.
5310 You can use this command to fetch successive lines, one by one.
5312 C-c SPC accumulates lines of input. More precisely, it arranges to
5313 send the current line together with the following line, when you send
5316 C-c C-a if repeated twice consecutively now moves to the process mark,
5317 which separates the pending input from the subprocess output and the
5318 previously sent input.
5320 C-c M-r now runs comint-previous-matching-input-from-input;
5321 it searches for a previous command, using the current pending input
5322 as the search string.
5324 *** New option compilation-scroll-output can be set to scroll
5325 automatically in compilation-mode windows.
5329 *** Multiline macros are now handled, both as they affect indentation,
5330 and as recognized syntax. New syntactic symbol cpp-macro-cont is
5331 assigned to second and subsequent lines of a multiline macro
5334 *** A new style "user" which captures all non-hook-ified
5335 (i.e. top-level) .emacs file variable settings and customizations.
5336 Style "cc-mode" is an alias for "user" and is deprecated. "gnu"
5337 style is still the default however.
5339 *** "java" style now conforms to Sun's JDK coding style.
5341 *** There are new commands c-beginning-of-defun, c-end-of-defun which
5342 are alternatives which you could bind to C-M-a and C-M-e if you prefer
5343 them. They do not have key bindings by default.
5345 *** New and improved implementations of M-a (c-beginning-of-statement)
5346 and M-e (c-end-of-statement).
5348 *** C++ namespace blocks are supported, with new syntactic symbols
5349 namespace-open, namespace-close, and innamespace.
5351 *** File local variable settings of c-file-style and c-file-offsets
5352 makes the style variables local to that buffer only.
5354 *** New indentation functions c-lineup-close-paren,
5355 c-indent-one-line-block, c-lineup-dont-change.
5357 *** Improvements (hopefully!) to the way CC Mode is loaded. You
5358 should now be able to do a (require 'cc-mode) to get the entire
5359 package loaded properly for customization in your .emacs file. A new
5360 variable c-initialize-on-load controls this and is t by default.
5362 ** Changes to hippie-expand.
5364 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-dabbrev-skip-space'. If
5365 non-nil, trailing spaces may be included in the abbreviation to search for,
5366 which then gives the same behavior as the original `dabbrev-expand'.
5368 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-dabbrev-as-symbol'. If
5369 non-nil, characters of syntax '_' is considered part of the word when
5370 expanding dynamically.
5372 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-no-restriction'. If
5373 non-nil, narrowed buffers are widened before they are searched.
5375 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-only-buffers'. If
5376 non-empty, buffers searched are restricted to the types specified in
5377 this list. Useful for example when constructing new special-purpose
5378 expansion functions with `make-hippie-expand-function'.
5380 *** Text properties of the expansion are no longer copied.
5382 ** Changes in BibTeX mode.
5384 *** Any titleword matching a regexp in the new variable
5385 bibtex-autokey-titleword-ignore (case sensitive) is ignored during
5386 automatic key generation. This replaces variable
5387 bibtex-autokey-titleword-first-ignore, which only checked for matches
5388 against the first word in the title.
5390 *** Autokey generation now uses all words from the title, not just
5391 capitalized words. To avoid conflicts with existing customizations,
5392 bibtex-autokey-titleword-ignore is set up such that words starting with
5393 lowerkey characters will still be ignored. Thus, if you want to use
5394 lowercase words from the title, you will have to overwrite the
5395 bibtex-autokey-titleword-ignore standard setting.
5397 *** Case conversion of names and title words for automatic key
5398 generation is more flexible. Variable bibtex-autokey-preserve-case is
5399 replaced by bibtex-autokey-titleword-case-convert and
5400 bibtex-autokey-name-case-convert.
5402 ** Changes in vcursor.el.
5404 *** Support for character terminals is available: there is a new keymap
5405 and the vcursor will appear as an arrow between buffer text. A
5406 variable `vcursor-interpret-input' allows input from the vcursor to be
5407 entered exactly as if typed. Numerous functions, including
5408 `vcursor-compare-windows', have been rewritten to improve consistency
5409 in the selection of windows and corresponding keymaps.
5411 *** vcursor options can now be altered with M-x customize under the
5412 Editing group once the package is loaded.
5414 *** Loading vcursor now does not define keys by default, as this is
5415 generally a bad side effect. Use M-x customize to set
5416 vcursor-key-bindings to t to restore the old behaviour.
5418 *** vcursor-auto-disable can be `copy', which turns off copying from the
5419 vcursor, but doesn't disable it, after any non-vcursor command.
5423 *** You can now spell check comments and strings in the current
5424 buffer with M-x ispell-comments-and-strings. Comments and strings
5425 are identified by syntax tables in effect.
5427 *** Generic region skipping implemented.
5428 A single buffer can be broken into a number of regions where text will
5429 and will not be checked. The definitions of the regions can be user
5430 defined. New applications and improvements made available by this
5433 o URLs are automatically skipped
5434 o EMail message checking is vastly improved.
5436 *** Ispell can highlight the erroneous word even on non-window terminals.
5438 ** Changes to RefTeX mode
5440 RefTeX has been updated in order to make it more usable with very
5441 large projects (like a several volume math book). The parser has been
5442 re-written from scratch. To get maximum speed from RefTeX, check the
5443 section `Optimizations' in the manual.
5445 *** New recursive parser.
5447 The old version of RefTeX created a single large buffer containing the
5448 entire multifile document in order to parse the document. The new
5449 recursive parser scans the individual files.
5451 *** Parsing only part of a document.
5453 Reparsing of changed document parts can now be made faster by enabling
5454 partial scans. To use this feature, read the documentation string of
5455 the variable `reftex-enable-partial-scans' and set the variable to t.
5457 (setq reftex-enable-partial-scans t)
5459 *** Storing parsing information in a file.
5461 This can improve startup times considerably. To turn it on, use
5463 (setq reftex-save-parse-info t)
5465 *** Using multiple selection buffers
5467 If the creation of label selection buffers is too slow (this happens
5468 for large documents), you can reuse these buffers by setting
5470 (setq reftex-use-multiple-selection-buffers t)
5472 *** References to external documents.
5474 The LaTeX package `xr' allows to cross-reference labels in external
5475 documents. RefTeX can provide information about the external
5476 documents as well. To use this feature, set up the \externaldocument
5477 macros required by the `xr' package and rescan the document with
5478 RefTeX. The external labels can then be accessed with the `x' key in
5479 the selection buffer provided by `reftex-reference' (bound to `C-c )').
5480 The `x' key also works in the table of contents buffer.
5482 *** Many more labeled LaTeX environments are recognized by default.
5484 The builtin command list now covers all the standard LaTeX commands,
5485 and all of the major packages included in the LaTeX distribution.
5487 Also, RefTeX now understands the \appendix macro and changes
5488 the enumeration of sections in the *toc* buffer accordingly.
5490 *** Mouse support for selection and *toc* buffers
5492 The mouse can now be used to select items in the selection and *toc*
5493 buffers. See also the new option `reftex-highlight-selection'.
5495 *** New keymaps for selection and table of contents modes.
5497 The selection processes for labels and citation keys, and the table of
5498 contents buffer now have their own keymaps: `reftex-select-label-map',
5499 `reftex-select-bib-map', `reftex-toc-map'. The selection processes
5500 have a number of new keys predefined. In particular, TAB lets you
5501 enter a label with completion. Check the on-the-fly help (press `?'
5502 at the selection prompt) or read the Info documentation to find out
5505 *** Support for the varioref package
5507 The `v' key in the label selection buffer toggles \ref versus \vref.
5511 Three new hooks can be used to redefine the way labels, references,
5512 and citations are created. These hooks are
5513 `reftex-format-label-function', `reftex-format-ref-function',
5514 `reftex-format-cite-function'.
5516 *** Citations outside LaTeX
5518 The command `reftex-citation' may also be used outside LaTeX (e.g. in
5519 a mail buffer). See the Info documentation for details.
5521 *** Short context is no longer fontified.
5523 The short context in the label menu no longer copies the
5524 fontification from the text in the buffer. If you prefer it to be
5527 (setq reftex-refontify-context t)
5529 ** file-cache-minibuffer-complete now accepts a prefix argument.
5530 With a prefix argument, it does not try to do completion of
5531 the file name within its directory; it only checks for other
5532 directories that contain the same file name.
5534 Thus, given the file name Makefile, and assuming that a file
5535 Makefile.in exists in the same directory, ordinary
5536 file-cache-minibuffer-complete will try to complete Makefile to
5537 Makefile.in and will therefore never look for other directories that
5538 have Makefile. A prefix argument tells it not to look for longer
5539 names such as Makefile.in, so that instead it will look for other
5540 directories--just as if the name were already complete in its present
5543 ** New modes and packages
5545 *** There is a new alternative major mode for Perl, Cperl mode.
5546 It has many more features than Perl mode, and some people prefer
5547 it, but some do not.
5549 *** There is a new major mode, M-x vhdl-mode, for editing files of VHDL
5552 *** M-x which-function-mode enables a minor mode that displays the
5553 current function name continuously in the mode line, as you move
5556 Which Function mode is effective in major modes which support Imenu.
5558 *** Gametree is a major mode for editing game analysis trees. The author
5559 uses it for keeping notes about his postal Chess games, but it should
5560 be helpful for other two-player games as well, as long as they have an
5561 established system of notation similar to Chess.
5563 *** The new minor mode checkdoc-minor-mode provides Emacs Lisp
5564 documentation string checking for style and spelling. The style
5565 guidelines are found in the Emacs Lisp programming manual.
5567 *** The net-utils package makes some common networking features
5568 available in Emacs. Some of these functions are wrappers around
5569 system utilities (ping, nslookup, etc); others are implementations of
5570 simple protocols (finger, whois) in Emacs Lisp. There are also
5571 functions to make simple connections to TCP/IP ports for debugging and
5574 *** highlight-changes-mode is a minor mode that uses colors to
5575 identify recently changed parts of the buffer text.
5577 *** The new package `midnight' lets you specify things to be done
5578 within Emacs at midnight--by default, kill buffers that you have not
5579 used in a considerable time. To use this feature, customize
5580 the user option `midnight-mode' to t.
5582 *** The file generic-x.el defines a number of simple major modes.
5584 apache-generic-mode: For Apache and NCSA httpd configuration files
5585 samba-generic-mode: Samba configuration files
5586 fvwm-generic-mode: For fvwm initialization files
5587 x-resource-generic-mode: For X resource files
5588 hosts-generic-mode: For hosts files (.rhosts, /etc/hosts, etc)
5589 mailagent-rules-generic-mode: For mailagent .rules files
5590 javascript-generic-mode: For JavaScript files
5591 vrml-generic-mode: For VRML files
5592 java-manifest-generic-mode: For Java MANIFEST files
5593 java-properties-generic-mode: For Java property files
5594 mailrc-generic-mode: For .mailrc files
5596 Platform-specific modes:
5598 prototype-generic-mode: For Solaris/Sys V prototype files
5599 pkginfo-generic-mode: For Solaris/Sys V pkginfo files
5600 alias-generic-mode: For C shell alias files
5601 inf-generic-mode: For MS-Windows INF files
5602 ini-generic-mode: For MS-Windows INI files
5603 reg-generic-mode: For MS-Windows Registry files
5604 bat-generic-mode: For MS-Windows BAT scripts
5605 rc-generic-mode: For MS-Windows Resource files
5606 rul-generic-mode: For InstallShield scripts
5608 * Lisp changes in Emacs 20.3 since the Emacs Lisp Manual was published
5610 ** If you want a Lisp file to be read in unibyte mode,
5611 use -*-unibyte: t;-*- on its first line.
5612 That will force Emacs to read that file in unibyte mode.
5613 Otherwise, the file will be loaded and byte-compiled in multibyte mode.
5615 Thus, each lisp file is read in a consistent way regardless of whether
5616 you started Emacs with --unibyte, so that a Lisp program gives
5617 consistent results regardless of how Emacs was started.
5619 ** The new function assoc-default is useful for searching an alist,
5620 and using a default value if the key is not found there. You can
5621 specify a comparison predicate, so this function is useful for
5622 searching comparing a string against an alist of regular expressions.
5624 ** The functions unibyte-char-to-multibyte and
5625 multibyte-char-to-unibyte convert between unibyte and multibyte
5626 character codes, in a way that is appropriate for the current language
5629 ** The functions read-event, read-char and read-char-exclusive now
5630 take two optional arguments. PROMPT, if non-nil, specifies a prompt
5631 string. SUPPRESS-INPUT-METHOD, if non-nil, says to disable the
5632 current input method for reading this one event.
5634 ** Two new variables print-escape-nonascii and print-escape-multibyte
5635 now control whether to output certain characters as
5636 backslash-sequences. print-escape-nonascii applies to single-byte
5637 non-ASCII characters; print-escape-multibyte applies to multibyte
5638 characters. Both of these variables are used only when printing
5639 in readable fashion (prin1 uses them, princ does not).
5641 * Lisp changes in Emacs 20.3 before the Emacs Lisp Manual was published
5643 ** Compiled Emacs Lisp files made with the modified "MBSK" version
5644 of Emacs 20.2 do not work in Emacs 20.3.
5646 ** Buffer positions are now measured in characters, as they were
5647 in Emacs 19 and before. This means that (forward-char 1)
5648 always increases point by 1.
5650 The function chars-in-region now just subtracts its arguments. It is
5651 considered obsolete. The function char-boundary-p has been deleted.
5653 See below for additional changes relating to multibyte characters.
5655 ** defcustom, defface and defgroup now accept the keyword `:version'.
5656 Use this to specify in which version of Emacs a certain variable's
5657 default value changed. For example,
5659 (defcustom foo-max 34 "*Maximum number of foo's allowed."
5664 (defgroup foo-group nil "The foo group."
5667 If an entire new group is added or the variables in it have the
5668 default values changed, then just add a `:version' to that group. It
5669 is recommended that new packages added to the distribution contain a
5670 `:version' in the top level group.
5672 This information is used to control the customize-changed-options command.
5674 ** It is now an error to change the value of a symbol whose name
5675 starts with a colon--if it is interned in the standard obarray.
5677 However, setting such a symbol to its proper value, which is that
5678 symbol itself, is not an error. This is for the sake of programs that
5679 support previous Emacs versions by explicitly setting these variables
5682 If you set the variable keyword-symbols-constant-flag to nil,
5683 this error is suppressed, and you can set these symbols to any
5686 ** There is a new debugger command, R.
5687 It evaluates an expression like e, but saves the result
5688 in the buffer *Debugger-record*.
5690 ** Frame-local variables.
5692 You can now make a variable local to various frames. To do this, call
5693 the function make-variable-frame-local; this enables frames to have
5694 local bindings for that variable.
5696 These frame-local bindings are actually frame parameters: you create a
5697 frame-local binding in a specific frame by calling
5698 modify-frame-parameters and specifying the variable name as the
5701 Buffer-local bindings take precedence over frame-local bindings.
5702 Thus, if the current buffer has a buffer-local binding, that binding is
5703 active; otherwise, if the selected frame has a frame-local binding,
5704 that binding is active; otherwise, the default binding is active.
5706 It would not be hard to implement window-local bindings, but it is not
5707 clear that this would be very useful; windows tend to come and go in a
5708 very transitory fashion, so that trying to produce any specific effect
5709 through a window-local binding would not be very robust.
5711 ** `sregexq' and `sregex' are two new functions for constructing
5712 "symbolic regular expressions." These are Lisp expressions that, when
5713 evaluated, yield conventional string-based regexps. The symbolic form
5714 makes it easier to construct, read, and maintain complex patterns.
5715 See the documentation in sregex.el.
5717 ** parse-partial-sexp's return value has an additional element which
5718 is used to pass information along if you pass it to another call to
5719 parse-partial-sexp, starting its scan where the first call ended.
5720 The contents of this field are not yet finalized.
5722 ** eval-region now accepts a fourth optional argument READ-FUNCTION.
5723 If it is non-nil, that function is used instead of `read'.
5725 ** unload-feature by default removes the feature's functions from
5726 known hooks to avoid trouble, but a package providing FEATURE can
5727 define a hook FEATURE-unload-hook to be run by unload-feature instead.
5729 ** read-from-minibuffer no longer returns the argument DEFAULT-VALUE
5730 when the user enters empty input. It now returns the null string, as
5731 it did in Emacs 19. The default value is made available in the
5732 history via M-n, but it is not applied here as a default.
5734 The other, more specialized minibuffer-reading functions continue to
5735 return the default value (not the null string) when the user enters
5738 ** The new variable read-buffer-function controls which routine to use
5739 for selecting buffers. For example, if you set this variable to
5740 `iswitchb-read-buffer', iswitchb will be used to read buffer names.
5741 Other functions can also be used if they accept the same arguments as
5742 `read-buffer' and return the selected buffer name as a string.
5744 ** The new function read-passwd reads a password from the terminal,
5745 echoing a period for each character typed. It takes three arguments:
5746 a prompt string, a flag which says "read it twice to make sure", and a
5747 default password to use if the user enters nothing.
5749 ** The variable fill-nobreak-predicate gives major modes a way to
5750 specify not to break a line at certain places. Its value is a
5751 function which is called with no arguments, with point located at the
5752 place where a break is being considered. If the function returns
5753 non-nil, then the line won't be broken there.
5755 ** window-end now takes an optional second argument, UPDATE.
5756 If this is non-nil, then the function always returns an accurate
5757 up-to-date value for the buffer position corresponding to the
5758 end of the window, even if this requires computation.
5760 ** other-buffer now takes an optional argument FRAME
5761 which specifies which frame's buffer list to use.
5762 If it is nil, that means use the selected frame's buffer list.
5764 ** The new variable buffer-display-time, always local in every buffer,
5765 holds the value of (current-time) as of the last time that a window
5766 was directed to display this buffer.
5768 ** It is now meaningful to compare two window-configuration objects
5769 with `equal'. Two window-configuration objects are equal if they
5770 describe equivalent arrangements of windows, in the same frame--in
5771 other words, if they would give the same results if passed to
5772 set-window-configuration.
5774 ** compare-window-configurations is a new function that compares two
5775 window configurations loosely. It ignores differences in saved buffer
5776 positions and scrolling, and considers only the structure and sizes of
5777 windows and the choice of buffers to display.
5779 ** The variable minor-mode-overriding-map-alist allows major modes to
5780 override the key bindings of a minor mode. The elements of this alist
5781 look like the elements of minor-mode-map-alist: (VARIABLE . KEYMAP).
5783 If the VARIABLE in an element of minor-mode-overriding-map-alist has a
5784 non-nil value, the paired KEYMAP is active, and totally overrides the
5785 map (if any) specified for the same variable in minor-mode-map-alist.
5787 minor-mode-overriding-map-alist is automatically local in all buffers,
5788 and it is meant to be set by major modes.
5790 ** The function match-string-no-properties is like match-string
5791 except that it discards all text properties from the result.
5793 ** The function load-average now accepts an optional argument
5794 USE-FLOATS. If it is non-nil, the load average values are returned as
5795 floating point numbers, rather than as integers to be divided by 100.
5797 ** The new variable temporary-file-directory specifies the directory
5798 to use for creating temporary files. The default value is determined
5799 in a reasonable way for your operating system; on GNU and Unix systems
5800 it is based on the TMP and TMPDIR environment variables.
5804 *** easymenu.el now uses the new menu item format and supports the
5805 keywords :visible and :filter. The existing keyword :keys is now
5808 The variable `easy-menu-precalculate-equivalent-keybindings' controls
5809 a new feature which calculates keyboard equivalents for the menu when
5810 you define the menu. The default is t. If you rarely use menus, you
5811 can set the variable to nil to disable this precalculation feature;
5812 then the calculation is done only if you use the menu bar.
5814 *** A new format for menu items is supported.
5816 In a keymap, a key binding that has the format
5817 (STRING . REAL-BINDING) or (STRING HELP-STRING . REAL-BINDING)
5818 defines a menu item. Now a menu item definition may also be a list that
5819 starts with the symbol `menu-item'.
5822 (menu-item ITEM-NAME) or
5823 (menu-item ITEM-NAME REAL-BINDING . ITEM-PROPERTY-LIST)
5824 where ITEM-NAME is an expression which evaluates to the menu item
5825 string, and ITEM-PROPERTY-LIST has the form of a property list.
5826 The supported properties include
5828 :enable FORM Evaluate FORM to determine whether the
5830 :visible FORM Evaluate FORM to determine whether the
5831 item should appear in the menu.
5833 FILTER-FN is a function of one argument,
5834 which will be REAL-BINDING.
5835 It should return a binding to use instead.
5837 DESCRIPTION is a string that describes an equivalent keyboard
5838 binding for for REAL-BINDING. DESCRIPTION is expanded with
5839 `substitute-command-keys' before it is used.
5840 :key-sequence KEY-SEQUENCE
5841 KEY-SEQUENCE is a key-sequence for an equivalent
5844 This means that the command normally has no
5845 keyboard equivalent.
5846 :help HELP HELP is the extra help string (not currently used).
5847 :button (TYPE . SELECTED)
5848 TYPE is :toggle or :radio.
5849 SELECTED is a form, to be evaluated, and its
5850 value says whether this button is currently selected.
5852 Buttons are at the moment only simulated by prefixes in the menu.
5853 Eventually ordinary X-buttons may be supported.
5855 (menu-item ITEM-NAME) defines unselectable item.
5859 *** The new event type `mouse-wheel' is generated by a wheel on a
5860 mouse (such as the MS Intellimouse). The event contains a delta that
5861 corresponds to the amount and direction that the wheel is rotated,
5862 which is typically used to implement a scroll or zoom. The format is:
5864 (mouse-wheel POSITION DELTA)
5866 where POSITION is a list describing the position of the event in the
5867 same format as a mouse-click event, and DELTA is a signed number
5868 indicating the number of increments by which the wheel was rotated. A
5869 negative DELTA indicates that the wheel was rotated backwards, towards
5870 the user, and a positive DELTA indicates that the wheel was rotated
5871 forward, away from the user.
5873 As of now, this event type is generated only on MS Windows.
5875 *** The new event type `drag-n-drop' is generated when a group of
5876 files is selected in an application outside of Emacs, and then dragged
5877 and dropped onto an Emacs frame. The event contains a list of
5878 filenames that were dragged and dropped, which are then typically
5879 loaded into Emacs. The format is:
5881 (drag-n-drop POSITION FILES)
5883 where POSITION is a list describing the position of the event in the
5884 same format as a mouse-click event, and FILES is the list of filenames
5885 that were dragged and dropped.
5887 As of now, this event type is generated only on MS Windows.
5889 ** Changes relating to multibyte characters.
5891 *** The variable enable-multibyte-characters is now read-only;
5892 any attempt to set it directly signals an error. The only way
5893 to change this value in an existing buffer is with set-buffer-multibyte.
5895 *** In a string constant, `\ ' now stands for "nothing at all". You
5896 can use it to terminate a hex escape which is followed by a character
5897 that could otherwise be read as part of the hex escape.
5899 *** String indices are now measured in characters, as they were
5900 in Emacs 19 and before.
5902 The function chars-in-string has been deleted.
5903 The function concat-chars has been renamed to `string'.
5905 *** The function set-buffer-multibyte sets the flag in the current
5906 buffer that says whether the buffer uses multibyte representation or
5907 unibyte representation. If the argument is nil, it selects unibyte
5908 representation. Otherwise it selects multibyte representation.
5910 This function does not change the contents of the buffer, viewed
5911 as a sequence of bytes. However, it does change the contents
5912 viewed as characters; a sequence of two bytes which is treated as
5913 one character when the buffer uses multibyte representation
5914 will count as two characters using unibyte representation.
5916 This function sets enable-multibyte-characters to record which
5917 representation is in use. It also adjusts various data in the buffer
5918 (including its markers, overlays and text properties) so that they are
5919 consistent with the new representation.
5921 *** string-make-multibyte takes a string and converts it to multibyte
5922 representation. Most of the time, you don't need to care
5923 about the representation, because Emacs converts when necessary;
5924 however, it makes a difference when you compare strings.
5926 The conversion of non-ASCII characters works by adding the value of
5927 nonascii-insert-offset to each character, or by translating them
5928 using the table nonascii-translation-table.
5930 *** string-make-unibyte takes a string and converts it to unibyte
5931 representation. Most of the time, you don't need to care about the
5932 representation, but it makes a difference when you compare strings.
5934 The conversion from multibyte to unibyte representation
5935 loses information; the only time Emacs performs it automatically
5936 is when inserting a multibyte string into a unibyte buffer.
5938 *** string-as-multibyte takes a string, and returns another string
5939 which contains the same bytes, but treats them as multibyte.
5941 *** string-as-unibyte takes a string, and returns another string
5942 which contains the same bytes, but treats them as unibyte.
5944 *** The new function compare-strings lets you compare
5945 portions of two strings. Unibyte strings are converted to multibyte,
5946 so that a unibyte string can match a multibyte string.
5947 You can specify whether to ignore case or not.
5949 *** assoc-ignore-case now uses compare-strings so that
5950 it can treat unibyte and multibyte strings as equal.
5952 *** Regular expression operations and buffer string searches now
5953 convert the search pattern to multibyte or unibyte to accord with the
5954 buffer or string being searched.
5956 One consequence is that you cannot always use \200-\377 inside of
5957 [...] to match all non-ASCII characters. This does still work when
5958 searching or matching a unibyte buffer or string, but not when
5959 searching or matching a multibyte string. Unfortunately, there is no
5960 obvious choice of syntax to use within [...] for that job. But, what
5961 you want is just to match all non-ASCII characters, the regular
5962 expression [^\0-\177] works for it.
5964 *** Structure of coding system changed.
5966 All coding systems (including aliases and subsidiaries) are named
5967 by symbols; the symbol's `coding-system' property is a vector
5968 which defines the coding system. Aliases share the same vector
5969 as the principal name, so that altering the contents of this
5970 vector affects the principal name and its aliases. You can define
5971 your own alias name of a coding system by the function
5972 define-coding-system-alias.
5974 The coding system definition includes a property list of its own. Use
5975 the new functions `coding-system-get' and `coding-system-put' to
5976 access such coding system properties as post-read-conversion,
5977 pre-write-conversion, character-translation-table-for-decode,
5978 character-translation-table-for-encode, mime-charset, and
5979 safe-charsets. For instance, (coding-system-get 'iso-latin-1
5980 'mime-charset) gives the corresponding MIME-charset parameter
5983 Among the coding system properties listed above, safe-charsets is new.
5984 The value of this property is a list of character sets which this
5985 coding system can correctly encode and decode. For instance:
5986 (coding-system-get 'iso-latin-1 'safe-charsets) => (ascii latin-iso8859-1)
5988 Here, "correctly encode" means that the encoded character sets can
5989 also be handled safely by systems other than Emacs as far as they
5990 are capable of that coding system. Though, Emacs itself can encode
5991 the other character sets and read it back correctly.
5993 *** The new function select-safe-coding-system can be used to find a
5994 proper coding system for encoding the specified region or string.
5995 This function requires a user interaction.
5997 *** The new functions find-coding-systems-region and
5998 find-coding-systems-string are helper functions used by
5999 select-safe-coding-system. They return a list of all proper coding
6000 systems to encode a text in some region or string. If you don't want
6001 a user interaction, use one of these functions instead of
6002 select-safe-coding-system.
6004 *** The explicit encoding and decoding functions, such as
6005 decode-coding-region and encode-coding-string, now set
6006 last-coding-system-used to reflect the actual way encoding or decoding
6009 *** The new function detect-coding-with-language-environment can be
6010 used to detect a coding system of text according to priorities of
6011 coding systems used by some specific language environment.
6013 *** The functions detect-coding-region and detect-coding-string always
6014 return a list if the arg HIGHEST is nil. Thus, if only ASCII
6015 characters are found, they now return a list of single element
6016 `undecided' or its subsidiaries.
6018 *** The new functions coding-system-change-eol-conversion and
6019 coding-system-change-text-conversion can be used to get a different
6020 coding system than what specified only in how end-of-line or text is
6023 *** The new function set-selection-coding-system can be used to set a
6024 coding system for communicating with other X clients.
6026 *** The function `map-char-table' now passes as argument only valid
6027 character codes, plus generic characters that stand for entire
6028 character sets or entire subrows of a character set. In other words,
6029 each time `map-char-table' calls its FUNCTION argument, the key value
6030 either will be a valid individual character code, or will stand for a
6031 range of characters.
6033 *** The new function `char-valid-p' can be used for checking whether a
6034 Lisp object is a valid character code or not.
6036 *** The new function `charset-after' returns a charset of a character
6037 in the current buffer at position POS.
6039 *** Input methods are now implemented using the variable
6040 input-method-function. If this is non-nil, its value should be a
6041 function; then, whenever Emacs reads an input event that is a printing
6042 character with no modifier bits, it calls that function, passing the
6043 event as an argument. Often this function will read more input, first
6044 binding input-method-function to nil.
6046 The return value should be a list of the events resulting from input
6047 method processing. These events will be processed sequentially as
6048 input, before resorting to unread-command-events. Events returned by
6049 the input method function are not passed to the input method function,
6050 not even if they are printing characters with no modifier bits.
6052 The input method function is not called when reading the second and
6053 subsequent events of a key sequence.
6055 *** You can customize any language environment by using
6056 set-language-environment-hook and exit-language-environment-hook.
6058 The hook `exit-language-environment-hook' should be used to undo
6059 customizations that you made with set-language-environment-hook. For
6060 instance, if you set up a special key binding for a specific language
6061 environment by set-language-environment-hook, you should set up
6062 exit-language-environment-hook to restore the normal key binding.
6064 * Changes in Emacs 20.1
6066 ** Emacs has a new facility for customization of its many user
6067 options. It is called M-x customize. With this facility you can look
6068 at the many user options in an organized way; they are grouped into a
6071 M-x customize also knows what sorts of values are legitimate for each
6072 user option and ensures that you don't use invalid values.
6074 With M-x customize, you can set options either for the present Emacs
6075 session or permanently. (Permanent settings are stored automatically
6076 in your .emacs file.)
6078 ** Scroll bars are now on the left side of the window.
6079 You can change this with M-x customize-option scroll-bar-mode.
6081 ** The mode line no longer includes the string `Emacs'.
6082 This makes more space in the mode line for other information.
6084 ** When you select a region with the mouse, it is highlighted
6085 immediately afterward. At that time, if you type the DELETE key, it
6088 The BACKSPACE key, and the ASCII character DEL, do not do this; they
6089 delete the character before point, as usual.
6091 ** In an incremental search the whole current match is highlighted
6092 on terminals which support this. (You can disable this feature
6093 by setting search-highlight to nil.)
6095 ** In the minibuffer, in some cases, you can now use M-n to
6096 insert the default value into the minibuffer as text. In effect,
6097 the default value (if the minibuffer routines know it) is tacked
6098 onto the history "in the future". (The more normal use of the
6099 history list is to use M-p to insert minibuffer input used in the
6102 ** In Text mode, now only blank lines separate paragraphs.
6103 This makes it possible to get the full benefit of Adaptive Fill mode
6104 in Text mode, and other modes derived from it (such as Mail mode).
6105 TAB in Text mode now runs the command indent-relative; this
6106 makes a practical difference only when you use indented paragraphs.
6108 As a result, the old Indented Text mode is now identical to Text mode,
6109 and is an alias for it.
6111 If you want spaces at the beginning of a line to start a paragraph,
6112 use the new mode, Paragraph Indent Text mode.
6114 ** Scrolling changes
6116 *** Scroll commands to scroll a whole screen now preserve the screen
6117 position of the cursor, if scroll-preserve-screen-position is non-nil.
6119 In this mode, if you scroll several screens back and forth, finishing
6120 on the same screen where you started, the cursor goes back to the line
6123 *** If you set scroll-conservatively to a small number, then when you
6124 move point a short distance off the screen, Emacs will scroll the
6125 screen just far enough to bring point back on screen, provided that
6126 does not exceed `scroll-conservatively' lines.
6128 *** The new variable scroll-margin says how close point can come to the
6129 top or bottom of a window. It is a number of screen lines; if point
6130 comes within that many lines of the top or bottom of the window, Emacs
6131 recenters the window.
6133 ** International character set support (MULE)
6135 Emacs now supports a wide variety of international character sets,
6136 including European variants of the Latin alphabet, as well as Chinese,
6137 Devanagari (Hindi and Marathi), Ethiopian, Greek, IPA, Japanese,
6138 Korean, Lao, Russian, Thai, Tibetan, and Vietnamese scripts. These
6139 features have been merged from the modified version of Emacs known as
6140 MULE (for "MULti-lingual Enhancement to GNU Emacs")
6142 Users of these scripts have established many more-or-less standard
6143 coding systems for storing files. Emacs uses a single multibyte
6144 character encoding within Emacs buffers; it can translate from a wide
6145 variety of coding systems when reading a file and can translate back
6146 into any of these coding systems when saving a file.
6148 Keyboards, even in the countries where these character sets are used,
6149 generally don't have keys for all the characters in them. So Emacs
6150 supports various "input methods", typically one for each script or
6151 language, to make it possible to type them.
6153 The Emacs internal multibyte encoding represents a non-ASCII
6154 character as a sequence of bytes in the range 0200 through 0377.
6156 The new prefix key C-x RET is used for commands that pertain
6157 to multibyte characters, coding systems, and input methods.
6159 You can disable multibyte character support as follows:
6161 (setq-default enable-multibyte-characters nil)
6163 Calling the function standard-display-european turns off multibyte
6164 characters, unless you specify a non-nil value for the second
6165 argument, AUTO. This provides compatibility for people who are
6166 already using standard-display-european to continue using unibyte
6167 characters for their work until they want to change.
6171 An input method is a kind of character conversion which is designed
6172 specifically for interactive input. In Emacs, typically each language
6173 has its own input method (though sometimes several languages which use
6174 the same characters can share one input method). Some languages
6175 support several input methods.
6177 The simplest kind of input method works by mapping ASCII letters into
6178 another alphabet. This is how the Greek and Russian input methods
6181 A more powerful technique is composition: converting sequences of
6182 characters into one letter. Many European input methods use
6183 composition to produce a single non-ASCII letter from a sequence which
6184 consists of a letter followed by diacritics. For example, a' is one
6185 sequence of two characters that might be converted into a single
6188 The input methods for syllabic scripts typically use mapping followed
6189 by conversion. The input methods for Thai and Korean work this way.
6190 First, letters are mapped into symbols for particular sounds or tone
6191 marks; then, sequences of these which make up a whole syllable are
6192 mapped into one syllable sign--most often a "composite character".
6194 None of these methods works very well for Chinese and Japanese, so
6195 they are handled specially. First you input a whole word using
6196 phonetic spelling; then, after the word is in the buffer, Emacs
6197 converts it into one or more characters using a large dictionary.
6199 Since there is more than one way to represent a phonetically spelled
6200 word using Chinese characters, Emacs can only guess which one to use;
6201 typically these input methods give you a way to say "guess again" if
6202 the first guess is wrong.
6204 *** The command C-x RET m (toggle-enable-multibyte-characters)
6205 turns multibyte character support on or off for the current buffer.
6207 If multibyte character support is turned off in a buffer, then each
6208 byte is a single character, even codes 0200 through 0377--exactly as
6209 they did in Emacs 19.34. This includes the features for support for
6210 the European characters, ISO Latin-1 and ISO Latin-2.
6212 However, there is no need to turn off multibyte character support to
6213 use ISO Latin-1 or ISO Latin-2; the Emacs multibyte character set
6214 includes all the characters in these character sets, and Emacs can
6215 translate automatically to and from either one.
6217 *** Visiting a file in unibyte mode.
6219 Turning off multibyte character support in the buffer after visiting a
6220 file with multibyte code conversion will display the multibyte
6221 sequences already in the buffer, byte by byte. This is probably not
6224 If you want to edit a file of unibyte characters (Latin-1, for
6225 example), you can do it by specifying `no-conversion' as the coding
6226 system when reading the file. This coding system also turns off
6227 multibyte characters in that buffer.
6229 If you turn off multibyte character support entirely, this turns off
6230 character conversion as well.
6232 *** Displaying international characters on X Windows.
6234 A font for X typically displays just one alphabet or script.
6235 Therefore, displaying the entire range of characters Emacs supports
6236 requires using many fonts.
6238 Therefore, Emacs now supports "fontsets". Each fontset is a
6239 collection of fonts, each assigned to a range of character codes.
6241 A fontset has a name, like a font. Individual fonts are defined by
6242 the X server; fontsets are defined within Emacs itself. But once you
6243 have defined a fontset, you can use it in a face or a frame just as
6244 you would use a font.
6246 If a fontset specifies no font for a certain character, or if it
6247 specifies a font that does not exist on your system, then it cannot
6248 display that character. It will display an empty box instead.
6250 The fontset height and width are determined by the ASCII characters
6251 (that is, by the font in the fontset which is used for ASCII
6252 characters). If another font in the fontset has a different height,
6253 or the wrong width, then characters assigned to that font are clipped,
6254 and displayed within a box if highlight-wrong-size-font is non-nil.
6256 *** Defining fontsets.
6258 Emacs does not use any fontset by default. Its default font is still
6259 chosen as in previous versions. You can tell Emacs to use a fontset
6260 with the `-fn' option or the `Font' X resource.
6262 Emacs creates a standard fontset automatically according to the value
6263 of standard-fontset-spec. This fontset's short name is
6264 `fontset-standard'. Bold, italic, and bold-italic variants of the
6265 standard fontset are created automatically.
6267 If you specify a default ASCII font with the `Font' resource or `-fn'
6268 argument, a fontset is generated from it. This works by replacing the
6269 FOUNDARY, FAMILY, ADD_STYLE, and AVERAGE_WIDTH fields of the font name
6270 with `*' then using this to specify a fontset. This fontset's short
6271 name is `fontset-startup'.
6273 Emacs checks resources of the form Fontset-N where N is 0, 1, 2...
6274 The resource value should have this form:
6275 FONTSET-NAME, [CHARSET-NAME:FONT-NAME]...
6276 FONTSET-NAME should have the form of a standard X font name, except:
6277 * most fields should be just the wild card "*".
6278 * the CHARSET_REGISTRY field should be "fontset"
6279 * the CHARSET_ENCODING field can be any nickname of the fontset.
6280 The construct CHARSET-NAME:FONT-NAME can be repeated any number
6281 of times; each time specifies the font for one character set.
6282 CHARSET-NAME should be the name name of a character set, and
6283 FONT-NAME should specify an actual font to use for that character set.
6285 Each of these fontsets has an alias which is made from the
6286 last two font name fields, CHARSET_REGISTRY and CHARSET_ENCODING.
6287 You can refer to the fontset by that alias or by its full name.
6289 For any character sets that you don't mention, Emacs tries to choose a
6290 font by substituting into FONTSET-NAME. For instance, with the
6292 Emacs*Fontset-0: -*-fixed-medium-r-normal-*-24-*-*-*-*-*-fontset-24
6293 the font for ASCII is generated as below:
6294 -*-fixed-medium-r-normal-*-24-*-ISO8859-1
6295 Here is the substitution rule:
6296 Change CHARSET_REGISTRY and CHARSET_ENCODING to that of the charset
6297 defined in the variable x-charset-registries. For instance, ASCII has
6298 the entry (ascii . "ISO8859-1") in this variable. Then, reduce
6299 sequences of wild cards -*-...-*- with a single wildcard -*-.
6300 (This is to prevent use of auto-scaled fonts.)
6302 The function which processes the fontset resource value to create the
6303 fontset is called create-fontset-from-fontset-spec. You can also call
6304 that function explicitly to create a fontset.
6306 With the X resource Emacs.Font, you can specify a fontset name just
6307 like an actual font name. But be careful not to specify a fontset
6308 name in a wildcard resource like Emacs*Font--that tries to specify the
6309 fontset for other purposes including menus, and they cannot handle
6312 *** The command M-x set-language-environment sets certain global Emacs
6313 defaults for a particular choice of language.
6315 Selecting a language environment typically specifies a default input
6316 method and which coding systems to recognize automatically when
6317 visiting files. However, it does not try to reread files you have
6318 already visited; the text in those buffers is not affected. The
6319 language environment may also specify a default choice of coding
6320 system for new files that you create.
6322 It makes no difference which buffer is current when you use
6323 set-language-environment, because these defaults apply globally to the
6324 whole Emacs session.
6326 For example, M-x set-language-environment RET Latin-1 RET
6327 chooses the Latin-1 character set. In the .emacs file, you can do this
6328 with (set-language-environment "Latin-1").
6330 *** The command C-x RET f (set-buffer-file-coding-system)
6331 specifies the file coding system for the current buffer. This
6332 specifies what sort of character code translation to do when saving
6333 the file. As an argument, you must specify the name of one of the
6334 coding systems that Emacs supports.
6336 *** The command C-x RET c (universal-coding-system-argument)
6337 lets you specify a coding system when you read or write a file.
6338 This command uses the minibuffer to read a coding system name.
6339 After you exit the minibuffer, the specified coding system
6340 is used for *the immediately following command*.
6342 So if the immediately following command is a command to read or
6343 write a file, it uses the specified coding system for that file.
6345 If the immediately following command does not use the coding system,
6346 then C-x RET c ultimately has no effect.
6348 For example, C-x RET c iso-8859-1 RET C-x C-f temp RET
6349 visits the file `temp' treating it as ISO Latin-1.
6351 *** You can specify the coding system for a file using the -*-
6352 construct. Include `coding: CODINGSYSTEM;' inside the -*-...-*-
6353 to specify use of coding system CODINGSYSTEM. You can also
6354 specify the coding system in a local variable list at the end
6357 *** The command C-x RET t (set-terminal-coding-system) specifies
6358 the coding system for terminal output. If you specify a character
6359 code for terminal output, all characters output to the terminal are
6360 translated into that character code.
6362 This feature is useful for certain character-only terminals built in
6363 various countries to support the languages of those countries.
6365 By default, output to the terminal is not translated at all.
6367 *** The command C-x RET k (set-keyboard-coding-system) specifies
6368 the coding system for keyboard input.
6370 Character code translation of keyboard input is useful for terminals
6371 with keys that send non-ASCII graphic characters--for example,
6372 some terminals designed for ISO Latin-1 or subsets of it.
6374 By default, keyboard input is not translated at all.
6376 Character code translation of keyboard input is similar to using an
6377 input method, in that both define sequences of keyboard input that
6378 translate into single characters. However, input methods are designed
6379 to be convenient for interactive use, while the code translations are
6380 designed to work with terminals.
6382 *** The command C-x RET p (set-buffer-process-coding-system)
6383 specifies the coding system for input and output to a subprocess.
6384 This command applies to the current buffer; normally, each subprocess
6385 has its own buffer, and thus you can use this command to specify
6386 translation to and from a particular subprocess by giving the command
6387 in the corresponding buffer.
6389 By default, process input and output are not translated at all.
6391 *** The variable file-name-coding-system specifies the coding system
6392 to use for encoding file names before operating on them.
6393 It is also used for decoding file names obtained from the system.
6395 *** The command C-\ (toggle-input-method) activates or deactivates
6396 an input method. If no input method has been selected before, the
6397 command prompts for you to specify the language and input method you
6400 C-u C-\ (select-input-method) lets you switch to a different input
6401 method. C-h C-\ (or C-h I) describes the current input method.
6403 *** Some input methods remap the keyboard to emulate various keyboard
6404 layouts commonly used for particular scripts. How to do this
6405 remapping properly depends on your actual keyboard layout. To specify
6406 which layout your keyboard has, use M-x quail-set-keyboard-layout.
6408 *** The command C-h C (describe-coding-system) displays
6409 the coding systems currently selected for various purposes, plus
6410 related information.
6412 *** The command C-h h (view-hello-file) displays a file called
6413 HELLO, which has examples of text in many languages, using various
6416 *** The command C-h L (describe-language-support) displays
6417 information about the support for a particular language.
6418 You specify the language as an argument.
6420 *** The mode line now contains a letter or character that identifies
6421 the coding system used in the visited file. It normally follows the
6424 A dash indicates the default state of affairs: no code conversion
6425 (except CRLF => newline if appropriate). `=' means no conversion
6426 whatsoever. The ISO 8859 coding systems are represented by digits
6427 1 through 9. Other coding systems are represented by letters:
6429 A alternativnyj (Russian)
6431 C cn-gb-2312 (Chinese)
6432 C iso-2022-cn (Chinese)
6433 D in-is13194-devanagari (Indian languages)
6434 E euc-japan (Japanese)
6435 I iso-2022-cjk or iso-2022-ss2 (Chinese, Japanese, Korean)
6436 J junet (iso-2022-7) or old-jis (iso-2022-jp-1978-irv) (Japanese)
6437 K euc-korea (Korean)
6440 S shift_jis (Japanese)
6443 V viscii or vscii (Vietnamese)
6444 i iso-2022-lock (Chinese, Japanese, Korean)
6445 k iso-2022-kr (Korean)
6449 When you are using a character-only terminal (not a window system),
6450 two additional characters appear in between the dash and the file
6451 coding system. These two characters describe the coding system for
6452 keyboard input, and the coding system for terminal output.
6454 *** The new variable rmail-file-coding-system specifies the code
6455 conversion to use for RMAIL files. The default value is nil.
6457 When you read mail with Rmail, each message is decoded automatically
6458 into Emacs' internal format. This has nothing to do with
6459 rmail-file-coding-system. That variable controls reading and writing
6460 Rmail files themselves.
6462 *** The new variable sendmail-coding-system specifies the code
6463 conversion for outgoing mail. The default value is nil.
6465 Actually, there are three different ways of specifying the coding system
6468 - If you use C-x RET f in the mail buffer, that takes priority.
6469 - Otherwise, if you set sendmail-coding-system non-nil, that specifies it.
6470 - Otherwise, the default coding system for new files is used,
6471 if that is non-nil. That comes from your language environment.
6472 - Otherwise, Latin-1 is used.
6474 *** The command C-h t (help-with-tutorial) accepts a prefix argument
6475 to specify the language for the tutorial file. Currently, English,
6476 Japanese, Korean and Thai are supported. We welcome additional
6479 ** An easy new way to visit a file with no code or format conversion
6480 of any kind: Use M-x find-file-literally. There is also a command
6481 insert-file-literally which inserts a file into the current buffer
6482 without any conversion.
6484 ** C-q's handling of octal character codes is changed.
6485 You can now specify any number of octal digits.
6486 RET terminates the digits and is discarded;
6487 any other non-digit terminates the digits and is then used as input.
6489 ** There are new commands for looking up Info documentation for
6490 functions, variables and file names used in your programs.
6492 Type M-x info-lookup-symbol to look up a symbol in the buffer at point.
6493 Type M-x info-lookup-file to look up a file in the buffer at point.
6495 Precisely which Info files are used to look it up depends on the major
6496 mode. For example, in C mode, the GNU libc manual is used.
6498 ** M-TAB in most programming language modes now runs the command
6499 complete-symbol. This command performs completion on the symbol name
6500 in the buffer before point.
6502 With a numeric argument, it performs completion based on the set of
6503 symbols documented in the Info files for the programming language that
6506 With no argument, it does completion based on the current tags tables,
6507 just like the old binding of M-TAB (complete-tag).
6509 ** File locking works with NFS now.
6511 The lock file for FILENAME is now a symbolic link named .#FILENAME,
6512 in the same directory as FILENAME.
6514 This means that collision detection between two different machines now
6515 works reasonably well; it also means that no file server or directory
6516 can become a bottleneck.
6518 The new method does have drawbacks. It means that collision detection
6519 does not operate when you edit a file in a directory where you cannot
6520 create new files. Collision detection also doesn't operate when the
6521 file server does not support symbolic links. But these conditions are
6522 rare, and the ability to have collision detection while using NFS is
6523 so useful that the change is worth while.
6525 When Emacs or a system crashes, this may leave behind lock files which
6526 are stale. So you may occasionally get warnings about spurious
6527 collisions. When you determine that the collision is spurious, just
6528 tell Emacs to go ahead anyway.
6530 ** If you wish to use Show Paren mode to display matching parentheses,
6531 it is no longer sufficient to load paren.el. Instead you must call
6534 ** If you wish to use Delete Selection mode to replace a highlighted
6535 selection when you insert new text, it is no longer sufficient to load
6536 delsel.el. Instead you must call the function delete-selection-mode.
6538 ** If you wish to use Partial Completion mode to complete partial words
6539 within symbols or filenames, it is no longer sufficient to load
6540 complete.el. Instead you must call the function partial-completion-mode.
6542 ** If you wish to use uniquify to rename buffers for you,
6543 it is no longer sufficient to load uniquify.el. You must also
6544 set uniquify-buffer-name-style to one of the non-nil legitimate values.
6546 ** Changes in View mode.
6548 *** Several new commands are available in View mode.
6549 Do H in view mode for a list of commands.
6551 *** There are two new commands for entering View mode:
6552 view-file-other-frame and view-buffer-other-frame.
6554 *** Exiting View mode does a better job of restoring windows to their
6557 *** New customization variable view-scroll-auto-exit. If non-nil,
6558 scrolling past end of buffer makes view mode exit.
6560 *** New customization variable view-exits-all-viewing-windows. If
6561 non-nil, view-mode will at exit restore all windows viewing buffer,
6562 not just the selected window.
6564 *** New customization variable view-read-only. If non-nil, visiting a
6565 read-only file automatically enters View mode, and toggle-read-only
6566 turns View mode on or off.
6568 *** New customization variable view-remove-frame-by-deleting controls
6569 how to remove a not needed frame at view mode exit. If non-nil,
6570 delete the frame, if nil make an icon of it.
6572 ** C-x v l, the command to print a file's version control log,
6573 now positions point at the entry for the file's current branch version.
6575 ** C-x v =, the command to compare a file with the last checked-in version,
6576 has a new feature. If the file is currently not locked, so that it is
6577 presumably identical to the last checked-in version, the command now asks
6578 which version to compare with.
6580 ** When using hideshow.el, incremental search can temporarily show hidden
6581 blocks if a match is inside the block.
6583 The block is hidden again if the search is continued and the next match
6584 is outside the block. By customizing the variable
6585 isearch-hide-immediately you can choose to hide all the temporarily
6586 shown blocks only when exiting from incremental search.
6588 By customizing the variable hs-isearch-open you can choose what kind
6589 of blocks to temporarily show during isearch: comment blocks, code
6590 blocks, all of them or none.
6592 ** The new command C-x 4 0 (kill-buffer-and-window) kills the
6593 current buffer and deletes the selected window. It asks for
6596 ** C-x C-w, which saves the buffer into a specified file name,
6597 now changes the major mode according to that file name.
6598 However, the mode will not be changed if
6599 (1) a local variables list or the `-*-' line specifies a major mode, or
6600 (2) the current major mode is a "special" mode,
6601 not suitable for ordinary files, or
6602 (3) the new file name does not particularly specify any mode.
6604 This applies to M-x set-visited-file-name as well.
6606 However, if you set change-major-mode-with-file-name to nil, then
6607 these commands do not change the major mode.
6609 ** M-x occur changes.
6611 *** If the argument to M-x occur contains upper case letters,
6612 it performs a case-sensitive search.
6614 *** In the *Occur* buffer made by M-x occur,
6615 if you type g or M-x revert-buffer, this repeats the search
6616 using the same regular expression and the same buffer as before.
6618 ** In Transient Mark mode, the region in any one buffer is highlighted
6619 in just one window at a time. At first, it is highlighted in the
6620 window where you set the mark. The buffer's highlighting remains in
6621 that window unless you select to another window which shows the same
6622 buffer--then the highlighting moves to that window.
6624 ** The feature to suggest key bindings when you use M-x now operates
6625 after the command finishes. The message suggesting key bindings
6626 appears temporarily in the echo area. The previous echo area contents
6627 come back after a few seconds, in case they contain useful information.
6629 ** Each frame now independently records the order for recently
6630 selected buffers, so that the default for C-x b is now based on the
6631 buffers recently selected in the selected frame.
6633 ** Outline mode changes.
6635 *** Outline mode now uses overlays (this is the former noutline.el).
6637 *** Incremental searches skip over invisible text in Outline mode.
6639 ** When a minibuffer window is active but not the selected window, if
6640 you try to use the minibuffer, you used to get a nested minibuffer.
6641 Now, this not only gives an error, it also cancels the minibuffer that
6644 The motive for this change is so that beginning users do not
6645 unknowingly move away from minibuffers, leaving them active, and then
6648 If you want to be able to have recursive minibuffers, you must
6649 set enable-recursive-minibuffers to non-nil.
6651 ** Changes in dynamic abbrevs.
6653 *** Expanding dynamic abbrevs with M-/ is now smarter about case
6654 conversion. If the expansion has mixed case not counting the first
6655 character, and the abbreviation matches the beginning of the expansion
6656 including case, then the expansion is copied verbatim.
6658 The expansion is also copied verbatim if the abbreviation itself has
6659 mixed case. And using SPC M-/ to copy an additional word always
6660 copies it verbatim except when the previous copied word is all caps.
6662 *** The values of `dabbrev-case-replace' and `dabbrev-case-fold-search'
6663 are no longer Lisp expressions. They have simply three possible
6666 `dabbrev-case-replace' has these three values: nil (don't preserve
6667 case), t (do), or `case-replace' (do like M-x query-replace).
6668 `dabbrev-case-fold-search' has these three values: nil (don't ignore
6669 case), t (do), or `case-fold-search' (do like search).
6671 ** Minibuffer history lists are truncated automatically now to a
6672 certain length. The variable history-length specifies how long they
6673 can be. The default value is 30.
6675 ** Changes in Mail mode.
6677 *** The key C-x m no longer runs the `mail' command directly.
6678 Instead, it runs the command `compose-mail', which invokes the mail
6679 composition mechanism you have selected with the variable
6680 `mail-user-agent'. The default choice of user agent is
6681 `sendmail-user-agent', which gives behavior compatible with the old
6684 C-x 4 m now runs compose-mail-other-window, and C-x 5 m runs
6685 compose-mail-other-frame.
6687 *** While composing a reply to a mail message, from Rmail, you can use
6688 the command C-c C-r to cite just the region from the message you are
6689 replying to. This copies the text which is the selected region in the
6690 buffer that shows the original message.
6692 *** The command C-c C-i inserts a file at the end of the message,
6693 with separator lines around the contents.
6695 *** The command M-x expand-mail-aliases expands all mail aliases
6696 in suitable mail headers. Emacs automatically extracts mail alias
6697 definitions from your mail alias file (e.g., ~/.mailrc). You do not
6698 need to expand mail aliases yourself before sending mail.
6700 *** New features in the mail-complete command.
6702 **** The mail-complete command now inserts the user's full name,
6703 for local users or if that is known. The variable mail-complete-style
6704 controls the style to use, and whether to do this at all.
6705 Its values are like those of mail-from-style.
6707 **** The variable mail-passwd-command lets you specify a shell command
6708 to run to fetch a set of password-entries that add to the ones in
6711 **** The variable mail-passwd-file now specifies a list of files to read
6712 to get the list of user ids. By default, one file is used:
6715 ** You can "quote" a file name to inhibit special significance of
6716 special syntax, by adding `/:' to the beginning. Thus, if you have a
6717 directory named `/foo:', you can prevent it from being treated as a
6718 reference to a remote host named `foo' by writing it as `/:/foo:'.
6720 Emacs uses this new construct automatically when necessary, such as
6721 when you start it with a working directory whose name might otherwise
6722 be taken to be magic.
6724 ** There is a new command M-x grep-find which uses find to select
6725 files to search through, and grep to scan them. The output is
6726 available in a Compile mode buffer, as with M-x grep.
6728 M-x grep now uses the -e option if the grep program supports that.
6729 (-e prevents problems if the search pattern starts with a dash.)
6731 ** In Dired, the & command now flags for deletion the files whose names
6732 suggest they are probably not needed in the long run.
6734 In Dired, * is now a prefix key for mark-related commands.
6736 new key dired.el binding old key
6737 ------- ---------------- -------
6738 * c dired-change-marks c
6740 * * dired-mark-executables * (binding deleted)
6741 * / dired-mark-directories / (binding deleted)
6742 * @ dired-mark-symlinks @ (binding deleted)
6744 * DEL dired-unmark-backward DEL
6745 * ? dired-unmark-all-files M-C-?
6746 * ! dired-unmark-all-marks
6747 * % dired-mark-files-regexp % m
6748 * C-n dired-next-marked-file M-}
6749 * C-p dired-prev-marked-file M-{
6753 *** When Rmail cannot convert your incoming mail into Babyl format, it
6754 saves the new mail in the file RMAILOSE.n, where n is an integer
6755 chosen to make a unique name. This way, Rmail will not keep crashing
6756 each time you run it.
6758 *** In Rmail, the variable rmail-summary-line-count-flag now controls
6759 whether to include the line count in the summary. Non-nil means yes.
6761 *** In Rmail summary buffers, d and C-d (the commands to delete
6762 messages) now take repeat counts as arguments. A negative argument
6763 means to move in the opposite direction.
6765 *** In Rmail, the t command now takes an optional argument which lets
6766 you specify whether to show the message headers in full or pruned.
6768 *** In Rmail, the new command w (rmail-output-body-to-file) writes
6769 just the body of the current message into a file, without the headers.
6770 It takes the file name from the message subject, by default, but you
6771 can edit that file name in the minibuffer before it is actually used
6776 *** nntp.el has been totally rewritten in an asynchronous fashion.
6778 *** Article prefetching functionality has been moved up into
6781 *** Scoring can now be performed with logical operators like
6782 `and', `or', `not', and parent redirection.
6784 *** Article washing status can be displayed in the
6787 *** gnus.el has been split into many smaller files.
6789 *** Suppression of duplicate articles based on Message-ID.
6791 (setq gnus-suppress-duplicates t)
6793 *** New variables for specifying what score and adapt files
6794 are to be considered home score and adapt files. See
6795 `gnus-home-score-file' and `gnus-home-adapt-files'.
6797 *** Groups can inherit group parameters from parent topics.
6799 *** Article editing has been revamped and is now usable.
6801 *** Signatures can be recognized in more intelligent fashions.
6802 See `gnus-signature-separator' and `gnus-signature-limit'.
6804 *** Summary pick mode has been made to look more nn-like.
6805 Line numbers are displayed and the `.' command can be
6806 used to pick articles.
6808 *** Commands for moving the .newsrc.eld from one server to
6809 another have been added.
6811 `M-x gnus-change-server'
6813 *** A way to specify that "uninteresting" fields be suppressed when
6814 generating lines in buffers.
6816 *** Several commands in the group buffer can be undone with
6819 *** Scoring can be done on words using the new score type `w'.
6821 *** Adaptive scoring can be done on a Subject word-by-word basis:
6823 (setq gnus-use-adaptive-scoring '(word))
6825 *** Scores can be decayed.
6827 (setq gnus-decay-scores t)
6829 *** Scoring can be performed using a regexp on the Date header. The
6830 Date is normalized to compact ISO 8601 format first.
6832 *** A new command has been added to remove all data on articles from
6835 `M-x gnus-group-clear-data-on-native-groups'
6837 *** A new command for reading collections of documents
6838 (nndoc with nnvirtual on top) has been added -- `M-C-d'.
6840 *** Process mark sets can be pushed and popped.
6842 *** A new mail-to-news backend makes it possible to post
6843 even when the NNTP server doesn't allow posting.
6845 *** A new backend for reading searches from Web search engines
6846 (DejaNews, Alta Vista, InReference) has been added.
6848 Use the `G w' command in the group buffer to create such
6851 *** Groups inside topics can now be sorted using the standard
6852 sorting functions, and each topic can be sorted independently.
6854 See the commands under the `T S' submap.
6856 *** Subsets of the groups can be sorted independently.
6858 See the commands under the `G P' submap.
6860 *** Cached articles can be pulled into the groups.
6862 Use the `Y c' command.
6864 *** Score files are now applied in a more reliable order.
6866 *** Reports on where mail messages end up can be generated.
6868 `M-x nnmail-split-history'
6870 *** More hooks and functions have been added to remove junk
6871 from incoming mail before saving the mail.
6873 See `nnmail-prepare-incoming-header-hook'.
6875 *** The nnml mail backend now understands compressed article files.
6877 *** To enable Gnus to read/post multi-lingual articles, you must execute
6878 the following code, for instance, in your .emacs.
6880 (add-hook 'gnus-startup-hook 'gnus-mule-initialize)
6882 Then, when you start Gnus, it will decode non-ASCII text automatically
6883 and show appropriate characters. (Note: if you are using gnus-mime
6884 from the SEMI package, formerly known as TM, you should NOT add this
6885 hook to gnus-startup-hook; gnus-mime has its own method of handling
6888 Since it is impossible to distinguish all coding systems
6889 automatically, you may need to specify a choice of coding system for a
6890 particular news group. This can be done by:
6892 (gnus-mule-add-group NEWSGROUP 'CODING-SYSTEM)
6894 Here NEWSGROUP should be a string which names a newsgroup or a tree
6895 of newsgroups. If NEWSGROUP is "XXX.YYY", all news groups under
6896 "XXX.YYY" (including "XXX.YYY.ZZZ") will use the specified coding
6897 system. CODING-SYSTEM specifies which coding system to use (for both
6898 for reading and posting).
6900 CODING-SYSTEM can also be a cons cell of the form
6901 (READ-CODING-SYSTEM . POST-CODING-SYSTEM)
6902 Then READ-CODING-SYSTEM is used when you read messages from the
6903 newsgroups, while POST-CODING-SYSTEM is used when you post messages
6906 Emacs knows the right coding systems for certain newsgroups by
6907 default. Here are some of these default settings:
6909 (gnus-mule-add-group "fj" 'iso-2022-7)
6910 (gnus-mule-add-group "alt.chinese.text" 'hz-gb-2312)
6911 (gnus-mule-add-group "alt.hk" 'hz-gb-2312)
6912 (gnus-mule-add-group "alt.chinese.text.big5" 'cn-big5)
6913 (gnus-mule-add-group "soc.culture.vietnamese" '(nil . viqr))
6915 When you reply by mail to an article, these settings are ignored;
6916 the mail is encoded according to sendmail-coding-system, as usual.
6920 *** If you edit primarily one style of C (or C++, Objective-C, Java)
6921 code, you may want to make the CC Mode style variables have global
6922 values so that you can set them directly in your .emacs file. To do
6923 this, set c-style-variables-are-local-p to nil in your .emacs file.
6924 Note that this only takes effect if you do it *before* cc-mode.el is
6927 If you typically edit more than one style of C (or C++, Objective-C,
6928 Java) code in a single Emacs session, you may want to make the CC Mode
6929 style variables have buffer local values. By default, all buffers
6930 share the same style variable settings; to make them buffer local, set
6931 c-style-variables-are-local-p to t in your .emacs file. Note that you
6932 must do this *before* CC Mode is loaded.
6934 *** The new variable c-indentation-style holds the C style name
6935 of the current buffer.
6937 *** The variable c-block-comments-indent-p has been deleted, because
6938 it is no longer necessary. C mode now handles all the supported styles
6939 of block comments, with no need to say which one you will use.
6941 *** There is a new indentation style "python", which specifies the C
6942 style that the Python developers like.
6944 *** There is a new c-cleanup-list option: brace-elseif-brace.
6945 This says to put ...} else if (...) {... on one line,
6946 just as brace-else-brace says to put ...} else {... on one line.
6950 ** In vc-retrieve-snapshot (C-x v r), if you don't specify a snapshot
6951 name, it retrieves the *latest* versions of all files in the current
6952 directory and its subdirectories (aside from files already locked).
6954 This feature is useful if your RCS directory is a link to a common
6955 master directory, and you want to pick up changes made by other
6958 You can do the same thing for an individual file by typing C-u C-x C-q
6959 RET in a buffer visiting that file.
6961 *** VC can now handle files under CVS that are being "watched" by
6962 other developers. Such files are made read-only by CVS. To get a
6963 writable copy, type C-x C-q in a buffer visiting such a file. VC then
6964 calls "cvs edit", which notifies the other developers of it.
6966 *** vc-version-diff (C-u C-x v =) now suggests reasonable defaults for
6967 version numbers, based on the current state of the file.
6969 ** Calendar changes.
6971 A new function, list-holidays, allows you list holidays or subclasses
6972 of holidays for ranges of years. Related menu items allow you do this
6973 for the year of the selected date, or the following/previous years.
6977 There are some new user variables for customizing the page layout.
6979 *** Paper size, paper orientation, columns
6981 The variable `ps-paper-type' determines the size of paper ps-print
6982 formats for; it should contain one of the symbols:
6983 `a4' `a3' `letter' `legal' `letter-small' `tabloid'
6984 `ledger' `statement' `executive' `a4small' `b4' `b5'
6985 It defaults to `letter'.
6986 If you need other sizes, see the variable `ps-page-dimensions-database'.
6988 The variable `ps-landscape-mode' determines the orientation
6989 of the printing on the page. nil, the default, means "portrait" mode,
6990 non-nil means "landscape" mode.
6992 The variable `ps-number-of-columns' must be a positive integer.
6993 It determines the number of columns both in landscape and portrait mode.
6996 *** Horizontal layout
6998 The horizontal layout is determined by the variables
6999 `ps-left-margin', `ps-inter-column', and `ps-right-margin'.
7000 All are measured in points.
7004 The vertical layout is determined by the variables
7005 `ps-bottom-margin', `ps-top-margin', and `ps-header-offset'.
7006 All are measured in points.
7010 If the variable `ps-print-header' is nil, no header is printed. Then
7011 `ps-header-offset' is not relevant and `ps-top-margin' represents the
7012 margin above the text.
7014 If the variable `ps-print-header-frame' is non-nil, a gaudy
7015 framing box is printed around the header.
7017 The contents of the header are determined by `ps-header-lines',
7018 `ps-show-n-of-n', `ps-left-header' and `ps-right-header'.
7020 The height of the header is determined by `ps-header-line-pad',
7021 `ps-header-font-family', `ps-header-title-font-size' and
7022 `ps-header-font-size'.
7026 The variable `ps-font-family' determines which font family is to be
7027 used for ordinary text. Its value must be a key symbol in the alist
7028 `ps-font-info-database'. You can add other font families by adding
7029 elements to this alist.
7031 The variable `ps-font-size' determines the size of the font
7032 for ordinary text. It defaults to 8.5 points.
7034 ** hideshow changes.
7036 *** now supports hiding of blocks of single line comments (like // for
7039 *** Support for java-mode added.
7041 *** When doing `hs-hide-all' it is now possible to also hide the comments
7042 in the file if `hs-hide-comments-when-hiding-all' is set.
7044 *** The new function `hs-hide-initial-comment' hides the the comments at
7045 the beginning of the files. Finally those huge RCS logs don't stay in your
7046 way! This is run by default when entering the `hs-minor-mode'.
7048 *** Now uses overlays instead of `selective-display', so is more
7049 robust and a lot faster.
7051 *** A block beginning can span multiple lines.
7053 *** The new variable `hs-show-hidden-short-form' if t, directs hideshow
7054 to show only the beginning of a block when it is hidden. See the
7055 documentation for more details.
7057 ** Changes in Enriched mode.
7059 *** When you visit a file in enriched-mode, Emacs will make sure it is
7060 filled to the current fill-column. This behavior is now independent
7061 of the size of the window. When you save the file, the fill-column in
7062 use is stored as well, so that the whole buffer need not be refilled
7063 the next time unless the fill-column is different.
7065 *** use-hard-newlines is now a minor mode. When it is enabled, Emacs
7066 distinguishes between hard and soft newlines, and treats hard newlines
7067 as paragraph boundaries. Otherwise all newlines inserted are marked
7068 as soft, and paragraph boundaries are determined solely from the text.
7074 The variables font-lock-face-attributes, font-lock-display-type and
7075 font-lock-background-mode are now obsolete; the recommended way to specify the
7076 faces to use for Font Lock mode is with M-x customize-group on the new custom
7077 group font-lock-highlighting-faces. If you set font-lock-face-attributes in
7078 your ~/.emacs file, Font Lock mode will respect its value. However, you should
7079 consider converting from setting that variable to using M-x customize.
7081 You can still use X resources to specify Font Lock face appearances.
7083 *** Maximum decoration
7085 Fontification now uses the maximum level of decoration supported by
7086 default. Previously, fontification used a mode-specific default level
7087 of decoration, which is typically the minimum level of decoration
7088 supported. You can set font-lock-maximum-decoration to nil
7089 to get the old behavior.
7093 Support is now provided for Java, Objective-C, AWK and SIMULA modes.
7095 Note that Font Lock mode can be turned on without knowing exactly what modes
7096 support Font Lock mode, via the command global-font-lock-mode.
7098 *** Configurable support
7100 Support for C, C++, Objective-C and Java can be more easily configured for
7101 additional types and classes via the new variables c-font-lock-extra-types,
7102 c++-font-lock-extra-types, objc-font-lock-extra-types and, you guessed it,
7103 java-font-lock-extra-types. These value of each of these variables should be a
7104 list of regexps matching the extra type names. For example, the default value
7105 of c-font-lock-extra-types is ("\\sw+_t") which means fontification follows the
7106 convention that C type names end in _t. This results in slower fontification.
7108 Of course, you can change the variables that specify fontification in whatever
7109 way you wish, typically by adding regexps. However, these new variables make
7110 it easier to make specific and common changes for the fontification of types.
7112 *** Adding highlighting patterns to existing support
7114 You can use the new function font-lock-add-keywords to add your own
7115 highlighting patterns, such as for project-local or user-specific constructs,
7118 For example, to highlight `FIXME:' words in C comments, put:
7120 (font-lock-add-keywords 'c-mode '(("\\<FIXME:" 0 font-lock-warning-face t)))
7126 Font Lock now defines two new faces, font-lock-builtin-face and
7127 font-lock-warning-face. These are intended to highlight builtin keywords,
7128 distinct from a language's normal keywords, and objects that should be brought
7129 to user attention, respectively. Various modes now use these new faces.
7131 *** Changes to fast-lock support mode
7133 The fast-lock package, one of the two Font Lock support modes, can now process
7134 cache files silently. You can use the new variable fast-lock-verbose, in the
7135 same way as font-lock-verbose, to control this feature.
7137 *** Changes to lazy-lock support mode
7139 The lazy-lock package, one of the two Font Lock support modes, can now fontify
7140 according to the true syntactic context relative to other lines. You can use
7141 the new variable lazy-lock-defer-contextually to control this feature. If
7142 non-nil, changes to the buffer will cause subsequent lines in the buffer to be
7143 refontified after lazy-lock-defer-time seconds of idle time. If nil, then only
7144 the modified lines will be refontified; this is the same as the previous Lazy
7145 Lock mode behaviour and the behaviour of Font Lock mode.
7147 This feature is useful in modes where strings or comments can span lines.
7148 For example, if a string or comment terminating character is deleted, then if
7149 this feature is enabled subsequent lines in the buffer will be correctly
7150 refontified to reflect their new syntactic context. Previously, only the line
7151 containing the deleted character would be refontified and you would have to use
7152 the command M-g M-g (font-lock-fontify-block) to refontify some lines.
7154 As a consequence of this new feature, two other variables have changed:
7156 Variable `lazy-lock-defer-driven' is renamed `lazy-lock-defer-on-scrolling'.
7157 Variable `lazy-lock-defer-time' can now only be a time, i.e., a number.
7158 Buffer modes for which on-the-fly deferral applies can be specified via the
7159 new variable `lazy-lock-defer-on-the-fly'.
7161 If you set these variables in your ~/.emacs, then you may have to change those
7164 ** Ada mode changes.
7166 *** There is now better support for using find-file.el with Ada mode.
7167 If you switch between spec and body, the cursor stays in the same
7168 procedure (modulo overloading). If a spec has no body file yet, but
7169 you try to switch to its body file, Ada mode now generates procedure
7172 *** There are two new commands:
7173 - `ada-make-local' : invokes gnatmake on the current buffer
7174 - `ada-check-syntax' : check syntax of current buffer.
7176 The user options `ada-compiler-make', `ada-make-options',
7177 `ada-language-version', `ada-compiler-syntax-check', and
7178 `ada-compile-options' are used within these commands.
7180 *** Ada mode can now work with Outline minor mode. The outline level
7181 is calculated from the indenting, not from syntactic constructs.
7182 Outlining does not work if your code is not correctly indented.
7184 *** The new function `ada-gnat-style' converts the buffer to the style of
7185 formatting used in GNAT. It places two blanks after a comment start,
7186 places one blank between a word end and an opening '(', and puts one
7187 space between a comma and the beginning of a word.
7189 ** Scheme mode changes.
7191 *** Scheme mode indentation now uses many of the facilities of Lisp
7192 mode; therefore, the variables to customize it are the variables used
7193 for Lisp mode which have names starting with `lisp-'. The variables
7194 with names starting with `scheme-' which used to do this no longer
7197 If you want to use different indentation for Scheme and Lisp, this is
7198 still possible, but now you must do it by adding a hook to
7199 scheme-mode-hook, which could work by setting the `lisp-' indentation
7200 variables as buffer-local variables.
7202 *** DSSSL mode is a variant of Scheme mode, for editing DSSSL scripts.
7205 ** Changes to the emacsclient program
7207 *** If a socket can't be found, and environment variables LOGNAME or
7208 USER are set, emacsclient now looks for a socket based on the UID
7209 associated with the name. That is an emacsclient running as root
7210 can connect to an Emacs server started by a non-root user.
7212 *** The emacsclient program now accepts an option --no-wait which tells
7213 it to return immediately without waiting for you to "finish" the
7216 *** The new option --alternate-editor allows to specify an editor to
7217 use if Emacs is not running. The environment variable
7218 ALTERNATE_EDITOR can be used for the same effect; the command line
7219 option takes precedence.
7221 ** M-x eldoc-mode enables a minor mode in which the echo area
7222 constantly shows the parameter list for function being called at point
7223 (in Emacs Lisp and Lisp Interaction modes only).
7225 ** C-x n d now runs the new command narrow-to-defun,
7226 which narrows the accessible parts of the buffer to just
7229 ** Emacs now handles the `--' argument in the standard way; all
7230 following arguments are treated as ordinary file names.
7232 ** On MSDOS and Windows, the bookmark file is now called _emacs.bmk,
7233 and the saved desktop file is now called _emacs.desktop (truncated if
7236 ** When you kill a buffer that visits a file,
7237 if there are any registers that save positions in the file,
7238 these register values no longer become completely useless.
7239 If you try to go to such a register with C-x j, then you are
7240 asked whether to visit the file again. If you say yes,
7241 it visits the file and then goes to the same position.
7243 ** When you visit a file that changes frequently outside Emacs--for
7244 example, a log of output from a process that continues to run--it may
7245 be useful for Emacs to revert the file without querying you whenever
7246 you visit the file afresh with C-x C-f.
7248 You can request this behavior for certain files by setting the
7249 variable revert-without-query to a list of regular expressions. If a
7250 file's name matches any of these regular expressions, find-file and
7251 revert-buffer revert the buffer without asking for permission--but
7252 only if you have not edited the buffer text yourself.
7254 ** set-default-font has been renamed to set-frame-font
7255 since it applies only to the current frame.
7257 ** In TeX mode, you can use the variable tex-main-file to specify the
7258 file for tex-file to run TeX on. (By default, tex-main-file is nil,
7259 and tex-file runs TeX on the current visited file.)
7261 This is useful when you are editing a document that consists of
7262 multiple files. In each of the included files, you can set up a local
7263 variable list which specifies the top-level file of your document for
7264 tex-main-file. Then tex-file will run TeX on the whole document
7265 instead of just the file you are editing.
7269 RefTeX mode is a new minor mode with special support for \label, \ref
7270 and \cite macros in LaTeX documents. RefTeX distinguishes labels of
7271 different environments (equation, figure, ...) and has full support for
7272 multifile documents. To use it, select a buffer with a LaTeX document and
7273 turn the mode on with M-x reftex-mode. Here are the main user commands:
7276 Creates a label semi-automatically. RefTeX is context sensitive and
7277 knows which kind of label is needed.
7279 C-c ) reftex-reference
7280 Offers in a menu all labels in the document, along with context of the
7281 label definition. The selected label is referenced as \ref{LABEL}.
7283 C-c [ reftex-citation
7284 Prompts for a regular expression and displays a list of matching BibTeX
7285 database entries. The selected entry is cited with a \cite{KEY} macro.
7287 C-c & reftex-view-crossref
7288 Views the cross reference of a \ref or \cite command near point.
7291 Shows a table of contents of the (multifile) document. From there you
7292 can quickly jump to every section.
7294 Under X, RefTeX installs a "Ref" menu in the menu bar, with additional
7295 commands. Press `?' to get help when a prompt mentions this feature.
7296 Full documentation and customization examples are in the file
7297 reftex.el. You can use the finder to view the file documentation:
7298 C-h p --> tex --> reftex.el
7300 ** Changes in BibTeX mode.
7302 *** Info documentation is now available.
7304 *** Don't allow parentheses in string constants anymore. This confused
7305 both the BibTeX program and Emacs BibTeX mode.
7307 *** Renamed variable bibtex-mode-user-optional-fields to
7308 bibtex-user-optional-fields.
7310 *** Removed variable bibtex-include-OPTannote
7311 (use bibtex-user-optional-fields instead).
7313 *** New interactive functions to copy and kill fields and complete
7314 entries to the BibTeX kill ring, from where they can be yanked back by
7315 appropriate functions.
7317 *** New interactive functions for repositioning and marking of
7318 entries. They are bound by default to M-C-l and M-C-h.
7320 *** New hook bibtex-clean-entry-hook. It is called after entry has
7323 *** New variable bibtex-field-delimiters, which replaces variables
7324 bibtex-field-{left|right}-delimiter.
7326 *** New variable bibtex-entry-delimiters to determine how entries
7329 *** Allow preinitialization of fields. See documentation of
7330 bibtex-user-optional-fields, bibtex-entry-field-alist, and
7331 bibtex-include-OPTkey for details.
7333 *** Book and InBook entries require either an author or an editor
7334 field. This is now supported by bibtex.el. Alternative fields are
7335 prefixed with `ALT'.
7337 *** New variable bibtex-entry-format, which replaces variable
7338 bibtex-clean-entry-zap-empty-opts and allows specification of many
7339 formatting options performed on cleaning an entry (see variable
7342 *** Even more control on how automatic keys are generated. See
7343 documentation of bibtex-generate-autokey for details. Transcriptions
7344 for foreign languages other than German are now handled, too.
7346 *** New boolean user option bibtex-comma-after-last-field to decide if
7347 comma should be inserted at end of last field.
7349 *** New boolean user option bibtex-align-at-equal-sign to determine if
7350 alignment should be made at left side of field contents or at equal
7351 signs. New user options to control entry layout (e.g. indentation).
7353 *** New function bibtex-fill-entry to realign entries.
7355 *** New function bibtex-reformat to reformat region or buffer.
7357 *** New function bibtex-convert-alien to convert a BibTeX database
7360 *** New function bibtex-complete-key (similar to bibtex-complete-string)
7361 to complete prefix to a key defined in buffer. Mainly useful in
7364 *** New function bibtex-count-entries to count entries in buffer or
7367 *** Added support for imenu.
7369 *** The function `bibtex-validate' now checks current region instead
7370 of buffer if mark is active. Now it shows all errors of buffer in a
7371 `compilation mode' buffer. You can use the normal commands (e.g.
7372 `next-error') for compilation modes to jump to errors.
7374 *** New variable `bibtex-string-file-path' to determine where the files
7375 from `bibtex-string-files' are searched.
7377 ** Iso Accents mode now supports Latin-3 as an alternative.
7379 ** The command next-error now opens blocks hidden by hideshow.
7381 ** The function using-unix-filesystems has been replaced by the
7382 functions add-untranslated-filesystem and remove-untranslated-filesystem.
7383 Each of these functions takes the name of a drive letter or directory
7386 When a filesystem is added as untranslated, all files on it are read
7387 and written in binary mode (no cr/lf translation is performed).
7389 ** browse-url changes
7391 *** New methods for: Grail (browse-url-generic), MMM (browse-url-mmm),
7392 Lynx in a separate xterm (browse-url-lynx-xterm) or in an Emacs window
7393 (browse-url-lynx-emacs), remote W3 (browse-url-w3-gnudoit), generic
7394 non-remote-controlled browsers (browse-url-generic) and associated
7395 customization variables.
7397 *** New commands `browse-url-of-region' and `browse-url'.
7399 *** URLs marked up with <URL:...> (RFC1738) work if broken across
7400 lines. Browsing methods can be associated with URL regexps
7401 (e.g. mailto: URLs) via `browse-url-browser-function'.
7405 *** Clicking Mouse-2 on a brief command description in Ediff control panel
7406 pops up the Info file for this command.
7408 *** There is now a variable, ediff-autostore-merges, which controls whether
7409 the result of a merge is saved in a file. By default, this is done only when
7410 merge is done from a session group (eg, when merging files in two different
7413 *** Since Emacs 19.31 (this hasn't been announced before), Ediff can compare
7414 and merge groups of files residing in different directories, or revisions of
7415 files in the same directory.
7417 *** Since Emacs 19.31, Ediff can apply multi-file patches interactively.
7418 The patches must be in the context format or GNU unified format. (The bug
7419 related to the GNU format has now been fixed.)
7423 *** The startup file is now .viper instead of .vip
7424 *** All variable/function names have been changed to start with viper-
7426 *** C-\ now simulates the meta-key in all Viper states.
7427 *** C-z in Insert state now escapes to Vi for the duration of the next
7428 Viper command. In Vi and Insert states, C-z behaves as before.
7429 *** C-c \ escapes to Vi for one command if Viper is in Insert or Emacs states.
7430 *** _ is no longer the meta-key in Vi state.
7431 *** The variable viper-insert-state-cursor-color can be used to change cursor
7432 color when Viper is in insert state.
7433 *** If search lands the cursor near the top or the bottom of the window,
7434 Viper pulls the window up or down to expose more context. The variable
7435 viper-adjust-window-after-search controls this behavior.
7439 *** In C, C++, Objective C and Java, Etags tags global variables by
7440 default. The resulting tags files are inflated by 30% on average.
7441 Use --no-globals to turn this feature off. Etags can also tag
7442 variables which are members of structure-like constructs, but it does
7443 not by default. Use --members to turn this feature on.
7445 *** C++ member functions are now recognized as tags.
7447 *** Java is tagged like C++. In addition, "extends" and "implements"
7448 constructs are tagged. Files are recognised by the extension .java.
7450 *** Etags can now handle programs written in Postscript. Files are
7451 recognised by the extensions .ps and .pdb (Postscript with C syntax).
7452 In Postscript, tags are lines that start with a slash.
7454 *** Etags now handles Objective C and Objective C++ code. The usual C and
7455 C++ tags are recognized in these languages; in addition, etags
7456 recognizes special Objective C syntax for classes, class categories,
7457 methods and protocols.
7459 *** Etags also handles Cobol. Files are recognised by the extension
7460 .cobol. The tagged lines are those containing a word that begins in
7461 column 8 and ends in a full stop, i.e. anything that could be a
7464 *** Regexps in Etags now support intervals, as in ed or grep. The syntax of
7465 an interval is \{M,N\}, and it means to match the preceding expression
7466 at least M times and as many as N times.
7468 ** The format for specifying a custom format for time-stamp to insert
7469 in files has changed slightly.
7471 With the new enhancements to the functionality of format-time-string,
7472 time-stamp-format will change to be eventually compatible with it.
7473 This conversion is being done in two steps to maintain compatibility
7474 with old time-stamp-format values.
7476 In the new scheme, alternate case is signified by the number-sign
7477 (`#') modifier, rather than changing the case of the format character.
7478 This feature is as yet incompletely implemented for compatibility
7481 In the old time-stamp-format, all numeric fields defaulted to their
7482 natural width. (With format-time-string, each format has a
7483 fixed-width default.) In this version, you can specify the colon
7484 (`:') modifier to a numeric conversion to mean "give me the historical
7485 time-stamp-format width default." Do not use colon if you are
7486 specifying an explicit width, as in "%02d".
7488 Numbers are no longer truncated to the requested width, except in the
7489 case of "%02y", which continues to give a two-digit year. Digit
7490 truncation probably wasn't being used for anything else anyway.
7492 The new formats will work with old versions of Emacs. New formats are
7493 being recommended now to allow time-stamp-format to change in the
7494 future to be compatible with format-time-string. The new forms being
7495 recommended now will continue to work then.
7497 See the documentation string for the variable time-stamp-format for
7500 ** There are some additional major modes:
7502 dcl-mode, for editing VMS DCL files.
7503 m4-mode, for editing files of m4 input.
7504 meta-mode, for editing MetaFont and MetaPost source files.
7506 ** In Shell mode, the command shell-copy-environment-variable lets you
7507 copy the value of a specified environment variable from the subshell
7510 ** New Lisp packages include:
7512 *** battery.el displays battery status for laptops.
7514 *** M-x bruce (named after Lenny Bruce) is a program that might
7515 be used for adding some indecent words to your email.
7517 *** M-x crisp-mode enables an emulation for the CRiSP editor.
7519 *** M-x dirtrack arranges for better tracking of directory changes
7522 *** The new library elint.el provides for linting of Emacs Lisp code.
7523 See the documentation for `elint-initialize', `elint-current-buffer'
7526 *** M-x expand-add-abbrevs defines a special kind of abbrev which is
7527 meant for programming constructs. These abbrevs expand like ordinary
7528 ones, when you type SPC, but only at the end of a line and not within
7529 strings or comments.
7531 These abbrevs can act as templates: you can define places within an
7532 abbrev for insertion of additional text. Once you expand the abbrev,
7533 you can then use C-x a p and C-x a n to move back and forth to these
7534 insertion points. Thus you can conveniently insert additional text
7537 *** filecache.el remembers the location of files so that you
7538 can visit them by short forms of their names.
7540 *** find-func.el lets you find the definition of the user-loaded
7541 Emacs Lisp function at point.
7543 *** M-x handwrite converts text to a "handwritten" picture.
7545 *** M-x iswitchb-buffer is a command for switching to a buffer, much like
7546 switch-buffer, but it reads the argument in a more helpful way.
7548 *** M-x landmark implements a neural network for landmark learning.
7550 *** M-x locate provides a convenient interface to the `locate' program.
7552 *** M4 mode is a new mode for editing files of m4 input.
7554 *** mantemp.el creates C++ manual template instantiations
7555 from the GCC error messages which indicate which instantiations are needed.
7557 *** mouse-copy.el provides a one-click copy and move feature.
7558 You can drag a region with M-mouse-1, and it is automatically
7559 inserted at point. M-Shift-mouse-1 deletes the text from its
7560 original place after inserting the copy.
7562 *** mouse-drag.el lets you do scrolling by dragging Mouse-2
7565 You click the mouse and move; that distance either translates into the
7566 velocity to scroll (with mouse-drag-throw) or the distance to scroll
7567 (with mouse-drag-drag). Horizontal scrolling is enabled when needed.
7569 Enable mouse-drag with:
7570 (global-set-key [down-mouse-2] 'mouse-drag-throw)
7572 (global-set-key [down-mouse-2] 'mouse-drag-drag)
7574 *** mspools.el is useful for determining which mail folders have
7575 mail waiting to be read in them. It works with procmail.
7577 *** Octave mode is a major mode for editing files of input for Octave.
7578 It comes with a facility for communicating with an Octave subprocess.
7582 The ogonek package provides functions for changing the coding of
7583 Polish diacritic characters in buffers. Codings known from various
7584 platforms are supported such as ISO8859-2, Mazovia, IBM Latin2, and
7585 TeX. For example, you can change the coding from Mazovia to
7586 ISO8859-2. Another example is a change of coding from ISO8859-2 to
7587 prefix notation (in which `/a' stands for the aogonek character, for
7588 instance) and vice versa.
7590 To use this package load it using
7591 M-x load-library [enter] ogonek
7592 Then, you may get an explanation by calling one of
7593 M-x ogonek-jak -- in Polish
7594 M-x ogonek-how -- in English
7595 The info specifies the commands and variables provided as well as the
7596 ways of customization in `.emacs'.
7598 *** Interface to ph.
7600 Emacs provides a client interface to CCSO Nameservers (ph/qi)
7602 The CCSO nameserver is used in many universities to provide directory
7603 services about people. ph.el provides a convenient Emacs interface to
7606 *** uce.el is useful for replying to unsolicited commercial email.
7608 *** vcursor.el implements a "virtual cursor" feature.
7609 You can move the virtual cursor with special commands
7610 while the real cursor does not move.
7612 *** webjump.el is a "hot list" package which you can set up
7613 for visiting your favorite web sites.
7615 *** M-x winner-mode is a minor mode which saves window configurations,
7616 so you can move back to other configurations that you have recently used.
7620 Movemail no longer needs to be installed setuid root in order for POP
7621 mail retrieval to function properly. This is because it no longer
7622 supports the RPOP (reserved-port POP) protocol; instead, it uses the
7623 user's POP password to authenticate to the mail server.
7625 This change was made earlier, but not reported in NEWS before.
7627 * Emacs 20.1 changes for MS-DOS and MS-Windows.
7629 ** Changes in handling MS-DOS/MS-Windows text files.
7631 Emacs handles three different conventions for representing
7632 end-of-line: CRLF for MSDOS, LF for Unix and GNU, and CR (used on the
7633 Macintosh). Emacs determines which convention is used in a specific
7634 file based on the contents of that file (except for certain special
7635 file names), and when it saves the file, it uses the same convention.
7637 To save the file and change the end-of-line convention, you can use
7638 C-x RET f (set-buffer-file-coding-system) to specify a different
7639 coding system for the buffer. Then, when you save the file, the newly
7640 specified coding system will take effect. For example, to save with
7641 LF, specify undecided-unix (or some other ...-unix coding system); to
7642 save with CRLF, specify undecided-dos.
7644 * Lisp Changes in Emacs 20.1
7646 ** Byte-compiled files made with Emacs 20 will, in general, work in
7647 Emacs 19 as well, as long as the source code runs in Emacs 19. And
7648 vice versa: byte-compiled files made with Emacs 19 should also run in
7649 Emacs 20, as long as the program itself works in Emacs 20.
7651 ** Windows-specific functions and variables have been renamed
7652 to start with w32- instead of win32-.
7654 In hacker language, calling something a "win" is a form of praise. We
7655 don't want to praise a non-free Microsoft system, so we don't call it
7658 ** Basic Lisp changes
7660 *** A symbol whose name starts with a colon now automatically
7661 evaluates to itself. Therefore such a symbol can be used as a constant.
7663 *** The defined purpose of `defconst' has been changed. It should now
7664 be used only for values that should not be changed whether by a program
7667 The actual behavior of defconst has not been changed.
7669 *** There are new macros `when' and `unless'
7671 (when CONDITION BODY...) is short for (if CONDITION (progn BODY...))
7672 (unless CONDITION BODY...) is short for (if CONDITION nil BODY...)
7674 *** Emacs now defines functions caar, cadr, cdar and cddr with their
7675 usual Lisp meanings. For example, caar returns the car of the car of
7678 *** equal, when comparing strings, now ignores their text properties.
7680 *** The new function `functionp' tests whether an object is a function.
7682 *** arrayp now returns t for char-tables and bool-vectors.
7684 *** Certain primitives which use characters (as integers) now get an
7685 error if the integer is not a valid character code. These primitives
7686 include insert-char, char-to-string, and the %c construct in the
7689 *** The `require' function now insists on adding a suffix, either .el
7690 or .elc, to the file name. Thus, (require 'foo) will not use a file
7691 whose name is just foo. It insists on foo.el or foo.elc.
7693 *** The `autoload' function, when the file name does not contain
7694 either a directory name or the suffix .el or .elc, insists on
7695 adding one of these suffixes.
7697 *** string-to-number now takes an optional second argument BASE
7698 which specifies the base to use when converting an integer.
7699 If BASE is omitted, base 10 is used.
7701 We have not implemented other radices for floating point numbers,
7702 because that would be much more work and does not seem useful.
7704 *** substring now handles vectors as well as strings.
7706 *** The Common Lisp function eql is no longer defined normally.
7707 You must load the `cl' library to define it.
7709 *** The new macro `with-current-buffer' lets you evaluate an expression
7710 conveniently with a different current buffer. It looks like this:
7712 (with-current-buffer BUFFER BODY-FORMS...)
7714 BUFFER is the expression that says which buffer to use.
7715 BODY-FORMS say what to do in that buffer.
7717 *** The new primitive `save-current-buffer' saves and restores the
7718 choice of current buffer, like `save-excursion', but without saving or
7719 restoring the value of point or the mark. `with-current-buffer'
7720 works using `save-current-buffer'.
7722 *** The new macro `with-temp-file' lets you do some work in a new buffer and
7723 write the output to a specified file. Like `progn', it returns the value
7726 *** The new macro `with-temp-buffer' lets you do some work in a new buffer,
7727 which is discarded after use. Like `progn', it returns the value of the
7728 last form. If you wish to return the buffer contents, use (buffer-string)
7731 *** The new function split-string takes a string, splits it at certain
7732 characters, and returns a list of the substrings in between the
7735 For example, (split-string "foo bar lose" " +") returns ("foo" "bar" "lose").
7737 *** The new macro with-output-to-string executes some Lisp expressions
7738 with standard-output set up so that all output feeds into a string.
7739 Then it returns that string.
7741 For example, if the current buffer name is `foo',
7743 (with-output-to-string
7744 (princ "The buffer is ")
7745 (princ (buffer-name)))
7747 returns "The buffer is foo".
7749 ** Non-ASCII characters are now supported, if enable-multibyte-characters
7752 These characters have character codes above 256. When inserted in the
7753 buffer or stored in a string, they are represented as multibyte
7754 characters that occupy several buffer positions each.
7756 *** When enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil, a single character in
7757 a buffer or string can be two or more bytes (as many as four).
7759 Buffers and strings are still made up of unibyte elements;
7760 character positions and string indices are always measured in bytes.
7761 Therefore, moving forward one character can increase the buffer
7762 position by 2, 3 or 4. The function forward-char moves by whole
7763 characters, and therefore is no longer equivalent to
7764 (lambda (n) (goto-char (+ (point) n))).
7766 ASCII characters (codes 0 through 127) are still single bytes, always.
7767 Sequences of byte values 128 through 255 are used to represent
7768 non-ASCII characters. These sequences are called "multibyte
7771 The first byte of a multibyte character is always in the range 128
7772 through 159 (octal 0200 through 0237). These values are called
7773 "leading codes". The second and subsequent bytes are always in the
7774 range 160 through 255 (octal 0240 through 0377). The first byte, the
7775 leading code, determines how many bytes long the sequence is.
7777 *** The function forward-char moves over characters, and therefore
7778 (forward-char 1) may increase point by more than 1 if it moves over a
7779 multibyte character. Likewise, delete-char always deletes a
7780 character, which may be more than one buffer position.
7782 This means that some Lisp programs, which assume that a character is
7783 always one buffer position, need to be changed.
7785 However, all ASCII characters are always one buffer position.
7787 *** The regexp [\200-\377] no longer matches all non-ASCII characters,
7788 because when enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil, these characters
7789 have codes that are not in the range octal 200 to octal 377. However,
7790 the regexp [^\000-\177] does match all non-ASCII characters,
7793 *** The function char-boundary-p returns non-nil if position POS is
7794 between two characters in the buffer (not in the middle of a
7797 When the value is non-nil, it says what kind of character follows POS:
7799 0 if POS is at an ASCII character or at the end of range,
7800 1 if POS is before a 2-byte length multi-byte form,
7801 2 if POS is at a head of 3-byte length multi-byte form,
7802 3 if POS is at a head of 4-byte length multi-byte form,
7803 4 if POS is at a head of multi-byte form of a composite character.
7805 *** The function char-bytes returns how many bytes the character CHAR uses.
7807 *** Strings can contain multibyte characters. The function
7808 `length' returns the string length counting bytes, which may be
7809 more than the number of characters.
7811 You can include a multibyte character in a string constant by writing
7812 it literally. You can also represent it with a hex escape,
7813 \xNNNNNNN..., using as many digits as necessary. Any character which
7814 is not a valid hex digit terminates this construct. If you want to
7815 follow it with a character that is a hex digit, write backslash and
7816 newline in between; that will terminate the hex escape.
7818 *** The function concat-chars takes arguments which are characters
7819 and returns a string containing those characters.
7821 *** The function sref access a multibyte character in a string.
7822 (sref STRING INDX) returns the character in STRING at INDEX. INDEX
7823 counts from zero. If INDEX is at a position in the middle of a
7824 character, sref signals an error.
7826 *** The function chars-in-string returns the number of characters
7827 in a string. This is less than the length of the string, if the
7828 string contains multibyte characters (the length counts bytes).
7830 *** The function chars-in-region returns the number of characters
7831 in a region from BEG to END. This is less than (- END BEG) if the
7832 region contains multibyte characters (the length counts bytes).
7834 *** The function string-to-list converts a string to a list of
7835 the characters in it. string-to-vector converts a string
7836 to a vector of the characters in it.
7838 *** The function store-substring alters part of the contents
7839 of a string. You call it as follows:
7841 (store-substring STRING IDX OBJ)
7843 This says to alter STRING, by storing OBJ starting at index IDX in
7844 STRING. OBJ may be either a character or a (smaller) string.
7845 This function really does alter the contents of STRING.
7846 Since it is impossible to change the length of an existing string,
7847 it is an error if OBJ doesn't fit within STRING's actual length.
7849 *** char-width returns the width (in columns) of the character CHAR,
7850 if it were displayed in the current buffer and the selected window.
7852 *** string-width returns the width (in columns) of the text in STRING,
7853 if it were displayed in the current buffer and the selected window.
7855 *** truncate-string-to-width shortens a string, if necessary,
7856 to fit within a certain number of columns. (Of course, it does
7857 not alter the string that you give it; it returns a new string
7858 which contains all or just part of the existing string.)
7860 (truncate-string-to-width STR END-COLUMN &optional START-COLUMN PADDING)
7862 This returns the part of STR up to column END-COLUMN.
7864 The optional argument START-COLUMN specifies the starting column.
7865 If this is non-nil, then the first START-COLUMN columns of the string
7866 are not included in the resulting value.
7868 The optional argument PADDING, if non-nil, is a padding character to be added
7869 at the beginning and end the resulting string, to extend it to exactly
7870 WIDTH columns. If PADDING is nil, that means do not pad; then, if STRING
7871 is narrower than WIDTH, the value is equal to STRING.
7873 If PADDING and START-COLUMN are both non-nil, and if there is no clean
7874 place in STRING that corresponds to START-COLUMN (because one
7875 character extends across that column), then the padding character
7876 PADDING is added one or more times at the beginning of the result
7877 string, so that its columns line up as if it really did start at
7878 column START-COLUMN.
7880 *** When the functions in the list after-change-functions are called,
7881 the third argument is the number of bytes in the pre-change text, not
7882 necessarily the number of characters. It is, in effect, the
7883 difference in buffer position between the beginning and the end of the
7884 changed text, before the change.
7886 *** The characters Emacs uses are classified in various character
7887 sets, each of which has a name which is a symbol. In general there is
7888 one character set for each script, not for each language.
7890 **** The function charsetp tests whether an object is a character set name.
7892 **** The variable charset-list holds a list of character set names.
7894 **** char-charset, given a character code, returns the name of the character
7895 set that the character belongs to. (The value is a symbol.)
7897 **** split-char, given a character code, returns a list containing the
7898 name of the character set, followed by one or two byte-values
7899 which identify the character within that character set.
7901 **** make-char, given a character set name and one or two subsequent
7902 byte-values, constructs a character code. This is roughly the
7903 opposite of split-char.
7905 **** find-charset-region returns a list of the character sets
7906 of all the characters between BEG and END.
7908 **** find-charset-string returns a list of the character sets
7909 of all the characters in a string.
7911 *** Here are the Lisp facilities for working with coding systems
7912 and specifying coding systems.
7914 **** The function coding-system-list returns a list of all coding
7915 system names (symbols). With optional argument t, it returns a list
7916 of all distinct base coding systems, not including variants.
7917 (Variant coding systems are those like latin-1-dos, latin-1-unix
7918 and latin-1-mac which specify the end-of-line conversion as well
7919 as what to do about code conversion.)
7921 **** coding-system-p tests a symbol to see if it is a coding system
7922 name. It returns t if so, nil if not.
7924 **** file-coding-system-alist specifies which coding systems to use
7925 for certain file names. It works like network-coding-system-alist,
7926 except that the PATTERN is matched against the file name.
7928 Each element has the format (PATTERN . VAL), where PATTERN determines
7929 which file names the element applies to. PATTERN should be a regexp
7930 to match against a file name.
7932 VAL is a coding system, a cons cell containing two coding systems, or
7933 a function symbol. If VAL is a coding system, it is used for both
7934 decoding what received from the network stream and encoding what sent
7935 to the network stream. If VAL is a cons cell containing two coding
7936 systems, the car specifies the coding system for decoding, and the cdr
7937 specifies the coding system for encoding.
7939 If VAL is a function symbol, the function must return a coding system
7940 or a cons cell containing two coding systems, which is used as above.
7942 **** The variable network-coding-system-alist specifies
7943 the coding system to use for network sockets.
7945 Each element has the format (PATTERN . VAL), where PATTERN determines
7946 which network sockets the element applies to. PATTERN should be
7947 either a port number or a regular expression matching some network
7950 VAL is a coding system, a cons cell containing two coding systems, or
7951 a function symbol. If VAL is a coding system, it is used for both
7952 decoding what received from the network stream and encoding what sent
7953 to the network stream. If VAL is a cons cell containing two coding
7954 systems, the car specifies the coding system for decoding, and the cdr
7955 specifies the coding system for encoding.
7957 If VAL is a function symbol, the function must return a coding system
7958 or a cons cell containing two coding systems, which is used as above.
7960 **** process-coding-system-alist specifies which coding systems to use
7961 for certain subprocess. It works like network-coding-system-alist,
7962 except that the PATTERN is matched against the program name used to
7963 start the subprocess.
7965 **** The variable default-process-coding-system specifies the coding
7966 systems to use for subprocess (and net connection) input and output,
7967 when nothing else specifies what to do. The value is a cons cell
7968 (OUTPUT-CODING . INPUT-CODING). OUTPUT-CODING applies to output
7969 to the subprocess, and INPUT-CODING applies to input from it.
7971 **** The variable coding-system-for-write, if non-nil, specifies the
7972 coding system to use for writing a file, or for output to a synchronous
7975 It also applies to any asynchronous subprocess or network connection,
7976 but in a different way: the value of coding-system-for-write when you
7977 start the subprocess or connection affects that subprocess or
7978 connection permanently or until overridden.
7980 The variable coding-system-for-write takes precedence over
7981 file-coding-system-alist, process-coding-system-alist and
7982 network-coding-system-alist, and all other methods of specifying a
7983 coding system for output. But most of the time this variable is nil.
7984 It exists so that Lisp programs can bind it to a specific coding
7985 system for one operation at a time.
7987 **** coding-system-for-read applies similarly to input from
7988 files, subprocesses or network connections.
7990 **** The function process-coding-system tells you what
7991 coding systems(s) an existing subprocess is using.
7992 The value is a cons cell,
7993 (DECODING-CODING-SYSTEM . ENCODING-CODING-SYSTEM)
7994 where DECODING-CODING-SYSTEM is used for decoding output from
7995 the subprocess, and ENCODING-CODING-SYSTEM is used for encoding
7996 input to the subprocess.
7998 **** The function set-process-coding-system can be used to
7999 change the coding systems in use for an existing subprocess.
8001 ** Emacs has a new facility to help users manage the many
8002 customization options. To make a Lisp program work with this facility,
8003 you need to use the new macros defgroup and defcustom.
8005 You use defcustom instead of defvar, for defining a user option
8006 variable. The difference is that you specify two additional pieces of
8007 information (usually): the "type" which says what values are
8008 legitimate, and the "group" which specifies the hierarchy for
8011 Thus, instead of writing
8013 (defvar foo-blurgoze nil
8014 "*Non-nil means that foo will act very blurgozely.")
8016 you would now write this:
8018 (defcustom foo-blurgoze nil
8019 "*Non-nil means that foo will act very blurgozely."
8023 The type `boolean' means that this variable has only
8024 two meaningful states: nil and non-nil. Other type values
8025 describe other possibilities; see the manual for Custom
8026 for a description of them.
8028 The "group" argument is used to specify a group which the option
8029 should belong to. You define a new group like this:
8031 (defgroup ispell nil
8032 "Spell checking using Ispell."
8035 The "group" argument in defgroup specifies the parent group. The root
8036 group is called `emacs'; it should not contain any variables itself,
8037 but only other groups. The immediate subgroups of `emacs' correspond
8038 to the keywords used by C-h p. Under these subgroups come
8039 second-level subgroups that belong to individual packages.
8041 Each Emacs package should have its own set of groups. A simple
8042 package should have just one group; a more complex package should
8043 have a hierarchy of its own groups. The sole or root group of a
8044 package should be a subgroup of one or more of the "keyword"
8045 first-level subgroups.
8047 ** New `widget' library for inserting UI components in buffers.
8049 This library, used by the new custom library, is documented in a
8050 separate manual that accompanies Emacs.
8054 The easy-mmode package provides macros and functions that make
8055 developing minor modes easier. Roughly, the programmer has to code
8056 only the functionality of the minor mode. All the rest--toggles,
8057 predicate, and documentation--can be done in one call to the macro
8058 `easy-mmode-define-minor-mode' (see the documentation). See also
8059 `easy-mmode-define-keymap'.
8061 ** Text property changes
8063 *** The `intangible' property now works on overlays as well as on a
8066 *** The new functions next-char-property-change and
8067 previous-char-property-change scan through the buffer looking for a
8068 place where either a text property or an overlay might change. The
8069 functions take two arguments, POSITION and LIMIT. POSITION is the
8070 starting position for the scan. LIMIT says where to stop the scan.
8072 If no property change is found before LIMIT, the value is LIMIT. If
8073 LIMIT is nil, scan goes to the beginning or end of the accessible part
8074 of the buffer. If no property change is found, the value is the
8075 position of the beginning or end of the buffer.
8077 *** In the `local-map' text property or overlay property, the property
8078 value can now be a symbol whose function definition is a keymap. This
8079 is an alternative to using the keymap itself.
8081 ** Changes in invisibility features
8083 *** Isearch can now temporarily show parts of the buffer which are
8084 hidden by an overlay with a invisible property, when the search match
8085 is inside that portion of the buffer. To enable this the overlay
8086 should have a isearch-open-invisible property which is a function that
8087 would be called having the overlay as an argument, the function should
8088 make the overlay visible.
8090 During incremental search the overlays are shown by modifying the
8091 invisible and intangible properties, if beside this more actions are
8092 needed the overlay should have a isearch-open-invisible-temporary
8093 which is a function. The function is called with 2 arguments: one is
8094 the overlay and the second is nil when it should show the overlay and
8095 t when it should hide it.
8097 *** add-to-invisibility-spec, remove-from-invisibility-spec
8099 Modes that use overlays to hide portions of a buffer should set the
8100 invisible property of the overlay to the mode's name (or another symbol)
8101 and modify the `buffer-invisibility-spec' to include that symbol.
8102 Use `add-to-invisibility-spec' and `remove-from-invisibility-spec' to
8103 manipulate the `buffer-invisibility-spec'.
8104 Here is an example of how to do this:
8106 ;; If we want to display an ellipsis:
8107 (add-to-invisibility-spec '(my-symbol . t))
8108 ;; If you don't want ellipsis:
8109 (add-to-invisibility-spec 'my-symbol)
8112 (overlay-put (make-overlay beginning end) 'invisible 'my-symbol)
8115 ;; When done with the overlays:
8116 (remove-from-invisibility-spec '(my-symbol . t))
8118 (remove-from-invisibility-spec 'my-symbol)
8120 ** Changes in syntax parsing.
8122 *** The syntax-directed buffer-scan functions (such as
8123 `parse-partial-sexp', `forward-word' and similar functions) can now
8124 obey syntax information specified by text properties, if the variable
8125 `parse-sexp-lookup-properties' is non-nil.
8127 If the value of `parse-sexp-lookup-properties' is nil, the behavior
8128 is as before: the syntax-table of the current buffer is always
8129 used to determine the syntax of the character at the position.
8131 When `parse-sexp-lookup-properties' is non-nil, the syntax of a
8132 character in the buffer is calculated thus:
8134 a) if the `syntax-table' text-property of that character
8135 is a cons, this cons becomes the syntax-type;
8137 Valid values of `syntax-table' text-property are: nil, a valid
8138 syntax-table, and a valid syntax-table element, i.e.,
8139 a cons cell of the form (SYNTAX-CODE . MATCHING-CHAR).
8141 b) if the character's `syntax-table' text-property
8142 is a syntax table, this syntax table is used
8143 (instead of the syntax-table of the current buffer) to
8144 determine the syntax type of the character.
8146 c) otherwise the syntax-type is determined by the syntax-table
8147 of the current buffer.
8149 *** The meaning of \s in regular expressions is also affected by the
8150 value of `parse-sexp-lookup-properties'. The details are the same as
8151 for the syntax-directed buffer-scan functions.
8153 *** There are two new syntax-codes, `!' and `|' (numeric values 14
8154 and 15). A character with a code `!' starts a comment which is ended
8155 only by another character with the same code (unless quoted). A
8156 character with a code `|' starts a string which is ended only by
8157 another character with the same code (unless quoted).
8159 These codes are mainly meant for use as values of the `syntax-table'
8162 *** The function `parse-partial-sexp' has new semantics for the sixth
8163 arg COMMENTSTOP. If it is `syntax-table', parse stops after the start
8164 of a comment or a string, or after end of a comment or a string.
8166 *** The state-list which the return value from `parse-partial-sexp'
8167 (and can also be used as an argument) now has an optional ninth
8168 element: the character address of the start of last comment or string;
8169 nil if none. The fourth and eighth elements have special values if the
8170 string/comment is started by a "!" or "|" syntax-code.
8172 *** Since new features of `parse-partial-sexp' allow a complete
8173 syntactic parsing, `font-lock' no longer supports
8174 `font-lock-comment-start-regexp'.
8176 ** Changes in face features
8178 *** The face functions are now unconditionally defined in Emacs, even
8179 if it does not support displaying on a device that supports faces.
8181 *** The function face-documentation returns the documentation string
8182 of a face (or nil if it doesn't have one).
8184 *** The function face-bold-p returns t if a face should be bold.
8185 set-face-bold-p sets that flag.
8187 *** The function face-italic-p returns t if a face should be italic.
8188 set-face-italic-p sets that flag.
8190 *** You can now specify foreground and background colors for text
8191 by adding elements of the form (foreground-color . COLOR-NAME)
8192 and (background-color . COLOR-NAME) to the list of faces in
8193 the `face' property (either the character's text property or an
8196 This means that you no longer need to create named faces to use
8197 arbitrary colors in a Lisp package.
8199 ** Changes in file-handling functions
8201 *** File-access primitive functions no longer discard an extra redundant
8202 directory name from the beginning of the file name. In other words,
8203 they no longer do anything special with // or /~. That conversion
8204 is now done only in substitute-in-file-name.
8206 This makes it possible for a Lisp program to open a file whose name
8209 *** If copy-file is unable to set the date of the output file,
8210 it now signals an error with the condition file-date-error.
8212 *** The inode number returned by file-attributes may be an integer (if
8213 the number fits in a Lisp integer) or a list of integers.
8215 *** insert-file-contents can now read from a special file,
8216 as long as the arguments VISIT and REPLACE are nil.
8218 *** The RAWFILE arg to find-file-noselect, if non-nil, now suppresses
8219 character code conversion as well as other things.
8221 Meanwhile, this feature does work with remote file names
8222 (formerly it did not).
8224 *** Lisp packages which create temporary files should use the TMPDIR
8225 environment variable to decide which directory to put them in.
8227 *** interpreter-mode-alist elements now specify regexps
8228 instead of constant strings.
8230 *** expand-file-name no longer treats `//' or `/~' specially. It used
8231 to delete all the text of a file name up through the first slash of
8232 any `//' or `/~' sequence. Now it passes them straight through.
8234 substitute-in-file-name continues to treat those sequences specially,
8235 in the same way as before.
8237 *** The variable `format-alist' is more general now.
8238 The FROM-FN and TO-FN in a format definition can now be strings
8239 which specify shell commands to use as filters to perform conversion.
8241 *** The new function access-file tries to open a file, and signals an
8242 error if that fails. If the open succeeds, access-file does nothing
8243 else, and returns nil.
8245 *** The function insert-directory now signals an error if the specified
8246 directory cannot be listed.
8248 ** Changes in minibuffer input
8250 *** The functions read-buffer, read-variable, read-command, read-string
8251 read-file-name, read-from-minibuffer and completing-read now take an
8252 additional argument which specifies the default value. If this
8253 argument is non-nil, it should be a string; that string is used in two
8256 It is returned if the user enters empty input.
8257 It is available through the history command M-n.
8259 *** The functions read-string, read-from-minibuffer,
8260 read-no-blanks-input and completing-read now take an additional
8261 argument INHERIT-INPUT-METHOD. If this is non-nil, then the
8262 minibuffer inherits the current input method and the setting of
8263 enable-multibyte-characters from the previously current buffer.
8265 In an interactive spec, you can use M instead of s to read an
8266 argument in this way.
8268 *** All minibuffer input functions discard text properties
8269 from the text you enter in the minibuffer, unless the variable
8270 minibuffer-allow-text-properties is non-nil.
8272 ** Echo area features
8274 *** Clearing the echo area now runs the normal hook
8275 echo-area-clear-hook. Note that the echo area can be used while the
8276 minibuffer is active; in that case, the minibuffer is still active
8277 after the echo area is cleared.
8279 *** The function current-message returns the message currently displayed
8280 in the echo area, or nil if there is none.
8282 ** Keyboard input features
8284 *** tty-erase-char is a new variable that reports which character was
8285 set up as the terminal's erase character when time Emacs was started.
8287 *** num-nonmacro-input-events is the total number of input events
8288 received so far from the terminal. It does not count those generated
8291 ** Frame-related changes
8293 *** make-frame runs the normal hook before-make-frame-hook just before
8294 creating a frame, and just after creating a frame it runs the abnormal
8295 hook after-make-frame-functions with the new frame as arg.
8297 *** The new hook window-configuration-change-hook is now run every time
8298 the window configuration has changed. The frame whose configuration
8299 has changed is the selected frame when the hook is run.
8301 *** Each frame now independently records the order for recently
8302 selected buffers, in its buffer-list frame parameter, so that the
8303 value of other-buffer is now based on the buffers recently displayed
8304 in the selected frame.
8306 *** The value of the frame parameter vertical-scroll-bars
8307 is now `left', `right' or nil. A non-nil value specifies
8308 which side of the window to put the scroll bars on.
8310 ** X Windows features
8312 *** You can examine X resources for other applications by binding
8313 x-resource-class around a call to x-get-resource. The usual value of
8314 x-resource-class is "Emacs", which is the correct value for Emacs.
8316 *** In menus, checkboxes and radio buttons now actually work.
8317 The menu displays the current status of the box or button.
8319 *** The function x-list-fonts now takes an optional fourth argument
8320 MAXIMUM which sets a limit on how many matching fonts to return.
8321 A smaller value of MAXIMUM makes the function faster.
8323 If the only question is whether *any* font matches the pattern,
8324 it is good to supply 1 for this argument.
8326 ** Subprocess features
8328 *** A reminder: it is no longer necessary for subprocess filter
8329 functions and sentinels to do save-match-data, because Emacs does this
8332 *** The new function shell-command-to-string executes a shell command
8333 and returns the output from the command as a string.
8335 *** The new function process-contact returns t for a child process,
8336 and (HOSTNAME SERVICE) for a net connection.
8338 ** An error in running pre-command-hook or post-command-hook
8339 does clear the variable to nil. The documentation was wrong before.
8341 ** In define-key-after, if AFTER is t, the new binding now always goes
8342 at the end of the keymap. If the keymap is a menu, this means it
8343 goes after the other menu items.
8345 ** If you have a program that makes several changes in the same area
8346 of the buffer, you can use the macro combine-after-change-calls
8347 around that Lisp code to make it faster when after-change hooks
8350 The macro arranges to call the after-change functions just once for a
8351 series of several changes--if that seems safe.
8353 Don't alter the variables after-change-functions and
8354 after-change-function within the body of a combine-after-change-calls
8357 ** If you define an abbrev (with define-abbrev) whose EXPANSION
8358 is not a string, then the abbrev does not expand in the usual sense,
8359 but its hook is still run.
8361 ** Normally, the Lisp debugger is not used (even if you have enabled it)
8362 for errors that are handled by condition-case.
8364 If you set debug-on-signal to a non-nil value, then the debugger is called
8365 regardless of whether there is a handler for the condition. This is
8366 useful for debugging problems that happen inside of a condition-case.
8368 This mode of operation seems to be unreliable in other ways. Errors that
8369 are normal and ought to be handled, perhaps in timers or process
8370 filters, will instead invoke the debugger. So don't say you weren't
8373 ** The new variable ring-bell-function lets you specify your own
8374 way for Emacs to "ring the bell".
8376 ** If run-at-time's TIME argument is t, the action is repeated at
8377 integral multiples of REPEAT from the epoch; this is useful for
8378 functions like display-time.
8380 ** You can use the function locate-library to find the precise file
8381 name of a Lisp library. This isn't new, but wasn't documented before.
8383 ** Commands for entering view mode have new optional arguments that
8384 can be used from Lisp. Low-level entrance to and exit from view mode
8385 is done by functions view-mode-enter and view-mode-exit.
8387 ** batch-byte-compile-file now makes Emacs return a nonzero status code
8388 if there is an error in compilation.
8390 ** pop-to-buffer, switch-to-buffer-other-window and
8391 switch-to-buffer-other-frame now accept an additional optional
8392 argument NORECORD, much like switch-to-buffer. If it is non-nil,
8393 they don't put the buffer at the front of the buffer list.
8395 ** If your .emacs file leaves the *scratch* buffer non-empty,
8396 Emacs does not display the startup message, so as to avoid changing
8397 the *scratch* buffer.
8399 ** The new function regexp-opt returns an efficient regexp to match a string.
8400 The arguments are STRINGS and (optionally) PAREN. This function can be used
8401 where regexp matching or searching is intensively used and speed is important,
8402 e.g., in Font Lock mode.
8404 ** The variable buffer-display-count is local to each buffer,
8405 and is incremented each time the buffer is displayed in a window.
8406 It starts at 0 when the buffer is created.
8408 ** The new function compose-mail starts composing a mail message
8409 using the user's chosen mail composition agent (specified with the
8410 variable mail-user-agent). It has variants compose-mail-other-window
8411 and compose-mail-other-frame.
8413 ** The `user-full-name' function now takes an optional parameter which
8414 can either be a number (the UID) or a string (the login name). The
8415 full name of the specified user will be returned.
8417 ** Lisp packages that load files of customizations, or any other sort
8418 of user profile, should obey the variable init-file-user in deciding
8419 where to find it. They should load the profile of the user name found
8420 in that variable. If init-file-user is nil, meaning that the -q
8421 option was used, then Lisp packages should not load the customization
8424 ** format-time-string now allows you to specify the field width
8425 and type of padding. This works as in printf: you write the field
8426 width as digits in the middle of a %-construct. If you start
8427 the field width with 0, it means to pad with zeros.
8429 For example, %S normally specifies the number of seconds since the
8430 minute; %03S means to pad this with zeros to 3 positions, %_3S to pad
8431 with spaces to 3 positions. Plain %3S pads with zeros, because that
8432 is how %S normally pads to two positions.
8434 ** thing-at-point now supports a new kind of "thing": url.
8436 ** imenu.el changes.
8438 You can now specify a function to be run when selecting an
8439 item from menu created by imenu.
8441 An example of using this feature: if we define imenu items for the
8442 #include directives in a C file, we can open the included file when we
8443 select one of those items.
8445 * Emacs 19.34 is a bug-fix release with no user-visible changes.
8447 * Changes in Emacs 19.33.
8449 ** Bibtex mode no longer turns on Auto Fill automatically. (No major
8450 mode should do that--it is the user's choice.)
8452 ** The variable normal-auto-fill-function specifies the function to
8453 use for auto-fill-function, if and when Auto Fill is turned on.
8454 Major modes can set this locally to alter how Auto Fill works.
8456 * Editing Changes in Emacs 19.32
8458 ** C-x f with no argument now signals an error.
8459 To set the fill column at the current column, use C-u C-x f.
8461 ** Expanding dynamic abbrevs with M-/ is now smarter about case
8462 conversion. If you type the abbreviation with mixed case, and it
8463 matches the beginning of the expansion including case, then the
8464 expansion is copied verbatim. Using SPC M-/ to copy an additional
8465 word always copies it verbatim except when the previous copied word is
8468 ** On a non-windowing terminal, which can display only one Emacs frame
8469 at a time, creating a new frame with C-x 5 2 also selects that frame.
8471 When using a display that can show multiple frames at once, C-x 5 2
8472 does make the frame visible, but does not select it. This is the same
8473 as in previous Emacs versions.
8475 ** You can use C-x 5 2 to create multiple frames on MSDOS, just as on a
8476 non-X terminal on Unix. Of course, only one frame is visible at any
8477 time, since your terminal doesn't have the ability to display multiple
8480 ** On Windows, set win32-pass-alt-to-system to a non-nil value
8481 if you would like tapping the Alt key to invoke the Windows menu.
8482 This feature is not enabled by default; since the Alt key is also the
8483 Meta key, it is too easy and painful to activate this feature by
8486 ** The command apply-macro-to-region-lines repeats the last defined
8487 keyboard macro once for each complete line within the current region.
8488 It does this line by line, by moving point to the beginning of that
8489 line and then executing the macro.
8491 This command is not new, but was never documented before.
8493 ** You can now use Mouse-1 to place the region around a string constant
8494 (something surrounded by doublequote characters or other delimiter
8495 characters of like syntax) by double-clicking on one of the delimiting
8500 *** Font Lock support modes
8502 Font Lock can be configured to use Fast Lock mode and Lazy Lock mode (see
8503 below) in a flexible way. Rather than adding the appropriate function to the
8504 hook font-lock-mode-hook, you can use the new variable font-lock-support-mode
8505 to control which modes have Fast Lock mode or Lazy Lock mode turned on when
8506 Font Lock mode is enabled.
8508 For example, to use Fast Lock mode when Font Lock mode is turned on, put:
8510 (setq font-lock-support-mode 'fast-lock-mode)
8516 The lazy-lock package speeds up Font Lock mode by making fontification occur
8517 only when necessary, such as when a previously unfontified part of the buffer
8518 becomes visible in a window. When you create a buffer with Font Lock mode and
8519 Lazy Lock mode turned on, the buffer is not fontified. When certain events
8520 occur (such as scrolling), Lazy Lock makes sure that the visible parts of the
8521 buffer are fontified. Lazy Lock also defers on-the-fly fontification until
8522 Emacs has been idle for a given amount of time.
8524 To use this package, put in your ~/.emacs:
8526 (setq font-lock-support-mode 'lazy-lock-mode)
8528 To control the package behaviour, see the documentation for `lazy-lock-mode'.
8530 ** Changes in BibTeX mode.
8532 *** For all entries allow spaces and tabs between opening brace or
8535 *** Non-escaped double-quoted characters (as in `Sch"of') are now
8540 Gnus, the Emacs news reader, has undergone further rewriting. Many new
8541 commands and variables have been added. There should be no
8542 significant incompatibilities between this Gnus version and the
8543 previously released version, except in the message composition area.
8545 Below is a list of the more user-visible changes. Coding changes
8546 between Gnus 5.1 and 5.2 are more extensive.
8548 *** A new message composition mode is used. All old customization
8549 variables for mail-mode, rnews-reply-mode and gnus-msg are now
8552 *** Gnus is now able to generate "sparse" threads -- threads where
8553 missing articles are represented by empty nodes.
8555 (setq gnus-build-sparse-threads 'some)
8557 *** Outgoing articles are stored on a special archive server.
8559 To disable this: (setq gnus-message-archive-group nil)
8561 *** Partial thread regeneration now happens when articles are
8564 *** Gnus can make use of GroupLens predictions:
8566 (setq gnus-use-grouplens t)
8568 *** A trn-line tree buffer can be displayed.
8570 (setq gnus-use-trees t)
8572 *** An nn-like pick-and-read minor mode is available for the summary
8575 (add-hook 'gnus-summary-mode-hook 'gnus-pick-mode)
8577 *** In binary groups you can use a special binary minor mode:
8579 `M-x gnus-binary-mode'
8581 *** Groups can be grouped in a folding topic hierarchy.
8583 (add-hook 'gnus-group-mode-hook 'gnus-topic-mode)
8585 *** Gnus can re-send and bounce mail.
8587 Use the `S D r' and `S D b'.
8589 *** Groups can now have a score, and bubbling based on entry frequency
8592 (add-hook 'gnus-summary-exit-hook 'gnus-summary-bubble-group)
8594 *** Groups can be process-marked, and commands can be performed on
8597 *** Caching is possible in virtual groups.
8599 *** nndoc now understands all kinds of digests, mail boxes, rnews news
8600 batches, ClariNet briefs collections, and just about everything else.
8602 *** Gnus has a new backend (nnsoup) to create/read SOUP packets.
8604 *** The Gnus cache is much faster.
8606 *** Groups can be sorted according to many criteria.
8608 For instance: (setq gnus-group-sort-function 'gnus-group-sort-by-rank)
8610 *** New group parameters have been introduced to set list-address and
8613 *** All formatting specs allow specifying faces to be used.
8615 *** There are several more commands for setting/removing/acting on
8616 process marked articles on the `M P' submap.
8618 *** The summary buffer can be limited to show parts of the available
8619 articles based on a wide range of criteria. These commands have been
8620 bound to keys on the `/' submap.
8622 *** Articles can be made persistent -- as an alternative to saving
8623 articles with the `*' command.
8625 *** All functions for hiding article elements are now toggles.
8627 *** Article headers can be buttonized.
8629 (add-hook 'gnus-article-display-hook 'gnus-article-add-buttons-to-head)
8631 *** All mail backends support fetching articles by Message-ID.
8633 *** Duplicate mail can now be treated properly. See the
8634 `nnmail-treat-duplicates' variable.
8636 *** All summary mode commands are available directly from the article
8639 *** Frames can be part of `gnus-buffer-configuration'.
8641 *** Mail can be re-scanned by a daemonic process.
8643 *** Gnus can make use of NoCeM files to filter spam.
8645 (setq gnus-use-nocem t)
8647 *** Groups can be made permanently visible.
8649 (setq gnus-permanently-visible-groups "^nnml:")
8651 *** Many new hooks have been introduced to make customizing easier.
8653 *** Gnus respects the Mail-Copies-To header.
8655 *** Threads can be gathered by looking at the References header.
8657 (setq gnus-summary-thread-gathering-function
8658 'gnus-gather-threads-by-references)
8660 *** Read articles can be stored in a special backlog buffer to avoid
8663 (setq gnus-keep-backlog 50)
8665 *** A clean copy of the current article is always stored in a separate
8666 buffer to allow easier treatment.
8668 *** Gnus can suggest where to save articles. See `gnus-split-methods'.
8670 *** Gnus doesn't have to do as much prompting when saving.
8672 (setq gnus-prompt-before-saving t)
8674 *** gnus-uu can view decoded files asynchronously while fetching
8677 (setq gnus-uu-grabbed-file-functions 'gnus-uu-grab-view)
8679 *** Filling in the article buffer now works properly on cited text.
8681 *** Hiding cited text adds buttons to toggle hiding, and how much
8682 cited text to hide is now customizable.
8684 (setq gnus-cited-lines-visible 2)
8686 *** Boring headers can be hidden.
8688 (add-hook 'gnus-article-display-hook 'gnus-article-hide-boring-headers)
8690 *** Default scoring values can now be set from the menu bar.
8692 *** Further syntax checking of outgoing articles have been added.
8694 The Gnus manual has been expanded. It explains all these new features
8697 * Lisp Changes in Emacs 19.32
8699 ** The function set-visited-file-name now accepts an optional
8700 second argument NO-QUERY. If it is non-nil, then the user is not
8701 asked for confirmation in the case where the specified file already
8704 ** The variable print-length applies to printing vectors and bitvectors,
8707 ** The new function keymap-parent returns the parent keymap
8710 ** The new function set-keymap-parent specifies a new parent for a
8711 given keymap. The arguments are KEYMAP and PARENT. PARENT must be a
8714 ** Sometimes menu keymaps use a command name, a symbol, which is really
8715 an automatically generated alias for some other command, the "real"
8716 name. In such a case, you should give that alias symbol a non-nil
8717 menu-alias property. That property tells the menu system to look for
8718 equivalent keys for the real name instead of equivalent keys for the
8721 * Editing Changes in Emacs 19.31
8723 ** Freedom of the press restricted in the United States.
8725 Emacs has been censored in accord with the Communications Decency Act.
8726 This includes removing some features of the doctor program. That law
8727 was described by its supporters as a ban on pornography, but it bans
8728 far more than that. The Emacs distribution has never contained any
8729 pornography, but parts of it were nonetheless prohibited.
8731 For information on US government censorship of the Internet, and what
8732 you can do to bring back freedom of the press, see the web site
8733 `http://www.vtw.org/'.
8735 ** A note about C mode indentation customization.
8737 The old (Emacs 19.29) ways of specifying a C indentation style
8738 do not normally work in the new implementation of C mode.
8739 It has its own methods of customizing indentation, which are
8740 much more powerful than the old C mode. See the Editing Programs
8741 chapter of the manual for details.
8743 However, you can load the library cc-compat to make the old
8744 customization variables take effect.
8746 ** Marking with the mouse.
8748 When you mark a region with the mouse, the region now remains
8749 highlighted until the next input event, regardless of whether you are
8750 using M-x transient-mark-mode.
8752 ** Improved Windows NT/95 support.
8754 *** Emacs now supports scroll bars on Windows NT and Windows 95.
8756 *** Emacs now supports subprocesses on Windows 95. (Subprocesses used
8757 to work on NT only and not on 95.)
8759 *** There are difficulties with subprocesses, though, due to problems
8760 in Windows, beyond the control of Emacs. They work fine as long as
8761 you run Windows applications. The problems arise when you run a DOS
8762 application in a subprocesses. Since current shells run as DOS
8763 applications, these problems are significant.
8765 If you run a DOS application in a subprocess, then the application is
8766 likely to busy-wait, which means that your machine will be 100% busy.
8767 However, if you don't mind the temporary heavy load, the subprocess
8768 will work OK as long as you tell it to terminate before you start any
8769 other DOS application as a subprocess.
8771 Emacs is unable to terminate or interrupt a DOS subprocess.
8772 You have to do this by providing input directly to the subprocess.
8774 If you run two DOS applications at the same time in two separate
8775 subprocesses, even if one of them is asynchronous, you will probably
8776 have to reboot your machine--until then, it will remain 100% busy.
8777 Windows simply does not cope when one Windows process tries to run two
8778 separate DOS subprocesses. Typing CTL-ALT-DEL and then choosing
8779 Shutdown seems to work although it may take a few minutes.
8781 ** M-x resize-minibuffer-mode.
8783 This command, not previously mentioned in NEWS, toggles a mode in
8784 which the minibuffer window expands to show as many lines as the
8785 minibuffer contains.
8787 ** `title' frame parameter and resource.
8789 The `title' X resource now specifies just the frame title, nothing else.
8790 It does not affect the name used for looking up other X resources.
8791 It works by setting the new `title' frame parameter, which likewise
8792 affects just the displayed title of the frame.
8794 The `name' parameter continues to do what it used to do:
8795 it specifies the frame name for looking up X resources,
8796 and also serves as the default for the displayed title
8797 when the `title' parameter is unspecified or nil.
8799 ** Emacs now uses the X toolkit by default, if you have a new
8800 enough version of X installed (X11R5 or newer).
8802 ** When you compile Emacs with the Motif widget set, Motif handles the
8803 F10 key by activating the menu bar. To avoid confusion, the usual
8804 Emacs binding of F10 is replaced with a no-op when using Motif.
8806 If you want to be able to use F10 in Emacs, you can rebind the Motif
8807 menubar to some other key which you don't use. To do so, add
8808 something like this to your X resources file. This example rebinds
8809 the Motif menu bar activation key to S-F12:
8811 Emacs*defaultVirtualBindings: osfMenuBar : Shift<Key>F12
8813 ** In overwrite mode, DEL now inserts spaces in most cases
8814 to replace the characters it "deletes".
8816 ** The Rmail summary now shows the number of lines in each message.
8818 ** Rmail has a new command M-x unforward-rmail-message, which extracts
8819 a forwarded message from the message that forwarded it. To use it,
8820 select a message which contains a forwarded message and then type the command.
8821 It inserts the forwarded message as a separate Rmail message
8822 immediately after the selected one.
8824 This command also undoes the textual modifications that are standardly
8825 made, as part of forwarding, by Rmail and other mail reader programs.
8827 ** Turning off saving of .saves-... files in your home directory.
8829 Each Emacs session writes a file named .saves-... in your home
8830 directory to record which files M-x recover-session should recover.
8831 If you exit Emacs normally with C-x C-c, it deletes that file. If
8832 Emacs or the operating system crashes, the file remains for M-x
8835 You can turn off the writing of these files by setting
8836 auto-save-list-file-name to nil. If you do this, M-x recover-session
8839 Some previous Emacs versions failed to delete these files even on
8840 normal exit. This is fixed now. If you are thinking of turning off
8841 this feature because of past experiences with versions that had this
8842 bug, it would make sense to check whether you still want to do so
8843 now that the bug is fixed.
8845 ** Changes to Version Control (VC)
8847 There is a new variable, vc-follow-symlinks. It indicates what to do
8848 when you visit a link to a file that is under version control.
8849 Editing the file through the link bypasses the version control system,
8850 which is dangerous and probably not what you want.
8852 If this variable is t, VC follows the link and visits the real file,
8853 telling you about it in the echo area. If it is `ask' (the default),
8854 VC asks for confirmation whether it should follow the link. If nil,
8855 the link is visited and a warning displayed.
8857 ** iso-acc.el now lets you specify a choice of language.
8858 Languages include "latin-1" (the default) and "latin-2" (which
8859 is designed for entering ISO Latin-2 characters).
8861 There are also choices for specific human languages such as French and
8862 Portuguese. These are subsets of Latin-1, which differ in that they
8863 enable only the accent characters needed for particular language.
8864 The other accent characters, not needed for the chosen language,
8867 ** Posting articles and sending mail now has M-TAB completion on various
8868 header fields (Newsgroups, To, CC, ...).
8870 Completion in the Newsgroups header depends on the list of groups
8871 known to your news reader. Completion in the Followup-To header
8872 offers those groups which are in the Newsgroups header, since
8873 Followup-To usually just holds one of those.
8875 Completion in fields that hold mail addresses works based on the list
8876 of local users plus your aliases. Additionally, if your site provides
8877 a mail directory or a specific host to use for any unrecognized user
8878 name, you can arrange to query that host for completion also. (See the
8879 documentation of variables `mail-directory-process' and
8880 `mail-directory-stream'.)
8882 ** A greatly extended sgml-mode offers new features such as (to be configured)
8883 skeletons with completing read for tags and attributes, typing named
8884 characters including optionally all 8bit characters, making tags invisible
8885 with optional alternate display text, skipping and deleting tag(pair)s.
8887 Note: since Emacs' syntax feature cannot limit the special meaning of ', " and
8888 - to inside <>, for some texts the result, especially of font locking, may be
8889 wrong (see `sgml-specials' if you get wrong results).
8891 The derived html-mode configures this with tags and attributes more or
8892 less HTML3ish. It also offers optional quick keys like C-c 1 for
8893 headline or C-c u for unordered list (see `html-quick-keys'). Edit /
8894 Text Properties / Face or M-g combinations create tags as applicable.
8895 Outline minor mode is supported and level 1 font-locking tries to
8896 fontify tag contents (which only works when they fit on one line, due
8897 to a limitation in font-lock).
8899 External viewing via browse-url can occur automatically upon saving.
8901 ** M-x imenu-add-to-menubar now adds to the menu bar for the current
8902 buffer only. If you want to put an Imenu item in the menu bar for all
8903 buffers that use a particular major mode, use the mode hook, as in
8906 (add-hook 'emacs-lisp-mode-hook
8907 '(lambda () (imenu-add-to-menubar "Index")))
8909 ** Changes in BibTeX mode.
8911 *** Field names may now contain digits, hyphens, and underscores.
8913 *** Font Lock mode is now supported.
8915 *** bibtex-make-optional-field is no longer interactive.
8917 *** If bibtex-maintain-sorted-entries is non-nil, inserting new
8918 entries is now done with a faster algorithm. However, inserting
8919 will fail in this case if the buffer contains invalid entries or
8920 isn't in sorted order, so you should finish each entry with C-c C-c
8921 (bibtex-close-entry) after you have inserted or modified it.
8922 The default value of bibtex-maintain-sorted-entries is nil.
8924 *** Function `show-all' is no longer bound to a key, since C-u C-c C-q
8927 *** Entries with quotes inside quote-delimited fields (as `author =
8928 "Stefan Sch{\"o}f"') are now supported.
8930 *** Case in field names doesn't matter anymore when searching for help
8935 *** Global Font Lock mode
8937 Font Lock mode can be turned on globally, in buffers that support it, by the
8938 new command global-font-lock-mode. You can use the new variable
8939 font-lock-global-modes to control which modes have Font Lock mode automagically
8940 turned on. By default, this variable is set so that Font Lock mode is turned
8941 on globally where the buffer mode supports it.
8943 For example, to automagically turn on Font Lock mode where supported, put:
8945 (global-font-lock-mode t)
8949 *** Local Refontification
8951 In Font Lock mode, editing a line automatically refontifies that line only.
8952 However, if your change alters the syntactic context for following lines,
8953 those lines remain incorrectly fontified. To refontify them, use the new
8954 command M-g M-g (font-lock-fontify-block).
8956 In certain major modes, M-g M-g refontifies the entire current function.
8957 (The variable font-lock-mark-block-function controls how to find the
8958 current function.) In other major modes, M-g M-g refontifies 16 lines
8959 above and below point.
8961 With a prefix argument N, M-g M-g refontifies N lines above and below point.
8965 Follow mode is a new minor mode combining windows showing the same
8966 buffer into one tall "virtual window". The windows are typically two
8967 side-by-side windows. Follow mode makes them scroll together as if
8968 they were a unit. To use it, go to a frame with just one window,
8969 split it into two side-by-side windows using C-x 3, and then type M-x
8972 M-x follow-mode turns off Follow mode if it is already enabled.
8974 To display two side-by-side windows and activate Follow mode, use the
8975 command M-x follow-delete-other-windows-and-split.
8977 ** hide-show changes.
8979 The hooks hs-hide-hooks and hs-show-hooks have been renamed
8980 to hs-hide-hook and hs-show-hook, to follow the convention for
8983 ** Simula mode now has a menu containing the most important commands.
8984 The new command simula-indent-exp is bound to C-M-q.
8986 ** etags can now handle programs written in Erlang. Files are
8987 recognised by the extensions .erl and .hrl. The tagged lines are
8988 those that begin a function, record, or macro.
8992 *** It is now possible to compile Emacs with the version 2 of DJGPP.
8993 Compilation with DJGPP version 1 also still works.
8995 *** The documentation of DOS-specific aspects of Emacs was rewritten
8996 and expanded; see the ``MS-DOS'' node in the on-line docs.
8998 *** Emacs now uses ~ for backup file names, not .bak.
9000 *** You can simulate mouse-3 on two-button mice by simultaneously
9001 pressing both mouse buttons.
9003 *** A number of packages and commands which previously failed or had
9004 restricted functionality on MS-DOS, now work. The most important ones
9007 **** Printing (both with `M-x lpr-buffer' and with `ps-print' package)
9010 **** `Ediff' works (in a single-frame mode).
9012 **** `M-x display-time' can be used on MS-DOS (due to the new
9013 implementation of Emacs timers, see below).
9015 **** `Dired' supports Unix-style shell wildcards.
9017 **** The `c-macro-expand' command now works as on other platforms.
9019 **** `M-x recover-session' works.
9021 **** `M-x list-colors-display' displays all the available colors.
9023 **** The `TPU-EDT' package works.
9025 * Lisp changes in Emacs 19.31.
9027 ** The function using-unix-filesystems on Windows NT and Windows 95
9028 tells Emacs to read and write files assuming that they reside on a
9029 remote Unix filesystem. No CR/LF translation is done on any files in
9030 this case. Invoking using-unix-filesystems with t activates this
9031 behavior, and invoking it with any other value deactivates it.
9033 ** Change in system-type and system-configuration values.
9035 The value of system-type on a Linux-based GNU system is now `lignux',
9036 not `linux'. This means that some programs which use `system-type'
9037 need to be changed. The value of `system-configuration' will also
9040 It is generally recommended to use `system-configuration' rather
9043 See the file LINUX-GNU in this directory for more about this.
9045 ** The functions shell-command and dired-call-process
9046 now run file name handlers for default-directory, if it has them.
9048 ** Undoing the deletion of text now restores the positions of markers
9049 that pointed into or next to the deleted text.
9051 ** Timers created with run-at-time now work internally to Emacs, and
9052 no longer use a separate process. Therefore, they now work more
9053 reliably and can be used for shorter time delays.
9055 The new function run-with-timer is a convenient way to set up a timer
9056 to run a specified amount of time after the present. A call looks
9059 (run-with-timer SECS REPEAT FUNCTION ARGS...)
9061 SECS says how many seconds should elapse before the timer happens.
9062 It may be an integer or a floating point number. When the timer
9063 becomes ripe, the action is to call FUNCTION with arguments ARGS.
9065 REPEAT gives the interval for repeating the timer (measured in
9066 seconds). It may be an integer or a floating point number. nil or 0
9067 means don't repeat at all--call FUNCTION just once.
9069 *** with-timeout provides an easy way to do something but give
9070 up if too much time passes.
9072 (with-timeout (SECONDS TIMEOUT-FORMS...) BODY...)
9074 This executes BODY, but gives up after SECONDS seconds.
9075 If it gives up, it runs the TIMEOUT-FORMS and returns the value
9076 of the last one of them. Normally it returns the value of the last
9079 *** You can now arrange to call a function whenever Emacs is idle for
9080 a certain length of time. To do this, call run-with-idle-timer. A
9081 call looks like this:
9083 (run-with-idle-timer SECS REPEAT FUNCTION ARGS...)
9085 SECS says how many seconds of idleness should elapse before the timer
9086 runs. It may be an integer or a floating point number. When the
9087 timer becomes ripe, the action is to call FUNCTION with arguments
9090 Emacs becomes idle whenever it finishes executing a keyboard or mouse
9091 command. It remains idle until it receives another keyboard or mouse
9094 REPEAT, if non-nil, means this timer should be activated again each
9095 time Emacs becomes idle and remains idle for SECS seconds The timer
9096 does not repeat if Emacs *remains* idle; it runs at most once after
9097 each time Emacs becomes idle.
9099 If REPEAT is nil, the timer runs just once, the first time Emacs is
9100 idle for SECS seconds.
9102 *** post-command-idle-hook is now obsolete; you shouldn't use it at
9103 all, because it interferes with the idle timer mechanism. If your
9104 programs use post-command-idle-hook, convert them to use idle timers
9107 *** y-or-n-p-with-timeout lets you ask a question but give up if
9108 there is no answer within a certain time.
9110 (y-or-n-p-with-timeout PROMPT SECONDS DEFAULT-VALUE)
9112 asks the question PROMPT (just like y-or-n-p). If the user answers
9113 within SECONDS seconds, it returns the answer that the user gave.
9114 Otherwise it gives up after SECONDS seconds, and returns DEFAULT-VALUE.
9116 ** Minor change to `encode-time': you can now pass more than seven
9117 arguments. If you do that, the first six arguments have the usual
9118 meaning, the last argument is interpreted as the time zone, and the
9119 arguments in between are ignored.
9121 This means that it works to use the list returned by `decode-time' as
9122 the list of arguments for `encode-time'.
9124 ** The default value of load-path now includes the directory
9125 /usr/local/share/emacs/VERSION/site-lisp In addition to
9126 /usr/local/share/emacs/site-lisp. You can use this new directory for
9127 site-specific Lisp packages that belong with a particular Emacs
9130 It is not unusual for a Lisp package that works well in one Emacs
9131 version to cause trouble in another. Sometimes packages need updating
9132 for incompatible changes; sometimes they look at internal data that
9133 has changed; sometimes the package has been installed in Emacs itself
9134 and the installed version should be used. Whatever the reason for the
9135 problem, this new feature makes it easier to solve.
9137 ** When your program contains a fixed file name (like .completions or
9138 .abbrev.defs), the file name usually needs to be different on operating
9139 systems with limited file name syntax.
9141 Now you can avoid ad-hoc conditionals by using the function
9142 convert-standard-filename to convert the file name to a proper form
9143 for each operating system. Here is an example of use, from the file
9146 (defvar save-completions-file-name
9147 (convert-standard-filename "~/.completions")
9148 "*The filename to save completions to.")
9150 This sets the variable save-completions-file-name to a value that
9151 depends on the operating system, because the definition of
9152 convert-standard-filename depends on the operating system. On
9153 Unix-like systems, it returns the specified file name unchanged. On
9154 MS-DOS, it adapts the name to fit the limitations of that system.
9156 ** The interactive spec N now returns the numeric prefix argument
9157 rather than the raw prefix argument. (It still reads a number using the
9158 minibuffer if there is no prefix argument at all.)
9160 ** When a process is deleted, this no longer disconnects the process
9161 marker from its buffer position.
9163 ** The variable garbage-collection-messages now controls whether
9164 Emacs displays a message at the beginning and end of garbage collection.
9165 The default is nil, meaning there are no messages.
9167 ** The variable debug-ignored-errors specifies certain kinds of errors
9168 that should not enter the debugger. Its value is a list of error
9169 condition symbols and/or regular expressions. If the error has any
9170 of the condition symbols listed, or if any of the regular expressions
9171 matches the error message, then that error does not enter the debugger,
9172 regardless of the value of debug-on-error.
9174 This variable is initialized to match certain common but uninteresting
9175 errors that happen often during editing.
9177 ** The new function error-message-string converts an error datum
9178 into its error message. The error datum is what condition-case
9179 puts into the variable, to describe the error that happened.
9181 ** Anything that changes which buffer appears in a given window
9182 now runs the window-scroll-functions for that window.
9184 ** The new function get-buffer-window-list returns a list of windows displaying
9185 a buffer. The function is called with the buffer (a buffer object or a buffer
9186 name) and two optional arguments specifying the minibuffer windows and frames
9187 to search. Therefore this function takes optional args like next-window etc.,
9188 and not get-buffer-window.
9190 ** buffer-substring now runs the hook buffer-access-fontify-functions,
9191 calling each function with two arguments--the range of the buffer
9192 being accessed. buffer-substring-no-properties does not call them.
9194 If you use this feature, you should set the variable
9195 buffer-access-fontified-property to a non-nil symbol, which is a
9196 property name. Then, if all the characters in the buffer range have a
9197 non-nil value for that property, the buffer-access-fontify-functions
9198 are not called. When called, these functions should put a non-nil
9199 property on the text that they fontify, so that they won't get called
9200 over and over for the same text.
9202 ** Changes in lisp-mnt.el
9204 *** The lisp-mnt package can now recognize file headers that are written
9205 in the formats used by the `what' command and the RCS `ident' command:
9207 ;; @(#) HEADER: text
9210 in addition to the normal
9214 *** The commands lm-verify and lm-synopsis are now interactive. lm-verify
9215 checks that the library file has proper sections and headers, and
9216 lm-synopsis extracts first line "synopsis'"information.
9220 * For older news, see the file ONEWS
9222 ----------------------------------------------------------------------
9223 Copyright information:
9225 Copyright (C) 1999, 2000 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
9227 Permission is granted to anyone to make or distribute verbatim copies
9228 of this document as received, in any medium, provided that the
9229 copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved,
9230 thus giving the recipient permission to redistribute in turn.
9232 Permission is granted to distribute modified versions
9233 of this document, or of portions of it,
9234 under the above conditions, provided also that they
9235 carry prominent notices stating who last changed them.
9239 paragraph-separate: "[
\f]*$"