1 GNU Emacs NEWS -- history of user-visible changes. 5 Jan 2000
2 Copyright (C) 1996, 1997, 1998, 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 ** `movemail' defaults to supporting POP. You can turn this off using
12 the --without-pop configure option, should that be necessary.
14 ** There are new configure options associated with the support for
15 images and toolkit scrollbars. Use the --help option in `configure'
18 ** There is a new configure option `--without-xim' that instructs
19 Emacs to not use X Input Methods (XIM), if they these are available.
21 * Changes in Emacs 21.1
23 ** C-down-mouse-3 is bound differently. Now if the menu bar is not
24 displayed it pops up a menu containing the items which would be on the
25 menu bar. If the menu bar is displayed, it pops up the major mode
26 menu or the Edit menu if there is no major mode menu.
28 ** Variable `load-path' is no longer customizable because it contains
29 a version-dependent component.
31 ** The <delete> function key is now bound to `delete-char' by default.
32 Note that this takes effect only on window systems. On TTYs, Emacs
33 will receive ASCII 127 when the DEL key is pressed. This
34 character is still bound as before.
36 ** Item Save Options on the Options menu allows saving options set
39 ** New function executable-make-buffer-file-executable-if-script-p is
40 suitable as an after-save-hook as an alternative to executable-chmod.
42 ** The most preferred coding-system is now used to save a buffer if
43 buffer-file-coding-system is `undecided' and it is safe for the buffer
44 contents. (The most preferred is set by set-language-environment or
45 by M-x prefer-coding-system.) Thus if you visit an ASCII file and
46 insert a non-ASCII character from your current language environment,
47 the file will be saved silently with the appropriate coding.
48 Previously you would be prompted for a safe coding system.
50 ** New variable `inhibit-iso-escape-detection' determines if Emacs'
51 coding system detection algorithm should pay attention to ISO2022's
52 escape sequences. If this variable is non-nil, the algorithm ignores
53 such escape sequences. The default value is nil, and it is
54 recommended not to change it except for the special case that you
55 always want to read any escape code verbatimly. If you just want to
56 read a specific file without decoding escape codes, use C-x RET c
57 (`universal-coding-system-argument').
59 ** Variable `default-korean-keyboard' is initialized properly from the
60 environment variable `HANGUL_KEYBOARD_TYPE'.
62 ** C-u C-x = provides detailed information about the character at
63 point in a pop-up window.
65 ** New command M-x list-charset-chars reads a character set name and
66 displays all characters in that character set.
68 ** M-x set-terminal-coding-system (C-x RET t) now allows CCL-based
69 coding systems such as cpXXX and cyrillic-koi8.
71 ** M-; now calls comment-dwim which tries to do something clever based
74 ** The function `getenv' is now callable interactively.
76 ** The many obsolete language `setup-...-environment' commands have
77 been removed -- use `set-language-environment'.
79 ** New user options `display-time-mail-face' and
80 `display-time-use-mail-icon' control the appearance of mode-line mail
81 indicator used by the display-time package. On a suitable display the
82 indicator can be an icon and is mouse-sensitive.
84 ** Emacs' auto-save list files are now by default stored in a
85 sub-directory `.emacs.d/auto-save-list/' of the user's home directory.
86 (On MS-DOS, this subdirectory's name is `_emacs.d/auto-save.list/'.)
87 You can customize `auto-save-list-prefix' to change this location.
89 ** On window-systems, additional space can be put between text lines
90 on the display using several methods
92 - By setting frame parameter `line-spacing' to PIXELS. PIXELS must be
93 a positive integer, and specifies that PIXELS number of pixels should
94 be put below text lines on the affected frame or frames.
96 - By setting X resource `lineSpacing', class `LineSpacing'. This is
97 equivalent ot specifying the frame parameter.
99 - By specifying `--line-spacing=N' or `-lsp N' on the command line.
101 - By setting buffer-local variable `line-spacing'. The meaning is
102 the same, but applies to the a particular buffer only.
104 ** The new command `clone-indirect-buffer' can be used to create
105 an indirect buffer that is a twin copy of the current buffer. The
106 command `clone-indirect-buffer-other-window', bound to C-x 4 c,
107 does the same but displays the indirect buffer in another window.
109 ** New user options `backup-directory-alist' and
110 `make-backup-file-name-function' control the placement of backups,
111 typically in a single directory or in an invisible sub-directory.
113 ** New commands iso-iso2sgml and iso-sgml2iso convert between Latin-1
114 characters and the corresponding SGML (HTML) entities.
116 ** Emacs now refuses to load compiled Lisp files which weren't
117 compiled with Emacs. Set `load-dangerous-libraries' to t to change
120 The reason for this change is an incompatible change in XEmacs' byte
121 compiler. Files compiled with XEmacs can contain byte codes that let
124 ** New X resources recognized
126 *** The X resource `synchronous', class `Synchronous', specifies
127 whether Emacs should run in synchronous mode. Synchronous mode
128 is useful for debugging X problems.
132 emacs.synchronous: true
134 *** The X resource `visualClass, class `VisualClass', specifies the
135 visual Emacs should use. The resource's value should be a string of
136 the form `CLASS-DEPTH', where CLASS is the name of the visual class,
137 and DEPTH is the requested color depth as a decimal number. Valid
138 visual class names are
147 Visual class names specified as X resource are case-insensitive, i.e.
148 `pseudocolor', `Pseudocolor' and `PseudoColor' all have the same
151 The program `xdpyinfo' can be used to list the visual classes
152 supported on your display, and which depths they have. If
153 `visualClass' is not specified, Emacs uses the display's default
158 emacs.visualClass: TrueColor-8
160 *** The X resource `privateColormap', class `PrivateColormap',
161 specifies that Emacs should use a private colormap if it is using the
162 default visual, and that visual is of class PseudoColor. Recognized
163 resource values are `true' or `on'.
167 emacs.privateColormap: true
169 ** The menu bar configuration has changed. The new configuration is
170 more CUA-compliant. The most significant change is that Options is
171 now a separate menu-bar item, with Mule and Customize as its submenus.
173 ** User-option `show-cursor-in-non-selected-windows' controls how to
174 display the cursor in non-selected windows. If nil, no cursor is
175 shown, if non-nil a hollow box cursor is shown. This option can
178 ** The variable `echo-keystrokes' may now have a floating point value.
180 ** C-x 5 1 runs the new command delete-other-frames which deletes
181 all frames except the selected one.
183 ** If your init file is compiled (.emacs.elc), `user-init-file' is set
184 to the source name (.emacs.el), if that exists, after loading it.
186 ** The help string specified for a menu-item whose definition contains
187 the property `:help HELP' is now displayed under X either in the echo
188 area or with tooltips.
190 ** New user option `read-mail-command' specifies a command to use to
191 read mail from the menu etc.
193 ** Hexl contains a new command `hexl-insert-hex-string' which inserts
194 a string of hexadecimal numbers read from the mini-buffer.
196 ** Changes in Texinfo mode.
198 ** A couple of new key bindings have been added for inserting Texinfo
202 -------------------------
209 ** Changes in Outline mode.
211 There is now support for Imenu to index headings. A new command
212 `outline-headers-as-kill' copies the visible headings in the region to
213 the kill ring, e.g. to produce a table of contents.
215 ** New command M-x check-parens can be used to find unbalanced paren
216 groups and strings in buffers in Lisp mode (or other modes).
218 ** You can now easily create new *Info* buffers using either M-x clone-buffer
219 or C-u m <entry> RET. M-x clone-buffer can also be used on *Help* and
220 several other special buffers.
222 ** Emacs can now support 'wheeled' mice (such as the MS IntelliMouse)
223 under XFree86. To enable this, simply put (mwheel-install) in your
226 The variables `mwheel-follow-mouse' and `mwheel-scroll-amount'
227 determine where and by how much buffers are scrolled.
229 ** Listing buffers with M-x list-buffers (C-x C-b) now shows
230 abbreviated file names. Abbreviations can be customized by changing
231 `directory-abbrev-alist'.
233 ** Reading from the mini-buffer now reads from standard input if Emacs
234 is running in batch mode. For example,
236 (message "%s" (read t))
238 will read a Lisp expression from standard input and print the result
241 ** Faces and frame parameters.
243 There are four new faces `scroll-bar', `border', `cursor' and `mouse'.
244 Setting the frame parameters `scroll-bar-foreground' and
245 `scroll-bar-background' sets foreground and background color of face
246 `scroll-bar' and vice versa. Setting frame parameter `border-color'
247 sets the background color of face `border' and vice versa. Likewise
248 for frame parameters `cursor-color' and face `cursor', and frame
249 parameter `mouse-color' and face `mouse'.
251 Changing frame parameter `font' sets font-related attributes of the
252 `default' face and vice versa. Setting frame parameters
253 `foreground-color' or `background-color' sets the colors of the
254 `default' face and vice versa.
258 The face `menu' can be used to change colors and font of Emacs' menus.
259 Setting the font of LessTif/Motif menus is currently not supported;
260 attempts to set the font are ignored in this case.
262 ** New frame parameter `screen-gamma' for gamma correction.
264 The new frame parameter `screen-gamma' specifies gamma-correction for
265 colors. Its value may be nil, the default, in which case no gamma
266 correction occurs, or a number > 0, usually a float, that specifies
267 the screen gamma of a frame's display.
269 PC monitors usually have a screen gamma of 2.2. smaller values result
270 in darker colors. You might want to try a screen gamma of 1.5 for LCD
271 color displays. The viewing gamma Emacs uses is 0.4545. (1/2.2).
273 The X resource name of this parameter is `screenGamma', class
276 ** Emacs has a new redisplay engine.
278 The new redisplay handles characters of variable width and height.
279 Italic text can be used without redisplay problems. Fonts containing
280 oversized characters, i.e. characters larger than the logical height
281 of a font can be used. Images of various formats can be displayed in
284 ** Emacs has a new face implementation.
286 The new faces no longer fundamentally use X font names to specify the
287 font. Instead, each face has several independent attributes--family,
288 height, width, weight and slant--that it may or may not specify.
289 These attributes can be merged from various faces, and then together
292 Faces are supported on terminals that can display color or fonts.
293 These terminal capabilities are auto-detected. Details can be found
294 under Lisp changes, below.
296 ** New default font is Courier 12pt.
298 ** When using a windowing terminal, Emacs window now has a cursor of
299 its own. When the window is selected, the cursor is solid; otherwise,
302 ** Bitmap areas to the left and right of windows are used to display
303 truncation marks, continuation marks, overlay arrows and alike. The
304 foreground, background, and stipple of these areas can be changed by
305 customizing face `fringe'.
307 ** The mode line under X is now drawn with shadows by default. You
308 can change its appearance by modifying the face `modeline'.
312 Emacs now runs with LessTif (see <http://www.lesstif.org>). You will
313 need a version 0.88.1 or later.
315 ** Toolkit scroll bars.
317 Emacs now uses toolkit scrollbars if available. When configured for
318 LessTif/Motif, it will use that toolkit's scrollbar. Otherwise, when
319 configured for Lucid and Athena widgets, it will use the Xaw3d scroll
320 bar if Xaw3d is available. You can turn off the use of toolkit scroll
321 bars by specifying `--with-toolkit-scroll-bars=no' when configuring
324 When you encounter problems with the Xaw3d scroll bar, watch out how
325 Xaw3d is compiled on your system. If the Makefile generated from
326 Xaw3d's Imakefile contains a `-DNARROWPROTO' compiler option, and your
327 Emacs system configuration file `s/your-system.h' does not contain a
328 define for NARROWPROTO, you might consider adding it. Take
329 `s/freebsd.h' as an example.
331 Alternatively, if you don't have access to the Xaw3d source code, take
332 a look at your system's imake configuration file, for example in the
333 directory `/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/config' (paths are different on
334 different systems). You will find files `*.cf' there. If your
335 system's cf-file contains a line like `#define NeedWidePrototypes NO',
336 add a `#define NARROWPROTO' to your Emacs system configuration file.
338 The reason for this is that one Xaw3d function uses `double' or
339 `float' function parameters depending on the setting of NARROWPROTO.
340 This is not a problem when Imakefiles are used because each system's
341 image configuration file contains the necessary information. Since
342 Emacs doesn't use imake, this has do be done manually.
344 ** Toggle buttons and radio buttons in menus.
346 When compiled with LessTif (or Motif) support, Emacs uses toolkit
347 widgets for radio and toggle buttons in menus. When configured for
348 Lucid, Emacs draws radio buttons and toggle buttons similar to Motif.
350 ** Highlighting of trailing whitespace.
352 When `show-trailing-whitespace' is non-nil, Emacs displays trailing
353 whitespace in the face `trailing-whitespace'. Trailing whitespace is
354 defined as spaces or tabs at the end of a line. To avoid busy
355 highlighting when entering new text, trailing whitespace is not
356 displayed if point is at the end of the line containing the
361 Emacs can optionally display a busy-cursor under X. You can turn the
362 display on or off by customizing group `cursor'.
366 M-x blink-cursor-mode toggles a blinking cursor under X and on
367 terminals having terminal capabilities `vi', `vs', and `ve'. Blinking
368 and related parameters like frequency and delay can be customized in
371 ** New font-lock support mode `jit-lock-mode'.
373 This support mode is roughly equivalent to `lazy-lock' but is
374 generally faster. It supports stealth and deferred fontification.
375 See the documentation of the function `jit-lock-mode' for more
378 Font-lock uses jit-lock-mode as default support mode, so you don't
379 have to do anything to activate it.
381 ** Tabs and variable-width text.
383 Tabs are now displayed with stretch properties; the width of a tab is
384 defined as a multiple of the normal character width of a frame, and is
385 independent of the fonts used in the text where the tab appears.
386 Thus, tabs can be used to line up text in different fonts.
388 ** Enhancements of the Lucid menu bar
390 *** The Lucid menu bar now supports the resource "margin".
392 emacs.pane.menubar.margin: 5
394 The default margin is 4 which makes the menu bar appear like the
397 *** Arrows that indicate sub-menus are now drawn with shadows, as in
400 ** Hscrolling in C code.
402 Horizontal scrolling now happens automatically if
403 `automatic-hscrolling' is set (the default). This setting can be
408 Emacs supports a tool bar at the top of a frame under X. For details
409 how to define a tool bar, see the page describing Lisp-level changes.
411 ** Mouse-sensitive mode line.
413 Different parts of the mode line under X have been made
414 mouse-sensitive. Moving the mouse to a mouse-sensitive part in the mode
415 line changes the appearance of the mouse pointer to an arrow, and help
416 about available mouse actions is displayed either in the echo area, or
417 in the tooltip window if you have enabled one.
419 Currently, the following actions have been defined:
421 - Mouse-1 on the buffer name in the mode line switches between two
424 - Mouse-2 on the buffer-name switches to the next buffer, and
425 M-mouse-2 switches to the previous buffer in the buffer list.
427 - Mouse-3 on the buffer-name displays a buffer menu.
429 - Mouse-2 on the read-only status in the mode line (`%' or `*')
430 toggles the read-only status.
432 - Mouse-3 on the mode name display a minor-mode menu.
434 ** LessTif/Motif file selection dialog.
436 When Emacs is configured to use LessTif or Motif, reading a file name
437 from a menu will pop up a file selection dialog if `use-dialog-box' is
440 ** Emacs can display faces on TTY frames.
442 Emacs automatically detects terminals that are able to display colors.
443 Faces with a weight greater than normal are displayed extra-bright, if
444 the terminal supports it. Faces with a weight less than normal and
445 italic faces are displayed dimmed, if the terminal supports it.
446 Underlined faces are displayed underlined if possible. Other face
447 attributes such as `overline', `strike-through', and `box' are ignored
452 Emacs supports playing sound files on GNU/Linux and FreeBSD (Voxware
453 driver and native BSD driver, a.k.a. Luigi's driver). Currently
454 supported file formats are RIFF-WAVE (*.wav) and Sun Audio (*.au).
456 ** A new variable, backup-by-copying-when-privileged-mismatch, gives
457 the highest file uid for which backup-by-copying-when-mismatch will be
458 forced on. The assumption is that uids less than or equal to this
459 value are special uids (root, bin, daemon, etc.--not real system
460 users) and that files owned by these users should not change ownership,
461 even if your system policy allows users other than root to edit them.
463 The default is 200; set the variable to nil to disable the feature.
465 ** A block cursor can be drawn as wide as the glyph under it under X.
467 As an example: if a block cursor is over a tab character, it will be
468 drawn as wide as that tab on the display. To do this, set
469 `x-stretch-cursor' to a non-nil value.
471 ** Empty display lines at the end of a buffer may be marked with a
472 bitmap (this is similar to the tilde displayed by vi).
474 This behavior is activated by setting the buffer-local variable
475 `indicate-empty-lines' to a non-nil value. The default value of this
476 variable is found in `default-indicate-empty-lines'.
478 ** There is a new "aggressive" scrolling method.
480 When scrolling up because point is above the window start, if the
481 value of the buffer-local variable `scroll-up-aggessively' is a
482 number, Emacs chooses a new window start so that point ends up that
483 fraction of the window's height from the bottom of the window.
485 When scrolling down because point is below the window end, if the
486 value of the buffer-local variable `scroll-down-aggessively' is a
487 number, Emacs chooses a new window start so that point ends up that
488 fraction of the window's height from the top of the window.
490 ** The rectangle commands now avoid inserting undesirable spaces,
491 notably at the end of lines.
493 All these functions have been rewritten to avoid inserting unwanted
494 spaces, and an optional prefix now allows them to behave the old way.
496 There is a new command M-x replace-rectangle.
498 ** The new command M-x query-replace-regexp-eval acts like
499 query-replace-regexp, but takes a Lisp expression which is evaluated
500 after each match to get the replacement text.
502 ** M-x query-replace recognizes a new command `e' (or `E') that lets
503 you edit the replacement string.
505 ** The new command mail-abbrev-complete-alias, bound to `M-TAB', let's
506 you complete mail aliases in the text, analogous to
507 lisp-complete-symbol.
509 ** Emacs now resizes mini-windows if appropriate.
511 If a message is longer than one line, or minibuffer contents are
512 longer than one line, Emacs now resizes the minibuffer window unless
513 it is on a frame of its own. You can control the maximum minibuffer
514 window size by setting the following variable:
516 - User option: max-mini-window-height
518 Maximum height for resizing mini-windows. If a float, it specifies a
519 fraction of the mini-window frame's height. If an integer, it
520 specifies a number of lines. If nil, don't resize.
524 ** The command `Info-search' now uses a search history.
526 ** Changes to hideshow.el
528 Hideshow is now at version 5.x. It uses a new algorithms for block
529 selection and traversal and includes more isearch support.
531 *** Generalized block selection and traversal
533 A block is now recognized by three things: its start and end regexps
534 (both strings), and a match-data selector (an integer) specifying
535 which sub-expression in the start regexp serves as the place where a
536 `forward-sexp'-like function can operate. Hideshow always adjusts
537 point to this sub-expression before calling `hs-forward-sexp-func'
538 (which for most modes evaluates to `forward-sexp').
540 If the match-data selector is not specified, it defaults to zero,
541 i.e., the entire start regexp is valid, w/ no prefix. This is
542 backwards compatible with previous versions of hideshow. Please see
543 the docstring for variable `hs-special-modes-alist' for details.
545 *** Isearch support for updating mode line
547 During incremental search, if Hideshow minor mode is active, hidden
548 blocks are temporarily shown. The variable `hs-headline' records the
549 line at the beginning of the opened block (preceding the hidden
550 portion of the buffer), and the mode line is refreshed. When a block
551 is re-hidden, the variable is set to nil.
553 To show `hs-headline' in the mode line, you may wish to include
554 something like this in your .emacs.
556 (add-hook 'hs-minor-mode-hook
558 (add-to-list 'mode-line-format 'hs-headline)))
560 ** Changes to Change Log mode and Add-Log functions
562 If you invoke `add-change-log-entry' from a backup file, it makes an
563 entry appropriate for the file's parent. This is useful for making
564 log entries by comparing a version with deleted functions.
566 New command M-x change-log-merge merges another log into the current
567 buffer, fixing old-style date formats if necessary.
569 Change Log mode now adds a file's version number to change log entries
570 if user-option `change-log-version-info-enabled' is non-nil.
572 The search for a file's version number is performed based on regular
573 expressions from `change-log-version-number-regexp-list' which can be
574 cutomized. Version numbers are only found in the first 10 percent of
577 ** Changes in Font Lock
579 *** The new function `font-lock-remove-keywords' can be used to remove
580 font-lock keywords from the current buffer or from a specific major
583 ** Comint (subshell) changes
585 Comint now includes new features to send commands to running processes
586 and redirect the output to a designated buffer or buffers.
588 The command M-x comint-redirect-send-command reads a command and
589 buffer name from the mini-buffer. The command is sent to the current
590 buffer's process, and its output is inserted into the specified buffer.
592 The command M-x comint-redirect-send-command-to-process acts like
593 M-x comint-redirect-send-command but additionally reads the name of
594 the buffer whose process should be used from the mini-buffer.
596 Packages based on comint.el like shell-mode, and
597 scheme-interaction-mode now highlight user input, and support choosing
598 previous input with mouse-2. To control this feature, see the
599 user-option `comint-highlight-input'.
601 ** Changes to Rmail mode
603 *** The new user-option rmail-rmail-user-mail-address-regexp can be
604 set to fine tune the identification of of the correspondent when
605 receiving new mail. If it matches the address of the sender, the
606 recipient is taken as correspondent of a mail. If nil, the default,
607 `user-login-name' and `user-mail-address' are used to exclude yourself
610 Usually you don't have to set this variable, except if you collect
611 mails sent by you under different user names. Then it should be a
612 regexp matching your mail addresses.
614 *** The new user-option rmail-confirm-expunge controls whether and how
615 to ask for confirmation before expunging deleted messages from an
616 Rmail file. You can choose between no confirmation, confirmation
617 with y-or-n-p, or confirmation with yes-or-no-p. Default is to ask
618 for confirmation with yes-or-no-p.
620 *** RET is now bound in the Rmail summary to rmail-summary-goto-msg,
623 *** There is a new user option `rmail-digest-end-regexps' that
624 specifies the regular expressions to detect the line that ends a
627 *** The new user option `rmail-automatic-folder-directives' specifies
628 in which folder to put messages automatically.
630 ** Changes to TeX mode
632 The default mode has been changed from `plain-tex-mode' to
635 ** Changes to RefTeX mode
637 *** RefTeX has new support for index generation. Index entries can be
638 created with `C-c <', with completion available on index keys.
639 Pressing `C-c /' indexes the word at the cursor with a default
640 macro. `C-c >' compiles all index entries into an alphabetically
641 sorted *Index* buffer which looks like the final index. Entries
642 can be edited from that buffer.
644 *** Label and citation key selection now allow to select several
645 items and reference them together (use `m' to mark items, `a' or
646 `A' to use all marked entries).
648 *** reftex.el has been split into a number of smaller files to reduce
649 memory use when only a part of RefTeX is being used.
651 *** a new command `reftex-view-crossref-from-bibtex' (bound to `C-c &'
652 in BibTeX-mode) can be called in a BibTeX database buffer in order
653 to show locations in LaTeX documents where a particular entry has
656 ** Emacs Lisp mode now allows multiple levels of outline headings.
657 The level of a heading is determined from the number of leading
658 semicolons in a heading line. Toplevel forms starting with a `('
659 in column 1 are always made leaves.
661 ** The M-x time-stamp command (most commonly used on write-file-hooks)
662 has the following new features:
664 *** The patterns for finding the time stamp and for updating a pattern
665 may match text spanning multiple lines. For example, some people like
666 to have the filename and date on separate lines. The new variable
667 time-stamp-inserts-lines controls the matching for multi-line patterns.
669 *** More than one time stamp can be updated in the same file. This
670 feature is useful if you need separate time stamps in a program source
671 file to both include in formatted documentation and insert in the
672 compiled binary. The same time-stamp will be written at each matching
673 pattern. The variable time-stamp-count enables this new feature; it
676 ** Partial Completion mode now completes environment variables in
681 Tooltips are small X windows displaying a help string at the current
682 mouse position. To use them, use the Lisp package `tooltip' which you
683 can access via the user option `tooltip-mode'.
685 Tooltips also provides support for GUD debugging. If activated,
686 variable values can be displayed in tooltips by pointing at them with
687 the mouse in source buffers. You can customize various aspects of the
688 tooltip display in the group `tooltip'.
692 *** Customize now supports comments about customized items. Use the
693 `State' menu to add comments. Note that customization comments will
694 cause the customizations to fail in earlier versions of Emacs.
696 *** The new option `custom-buffer-done-function' says whether to kill
697 Custom buffers when you've done with them or just bury them (the
700 *** The keyword :set-after in defcustom allows to specify dependencies
701 between custom options. Example:
703 (defcustom default-input-method nil
704 "*Default input method for multilingual text (a string).
705 This is the input method activated automatically by the command
706 `toggle-input-method' (\\[toggle-input-method])."
708 :type '(choice (const nil) string)
709 :set-after '(current-language-environment))
711 This specifies that default-input-method should be set after
712 current-language-environment even if default-input-method appears
713 first in a custom-set-variables statement.
715 ** New features in evaluation commands
717 *** The commands to evaluate Lisp expressions, such as C-M-x in Lisp
718 modes, C-j in Lisp Interaction mode, and M-:, now bind the variables
719 print-level, print-length, and debug-on-error based on the
720 customizable variables eval-expression-print-level,
721 eval-expression-print-length, and eval-expression-debug-on-error.
723 *** The function `eval-defun' (M-C-x) now loads Edebug and instruments
724 code when called with a prefix argument.
728 *** New variable `dired-recursive-deletes' determines if the delete
729 command will delete non-empty directories recursively. The default
730 is, delete only empty directories.
732 *** New variable `dired-recursive-copies' determines if the copy
733 command will copy directories recursively. The default is, do not
734 copy directories recursively.
736 *** In command `dired-do-shell-command' (usually bound to `!') a `?'
737 in the shell command has a special meaning similar to `*', but with
738 the difference that the command will be run on each file individually.
740 *** The new command `dired-find-alternate-file' (usually bound to `a')
741 replaces the Dired buffer with the buffer for an alternate file or
744 *** The new command `dired-show-file-type' (usually bound to `w') shows
745 a message in the echo area describing what type of file the point is on.
746 This command invokes the external program `file' do its work, and so
747 will only work on systems with that program, and will be only as
748 accurate or inaccurate as it is.
750 ** The variable mail-specify-envelope-from controls whether to
751 use the -f option when sending mail.
755 Note: This release contains changes that might not be compatible with
756 current user setups (although it's believed that these
757 incompatibilities will only show in very uncommon circumstances).
758 However, since the impact is uncertain, these changes may be rolled
759 back depending on user feedback. Therefore there's no forward
760 compatibility guarantee wrt the new features introduced in this
763 *** New initialization procedure for the style system.
764 When the initial style for a buffer is determined by CC Mode (from the
765 variable c-default-style), the global values of style variables now
766 take precedence over the values specified by the chosen style. This
767 is different than the old behavior: previously, the style-specific
768 settings would override the global settings. This change makes it
769 possible to do simple configuration in the intuitive way with
770 Customize or with setq lines in one's .emacs file.
772 By default, the global value of every style variable is the new
773 special symbol set-from-style, which causes the value to be taken from
774 the style system. This means that in effect, only an explicit setting
775 of a style variable will cause the "overriding" behavior described
778 Also note that global settings override style-specific settings *only*
779 when the initial style of a buffer is chosen by a CC Mode major mode
780 function. When a style is chosen in other ways --- for example, by a
781 call like (c-set-style "gnu") in a hook, or via M-x c-set-style ---
782 then the style-specific values take precedence over any global style
783 values. In Lisp terms, global values override style-specific values
784 only when the new second argument to c-set-style is non-nil; see the
785 function documentation for more info.
787 The purpose of these changes is to make it easier for users,
788 especially novice users, to do simple customizations with Customize or
789 with setq in their .emacs files. On the other hand, the new system is
790 intended to be compatible with advanced users' customizations as well,
791 such as those that choose styles in hooks or whatnot. This new system
792 is believed to be almost entirely compatible with current
793 configurations, in spite of the changed precedence between style and
794 global variable settings when a buffer's default style is set.
796 (Thanks to Eric Eide for clarifying this explanation a bit.)
798 **** c-offsets-alist is now a customizable variable.
799 This became possible as a result of the new initialization behavior.
801 This variable is treated slightly differently from the other style
802 variables; instead of using the symbol set-from-style, it will be
803 completed with the syntactic symbols it doesn't already contain when
804 the style is first initialized. This means it now defaults to the
805 empty list to make all syntactic elements get their values from the
808 **** Compatibility variable to restore the old behavior.
809 In case your configuration doesn't work with this change, you can set
810 c-old-style-variable-behavior to non-nil to get the old behavior back
813 *** Improvements to line breaking and text filling.
814 CC Mode now handles this more intelligently and seamlessly wrt the
815 surrounding code, especially inside comments. For details see the new
816 chapter about this in the manual.
818 **** New variable to recognize comment line prefix decorations.
819 The variable c-comment-prefix-regexp has been added to properly
820 recognize the line prefix in both block and line comments. It's
821 primarily used to initialize the various paragraph recognition and
822 adaptive filling variables that the text handling functions uses.
824 **** New variable c-block-comment-prefix.
825 This is a generalization of the now obsolete variable
826 c-comment-continuation-stars to handle arbitrary strings.
828 **** CC Mode now uses adaptive fill mode.
829 This to make it adapt better to the paragraph style inside comments.
831 It's also possible to use other adaptive filling packages inside CC
832 Mode, notably Kyle E. Jones' Filladapt mode (http://wonderworks.com/).
833 A new convenience function c-setup-filladapt sets up Filladapt for use
836 Note though that the 2.12 version of Filladapt lacks a feature that
837 causes it to work suboptimally when c-comment-prefix-regexp can match
838 the empty string (which it commonly does). A patch for that is
839 available from the CC Mode web site (http://www.python.org/emacs/
842 **** It's now possible to selectively turn off auto filling.
843 The variable c-ignore-auto-fill is used to ignore auto fill mode in
844 specific contexts, e.g. in preprocessor directives and in string
847 **** New context sensitive line break function c-context-line-break.
848 It works like newline-and-indent in normal code, and adapts the line
849 prefix according to the comment style when used inside comments. If
850 you're normally using newline-and-indent, you might want to switch to
853 *** Fixes to IDL mode.
854 It now does a better job in recognizing only the constructs relevant
855 to IDL. E.g. it no longer matches "class" as the beginning of a
856 struct block, but it does match the CORBA 2.3 "valuetype" keyword.
859 *** Improvements to the Whitesmith style.
860 It now keeps the style consistently on all levels and both when
861 opening braces hangs and when they don't.
863 **** New lineup function c-lineup-whitesmith-in-block.
865 *** New lineup functions c-lineup-template-args and c-indent-multi-line-block.
866 See their docstrings for details. c-lineup-template-args does a
867 better job of tracking the brackets used as parens in C++ templates,
868 and is used by default to line up continued template arguments.
870 *** c-lineup-comment now preserves alignment with a comment on the
871 previous line. It used to instead preserve comments that started in
872 the column specified by comment-column.
874 *** c-lineup-C-comments handles "free form" text comments.
875 In comments with a long delimiter line at the start, the indentation
876 is kept unchanged for lines that start with an empty comment line
877 prefix. This is intended for the type of large block comments that
878 contain documentation with its own formatting. In these you normally
879 don't want CC Mode to change the indentation.
881 *** The `c' syntactic symbol is now relative to the comment start
882 instead of the previous line, to make integers usable as lineup
885 *** All lineup functions have gotten docstrings.
887 *** More preprocessor directive movement functions.
888 c-down-conditional does the reverse of c-up-conditional.
889 c-up-conditional-with-else and c-down-conditional-with-else are
890 variants of these that also stops at "#else" lines (suggested by Don
893 *** Minor improvements to many movement functions in tricky situations.
895 ** Makefile mode changes
897 *** The mode now uses the abbrev table `makefile-mode-abbrev-table'.
899 *** Conditionals and include statements are now highlighted when
900 Fontlock mode is active.
904 ** In Isearch mode, M-C-s and M-C-r are now bound like C-s and C-r,
905 respectively, i.e. you can repeat a regexp isearch with the same keys
906 that started the search.
908 *** In Isearch mode, mouse-2 in the echo area now yanks the current
909 selection into the search string rather than giving an error.
911 *** There is a new lazy highlighting feature in incremental search.
913 Lazy highlighting is switched on/off by customizing variable
914 `isearch-lazy-highlight'. When active, all matches for the current
915 search string are highlighted. The current match is highlighted as
916 before using face `isearch' or `region'. All other matches are
917 highlighted using face `isearch-lazy-highlight-face' which defaults to
918 `secondary-selection'.
920 The extra highlighting makes it easier to anticipate where the cursor
921 will end up each time you press C-s or C-r to repeat a pending search.
922 Highlighting of these additional matches happens in a deferred fashion
923 using "idle timers," so the cycles needed do not rob isearch of its
924 usual snappy response.
926 If `isearch-lazy-highlight-cleanup' is set to t, highlights for
927 matches are automatically cleared when you end the search. If it is
928 set to nil, you can remove the highlights manually with `M-x
929 isearch-lazy-highlight-cleanup'.
931 ** Changes in sort.el
933 The function sort-numeric-fields interprets numbers starting with `0'
934 as octal and numbers starting with `0x' or `0X' as hexadecimal. The
935 new user-option sort-numberic-base can be used to specify a default
938 ** Changes to Ange-ftp
940 *** Ange-ftp allows you to specify of a port number in remote file
941 names cleanly. It is appended to the host name, separated by a hash
942 sign, e.g. `/foo@bar.org#666:mumble'. (This syntax comes from EFS.)
944 *** If the new user-option `ange-ftp-try-passive-mode' is set, passive
945 ftp mode will be used if the ftp client supports that.
947 ** Shell script mode changes.
949 Shell script mode (sh-script) can now indent scripts for shells
950 derived from sh and rc. The indentation style is customizeable, and
951 sh-script can attempt to "learn" the current buffer's style.
955 *** In DOS, etags looks for file.cgz if it cannot find file.c.
957 *** New option --ignore-case-regex is an alternative to --regex. It is now
958 possible to bind a regexp to a language, by prepending the regexp with
959 {lang}, where lang is one of the languages that `etags --help' prints out.
960 This feature is useful especially for regex files, where each line contains
961 a regular expression. The manual contains details.
963 *** In C and derived languages, etags creates tags for function
964 declarations when given the --declarations option.
966 *** In C++, tags are created for "operator". The tags have the form
967 "operator+", without spaces between the keyword and the operator.
969 *** New language Ada: tags are functions, procedures, packages, tasks, and
972 *** In Fortran, `procedure' is not tagged.
974 *** In Java, tags are created for "interface".
976 *** In Lisp, "(defstruct (foo", "(defun (operator" and similar constructs
979 *** In Perl, the --globals option tags global variables. my and local
980 variables are tagged.
982 *** New language Python: def and class at the beginning of a line are tags.
984 *** .ss files are Scheme files, .pdb is Postscript with C syntax, .psw is
987 ** Changes in etags.el
989 *** The new user-option tags-case-fold-search can be used to make
990 tags operations case-sensitive or case-insensitive. The default
991 is to use the same setting as case-fold-search.
993 *** You can display additional output with M-x tags-apropos by setting
994 the new variable tags-apropos-additional-actions.
996 If non-nil, the variable's value should be a list of triples (TITLE
997 FUNCTION TO-SEARCH). For each triple, M-x tags-apropos processes
998 TO-SEARCH and lists tags from it. TO-SEARCH should be an alist,
999 obarray, or symbol. If it is a symbol, the symbol's value is used.
1001 TITLE is a string to use to label the list of tags from TO-SEARCH.
1003 FUNCTION is a function to call when an entry is selected in the Tags
1004 List buffer. It is called with one argument, the selected symbol.
1006 A useful example value for this variable might be something like:
1008 '(("Emacs Lisp" Info-goto-emacs-command-node obarray)
1009 ("Common Lisp" common-lisp-hyperspec common-lisp-hyperspec-obarray)
1010 ("SCWM" scwm-documentation scwm-obarray))
1012 *** The face tags-tag-face can be used to customize the appearance
1013 of tags in the output of M-x tags-apropos.
1015 *** Setting tags-apropos-verbose to a non-nil value displays the
1016 names of tags files in the *Tags List* buffer.
1018 ** Emacs now attempts to determine the initial language environment
1019 and preferred and locale coding systems systematically from the
1020 LC_ALL, LC_CTYPE, and LANG environment variables during startup.
1022 ** New language environments `Polish', `Latin-8' and `Latin-9'.
1023 Latin-8 and Latin-9 correspond respectively to the ISO character sets
1024 8859-14 (Celtic) and 8859-15 (updated Latin-1, with the Euro sign).
1025 There is currently no specific input method support for them.
1027 ** Fortran mode has a new command `fortran-strip-sequence-nos' to
1028 remove text past column 72. The syntax class of `\' in Fortran is now
1029 appropriate for C-style escape sequences in strings.
1031 ** SGML mode's default `sgml-validate-command' is now `nsgmls'.
1033 ** A new command `view-emacs-problems' (C-h P) displays the PROBLEMS file.
1035 ** The Dabbrev package has a new user-option `dabbrev-ignore-regexps'
1036 containing a list of regular expressions. Buffers matching a regular
1037 expression from that list, are not checked.
1039 ** New modes and packages
1041 *** The new package xml.el provides a simple but generic XML
1042 parser. It doesn't parse the DTDs however.
1044 *** The comment operations are now provided by the newcomment.el
1045 package which allows different styles of comment-region and should
1046 be more robust while offering the same functionality.
1048 *** The Ebrowse package implements a C++ class browser and tags
1049 facilities tailored for use with C++. It is documented in a
1050 separate Texinfo file.
1052 *** The PCL-CVS package available by either running M-x cvs-examine
1053 or by visiting a CVS administrative directory (with a prefix argument)
1054 provides an alternative interface to VC-dired for CVS.
1055 It comes with log-view-mode to view RCS and SCCS logs and log-edit-mode
1056 used to enter checkin log messages.
1058 *** The new package called `woman' allows to browse Unix man pages
1059 without invoking external programs.
1061 The command `M-x woman' formats manual pages entirely in Emacs Lisp
1062 and then displays them, like `M-x manual-entry' does. Unlike
1063 `manual-entry', `woman' does not invoke any external programs, so it
1064 is useful on systems such as MS-DOS/MS-Windows where the `man' and
1065 Groff or `troff' commands are not readily available.
1067 The command `M-x woman-find-file' asks for the file name of a man
1068 page, then formats and displays it like `M-x woman' does.
1070 *** The new command M-x re-builder offers a convenient interface for
1071 authoring regular expressions with immediate visual feedback.
1073 The buffer from which the command was called becomes the target for
1074 the regexp editor popping up in a separate window. Matching text in
1075 the target buffer is immediately color marked during the editing.
1076 Each sub-expression of the regexp will show up in a different face so
1077 even complex regexps can be edited and verified on target data in a
1080 On displays not supporting faces the matches instead blink like
1081 matching parens to make them stand out. On such a setup you will
1082 probably also want to use the sub-expression mode when the regexp
1083 contains such to get feedback about their respective limits.
1085 *** glasses-mode is a minor mode that makes
1086 unreadableIdentifiersLikeThis readable. It works as glasses, without
1087 actually modifying content of a buffer.
1089 *** The package ebnf2ps translates an EBNF to a syntactic chart in
1092 Currently accepts ad-hoc EBNF, ISO EBNF and Bison/Yacc.
1094 The ad-hoc default EBNF syntax has the following elements:
1096 ; comment (until end of line)
1100 $A default non-terminal
1101 $"C" default terminal
1102 $?C? default special
1103 A = B. production (A is the header and B the body)
1104 C D sequence (C occurs before D)
1105 C | D alternative (C or D occurs)
1106 A - B exception (A excluding B, B without any non-terminal)
1107 n * A repetition (A repeats n (integer) times)
1108 (C) group (expression C is grouped together)
1109 [C] optional (C may or not occurs)
1110 C+ one or more occurrences of C
1111 {C}+ one or more occurrences of C
1112 {C}* zero or more occurrences of C
1113 {C} zero or more occurrences of C
1114 C / D equivalent to: C {D C}*
1115 {C || D}+ equivalent to: C {D C}*
1116 {C || D}* equivalent to: [C {D C}*]
1117 {C || D} equivalent to: [C {D C}*]
1119 Please, see ebnf2ps documentation for EBNF syntax and how to use it.
1121 *** The package align.el will align columns within a region, using M-x
1122 align. Its mode-specific rules, based on regular expressions,
1123 determine where the columns should be split. In C and C++, for
1124 example, it will align variable names in declaration lists, or the
1125 equal signs of assignments.
1127 *** `paragraph-indent-minor-mode' is a new minor mode supporting
1128 paragraphs in the same style as `paragraph-indent-text-mode'.
1130 *** bs.el is a new package for buffer selection similar to
1131 list-buffers or electric-buffer-list. Use M-x bs-show to display a
1132 buffer menu with this package. You can use M-x bs-customize to
1133 customize the package.
1135 *** find-lisp.el is a package emulating the Unix find command in Lisp.
1137 *** calculator.el is a small calculator package that is intended to
1138 replace desktop calculators such as xcalc and calc.exe. Actually, it
1139 is not too small - it has more features than most desktop calculators,
1140 and can be customized easily to get many more functions. It should
1141 not be confused with "calc" which is a much bigger mathematical tool
1142 which answers different needs.
1144 *** The minor modes cwarn-mode and global-cwarn-mode highlights
1145 suspicious C and C++ constructions. Currently, assignments inside
1146 expressions, semicolon following `if', `for' and `while' (except, of
1147 course, after a `do .. while' statement), and C++ functions with
1148 reference parameters are recognized. The modes require font-lock mode
1151 *** smerge-mode.el provides `smerge-mode', a simple minor-mode for files
1152 containing diff3-style conflict markers, such as generated by RCS.
1154 *** 5x5.el is a simple puzzle game.
1156 *** hl-line.el provides a minor mode to highlight the current line.
1158 *** ansi-color.el translates ANSI terminal escapes into text-properties.
1160 *** delphi.el provides a major mode for editing the Delphi (Object
1163 *** quickurl.el provides a simple method of inserting a URL based on
1166 *** sql.el provides an interface to SQL data bases.
1168 *** fortune.el uses the fortune program to create mail/news signatures.
1170 *** whitespace.el ???
1172 *** PostScript mode (ps-mode) is a new major mode for editing PostScript
1173 files. It offers: interaction with a PostScript interpreter, including
1174 (very basic) error handling; fontification, easily customizable for
1175 interpreter messages; auto-indentation; insertion of EPSF templates and
1176 often used code snippets; viewing of BoundingBox; commenting out /
1177 uncommenting regions; conversion of 8bit characters to PostScript octal
1178 codes. All functionality is accessible through a menu.
1180 *** delim-col helps to prettify columns in a text region or rectangle.
1182 Here is an example of columns:
1185 dog pineapple car EXTRA
1186 porcupine strawberry airplane
1188 Doing the following settings:
1190 (setq delimit-columns-str-before "[ ")
1191 (setq delimit-columns-str-after " ]")
1192 (setq delimit-columns-str-separator ", ")
1193 (setq delimit-columns-separator "\t")
1196 Selecting the lines above and typing:
1198 M-x delimit-columns-region
1202 [ horse , apple , bus , ]
1203 [ dog , pineapple , car , EXTRA ]
1204 [ porcupine, strawberry, airplane, ]
1206 delim-col has the following options:
1208 delimit-columns-str-before Specify a string to be inserted
1211 delimit-columns-str-separator Specify a string to be inserted
1212 between each column.
1214 delimit-columns-str-after Specify a string to be inserted
1217 delimit-columns-separator Specify a regexp which separates
1220 delim-col has the following commands:
1222 delimit-columns-region Prettify all columns in a text region.
1223 delimit-columns-rectangle Prettify all columns in a text rectangle.
1225 *** The package recentf.el maintains a menu for visiting files that
1226 were operated on recently.
1228 M-x recentf-mode RET toggles recentf mode.
1230 M-x customize-variable RET recentf-mode RET can be used to enable
1231 recentf at Emacs startup.
1233 M-x customize-variable RET recentf-menu-filter RET to specify a menu
1234 filter function to change the menu appearance. For example, the recent
1235 file list can be displayed:
1237 - organized by major modes, directories or user defined rules.
1238 - sorted by file pathes, file names, ascending or descending.
1239 - showing pathes relative to the current default-directory
1241 The `recentf-filter-changer' menu filter function allows to
1242 dynamically change the menu appearance.
1244 *** elide-head.el provides a mechanism for eliding boilerplate header
1247 *** footnote.el provides `footnote-mode', a minor mode supporting use
1248 of footnotes. It is intended for use with Message mode, but isn't
1249 specific to Message mode.
1251 *** diff-mode.el provides `diff-mode', a major mode for
1252 viewing/editing context diffs (patches). It is selected for files
1253 with extension `.diff', `.diffs', `.patch' and `.rej'.
1255 *** EUDC, the Emacs Unified Directory Client, provides a common user
1256 interface to access directory servers using different directory
1257 protocols. It has a separate manual.
1259 *** autoconf.el provides a major mode for editing configure.in files
1260 for Autoconf, selected automatically.
1262 *** windmove.el provides moving between windows.
1264 *** crm.el provides a facility to read multiple strings from the
1265 minibuffer with completion.
1267 *** todo-mode.el provides management of TODO lists and integration
1268 with the diary features.
1270 *** autoarg.el provides a feature reported from Twenex Emacs whereby
1271 numeric keys supply prefix args rather than self inserting.
1273 *** The function `turn-off-auto-fill' unconditionally turns off Auto
1276 ** Withdrawn packages
1278 *** mldrag.el has been removed. mouse.el provides the same
1279 functionality with aliases for the mldrag functions.
1281 *** eval-reg.el has been obsoleted by changes to edebug.el and removed.
1283 *** ph.el has been obsoleted by EUDC and removed.
1286 * Lisp changes made after edition 2.6 of the Emacs Lisp Manual,
1287 (Display-related features are described in a page of their own below.)
1289 ** The value of the `help-echo' text property is called as a function
1290 or evaluated, if it is not a string already, to obtain a help string.
1292 ** Function `make-obsolete' now has an optional arg to say when the
1293 function was declared obsolete.
1295 ** Function plist-member is renamed from widget-plist-member (which is
1296 retained as an alias).
1298 ** Easy-menu's :filter now works as in XEmacs.
1299 It takes the unconverted (i.e. XEmacs) form of the menu and the result
1300 is automatically converted to Emacs' form.
1302 ** The new function `window-list' has been defined
1304 - Function: window-list &optional WINDOW MINIBUF ALL-FRAMES
1306 Return a list of windows in canonical order. The parameters WINDOW,
1307 MINIBUF and ALL-FRAMES are defined like for `next-window'.
1309 ** There's a new function `some-window' defined as follows
1311 - Function: some-window PREDICATE &optional MINIBUF ALL-FRAMES DEFAULT
1313 Return a window satisfying PREDICATE.
1315 This function cycles through all visible windows using `walk-windows',
1316 calling PREDICATE on each one. PREDICATE is called with a window as
1317 argument. The first window for which PREDICATE returns a non-nil
1318 value is returned. If no window satisfies PREDICATE, DEFAULT is
1321 Optional second arg MINIBUF t means count the minibuffer window even
1322 if not active. MINIBUF nil or omitted means count the minibuffer iff
1323 it is active. MINIBUF neither t nor nil means not to count the
1324 minibuffer even if it is active.
1326 Several frames may share a single minibuffer; if the minibuffer
1327 counts, all windows on all frames that share that minibuffer count
1328 too. Therefore, if you are using a separate minibuffer frame
1329 and the minibuffer is active and MINIBUF says it counts,
1330 `walk-windows' includes the windows in the frame from which you
1331 entered the minibuffer, as well as the minibuffer window.
1333 ALL-FRAMES is the optional third argument.
1334 ALL-FRAMES nil or omitted means cycle within the frames as specified above.
1335 ALL-FRAMES = `visible' means include windows on all visible frames.
1336 ALL-FRAMES = 0 means include windows on all visible and iconified frames.
1337 ALL-FRAMES = t means include windows on all frames including invisible frames.
1338 If ALL-FRAMES is a frame, it means include windows on that frame.
1339 Anything else means restrict to the selected frame.
1341 ** The function `single-key-description' now encloses function key
1342 and event names in angle brackets.
1344 ** If the variable `message-truncate-lines' is bound to t around a
1345 call to `message', the echo area will not be resized to display that
1346 message; it will be truncated instead, as it was done in 20.x.
1347 Default value is nil.
1349 ** The user option line-number-display-limit can now be set to nil,
1352 ** select-safe-coding-system now also checks the most preferred
1353 coding-system if buffer-file-coding-system is `undecided' and
1354 DEFAULT-CODING-SYSTEM is not specified,
1356 ** The function `subr-arity' provides information on the argument list
1359 ** The text property `keymap' specifies a key map which overrides the
1360 buffer's local map and the map specified by the `local-map' property.
1361 This is probably what most current uses of `local-map' want, rather
1362 than replacing the local map.
1364 ** The obsolete variables before-change-function and
1365 after-change-function are no longer acted upon and have been removed.
1367 ** The function `apropos-mode' runs the hook `apropos-mode-hook'.
1369 ** `concat' no longer accepts individual integer arguments, as
1373 * Lisp changes in Emacs 21.1 (see following page for display-related features)
1375 Note that +++ before an item means the Lisp manual has been updated.
1376 --- means that I have decided it does not need to be in the Lisp manual.
1377 When you add a new item, please add it without either +++ or ---
1378 so I will know I still need to look at it -- rms.
1380 *** The functions `find-charset-region' and `find-charset-string' include
1381 `eight-bit-control' and/or `eight-bit-graphic' in the returned list
1382 when it finds 8-bit characters. Previously, it included `ascii' in a
1383 multibyte buffer and `unknown' in a unibyte buffer.
1385 *** The functions `set-buffer-modified', `string-as-multibyte' and
1386 `string-as-unibyte' change the byte sequence of a buffer if it
1387 contains a character from the `eight-bit-control' character set.
1389 *** The handling of multibyte sequences in a multibyte buffer is
1390 changed. Previously, a byte sequence matching the pattern
1391 [\200-\237][\240-\377]+ was interpreted as a single character
1392 regardless of the length of the trailing bytes [\240-\377]+. Thus, if
1393 the sequence was longer than what the leading byte indicated, the
1394 extra trailing bytes were ignored by Lisp functions. Now such extra
1395 bytes are independent 8-bit characters belonging to the charset
1398 ** Fontsets are now implemented using char-tables.
1400 A fontset can now be specified for for each independent character, for
1401 a group of characters or for a character set rather than just for a
1402 character set as previously.
1404 *** The arguments of the function `set-fontset-font' are changed.
1405 They are NAME, CHARACTER, FONTNAME, and optional FRAME. The function
1406 modifies fontset NAME to use FONTNAME for CHARACTER.
1408 CHARACTER may be a cons (FROM . TO), where FROM and TO are non-generic
1409 characters. In that case FONTNAME is used for all characters in the
1410 range FROM and TO (inclusive). CHARACTER may be a charset. In that
1411 case FONTNAME is used for all character in the charset.
1413 FONTNAME may be a cons (FAMILY . REGISTRY), where FAMILY is the family
1414 name of a font and REGSITRY is a registry name of a font.
1416 *** Variable x-charset-registry has been deleted. The default charset
1417 registries of character sets are set in the default fontset
1420 *** The function `create-fontset-from-fontset-spec' ignores the second
1421 argument STYLE-VARIANT. It never creates style-variant fontsets.
1423 ** The method of composing characters is changed. Now character
1424 composition is done by a special text property `composition' in
1425 buffers and strings.
1427 *** Charset composition is deleted. Emacs never creates a `composite
1428 character' which is an independent character with a unique character
1429 code. Thus the following functions handling `composite characters'
1430 have been deleted: composite-char-component,
1431 composite-char-component-count, composite-char-composition-rule,
1432 composite-char-composition-rule and decompose-composite-char delete.
1433 The variables leading-code-composition and min-composite-char have
1436 *** Three more glyph reference points are added. They can be used to
1437 specify a composition rule. See the documentation of the variable
1438 `reference-point-alist' for more detail.
1440 *** The function `compose-region' takes new arguments COMPONENTS and
1441 MODIFICATION-FUNC. With COMPONENTS, you can specify not only a
1442 composition rule but also characters to be composed. Such characters
1443 may differ between buffer and string text.
1445 *** The function `compose-string' takes new arguments START, END,
1446 COMPONENTS, and MODIFICATION-FUNC.
1448 *** The function `compose-string' puts text property `composition'
1449 directly on the argument STRING instead of returning a new string.
1450 Likewise, the function `decompose-string' just removes text property
1451 `composition' from STRING.
1453 *** The new function `find-composition' returns information about
1454 a composition at a specified position in a buffer or a string.
1456 *** The function `decompose-composite-char' is now labeled as
1459 ** The new character set `mule-unicode-0100-24ff' is introduced for
1460 Unicode characters of the range U+0100..U+24FF. Currently, this
1461 character set is not used.
1463 ** The new character sets `japanese-jisx0213-1' and
1464 `japanese-jisx0213-2' are introduced for the new Japanese standard JIS
1465 X 0213 Plane 1 and Plane 2.
1468 ** The new character sets `eight-bit-control' and `eight-bit-graphic'
1469 are introduced for 8-bit characters in the ranges 0x80..0x9F and
1470 0xA0..0xFF respectively.
1473 ** If the APPEND argument of `write-region' is an integer, it seeks to
1474 that offset in the file before writing.
1476 ** The function `add-minor-mode' has been added for convenience and
1477 compatibility with XEmacs (and is used internally by define-minor-mode).
1479 ** The function `shell-command' now sets the default directory of the
1480 `*Shell Command Output*' buffer to the default directory of the buffer
1481 from which the command was issued.
1483 ** The functions `query-replace', `query-replace-regexp',
1484 `query-replace-regexp-eval' `map-query-replace-regexp',
1485 `replace-string', `replace-regexp', and `perform-replace' take two
1486 additional optional arguments START and END that specify the region to
1489 ** The new function `count-screen-lines' is a more flexible alternative
1490 to `window-buffer-height'.
1492 - Function: count-screen-lines &optional BEG END COUNT-FINAL-NEWLINE WINDOW
1494 Return the number of screen lines in the region between BEG and END.
1495 The number of screen lines may be different from the number of actual
1496 lines, due to line breaking, display table, etc.
1498 Optional arguments BEG and END default to `point-min' and `point-max'
1501 If region ends with a newline, ignore it unless optinal third argument
1502 COUNT-FINAL-NEWLINE is non-nil.
1504 The optional fourth argument WINDOW specifies the window used for
1505 obtaining parameters such as width, horizontal scrolling, and so
1506 on. The default is to use the selected window's parameters.
1508 Like `vertical-motion', `count-screen-lines' always uses the current
1509 buffer, regardless of which buffer is displayed in WINDOW. This makes
1510 possible to use `count-screen-lines' in any buffer, whether or not it
1511 is currently displayed in some window.
1513 ** The new function `mapc' is like `mapcar' but doesn't collect the
1514 argument function's results.
1516 ** The functions base64-decode-region and base64-decode-string now
1517 signal an error instead of returning nil if decoding fails.
1519 ** The function sendmail-user-agent-compose now recognizes a `body'
1520 header is the list of headers passed to it.
1522 ** The new function member-ignore-case works like `member', but
1523 ignores differences in case and text representation.
1525 ** The buffer-local variable cursor-type can be used to specify the
1526 cursor to use in windows displaying a buffer. Values are interpreted
1529 t use the cursor specified for the frame (default)
1530 nil don't display a cursor
1531 `bar' display a bar cursor with default width
1532 (bar . WIDTH) display a bar cursor with width WIDTH
1533 others display a box cursor.
1535 ** The variable open-paren-in-column-0-is-defun-start controls whether
1536 an open parenthesis in column 0 is considered to be the start of a
1537 defun. If set, the default, it is considered a defun start. If not
1538 set, an open parenthesis in column 0 has no special meaning.
1540 ** The new function `string-to-syntax' can be used to translate syntax
1541 specifications in string form as accepted by `modify-syntax-entry' to
1542 the cons-cell form that is used for the values of the `syntax-table'
1543 text property, and in `font-lock-syntactic-keywords'.
1547 (string-to-syntax "()")
1550 ** Emacs' reader supports CL read syntax for integers in bases
1553 *** `#BINTEGER' or `#bINTEGER' reads INTEGER in binary (radix 2).
1554 INTEGER optionally contains a sign.
1561 *** `#OINTEGER' or `#oINTEGER' reads INTEGER in octal (radix 8).
1566 *** `#XINTEGER' or `#xINTEGER' reads INTEGER in hexadecimal (radix 16).
1571 *** `#RADIXrINTEGER' reads INTEGER in radix RADIX, 2 <= RADIX <= 36.
1578 ** The function `documentation-property' now evaluates the value of
1579 the given property to obtain a string if it doesn't refer to etc/DOC
1582 ** If called for a symbol, the function `documentation' now looks for
1583 a `function-documentation' property of that symbol. If it has a non-nil
1584 value, the documentation is taken from that value. If the value is
1585 not a string, it is evaluated to obtain a string.
1588 ** The last argument of `define-key-after' defaults to t for convenience.
1590 ** The new function `replace-regexp-in-string' replaces all matches
1591 for a regexp in a string.
1593 ** `mouse-position' now runs the abnormal hook
1594 `mouse-position-function'.
1596 ** The function string-to-number now returns a float for numbers
1597 that don't fit into a Lisp integer.
1599 ** The variable keyword-symbols-constants-flag has been removed.
1600 Keywords are now always considered constants.
1603 ** The new function `delete-and-extract-region' deletes text and
1606 ** The function `clear-this-command-keys' now also clears the vector
1607 returned by function `recent-keys'.
1610 ** Variables `beginning-of-defun-function' and `end-of-defun-function'
1611 can be used to define handlers for the functions that find defuns.
1612 Major modes can define these locally instead of rebinding M-C-a
1613 etc. if the normal conventions for defuns are not appropriate for the
1617 ** easy-mmode-define-minor-mode now takes an additional BODY argument
1618 and is renamed `define-minor-mode'.
1621 ** If an abbrev has a hook function which is a symbol, and that symbol
1622 has a non-nil `no-self-insert' property, the return value of the hook
1623 function specifies whether an expansion has been done or not. If it
1624 returns nil, abbrev-expand also returns nil, meaning "no expansion has
1627 When abbrev expansion is done by typing a self-inserting character,
1628 and the abbrev has a hook with the `no-self-insert' property, and the
1629 hook function returns non-nil meaning expansion has been done,
1630 then the self-inserting character is not inserted.
1633 ** The function `intern-soft' now accepts a symbol as first argument.
1634 In this case, that exact symbol is looked up in the specified obarray,
1635 and the function's value is nil if it is not found.
1638 ** The new macro `with-syntax-table' can be used to evaluate forms
1639 with the syntax table of the current buffer temporarily set to a
1642 (with-syntax-table TABLE &rest BODY)
1644 Evaluate BODY with syntax table of current buffer set to a copy of
1645 TABLE. The current syntax table is saved, BODY is evaluated, and the
1646 saved table is restored, even in case of an abnormal exit. Value is
1650 ** Regular expressions now support intervals \{n,m\} as well as
1651 Perl's shy-groups \(?:...\) and non-greedy *? +? and ?? operators.
1654 ** The optional argument BUFFER of function file-local-copy has been
1655 removed since it wasn't used by anything.
1658 ** The file name argument of function `file-locked-p' is now required
1659 instead of being optional.
1662 ** The new built-in error `text-read-only' is signaled when trying to
1663 modify read-only text.
1666 ** New functions and variables for locales.
1668 The new variable `locale-coding-system' specifies how to encode and
1669 decode strings passed to low-level message functions like strerror and
1670 time functions like strftime. The new variables
1671 `system-messages-locale' and `system-time-locale' give the system
1672 locales to be used when invoking these two types of functions.
1674 The new function `set-locale-environment' sets the language
1675 environment, preferred coding system, and locale coding system from
1676 the system locale as specified by the LC_ALL, LC_CTYPE, and LANG
1677 environment variables. Normally, it is invoked during startup and need
1678 not be invoked thereafter. It uses the new variables
1679 `locale-language-names', `locale-charset-language-names', and
1680 `locale-preferred-coding-systems' to make its decisions.
1683 ** syntax tables now understand nested comments.
1684 To declare a comment syntax as allowing nesting, just add an `n'
1685 modifier to either of the characters of the comment end and the comment
1689 ** The function `pixmap-spec-p' has been renamed `bitmap-spec-p'
1690 because `bitmap' is more in line with the usual X terminology.
1693 ** New function `propertize'
1695 The new function `propertize' can be used to conveniently construct
1696 strings with text properties.
1698 - Function: propertize STRING &rest PROPERTIES
1700 Value is a copy of STRING with text properties assigned as specified
1701 by PROPERTIES. PROPERTIES is a sequence of pairs PROPERTY VALUE, with
1702 PROPERTY being the name of a text property and VALUE being the
1703 specified value of that property. Example:
1705 (propertize "foo" 'face 'bold 'read-only t)
1708 ** push and pop macros.
1710 Simple versions of the push and pop macros of Common Lisp
1711 are now defined in Emacs Lisp. These macros allow only symbols
1712 as the place that holds the list to be changed.
1714 (push NEWELT LISTNAME) add NEWELT to the front of LISTNAME's value.
1715 (pop LISTNAME) return first elt of LISTNAME, and remove it
1716 (thus altering the value of LISTNAME).
1718 ** New dolist and dotimes macros.
1720 Simple versions of the dolist and dotimes macros of Common Lisp
1721 are now defined in Emacs Lisp.
1723 (dolist (VAR LIST [RESULT]) BODY...)
1724 Execute body once for each element of LIST,
1725 using the variable VAR to hold the current element.
1726 Then return the value of RESULT, or nil if RESULT is omitted.
1728 (dotimes (VAR COUNT [RESULT]) BODY...)
1729 Execute BODY with VAR bound to successive integers running from 0,
1730 inclusive, to COUNT, exclusive.
1731 Then return the value of RESULT, or nil if RESULT is omitted.
1734 ** Regular expressions now support Posix character classes such
1735 as [:alpha:], [:space:] and so on.
1737 [:digit:] matches 0 through 9
1738 [:cntrl:] matches ASCII control characters
1739 [:xdigit:] matches 0 through 9, a through f and A through F.
1740 [:blank:] matches space and tab only
1741 [:graph:] matches graphic characters--everything except ASCII control chars,
1743 [:print:] matches printing characters--everything except ASCII control chars
1745 [:alnum:] matches letters and digits.
1746 (But at present, for multibyte characters,
1747 it matches anything that has word syntax.)
1748 [:alpha:] matches letters.
1749 (But at present, for multibyte characters,
1750 it matches anything that has word syntax.)
1751 [:ascii:] matches ASCII (unibyte) characters.
1752 [:nonascii:] matches non-ASCII (multibyte) characters.
1753 [:lower:] matches anything lower-case.
1754 [:punct:] matches punctuation.
1755 (But at present, for multibyte characters,
1756 it matches anything that has non-word syntax.)
1757 [:space:] matches anything that has whitespace syntax.
1758 [:upper:] matches anything upper-case.
1759 [:word:] matches anything that has word syntax.
1762 ** Emacs now has built-in hash tables.
1764 The following functions are defined for hash tables:
1766 - Function: make-hash-table ARGS
1768 The argument list ARGS consists of keyword/argument pairs. All arguments
1769 are optional. The following arguments are defined:
1773 TEST must be a symbol specifying how to compare keys. Default is `eql'.
1774 Predefined are `eq', `eql' and `equal'. If TEST is not predefined,
1775 it must have been defined with `define-hash-table-test'.
1779 SIZE must be an integer > 0 giving a hint to the implementation how
1780 many elements will be put in the hash table. Default size is 65.
1782 :rehash-size REHASH-SIZE
1784 REHASH-SIZE specifies by how much to grow a hash table once it becomes
1785 full. If REHASH-SIZE is an integer, add that to the hash table's old
1786 size to get the new size. Otherwise, REHASH-SIZE must be a float >
1787 1.0, and the new size is computed by multiplying REHASH-SIZE with the
1788 old size. Default rehash size is 1.5.
1790 :rehash-threshold THRESHOLD
1792 THRESHOLD must be a float > 0 and <= 1.0 specifying when to resize the
1793 hash table. It is resized when the ratio of (number of entries) /
1794 (size of hash table) is >= THRESHOLD. Default threshold is 0.8.
1798 WEAK must be either nil, one of the symbols `key, `value', or t.
1799 Entries are removed from weak tables during garbage collection if
1800 their key and/or value are not referenced elsewhere outside of the
1801 hash table. Default are non-weak hash tables.
1803 - Function: makehash &optional TEST
1805 Similar to make-hash-table, but only TEST can be specified.
1807 - Function: hash-table-p TABLE
1809 Returns non-nil if TABLE is a hash table object.
1811 - Function: copy-hash-table TABLE
1813 Returns a copy of TABLE. Only the table itself is copied, keys and
1816 - Function: hash-table-count TABLE
1818 Returns the number of entries in TABLE.
1820 - Function: hash-table-rehash-size TABLE
1822 Returns the rehash size of TABLE.
1824 - Function: hash-table-rehash-threshold TABLE
1826 Returns the rehash threshold of TABLE.
1828 - Function: hash-table-rehash-size TABLE
1830 Returns the size of TABLE.
1832 - Function: hash-table-rehash-test TABLE
1834 Returns the test TABLE uses to compare keys.
1836 - Function: hash-table-weakness TABLE
1838 Returns the weakness specified for TABLE.
1840 - Function: clrhash TABLE
1844 - Function: gethash KEY TABLE &optional DEFAULT
1846 Look up KEY in TABLE and return its associated VALUE or DEFAULT if
1849 - Function: puthash KEY VALUE TABLE
1851 Associate KEY with VALUE in TABLE. If KEY is already associated with
1852 another value, replace the old value with VALUE.
1854 - Function: remhash KEY TABLE
1856 Remove KEY from TABLE if it is there.
1858 - Function: maphash FUNCTION TABLE
1860 Call FUNCTION for all elements in TABLE. FUNCTION must take two
1861 arguments KEY and VALUE.
1863 - Function: sxhash OBJ
1865 Return a hash code for Lisp object OBJ.
1867 - Function: define-hash-table-test NAME TEST-FN HASH-FN
1869 Define a new hash table test named NAME. If NAME is specified as
1870 a test in `make-hash-table', the table created will use TEST-FN for
1871 comparing keys, and HASH-FN to compute hash codes for keys. Test
1872 and hash function are stored as symbol property `hash-table-test'
1873 of NAME with a value of (TEST-FN HASH-FN).
1875 TEST-FN must take two arguments and return non-nil if they are the same.
1877 HASH-FN must take one argument and return an integer that is the hash
1878 code of the argument. The function should use the whole range of
1879 integer values for hash code computation, including negative integers.
1881 Example: The following creates a hash table whose keys are supposed to
1882 be strings that are compared case-insensitively.
1884 (defun case-fold-string= (a b)
1885 (compare-strings a nil nil b nil nil t))
1887 (defun case-fold-string-hash (a)
1888 (sxhash (upcase a)))
1890 (define-hash-table-test 'case-fold 'case-fold-string=
1891 'case-fold-string-hash))
1893 (make-hash-table :test 'case-fold)
1896 ** The Lisp reader handles circular structure.
1898 It now works to use the #N= and #N# constructs to represent
1899 circular structures. For example, #1=(a . #1#) represents
1900 a cons cell which is its own cdr.
1903 ** The Lisp printer handles circular structure.
1905 If you bind print-circle to a non-nil value, the Lisp printer outputs
1906 #N= and #N# constructs to represent circular and shared structure.
1909 ** If the second argument to `move-to-column' is anything but nil or
1910 t, that means replace a tab with spaces if necessary to reach the
1911 specified column, but do not add spaces at the end of the line if it
1912 is too short to reach that column.
1915 ** perform-replace has a new feature: the REPLACEMENTS argument may
1916 now be a cons cell (FUNCTION . DATA). This means to call FUNCTION
1917 after each match to get the replacement text. FUNCTION is called with
1918 two arguments: DATA, and the number of replacements already made.
1920 If the FROM-STRING contains any upper-case letters,
1921 perform-replace also turns off `case-fold-search' temporarily
1922 and inserts the replacement text without altering case in it.
1925 ** The function buffer-size now accepts an optional argument
1926 to specify which buffer to return the size of.
1929 ** The calendar motion commands now run the normal hook
1930 calendar-move-hook after moving point.
1933 ** The new variable small-temporary-file-directory specifies a
1934 directory to use for creating temporary files that are likely to be
1935 small. (Certain Emacs features use this directory.) If
1936 small-temporary-file-directory is nil, they use
1937 temporary-file-directory instead.
1940 ** The variable `inhibit-modification-hooks', if non-nil, inhibits all
1941 the hooks that track changes in the buffer. This affects
1942 `before-change-functions' and `after-change-functions', as well as
1943 hooks attached to text properties and overlay properties.
1946 ** assoc-delete-all is a new function that deletes all the
1947 elements of an alist which have a particular value as the car.
1950 ** make-temp-file provides a more reliable way to create a temporary file.
1952 make-temp-file is used like make-temp-name, except that it actually
1953 creates the file before it returns. This prevents a timing error,
1954 ensuring that no other job can use the same name for a temporary file.
1957 ** New exclusive-open feature in `write-region'
1959 The optional seventh arg is now called MUSTBENEW. If non-nil, it insists
1960 on a check for an existing file with the same name. If MUSTBENEW
1961 is `excl', that means to get an error if the file already exists;
1962 never overwrite. If MUSTBENEW is neither nil nor `excl', that means
1963 ask for confirmation before overwriting, but do go ahead and
1964 overwrite the file if the user gives confirmation.
1966 If the MUSTBENEW argument in `write-region' is `excl',
1967 that means to use a special feature in the `open' system call
1968 to get an error if the file exists at that time.
1969 The error reported is `file-already-exists'.
1972 ** Function `format' now handles text properties.
1974 Text properties of the format string are applied to the result string.
1975 If the result string is longer than the format string, text properties
1976 ending at the end of the format string are extended to the end of the
1979 Text properties from string arguments are applied to the result
1980 string where arguments appear in the result string.
1984 (let ((s1 "hello, %s")
1986 (put-text-property 0 (length s1) 'face 'bold s1)
1987 (put-text-property 0 (length s2) 'face 'italic s2)
1990 results in a bold-face string with an italic `world' at the end.
1993 ** Messages can now be displayed with text properties.
1995 Text properties are handled as described above for function `format'.
1996 The following example displays a bold-face message with an italic
1999 (let ((msg "hello, %s!")
2001 (put-text-property 0 (length msg) 'face 'bold msg)
2002 (put-text-property 0 (length arg) 'face 'italic arg)
2008 Emacs supports playing sound files on GNU/Linux and the free BSDs
2009 (Voxware driver and native BSD driver, aka as Luigi's driver).
2011 Currently supported file formats are RIFF-WAVE (*.wav) and Sun Audio
2012 (*.au). You must configure Emacs with the option `--with-sound=yes'
2013 to enable sound support.
2015 Sound files can be played by calling (play-sound SOUND). SOUND is a
2016 list of the form `(sound PROPERTY...)'. The function is only defined
2017 when sound support is present for the system on which Emacs runs. The
2018 functions runs `play-sound-functions' with one argument which is the
2019 sound to play, before playing the sound.
2021 The following sound properties are supported:
2025 FILE is a file name. If FILE isn't an absolute name, it will be
2026 searched relative to `data-directory'.
2030 DATA is a string containing sound data. Either :file or :data
2031 may be present, but not both.
2035 VOLUME must be an integer in the range 0..100 or a float in the range
2036 0..1. This property is optional.
2038 Other properties are ignored.
2040 ** `multimedia' is a new Finder keyword and Custom group.
2042 ** keywordp is a new predicate to test efficiently for an object being
2045 ** Changes to garbage collection
2047 *** The function garbage-collect now additionally returns the number
2048 of live and free strings.
2050 *** There is a new variable `strings-consed' holding the number of
2051 strings that have been consed so far.
2054 * Lisp-level Display features added after release 2.6 of the Emacs
2058 ** Help strings in menu items are now used to provide `help-echo' text.
2060 ** The function `image-size' can be used to determine the size of an
2063 - Function: image-size SPEC &optional PIXELS FRAME
2065 Return the size of an image as a pair (WIDTH . HEIGHT).
2067 SPEC is an image specification. PIXELS non-nil means return sizes
2068 measured in pixels, otherwise return sizes measured in canonical
2069 character units (fractions of the width/height of the frame's default
2070 font). FRAME is the frame on which the image will be displayed.
2071 FRAME nil or omitted means use the selected frame.
2073 ** The function `find-image' can be used to find a usable image
2074 satisfying one of a list of specifications.
2077 ** The STRING argument of `put-image' and `insert-image' is now
2080 ** Image specifications may contain the property `:ascent center'.
2082 When this property is specified, the image is vertically centered
2083 around a centerline which would be the vertical center of text drawn
2084 at the position of the image, in the manner specified by the text
2085 properties and overlays that apply to the image.
2088 * New Lisp-level Display features in Emacs 21.1
2090 Note that +++ before an item means the Lisp manual has been updated.
2091 --- means that I have decided it does not need to be in the Lisp manual.
2092 When you add a new item, please add it without either +++ or ---
2093 so I will know I still need to look at it -- rms.
2095 ** The function tty-suppress-bold-inverse-default-colors can be used
2096 to make Emacs avoid displaying text with bold black foreground on TTYs.
2098 Some terminals, notably PC consoles, emulate bold text by displaying
2099 text in brighter colors. On such a console, a bold black foreground
2100 is displayed in a gray color. If this turns out to be hard to read on
2101 your monitor---the problem occurred with the mode line on
2102 laptops---you can instruct Emacs to ignore the text's boldness, and to
2103 just display it black instead.
2105 This situation can't be detected automatically. You will have to put
2108 (tty-suppress-bold-inverse-default-colors t)
2112 ** New face implementation.
2114 Emacs faces have been reimplemented from scratch. They don't use XLFD
2115 font names anymore and face merging now works as expected.
2120 Each face can specify the following display attributes:
2122 1. Font family or fontset alias name.
2124 2. Relative proportionate width, aka character set width or set
2125 width (swidth), e.g. `semi-compressed'.
2127 3. Font height in 1/10pt
2129 4. Font weight, e.g. `bold'.
2131 5. Font slant, e.g. `italic'.
2133 6. Foreground color.
2135 7. Background color.
2137 8. Whether or not characters should be underlined, and in what color.
2139 9. Whether or not characters should be displayed in inverse video.
2141 10. A background stipple, a bitmap.
2143 11. Whether or not characters should be overlined, and in what color.
2145 12. Whether or not characters should be strike-through, and in what
2148 13. Whether or not a box should be drawn around characters, its
2149 color, the width of the box lines, and 3D appearance.
2151 Faces are frame-local by nature because Emacs allows to define the
2152 same named face (face names are symbols) differently for different
2153 frames. Each frame has an alist of face definitions for all named
2154 faces. The value of a named face in such an alist is a Lisp vector
2155 with the symbol `face' in slot 0, and a slot for each each of the face
2156 attributes mentioned above.
2158 There is also a global face alist `face-new-frame-defaults'. Face
2159 definitions from this list are used to initialize faces of newly
2162 A face doesn't have to specify all attributes. Those not specified
2163 have a nil value. Faces specifying all attributes are called
2169 The display style of a given character in the text is determined by
2170 combining several faces. This process is called `face merging'. Any
2171 aspect of the display style that isn't specified by overlays or text
2172 properties is taken from the `default' face. Since it is made sure
2173 that the default face is always fully-specified, face merging always
2174 results in a fully-specified face.
2177 *** Face realization.
2179 After all face attributes for a character have been determined by
2180 merging faces of that character, that face is `realized'. The
2181 realization process maps face attributes to what is physically
2182 available on the system where Emacs runs. The result is a `realized
2183 face' in form of an internal structure which is stored in the face
2184 cache of the frame on which it was realized.
2186 Face realization is done in the context of the charset of the
2187 character to display because different fonts and encodings are used
2188 for different charsets. In other words, for characters of different
2189 charsets, different realized faces are needed to display them.
2191 Except for composite characters, faces are always realized for a
2192 specific character set and contain a specific font, even if the face
2193 being realized specifies a fontset. The reason is that the result of
2194 the new font selection stage is better than what can be done with
2195 statically defined font name patterns in fontsets.
2197 In unibyte text, Emacs' charsets aren't applicable; function
2198 `char-charset' reports ASCII for all characters, including those >
2199 0x7f. The X registry and encoding of fonts to use is determined from
2200 the variable `face-default-registry' in this case. The variable is
2201 initialized at Emacs startup time from the font the user specified for
2204 Currently all unibyte text, i.e. all buffers with
2205 `enable-multibyte-characters' nil are displayed with fonts of the same
2206 registry and encoding `face-default-registry'. This is consistent
2207 with the fact that languages can also be set globally, only.
2210 **** Clearing face caches.
2212 The Lisp function `clear-face-cache' can be called to clear face caches
2213 on all frames. If called with a non-nil argument, it will also unload
2219 Font selection tries to find the best available matching font for a
2220 given (charset, face) combination. This is done slightly differently
2221 for faces specifying a fontset, or a font family name.
2223 If the face specifies a fontset name, that fontset determines a
2224 pattern for fonts of the given charset. If the face specifies a font
2225 family, a font pattern is constructed. Charset symbols have a
2226 property `x-charset-registry' for that purpose that maps a charset to
2227 an XLFD registry and encoding in the font pattern constructed.
2229 Available fonts on the system on which Emacs runs are then matched
2230 against the font pattern. The result of font selection is the best
2231 match for the given face attributes in this font list.
2233 Font selection can be influenced by the user.
2235 The user can specify the relative importance he gives the face
2236 attributes width, height, weight, and slant by setting
2237 face-font-selection-order (faces.el) to a list of face attribute
2238 names. The default is (:width :height :weight :slant), and means
2239 that font selection first tries to find a good match for the font
2240 width specified by a face, then---within fonts with that width---tries
2241 to find a best match for the specified font height, etc.
2243 Setting `face-alternative-font-family-alist' allows the user to
2244 specify alternative font families to try if a family specified by a
2250 Emacs can make use of scalable fonts but doesn't do so by default,
2251 since the use of too many or too big scalable fonts may crash XFree86
2254 To enable scalable font use, set the variable
2255 `scalable-fonts-allowed'. A value of nil, the default, means never use
2256 scalable fonts. A value of t means any scalable font may be used.
2257 Otherwise, the value must be a list of regular expressions. A
2258 scalable font may then be used if it matches a regular expression from
2261 (setq scalable-fonts-allowed '("muleindian-2$"))
2263 allows the use of scalable fonts with registry `muleindian-2'.
2266 *** Functions and variables related to font selection.
2268 - Function: x-family-fonts &optional FAMILY FRAME
2270 Return a list of available fonts of family FAMILY on FRAME. If FAMILY
2271 is omitted or nil, list all families. Otherwise, FAMILY must be a
2272 string, possibly containing wildcards `?' and `*'.
2274 If FRAME is omitted or nil, use the selected frame. Each element of
2275 the result is a vector [FAMILY WIDTH POINT-SIZE WEIGHT SLANT FIXED-P
2276 FULL REGISTRY-AND-ENCODING]. FAMILY is the font family name.
2277 POINT-SIZE is the size of the font in 1/10 pt. WIDTH, WEIGHT, and
2278 SLANT are symbols describing the width, weight and slant of the font.
2279 These symbols are the same as for face attributes. FIXED-P is non-nil
2280 if the font is fixed-pitch. FULL is the full name of the font, and
2281 REGISTRY-AND-ENCODING is a string giving the registry and encoding of
2282 the font. The result list is sorted according to the current setting
2283 of the face font sort order.
2285 - Function: x-font-family-list
2287 Return a list of available font families on FRAME. If FRAME is
2288 omitted or nil, use the selected frame. Value is a list of conses
2289 (FAMILY . FIXED-P) where FAMILY is a font family, and FIXED-P is
2290 non-nil if fonts of that family are fixed-pitch.
2292 - Variable: font-list-limit
2294 Limit for font matching. If an integer > 0, font matching functions
2295 won't load more than that number of fonts when searching for a
2296 matching font. The default is currently 100.
2299 *** Setting face attributes.
2301 For the most part, the new face implementation is interface-compatible
2302 with the old one. Old face attribute related functions are now
2303 implemented in terms of the new functions `set-face-attribute' and
2306 Face attributes are identified by their names which are keyword
2307 symbols. All attributes can be set to `unspecified'.
2309 The following attributes are recognized:
2313 VALUE must be a string specifying the font family, e.g. ``courier'',
2314 or a fontset alias name. If a font family is specified, wild-cards `*'
2315 and `?' are allowed.
2319 VALUE specifies the relative proportionate width of the font to use.
2320 It must be one of the symbols `ultra-condensed', `extra-condensed',
2321 `condensed', `semi-condensed', `normal', `semi-expanded', `expanded',
2322 `extra-expanded', or `ultra-expanded'.
2326 VALUE must be an integer specifying the height of the font to use in
2331 VALUE specifies the weight of the font to use. It must be one of the
2332 symbols `ultra-bold', `extra-bold', `bold', `semi-bold', `normal',
2333 `semi-light', `light', `extra-light', `ultra-light'.
2337 VALUE specifies the slant of the font to use. It must be one of the
2338 symbols `italic', `oblique', `normal', `reverse-italic', or
2341 `:foreground', `:background'
2343 VALUE must be a color name, a string.
2347 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be underlined. If
2348 VALUE is t, underline with foreground color of the face. If VALUE is
2349 a string, underline with that color. If VALUE is nil, explicitly
2354 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be overlined. If
2355 VALUE is t, overline with foreground color of the face. If VALUE is a
2356 string, overline with that color. If VALUE is nil, explicitly don't
2361 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be drawn with a line
2362 striking through them. If VALUE is t, use the foreground color of the
2363 face. If VALUE is a string, strike-through with that color. If VALUE
2364 is nil, explicitly don't strike through.
2368 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should have a box drawn
2369 around them. If VALUE is nil, explicitly don't draw boxes. If
2370 VALUE is t, draw a box with lines of width 1 in the foreground color
2371 of the face. If VALUE is a string, the string must be a color name,
2372 and the box is drawn in that color with a line width of 1. Otherwise,
2373 VALUE must be a property list of the form `(:line-width WIDTH
2374 :color COLOR :style STYLE)'. If a keyword/value pair is missing from
2375 the property list, a default value will be used for the value, as
2376 specified below. WIDTH specifies the width of the lines to draw; it
2377 defaults to 1. COLOR is the name of the color to draw in, default is
2378 the foreground color of the face for simple boxes, and the background
2379 color of the face for 3D boxes. STYLE specifies whether a 3D box
2380 should be draw. If STYLE is `released-button', draw a box looking
2381 like a released 3D button. If STYLE is `pressed-button' draw a box
2382 that appears like a pressed button. If STYLE is nil, the default if
2383 the property list doesn't contain a style specification, draw a 2D
2388 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be displayed in
2389 inverse video. VALUE must be one of t or nil.
2393 If VALUE is a string, it must be the name of a file of pixmap data.
2394 The directories listed in the `x-bitmap-file-path' variable are
2395 searched. Alternatively, VALUE may be a list of the form (WIDTH
2396 HEIGHT DATA) where WIDTH and HEIGHT are the size in pixels, and DATA
2397 is a string containing the raw bits of the bitmap. VALUE nil means
2398 explicitly don't use a stipple pattern.
2400 For convenience, attributes `:family', `:width', `:height', `:weight',
2401 and `:slant' may also be set in one step from an X font name:
2405 Set font-related face attributes from VALUE. VALUE must be a valid
2406 XLFD font name. If it is a font name pattern, the first matching font
2407 is used--this is for compatibility with the behavior of previous
2410 For compatibility with Emacs 20, keywords `:bold' and `:italic' can
2411 be used to specify that a bold or italic font should be used. VALUE
2412 must be t or nil in that case. A value of `unspecified' is not allowed."
2414 Please see also the documentation of `set-face-attribute' and
2417 *** Face attributes and X resources
2419 The following X resource names can be used to set face attributes
2422 Face attribute X resource class
2423 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
2424 :family attributeFamily . Face.AttributeFamily
2425 :width attributeWidth Face.AttributeWidth
2426 :height attributeHeight Face.AttributeHeight
2427 :weight attributeWeight Face.AttributeWeight
2428 :slant attributeSlant Face.AttributeSlant
2429 foreground attributeForeground Face.AttributeForeground
2430 :background attributeBackground . Face.AttributeBackground
2431 :overline attributeOverline Face.AttributeOverline
2432 :strike-through attributeStrikeThrough Face.AttributeStrikeThrough
2433 :box attributeBox Face.AttributeBox
2434 :underline attributeUnderline Face.AttributeUnderline
2435 :inverse-video attributeInverse Face.AttributeInverse
2436 :stipple attributeStipple Face.AttributeStipple
2437 or attributeBackgroundPixmap
2438 Face.AttributeBackgroundPixmap
2439 :font attributeFont Face.AttributeFont
2440 :bold attributeBold Face.AttributeBold
2441 :italic attributeItalic . Face.AttributeItalic
2442 :font attributeFont Face.AttributeFont
2445 *** Text property `face'.
2447 The value of the `face' text property can now be a single face
2448 specification or a list of such specifications. Each face
2449 specification can be
2451 1. A symbol or string naming a Lisp face.
2453 2. A property list of the form (KEYWORD VALUE ...) where each
2454 KEYWORD is a face attribute name, and VALUE is an appropriate value
2455 for that attribute. Please see the doc string of `set-face-attribute'
2456 for face attribute names.
2458 3. Conses of the form (FOREGROUND-COLOR . COLOR) or
2459 (BACKGROUND-COLOR . COLOR) where COLOR is a color name. This is
2460 for compatibility with previous Emacs versions.
2463 ** Support functions for colors on text-only terminals.
2465 The function `tty-color-define' can be used to define colors for use
2466 on TTY and MSDOS frames. It maps a color name to a color number on
2467 the terminal. Emacs defines a couple of common color mappings by
2468 default. You can get defined colors with a call to
2469 `defined-colors'. The function `tty-color-clear' can be
2470 used to clear the mapping table.
2472 ** Unified support for colors independent of frame type.
2474 The new functions `defined-colors', `color-defined-p', `color-values',
2475 and `display-color-p' work for any type of frame. On frames whose
2476 type is neither x nor w32, these functions transparently map X-style
2477 color specifications to the closest colors supported by the frame
2478 display. Lisp programs should use these new functions instead of the
2479 old `x-defined-colors', `x-color-defined-p', `x-color-values', and
2480 `x-display-color-p'. (The old function names are still available for
2481 compatibility; they are now aliases of the new names.) Lisp programs
2482 should no more look at the value of the variable window-system to
2483 modify their color-related behavior.
2485 The primitives `color-gray-p' and `color-supported-p' also work for
2488 ** Platform-independent functions to describe display capabilities.
2490 The new functions `display-mouse-p', `display-popup-menus-p',
2491 `display-graphic-p', `display-selections-p', `display-screens',
2492 `display-pixel-width', `display-pixel-height', `display-mm-width',
2493 `display-mm-height', `display-backing-store', `display-save-under',
2494 `display-planes', `display-color-cells', `display-visual-class', and
2495 `display-grayscale-p' describe the basic capabilities of a particular
2496 display. Lisp programs should call these functions instead of testing
2497 the value of the variables `window-system' or `system-type', or calling
2498 platform-specific functions such as `x-display-pixel-width'.
2501 ** The minibuffer prompt is now actually inserted in the minibuffer.
2503 This makes it possible to scroll through the prompt, if you want to.
2505 The function minubuffer-prompt-end returns the current position of the
2506 end of the minibuffer prompt, if the minibuffer is current.
2507 Otherwise, it returns zero.
2509 ** New `field' abstraction in buffers.
2511 There is now code to support an abstraction called `fields' in emacs
2512 buffers. A field is a contiguous region of text with the same `field'
2515 Many emacs functions, such as forward-word, forward-sentence,
2516 forward-paragraph, beginning-of-line, etc., stop moving when they come
2517 to the boundary between fields; beginning-of-line and end-of-line will
2518 not let the point move past the field boundary, but other movement
2519 commands continue into the next field if repeated. Stopping at field
2520 boundaries can be suppressed programmatically by binding
2521 `inhibit-field-text-motion' to a non-nil value around calls to these
2524 Now that the minibuffer prompt is inserted into the minibuffer, it is in
2525 a separate field from the user-input part of the buffer, so that common
2526 editing commands treat the user's text separately from the prompt.
2528 The following functions are defined for operating on fields:
2530 - Function: constrain-to-field NEW-POS OLD-POS &optional ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE ONLY-IN-LINE
2532 Return the position closest to NEW-POS that is in the same field as OLD-POS.
2533 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
2534 If NEW-POS is nil, then the current point is used instead, and set to the
2535 constrained position if that is is different.
2537 If OLD-POS is at the boundary of two fields, then the allowable
2538 positions for NEW-POS depends on the value of the optional argument
2539 ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE: If ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE is nil, then NEW-POS is
2540 constrained to the field that has the same `field' text-property
2541 as any new characters inserted at OLD-POS, whereas if ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE
2542 is non-nil, NEW-POS is constrained to the union of the two adjacent
2545 If the optional argument ONLY-IN-LINE is non-nil and constraining
2546 NEW-POS would move it to a different line, NEW-POS is returned
2547 unconstrained. This useful for commands that move by line, like
2548 C-n or C-a, which should generally respect field boundaries
2549 only in the case where they can still move to the right line.
2551 - Function: erase-field &optional POS
2553 Erases the field surrounding POS.
2554 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
2555 If POS is nil, the position of the current buffer's point is used.
2557 - Function: field-beginning &optional POS ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE
2559 Return the beginning of the field surrounding POS.
2560 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
2561 If POS is nil, the position of the current buffer's point is used.
2562 If ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE is non-nil and POS is already at beginning of an
2563 field, then the beginning of the *previous* field is returned.
2565 - Function: field-end &optional POS ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE
2567 Return the end of the field surrounding POS.
2568 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
2569 If POS is nil, the position of the current buffer's point is used.
2570 If ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE is non-nil and POS is already at end of a field,
2571 then the end of the *following* field is returned.
2573 - Function: field-string &optional POS
2575 Return the contents of the field surrounding POS as a string.
2576 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
2577 If POS is nil, the position of the current buffer's point is used.
2579 - Function: field-string-no-properties &optional POS
2581 Return the contents of the field around POS, without text-properties.
2582 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
2583 If POS is nil, the position of the current buffer's point is used.
2588 Emacs can now display images. Images are inserted into text by giving
2589 strings or buffer text a `display' text property containing one of
2590 (AREA IMAGE) or IMAGE. The display of the `display' property value
2591 replaces the display of the characters having that property.
2593 If the property value has the form (AREA IMAGE), AREA must be one of
2594 `(margin left-margin)', `(margin right-margin)' or `(margin nil)'. If
2595 AREA is `(margin nil)', IMAGE will be displayed in the text area of a
2596 window, otherwise it will be displayed in the left or right marginal
2599 IMAGE is an image specification.
2601 *** Image specifications
2603 Image specifications are lists of the form `(image PROPS)' where PROPS
2604 is a property list whose keys are keyword symbols. Each
2605 specifications must contain a property `:type TYPE' with TYPE being a
2606 symbol specifying the image type, e.g. `xbm'. Properties not
2607 described below are ignored.
2609 The following is a list of properties all image types share.
2613 ASCENT must be a number in the range 0..100, or the symbol `center'.
2614 If it is a number, it specifies the percentage of the image's height
2615 to use for its ascent.
2617 If not specified, ASCENT defaults to the value 50 which means that the
2618 image will be centered with the base line of the row it appears in.
2620 If ASCENT is `center' the image is vertically centered around a
2621 centerline which is the vertical center of text drawn at the position
2622 of the image, in the manner specified by the text properties and
2623 overlays that apply to the image.
2627 MARGIN must be a number >= 0 specifying how many pixels to put as
2628 margin around the image. Default is 0.
2632 RELIEF is analogous to the `:relief' attribute of faces. Puts a relief
2637 Apply an image algorithm to the image before displaying it. ALGO must
2638 be a symbol specifying the algorithm. Currently only `laplace' is
2639 supported which applies a Laplace edge detection algorithm to an image
2640 which is intended to display images "disabled."
2642 `:heuristic-mask BG'
2644 If BG is not nil, build a clipping mask for the image, so that the
2645 background of a frame is visible behind the image. If BG is t,
2646 determine the background color of the image by looking at the 4
2647 corners of the image, assuming the most frequently occuring color from
2648 the corners is the background color of the image. Otherwise, BG must
2649 be a list `(RED GREEN BLUE)' specifying the color to assume for the
2650 background of the image.
2654 Load image from FILE. If FILE is not absolute after expanding it,
2655 search for the image in `data-directory'. Some image types support
2656 building images from data. When this is done, no `:file' property
2657 may be present in the image specification.
2661 Get image data from DATA. (As of this writing, this is not yet
2662 supported for image type `postscript'). Either :file or :data may be
2663 present in an image specification, but not both. All image types
2664 support strings as DATA, some types allow additional types of DATA.
2666 *** Supported image types
2668 **** XBM, image type `xbm'.
2670 XBM images don't require an external library. Additional image
2671 properties supported are
2675 FG must be a string specifying the image foreground color. Default
2676 is the frame's foreground.
2680 BG must be a string specifying the image foreground color. Default is
2681 the frame's background color.
2683 XBM images can be constructed from data instead of file. In this
2684 case, the image specification must contain the following properties
2685 instead of a `:file' property.
2689 WIDTH specifies the width of the image in pixels.
2693 HEIGHT specifies the height of the image in pixels.
2699 1. a string large enough to hold the bitmap data, i.e. it must
2700 have a size >= (WIDTH + 7) / 8 * HEIGHT
2702 2. a bool-vector of size >= WIDTH * HEIGHT
2704 3. a vector of strings or bool-vectors, one for each line of the
2707 4. a string that's an in-memory XBM file. Neither width nor
2708 height may be specified in this case because these are defined
2711 **** XPM, image type `xpm'
2713 XPM images require the external library `libXpm', package
2714 `xpm-3.4k.tar.gz', version 3.4k or later. Make sure the library is
2715 found when Emacs is configured by supplying appropriate paths via
2716 `--x-includes' and `--x-libraries'.
2718 Additional image properties supported are:
2720 `:color-symbols SYMBOLS'
2722 SYMBOLS must be a list of pairs (NAME . COLOR), with NAME being the
2723 name of color as it appears in an XPM file, and COLOR being an X color
2726 XPM images can be built from memory instead of files. In that case,
2727 add a `:data' property instead of a `:file' property.
2729 The XPM library uses libz in its implementation so that it is able
2730 to display compressed images.
2732 **** PBM, image type `pbm'
2734 PBM images don't require an external library. Color, gray-scale and
2735 mono images are supported. There are no additional image properties
2738 **** JPEG, image type `jpeg'
2740 Support for JPEG images requires the external library `libjpeg',
2741 package `jpegsrc.v6a.tar.gz', or later. Additional image properties
2744 **** TIFF, image type `tiff'
2746 Support for TIFF images requires the external library `libtiff',
2747 package `tiff-v3.4-tar.gz', or later. There are no additional image
2750 **** GIF, image type `gif'
2752 Support for GIF images requires the external library `libungif', package
2753 `libungif-4.1.0', or later.
2755 Additional image properties supported are:
2759 INDEX must be an integer >= 0. Load image number INDEX from a
2760 multi-image GIF file. An error is signalled if INDEX is too large.
2762 This could be used to implement limited support for animated GIFs.
2763 For example, the following function displays a multi-image GIF file
2764 at point-min in the current buffer, switching between sub-images
2767 (defun show-anim (file max)
2768 "Display multi-image GIF file FILE which contains MAX subimages."
2769 (display-anim (current-buffer) file 0 max t))
2771 (defun display-anim (buffer file idx max first-time)
2774 (let ((img (create-image file nil nil :index idx)))
2777 (goto-char (point-min))
2778 (unless first-time (delete-char 1))
2779 (insert-image img "x"))
2780 (run-with-timer 0.1 nil 'display-anim buffer file (1+ idx) max nil)))
2782 **** PNG, image type `png'
2784 Support for PNG images requires the external library `libpng',
2785 package `libpng-1.0.2.tar.gz', or later. There are no additional image
2788 **** Ghostscript, image type `postscript'.
2790 Additional image properties supported are:
2794 WIDTH is width of the image in pt (1/72 inch). WIDTH must be an
2795 integer. This is a required property.
2799 HEIGHT specifies the height of the image in pt (1/72 inch). HEIGHT
2800 must be a integer. This is an required property.
2804 BOX must be a list or vector of 4 integers giving the bounding box of
2805 the PS image, analogous to the `BoundingBox' comment found in PS
2806 files. This is an required property.
2808 Part of the Ghostscript interface is implemented in Lisp. See
2813 The variable `image-types' contains a list of those image types
2814 which are supported in the current configuration.
2816 Images are stored in an image cache and removed from the cache when
2817 they haven't been displayed for `image-cache-eviction-delay seconds.
2818 The function `clear-image-cache' can be used to clear the image cache
2819 manually. Images in the cache are compared with `equal', i.e. all
2820 images with `equal' specifications share the same image.
2822 *** Simplified image API, image.el
2824 The new Lisp package image.el contains functions that simplify image
2825 creation and putting images into text. The function `create-image'
2826 can be used to create images. The macro `defimage' can be used to
2827 define an image based on available image types. The functions
2828 `put-image' and `insert-image' can be used to insert an image into a
2834 Windows can now have margins which are used for special text
2837 To give a window margins, either set the buffer-local variables
2838 `left-margin-width' and `right-margin-width', or call
2839 `set-window-margins'. The function `window-margins' can be used to
2840 obtain the current settings. To make `left-margin-width' and
2841 `right-margin-width' take effect, you must set them before displaying
2842 the buffer in a window, or use `set-window-buffer' to force an update
2843 of the display margins.
2845 You can put text in margins by giving it a `display' text property
2846 containing a pair of the form `(LOCATION . VALUE)', where LOCATION is
2847 one of `left-margin' or `right-margin' or nil. VALUE can be either a
2848 string, an image specification or a stretch specification (see later
2854 Emacs displays short help messages in the echo area, when the mouse
2855 moves over a tool-bar item or a piece of text that has a text property
2856 `help-echo'. This feature also applies to strings in the mode line
2857 that have a `help-echo' property.
2859 If the value of the `help-echo' property is a function, that function
2860 is called with three arguments WINDOW, OBJECT and POSITION. WINDOW is
2861 the window in which the help was found, OBJECT is the buffer or string
2862 which had the `help-echo' property. POSITION is the position within
2863 OBJECT under the mouse pointer. The function should return a help
2864 string or nil for none.
2866 If the value of the `help-echo' property is neither a function nor a
2867 string, it is evaluated to obtain a help string.
2869 For tool-bar and menu-bar items, their key definition is used to
2870 determine the help to display. If their definition contains a
2871 property `:help FORM', FORM is evaluated to determine the help string.
2872 For tool-bar items without a help form, the caption of the item is
2873 used as help string.
2875 The hook `show-help-function' can be set to a function that displays
2876 the help string differently. For example, enabling a tooltip window
2877 causes the help display to appear there instead of in the echo area.
2880 ** Vertical fractional scrolling.
2882 The display of text in windows can be scrolled smoothly in pixels.
2883 This is useful, for example, for making parts of large images visible.
2885 The function `window-vscroll' returns the current value of vertical
2886 scrolling, a non-negative fraction of the canonical character height.
2887 The function `set-window-vscroll' can be used to set the vertical
2888 scrolling value. Here is an example of how these function might be
2891 (global-set-key [A-down]
2894 (set-window-vscroll (selected-window)
2895 (+ 0.5 (window-vscroll)))))
2896 (global-set-key [A-up]
2899 (set-window-vscroll (selected-window)
2900 (- (window-vscroll) 0.5)))))
2903 ** New hook `fontification-functions'.
2905 Functions from `fontification-functions' are called from redisplay
2906 when it encounters a region of text that is not yet fontified. This
2907 variable automatically becomes buffer-local when set. Each function
2908 is called with one argument, POS.
2910 At least one of the hook functions should fontify one or more
2911 characters starting at POS in the current buffer. It should mark them
2912 as fontified by giving them a non-nil value of the `fontified' text
2913 property. It may be reasonable for these functions to check for the
2914 `fontified' property and not put it back on, but they do not have to.
2917 ** Tool bar support.
2919 Emacs supports a tool bar at the top of a frame under X. The frame
2920 parameter `tool-bar-lines' (X resource "toolBar", class "ToolBar")
2921 controls how may lines to reserve for the tool bar. A zero value
2922 suppresses the tool bar. If the value is non-zero and
2923 `auto-resize-tool-bars' is non-nil the tool bar's size will be changed
2924 automatically so that all tool bar items are visible.
2926 *** Tool bar item definitions
2928 Tool bar items are defined using `define-key' with a prefix-key
2929 `tool-bar'. For example `(define-key global-map [tool-bar item1] ITEM)'
2930 where ITEM is a list `(menu-item CAPTION BINDING PROPS...)'.
2932 CAPTION is the caption of the item, If it's not a string, it is
2933 evaluated to get a string. The caption is currently not displayed in
2934 the tool bar, but it is displayed if the item doesn't have a `:help'
2935 property (see below).
2937 BINDING is the tool bar item's binding. Tool bar items with keymaps as
2938 binding are currently ignored.
2940 The following properties are recognized:
2944 FORM is evaluated and specifies whether the tool bar item is enabled
2949 FORM is evaluated and specifies whether the tool bar item is displayed.
2953 FUNCTION is called with one parameter, the same list BINDING in which
2954 FUNCTION is specified as the filter. The value FUNCTION returns is
2955 used instead of BINDING to display this item.
2957 `:button (TYPE SELECTED)'
2959 TYPE must be one of `:radio' or `:toggle'. SELECTED is evaluated
2960 and specifies whether the button is selected (pressed) or not.
2964 IMAGES is either a single image specification or a vector of four
2965 image specifications. If it is a vector, this table lists the
2966 meaning of each of the four elements:
2968 Index Use when item is
2969 ----------------------------------------
2970 0 enabled and selected
2971 1 enabled and deselected
2972 2 disabled and selected
2973 3 disabled and deselected
2975 If IMAGE is a single image specification, a Laplace edge-detection
2976 algorithm is used on that image to draw the image in disabled state.
2978 `:help HELP-STRING'.
2980 Gives a help string to display for the tool bar item. This help
2981 is displayed when the mouse is moved over the item.
2983 *** Tool-bar-related variables.
2985 If `auto-resize-tool-bar' is non-nil, the tool bar will automatically
2986 resize to show all defined tool bar items. It will never grow larger
2987 than 1/4 of the frame's size.
2989 If `auto-raise-tool-bar-buttons' is non-nil, tool bar buttons will be
2990 raised when the mouse moves over them.
2992 You can add extra space between tool bar items by setting
2993 `tool-bar-button-margin' to a positive integer specifying a number of
2994 pixels. Default is 1.
2996 You can change the shadow thickness of tool bar buttons by setting
2997 `tool-bar-button-relief' to an integer. Default is 3.
2999 *** Tool-bar clicks with modifiers.
3001 You can bind commands to clicks with control, shift, meta etc. on
3004 (define-key global-map [tool-bar shell]
3005 '(menu-item "Shell" shell
3006 :image (image :type xpm :file "shell.xpm")))
3008 is the original tool bar item definition, then
3010 (define-key global-map [tool-bar S-shell] 'some-command)
3012 makes a binding to run `some-command' for a shifted click on the same
3015 ** Mode line changes.
3018 *** Mouse-sensitive mode line.
3020 The mode line can be made mouse-sensitive by displaying strings there
3021 that have a `local-map' text property. There are three ways to display
3022 a string with a `local-map' property in the mode line.
3024 1. The mode line spec contains a variable whose string value has
3025 a `local-map' text property.
3027 2. The mode line spec contains a format specifier (e.g. `%12b'), and
3028 that format specifier has a `local-map' property.
3030 3. The mode line spec contains a list containing `:eval FORM'. FORM
3031 is evaluated. If the result is a string, and that string has a
3032 `local-map' property.
3034 The same mechanism is used to determine the `face' and `help-echo'
3035 properties of strings in the mode line. See `bindings.el' for an
3038 *** If a mode line element has the form `(:eval FORM)', FORM is
3039 evaluated and the result is used as mode line element.
3042 *** You can suppress mode-line display by setting the buffer-local
3043 variable mode-line-format to nil.
3046 *** A headerline can now be displayed at the top of a window.
3048 This mode line's contents are controlled by the new variable
3049 `header-line-format' and `default-header-line-format' which are
3050 completely analogous to `mode-line-format' and
3051 `default-mode-line-format'. A value of nil means don't display a top
3054 The appearance of top mode lines is controlled by the face
3057 The function `coordinates-in-window-p' returns `header-line' for a
3058 position in the header-line.
3061 ** Text property `display'
3063 The `display' text property is used to insert images into text, and
3064 also control other aspects of how text displays. The value of the
3065 `display' property should be a display specification, as described
3066 below, or a list or vector containing display specifications.
3068 *** Variable width and height spaces
3070 To display a space of fractional width or height, use a display
3071 specification of the form `(LOCATION STRECH)'. If LOCATION is
3072 `(margin left-margin)', the space is displayed in the left marginal
3073 area, if it is `(margin right-margin)', it is displayed in the right
3074 marginal area, and if LOCATION is `(margin nil)' the space is
3075 displayed in the text. In the latter case you can also use the
3076 simpler form STRETCH as property value.
3078 The stretch specification STRETCH itself is a list of the form `(space
3079 PROPS)', where PROPS is a property list which can contain the
3080 properties described below.
3082 The display of the fractional space replaces the display of the
3083 characters having the `display' property.
3087 Specifies that the space width should be WIDTH times the normal
3088 character width. WIDTH can be an integer or floating point number.
3090 - :relative-width FACTOR
3092 Specifies that the width of the stretch should be computed from the
3093 first character in a group of consecutive characters that have the
3094 same `display' property. The computation is done by multiplying the
3095 width of that character by FACTOR.
3099 Specifies that the space should be wide enough to reach HPOS. The
3100 value HPOS is measured in units of the normal character width.
3102 Exactly one of the above properties should be used.
3106 Specifies the height of the space, as HEIGHT, measured in terms of the
3109 - :relative-height FACTOR
3111 The height of the space is computed as the product of the height
3112 of the text having the `display' property and FACTOR.
3116 Specifies that ASCENT percent of the height of the stretch should be
3117 used for the ascent of the stretch, i.e. for the part above the
3118 baseline. The value of ASCENT must be a non-negative number less or
3121 You should not use both `:height' and `:relative-height' together.
3125 A display specification for an image has the form `(LOCATION
3126 . IMAGE)', where IMAGE is an image specification. The image replaces,
3127 in the display, the characters having this display specification in
3128 their `display' text property. If LOCATION is `(margin left-margin)',
3129 the image will be displayed in the left marginal area, if it is
3130 `(margin right-margin)' it will be displayed in the right marginal
3131 area, and if LOCATION is `(margin nil)' the image will be displayed in
3132 the text. In the latter case you can also use the simpler form IMAGE
3133 as display specification.
3135 *** Other display properties
3137 - :space-width FACTOR
3139 Specifies that space characters in the text having that property
3140 should be displayed FACTOR times as wide as normal; FACTOR must be an
3145 Display text having this property in a font that is smaller or larger.
3147 If HEIGHT is a list of the form `(+ N)', where N is an integer, that
3148 means to use a font that is N steps larger. If HEIGHT is a list of
3149 the form `(- N)', that means to use a font that is N steps smaller. A
3150 ``step'' is defined by the set of available fonts; each size for which
3151 a font is available counts as a step.
3153 If HEIGHT is a number, that means to use a font that is HEIGHT times
3154 as tall as the frame's default font.
3156 If HEIGHT is a symbol, it is called as a function with the current
3157 height as argument. The function should return the new height to use.
3159 Otherwise, HEIGHT is evaluated to get the new height, with the symbol
3160 `height' bound to the current specified font height.
3164 FACTOR must be a number, specifying a multiple of the current
3165 font's height. If it is positive, that means to display the characters
3166 raised. If it is negative, that means to display them lower down. The
3167 amount of raising or lowering is computed without taking account of the
3168 `:height' subproperty.
3170 *** Conditional display properties
3172 All display specifications can be conditionalized. If a specification
3173 has the form `(:when CONDITION . SPEC)', the specification SPEC
3174 applies only when CONDITION yields a non-nil value when evaluated.
3175 During evaluattion, point is temporarily set to the end position of
3176 the text having the `display' property.
3178 The normal specification consisting of SPEC only is equivalent to
3182 ** New menu separator types.
3184 Emacs now supports more than one menu separator type. Menu items with
3185 item names consisting of dashes only (including zero dashes) are
3186 treated like before. In addition, the following item names are used
3187 to specify other menu separator types.
3189 - `--no-line' or `--space', or `--:space', or `--:noLine'
3191 No separator lines are drawn, but a small space is inserted where the
3194 - `--single-line' or `--:singleLine'
3196 A single line in the menu's foreground color.
3198 - `--double-line' or `--:doubleLine'
3200 A double line in the menu's foreground color.
3202 - `--single-dashed-line' or `--:singleDashedLine'
3204 A single dashed line in the menu's foreground color.
3206 - `--double-dashed-line' or `--:doubleDashedLine'
3208 A double dashed line in the menu's foreground color.
3210 - `--shadow-etched-in' or `--:shadowEtchedIn'
3212 A single line with 3D sunken appearance. This is the the form
3213 displayed for item names consisting of dashes only.
3215 - `--shadow-etched-out' or `--:shadowEtchedOut'
3217 A single line with 3D raised appearance.
3219 - `--shadow-etched-in-dash' or `--:shadowEtchedInDash'
3221 A single dashed line with 3D sunken appearance.
3223 - `--shadow-etched-out-dash' or `--:shadowEtchedOutDash'
3225 A single dashed line with 3D raise appearance.
3227 - `--shadow-double-etched-in' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedIn'
3229 Two lines with 3D sunken appearance.
3231 - `--shadow-double-etched-out' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedOut'
3233 Two lines with 3D raised appearance.
3235 - `--shadow-double-etched-in-dash' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedInDash'
3237 Two dashed lines with 3D sunken appearance.
3239 - `--shadow-double-etched-out-dash' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedOutDash'
3241 Two dashed lines with 3D raised appearance.
3243 Under LessTif/Motif, the last four separator types are displayed like
3244 the corresponding single-line separators.
3247 ** New frame parameters for scroll bar colors.
3249 The new frame parameters `scroll-bar-foreground' and
3250 `scroll-bar-background' can be used to change scroll bar colors.
3251 Their value must be either a color name, a string, or nil to specify
3252 that scroll bars should use a default color. For toolkit scroll bars,
3253 default colors are toolkit specific. For non-toolkit scroll bars, the
3254 default background is the background color of the frame, and the
3255 default foreground is black.
3257 The X resource name of these parameters are `scrollBarForeground'
3258 (class ScrollBarForeground) and `scrollBarBackground' (class
3259 `ScrollBarBackground').
3261 Setting these parameters overrides toolkit specific X resource
3262 settings for scroll bar colors.
3265 ** You can set `redisplay-dont-pause' to a non-nil value to prevent
3266 display updates from being interrupted when input is pending.
3269 ** Changing a window's width may now change its window start if it
3270 starts on a continuation line. The new window start is computed based
3271 on the window's new width, starting from the start of the continued
3272 line as the start of the screen line with the minimum distance from
3273 the original window start.
3276 ** The variable `hscroll-step' and the functions
3277 `hscroll-point-visible' and `hscroll-window-column' have been removed
3278 now that proper horizontal scrolling is implemented.
3281 ** Windows can now be made fixed-width and/or fixed-height.
3283 A window is fixed-size if its buffer has a buffer-local variable
3284 `window-size-fixed' whose value is not nil. A value of `height' makes
3285 windows fixed-height, a value of `width' makes them fixed-width, any
3286 other non-nil value makes them both fixed-width and fixed-height.
3288 The following code makes all windows displaying the current buffer
3289 fixed-width and fixed-height.
3291 (set (make-local-variable 'window-size-fixed) t)
3293 A call to enlarge-window on a window gives an error if that window is
3294 fixed-width and it is tried to change the window's width, or if the
3295 window is fixed-height, and it is tried to change its height. To
3296 change the size of a fixed-size window, bind `window-size-fixed'
3297 temporarily to nil, for example
3299 (let ((window-size-fixed nil))
3300 (enlarge-window 10))
3302 Likewise, an attempt to split a fixed-height window vertically,
3303 or a fixed-width window horizontally results in a error.
3305 ** The cursor-type frame parameter is now supported on MS-DOS
3306 terminals. When Emacs starts, it by default changes the cursor shape
3307 to a solid box, as it does on Unix. The `cursor-type' frame parameter
3308 overrides this as it does on Unix, except that the bar cursor is
3309 horizontal rather than vertical (since the MS-DOS display doesn't
3310 support a vertical-bar cursor).
3312 * Emacs 20.7 is a bug-fix release with few user-visible changes
3314 ** It is now possible to use CCL-based coding systems for keyboard
3317 ** ange-ftp now handles FTP security extensions, like Kerberos.
3319 ** Rmail has been extended to recognize more forms of digest messages.
3321 ** Now, most coding systems set in keyboard coding system work not
3322 only for character input, but also in incremental search. The
3323 exceptions are such coding systems that handle 2-byte character sets
3324 (e.g euc-kr, euc-jp) and that use ISO's escape sequence
3325 (e.g. iso-2022-jp). They are ignored in incremental search.
3327 ** Support for Macintosh PowerPC-based machines running GNU/Linux has
3331 * Emacs 20.6 is a bug-fix release with one user-visible change
3333 ** Support for ARM-based non-RISCiX machines has been added.
3336 * Emacs 20.5 is a bug-fix release with no user-visible changes.
3338 ** Not new, but not mentioned before:
3339 M-w when Transient Mark mode is enabled disables the mark.
3341 * Changes in Emacs 20.4
3343 ** Init file may be called .emacs.el.
3345 You can now call the Emacs init file `.emacs.el'.
3346 Formerly the name had to be `.emacs'. If you use the name
3347 `.emacs.el', you can byte-compile the file in the usual way.
3349 If both `.emacs' and `.emacs.el' exist, the latter file
3350 is the one that is used.
3352 ** shell-command, and shell-command-on-region, now return
3353 the exit code of the command (unless it is asynchronous).
3354 Also, you can specify a place to put the error output,
3355 separate from the command's regular output.
3356 Interactively, the variable shell-command-default-error-buffer
3357 says where to put error output; set it to a buffer name.
3358 In calls from Lisp, an optional argument ERROR-BUFFER specifies
3361 When you specify a non-nil error buffer (or buffer name), any error
3362 output is inserted before point in that buffer, with \f\n to separate
3363 it from the previous batch of error output. The error buffer is not
3364 cleared, so error output from successive commands accumulates there.
3366 ** Setting the default value of enable-multibyte-characters to nil in
3367 the .emacs file, either explicitly using setq-default, or via Custom,
3368 is now essentially equivalent to using --unibyte: all buffers
3369 created during startup will be made unibyte after loading .emacs.
3371 ** C-x C-f now handles the wildcards * and ? in file names. For
3372 example, typing C-x C-f c*.c RET visits all the files whose names
3373 match c*.c. To visit a file whose name contains * or ?, add the
3374 quoting sequence /: to the beginning of the file name.
3376 ** The M-x commands keep-lines, flush-lines and count-matches
3377 now have the same feature as occur and query-replace:
3378 if the pattern contains any upper case letters, then
3379 they never ignore case.
3381 ** The end-of-line format conversion feature previously mentioned
3382 under `* Emacs 20.1 changes for MS-DOS and MS-Windows' actually
3383 applies to all operating systems. Emacs recognizes from the contents
3384 of a file what convention it uses to separate lines--newline, CRLF, or
3385 just CR--and automatically converts the contents to the normal Emacs
3386 convention (using newline to separate lines) for editing. This is a
3387 part of the general feature of coding system conversion.
3389 If you subsequently save the buffer, Emacs converts the text back to
3390 the same format that was used in the file before.
3392 You can turn off end-of-line conversion by setting the variable
3393 `inhibit-eol-conversion' to non-nil, e.g. with Custom in the MULE group.
3395 ** The character set property `prefered-coding-system' has been
3396 renamed to `preferred-coding-system', for the sake of correct spelling.
3397 This is a fairly internal feature, so few programs should be affected.
3399 ** Mode-line display of end-of-line format is changed.
3400 The indication of the end-of-line format of the file visited by a
3401 buffer is now more explicit when that format is not the usual one for
3402 your operating system. For example, the DOS-style end-of-line format
3403 is displayed as "(DOS)" on Unix and GNU/Linux systems. The usual
3404 end-of-line format is still displayed as a single character (colon for
3405 Unix, backslash for DOS and Windows, and forward slash for the Mac).
3407 The values of the variables eol-mnemonic-unix, eol-mnemonic-dos,
3408 eol-mnemonic-mac, and eol-mnemonic-undecided, which are strings,
3409 control what is displayed in the mode line for each end-of-line
3410 format. You can now customize these variables.
3412 ** In the previous version of Emacs, tar-mode didn't work well if a
3413 filename contained non-ASCII characters. Now this is fixed. Such a
3414 filename is decoded by file-name-coding-system if the default value of
3415 enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil.
3417 ** The command temp-buffer-resize-mode toggles a minor mode
3418 in which temporary buffers (such as help buffers) are given
3419 windows just big enough to hold the whole contents.
3421 ** If you use completion.el, you must now run the function
3422 dynamic-completion-mode to enable it. Just loading the file
3423 doesn't have any effect.
3425 ** In Flyspell mode, the default is now to make just one Ispell process,
3428 ** If you use iswitchb but do not call (iswitchb-default-keybindings) to
3429 use the default keybindings, you will need to add the following line:
3430 (add-hook 'minibuffer-setup-hook 'iswitchb-minibuffer-setup)
3432 ** Auto-show mode is no longer enabled just by loading auto-show.el.
3433 To control it, set `auto-show-mode' via Custom or use the
3434 `auto-show-mode' command.
3436 ** Handling of X fonts' ascent/descent parameters has been changed to
3437 avoid redisplay problems. As a consequence, compared with previous
3438 versions the line spacing and frame size now differ with some font
3439 choices, typically increasing by a pixel per line. This change
3440 occurred in version 20.3 but was not documented then.
3442 ** If you select the bar cursor style, it uses the frame's
3443 cursor-color, rather than the cursor foreground pixel.
3445 ** In multibyte mode, Rmail decodes incoming MIME messages using the
3446 character set specified in the message. If you want to disable this
3447 feature, set the variable rmail-decode-mime-charset to nil.
3449 ** Not new, but not mentioned previously in NEWS: when you use #! at
3450 the beginning of a file to make it executable and specify an
3451 interpreter program, Emacs looks on the second line for the -*- mode
3452 and variable specification, as well as on the first line.
3454 ** Support for IBM codepage encoding of non-ASCII characters.
3456 The new command M-x codepage-setup creates a special coding system
3457 that can be used to convert text between a specific IBM codepage and
3458 one of the character sets built into Emacs which matches that
3459 codepage. For example, codepage 850 corresponds to Latin-1 character
3460 set, codepage 855 corresponds to Cyrillic-ISO character set, etc.
3462 Windows codepages 1250, 1251 and some others, where Windows deviates
3463 from the corresponding ISO character set, are also supported.
3465 IBM box-drawing characters and other glyphs which don't have
3466 equivalents in the corresponding ISO character set, are converted to
3467 a character defined by dos-unsupported-char-glyph on MS-DOS, and to
3468 `?' on other systems.
3470 IBM codepages are widely used on MS-DOS and MS-Windows, so this
3471 feature is most useful on those platforms, but it can also be used on
3474 Emacs compiled for MS-DOS automatically loads the support for the
3475 current codepage when it starts.
3479 *** When mail is sent using compose-mail (C-x m), and if
3480 `mail-send-nonascii' is set to the new default value `mime',
3481 appropriate MIME headers are added. The headers are added only if
3482 non-ASCII characters are present in the body of the mail, and no other
3483 MIME headers are already present. For example, the following three
3484 headers are added if the coding system used in the *mail* buffer is
3488 Content-type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
3489 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
3491 *** The new variable default-sendmail-coding-system specifies the
3492 default way to encode outgoing mail. This has higher priority than
3493 default-buffer-file-coding-system but has lower priority than
3494 sendmail-coding-system and the local value of
3495 buffer-file-coding-system.
3497 You should not set this variable manually. Instead, set
3498 sendmail-coding-system to specify a fixed encoding for all outgoing
3501 *** When you try to send a message that contains non-ASCII characters,
3502 if the coding system specified by those variables doesn't handle them,
3503 Emacs will ask you to select a suitable coding system while showing a
3504 list of possible coding systems.
3508 *** c-default-style can now take an association list that maps major
3509 modes to style names. When this variable is an alist, Java mode no
3510 longer hardcodes a setting to "java" style. See the variable's
3511 docstring for details.
3513 *** It's now possible to put a list as the offset on a syntactic
3514 symbol. The list is evaluated recursively until a non-nil offset is
3515 found. This is useful to combine several lineup functions to act in a
3516 prioritized order on a single line. However, none of the supplied
3517 lineup functions use this feature currently.
3519 *** New syntactic symbol catch-clause, which is used on the "catch" and
3520 "finally" lines in try-catch constructs in C++ and Java.
3522 *** New cleanup brace-catch-brace on c-cleanup-list, which does for
3523 "catch" lines what brace-elseif-brace does for "else if" lines.
3525 *** The braces of Java anonymous inner classes are treated separately
3526 from the braces of other classes in auto-newline mode. Two new
3527 symbols inexpr-class-open and inexpr-class-close may be used on
3528 c-hanging-braces-alist to control the automatic newlines used for
3531 *** Support for the Pike language added, along with new Pike specific
3532 syntactic symbols: inlambda, lambda-intro-cont
3534 *** Support for Java anonymous classes via new syntactic symbol
3535 inexpr-class. New syntactic symbol inexpr-statement for Pike
3536 support and gcc-style statements inside expressions. New lineup
3537 function c-lineup-inexpr-block.
3539 *** New syntactic symbol brace-entry-open which is used in brace lists
3540 (i.e. static initializers) when a list entry starts with an open
3541 brace. These used to be recognized as brace-list-entry's.
3542 c-electric-brace also recognizes brace-entry-open braces
3543 (brace-list-entry's can no longer be electrified).
3545 *** New command c-indent-line-or-region, not bound by default.
3547 *** `#' is only electric when typed in the indentation of a line.
3549 *** Parentheses are now electric (via the new command c-electric-paren)
3550 for auto-reindenting lines when parens are typed.
3552 *** In "gnu" style, inline-open offset is now set to zero.
3554 *** Uniform handling of the inclass syntactic symbol. The indentation
3555 associated with it is now always relative to the class opening brace.
3556 This means that the indentation behavior has changed in some
3557 circumstances, but only if you've put anything besides 0 on the
3558 class-open syntactic symbol (none of the default styles do that).
3562 *** New functionality for using Gnus as an offline newsreader has been
3563 added. A plethora of new commands and modes have been added. See the
3564 Gnus manual for the full story.
3566 *** The nndraft backend has returned, but works differently than
3567 before. All Message buffers are now also articles in the nndraft
3568 group, which is created automatically.
3570 *** `gnus-alter-header-function' can now be used to alter header
3573 *** `gnus-summary-goto-article' now accept Message-ID's.
3575 *** A new Message command for deleting text in the body of a message
3576 outside the region: `C-c C-v'.
3578 *** You can now post to component group in nnvirtual groups with
3581 *** `nntp-rlogin-program' -- new variable to ease customization.
3583 *** `C-u C-c C-c' in `gnus-article-edit-mode' will now inhibit
3584 re-highlighting of the article buffer.
3586 *** New element in `gnus-boring-article-headers' -- `long-to'.
3588 *** `M-i' symbolic prefix command. See the section "Symbolic
3589 Prefixes" in the Gnus manual for details.
3591 *** `L' and `I' in the summary buffer now take the symbolic prefix
3592 `a' to add the score rule to the "all.SCORE" file.
3594 *** `gnus-simplify-subject-functions' variable to allow greater
3595 control over simplification.
3597 *** `A T' -- new command for fetching the current thread.
3599 *** `/ T' -- new command for including the current thread in the
3602 *** `M-RET' is a new Message command for breaking cited text.
3604 *** \\1-expressions are now valid in `nnmail-split-methods'.
3606 *** The `custom-face-lookup' function has been removed.
3607 If you used this function in your initialization files, you must
3608 rewrite them to use `face-spec-set' instead.
3610 *** Cancelling now uses the current select method. Symbolic prefix
3611 `a' forces normal posting method.
3613 *** New command to translate M******** sm*rtq**t*s into proper text
3616 *** For easier debugging of nntp, you can set `nntp-record-commands'
3619 *** nntp now uses ~/.authinfo, a .netrc-like file, for controlling
3620 where and how to send AUTHINFO to NNTP servers.
3622 *** A command for editing group parameters from the summary buffer
3625 *** A history of where mails have been split is available.
3627 *** A new article date command has been added -- `article-date-iso8601'.
3629 *** Subjects can be simplified when threading by setting
3630 `gnus-score-thread-simplify'.
3632 *** A new function for citing in Message has been added --
3633 `message-cite-original-without-signature'.
3635 *** `article-strip-all-blank-lines' -- new article command.
3637 *** A new Message command to kill to the end of the article has
3640 *** A minimum adaptive score can be specified by using the
3641 `gnus-adaptive-word-minimum' variable.
3643 *** The "lapsed date" article header can be kept continually
3644 updated by the `gnus-start-date-timer' command.
3646 *** Web listserv archives can be read with the nnlistserv backend.
3648 *** Old dejanews archives can now be read by nnweb.
3650 *** `gnus-posting-styles' has been re-activated.
3652 ** Changes to TeX and LaTeX mode
3654 *** The new variable `tex-start-options-string' can be used to give
3655 options for the TeX run. The default value causes TeX to run in
3656 nonstopmode. For an interactive TeX run set it to nil or "".
3658 *** The command `tex-feed-input' sends input to the Tex Shell. In a
3659 TeX buffer it is bound to the keys C-RET, C-c RET, and C-c C-m (some
3660 of these keys may not work on all systems). For instance, if you run
3661 TeX interactively and if the TeX run stops because of an error, you
3662 can continue it without leaving the TeX buffer by typing C-RET.
3664 *** The Tex Shell Buffer is now in `compilation-shell-minor-mode'.
3665 All error-parsing commands of the Compilation major mode are available
3666 but bound to keys that don't collide with the shell. Thus you can use
3667 the Tex Shell for command line executions like a usual shell.
3669 *** The commands `tex-validate-region' and `tex-validate-buffer' check
3670 the matching of braces and $'s. The errors are listed in a *Occur*
3671 buffer and you can use C-c C-c or mouse-2 to go to a particular
3674 ** Changes to RefTeX mode
3676 *** The table of contents buffer can now also display labels and
3677 file boundaries in addition to sections. Use `l', `i', and `c' keys.
3679 *** Labels derived from context (the section heading) are now
3680 lowercase by default. To make the label legal in LaTeX, latin-1
3681 characters will lose their accent. All Mule characters will be
3682 removed from the label.
3684 *** The automatic display of cross reference information can also use
3685 a window instead of the echo area. See variable `reftex-auto-view-crossref'.
3687 *** kpsewhich can be used by RefTeX to find TeX and BibTeX files. See the
3688 customization group `reftex-finding-files'.
3690 *** The option `reftex-bibfile-ignore-list' has been renamed to
3691 `reftex-bibfile-ignore-regexps' and indeed can be fed with regular
3694 *** Multiple Selection buffers are now hidden buffers.
3696 ** New/deleted modes and packages
3698 *** The package snmp-mode.el provides major modes for editing SNMP and
3699 SNMPv2 MIBs. It has entries on `auto-mode-alist'.
3701 *** The package sql.el provides a major mode, M-x sql-mode, for
3702 editing SQL files, and M-x sql-interactive-mode for interacting with
3703 SQL interpreters. It has an entry on `auto-mode-alist'.
3705 *** M-x highlight-changes-mode provides a minor mode displaying buffer
3706 changes with a special face.
3708 *** ispell4.el has been deleted. It got in the way of ispell.el and
3709 this was hard to fix reliably. It has long been obsolete -- use
3710 Ispell 3.1 and ispell.el.
3712 * MS-DOS changes in Emacs 20.4
3714 ** Emacs compiled for MS-DOS now supports MULE features better.
3715 This includes support for display of all ISO 8859-N character sets,
3716 conversion to and from IBM codepage encoding of non-ASCII characters,
3717 and automatic setup of the MULE environment at startup. For details,
3718 check out the section `MS-DOS and MULE' in the manual.
3720 The MS-DOS installation procedure automatically configures and builds
3721 Emacs with input method support if it finds an unpacked Leim
3722 distribution when the config.bat script is run.
3724 ** Formerly, the value of lpr-command did not affect printing on
3725 MS-DOS unless print-region-function was set to nil, but now it
3726 controls whether an external program is invoked or output is written
3727 directly to a printer port. Similarly, in the previous version of
3728 Emacs, the value of ps-lpr-command did not affect PostScript printing
3729 on MS-DOS unless ps-printer-name was set to something other than a
3730 string (eg. t or `pipe'), but now it controls whether an external
3731 program is used. (These changes were made so that configuration of
3732 printing variables would be almost identical across all platforms.)
3734 ** In the previous version of Emacs, PostScript and non-PostScript
3735 output was piped to external programs, but because most print programs
3736 available for MS-DOS and MS-Windows cannot read data from their standard
3737 input, on those systems the data to be output is now written to a
3738 temporary file whose name is passed as the last argument to the external
3741 An exception is made for `print', a standard program on Windows NT,
3742 and `nprint', a standard program on Novell Netware. For both of these
3743 programs, the command line is constructed in the appropriate syntax
3744 automatically, using only the value of printer-name or ps-printer-name
3745 as appropriate--the value of the relevant `-switches' variable is
3746 ignored, as both programs have no useful switches.
3748 ** The value of the variable dos-printer (cf. dos-ps-printer), if it has
3749 a value, overrides the value of printer-name (cf. ps-printer-name), on
3750 MS-DOS and MS-Windows only. This has been true since version 20.3, but
3751 was not documented clearly before.
3753 ** All the Emacs games now work on MS-DOS terminals.
3754 This includes Tetris and Snake.
3756 * Lisp changes in Emacs 20.4
3758 ** New functions line-beginning-position and line-end-position
3759 return the position of the beginning or end of the current line.
3760 They both accept an optional argument, which has the same
3761 meaning as the argument to beginning-of-line or end-of-line.
3763 ** find-file and allied functions now have an optional argument
3764 WILDCARD. If this is non-nil, they do wildcard processing,
3765 and visit all files that match the wildcard pattern.
3767 ** Changes in the file-attributes function.
3769 *** The file size returned by file-attributes may be an integer or a float.
3770 It is an integer if the size fits in a Lisp integer, float otherwise.
3772 *** The inode number returned by file-attributes may be an integer (if
3773 the number fits in a Lisp integer) or a cons cell containing two
3776 ** The new function directory-files-and-attributes returns a list of
3777 files in a directory and their attributes. It accepts the same
3778 arguments as directory-files and has similar semantics, except that
3779 file names and attributes are returned.
3781 ** The new function file-attributes-lessp is a helper function for
3782 sorting the list generated by directory-files-and-attributes. It
3783 accepts two arguments, each a list of a file name and its atttributes.
3784 It compares the file names of each according to string-lessp and
3787 ** The new function file-expand-wildcards expands a wildcard-pattern
3788 to produce a list of existing files that match the pattern.
3790 ** New functions for base64 conversion:
3792 The function base64-encode-region converts a part of the buffer
3793 into the base64 code used in MIME. base64-decode-region
3794 performs the opposite conversion. Line-breaking is supported
3797 Functions base64-encode-string and base64-decode-string do a similar
3798 job on the text in a string. They return the value as a new string.
3801 The new function process-running-child-p
3802 will tell you if a subprocess has given control of its
3803 terminal to its own child process.
3805 ** interrupt-process and such functions have a new feature:
3806 when the second argument is `lambda', they send a signal
3807 to the running child of the subshell, if any, but if the shell
3808 itself owns its terminal, no signal is sent.
3810 ** There are new widget types `plist' and `alist' which can
3811 be used for customizing variables whose values are plists or alists.
3813 ** easymenu.el Now understands `:key-sequence' and `:style button'.
3814 :included is an alias for :visible.
3816 easy-menu-add-item now understands the values returned by
3817 easy-menu-remove-item and easy-menu-item-present-p. This can be used
3818 to move or copy menu entries.
3820 ** Multibyte editing changes
3822 *** The definitions of sref and char-bytes are changed. Now, sref is
3823 an alias of aref and char-bytes always returns 1. This change is to
3824 make some Emacs Lisp code which works on 20.2 and earlier also
3825 work on the latest Emacs. Such code uses a combination of sref and
3826 char-bytes in a loop typically as below:
3827 (setq char (sref str idx)
3828 idx (+ idx (char-bytes idx)))
3829 The byte-compiler now warns that this is obsolete.
3831 If you want to know how many bytes a specific multibyte character
3832 (say, CH) occupies in a multibyte buffer, use this code:
3833 (charset-bytes (char-charset ch))
3835 *** In multibyte mode, when you narrow a buffer to some region, and the
3836 region is preceded or followed by non-ASCII codes, inserting or
3837 deleting at the head or the end of the region may signal this error:
3839 Byte combining across boundary of accessible buffer text inhibitted
3841 This is to avoid some bytes being combined together into a character
3842 across the boundary.
3844 *** The functions find-charset-region and find-charset-string include
3845 `unknown' in the returned list in the following cases:
3846 o The current buffer or the target string is unibyte and
3847 contains 8-bit characters.
3848 o The current buffer or the target string is multibyte and
3849 contains invalid characters.
3851 *** The functions decode-coding-region and encode-coding-region remove
3852 text properties of the target region. Ideally, they should correctly
3853 preserve text properties, but for the moment, it's hard. Removing
3854 text properties is better than preserving them in a less-than-correct
3857 *** prefer-coding-system sets EOL conversion of default coding systems.
3858 If the argument to prefer-coding-system specifies a certain type of
3859 end of line conversion, the default coding systems set by
3860 prefer-coding-system will specify that conversion type for end of line.
3862 *** The new function thai-compose-string can be used to properly
3863 compose Thai characters in a string.
3865 ** The primitive `define-prefix-command' now takes an optional third
3866 argument NAME, which should be a string. It supplies the menu name
3867 for the created keymap. Keymaps created in order to be displayed as
3868 menus should always use the third argument.
3870 ** The meanings of optional second arguments for read-char,
3871 read-event, and read-char-exclusive are flipped. Now the second
3872 arguments are INHERIT-INPUT-METHOD. These functions use the current
3873 input method (if any) if and only if INHERIT-INPUT-METHOD is non-nil.
3875 ** The new function clear-this-command-keys empties out the contents
3876 of the vector that (this-command-keys) returns. This is useful in
3877 programs that read passwords, to prevent the passwords from echoing
3878 inadvertently as part of the next command in certain cases.
3880 ** The new macro `with-temp-message' displays a temporary message in
3881 the echo area, while executing some Lisp code. Like `progn', it
3882 returns the value of the last form, but it also restores the previous
3885 (with-temp-message MESSAGE &rest BODY)
3887 ** The function `require' now takes an optional third argument
3888 NOERROR. If it is non-nil, then there is no error if the
3889 requested feature cannot be loaded.
3891 ** In the function modify-face, an argument of (nil) for the
3892 foreground color, background color or stipple pattern
3893 means to clear out that attribute.
3895 ** The `outer-window-id' frame property of an X frame
3896 gives the window number of the outermost X window for the frame.
3898 ** Temporary buffers made with with-output-to-temp-buffer are now
3899 read-only by default, and normally use the major mode Help mode
3900 unless you put them in some other non-Fundamental mode before the
3901 end of with-output-to-temp-buffer.
3903 ** The new functions gap-position and gap-size return information on
3904 the gap of the current buffer.
3906 ** The new functions position-bytes and byte-to-position provide a way
3907 to convert between character positions and byte positions in the
3910 ** vc.el defines two new macros, `edit-vc-file' and `with-vc-file', to
3911 facilitate working with version-controlled files from Lisp programs.
3912 These macros check out a given file automatically if needed, and check
3913 it back in after any modifications have been made.
3915 * Installation Changes in Emacs 20.3
3917 ** The default value of load-path now includes most subdirectories of
3918 the site-specific directories /usr/local/share/emacs/site-lisp and
3919 /usr/local/share/emacs/VERSION/site-lisp, in addition to those
3920 directories themselves. Both immediate subdirectories and
3921 subdirectories multiple levels down are added to load-path.
3923 Not all subdirectories are included, though. Subdirectories whose
3924 names do not start with a letter or digit are excluded.
3925 Subdirectories named RCS or CVS are excluded. Also, a subdirectory
3926 which contains a file named `.nosearch' is excluded. You can use
3927 these methods to prevent certain subdirectories from being searched.
3929 Emacs finds these subdirectories and adds them to load-path when it
3930 starts up. While it would be cleaner to find the subdirectories each
3931 time Emacs loads a file, that would be much slower.
3933 This feature is an incompatible change. If you have stored some Emacs
3934 Lisp files in a subdirectory of the site-lisp directory specifically
3935 to prevent them from being used, you will need to rename the
3936 subdirectory to start with a non-alphanumeric character, or create a
3937 `.nosearch' file in it, in order to continue to achieve the desired
3940 ** Emacs no longer includes an old version of the C preprocessor from
3941 GCC. This was formerly used to help compile Emacs with C compilers
3942 that had limits on the significant length of an identifier, but in
3943 fact we stopped supporting such compilers some time ago.
3945 * Changes in Emacs 20.3
3947 ** The new command C-x z (repeat) repeats the previous command
3948 including its argument. If you repeat the z afterward,
3949 it repeats the command additional times; thus, you can
3950 perform many repetitions with one keystroke per repetition.
3952 ** Emacs now supports "selective undo" which undoes only within a
3953 specified region. To do this, set point and mark around the desired
3954 region and type C-u C-x u (or C-u C-_). You can then continue undoing
3955 further, within the same region, by repeating the ordinary undo
3956 command C-x u or C-_. This will keep undoing changes that were made
3957 within the region you originally specified, until either all of them
3958 are undone, or it encounters a change which crosses the edge of that
3961 In Transient Mark mode, undoing when a region is active requests
3964 ** If you specify --unibyte when starting Emacs, then all buffers are
3965 unibyte, except when a Lisp program specifically creates a multibyte
3966 buffer. Setting the environment variable EMACS_UNIBYTE has the same
3967 effect. The --no-unibyte option overrides EMACS_UNIBYTE and directs
3968 Emacs to run normally in multibyte mode.
3970 The option --unibyte does not affect the reading of Emacs Lisp files,
3971 though. If you want a Lisp file to be read in unibyte mode, use
3972 -*-unibyte: t;-*- on its first line. That will force Emacs to
3973 load that file in unibyte mode, regardless of how Emacs was started.
3975 ** toggle-enable-multibyte-characters no longer has a key binding and
3976 no longer appears in the menu bar. We've realized that changing the
3977 enable-multibyte-characters variable in an existing buffer is
3978 something that most users not do.
3980 ** You can specify a coding system to use for the next cut or paste
3981 operations through the window system with the command C-x RET X.
3982 The coding system can make a difference for communication with other
3985 C-x RET x specifies a coding system for all subsequent cutting and
3988 ** You can specify the printer to use for commands that do printing by
3989 setting the variable `printer-name'. Just what a printer name looks
3990 like depends on your operating system. You can specify a different
3991 printer for the Postscript printing commands by setting
3994 ** Emacs now supports on-the-fly spell checking by the means of a
3995 minor mode. It is called M-x flyspell-mode. You don't have to remember
3996 any other special commands to use it, and you will hardly notice it
3997 except when you make a spelling error. Flyspell works by highlighting
3998 incorrect words as soon as they are completed or as soon as the cursor
4001 Flyspell mode works with whichever dictionary you have selected for
4002 Ispell in Emacs. In TeX mode, it understands TeX syntax so as not
4003 to be confused by TeX commands.
4005 You can correct a misspelled word by editing it into something
4006 correct. You can also correct it, or accept it as correct, by
4007 clicking on the word with Mouse-2; that gives you a pop-up menu
4008 of various alternative replacements and actions.
4010 Flyspell mode also proposes "automatic" corrections. M-TAB replaces
4011 the current misspelled word with a possible correction. If several
4012 corrections are made possible, M-TAB cycles through them in
4013 alphabetical order, or in order of decreasing likelihood if
4014 flyspell-sort-corrections is nil.
4016 Flyspell mode also flags an error when a word is repeated, if
4017 flyspell-mark-duplications-flag is non-nil.
4019 ** Changes in input method usage.
4021 Now you can use arrow keys (right, left, down, up) for selecting among
4022 the alternatives just the same way as you do by C-f, C-b, C-n, and C-p
4025 You can use the ENTER key to accept the current conversion.
4027 If you type TAB to display a list of alternatives, you can select one
4028 of the alternatives with Mouse-2.
4030 The meaning of the variable `input-method-verbose-flag' is changed so
4031 that you can set it to t, nil, `default', or `complex-only'.
4033 If the value is nil, extra guidance is never given.
4035 If the value is t, extra guidance is always given.
4037 If the value is `complex-only', extra guidance is always given only
4038 when you are using complex input methods such as chinese-py.
4040 If the value is `default' (this is the default), extra guidance is
4041 given in the following case:
4042 o When you are using a complex input method.
4043 o When you are using a simple input method but not in the minibuffer.
4045 If you are using Emacs through a very slow line, setting
4046 input-method-verbose-flag to nil or to complex-only is a good choice,
4047 and if you are using an input method you are not familiar with,
4048 setting it to t is helpful.
4050 The old command select-input-method is now called set-input-method.
4052 In the language environment "Korean", you can use the following
4054 Shift-SPC toggle-korean-input-method
4055 C-F9 quail-hangul-switch-symbol-ksc
4056 F9 quail-hangul-switch-hanja
4057 These key bindings are canceled when you switch to another language
4060 ** The minibuffer history of file names now records the specified file
4061 names, not the entire minibuffer input. For example, if the
4062 minibuffer starts out with /usr/foo/, you might type in /etc/passwd to
4065 /usr/foo//etc/passwd
4067 which stands for the file /etc/passwd.
4069 Formerly, this used to put /usr/foo//etc/passwd in the history list.
4070 Now this puts just /etc/passwd in the history list.
4072 ** If you are root, Emacs sets backup-by-copying-when-mismatch to t
4073 at startup, so that saving a file will be sure to preserve
4074 its owner and group.
4076 ** find-func.el can now also find the place of definition of Emacs
4077 Lisp variables in user-loaded libraries.
4079 ** C-x r t (string-rectangle) now deletes the existing rectangle
4080 contents before inserting the specified string on each line.
4082 ** There is a new command delete-whitespace-rectangle
4083 which deletes whitespace starting from a particular column
4084 in all the lines on a rectangle. The column is specified
4085 by the left edge of the rectangle.
4087 ** You can now store a number into a register with C-u NUMBER C-x r n REG,
4088 increment it by INC with C-u INC C-x r + REG (to increment by one, omit
4089 C-u INC), and insert it in the buffer with C-x r g REG. This is useful
4090 for writing keyboard macros.
4092 ** The new command M-x speedbar displays a frame in which directories,
4093 files, and tags can be displayed, manipulated, and jumped to. The
4094 frame defaults to 20 characters in width, and is the same height as
4095 the frame that it was started from. Some major modes define
4096 additional commands for the speedbar, including Rmail, GUD/GDB, and
4099 ** query-replace-regexp is now bound to C-M-%.
4101 ** In Transient Mark mode, when the region is active, M-x
4102 query-replace and the other replace commands now operate on the region
4105 ** M-x write-region, when used interactively, now asks for
4106 confirmation before overwriting an existing file. When you call
4107 the function from a Lisp program, a new optional argument CONFIRM
4108 says whether to ask for confirmation in this case.
4110 ** If you use find-file-literally and the file is already visited
4111 non-literally, the command asks you whether to revisit the file
4112 literally. If you say no, it signals an error.
4114 ** Major modes defined with the "derived mode" feature
4115 now use the proper name for the mode hook: WHATEVER-mode-hook.
4116 Formerly they used the name WHATEVER-mode-hooks, but that is
4117 inconsistent with Emacs conventions.
4119 ** shell-command-on-region (and shell-command) reports success or
4120 failure if the command produces no output.
4122 ** Set focus-follows-mouse to nil if your window system or window
4123 manager does not transfer focus to another window when you just move
4126 ** mouse-menu-buffer-maxlen has been renamed to
4127 mouse-buffer-menu-maxlen to be consistent with the other related
4128 function and variable names.
4130 ** The new variable auto-coding-alist specifies coding systems for
4131 reading specific files. This has higher priority than
4132 file-coding-system-alist.
4134 ** If you set the variable unibyte-display-via-language-environment to
4135 t, then Emacs displays non-ASCII characters are displayed by
4136 converting them to the equivalent multibyte characters according to
4137 the current language environment. As a result, they are displayed
4138 according to the current fontset.
4140 ** C-q's handling of codes in the range 0200 through 0377 is changed.
4142 The codes in the range 0200 through 0237 are inserted as one byte of
4143 that code regardless of the values of nonascii-translation-table and
4144 nonascii-insert-offset.
4146 For the codes in the range 0240 through 0377, if
4147 enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil and nonascii-translation-table
4148 nor nonascii-insert-offset can't convert them to valid multibyte
4149 characters, they are converted to Latin-1 characters.
4151 ** If you try to find a file that is not read-accessible, you now get
4152 an error, rather than an empty buffer and a warning.
4154 ** In the minibuffer history commands M-r and M-s, an upper case
4155 letter in the regular expression forces case-sensitive search.
4157 ** In the *Help* buffer, cross-references to commands and variables
4158 are inferred and hyperlinked. Use C-h m in Help mode for the relevant
4161 ** M-x apropos-command, with a prefix argument, no longer looks for
4162 user option variables--instead it looks for noninteractive functions.
4164 Meanwhile, the command apropos-variable normally searches for
4165 user option variables; with a prefix argument, it looks at
4166 all variables that have documentation.
4168 ** When you type a long line in the minibuffer, and the minibuffer
4169 shows just one line, automatically scrolling works in a special way
4170 that shows you overlap with the previous line of text. The variable
4171 minibuffer-scroll-overlap controls how many characters of overlap
4172 it should show; the default is 20.
4174 Meanwhile, Resize Minibuffer mode is still available; in that mode,
4175 the minibuffer grows taller (up to a point) as needed to show the whole
4178 ** The new command M-x customize-changed-options lets you customize
4179 all the options whose meanings or default values have changed in
4180 recent Emacs versions. You specify a previous Emacs version number as
4181 argument, and the command creates a customization buffer showing all
4182 the customizable options which were changed since that version.
4183 Newly added options are included as well.
4185 If you don't specify a particular version number argument,
4186 then the customization buffer shows all the customizable options
4187 for which Emacs versions of changes are recorded.
4189 This function is also bound to the Changed Options entry in the
4192 ** When you run M-x grep with a prefix argument, it figures out
4193 the tag around point and puts that into the default grep command.
4195 ** The new command M-* (pop-tag-mark) pops back through a history of
4196 buffer positions from which M-. or other tag-finding commands were
4199 ** The new variable comment-padding specifies the number of spaces
4200 that `comment-region' will insert before the actual text of the comment.
4203 ** In Fortran mode the characters `.', `_' and `$' now have symbol
4204 syntax, not word syntax. Fortran mode now supports `imenu' and has
4205 new commands fortran-join-line (M-^) and fortran-narrow-to-subprogram
4206 (C-x n d). M-q can be used to fill a statement or comment block
4209 ** GUD now supports jdb, the Java debugger, and pdb, the Python debugger.
4211 ** If you set the variable add-log-keep-changes-together to a non-nil
4212 value, the command `C-x 4 a' will automatically notice when you make
4213 two entries in one day for one file, and combine them.
4215 ** You can use the command M-x diary-mail-entries to mail yourself a
4216 reminder about upcoming diary entries. See the documentation string
4217 for a sample shell script for calling this function automatically
4222 *** All you need to do to enable use of the Desktop package, is to set
4223 the variable desktop-enable to t with Custom.
4225 *** Minor modes are now restored. Which minor modes are restored
4226 and how modes are restored is controlled by `desktop-minor-mode-table'.
4228 ** There is no need to do anything special, now, to enable Gnus to
4229 read and post multi-lingual articles.
4231 ** Outline mode has now support for showing hidden outlines when
4232 doing an isearch. In order for this to happen search-invisible should
4233 be set to open (the default). If an isearch match is inside a hidden
4234 outline the outline is made visible. If you continue pressing C-s and
4235 the match moves outside the formerly invisible outline, the outline is
4236 made invisible again.
4238 ** Mail reading and sending changes
4240 *** The Rmail e command now switches to displaying the whole header of
4241 the message before it lets you edit the message. This is so that any
4242 changes you make in the header will not be lost if you subsequently
4245 *** The w command in Rmail, which writes the message body into a file,
4246 now works in the summary buffer as well. (The command to delete the
4247 summary buffer is now Q.) The default file name for the w command, if
4248 the message has no subject, is stored in the variable
4249 rmail-default-body-file.
4251 *** Most of the commands and modes that operate on mail and netnews no
4252 longer depend on the value of mail-header-separator. Instead, they
4253 handle whatever separator the buffer happens to use.
4255 *** If you set mail-signature to a value which is not t, nil, or a string,
4256 it should be an expression. When you send a message, this expression
4257 is evaluated to insert the signature.
4259 *** The new Lisp library feedmail.el (version 8) enhances processing of
4260 outbound email messages. It works in coordination with other email
4261 handling packages (e.g., rmail, VM, gnus) and is responsible for
4262 putting final touches on messages and actually submitting them for
4263 transmission. Users of the emacs program "fakemail" might be
4264 especially interested in trying feedmail.
4266 feedmail is not enabled by default. See comments at the top of
4267 feedmail.el for set-up instructions. Among the bigger features
4268 provided by feedmail are:
4270 **** you can park outgoing messages into a disk-based queue and
4271 stimulate sending some or all of them later (handy for laptop users);
4272 there is also a queue for draft messages
4274 **** you can get one last look at the prepped outbound message and
4275 be prompted for confirmation
4277 **** does smart filling of address headers
4279 **** can generate a MESSAGE-ID: line and a DATE: line; the date can be
4280 the time the message was written or the time it is being sent; this
4281 can make FCC copies more closely resemble copies that recipients get
4283 **** you can specify an arbitrary function for actually transmitting
4284 the message; included in feedmail are interfaces for /bin/[r]mail,
4285 /usr/lib/sendmail, and elisp smtpmail; it's easy to write a new
4286 function for something else (10-20 lines of elisp)
4290 *** The Dired function dired-do-toggle, which toggles marked and unmarked
4291 files, is now bound to "t" instead of "T".
4293 *** dired-at-point has been added to ffap.el. It allows one to easily
4294 run Dired on the directory name at point.
4296 *** Dired has a new command: %g. It searches the contents of
4297 files in the directory and marks each file that contains a match
4298 for a specified regexp.
4302 *** New option vc-ignore-vc-files lets you turn off version control
4305 *** VC Dired has been completely rewritten. It is now much
4306 faster, especially for CVS, and works very similar to ordinary
4309 VC Dired is invoked by typing C-x v d and entering the name of the
4310 directory to display. By default, VC Dired gives you a recursive
4311 listing of all files at or below the given directory which are
4312 currently locked (for CVS, all files not up-to-date are shown).
4314 You can change the listing format by setting vc-dired-recurse to nil,
4315 then it shows only the given directory, and you may also set
4316 vc-dired-terse-display to nil, then it shows all files under version
4317 control plus the names of any subdirectories, so that you can type `i'
4318 on such lines to insert them manually, as in ordinary Dired.
4320 All Dired commands operate normally in VC Dired, except for `v', which
4321 is redefined as the version control prefix. That means you may type
4322 `v l', `v =' etc. to invoke `vc-print-log', `vc-diff' and the like on
4323 the file named in the current Dired buffer line. `v v' invokes
4324 `vc-next-action' on this file, or on all files currently marked.
4326 The new command `v t' (vc-dired-toggle-terse-mode) allows you to
4327 toggle between terse display (only locked files) and full display (all
4328 VC files plus subdirectories). There is also a special command,
4329 `* l', to mark all files currently locked.
4331 Giving a prefix argument to C-x v d now does the same thing as in
4332 ordinary Dired: it allows you to supply additional options for the ls
4333 command in the minibuffer, to fine-tune VC Dired's output.
4335 *** Under CVS, if you merge changes from the repository into a working
4336 file, and CVS detects conflicts, VC now offers to start an ediff
4337 session to resolve them.
4339 Alternatively, you can use the new command `vc-resolve-conflicts' to
4340 resolve conflicts in a file at any time. It works in any buffer that
4341 contains conflict markers as generated by rcsmerge (which is what CVS
4344 *** You can now transfer changes between branches, using the new
4345 command vc-merge (C-x v m). It is implemented for RCS and CVS. When
4346 you invoke it in a buffer under version-control, you can specify
4347 either an entire branch or a pair of versions, and the changes on that
4348 branch or between the two versions are merged into the working file.
4349 If this results in any conflicts, they may be resolved interactively,
4352 ** Changes in Font Lock
4354 *** The face and variable previously known as font-lock-reference-face
4355 are now called font-lock-constant-face to better reflect their typical
4356 use for highlighting constants and labels. (Its face properties are
4357 unchanged.) The variable font-lock-reference-face remains for now for
4358 compatibility reasons, but its value is font-lock-constant-face.
4360 ** Frame name display changes
4362 *** The command set-frame-name lets you set the name of the current
4363 frame. You can use the new command select-frame-by-name to select and
4364 raise a frame; this is mostly useful on character-only terminals, or
4365 when many frames are invisible or iconified.
4367 *** On character-only terminal (not a window system), changing the
4368 frame name is now reflected on the mode line and in the Buffers/Frames
4371 ** Comint (subshell) changes
4373 *** In Comint modes, the commands to kill, stop or interrupt a
4374 subjob now also kill pending input. This is for compatibility
4375 with ordinary shells, where the signal characters do this.
4377 *** There are new commands in Comint mode.
4379 C-c C-x fetches the "next" line from the input history;
4380 that is, the line after the last line you got.
4381 You can use this command to fetch successive lines, one by one.
4383 C-c SPC accumulates lines of input. More precisely, it arranges to
4384 send the current line together with the following line, when you send
4387 C-c C-a if repeated twice consecutively now moves to the process mark,
4388 which separates the pending input from the subprocess output and the
4389 previously sent input.
4391 C-c M-r now runs comint-previous-matching-input-from-input;
4392 it searches for a previous command, using the current pending input
4393 as the search string.
4395 *** New option compilation-scroll-output can be set to scroll
4396 automatically in compilation-mode windows.
4400 *** Multiline macros are now handled, both as they affect indentation,
4401 and as recognized syntax. New syntactic symbol cpp-macro-cont is
4402 assigned to second and subsequent lines of a multiline macro
4405 *** A new style "user" which captures all non-hook-ified
4406 (i.e. top-level) .emacs file variable settings and customizations.
4407 Style "cc-mode" is an alias for "user" and is deprecated. "gnu"
4408 style is still the default however.
4410 *** "java" style now conforms to Sun's JDK coding style.
4412 *** There are new commands c-beginning-of-defun, c-end-of-defun which
4413 are alternatives which you could bind to C-M-a and C-M-e if you prefer
4414 them. They do not have key bindings by default.
4416 *** New and improved implementations of M-a (c-beginning-of-statement)
4417 and M-e (c-end-of-statement).
4419 *** C++ namespace blocks are supported, with new syntactic symbols
4420 namespace-open, namespace-close, and innamespace.
4422 *** File local variable settings of c-file-style and c-file-offsets
4423 makes the style variables local to that buffer only.
4425 *** New indentation functions c-lineup-close-paren,
4426 c-indent-one-line-block, c-lineup-dont-change.
4428 *** Improvements (hopefully!) to the way CC Mode is loaded. You
4429 should now be able to do a (require 'cc-mode) to get the entire
4430 package loaded properly for customization in your .emacs file. A new
4431 variable c-initialize-on-load controls this and is t by default.
4433 ** Changes to hippie-expand.
4435 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-dabbrev-skip-space'. If
4436 non-nil, trailing spaces may be included in the abbreviation to search for,
4437 which then gives the same behavior as the original `dabbrev-expand'.
4439 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-dabbrev-as-symbol'. If
4440 non-nil, characters of syntax '_' is considered part of the word when
4441 expanding dynamically.
4443 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-no-restriction'. If
4444 non-nil, narrowed buffers are widened before they are searched.
4446 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-only-buffers'. If
4447 non-empty, buffers searched are restricted to the types specified in
4448 this list. Useful for example when constructing new special-purpose
4449 expansion functions with `make-hippie-expand-function'.
4451 *** Text properties of the expansion are no longer copied.
4453 ** Changes in BibTeX mode.
4455 *** Any titleword matching a regexp in the new variable
4456 bibtex-autokey-titleword-ignore (case sensitive) is ignored during
4457 automatic key generation. This replaces variable
4458 bibtex-autokey-titleword-first-ignore, which only checked for matches
4459 against the first word in the title.
4461 *** Autokey generation now uses all words from the title, not just
4462 capitalized words. To avoid conflicts with existing customizations,
4463 bibtex-autokey-titleword-ignore is set up such that words starting with
4464 lowerkey characters will still be ignored. Thus, if you want to use
4465 lowercase words from the title, you will have to overwrite the
4466 bibtex-autokey-titleword-ignore standard setting.
4468 *** Case conversion of names and title words for automatic key
4469 generation is more flexible. Variable bibtex-autokey-preserve-case is
4470 replaced by bibtex-autokey-titleword-case-convert and
4471 bibtex-autokey-name-case-convert.
4473 ** Changes in vcursor.el.
4475 *** Support for character terminals is available: there is a new keymap
4476 and the vcursor will appear as an arrow between buffer text. A
4477 variable `vcursor-interpret-input' allows input from the vcursor to be
4478 entered exactly as if typed. Numerous functions, including
4479 `vcursor-compare-windows', have been rewritten to improve consistency
4480 in the selection of windows and corresponding keymaps.
4482 *** vcursor options can now be altered with M-x customize under the
4483 Editing group once the package is loaded.
4485 *** Loading vcursor now does not define keys by default, as this is
4486 generally a bad side effect. Use M-x customize to set
4487 vcursor-key-bindings to t to restore the old behaviour.
4489 *** vcursor-auto-disable can be `copy', which turns off copying from the
4490 vcursor, but doesn't disable it, after any non-vcursor command.
4494 *** You can now spell check comments and strings in the current
4495 buffer with M-x ispell-comments-and-strings. Comments and strings
4496 are identified by syntax tables in effect.
4498 *** Generic region skipping implemented.
4499 A single buffer can be broken into a number of regions where text will
4500 and will not be checked. The definitions of the regions can be user
4501 defined. New applications and improvements made available by this
4504 o URLs are automatically skipped
4505 o EMail message checking is vastly improved.
4507 *** Ispell can highlight the erroneous word even on non-window terminals.
4509 ** Changes to RefTeX mode
4511 RefTeX has been updated in order to make it more usable with very
4512 large projects (like a several volume math book). The parser has been
4513 re-written from scratch. To get maximum speed from RefTeX, check the
4514 section `Optimizations' in the manual.
4516 *** New recursive parser.
4518 The old version of RefTeX created a single large buffer containing the
4519 entire multifile document in order to parse the document. The new
4520 recursive parser scans the individual files.
4522 *** Parsing only part of a document.
4524 Reparsing of changed document parts can now be made faster by enabling
4525 partial scans. To use this feature, read the documentation string of
4526 the variable `reftex-enable-partial-scans' and set the variable to t.
4528 (setq reftex-enable-partial-scans t)
4530 *** Storing parsing information in a file.
4532 This can improve startup times considerably. To turn it on, use
4534 (setq reftex-save-parse-info t)
4536 *** Using multiple selection buffers
4538 If the creation of label selection buffers is too slow (this happens
4539 for large documents), you can reuse these buffers by setting
4541 (setq reftex-use-multiple-selection-buffers t)
4543 *** References to external documents.
4545 The LaTeX package `xr' allows to cross-reference labels in external
4546 documents. RefTeX can provide information about the external
4547 documents as well. To use this feature, set up the \externaldocument
4548 macros required by the `xr' package and rescan the document with
4549 RefTeX. The external labels can then be accessed with the `x' key in
4550 the selection buffer provided by `reftex-reference' (bound to `C-c )').
4551 The `x' key also works in the table of contents buffer.
4553 *** Many more labeled LaTeX environments are recognized by default.
4555 The builtin command list now covers all the standard LaTeX commands,
4556 and all of the major packages included in the LaTeX distribution.
4558 Also, RefTeX now understands the \appendix macro and changes
4559 the enumeration of sections in the *toc* buffer accordingly.
4561 *** Mouse support for selection and *toc* buffers
4563 The mouse can now be used to select items in the selection and *toc*
4564 buffers. See also the new option `reftex-highlight-selection'.
4566 *** New keymaps for selection and table of contents modes.
4568 The selection processes for labels and citation keys, and the table of
4569 contents buffer now have their own keymaps: `reftex-select-label-map',
4570 `reftex-select-bib-map', `reftex-toc-map'. The selection processes
4571 have a number of new keys predefined. In particular, TAB lets you
4572 enter a label with completion. Check the on-the-fly help (press `?'
4573 at the selection prompt) or read the Info documentation to find out
4576 *** Support for the varioref package
4578 The `v' key in the label selection buffer toggles \ref versus \vref.
4582 Three new hooks can be used to redefine the way labels, references,
4583 and citations are created. These hooks are
4584 `reftex-format-label-function', `reftex-format-ref-function',
4585 `reftex-format-cite-function'.
4587 *** Citations outside LaTeX
4589 The command `reftex-citation' may also be used outside LaTeX (e.g. in
4590 a mail buffer). See the Info documentation for details.
4592 *** Short context is no longer fontified.
4594 The short context in the label menu no longer copies the
4595 fontification from the text in the buffer. If you prefer it to be
4598 (setq reftex-refontify-context t)
4600 ** file-cache-minibuffer-complete now accepts a prefix argument.
4601 With a prefix argument, it does not try to do completion of
4602 the file name within its directory; it only checks for other
4603 directories that contain the same file name.
4605 Thus, given the file name Makefile, and assuming that a file
4606 Makefile.in exists in the same directory, ordinary
4607 file-cache-minibuffer-complete will try to complete Makefile to
4608 Makefile.in and will therefore never look for other directories that
4609 have Makefile. A prefix argument tells it not to look for longer
4610 names such as Makefile.in, so that instead it will look for other
4611 directories--just as if the name were already complete in its present
4614 ** New modes and packages
4616 *** There is a new alternative major mode for Perl, Cperl mode.
4617 It has many more features than Perl mode, and some people prefer
4618 it, but some do not.
4620 *** There is a new major mode, M-x vhdl-mode, for editing files of VHDL
4623 *** M-x which-function-mode enables a minor mode that displays the
4624 current function name continuously in the mode line, as you move
4627 Which Function mode is effective in major modes which support Imenu.
4629 *** Gametree is a major mode for editing game analysis trees. The author
4630 uses it for keeping notes about his postal Chess games, but it should
4631 be helpful for other two-player games as well, as long as they have an
4632 established system of notation similar to Chess.
4634 *** The new minor mode checkdoc-minor-mode provides Emacs Lisp
4635 documentation string checking for style and spelling. The style
4636 guidelines are found in the Emacs Lisp programming manual.
4638 *** The net-utils package makes some common networking features
4639 available in Emacs. Some of these functions are wrappers around
4640 system utilities (ping, nslookup, etc); others are implementations of
4641 simple protocols (finger, whois) in Emacs Lisp. There are also
4642 functions to make simple connections to TCP/IP ports for debugging and
4645 *** highlight-changes-mode is a minor mode that uses colors to
4646 identify recently changed parts of the buffer text.
4648 *** The new package `midnight' lets you specify things to be done
4649 within Emacs at midnight--by default, kill buffers that you have not
4650 used in a considerable time. To use this feature, customize
4651 the user option `midnight-mode' to t.
4653 *** The file generic-x.el defines a number of simple major modes.
4655 apache-generic-mode: For Apache and NCSA httpd configuration files
4656 samba-generic-mode: Samba configuration files
4657 fvwm-generic-mode: For fvwm initialization files
4658 x-resource-generic-mode: For X resource files
4659 hosts-generic-mode: For hosts files (.rhosts, /etc/hosts, etc)
4660 mailagent-rules-generic-mode: For mailagent .rules files
4661 javascript-generic-mode: For JavaScript files
4662 vrml-generic-mode: For VRML files
4663 java-manifest-generic-mode: For Java MANIFEST files
4664 java-properties-generic-mode: For Java property files
4665 mailrc-generic-mode: For .mailrc files
4667 Platform-specific modes:
4669 prototype-generic-mode: For Solaris/Sys V prototype files
4670 pkginfo-generic-mode: For Solaris/Sys V pkginfo files
4671 alias-generic-mode: For C shell alias files
4672 inf-generic-mode: For MS-Windows INF files
4673 ini-generic-mode: For MS-Windows INI files
4674 reg-generic-mode: For MS-Windows Registry files
4675 bat-generic-mode: For MS-Windows BAT scripts
4676 rc-generic-mode: For MS-Windows Resource files
4677 rul-generic-mode: For InstallShield scripts
4679 * Lisp changes in Emacs 20.3 since the Emacs Lisp Manual was published
4681 ** If you want a Lisp file to be read in unibyte mode,
4682 use -*-unibyte: t;-*- on its first line.
4683 That will force Emacs to read that file in unibyte mode.
4684 Otherwise, the file will be loaded and byte-compiled in multibyte mode.
4686 Thus, each lisp file is read in a consistent way regardless of whether
4687 you started Emacs with --unibyte, so that a Lisp program gives
4688 consistent results regardless of how Emacs was started.
4690 ** The new function assoc-default is useful for searching an alist,
4691 and using a default value if the key is not found there. You can
4692 specify a comparison predicate, so this function is useful for
4693 searching comparing a string against an alist of regular expressions.
4695 ** The functions unibyte-char-to-multibyte and
4696 multibyte-char-to-unibyte convert between unibyte and multibyte
4697 character codes, in a way that is appropriate for the current language
4700 ** The functions read-event, read-char and read-char-exclusive now
4701 take two optional arguments. PROMPT, if non-nil, specifies a prompt
4702 string. SUPPRESS-INPUT-METHOD, if non-nil, says to disable the
4703 current input method for reading this one event.
4705 ** Two new variables print-escape-nonascii and print-escape-multibyte
4706 now control whether to output certain characters as
4707 backslash-sequences. print-escape-nonascii applies to single-byte
4708 non-ASCII characters; print-escape-multibyte applies to multibyte
4709 characters. Both of these variables are used only when printing
4710 in readable fashion (prin1 uses them, princ does not).
4712 * Lisp changes in Emacs 20.3 before the Emacs Lisp Manual was published
4714 ** Compiled Emacs Lisp files made with the modified "MBSK" version
4715 of Emacs 20.2 do not work in Emacs 20.3.
4717 ** Buffer positions are now measured in characters, as they were
4718 in Emacs 19 and before. This means that (forward-char 1)
4719 always increases point by 1.
4721 The function chars-in-region now just subtracts its arguments. It is
4722 considered obsolete. The function char-boundary-p has been deleted.
4724 See below for additional changes relating to multibyte characters.
4726 ** defcustom, defface and defgroup now accept the keyword `:version'.
4727 Use this to specify in which version of Emacs a certain variable's
4728 default value changed. For example,
4730 (defcustom foo-max 34 "*Maximum number of foo's allowed."
4735 (defgroup foo-group nil "The foo group."
4738 If an entire new group is added or the variables in it have the
4739 default values changed, then just add a `:version' to that group. It
4740 is recommended that new packages added to the distribution contain a
4741 `:version' in the top level group.
4743 This information is used to control the customize-changed-options command.
4745 ** It is now an error to change the value of a symbol whose name
4746 starts with a colon--if it is interned in the standard obarray.
4748 However, setting such a symbol to its proper value, which is that
4749 symbol itself, is not an error. This is for the sake of programs that
4750 support previous Emacs versions by explicitly setting these variables
4753 If you set the variable keyword-symbols-constant-flag to nil,
4754 this error is suppressed, and you can set these symbols to any
4757 ** There is a new debugger command, R.
4758 It evaluates an expression like e, but saves the result
4759 in the buffer *Debugger-record*.
4761 ** Frame-local variables.
4763 You can now make a variable local to various frames. To do this, call
4764 the function make-variable-frame-local; this enables frames to have
4765 local bindings for that variable.
4767 These frame-local bindings are actually frame parameters: you create a
4768 frame-local binding in a specific frame by calling
4769 modify-frame-parameters and specifying the variable name as the
4772 Buffer-local bindings take precedence over frame-local bindings.
4773 Thus, if the current buffer has a buffer-local binding, that binding is
4774 active; otherwise, if the selected frame has a frame-local binding,
4775 that binding is active; otherwise, the default binding is active.
4777 It would not be hard to implement window-local bindings, but it is not
4778 clear that this would be very useful; windows tend to come and go in a
4779 very transitory fashion, so that trying to produce any specific effect
4780 through a window-local binding would not be very robust.
4782 ** `sregexq' and `sregex' are two new functions for constructing
4783 "symbolic regular expressions." These are Lisp expressions that, when
4784 evaluated, yield conventional string-based regexps. The symbolic form
4785 makes it easier to construct, read, and maintain complex patterns.
4786 See the documentation in sregex.el.
4788 ** parse-partial-sexp's return value has an additional element which
4789 is used to pass information along if you pass it to another call to
4790 parse-partial-sexp, starting its scan where the first call ended.
4791 The contents of this field are not yet finalized.
4793 ** eval-region now accepts a fourth optional argument READ-FUNCTION.
4794 If it is non-nil, that function is used instead of `read'.
4796 ** unload-feature by default removes the feature's functions from
4797 known hooks to avoid trouble, but a package providing FEATURE can
4798 define a hook FEATURE-unload-hook to be run by unload-feature instead.
4800 ** read-from-minibuffer no longer returns the argument DEFAULT-VALUE
4801 when the user enters empty input. It now returns the null string, as
4802 it did in Emacs 19. The default value is made available in the
4803 history via M-n, but it is not applied here as a default.
4805 The other, more specialized minibuffer-reading functions continue to
4806 return the default value (not the null string) when the user enters
4809 ** The new variable read-buffer-function controls which routine to use
4810 for selecting buffers. For example, if you set this variable to
4811 `iswitchb-read-buffer', iswitchb will be used to read buffer names.
4812 Other functions can also be used if they accept the same arguments as
4813 `read-buffer' and return the selected buffer name as a string.
4815 ** The new function read-passwd reads a password from the terminal,
4816 echoing a period for each character typed. It takes three arguments:
4817 a prompt string, a flag which says "read it twice to make sure", and a
4818 default password to use if the user enters nothing.
4820 ** The variable fill-nobreak-predicate gives major modes a way to
4821 specify not to break a line at certain places. Its value is a
4822 function which is called with no arguments, with point located at the
4823 place where a break is being considered. If the function returns
4824 non-nil, then the line won't be broken there.
4826 ** window-end now takes an optional second argument, UPDATE.
4827 If this is non-nil, then the function always returns an accurate
4828 up-to-date value for the buffer position corresponding to the
4829 end of the window, even if this requires computation.
4831 ** other-buffer now takes an optional argument FRAME
4832 which specifies which frame's buffer list to use.
4833 If it is nil, that means use the selected frame's buffer list.
4835 ** The new variable buffer-display-time, always local in every buffer,
4836 holds the value of (current-time) as of the last time that a window
4837 was directed to display this buffer.
4839 ** It is now meaningful to compare two window-configuration objects
4840 with `equal'. Two window-configuration objects are equal if they
4841 describe equivalent arrangements of windows, in the same frame--in
4842 other words, if they would give the same results if passed to
4843 set-window-configuration.
4845 ** compare-window-configurations is a new function that compares two
4846 window configurations loosely. It ignores differences in saved buffer
4847 positions and scrolling, and considers only the structure and sizes of
4848 windows and the choice of buffers to display.
4850 ** The variable minor-mode-overriding-map-alist allows major modes to
4851 override the key bindings of a minor mode. The elements of this alist
4852 look like the elements of minor-mode-map-alist: (VARIABLE . KEYMAP).
4854 If the VARIABLE in an element of minor-mode-overriding-map-alist has a
4855 non-nil value, the paired KEYMAP is active, and totally overrides the
4856 map (if any) specified for the same variable in minor-mode-map-alist.
4858 minor-mode-overriding-map-alist is automatically local in all buffers,
4859 and it is meant to be set by major modes.
4861 ** The function match-string-no-properties is like match-string
4862 except that it discards all text properties from the result.
4864 ** The function load-average now accepts an optional argument
4865 USE-FLOATS. If it is non-nil, the load average values are returned as
4866 floating point numbers, rather than as integers to be divided by 100.
4868 ** The new variable temporary-file-directory specifies the directory
4869 to use for creating temporary files. The default value is determined
4870 in a reasonable way for your operating system; on GNU and Unix systems
4871 it is based on the TMP and TMPDIR environment variables.
4875 *** easymenu.el now uses the new menu item format and supports the
4876 keywords :visible and :filter. The existing keyword :keys is now
4879 The variable `easy-menu-precalculate-equivalent-keybindings' controls
4880 a new feature which calculates keyboard equivalents for the menu when
4881 you define the menu. The default is t. If you rarely use menus, you
4882 can set the variable to nil to disable this precalculation feature;
4883 then the calculation is done only if you use the menu bar.
4885 *** A new format for menu items is supported.
4887 In a keymap, a key binding that has the format
4888 (STRING . REAL-BINDING) or (STRING HELP-STRING . REAL-BINDING)
4889 defines a menu item. Now a menu item definition may also be a list that
4890 starts with the symbol `menu-item'.
4893 (menu-item ITEM-NAME) or
4894 (menu-item ITEM-NAME REAL-BINDING . ITEM-PROPERTY-LIST)
4895 where ITEM-NAME is an expression which evaluates to the menu item
4896 string, and ITEM-PROPERTY-LIST has the form of a property list.
4897 The supported properties include
4899 :enable FORM Evaluate FORM to determine whether the
4901 :visible FORM Evaluate FORM to determine whether the
4902 item should appear in the menu.
4904 FILTER-FN is a function of one argument,
4905 which will be REAL-BINDING.
4906 It should return a binding to use instead.
4908 DESCRIPTION is a string that describes an equivalent keyboard
4909 binding for for REAL-BINDING. DESCRIPTION is expanded with
4910 `substitute-command-keys' before it is used.
4911 :key-sequence KEY-SEQUENCE
4912 KEY-SEQUENCE is a key-sequence for an equivalent
4915 This means that the command normally has no
4916 keyboard equivalent.
4917 :help HELP HELP is the extra help string (not currently used).
4918 :button (TYPE . SELECTED)
4919 TYPE is :toggle or :radio.
4920 SELECTED is a form, to be evaluated, and its
4921 value says whether this button is currently selected.
4923 Buttons are at the moment only simulated by prefixes in the menu.
4924 Eventually ordinary X-buttons may be supported.
4926 (menu-item ITEM-NAME) defines unselectable item.
4930 *** The new event type `mouse-wheel' is generated by a wheel on a
4931 mouse (such as the MS Intellimouse). The event contains a delta that
4932 corresponds to the amount and direction that the wheel is rotated,
4933 which is typically used to implement a scroll or zoom. The format is:
4935 (mouse-wheel POSITION DELTA)
4937 where POSITION is a list describing the position of the event in the
4938 same format as a mouse-click event, and DELTA is a signed number
4939 indicating the number of increments by which the wheel was rotated. A
4940 negative DELTA indicates that the wheel was rotated backwards, towards
4941 the user, and a positive DELTA indicates that the wheel was rotated
4942 forward, away from the user.
4944 As of now, this event type is generated only on MS Windows.
4946 *** The new event type `drag-n-drop' is generated when a group of
4947 files is selected in an application outside of Emacs, and then dragged
4948 and dropped onto an Emacs frame. The event contains a list of
4949 filenames that were dragged and dropped, which are then typically
4950 loaded into Emacs. The format is:
4952 (drag-n-drop POSITION FILES)
4954 where POSITION is a list describing the position of the event in the
4955 same format as a mouse-click event, and FILES is the list of filenames
4956 that were dragged and dropped.
4958 As of now, this event type is generated only on MS Windows.
4960 ** Changes relating to multibyte characters.
4962 *** The variable enable-multibyte-characters is now read-only;
4963 any attempt to set it directly signals an error. The only way
4964 to change this value in an existing buffer is with set-buffer-multibyte.
4966 *** In a string constant, `\ ' now stands for "nothing at all". You
4967 can use it to terminate a hex escape which is followed by a character
4968 that could otherwise be read as part of the hex escape.
4970 *** String indices are now measured in characters, as they were
4971 in Emacs 19 and before.
4973 The function chars-in-string has been deleted.
4974 The function concat-chars has been renamed to `string'.
4976 *** The function set-buffer-multibyte sets the flag in the current
4977 buffer that says whether the buffer uses multibyte representation or
4978 unibyte representation. If the argument is nil, it selects unibyte
4979 representation. Otherwise it selects multibyte representation.
4981 This function does not change the contents of the buffer, viewed
4982 as a sequence of bytes. However, it does change the contents
4983 viewed as characters; a sequence of two bytes which is treated as
4984 one character when the buffer uses multibyte representation
4985 will count as two characters using unibyte representation.
4987 This function sets enable-multibyte-characters to record which
4988 representation is in use. It also adjusts various data in the buffer
4989 (including its markers, overlays and text properties) so that they are
4990 consistent with the new representation.
4992 *** string-make-multibyte takes a string and converts it to multibyte
4993 representation. Most of the time, you don't need to care
4994 about the representation, because Emacs converts when necessary;
4995 however, it makes a difference when you compare strings.
4997 The conversion of non-ASCII characters works by adding the value of
4998 nonascii-insert-offset to each character, or by translating them
4999 using the table nonascii-translation-table.
5001 *** string-make-unibyte takes a string and converts it to unibyte
5002 representation. Most of the time, you don't need to care about the
5003 representation, but it makes a difference when you compare strings.
5005 The conversion from multibyte to unibyte representation
5006 loses information; the only time Emacs performs it automatically
5007 is when inserting a multibyte string into a unibyte buffer.
5009 *** string-as-multibyte takes a string, and returns another string
5010 which contains the same bytes, but treats them as multibyte.
5012 *** string-as-unibyte takes a string, and returns another string
5013 which contains the same bytes, but treats them as unibyte.
5015 *** The new function compare-strings lets you compare
5016 portions of two strings. Unibyte strings are converted to multibyte,
5017 so that a unibyte string can match a multibyte string.
5018 You can specify whether to ignore case or not.
5020 *** assoc-ignore-case now uses compare-strings so that
5021 it can treat unibyte and multibyte strings as equal.
5023 *** Regular expression operations and buffer string searches now
5024 convert the search pattern to multibyte or unibyte to accord with the
5025 buffer or string being searched.
5027 One consequence is that you cannot always use \200-\377 inside of
5028 [...] to match all non-ASCII characters. This does still work when
5029 searching or matching a unibyte buffer or string, but not when
5030 searching or matching a multibyte string. Unfortunately, there is no
5031 obvious choice of syntax to use within [...] for that job. But, what
5032 you want is just to match all non-ASCII characters, the regular
5033 expression [^\0-\177] works for it.
5035 *** Structure of coding system changed.
5037 All coding systems (including aliases and subsidiaries) are named
5038 by symbols; the symbol's `coding-system' property is a vector
5039 which defines the coding system. Aliases share the same vector
5040 as the principal name, so that altering the contents of this
5041 vector affects the principal name and its aliases. You can define
5042 your own alias name of a coding system by the function
5043 define-coding-system-alias.
5045 The coding system definition includes a property list of its own. Use
5046 the new functions `coding-system-get' and `coding-system-put' to
5047 access such coding system properties as post-read-conversion,
5048 pre-write-conversion, character-translation-table-for-decode,
5049 character-translation-table-for-encode, mime-charset, and
5050 safe-charsets. For instance, (coding-system-get 'iso-latin-1
5051 'mime-charset) gives the corresponding MIME-charset parameter
5054 Among the coding system properties listed above, safe-charsets is new.
5055 The value of this property is a list of character sets which this
5056 coding system can correctly encode and decode. For instance:
5057 (coding-system-get 'iso-latin-1 'safe-charsets) => (ascii latin-iso8859-1)
5059 Here, "correctly encode" means that the encoded character sets can
5060 also be handled safely by systems other than Emacs as far as they
5061 are capable of that coding system. Though, Emacs itself can encode
5062 the other character sets and read it back correctly.
5064 *** The new function select-safe-coding-system can be used to find a
5065 proper coding system for encoding the specified region or string.
5066 This function requires a user interaction.
5068 *** The new functions find-coding-systems-region and
5069 find-coding-systems-string are helper functions used by
5070 select-safe-coding-system. They return a list of all proper coding
5071 systems to encode a text in some region or string. If you don't want
5072 a user interaction, use one of these functions instead of
5073 select-safe-coding-system.
5075 *** The explicit encoding and decoding functions, such as
5076 decode-coding-region and encode-coding-string, now set
5077 last-coding-system-used to reflect the actual way encoding or decoding
5080 *** The new function detect-coding-with-language-environment can be
5081 used to detect a coding system of text according to priorities of
5082 coding systems used by some specific language environment.
5084 *** The functions detect-coding-region and detect-coding-string always
5085 return a list if the arg HIGHEST is nil. Thus, if only ASCII
5086 characters are found, they now return a list of single element
5087 `undecided' or its subsidiaries.
5089 *** The new functions coding-system-change-eol-conversion and
5090 coding-system-change-text-conversion can be used to get a different
5091 coding system than what specified only in how end-of-line or text is
5094 *** The new function set-selection-coding-system can be used to set a
5095 coding system for communicating with other X clients.
5097 *** The function `map-char-table' now passes as argument only valid
5098 character codes, plus generic characters that stand for entire
5099 character sets or entire subrows of a character set. In other words,
5100 each time `map-char-table' calls its FUNCTION argument, the key value
5101 either will be a valid individual character code, or will stand for a
5102 range of characters.
5104 *** The new function `char-valid-p' can be used for checking whether a
5105 Lisp object is a valid character code or not.
5107 *** The new function `charset-after' returns a charset of a character
5108 in the current buffer at position POS.
5110 *** Input methods are now implemented using the variable
5111 input-method-function. If this is non-nil, its value should be a
5112 function; then, whenever Emacs reads an input event that is a printing
5113 character with no modifier bits, it calls that function, passing the
5114 event as an argument. Often this function will read more input, first
5115 binding input-method-function to nil.
5117 The return value should be a list of the events resulting from input
5118 method processing. These events will be processed sequentially as
5119 input, before resorting to unread-command-events. Events returned by
5120 the input method function are not passed to the input method function,
5121 not even if they are printing characters with no modifier bits.
5123 The input method function is not called when reading the second and
5124 subsequent events of a key sequence.
5126 *** You can customize any language environment by using
5127 set-language-environment-hook and exit-language-environment-hook.
5129 The hook `exit-language-environment-hook' should be used to undo
5130 customizations that you made with set-language-environment-hook. For
5131 instance, if you set up a special key binding for a specific language
5132 environment by set-language-environment-hook, you should set up
5133 exit-language-environment-hook to restore the normal key binding.
5135 * Changes in Emacs 20.1
5137 ** Emacs has a new facility for customization of its many user
5138 options. It is called M-x customize. With this facility you can look
5139 at the many user options in an organized way; they are grouped into a
5142 M-x customize also knows what sorts of values are legitimate for each
5143 user option and ensures that you don't use invalid values.
5145 With M-x customize, you can set options either for the present Emacs
5146 session or permanently. (Permanent settings are stored automatically
5147 in your .emacs file.)
5149 ** Scroll bars are now on the left side of the window.
5150 You can change this with M-x customize-option scroll-bar-mode.
5152 ** The mode line no longer includes the string `Emacs'.
5153 This makes more space in the mode line for other information.
5155 ** When you select a region with the mouse, it is highlighted
5156 immediately afterward. At that time, if you type the DELETE key, it
5159 The BACKSPACE key, and the ASCII character DEL, do not do this; they
5160 delete the character before point, as usual.
5162 ** In an incremental search the whole current match is highlighted
5163 on terminals which support this. (You can disable this feature
5164 by setting search-highlight to nil.)
5166 ** In the minibuffer, in some cases, you can now use M-n to
5167 insert the default value into the minibuffer as text. In effect,
5168 the default value (if the minibuffer routines know it) is tacked
5169 onto the history "in the future". (The more normal use of the
5170 history list is to use M-p to insert minibuffer input used in the
5173 ** In Text mode, now only blank lines separate paragraphs.
5174 This makes it possible to get the full benefit of Adaptive Fill mode
5175 in Text mode, and other modes derived from it (such as Mail mode).
5176 TAB in Text mode now runs the command indent-relative; this
5177 makes a practical difference only when you use indented paragraphs.
5179 As a result, the old Indented Text mode is now identical to Text mode,
5180 and is an alias for it.
5182 If you want spaces at the beginning of a line to start a paragraph,
5183 use the new mode, Paragraph Indent Text mode.
5185 ** Scrolling changes
5187 *** Scroll commands to scroll a whole screen now preserve the screen
5188 position of the cursor, if scroll-preserve-screen-position is non-nil.
5190 In this mode, if you scroll several screens back and forth, finishing
5191 on the same screen where you started, the cursor goes back to the line
5194 *** If you set scroll-conservatively to a small number, then when you
5195 move point a short distance off the screen, Emacs will scroll the
5196 screen just far enough to bring point back on screen, provided that
5197 does not exceed `scroll-conservatively' lines.
5199 *** The new variable scroll-margin says how close point can come to the
5200 top or bottom of a window. It is a number of screen lines; if point
5201 comes within that many lines of the top or bottom of the window, Emacs
5202 recenters the window.
5204 ** International character set support (MULE)
5206 Emacs now supports a wide variety of international character sets,
5207 including European variants of the Latin alphabet, as well as Chinese,
5208 Devanagari (Hindi and Marathi), Ethiopian, Greek, IPA, Japanese,
5209 Korean, Lao, Russian, Thai, Tibetan, and Vietnamese scripts. These
5210 features have been merged from the modified version of Emacs known as
5211 MULE (for "MULti-lingual Enhancement to GNU Emacs")
5213 Users of these scripts have established many more-or-less standard
5214 coding systems for storing files. Emacs uses a single multibyte
5215 character encoding within Emacs buffers; it can translate from a wide
5216 variety of coding systems when reading a file and can translate back
5217 into any of these coding systems when saving a file.
5219 Keyboards, even in the countries where these character sets are used,
5220 generally don't have keys for all the characters in them. So Emacs
5221 supports various "input methods", typically one for each script or
5222 language, to make it possible to type them.
5224 The Emacs internal multibyte encoding represents a non-ASCII
5225 character as a sequence of bytes in the range 0200 through 0377.
5227 The new prefix key C-x RET is used for commands that pertain
5228 to multibyte characters, coding systems, and input methods.
5230 You can disable multibyte character support as follows:
5232 (setq-default enable-multibyte-characters nil)
5234 Calling the function standard-display-european turns off multibyte
5235 characters, unless you specify a non-nil value for the second
5236 argument, AUTO. This provides compatibility for people who are
5237 already using standard-display-european to continue using unibyte
5238 characters for their work until they want to change.
5242 An input method is a kind of character conversion which is designed
5243 specifically for interactive input. In Emacs, typically each language
5244 has its own input method (though sometimes several languages which use
5245 the same characters can share one input method). Some languages
5246 support several input methods.
5248 The simplest kind of input method works by mapping ASCII letters into
5249 another alphabet. This is how the Greek and Russian input methods
5252 A more powerful technique is composition: converting sequences of
5253 characters into one letter. Many European input methods use
5254 composition to produce a single non-ASCII letter from a sequence which
5255 consists of a letter followed by diacritics. For example, a' is one
5256 sequence of two characters that might be converted into a single
5259 The input methods for syllabic scripts typically use mapping followed
5260 by conversion. The input methods for Thai and Korean work this way.
5261 First, letters are mapped into symbols for particular sounds or tone
5262 marks; then, sequences of these which make up a whole syllable are
5263 mapped into one syllable sign--most often a "composite character".
5265 None of these methods works very well for Chinese and Japanese, so
5266 they are handled specially. First you input a whole word using
5267 phonetic spelling; then, after the word is in the buffer, Emacs
5268 converts it into one or more characters using a large dictionary.
5270 Since there is more than one way to represent a phonetically spelled
5271 word using Chinese characters, Emacs can only guess which one to use;
5272 typically these input methods give you a way to say "guess again" if
5273 the first guess is wrong.
5275 *** The command C-x RET m (toggle-enable-multibyte-characters)
5276 turns multibyte character support on or off for the current buffer.
5278 If multibyte character support is turned off in a buffer, then each
5279 byte is a single character, even codes 0200 through 0377--exactly as
5280 they did in Emacs 19.34. This includes the features for support for
5281 the European characters, ISO Latin-1 and ISO Latin-2.
5283 However, there is no need to turn off multibyte character support to
5284 use ISO Latin-1 or ISO Latin-2; the Emacs multibyte character set
5285 includes all the characters in these character sets, and Emacs can
5286 translate automatically to and from either one.
5288 *** Visiting a file in unibyte mode.
5290 Turning off multibyte character support in the buffer after visiting a
5291 file with multibyte code conversion will display the multibyte
5292 sequences already in the buffer, byte by byte. This is probably not
5295 If you want to edit a file of unibyte characters (Latin-1, for
5296 example), you can do it by specifying `no-conversion' as the coding
5297 system when reading the file. This coding system also turns off
5298 multibyte characters in that buffer.
5300 If you turn off multibyte character support entirely, this turns off
5301 character conversion as well.
5303 *** Displaying international characters on X Windows.
5305 A font for X typically displays just one alphabet or script.
5306 Therefore, displaying the entire range of characters Emacs supports
5307 requires using many fonts.
5309 Therefore, Emacs now supports "fontsets". Each fontset is a
5310 collection of fonts, each assigned to a range of character codes.
5312 A fontset has a name, like a font. Individual fonts are defined by
5313 the X server; fontsets are defined within Emacs itself. But once you
5314 have defined a fontset, you can use it in a face or a frame just as
5315 you would use a font.
5317 If a fontset specifies no font for a certain character, or if it
5318 specifies a font that does not exist on your system, then it cannot
5319 display that character. It will display an empty box instead.
5321 The fontset height and width are determined by the ASCII characters
5322 (that is, by the font in the fontset which is used for ASCII
5323 characters). If another font in the fontset has a different height,
5324 or the wrong width, then characters assigned to that font are clipped,
5325 and displayed within a box if highlight-wrong-size-font is non-nil.
5327 *** Defining fontsets.
5329 Emacs does not use any fontset by default. Its default font is still
5330 chosen as in previous versions. You can tell Emacs to use a fontset
5331 with the `-fn' option or the `Font' X resource.
5333 Emacs creates a standard fontset automatically according to the value
5334 of standard-fontset-spec. This fontset's short name is
5335 `fontset-standard'. Bold, italic, and bold-italic variants of the
5336 standard fontset are created automatically.
5338 If you specify a default ASCII font with the `Font' resource or `-fn'
5339 argument, a fontset is generated from it. This works by replacing the
5340 FOUNDARY, FAMILY, ADD_STYLE, and AVERAGE_WIDTH fields of the font name
5341 with `*' then using this to specify a fontset. This fontset's short
5342 name is `fontset-startup'.
5344 Emacs checks resources of the form Fontset-N where N is 0, 1, 2...
5345 The resource value should have this form:
5346 FONTSET-NAME, [CHARSET-NAME:FONT-NAME]...
5347 FONTSET-NAME should have the form of a standard X font name, except:
5348 * most fields should be just the wild card "*".
5349 * the CHARSET_REGISTRY field should be "fontset"
5350 * the CHARSET_ENCODING field can be any nickname of the fontset.
5351 The construct CHARSET-NAME:FONT-NAME can be repeated any number
5352 of times; each time specifies the font for one character set.
5353 CHARSET-NAME should be the name name of a character set, and
5354 FONT-NAME should specify an actual font to use for that character set.
5356 Each of these fontsets has an alias which is made from the
5357 last two font name fields, CHARSET_REGISTRY and CHARSET_ENCODING.
5358 You can refer to the fontset by that alias or by its full name.
5360 For any character sets that you don't mention, Emacs tries to choose a
5361 font by substituting into FONTSET-NAME. For instance, with the
5363 Emacs*Fontset-0: -*-fixed-medium-r-normal-*-24-*-*-*-*-*-fontset-24
5364 the font for ASCII is generated as below:
5365 -*-fixed-medium-r-normal-*-24-*-ISO8859-1
5366 Here is the substitution rule:
5367 Change CHARSET_REGISTRY and CHARSET_ENCODING to that of the charset
5368 defined in the variable x-charset-registries. For instance, ASCII has
5369 the entry (ascii . "ISO8859-1") in this variable. Then, reduce
5370 sequences of wild cards -*-...-*- with a single wildcard -*-.
5371 (This is to prevent use of auto-scaled fonts.)
5373 The function which processes the fontset resource value to create the
5374 fontset is called create-fontset-from-fontset-spec. You can also call
5375 that function explicitly to create a fontset.
5377 With the X resource Emacs.Font, you can specify a fontset name just
5378 like an actual font name. But be careful not to specify a fontset
5379 name in a wildcard resource like Emacs*Font--that tries to specify the
5380 fontset for other purposes including menus, and they cannot handle
5383 *** The command M-x set-language-environment sets certain global Emacs
5384 defaults for a particular choice of language.
5386 Selecting a language environment typically specifies a default input
5387 method and which coding systems to recognize automatically when
5388 visiting files. However, it does not try to reread files you have
5389 already visited; the text in those buffers is not affected. The
5390 language environment may also specify a default choice of coding
5391 system for new files that you create.
5393 It makes no difference which buffer is current when you use
5394 set-language-environment, because these defaults apply globally to the
5395 whole Emacs session.
5397 For example, M-x set-language-environment RET Latin-1 RET
5398 chooses the Latin-1 character set. In the .emacs file, you can do this
5399 with (set-language-environment "Latin-1").
5401 *** The command C-x RET f (set-buffer-file-coding-system)
5402 specifies the file coding system for the current buffer. This
5403 specifies what sort of character code translation to do when saving
5404 the file. As an argument, you must specify the name of one of the
5405 coding systems that Emacs supports.
5407 *** The command C-x RET c (universal-coding-system-argument)
5408 lets you specify a coding system when you read or write a file.
5409 This command uses the minibuffer to read a coding system name.
5410 After you exit the minibuffer, the specified coding system
5411 is used for *the immediately following command*.
5413 So if the immediately following command is a command to read or
5414 write a file, it uses the specified coding system for that file.
5416 If the immediately following command does not use the coding system,
5417 then C-x RET c ultimately has no effect.
5419 For example, C-x RET c iso-8859-1 RET C-x C-f temp RET
5420 visits the file `temp' treating it as ISO Latin-1.
5422 *** You can specify the coding system for a file using the -*-
5423 construct. Include `coding: CODINGSYSTEM;' inside the -*-...-*-
5424 to specify use of coding system CODINGSYSTEM. You can also
5425 specify the coding system in a local variable list at the end
5428 *** The command C-x RET t (set-terminal-coding-system) specifies
5429 the coding system for terminal output. If you specify a character
5430 code for terminal output, all characters output to the terminal are
5431 translated into that character code.
5433 This feature is useful for certain character-only terminals built in
5434 various countries to support the languages of those countries.
5436 By default, output to the terminal is not translated at all.
5438 *** The command C-x RET k (set-keyboard-coding-system) specifies
5439 the coding system for keyboard input.
5441 Character code translation of keyboard input is useful for terminals
5442 with keys that send non-ASCII graphic characters--for example,
5443 some terminals designed for ISO Latin-1 or subsets of it.
5445 By default, keyboard input is not translated at all.
5447 Character code translation of keyboard input is similar to using an
5448 input method, in that both define sequences of keyboard input that
5449 translate into single characters. However, input methods are designed
5450 to be convenient for interactive use, while the code translations are
5451 designed to work with terminals.
5453 *** The command C-x RET p (set-buffer-process-coding-system)
5454 specifies the coding system for input and output to a subprocess.
5455 This command applies to the current buffer; normally, each subprocess
5456 has its own buffer, and thus you can use this command to specify
5457 translation to and from a particular subprocess by giving the command
5458 in the corresponding buffer.
5460 By default, process input and output are not translated at all.
5462 *** The variable file-name-coding-system specifies the coding system
5463 to use for encoding file names before operating on them.
5464 It is also used for decoding file names obtained from the system.
5466 *** The command C-\ (toggle-input-method) activates or deactivates
5467 an input method. If no input method has been selected before, the
5468 command prompts for you to specify the language and input method you
5471 C-u C-\ (select-input-method) lets you switch to a different input
5472 method. C-h C-\ (or C-h I) describes the current input method.
5474 *** Some input methods remap the keyboard to emulate various keyboard
5475 layouts commonly used for particular scripts. How to do this
5476 remapping properly depends on your actual keyboard layout. To specify
5477 which layout your keyboard has, use M-x quail-set-keyboard-layout.
5479 *** The command C-h C (describe-coding-system) displays
5480 the coding systems currently selected for various purposes, plus
5481 related information.
5483 *** The command C-h h (view-hello-file) displays a file called
5484 HELLO, which has examples of text in many languages, using various
5487 *** The command C-h L (describe-language-support) displays
5488 information about the support for a particular language.
5489 You specify the language as an argument.
5491 *** The mode line now contains a letter or character that identifies
5492 the coding system used in the visited file. It normally follows the
5495 A dash indicates the default state of affairs: no code conversion
5496 (except CRLF => newline if appropriate). `=' means no conversion
5497 whatsoever. The ISO 8859 coding systems are represented by digits
5498 1 through 9. Other coding systems are represented by letters:
5500 A alternativnyj (Russian)
5502 C cn-gb-2312 (Chinese)
5503 C iso-2022-cn (Chinese)
5504 D in-is13194-devanagari (Indian languages)
5505 E euc-japan (Japanese)
5506 I iso-2022-cjk or iso-2022-ss2 (Chinese, Japanese, Korean)
5507 J junet (iso-2022-7) or old-jis (iso-2022-jp-1978-irv) (Japanese)
5508 K euc-korea (Korean)
5511 S shift_jis (Japanese)
5514 V viscii or vscii (Vietnamese)
5515 i iso-2022-lock (Chinese, Japanese, Korean)
5516 k iso-2022-kr (Korean)
5520 When you are using a character-only terminal (not a window system),
5521 two additional characters appear in between the dash and the file
5522 coding system. These two characters describe the coding system for
5523 keyboard input, and the coding system for terminal output.
5525 *** The new variable rmail-file-coding-system specifies the code
5526 conversion to use for RMAIL files. The default value is nil.
5528 When you read mail with Rmail, each message is decoded automatically
5529 into Emacs' internal format. This has nothing to do with
5530 rmail-file-coding-system. That variable controls reading and writing
5531 Rmail files themselves.
5533 *** The new variable sendmail-coding-system specifies the code
5534 conversion for outgoing mail. The default value is nil.
5536 Actually, there are three different ways of specifying the coding system
5539 - If you use C-x RET f in the mail buffer, that takes priority.
5540 - Otherwise, if you set sendmail-coding-system non-nil, that specifies it.
5541 - Otherwise, the default coding system for new files is used,
5542 if that is non-nil. That comes from your language environment.
5543 - Otherwise, Latin-1 is used.
5545 *** The command C-h t (help-with-tutorial) accepts a prefix argument
5546 to specify the language for the tutorial file. Currently, English,
5547 Japanese, Korean and Thai are supported. We welcome additional
5550 ** An easy new way to visit a file with no code or format conversion
5551 of any kind: Use M-x find-file-literally. There is also a command
5552 insert-file-literally which inserts a file into the current buffer
5553 without any conversion.
5555 ** C-q's handling of octal character codes is changed.
5556 You can now specify any number of octal digits.
5557 RET terminates the digits and is discarded;
5558 any other non-digit terminates the digits and is then used as input.
5560 ** There are new commands for looking up Info documentation for
5561 functions, variables and file names used in your programs.
5563 Type M-x info-lookup-symbol to look up a symbol in the buffer at point.
5564 Type M-x info-lookup-file to look up a file in the buffer at point.
5566 Precisely which Info files are used to look it up depends on the major
5567 mode. For example, in C mode, the GNU libc manual is used.
5569 ** M-TAB in most programming language modes now runs the command
5570 complete-symbol. This command performs completion on the symbol name
5571 in the buffer before point.
5573 With a numeric argument, it performs completion based on the set of
5574 symbols documented in the Info files for the programming language that
5577 With no argument, it does completion based on the current tags tables,
5578 just like the old binding of M-TAB (complete-tag).
5580 ** File locking works with NFS now.
5582 The lock file for FILENAME is now a symbolic link named .#FILENAME,
5583 in the same directory as FILENAME.
5585 This means that collision detection between two different machines now
5586 works reasonably well; it also means that no file server or directory
5587 can become a bottleneck.
5589 The new method does have drawbacks. It means that collision detection
5590 does not operate when you edit a file in a directory where you cannot
5591 create new files. Collision detection also doesn't operate when the
5592 file server does not support symbolic links. But these conditions are
5593 rare, and the ability to have collision detection while using NFS is
5594 so useful that the change is worth while.
5596 When Emacs or a system crashes, this may leave behind lock files which
5597 are stale. So you may occasionally get warnings about spurious
5598 collisions. When you determine that the collision is spurious, just
5599 tell Emacs to go ahead anyway.
5601 ** If you wish to use Show Paren mode to display matching parentheses,
5602 it is no longer sufficient to load paren.el. Instead you must call
5605 ** If you wish to use Delete Selection mode to replace a highlighted
5606 selection when you insert new text, it is no longer sufficient to load
5607 delsel.el. Instead you must call the function delete-selection-mode.
5609 ** If you wish to use Partial Completion mode to complete partial words
5610 within symbols or filenames, it is no longer sufficient to load
5611 complete.el. Instead you must call the function partial-completion-mode.
5613 ** If you wish to use uniquify to rename buffers for you,
5614 it is no longer sufficient to load uniquify.el. You must also
5615 set uniquify-buffer-name-style to one of the non-nil legitimate values.
5617 ** Changes in View mode.
5619 *** Several new commands are available in View mode.
5620 Do H in view mode for a list of commands.
5622 *** There are two new commands for entering View mode:
5623 view-file-other-frame and view-buffer-other-frame.
5625 *** Exiting View mode does a better job of restoring windows to their
5628 *** New customization variable view-scroll-auto-exit. If non-nil,
5629 scrolling past end of buffer makes view mode exit.
5631 *** New customization variable view-exits-all-viewing-windows. If
5632 non-nil, view-mode will at exit restore all windows viewing buffer,
5633 not just the selected window.
5635 *** New customization variable view-read-only. If non-nil, visiting a
5636 read-only file automatically enters View mode, and toggle-read-only
5637 turns View mode on or off.
5639 *** New customization variable view-remove-frame-by-deleting controls
5640 how to remove a not needed frame at view mode exit. If non-nil,
5641 delete the frame, if nil make an icon of it.
5643 ** C-x v l, the command to print a file's version control log,
5644 now positions point at the entry for the file's current branch version.
5646 ** C-x v =, the command to compare a file with the last checked-in version,
5647 has a new feature. If the file is currently not locked, so that it is
5648 presumably identical to the last checked-in version, the command now asks
5649 which version to compare with.
5651 ** When using hideshow.el, incremental search can temporarily show hidden
5652 blocks if a match is inside the block.
5654 The block is hidden again if the search is continued and the next match
5655 is outside the block. By customizing the variable
5656 isearch-hide-immediately you can choose to hide all the temporarily
5657 shown blocks only when exiting from incremental search.
5659 By customizing the variable hs-isearch-open you can choose what kind
5660 of blocks to temporarily show during isearch: comment blocks, code
5661 blocks, all of them or none.
5663 ** The new command C-x 4 0 (kill-buffer-and-window) kills the
5664 current buffer and deletes the selected window. It asks for
5667 ** C-x C-w, which saves the buffer into a specified file name,
5668 now changes the major mode according to that file name.
5669 However, the mode will not be changed if
5670 (1) a local variables list or the `-*-' line specifies a major mode, or
5671 (2) the current major mode is a "special" mode,
5672 not suitable for ordinary files, or
5673 (3) the new file name does not particularly specify any mode.
5675 This applies to M-x set-visited-file-name as well.
5677 However, if you set change-major-mode-with-file-name to nil, then
5678 these commands do not change the major mode.
5680 ** M-x occur changes.
5682 *** If the argument to M-x occur contains upper case letters,
5683 it performs a case-sensitive search.
5685 *** In the *Occur* buffer made by M-x occur,
5686 if you type g or M-x revert-buffer, this repeats the search
5687 using the same regular expression and the same buffer as before.
5689 ** In Transient Mark mode, the region in any one buffer is highlighted
5690 in just one window at a time. At first, it is highlighted in the
5691 window where you set the mark. The buffer's highlighting remains in
5692 that window unless you select to another window which shows the same
5693 buffer--then the highlighting moves to that window.
5695 ** The feature to suggest key bindings when you use M-x now operates
5696 after the command finishes. The message suggesting key bindings
5697 appears temporarily in the echo area. The previous echo area contents
5698 come back after a few seconds, in case they contain useful information.
5700 ** Each frame now independently records the order for recently
5701 selected buffers, so that the default for C-x b is now based on the
5702 buffers recently selected in the selected frame.
5704 ** Outline mode changes.
5706 *** Outline mode now uses overlays (this is the former noutline.el).
5708 *** Incremental searches skip over invisible text in Outline mode.
5710 ** When a minibuffer window is active but not the selected window, if
5711 you try to use the minibuffer, you used to get a nested minibuffer.
5712 Now, this not only gives an error, it also cancels the minibuffer that
5715 The motive for this change is so that beginning users do not
5716 unknowingly move away from minibuffers, leaving them active, and then
5719 If you want to be able to have recursive minibuffers, you must
5720 set enable-recursive-minibuffers to non-nil.
5722 ** Changes in dynamic abbrevs.
5724 *** Expanding dynamic abbrevs with M-/ is now smarter about case
5725 conversion. If the expansion has mixed case not counting the first
5726 character, and the abbreviation matches the beginning of the expansion
5727 including case, then the expansion is copied verbatim.
5729 The expansion is also copied verbatim if the abbreviation itself has
5730 mixed case. And using SPC M-/ to copy an additional word always
5731 copies it verbatim except when the previous copied word is all caps.
5733 *** The values of `dabbrev-case-replace' and `dabbrev-case-fold-search'
5734 are no longer Lisp expressions. They have simply three possible
5737 `dabbrev-case-replace' has these three values: nil (don't preserve
5738 case), t (do), or `case-replace' (do like M-x query-replace).
5739 `dabbrev-case-fold-search' has these three values: nil (don't ignore
5740 case), t (do), or `case-fold-search' (do like search).
5742 ** Minibuffer history lists are truncated automatically now to a
5743 certain length. The variable history-length specifies how long they
5744 can be. The default value is 30.
5746 ** Changes in Mail mode.
5748 *** The key C-x m no longer runs the `mail' command directly.
5749 Instead, it runs the command `compose-mail', which invokes the mail
5750 composition mechanism you have selected with the variable
5751 `mail-user-agent'. The default choice of user agent is
5752 `sendmail-user-agent', which gives behavior compatible with the old
5755 C-x 4 m now runs compose-mail-other-window, and C-x 5 m runs
5756 compose-mail-other-frame.
5758 *** While composing a reply to a mail message, from Rmail, you can use
5759 the command C-c C-r to cite just the region from the message you are
5760 replying to. This copies the text which is the selected region in the
5761 buffer that shows the original message.
5763 *** The command C-c C-i inserts a file at the end of the message,
5764 with separator lines around the contents.
5766 *** The command M-x expand-mail-aliases expands all mail aliases
5767 in suitable mail headers. Emacs automatically extracts mail alias
5768 definitions from your mail alias file (e.g., ~/.mailrc). You do not
5769 need to expand mail aliases yourself before sending mail.
5771 *** New features in the mail-complete command.
5773 **** The mail-complete command now inserts the user's full name,
5774 for local users or if that is known. The variable mail-complete-style
5775 controls the style to use, and whether to do this at all.
5776 Its values are like those of mail-from-style.
5778 **** The variable mail-passwd-command lets you specify a shell command
5779 to run to fetch a set of password-entries that add to the ones in
5782 **** The variable mail-passwd-file now specifies a list of files to read
5783 to get the list of user ids. By default, one file is used:
5786 ** You can "quote" a file name to inhibit special significance of
5787 special syntax, by adding `/:' to the beginning. Thus, if you have a
5788 directory named `/foo:', you can prevent it from being treated as a
5789 reference to a remote host named `foo' by writing it as `/:/foo:'.
5791 Emacs uses this new construct automatically when necessary, such as
5792 when you start it with a working directory whose name might otherwise
5793 be taken to be magic.
5795 ** There is a new command M-x grep-find which uses find to select
5796 files to search through, and grep to scan them. The output is
5797 available in a Compile mode buffer, as with M-x grep.
5799 M-x grep now uses the -e option if the grep program supports that.
5800 (-e prevents problems if the search pattern starts with a dash.)
5802 ** In Dired, the & command now flags for deletion the files whose names
5803 suggest they are probably not needed in the long run.
5805 In Dired, * is now a prefix key for mark-related commands.
5807 new key dired.el binding old key
5808 ------- ---------------- -------
5809 * c dired-change-marks c
5811 * * dired-mark-executables * (binding deleted)
5812 * / dired-mark-directories / (binding deleted)
5813 * @ dired-mark-symlinks @ (binding deleted)
5815 * DEL dired-unmark-backward DEL
5816 * ? dired-unmark-all-files M-C-?
5817 * ! dired-unmark-all-marks
5818 * % dired-mark-files-regexp % m
5819 * C-n dired-next-marked-file M-}
5820 * C-p dired-prev-marked-file M-{
5824 *** When Rmail cannot convert your incoming mail into Babyl format, it
5825 saves the new mail in the file RMAILOSE.n, where n is an integer
5826 chosen to make a unique name. This way, Rmail will not keep crashing
5827 each time you run it.
5829 *** In Rmail, the variable rmail-summary-line-count-flag now controls
5830 whether to include the line count in the summary. Non-nil means yes.
5832 *** In Rmail summary buffers, d and C-d (the commands to delete
5833 messages) now take repeat counts as arguments. A negative argument
5834 means to move in the opposite direction.
5836 *** In Rmail, the t command now takes an optional argument which lets
5837 you specify whether to show the message headers in full or pruned.
5839 *** In Rmail, the new command w (rmail-output-body-to-file) writes
5840 just the body of the current message into a file, without the headers.
5841 It takes the file name from the message subject, by default, but you
5842 can edit that file name in the minibuffer before it is actually used
5847 *** nntp.el has been totally rewritten in an asynchronous fashion.
5849 *** Article prefetching functionality has been moved up into
5852 *** Scoring can now be performed with logical operators like
5853 `and', `or', `not', and parent redirection.
5855 *** Article washing status can be displayed in the
5858 *** gnus.el has been split into many smaller files.
5860 *** Suppression of duplicate articles based on Message-ID.
5862 (setq gnus-suppress-duplicates t)
5864 *** New variables for specifying what score and adapt files
5865 are to be considered home score and adapt files. See
5866 `gnus-home-score-file' and `gnus-home-adapt-files'.
5868 *** Groups can inherit group parameters from parent topics.
5870 *** Article editing has been revamped and is now usable.
5872 *** Signatures can be recognized in more intelligent fashions.
5873 See `gnus-signature-separator' and `gnus-signature-limit'.
5875 *** Summary pick mode has been made to look more nn-like.
5876 Line numbers are displayed and the `.' command can be
5877 used to pick articles.
5879 *** Commands for moving the .newsrc.eld from one server to
5880 another have been added.
5882 `M-x gnus-change-server'
5884 *** A way to specify that "uninteresting" fields be suppressed when
5885 generating lines in buffers.
5887 *** Several commands in the group buffer can be undone with
5890 *** Scoring can be done on words using the new score type `w'.
5892 *** Adaptive scoring can be done on a Subject word-by-word basis:
5894 (setq gnus-use-adaptive-scoring '(word))
5896 *** Scores can be decayed.
5898 (setq gnus-decay-scores t)
5900 *** Scoring can be performed using a regexp on the Date header. The
5901 Date is normalized to compact ISO 8601 format first.
5903 *** A new command has been added to remove all data on articles from
5906 `M-x gnus-group-clear-data-on-native-groups'
5908 *** A new command for reading collections of documents
5909 (nndoc with nnvirtual on top) has been added -- `M-C-d'.
5911 *** Process mark sets can be pushed and popped.
5913 *** A new mail-to-news backend makes it possible to post
5914 even when the NNTP server doesn't allow posting.
5916 *** A new backend for reading searches from Web search engines
5917 (DejaNews, Alta Vista, InReference) has been added.
5919 Use the `G w' command in the group buffer to create such
5922 *** Groups inside topics can now be sorted using the standard
5923 sorting functions, and each topic can be sorted independently.
5925 See the commands under the `T S' submap.
5927 *** Subsets of the groups can be sorted independently.
5929 See the commands under the `G P' submap.
5931 *** Cached articles can be pulled into the groups.
5933 Use the `Y c' command.
5935 *** Score files are now applied in a more reliable order.
5937 *** Reports on where mail messages end up can be generated.
5939 `M-x nnmail-split-history'
5941 *** More hooks and functions have been added to remove junk
5942 from incoming mail before saving the mail.
5944 See `nnmail-prepare-incoming-header-hook'.
5946 *** The nnml mail backend now understands compressed article files.
5948 *** To enable Gnus to read/post multi-lingual articles, you must execute
5949 the following code, for instance, in your .emacs.
5951 (add-hook 'gnus-startup-hook 'gnus-mule-initialize)
5953 Then, when you start Gnus, it will decode non-ASCII text automatically
5954 and show appropriate characters. (Note: if you are using gnus-mime
5955 from the SEMI package, formerly known as TM, you should NOT add this
5956 hook to gnus-startup-hook; gnus-mime has its own method of handling
5959 Since it is impossible to distinguish all coding systems
5960 automatically, you may need to specify a choice of coding system for a
5961 particular news group. This can be done by:
5963 (gnus-mule-add-group NEWSGROUP 'CODING-SYSTEM)
5965 Here NEWSGROUP should be a string which names a newsgroup or a tree
5966 of newsgroups. If NEWSGROUP is "XXX.YYY", all news groups under
5967 "XXX.YYY" (including "XXX.YYY.ZZZ") will use the specified coding
5968 system. CODING-SYSTEM specifies which coding system to use (for both
5969 for reading and posting).
5971 CODING-SYSTEM can also be a cons cell of the form
5972 (READ-CODING-SYSTEM . POST-CODING-SYSTEM)
5973 Then READ-CODING-SYSTEM is used when you read messages from the
5974 newsgroups, while POST-CODING-SYSTEM is used when you post messages
5977 Emacs knows the right coding systems for certain newsgroups by
5978 default. Here are some of these default settings:
5980 (gnus-mule-add-group "fj" 'iso-2022-7)
5981 (gnus-mule-add-group "alt.chinese.text" 'hz-gb-2312)
5982 (gnus-mule-add-group "alt.hk" 'hz-gb-2312)
5983 (gnus-mule-add-group "alt.chinese.text.big5" 'cn-big5)
5984 (gnus-mule-add-group "soc.culture.vietnamese" '(nil . viqr))
5986 When you reply by mail to an article, these settings are ignored;
5987 the mail is encoded according to sendmail-coding-system, as usual.
5991 *** If you edit primarily one style of C (or C++, Objective-C, Java)
5992 code, you may want to make the CC Mode style variables have global
5993 values so that you can set them directly in your .emacs file. To do
5994 this, set c-style-variables-are-local-p to nil in your .emacs file.
5995 Note that this only takes effect if you do it *before* cc-mode.el is
5998 If you typically edit more than one style of C (or C++, Objective-C,
5999 Java) code in a single Emacs session, you may want to make the CC Mode
6000 style variables have buffer local values. By default, all buffers
6001 share the same style variable settings; to make them buffer local, set
6002 c-style-variables-are-local-p to t in your .emacs file. Note that you
6003 must do this *before* CC Mode is loaded.
6005 *** The new variable c-indentation-style holds the C style name
6006 of the current buffer.
6008 *** The variable c-block-comments-indent-p has been deleted, because
6009 it is no longer necessary. C mode now handles all the supported styles
6010 of block comments, with no need to say which one you will use.
6012 *** There is a new indentation style "python", which specifies the C
6013 style that the Python developers like.
6015 *** There is a new c-cleanup-list option: brace-elseif-brace.
6016 This says to put ...} else if (...) {... on one line,
6017 just as brace-else-brace says to put ...} else {... on one line.
6021 ** In vc-retrieve-snapshot (C-x v r), if you don't specify a snapshot
6022 name, it retrieves the *latest* versions of all files in the current
6023 directory and its subdirectories (aside from files already locked).
6025 This feature is useful if your RCS directory is a link to a common
6026 master directory, and you want to pick up changes made by other
6029 You can do the same thing for an individual file by typing C-u C-x C-q
6030 RET in a buffer visiting that file.
6032 *** VC can now handle files under CVS that are being "watched" by
6033 other developers. Such files are made read-only by CVS. To get a
6034 writable copy, type C-x C-q in a buffer visiting such a file. VC then
6035 calls "cvs edit", which notifies the other developers of it.
6037 *** vc-version-diff (C-u C-x v =) now suggests reasonable defaults for
6038 version numbers, based on the current state of the file.
6040 ** Calendar changes.
6042 A new function, list-holidays, allows you list holidays or subclasses
6043 of holidays for ranges of years. Related menu items allow you do this
6044 for the year of the selected date, or the following/previous years.
6048 There are some new user variables for customizing the page layout.
6050 *** Paper size, paper orientation, columns
6052 The variable `ps-paper-type' determines the size of paper ps-print
6053 formats for; it should contain one of the symbols:
6054 `a4' `a3' `letter' `legal' `letter-small' `tabloid'
6055 `ledger' `statement' `executive' `a4small' `b4' `b5'
6056 It defaults to `letter'.
6057 If you need other sizes, see the variable `ps-page-dimensions-database'.
6059 The variable `ps-landscape-mode' determines the orientation
6060 of the printing on the page. nil, the default, means "portrait" mode,
6061 non-nil means "landscape" mode.
6063 The variable `ps-number-of-columns' must be a positive integer.
6064 It determines the number of columns both in landscape and portrait mode.
6067 *** Horizontal layout
6069 The horizontal layout is determined by the variables
6070 `ps-left-margin', `ps-inter-column', and `ps-right-margin'.
6071 All are measured in points.
6075 The vertical layout is determined by the variables
6076 `ps-bottom-margin', `ps-top-margin', and `ps-header-offset'.
6077 All are measured in points.
6081 If the variable `ps-print-header' is nil, no header is printed. Then
6082 `ps-header-offset' is not relevant and `ps-top-margin' represents the
6083 margin above the text.
6085 If the variable `ps-print-header-frame' is non-nil, a gaudy
6086 framing box is printed around the header.
6088 The contents of the header are determined by `ps-header-lines',
6089 `ps-show-n-of-n', `ps-left-header' and `ps-right-header'.
6091 The height of the header is determined by `ps-header-line-pad',
6092 `ps-header-font-family', `ps-header-title-font-size' and
6093 `ps-header-font-size'.
6097 The variable `ps-font-family' determines which font family is to be
6098 used for ordinary text. Its value must be a key symbol in the alist
6099 `ps-font-info-database'. You can add other font families by adding
6100 elements to this alist.
6102 The variable `ps-font-size' determines the size of the font
6103 for ordinary text. It defaults to 8.5 points.
6105 ** hideshow changes.
6107 *** now supports hiding of blocks of single line comments (like // for
6110 *** Support for java-mode added.
6112 *** When doing `hs-hide-all' it is now possible to also hide the comments
6113 in the file if `hs-hide-comments-when-hiding-all' is set.
6115 *** The new function `hs-hide-initial-comment' hides the the comments at
6116 the beginning of the files. Finally those huge RCS logs don't stay in your
6117 way! This is run by default when entering the `hs-minor-mode'.
6119 *** Now uses overlays instead of `selective-display', so is more
6120 robust and a lot faster.
6122 *** A block beginning can span multiple lines.
6124 *** The new variable `hs-show-hidden-short-form' if t, directs hideshow
6125 to show only the beginning of a block when it is hidden. See the
6126 documentation for more details.
6128 ** Changes in Enriched mode.
6130 *** When you visit a file in enriched-mode, Emacs will make sure it is
6131 filled to the current fill-column. This behavior is now independent
6132 of the size of the window. When you save the file, the fill-column in
6133 use is stored as well, so that the whole buffer need not be refilled
6134 the next time unless the fill-column is different.
6136 *** use-hard-newlines is now a minor mode. When it is enabled, Emacs
6137 distinguishes between hard and soft newlines, and treats hard newlines
6138 as paragraph boundaries. Otherwise all newlines inserted are marked
6139 as soft, and paragraph boundaries are determined solely from the text.
6145 The variables font-lock-face-attributes, font-lock-display-type and
6146 font-lock-background-mode are now obsolete; the recommended way to specify the
6147 faces to use for Font Lock mode is with M-x customize-group on the new custom
6148 group font-lock-highlighting-faces. If you set font-lock-face-attributes in
6149 your ~/.emacs file, Font Lock mode will respect its value. However, you should
6150 consider converting from setting that variable to using M-x customize.
6152 You can still use X resources to specify Font Lock face appearances.
6154 *** Maximum decoration
6156 Fontification now uses the maximum level of decoration supported by
6157 default. Previously, fontification used a mode-specific default level
6158 of decoration, which is typically the minimum level of decoration
6159 supported. You can set font-lock-maximum-decoration to nil
6160 to get the old behavior.
6164 Support is now provided for Java, Objective-C, AWK and SIMULA modes.
6166 Note that Font Lock mode can be turned on without knowing exactly what modes
6167 support Font Lock mode, via the command global-font-lock-mode.
6169 *** Configurable support
6171 Support for C, C++, Objective-C and Java can be more easily configured for
6172 additional types and classes via the new variables c-font-lock-extra-types,
6173 c++-font-lock-extra-types, objc-font-lock-extra-types and, you guessed it,
6174 java-font-lock-extra-types. These value of each of these variables should be a
6175 list of regexps matching the extra type names. For example, the default value
6176 of c-font-lock-extra-types is ("\\sw+_t") which means fontification follows the
6177 convention that C type names end in _t. This results in slower fontification.
6179 Of course, you can change the variables that specify fontification in whatever
6180 way you wish, typically by adding regexps. However, these new variables make
6181 it easier to make specific and common changes for the fontification of types.
6183 *** Adding highlighting patterns to existing support
6185 You can use the new function font-lock-add-keywords to add your own
6186 highlighting patterns, such as for project-local or user-specific constructs,
6189 For example, to highlight `FIXME:' words in C comments, put:
6191 (font-lock-add-keywords 'c-mode '(("\\<FIXME:" 0 font-lock-warning-face t)))
6197 Font Lock now defines two new faces, font-lock-builtin-face and
6198 font-lock-warning-face. These are intended to highlight builtin keywords,
6199 distinct from a language's normal keywords, and objects that should be brought
6200 to user attention, respectively. Various modes now use these new faces.
6202 *** Changes to fast-lock support mode
6204 The fast-lock package, one of the two Font Lock support modes, can now process
6205 cache files silently. You can use the new variable fast-lock-verbose, in the
6206 same way as font-lock-verbose, to control this feature.
6208 *** Changes to lazy-lock support mode
6210 The lazy-lock package, one of the two Font Lock support modes, can now fontify
6211 according to the true syntactic context relative to other lines. You can use
6212 the new variable lazy-lock-defer-contextually to control this feature. If
6213 non-nil, changes to the buffer will cause subsequent lines in the buffer to be
6214 refontified after lazy-lock-defer-time seconds of idle time. If nil, then only
6215 the modified lines will be refontified; this is the same as the previous Lazy
6216 Lock mode behaviour and the behaviour of Font Lock mode.
6218 This feature is useful in modes where strings or comments can span lines.
6219 For example, if a string or comment terminating character is deleted, then if
6220 this feature is enabled subsequent lines in the buffer will be correctly
6221 refontified to reflect their new syntactic context. Previously, only the line
6222 containing the deleted character would be refontified and you would have to use
6223 the command M-g M-g (font-lock-fontify-block) to refontify some lines.
6225 As a consequence of this new feature, two other variables have changed:
6227 Variable `lazy-lock-defer-driven' is renamed `lazy-lock-defer-on-scrolling'.
6228 Variable `lazy-lock-defer-time' can now only be a time, i.e., a number.
6229 Buffer modes for which on-the-fly deferral applies can be specified via the
6230 new variable `lazy-lock-defer-on-the-fly'.
6232 If you set these variables in your ~/.emacs, then you may have to change those
6235 ** Ada mode changes.
6237 *** There is now better support for using find-file.el with Ada mode.
6238 If you switch between spec and body, the cursor stays in the same
6239 procedure (modulo overloading). If a spec has no body file yet, but
6240 you try to switch to its body file, Ada mode now generates procedure
6243 *** There are two new commands:
6244 - `ada-make-local' : invokes gnatmake on the current buffer
6245 - `ada-check-syntax' : check syntax of current buffer.
6247 The user options `ada-compiler-make', `ada-make-options',
6248 `ada-language-version', `ada-compiler-syntax-check', and
6249 `ada-compile-options' are used within these commands.
6251 *** Ada mode can now work with Outline minor mode. The outline level
6252 is calculated from the indenting, not from syntactic constructs.
6253 Outlining does not work if your code is not correctly indented.
6255 *** The new function `ada-gnat-style' converts the buffer to the style of
6256 formatting used in GNAT. It places two blanks after a comment start,
6257 places one blank between a word end and an opening '(', and puts one
6258 space between a comma and the beginning of a word.
6260 ** Scheme mode changes.
6262 *** Scheme mode indentation now uses many of the facilities of Lisp
6263 mode; therefore, the variables to customize it are the variables used
6264 for Lisp mode which have names starting with `lisp-'. The variables
6265 with names starting with `scheme-' which used to do this no longer
6268 If you want to use different indentation for Scheme and Lisp, this is
6269 still possible, but now you must do it by adding a hook to
6270 scheme-mode-hook, which could work by setting the `lisp-' indentation
6271 variables as buffer-local variables.
6273 *** DSSSL mode is a variant of Scheme mode, for editing DSSSL scripts.
6276 ** Changes to the emacsclient program
6278 *** If a socket can't be found, and environment variables LOGNAME or
6279 USER are set, emacsclient now looks for a socket based on the UID
6280 associated with the name. That is an emacsclient running as root
6281 can connect to an Emacs server started by a non-root user.
6283 *** The emacsclient program now accepts an option --no-wait which tells
6284 it to return immediately without waiting for you to "finish" the
6287 *** The new option --alternate-editor allows to specify an editor to
6288 use if Emacs is not running. The environment variable
6289 ALTERNATE_EDITOR can be used for the same effect; the command line
6290 option takes precedence.
6292 ** M-x eldoc-mode enables a minor mode in which the echo area
6293 constantly shows the parameter list for function being called at point
6294 (in Emacs Lisp and Lisp Interaction modes only).
6296 ** C-x n d now runs the new command narrow-to-defun,
6297 which narrows the accessible parts of the buffer to just
6300 ** Emacs now handles the `--' argument in the standard way; all
6301 following arguments are treated as ordinary file names.
6303 ** On MSDOS and Windows, the bookmark file is now called _emacs.bmk,
6304 and the saved desktop file is now called _emacs.desktop (truncated if
6307 ** When you kill a buffer that visits a file,
6308 if there are any registers that save positions in the file,
6309 these register values no longer become completely useless.
6310 If you try to go to such a register with C-x j, then you are
6311 asked whether to visit the file again. If you say yes,
6312 it visits the file and then goes to the same position.
6314 ** When you visit a file that changes frequently outside Emacs--for
6315 example, a log of output from a process that continues to run--it may
6316 be useful for Emacs to revert the file without querying you whenever
6317 you visit the file afresh with C-x C-f.
6319 You can request this behavior for certain files by setting the
6320 variable revert-without-query to a list of regular expressions. If a
6321 file's name matches any of these regular expressions, find-file and
6322 revert-buffer revert the buffer without asking for permission--but
6323 only if you have not edited the buffer text yourself.
6325 ** set-default-font has been renamed to set-frame-font
6326 since it applies only to the current frame.
6328 ** In TeX mode, you can use the variable tex-main-file to specify the
6329 file for tex-file to run TeX on. (By default, tex-main-file is nil,
6330 and tex-file runs TeX on the current visited file.)
6332 This is useful when you are editing a document that consists of
6333 multiple files. In each of the included files, you can set up a local
6334 variable list which specifies the top-level file of your document for
6335 tex-main-file. Then tex-file will run TeX on the whole document
6336 instead of just the file you are editing.
6340 RefTeX mode is a new minor mode with special support for \label, \ref
6341 and \cite macros in LaTeX documents. RefTeX distinguishes labels of
6342 different environments (equation, figure, ...) and has full support for
6343 multifile documents. To use it, select a buffer with a LaTeX document and
6344 turn the mode on with M-x reftex-mode. Here are the main user commands:
6347 Creates a label semi-automatically. RefTeX is context sensitive and
6348 knows which kind of label is needed.
6350 C-c ) reftex-reference
6351 Offers in a menu all labels in the document, along with context of the
6352 label definition. The selected label is referenced as \ref{LABEL}.
6354 C-c [ reftex-citation
6355 Prompts for a regular expression and displays a list of matching BibTeX
6356 database entries. The selected entry is cited with a \cite{KEY} macro.
6358 C-c & reftex-view-crossref
6359 Views the cross reference of a \ref or \cite command near point.
6362 Shows a table of contents of the (multifile) document. From there you
6363 can quickly jump to every section.
6365 Under X, RefTeX installs a "Ref" menu in the menu bar, with additional
6366 commands. Press `?' to get help when a prompt mentions this feature.
6367 Full documentation and customization examples are in the file
6368 reftex.el. You can use the finder to view the file documentation:
6369 C-h p --> tex --> reftex.el
6371 ** Changes in BibTeX mode.
6373 *** Info documentation is now available.
6375 *** Don't allow parentheses in string constants anymore. This confused
6376 both the BibTeX program and Emacs BibTeX mode.
6378 *** Renamed variable bibtex-mode-user-optional-fields to
6379 bibtex-user-optional-fields.
6381 *** Removed variable bibtex-include-OPTannote
6382 (use bibtex-user-optional-fields instead).
6384 *** New interactive functions to copy and kill fields and complete
6385 entries to the BibTeX kill ring, from where they can be yanked back by
6386 appropriate functions.
6388 *** New interactive functions for repositioning and marking of
6389 entries. They are bound by default to M-C-l and M-C-h.
6391 *** New hook bibtex-clean-entry-hook. It is called after entry has
6394 *** New variable bibtex-field-delimiters, which replaces variables
6395 bibtex-field-{left|right}-delimiter.
6397 *** New variable bibtex-entry-delimiters to determine how entries
6400 *** Allow preinitialization of fields. See documentation of
6401 bibtex-user-optional-fields, bibtex-entry-field-alist, and
6402 bibtex-include-OPTkey for details.
6404 *** Book and InBook entries require either an author or an editor
6405 field. This is now supported by bibtex.el. Alternative fields are
6406 prefixed with `ALT'.
6408 *** New variable bibtex-entry-format, which replaces variable
6409 bibtex-clean-entry-zap-empty-opts and allows specification of many
6410 formatting options performed on cleaning an entry (see variable
6413 *** Even more control on how automatic keys are generated. See
6414 documentation of bibtex-generate-autokey for details. Transcriptions
6415 for foreign languages other than German are now handled, too.
6417 *** New boolean user option bibtex-comma-after-last-field to decide if
6418 comma should be inserted at end of last field.
6420 *** New boolean user option bibtex-align-at-equal-sign to determine if
6421 alignment should be made at left side of field contents or at equal
6422 signs. New user options to control entry layout (e.g. indentation).
6424 *** New function bibtex-fill-entry to realign entries.
6426 *** New function bibtex-reformat to reformat region or buffer.
6428 *** New function bibtex-convert-alien to convert a BibTeX database
6431 *** New function bibtex-complete-key (similar to bibtex-complete-string)
6432 to complete prefix to a key defined in buffer. Mainly useful in
6435 *** New function bibtex-count-entries to count entries in buffer or
6438 *** Added support for imenu.
6440 *** The function `bibtex-validate' now checks current region instead
6441 of buffer if mark is active. Now it shows all errors of buffer in a
6442 `compilation mode' buffer. You can use the normal commands (e.g.
6443 `next-error') for compilation modes to jump to errors.
6445 *** New variable `bibtex-string-file-path' to determine where the files
6446 from `bibtex-string-files' are searched.
6448 ** Iso Accents mode now supports Latin-3 as an alternative.
6450 ** The command next-error now opens blocks hidden by hideshow.
6452 ** The function using-unix-filesystems has been replaced by the
6453 functions add-untranslated-filesystem and remove-untranslated-filesystem.
6454 Each of these functions takes the name of a drive letter or directory
6457 When a filesystem is added as untranslated, all files on it are read
6458 and written in binary mode (no cr/lf translation is performed).
6460 ** browse-url changes
6462 *** New methods for: Grail (browse-url-generic), MMM (browse-url-mmm),
6463 Lynx in a separate xterm (browse-url-lynx-xterm) or in an Emacs window
6464 (browse-url-lynx-emacs), remote W3 (browse-url-w3-gnudoit), generic
6465 non-remote-controlled browsers (browse-url-generic) and associated
6466 customization variables.
6468 *** New commands `browse-url-of-region' and `browse-url'.
6470 *** URLs marked up with <URL:...> (RFC1738) work if broken across
6471 lines. Browsing methods can be associated with URL regexps
6472 (e.g. mailto: URLs) via `browse-url-browser-function'.
6476 *** Clicking Mouse-2 on a brief command description in Ediff control panel
6477 pops up the Info file for this command.
6479 *** There is now a variable, ediff-autostore-merges, which controls whether
6480 the result of a merge is saved in a file. By default, this is done only when
6481 merge is done from a session group (eg, when merging files in two different
6484 *** Since Emacs 19.31 (this hasn't been announced before), Ediff can compare
6485 and merge groups of files residing in different directories, or revisions of
6486 files in the same directory.
6488 *** Since Emacs 19.31, Ediff can apply multi-file patches interactively.
6489 The patches must be in the context format or GNU unified format. (The bug
6490 related to the GNU format has now been fixed.)
6494 *** The startup file is now .viper instead of .vip
6495 *** All variable/function names have been changed to start with viper-
6497 *** C-\ now simulates the meta-key in all Viper states.
6498 *** C-z in Insert state now escapes to Vi for the duration of the next
6499 Viper command. In Vi and Insert states, C-z behaves as before.
6500 *** C-c \ escapes to Vi for one command if Viper is in Insert or Emacs states.
6501 *** _ is no longer the meta-key in Vi state.
6502 *** The variable viper-insert-state-cursor-color can be used to change cursor
6503 color when Viper is in insert state.
6504 *** If search lands the cursor near the top or the bottom of the window,
6505 Viper pulls the window up or down to expose more context. The variable
6506 viper-adjust-window-after-search controls this behavior.
6510 *** In C, C++, Objective C and Java, Etags tags global variables by
6511 default. The resulting tags files are inflated by 30% on average.
6512 Use --no-globals to turn this feature off. Etags can also tag
6513 variables which are members of structure-like constructs, but it does
6514 not by default. Use --members to turn this feature on.
6516 *** C++ member functions are now recognized as tags.
6518 *** Java is tagged like C++. In addition, "extends" and "implements"
6519 constructs are tagged. Files are recognised by the extension .java.
6521 *** Etags can now handle programs written in Postscript. Files are
6522 recognised by the extensions .ps and .pdb (Postscript with C syntax).
6523 In Postscript, tags are lines that start with a slash.
6525 *** Etags now handles Objective C and Objective C++ code. The usual C and
6526 C++ tags are recognized in these languages; in addition, etags
6527 recognizes special Objective C syntax for classes, class categories,
6528 methods and protocols.
6530 *** Etags also handles Cobol. Files are recognised by the extension
6531 .cobol. The tagged lines are those containing a word that begins in
6532 column 8 and ends in a full stop, i.e. anything that could be a
6535 *** Regexps in Etags now support intervals, as in ed or grep. The syntax of
6536 an interval is \{M,N\}, and it means to match the preceding expression
6537 at least M times and as many as N times.
6539 ** The format for specifying a custom format for time-stamp to insert
6540 in files has changed slightly.
6542 With the new enhancements to the functionality of format-time-string,
6543 time-stamp-format will change to be eventually compatible with it.
6544 This conversion is being done in two steps to maintain compatibility
6545 with old time-stamp-format values.
6547 In the new scheme, alternate case is signified by the number-sign
6548 (`#') modifier, rather than changing the case of the format character.
6549 This feature is as yet incompletely implemented for compatibility
6552 In the old time-stamp-format, all numeric fields defaulted to their
6553 natural width. (With format-time-string, each format has a
6554 fixed-width default.) In this version, you can specify the colon
6555 (`:') modifier to a numeric conversion to mean "give me the historical
6556 time-stamp-format width default." Do not use colon if you are
6557 specifying an explicit width, as in "%02d".
6559 Numbers are no longer truncated to the requested width, except in the
6560 case of "%02y", which continues to give a two-digit year. Digit
6561 truncation probably wasn't being used for anything else anyway.
6563 The new formats will work with old versions of Emacs. New formats are
6564 being recommended now to allow time-stamp-format to change in the
6565 future to be compatible with format-time-string. The new forms being
6566 recommended now will continue to work then.
6568 See the documentation string for the variable time-stamp-format for
6571 ** There are some additional major modes:
6573 dcl-mode, for editing VMS DCL files.
6574 m4-mode, for editing files of m4 input.
6575 meta-mode, for editing MetaFont and MetaPost source files.
6577 ** In Shell mode, the command shell-copy-environment-variable lets you
6578 copy the value of a specified environment variable from the subshell
6581 ** New Lisp packages include:
6583 *** battery.el displays battery status for laptops.
6585 *** M-x bruce (named after Lenny Bruce) is a program that might
6586 be used for adding some indecent words to your email.
6588 *** M-x crisp-mode enables an emulation for the CRiSP editor.
6590 *** M-x dirtrack arranges for better tracking of directory changes
6593 *** The new library elint.el provides for linting of Emacs Lisp code.
6594 See the documentation for `elint-initialize', `elint-current-buffer'
6597 *** M-x expand-add-abbrevs defines a special kind of abbrev which is
6598 meant for programming constructs. These abbrevs expand like ordinary
6599 ones, when you type SPC, but only at the end of a line and not within
6600 strings or comments.
6602 These abbrevs can act as templates: you can define places within an
6603 abbrev for insertion of additional text. Once you expand the abbrev,
6604 you can then use C-x a p and C-x a n to move back and forth to these
6605 insertion points. Thus you can conveniently insert additional text
6608 *** filecache.el remembers the location of files so that you
6609 can visit them by short forms of their names.
6611 *** find-func.el lets you find the definition of the user-loaded
6612 Emacs Lisp function at point.
6614 *** M-x handwrite converts text to a "handwritten" picture.
6616 *** M-x iswitchb-buffer is a command for switching to a buffer, much like
6617 switch-buffer, but it reads the argument in a more helpful way.
6619 *** M-x landmark implements a neural network for landmark learning.
6621 *** M-x locate provides a convenient interface to the `locate' program.
6623 *** M4 mode is a new mode for editing files of m4 input.
6625 *** mantemp.el creates C++ manual template instantiations
6626 from the GCC error messages which indicate which instantiations are needed.
6628 *** mouse-copy.el provides a one-click copy and move feature.
6629 You can drag a region with M-mouse-1, and it is automatically
6630 inserted at point. M-Shift-mouse-1 deletes the text from its
6631 original place after inserting the copy.
6633 *** mouse-drag.el lets you do scrolling by dragging Mouse-2
6636 You click the mouse and move; that distance either translates into the
6637 velocity to scroll (with mouse-drag-throw) or the distance to scroll
6638 (with mouse-drag-drag). Horizontal scrolling is enabled when needed.
6640 Enable mouse-drag with:
6641 (global-set-key [down-mouse-2] 'mouse-drag-throw)
6643 (global-set-key [down-mouse-2] 'mouse-drag-drag)
6645 *** mspools.el is useful for determining which mail folders have
6646 mail waiting to be read in them. It works with procmail.
6648 *** Octave mode is a major mode for editing files of input for Octave.
6649 It comes with a facility for communicating with an Octave subprocess.
6653 The ogonek package provides functions for changing the coding of
6654 Polish diacritic characters in buffers. Codings known from various
6655 platforms are supported such as ISO8859-2, Mazovia, IBM Latin2, and
6656 TeX. For example, you can change the coding from Mazovia to
6657 ISO8859-2. Another example is a change of coding from ISO8859-2 to
6658 prefix notation (in which `/a' stands for the aogonek character, for
6659 instance) and vice versa.
6661 To use this package load it using
6662 M-x load-library [enter] ogonek
6663 Then, you may get an explanation by calling one of
6664 M-x ogonek-jak -- in Polish
6665 M-x ogonek-how -- in English
6666 The info specifies the commands and variables provided as well as the
6667 ways of customization in `.emacs'.
6669 *** Interface to ph.
6671 Emacs provides a client interface to CCSO Nameservers (ph/qi)
6673 The CCSO nameserver is used in many universities to provide directory
6674 services about people. ph.el provides a convenient Emacs interface to
6677 *** uce.el is useful for replying to unsolicited commercial email.
6679 *** vcursor.el implements a "virtual cursor" feature.
6680 You can move the virtual cursor with special commands
6681 while the real cursor does not move.
6683 *** webjump.el is a "hot list" package which you can set up
6684 for visiting your favorite web sites.
6686 *** M-x winner-mode is a minor mode which saves window configurations,
6687 so you can move back to other configurations that you have recently used.
6691 Movemail no longer needs to be installed setuid root in order for POP
6692 mail retrieval to function properly. This is because it no longer
6693 supports the RPOP (reserved-port POP) protocol; instead, it uses the
6694 user's POP password to authenticate to the mail server.
6696 This change was made earlier, but not reported in NEWS before.
6698 * Emacs 20.1 changes for MS-DOS and MS-Windows.
6700 ** Changes in handling MS-DOS/MS-Windows text files.
6702 Emacs handles three different conventions for representing
6703 end-of-line: CRLF for MSDOS, LF for Unix and GNU, and CR (used on the
6704 Macintosh). Emacs determines which convention is used in a specific
6705 file based on the contents of that file (except for certain special
6706 file names), and when it saves the file, it uses the same convention.
6708 To save the file and change the end-of-line convention, you can use
6709 C-x RET f (set-buffer-file-coding-system) to specify a different
6710 coding system for the buffer. Then, when you save the file, the newly
6711 specified coding system will take effect. For example, to save with
6712 LF, specify undecided-unix (or some other ...-unix coding system); to
6713 save with CRLF, specify undecided-dos.
6715 * Lisp Changes in Emacs 20.1
6717 ** Byte-compiled files made with Emacs 20 will, in general, work in
6718 Emacs 19 as well, as long as the source code runs in Emacs 19. And
6719 vice versa: byte-compiled files made with Emacs 19 should also run in
6720 Emacs 20, as long as the program itself works in Emacs 20.
6722 ** Windows-specific functions and variables have been renamed
6723 to start with w32- instead of win32-.
6725 In hacker language, calling something a "win" is a form of praise. We
6726 don't want to praise a non-free Microsoft system, so we don't call it
6729 ** Basic Lisp changes
6731 *** A symbol whose name starts with a colon now automatically
6732 evaluates to itself. Therefore such a symbol can be used as a constant.
6734 *** The defined purpose of `defconst' has been changed. It should now
6735 be used only for values that should not be changed whether by a program
6738 The actual behavior of defconst has not been changed.
6740 *** There are new macros `when' and `unless'
6742 (when CONDITION BODY...) is short for (if CONDITION (progn BODY...))
6743 (unless CONDITION BODY...) is short for (if CONDITION nil BODY...)
6745 *** Emacs now defines functions caar, cadr, cdar and cddr with their
6746 usual Lisp meanings. For example, caar returns the car of the car of
6749 *** equal, when comparing strings, now ignores their text properties.
6751 *** The new function `functionp' tests whether an object is a function.
6753 *** arrayp now returns t for char-tables and bool-vectors.
6755 *** Certain primitives which use characters (as integers) now get an
6756 error if the integer is not a valid character code. These primitives
6757 include insert-char, char-to-string, and the %c construct in the
6760 *** The `require' function now insists on adding a suffix, either .el
6761 or .elc, to the file name. Thus, (require 'foo) will not use a file
6762 whose name is just foo. It insists on foo.el or foo.elc.
6764 *** The `autoload' function, when the file name does not contain
6765 either a directory name or the suffix .el or .elc, insists on
6766 adding one of these suffixes.
6768 *** string-to-number now takes an optional second argument BASE
6769 which specifies the base to use when converting an integer.
6770 If BASE is omitted, base 10 is used.
6772 We have not implemented other radices for floating point numbers,
6773 because that would be much more work and does not seem useful.
6775 *** substring now handles vectors as well as strings.
6777 *** The Common Lisp function eql is no longer defined normally.
6778 You must load the `cl' library to define it.
6780 *** The new macro `with-current-buffer' lets you evaluate an expression
6781 conveniently with a different current buffer. It looks like this:
6783 (with-current-buffer BUFFER BODY-FORMS...)
6785 BUFFER is the expression that says which buffer to use.
6786 BODY-FORMS say what to do in that buffer.
6788 *** The new primitive `save-current-buffer' saves and restores the
6789 choice of current buffer, like `save-excursion', but without saving or
6790 restoring the value of point or the mark. `with-current-buffer'
6791 works using `save-current-buffer'.
6793 *** The new macro `with-temp-file' lets you do some work in a new buffer and
6794 write the output to a specified file. Like `progn', it returns the value
6797 *** The new macro `with-temp-buffer' lets you do some work in a new buffer,
6798 which is discarded after use. Like `progn', it returns the value of the
6799 last form. If you wish to return the buffer contents, use (buffer-string)
6802 *** The new function split-string takes a string, splits it at certain
6803 characters, and returns a list of the substrings in between the
6806 For example, (split-string "foo bar lose" " +") returns ("foo" "bar" "lose").
6808 *** The new macro with-output-to-string executes some Lisp expressions
6809 with standard-output set up so that all output feeds into a string.
6810 Then it returns that string.
6812 For example, if the current buffer name is `foo',
6814 (with-output-to-string
6815 (princ "The buffer is ")
6816 (princ (buffer-name)))
6818 returns "The buffer is foo".
6820 ** Non-ASCII characters are now supported, if enable-multibyte-characters
6823 These characters have character codes above 256. When inserted in the
6824 buffer or stored in a string, they are represented as multibyte
6825 characters that occupy several buffer positions each.
6827 *** When enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil, a single character in
6828 a buffer or string can be two or more bytes (as many as four).
6830 Buffers and strings are still made up of unibyte elements;
6831 character positions and string indices are always measured in bytes.
6832 Therefore, moving forward one character can increase the buffer
6833 position by 2, 3 or 4. The function forward-char moves by whole
6834 characters, and therefore is no longer equivalent to
6835 (lambda (n) (goto-char (+ (point) n))).
6837 ASCII characters (codes 0 through 127) are still single bytes, always.
6838 Sequences of byte values 128 through 255 are used to represent
6839 non-ASCII characters. These sequences are called "multibyte
6842 The first byte of a multibyte character is always in the range 128
6843 through 159 (octal 0200 through 0237). These values are called
6844 "leading codes". The second and subsequent bytes are always in the
6845 range 160 through 255 (octal 0240 through 0377). The first byte, the
6846 leading code, determines how many bytes long the sequence is.
6848 *** The function forward-char moves over characters, and therefore
6849 (forward-char 1) may increase point by more than 1 if it moves over a
6850 multibyte character. Likewise, delete-char always deletes a
6851 character, which may be more than one buffer position.
6853 This means that some Lisp programs, which assume that a character is
6854 always one buffer position, need to be changed.
6856 However, all ASCII characters are always one buffer position.
6858 *** The regexp [\200-\377] no longer matches all non-ASCII characters,
6859 because when enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil, these characters
6860 have codes that are not in the range octal 200 to octal 377. However,
6861 the regexp [^\000-\177] does match all non-ASCII characters,
6864 *** The function char-boundary-p returns non-nil if position POS is
6865 between two characters in the buffer (not in the middle of a
6868 When the value is non-nil, it says what kind of character follows POS:
6870 0 if POS is at an ASCII character or at the end of range,
6871 1 if POS is before a 2-byte length multi-byte form,
6872 2 if POS is at a head of 3-byte length multi-byte form,
6873 3 if POS is at a head of 4-byte length multi-byte form,
6874 4 if POS is at a head of multi-byte form of a composite character.
6876 *** The function char-bytes returns how many bytes the character CHAR uses.
6878 *** Strings can contain multibyte characters. The function
6879 `length' returns the string length counting bytes, which may be
6880 more than the number of characters.
6882 You can include a multibyte character in a string constant by writing
6883 it literally. You can also represent it with a hex escape,
6884 \xNNNNNNN..., using as many digits as necessary. Any character which
6885 is not a valid hex digit terminates this construct. If you want to
6886 follow it with a character that is a hex digit, write backslash and
6887 newline in between; that will terminate the hex escape.
6889 *** The function concat-chars takes arguments which are characters
6890 and returns a string containing those characters.
6892 *** The function sref access a multibyte character in a string.
6893 (sref STRING INDX) returns the character in STRING at INDEX. INDEX
6894 counts from zero. If INDEX is at a position in the middle of a
6895 character, sref signals an error.
6897 *** The function chars-in-string returns the number of characters
6898 in a string. This is less than the length of the string, if the
6899 string contains multibyte characters (the length counts bytes).
6901 *** The function chars-in-region returns the number of characters
6902 in a region from BEG to END. This is less than (- END BEG) if the
6903 region contains multibyte characters (the length counts bytes).
6905 *** The function string-to-list converts a string to a list of
6906 the characters in it. string-to-vector converts a string
6907 to a vector of the characters in it.
6909 *** The function store-substring alters part of the contents
6910 of a string. You call it as follows:
6912 (store-substring STRING IDX OBJ)
6914 This says to alter STRING, by storing OBJ starting at index IDX in
6915 STRING. OBJ may be either a character or a (smaller) string.
6916 This function really does alter the contents of STRING.
6917 Since it is impossible to change the length of an existing string,
6918 it is an error if OBJ doesn't fit within STRING's actual length.
6920 *** char-width returns the width (in columns) of the character CHAR,
6921 if it were displayed in the current buffer and the selected window.
6923 *** string-width returns the width (in columns) of the text in STRING,
6924 if it were displayed in the current buffer and the selected window.
6926 *** truncate-string-to-width shortens a string, if necessary,
6927 to fit within a certain number of columns. (Of course, it does
6928 not alter the string that you give it; it returns a new string
6929 which contains all or just part of the existing string.)
6931 (truncate-string-to-width STR END-COLUMN &optional START-COLUMN PADDING)
6933 This returns the part of STR up to column END-COLUMN.
6935 The optional argument START-COLUMN specifies the starting column.
6936 If this is non-nil, then the first START-COLUMN columns of the string
6937 are not included in the resulting value.
6939 The optional argument PADDING, if non-nil, is a padding character to be added
6940 at the beginning and end the resulting string, to extend it to exactly
6941 WIDTH columns. If PADDING is nil, that means do not pad; then, if STRING
6942 is narrower than WIDTH, the value is equal to STRING.
6944 If PADDING and START-COLUMN are both non-nil, and if there is no clean
6945 place in STRING that corresponds to START-COLUMN (because one
6946 character extends across that column), then the padding character
6947 PADDING is added one or more times at the beginning of the result
6948 string, so that its columns line up as if it really did start at
6949 column START-COLUMN.
6951 *** When the functions in the list after-change-functions are called,
6952 the third argument is the number of bytes in the pre-change text, not
6953 necessarily the number of characters. It is, in effect, the
6954 difference in buffer position between the beginning and the end of the
6955 changed text, before the change.
6957 *** The characters Emacs uses are classified in various character
6958 sets, each of which has a name which is a symbol. In general there is
6959 one character set for each script, not for each language.
6961 **** The function charsetp tests whether an object is a character set name.
6963 **** The variable charset-list holds a list of character set names.
6965 **** char-charset, given a character code, returns the name of the character
6966 set that the character belongs to. (The value is a symbol.)
6968 **** split-char, given a character code, returns a list containing the
6969 name of the character set, followed by one or two byte-values
6970 which identify the character within that character set.
6972 **** make-char, given a character set name and one or two subsequent
6973 byte-values, constructs a character code. This is roughly the
6974 opposite of split-char.
6976 **** find-charset-region returns a list of the character sets
6977 of all the characters between BEG and END.
6979 **** find-charset-string returns a list of the character sets
6980 of all the characters in a string.
6982 *** Here are the Lisp facilities for working with coding systems
6983 and specifying coding systems.
6985 **** The function coding-system-list returns a list of all coding
6986 system names (symbols). With optional argument t, it returns a list
6987 of all distinct base coding systems, not including variants.
6988 (Variant coding systems are those like latin-1-dos, latin-1-unix
6989 and latin-1-mac which specify the end-of-line conversion as well
6990 as what to do about code conversion.)
6992 **** coding-system-p tests a symbol to see if it is a coding system
6993 name. It returns t if so, nil if not.
6995 **** file-coding-system-alist specifies which coding systems to use
6996 for certain file names. It works like network-coding-system-alist,
6997 except that the PATTERN is matched against the file name.
6999 Each element has the format (PATTERN . VAL), where PATTERN determines
7000 which file names the element applies to. PATTERN should be a regexp
7001 to match against a file name.
7003 VAL is a coding system, a cons cell containing two coding systems, or
7004 a function symbol. If VAL is a coding system, it is used for both
7005 decoding what received from the network stream and encoding what sent
7006 to the network stream. If VAL is a cons cell containing two coding
7007 systems, the car specifies the coding system for decoding, and the cdr
7008 specifies the coding system for encoding.
7010 If VAL is a function symbol, the function must return a coding system
7011 or a cons cell containing two coding systems, which is used as above.
7013 **** The variable network-coding-system-alist specifies
7014 the coding system to use for network sockets.
7016 Each element has the format (PATTERN . VAL), where PATTERN determines
7017 which network sockets the element applies to. PATTERN should be
7018 either a port number or a regular expression matching some network
7021 VAL is a coding system, a cons cell containing two coding systems, or
7022 a function symbol. If VAL is a coding system, it is used for both
7023 decoding what received from the network stream and encoding what sent
7024 to the network stream. If VAL is a cons cell containing two coding
7025 systems, the car specifies the coding system for decoding, and the cdr
7026 specifies the coding system for encoding.
7028 If VAL is a function symbol, the function must return a coding system
7029 or a cons cell containing two coding systems, which is used as above.
7031 **** process-coding-system-alist specifies which coding systems to use
7032 for certain subprocess. It works like network-coding-system-alist,
7033 except that the PATTERN is matched against the program name used to
7034 start the subprocess.
7036 **** The variable default-process-coding-system specifies the coding
7037 systems to use for subprocess (and net connection) input and output,
7038 when nothing else specifies what to do. The value is a cons cell
7039 (OUTPUT-CODING . INPUT-CODING). OUTPUT-CODING applies to output
7040 to the subprocess, and INPUT-CODING applies to input from it.
7042 **** The variable coding-system-for-write, if non-nil, specifies the
7043 coding system to use for writing a file, or for output to a synchronous
7046 It also applies to any asynchronous subprocess or network connection,
7047 but in a different way: the value of coding-system-for-write when you
7048 start the subprocess or connection affects that subprocess or
7049 connection permanently or until overridden.
7051 The variable coding-system-for-write takes precedence over
7052 file-coding-system-alist, process-coding-system-alist and
7053 network-coding-system-alist, and all other methods of specifying a
7054 coding system for output. But most of the time this variable is nil.
7055 It exists so that Lisp programs can bind it to a specific coding
7056 system for one operation at a time.
7058 **** coding-system-for-read applies similarly to input from
7059 files, subprocesses or network connections.
7061 **** The function process-coding-system tells you what
7062 coding systems(s) an existing subprocess is using.
7063 The value is a cons cell,
7064 (DECODING-CODING-SYSTEM . ENCODING-CODING-SYSTEM)
7065 where DECODING-CODING-SYSTEM is used for decoding output from
7066 the subprocess, and ENCODING-CODING-SYSTEM is used for encoding
7067 input to the subprocess.
7069 **** The function set-process-coding-system can be used to
7070 change the coding systems in use for an existing subprocess.
7072 ** Emacs has a new facility to help users manage the many
7073 customization options. To make a Lisp program work with this facility,
7074 you need to use the new macros defgroup and defcustom.
7076 You use defcustom instead of defvar, for defining a user option
7077 variable. The difference is that you specify two additional pieces of
7078 information (usually): the "type" which says what values are
7079 legitimate, and the "group" which specifies the hierarchy for
7082 Thus, instead of writing
7084 (defvar foo-blurgoze nil
7085 "*Non-nil means that foo will act very blurgozely.")
7087 you would now write this:
7089 (defcustom foo-blurgoze nil
7090 "*Non-nil means that foo will act very blurgozely."
7094 The type `boolean' means that this variable has only
7095 two meaningful states: nil and non-nil. Other type values
7096 describe other possibilities; see the manual for Custom
7097 for a description of them.
7099 The "group" argument is used to specify a group which the option
7100 should belong to. You define a new group like this:
7102 (defgroup ispell nil
7103 "Spell checking using Ispell."
7106 The "group" argument in defgroup specifies the parent group. The root
7107 group is called `emacs'; it should not contain any variables itself,
7108 but only other groups. The immediate subgroups of `emacs' correspond
7109 to the keywords used by C-h p. Under these subgroups come
7110 second-level subgroups that belong to individual packages.
7112 Each Emacs package should have its own set of groups. A simple
7113 package should have just one group; a more complex package should
7114 have a hierarchy of its own groups. The sole or root group of a
7115 package should be a subgroup of one or more of the "keyword"
7116 first-level subgroups.
7118 ** New `widget' library for inserting UI components in buffers.
7120 This library, used by the new custom library, is documented in a
7121 separate manual that accompanies Emacs.
7125 The easy-mmode package provides macros and functions that make
7126 developing minor modes easier. Roughly, the programmer has to code
7127 only the functionality of the minor mode. All the rest--toggles,
7128 predicate, and documentation--can be done in one call to the macro
7129 `easy-mmode-define-minor-mode' (see the documentation). See also
7130 `easy-mmode-define-keymap'.
7132 ** Text property changes
7134 *** The `intangible' property now works on overlays as well as on a
7137 *** The new functions next-char-property-change and
7138 previous-char-property-change scan through the buffer looking for a
7139 place where either a text property or an overlay might change. The
7140 functions take two arguments, POSITION and LIMIT. POSITION is the
7141 starting position for the scan. LIMIT says where to stop the scan.
7143 If no property change is found before LIMIT, the value is LIMIT. If
7144 LIMIT is nil, scan goes to the beginning or end of the accessible part
7145 of the buffer. If no property change is found, the value is the
7146 position of the beginning or end of the buffer.
7148 *** In the `local-map' text property or overlay property, the property
7149 value can now be a symbol whose function definition is a keymap. This
7150 is an alternative to using the keymap itself.
7152 ** Changes in invisibility features
7154 *** Isearch can now temporarily show parts of the buffer which are
7155 hidden by an overlay with a invisible property, when the search match
7156 is inside that portion of the buffer. To enable this the overlay
7157 should have a isearch-open-invisible property which is a function that
7158 would be called having the overlay as an argument, the function should
7159 make the overlay visible.
7161 During incremental search the overlays are shown by modifying the
7162 invisible and intangible properties, if beside this more actions are
7163 needed the overlay should have a isearch-open-invisible-temporary
7164 which is a function. The function is called with 2 arguments: one is
7165 the overlay and the second is nil when it should show the overlay and
7166 t when it should hide it.
7168 *** add-to-invisibility-spec, remove-from-invisibility-spec
7170 Modes that use overlays to hide portions of a buffer should set the
7171 invisible property of the overlay to the mode's name (or another symbol)
7172 and modify the `buffer-invisibility-spec' to include that symbol.
7173 Use `add-to-invisibility-spec' and `remove-from-invisibility-spec' to
7174 manipulate the `buffer-invisibility-spec'.
7175 Here is an example of how to do this:
7177 ;; If we want to display an ellipsis:
7178 (add-to-invisibility-spec '(my-symbol . t))
7179 ;; If you don't want ellipsis:
7180 (add-to-invisibility-spec 'my-symbol)
7183 (overlay-put (make-overlay beginning end) 'invisible 'my-symbol)
7186 ;; When done with the overlays:
7187 (remove-from-invisibility-spec '(my-symbol . t))
7189 (remove-from-invisibility-spec 'my-symbol)
7191 ** Changes in syntax parsing.
7193 *** The syntax-directed buffer-scan functions (such as
7194 `parse-partial-sexp', `forward-word' and similar functions) can now
7195 obey syntax information specified by text properties, if the variable
7196 `parse-sexp-lookup-properties' is non-nil.
7198 If the value of `parse-sexp-lookup-properties' is nil, the behavior
7199 is as before: the syntax-table of the current buffer is always
7200 used to determine the syntax of the character at the position.
7202 When `parse-sexp-lookup-properties' is non-nil, the syntax of a
7203 character in the buffer is calculated thus:
7205 a) if the `syntax-table' text-property of that character
7206 is a cons, this cons becomes the syntax-type;
7208 Valid values of `syntax-table' text-property are: nil, a valid
7209 syntax-table, and a valid syntax-table element, i.e.,
7210 a cons cell of the form (SYNTAX-CODE . MATCHING-CHAR).
7212 b) if the character's `syntax-table' text-property
7213 is a syntax table, this syntax table is used
7214 (instead of the syntax-table of the current buffer) to
7215 determine the syntax type of the character.
7217 c) otherwise the syntax-type is determined by the syntax-table
7218 of the current buffer.
7220 *** The meaning of \s in regular expressions is also affected by the
7221 value of `parse-sexp-lookup-properties'. The details are the same as
7222 for the syntax-directed buffer-scan functions.
7224 *** There are two new syntax-codes, `!' and `|' (numeric values 14
7225 and 15). A character with a code `!' starts a comment which is ended
7226 only by another character with the same code (unless quoted). A
7227 character with a code `|' starts a string which is ended only by
7228 another character with the same code (unless quoted).
7230 These codes are mainly meant for use as values of the `syntax-table'
7233 *** The function `parse-partial-sexp' has new semantics for the sixth
7234 arg COMMENTSTOP. If it is `syntax-table', parse stops after the start
7235 of a comment or a string, or after end of a comment or a string.
7237 *** The state-list which the return value from `parse-partial-sexp'
7238 (and can also be used as an argument) now has an optional ninth
7239 element: the character address of the start of last comment or string;
7240 nil if none. The fourth and eighth elements have special values if the
7241 string/comment is started by a "!" or "|" syntax-code.
7243 *** Since new features of `parse-partial-sexp' allow a complete
7244 syntactic parsing, `font-lock' no longer supports
7245 `font-lock-comment-start-regexp'.
7247 ** Changes in face features
7249 *** The face functions are now unconditionally defined in Emacs, even
7250 if it does not support displaying on a device that supports faces.
7252 *** The function face-documentation returns the documentation string
7253 of a face (or nil if it doesn't have one).
7255 *** The function face-bold-p returns t if a face should be bold.
7256 set-face-bold-p sets that flag.
7258 *** The function face-italic-p returns t if a face should be italic.
7259 set-face-italic-p sets that flag.
7261 *** You can now specify foreground and background colors for text
7262 by adding elements of the form (foreground-color . COLOR-NAME)
7263 and (background-color . COLOR-NAME) to the list of faces in
7264 the `face' property (either the character's text property or an
7267 This means that you no longer need to create named faces to use
7268 arbitrary colors in a Lisp package.
7270 ** Changes in file-handling functions
7272 *** File-access primitive functions no longer discard an extra redundant
7273 directory name from the beginning of the file name. In other words,
7274 they no longer do anything special with // or /~. That conversion
7275 is now done only in substitute-in-file-name.
7277 This makes it possible for a Lisp program to open a file whose name
7280 *** If copy-file is unable to set the date of the output file,
7281 it now signals an error with the condition file-date-error.
7283 *** The inode number returned by file-attributes may be an integer (if
7284 the number fits in a Lisp integer) or a list of integers.
7286 *** insert-file-contents can now read from a special file,
7287 as long as the arguments VISIT and REPLACE are nil.
7289 *** The RAWFILE arg to find-file-noselect, if non-nil, now suppresses
7290 character code conversion as well as other things.
7292 Meanwhile, this feature does work with remote file names
7293 (formerly it did not).
7295 *** Lisp packages which create temporary files should use the TMPDIR
7296 environment variable to decide which directory to put them in.
7298 *** interpreter-mode-alist elements now specify regexps
7299 instead of constant strings.
7301 *** expand-file-name no longer treats `//' or `/~' specially. It used
7302 to delete all the text of a file name up through the first slash of
7303 any `//' or `/~' sequence. Now it passes them straight through.
7305 substitute-in-file-name continues to treat those sequences specially,
7306 in the same way as before.
7308 *** The variable `format-alist' is more general now.
7309 The FROM-FN and TO-FN in a format definition can now be strings
7310 which specify shell commands to use as filters to perform conversion.
7312 *** The new function access-file tries to open a file, and signals an
7313 error if that fails. If the open succeeds, access-file does nothing
7314 else, and returns nil.
7316 *** The function insert-directory now signals an error if the specified
7317 directory cannot be listed.
7319 ** Changes in minibuffer input
7321 *** The functions read-buffer, read-variable, read-command, read-string
7322 read-file-name, read-from-minibuffer and completing-read now take an
7323 additional argument which specifies the default value. If this
7324 argument is non-nil, it should be a string; that string is used in two
7327 It is returned if the user enters empty input.
7328 It is available through the history command M-n.
7330 *** The functions read-string, read-from-minibuffer,
7331 read-no-blanks-input and completing-read now take an additional
7332 argument INHERIT-INPUT-METHOD. If this is non-nil, then the
7333 minibuffer inherits the current input method and the setting of
7334 enable-multibyte-characters from the previously current buffer.
7336 In an interactive spec, you can use M instead of s to read an
7337 argument in this way.
7339 *** All minibuffer input functions discard text properties
7340 from the text you enter in the minibuffer, unless the variable
7341 minibuffer-allow-text-properties is non-nil.
7343 ** Echo area features
7345 *** Clearing the echo area now runs the normal hook
7346 echo-area-clear-hook. Note that the echo area can be used while the
7347 minibuffer is active; in that case, the minibuffer is still active
7348 after the echo area is cleared.
7350 *** The function current-message returns the message currently displayed
7351 in the echo area, or nil if there is none.
7353 ** Keyboard input features
7355 *** tty-erase-char is a new variable that reports which character was
7356 set up as the terminal's erase character when time Emacs was started.
7358 *** num-nonmacro-input-events is the total number of input events
7359 received so far from the terminal. It does not count those generated
7362 ** Frame-related changes
7364 *** make-frame runs the normal hook before-make-frame-hook just before
7365 creating a frame, and just after creating a frame it runs the abnormal
7366 hook after-make-frame-functions with the new frame as arg.
7368 *** The new hook window-configuration-change-hook is now run every time
7369 the window configuration has changed. The frame whose configuration
7370 has changed is the selected frame when the hook is run.
7372 *** Each frame now independently records the order for recently
7373 selected buffers, in its buffer-list frame parameter, so that the
7374 value of other-buffer is now based on the buffers recently displayed
7375 in the selected frame.
7377 *** The value of the frame parameter vertical-scroll-bars
7378 is now `left', `right' or nil. A non-nil value specifies
7379 which side of the window to put the scroll bars on.
7381 ** X Windows features
7383 *** You can examine X resources for other applications by binding
7384 x-resource-class around a call to x-get-resource. The usual value of
7385 x-resource-class is "Emacs", which is the correct value for Emacs.
7387 *** In menus, checkboxes and radio buttons now actually work.
7388 The menu displays the current status of the box or button.
7390 *** The function x-list-fonts now takes an optional fourth argument
7391 MAXIMUM which sets a limit on how many matching fonts to return.
7392 A smaller value of MAXIMUM makes the function faster.
7394 If the only question is whether *any* font matches the pattern,
7395 it is good to supply 1 for this argument.
7397 ** Subprocess features
7399 *** A reminder: it is no longer necessary for subprocess filter
7400 functions and sentinels to do save-match-data, because Emacs does this
7403 *** The new function shell-command-to-string executes a shell command
7404 and returns the output from the command as a string.
7406 *** The new function process-contact returns t for a child process,
7407 and (HOSTNAME SERVICE) for a net connection.
7409 ** An error in running pre-command-hook or post-command-hook
7410 does clear the variable to nil. The documentation was wrong before.
7412 ** In define-key-after, if AFTER is t, the new binding now always goes
7413 at the end of the keymap. If the keymap is a menu, this means it
7414 goes after the other menu items.
7416 ** If you have a program that makes several changes in the same area
7417 of the buffer, you can use the macro combine-after-change-calls
7418 around that Lisp code to make it faster when after-change hooks
7421 The macro arranges to call the after-change functions just once for a
7422 series of several changes--if that seems safe.
7424 Don't alter the variables after-change-functions and
7425 after-change-function within the body of a combine-after-change-calls
7428 ** If you define an abbrev (with define-abbrev) whose EXPANSION
7429 is not a string, then the abbrev does not expand in the usual sense,
7430 but its hook is still run.
7432 ** Normally, the Lisp debugger is not used (even if you have enabled it)
7433 for errors that are handled by condition-case.
7435 If you set debug-on-signal to a non-nil value, then the debugger is called
7436 regardless of whether there is a handler for the condition. This is
7437 useful for debugging problems that happen inside of a condition-case.
7439 This mode of operation seems to be unreliable in other ways. Errors that
7440 are normal and ought to be handled, perhaps in timers or process
7441 filters, will instead invoke the debugger. So don't say you weren't
7444 ** The new variable ring-bell-function lets you specify your own
7445 way for Emacs to "ring the bell".
7447 ** If run-at-time's TIME argument is t, the action is repeated at
7448 integral multiples of REPEAT from the epoch; this is useful for
7449 functions like display-time.
7451 ** You can use the function locate-library to find the precise file
7452 name of a Lisp library. This isn't new, but wasn't documented before.
7454 ** Commands for entering view mode have new optional arguments that
7455 can be used from Lisp. Low-level entrance to and exit from view mode
7456 is done by functions view-mode-enter and view-mode-exit.
7458 ** batch-byte-compile-file now makes Emacs return a nonzero status code
7459 if there is an error in compilation.
7461 ** pop-to-buffer, switch-to-buffer-other-window and
7462 switch-to-buffer-other-frame now accept an additional optional
7463 argument NORECORD, much like switch-to-buffer. If it is non-nil,
7464 they don't put the buffer at the front of the buffer list.
7466 ** If your .emacs file leaves the *scratch* buffer non-empty,
7467 Emacs does not display the startup message, so as to avoid changing
7468 the *scratch* buffer.
7470 ** The new function regexp-opt returns an efficient regexp to match a string.
7471 The arguments are STRINGS and (optionally) PAREN. This function can be used
7472 where regexp matching or searching is intensively used and speed is important,
7473 e.g., in Font Lock mode.
7475 ** The variable buffer-display-count is local to each buffer,
7476 and is incremented each time the buffer is displayed in a window.
7477 It starts at 0 when the buffer is created.
7479 ** The new function compose-mail starts composing a mail message
7480 using the user's chosen mail composition agent (specified with the
7481 variable mail-user-agent). It has variants compose-mail-other-window
7482 and compose-mail-other-frame.
7484 ** The `user-full-name' function now takes an optional parameter which
7485 can either be a number (the UID) or a string (the login name). The
7486 full name of the specified user will be returned.
7488 ** Lisp packages that load files of customizations, or any other sort
7489 of user profile, should obey the variable init-file-user in deciding
7490 where to find it. They should load the profile of the user name found
7491 in that variable. If init-file-user is nil, meaning that the -q
7492 option was used, then Lisp packages should not load the customization
7495 ** format-time-string now allows you to specify the field width
7496 and type of padding. This works as in printf: you write the field
7497 width as digits in the middle of a %-construct. If you start
7498 the field width with 0, it means to pad with zeros.
7500 For example, %S normally specifies the number of seconds since the
7501 minute; %03S means to pad this with zeros to 3 positions, %_3S to pad
7502 with spaces to 3 positions. Plain %3S pads with zeros, because that
7503 is how %S normally pads to two positions.
7505 ** thing-at-point now supports a new kind of "thing": url.
7507 ** imenu.el changes.
7509 You can now specify a function to be run when selecting an
7510 item from menu created by imenu.
7512 An example of using this feature: if we define imenu items for the
7513 #include directives in a C file, we can open the included file when we
7514 select one of those items.
7516 * Emacs 19.34 is a bug-fix release with no user-visible changes.
7518 * Changes in Emacs 19.33.
7520 ** Bibtex mode no longer turns on Auto Fill automatically. (No major
7521 mode should do that--it is the user's choice.)
7523 ** The variable normal-auto-fill-function specifies the function to
7524 use for auto-fill-function, if and when Auto Fill is turned on.
7525 Major modes can set this locally to alter how Auto Fill works.
7527 * Editing Changes in Emacs 19.32
7529 ** C-x f with no argument now signals an error.
7530 To set the fill column at the current column, use C-u C-x f.
7532 ** Expanding dynamic abbrevs with M-/ is now smarter about case
7533 conversion. If you type the abbreviation with mixed case, and it
7534 matches the beginning of the expansion including case, then the
7535 expansion is copied verbatim. Using SPC M-/ to copy an additional
7536 word always copies it verbatim except when the previous copied word is
7539 ** On a non-windowing terminal, which can display only one Emacs frame
7540 at a time, creating a new frame with C-x 5 2 also selects that frame.
7542 When using a display that can show multiple frames at once, C-x 5 2
7543 does make the frame visible, but does not select it. This is the same
7544 as in previous Emacs versions.
7546 ** You can use C-x 5 2 to create multiple frames on MSDOS, just as on a
7547 non-X terminal on Unix. Of course, only one frame is visible at any
7548 time, since your terminal doesn't have the ability to display multiple
7551 ** On Windows, set win32-pass-alt-to-system to a non-nil value
7552 if you would like tapping the Alt key to invoke the Windows menu.
7553 This feature is not enabled by default; since the Alt key is also the
7554 Meta key, it is too easy and painful to activate this feature by
7557 ** The command apply-macro-to-region-lines repeats the last defined
7558 keyboard macro once for each complete line within the current region.
7559 It does this line by line, by moving point to the beginning of that
7560 line and then executing the macro.
7562 This command is not new, but was never documented before.
7564 ** You can now use Mouse-1 to place the region around a string constant
7565 (something surrounded by doublequote characters or other delimiter
7566 characters of like syntax) by double-clicking on one of the delimiting
7571 *** Font Lock support modes
7573 Font Lock can be configured to use Fast Lock mode and Lazy Lock mode (see
7574 below) in a flexible way. Rather than adding the appropriate function to the
7575 hook font-lock-mode-hook, you can use the new variable font-lock-support-mode
7576 to control which modes have Fast Lock mode or Lazy Lock mode turned on when
7577 Font Lock mode is enabled.
7579 For example, to use Fast Lock mode when Font Lock mode is turned on, put:
7581 (setq font-lock-support-mode 'fast-lock-mode)
7587 The lazy-lock package speeds up Font Lock mode by making fontification occur
7588 only when necessary, such as when a previously unfontified part of the buffer
7589 becomes visible in a window. When you create a buffer with Font Lock mode and
7590 Lazy Lock mode turned on, the buffer is not fontified. When certain events
7591 occur (such as scrolling), Lazy Lock makes sure that the visible parts of the
7592 buffer are fontified. Lazy Lock also defers on-the-fly fontification until
7593 Emacs has been idle for a given amount of time.
7595 To use this package, put in your ~/.emacs:
7597 (setq font-lock-support-mode 'lazy-lock-mode)
7599 To control the package behaviour, see the documentation for `lazy-lock-mode'.
7601 ** Changes in BibTeX mode.
7603 *** For all entries allow spaces and tabs between opening brace or
7606 *** Non-escaped double-quoted characters (as in `Sch"of') are now
7611 Gnus, the Emacs news reader, has undergone further rewriting. Many new
7612 commands and variables have been added. There should be no
7613 significant incompatibilities between this Gnus version and the
7614 previously released version, except in the message composition area.
7616 Below is a list of the more user-visible changes. Coding changes
7617 between Gnus 5.1 and 5.2 are more extensive.
7619 *** A new message composition mode is used. All old customization
7620 variables for mail-mode, rnews-reply-mode and gnus-msg are now
7623 *** Gnus is now able to generate "sparse" threads -- threads where
7624 missing articles are represented by empty nodes.
7626 (setq gnus-build-sparse-threads 'some)
7628 *** Outgoing articles are stored on a special archive server.
7630 To disable this: (setq gnus-message-archive-group nil)
7632 *** Partial thread regeneration now happens when articles are
7635 *** Gnus can make use of GroupLens predictions:
7637 (setq gnus-use-grouplens t)
7639 *** A trn-line tree buffer can be displayed.
7641 (setq gnus-use-trees t)
7643 *** An nn-like pick-and-read minor mode is available for the summary
7646 (add-hook 'gnus-summary-mode-hook 'gnus-pick-mode)
7648 *** In binary groups you can use a special binary minor mode:
7650 `M-x gnus-binary-mode'
7652 *** Groups can be grouped in a folding topic hierarchy.
7654 (add-hook 'gnus-group-mode-hook 'gnus-topic-mode)
7656 *** Gnus can re-send and bounce mail.
7658 Use the `S D r' and `S D b'.
7660 *** Groups can now have a score, and bubbling based on entry frequency
7663 (add-hook 'gnus-summary-exit-hook 'gnus-summary-bubble-group)
7665 *** Groups can be process-marked, and commands can be performed on
7668 *** Caching is possible in virtual groups.
7670 *** nndoc now understands all kinds of digests, mail boxes, rnews news
7671 batches, ClariNet briefs collections, and just about everything else.
7673 *** Gnus has a new backend (nnsoup) to create/read SOUP packets.
7675 *** The Gnus cache is much faster.
7677 *** Groups can be sorted according to many criteria.
7679 For instance: (setq gnus-group-sort-function 'gnus-group-sort-by-rank)
7681 *** New group parameters have been introduced to set list-address and
7684 *** All formatting specs allow specifying faces to be used.
7686 *** There are several more commands for setting/removing/acting on
7687 process marked articles on the `M P' submap.
7689 *** The summary buffer can be limited to show parts of the available
7690 articles based on a wide range of criteria. These commands have been
7691 bound to keys on the `/' submap.
7693 *** Articles can be made persistent -- as an alternative to saving
7694 articles with the `*' command.
7696 *** All functions for hiding article elements are now toggles.
7698 *** Article headers can be buttonized.
7700 (add-hook 'gnus-article-display-hook 'gnus-article-add-buttons-to-head)
7702 *** All mail backends support fetching articles by Message-ID.
7704 *** Duplicate mail can now be treated properly. See the
7705 `nnmail-treat-duplicates' variable.
7707 *** All summary mode commands are available directly from the article
7710 *** Frames can be part of `gnus-buffer-configuration'.
7712 *** Mail can be re-scanned by a daemonic process.
7714 *** Gnus can make use of NoCeM files to filter spam.
7716 (setq gnus-use-nocem t)
7718 *** Groups can be made permanently visible.
7720 (setq gnus-permanently-visible-groups "^nnml:")
7722 *** Many new hooks have been introduced to make customizing easier.
7724 *** Gnus respects the Mail-Copies-To header.
7726 *** Threads can be gathered by looking at the References header.
7728 (setq gnus-summary-thread-gathering-function
7729 'gnus-gather-threads-by-references)
7731 *** Read articles can be stored in a special backlog buffer to avoid
7734 (setq gnus-keep-backlog 50)
7736 *** A clean copy of the current article is always stored in a separate
7737 buffer to allow easier treatment.
7739 *** Gnus can suggest where to save articles. See `gnus-split-methods'.
7741 *** Gnus doesn't have to do as much prompting when saving.
7743 (setq gnus-prompt-before-saving t)
7745 *** gnus-uu can view decoded files asynchronously while fetching
7748 (setq gnus-uu-grabbed-file-functions 'gnus-uu-grab-view)
7750 *** Filling in the article buffer now works properly on cited text.
7752 *** Hiding cited text adds buttons to toggle hiding, and how much
7753 cited text to hide is now customizable.
7755 (setq gnus-cited-lines-visible 2)
7757 *** Boring headers can be hidden.
7759 (add-hook 'gnus-article-display-hook 'gnus-article-hide-boring-headers)
7761 *** Default scoring values can now be set from the menu bar.
7763 *** Further syntax checking of outgoing articles have been added.
7765 The Gnus manual has been expanded. It explains all these new features
7768 * Lisp Changes in Emacs 19.32
7770 ** The function set-visited-file-name now accepts an optional
7771 second argument NO-QUERY. If it is non-nil, then the user is not
7772 asked for confirmation in the case where the specified file already
7775 ** The variable print-length applies to printing vectors and bitvectors,
7778 ** The new function keymap-parent returns the parent keymap
7781 ** The new function set-keymap-parent specifies a new parent for a
7782 given keymap. The arguments are KEYMAP and PARENT. PARENT must be a
7785 ** Sometimes menu keymaps use a command name, a symbol, which is really
7786 an automatically generated alias for some other command, the "real"
7787 name. In such a case, you should give that alias symbol a non-nil
7788 menu-alias property. That property tells the menu system to look for
7789 equivalent keys for the real name instead of equivalent keys for the
7792 * Editing Changes in Emacs 19.31
7794 ** Freedom of the press restricted in the United States.
7796 Emacs has been censored in accord with the Communications Decency Act.
7797 This includes removing some features of the doctor program. That law
7798 was described by its supporters as a ban on pornography, but it bans
7799 far more than that. The Emacs distribution has never contained any
7800 pornography, but parts of it were nonetheless prohibited.
7802 For information on US government censorship of the Internet, and what
7803 you can do to bring back freedom of the press, see the web site
7804 `http://www.vtw.org/'.
7806 ** A note about C mode indentation customization.
7808 The old (Emacs 19.29) ways of specifying a C indentation style
7809 do not normally work in the new implementation of C mode.
7810 It has its own methods of customizing indentation, which are
7811 much more powerful than the old C mode. See the Editing Programs
7812 chapter of the manual for details.
7814 However, you can load the library cc-compat to make the old
7815 customization variables take effect.
7817 ** Marking with the mouse.
7819 When you mark a region with the mouse, the region now remains
7820 highlighted until the next input event, regardless of whether you are
7821 using M-x transient-mark-mode.
7823 ** Improved Windows NT/95 support.
7825 *** Emacs now supports scroll bars on Windows NT and Windows 95.
7827 *** Emacs now supports subprocesses on Windows 95. (Subprocesses used
7828 to work on NT only and not on 95.)
7830 *** There are difficulties with subprocesses, though, due to problems
7831 in Windows, beyond the control of Emacs. They work fine as long as
7832 you run Windows applications. The problems arise when you run a DOS
7833 application in a subprocesses. Since current shells run as DOS
7834 applications, these problems are significant.
7836 If you run a DOS application in a subprocess, then the application is
7837 likely to busy-wait, which means that your machine will be 100% busy.
7838 However, if you don't mind the temporary heavy load, the subprocess
7839 will work OK as long as you tell it to terminate before you start any
7840 other DOS application as a subprocess.
7842 Emacs is unable to terminate or interrupt a DOS subprocess.
7843 You have to do this by providing input directly to the subprocess.
7845 If you run two DOS applications at the same time in two separate
7846 subprocesses, even if one of them is asynchronous, you will probably
7847 have to reboot your machine--until then, it will remain 100% busy.
7848 Windows simply does not cope when one Windows process tries to run two
7849 separate DOS subprocesses. Typing CTL-ALT-DEL and then choosing
7850 Shutdown seems to work although it may take a few minutes.
7852 ** M-x resize-minibuffer-mode.
7854 This command, not previously mentioned in NEWS, toggles a mode in
7855 which the minibuffer window expands to show as many lines as the
7856 minibuffer contains.
7858 ** `title' frame parameter and resource.
7860 The `title' X resource now specifies just the frame title, nothing else.
7861 It does not affect the name used for looking up other X resources.
7862 It works by setting the new `title' frame parameter, which likewise
7863 affects just the displayed title of the frame.
7865 The `name' parameter continues to do what it used to do:
7866 it specifies the frame name for looking up X resources,
7867 and also serves as the default for the displayed title
7868 when the `title' parameter is unspecified or nil.
7870 ** Emacs now uses the X toolkit by default, if you have a new
7871 enough version of X installed (X11R5 or newer).
7873 ** When you compile Emacs with the Motif widget set, Motif handles the
7874 F10 key by activating the menu bar. To avoid confusion, the usual
7875 Emacs binding of F10 is replaced with a no-op when using Motif.
7877 If you want to be able to use F10 in Emacs, you can rebind the Motif
7878 menubar to some other key which you don't use. To do so, add
7879 something like this to your X resources file. This example rebinds
7880 the Motif menu bar activation key to S-F12:
7882 Emacs*defaultVirtualBindings: osfMenuBar : Shift<Key>F12
7884 ** In overwrite mode, DEL now inserts spaces in most cases
7885 to replace the characters it "deletes".
7887 ** The Rmail summary now shows the number of lines in each message.
7889 ** Rmail has a new command M-x unforward-rmail-message, which extracts
7890 a forwarded message from the message that forwarded it. To use it,
7891 select a message which contains a forwarded message and then type the command.
7892 It inserts the forwarded message as a separate Rmail message
7893 immediately after the selected one.
7895 This command also undoes the textual modifications that are standardly
7896 made, as part of forwarding, by Rmail and other mail reader programs.
7898 ** Turning off saving of .saves-... files in your home directory.
7900 Each Emacs session writes a file named .saves-... in your home
7901 directory to record which files M-x recover-session should recover.
7902 If you exit Emacs normally with C-x C-c, it deletes that file. If
7903 Emacs or the operating system crashes, the file remains for M-x
7906 You can turn off the writing of these files by setting
7907 auto-save-list-file-name to nil. If you do this, M-x recover-session
7910 Some previous Emacs versions failed to delete these files even on
7911 normal exit. This is fixed now. If you are thinking of turning off
7912 this feature because of past experiences with versions that had this
7913 bug, it would make sense to check whether you still want to do so
7914 now that the bug is fixed.
7916 ** Changes to Version Control (VC)
7918 There is a new variable, vc-follow-symlinks. It indicates what to do
7919 when you visit a link to a file that is under version control.
7920 Editing the file through the link bypasses the version control system,
7921 which is dangerous and probably not what you want.
7923 If this variable is t, VC follows the link and visits the real file,
7924 telling you about it in the echo area. If it is `ask' (the default),
7925 VC asks for confirmation whether it should follow the link. If nil,
7926 the link is visited and a warning displayed.
7928 ** iso-acc.el now lets you specify a choice of language.
7929 Languages include "latin-1" (the default) and "latin-2" (which
7930 is designed for entering ISO Latin-2 characters).
7932 There are also choices for specific human languages such as French and
7933 Portuguese. These are subsets of Latin-1, which differ in that they
7934 enable only the accent characters needed for particular language.
7935 The other accent characters, not needed for the chosen language,
7938 ** Posting articles and sending mail now has M-TAB completion on various
7939 header fields (Newsgroups, To, CC, ...).
7941 Completion in the Newsgroups header depends on the list of groups
7942 known to your news reader. Completion in the Followup-To header
7943 offers those groups which are in the Newsgroups header, since
7944 Followup-To usually just holds one of those.
7946 Completion in fields that hold mail addresses works based on the list
7947 of local users plus your aliases. Additionally, if your site provides
7948 a mail directory or a specific host to use for any unrecognized user
7949 name, you can arrange to query that host for completion also. (See the
7950 documentation of variables `mail-directory-process' and
7951 `mail-directory-stream'.)
7953 ** A greatly extended sgml-mode offers new features such as (to be configured)
7954 skeletons with completing read for tags and attributes, typing named
7955 characters including optionally all 8bit characters, making tags invisible
7956 with optional alternate display text, skipping and deleting tag(pair)s.
7958 Note: since Emacs' syntax feature cannot limit the special meaning of ', " and
7959 - to inside <>, for some texts the result, especially of font locking, may be
7960 wrong (see `sgml-specials' if you get wrong results).
7962 The derived html-mode configures this with tags and attributes more or
7963 less HTML3ish. It also offers optional quick keys like C-c 1 for
7964 headline or C-c u for unordered list (see `html-quick-keys'). Edit /
7965 Text Properties / Face or M-g combinations create tags as applicable.
7966 Outline minor mode is supported and level 1 font-locking tries to
7967 fontify tag contents (which only works when they fit on one line, due
7968 to a limitation in font-lock).
7970 External viewing via browse-url can occur automatically upon saving.
7972 ** M-x imenu-add-to-menubar now adds to the menu bar for the current
7973 buffer only. If you want to put an Imenu item in the menu bar for all
7974 buffers that use a particular major mode, use the mode hook, as in
7977 (add-hook 'emacs-lisp-mode-hook
7978 '(lambda () (imenu-add-to-menubar "Index")))
7980 ** Changes in BibTeX mode.
7982 *** Field names may now contain digits, hyphens, and underscores.
7984 *** Font Lock mode is now supported.
7986 *** bibtex-make-optional-field is no longer interactive.
7988 *** If bibtex-maintain-sorted-entries is non-nil, inserting new
7989 entries is now done with a faster algorithm. However, inserting
7990 will fail in this case if the buffer contains invalid entries or
7991 isn't in sorted order, so you should finish each entry with C-c C-c
7992 (bibtex-close-entry) after you have inserted or modified it.
7993 The default value of bibtex-maintain-sorted-entries is nil.
7995 *** Function `show-all' is no longer bound to a key, since C-u C-c C-q
7998 *** Entries with quotes inside quote-delimited fields (as `author =
7999 "Stefan Sch{\"o}f"') are now supported.
8001 *** Case in field names doesn't matter anymore when searching for help
8006 *** Global Font Lock mode
8008 Font Lock mode can be turned on globally, in buffers that support it, by the
8009 new command global-font-lock-mode. You can use the new variable
8010 font-lock-global-modes to control which modes have Font Lock mode automagically
8011 turned on. By default, this variable is set so that Font Lock mode is turned
8012 on globally where the buffer mode supports it.
8014 For example, to automagically turn on Font Lock mode where supported, put:
8016 (global-font-lock-mode t)
8020 *** Local Refontification
8022 In Font Lock mode, editing a line automatically refontifies that line only.
8023 However, if your change alters the syntactic context for following lines,
8024 those lines remain incorrectly fontified. To refontify them, use the new
8025 command M-g M-g (font-lock-fontify-block).
8027 In certain major modes, M-g M-g refontifies the entire current function.
8028 (The variable font-lock-mark-block-function controls how to find the
8029 current function.) In other major modes, M-g M-g refontifies 16 lines
8030 above and below point.
8032 With a prefix argument N, M-g M-g refontifies N lines above and below point.
8036 Follow mode is a new minor mode combining windows showing the same
8037 buffer into one tall "virtual window". The windows are typically two
8038 side-by-side windows. Follow mode makes them scroll together as if
8039 they were a unit. To use it, go to a frame with just one window,
8040 split it into two side-by-side windows using C-x 3, and then type M-x
8043 M-x follow-mode turns off Follow mode if it is already enabled.
8045 To display two side-by-side windows and activate Follow mode, use the
8046 command M-x follow-delete-other-windows-and-split.
8048 ** hide-show changes.
8050 The hooks hs-hide-hooks and hs-show-hooks have been renamed
8051 to hs-hide-hook and hs-show-hook, to follow the convention for
8054 ** Simula mode now has a menu containing the most important commands.
8055 The new command simula-indent-exp is bound to C-M-q.
8057 ** etags can now handle programs written in Erlang. Files are
8058 recognised by the extensions .erl and .hrl. The tagged lines are
8059 those that begin a function, record, or macro.
8063 *** It is now possible to compile Emacs with the version 2 of DJGPP.
8064 Compilation with DJGPP version 1 also still works.
8066 *** The documentation of DOS-specific aspects of Emacs was rewritten
8067 and expanded; see the ``MS-DOS'' node in the on-line docs.
8069 *** Emacs now uses ~ for backup file names, not .bak.
8071 *** You can simulate mouse-3 on two-button mice by simultaneously
8072 pressing both mouse buttons.
8074 *** A number of packages and commands which previously failed or had
8075 restricted functionality on MS-DOS, now work. The most important ones
8078 **** Printing (both with `M-x lpr-buffer' and with `ps-print' package)
8081 **** `Ediff' works (in a single-frame mode).
8083 **** `M-x display-time' can be used on MS-DOS (due to the new
8084 implementation of Emacs timers, see below).
8086 **** `Dired' supports Unix-style shell wildcards.
8088 **** The `c-macro-expand' command now works as on other platforms.
8090 **** `M-x recover-session' works.
8092 **** `M-x list-colors-display' displays all the available colors.
8094 **** The `TPU-EDT' package works.
8096 * Lisp changes in Emacs 19.31.
8098 ** The function using-unix-filesystems on Windows NT and Windows 95
8099 tells Emacs to read and write files assuming that they reside on a
8100 remote Unix filesystem. No CR/LF translation is done on any files in
8101 this case. Invoking using-unix-filesystems with t activates this
8102 behavior, and invoking it with any other value deactivates it.
8104 ** Change in system-type and system-configuration values.
8106 The value of system-type on a Linux-based GNU system is now `lignux',
8107 not `linux'. This means that some programs which use `system-type'
8108 need to be changed. The value of `system-configuration' will also
8111 It is generally recommended to use `system-configuration' rather
8114 See the file LINUX-GNU in this directory for more about this.
8116 ** The functions shell-command and dired-call-process
8117 now run file name handlers for default-directory, if it has them.
8119 ** Undoing the deletion of text now restores the positions of markers
8120 that pointed into or next to the deleted text.
8122 ** Timers created with run-at-time now work internally to Emacs, and
8123 no longer use a separate process. Therefore, they now work more
8124 reliably and can be used for shorter time delays.
8126 The new function run-with-timer is a convenient way to set up a timer
8127 to run a specified amount of time after the present. A call looks
8130 (run-with-timer SECS REPEAT FUNCTION ARGS...)
8132 SECS says how many seconds should elapse before the timer happens.
8133 It may be an integer or a floating point number. When the timer
8134 becomes ripe, the action is to call FUNCTION with arguments ARGS.
8136 REPEAT gives the interval for repeating the timer (measured in
8137 seconds). It may be an integer or a floating point number. nil or 0
8138 means don't repeat at all--call FUNCTION just once.
8140 *** with-timeout provides an easy way to do something but give
8141 up if too much time passes.
8143 (with-timeout (SECONDS TIMEOUT-FORMS...) BODY...)
8145 This executes BODY, but gives up after SECONDS seconds.
8146 If it gives up, it runs the TIMEOUT-FORMS and returns the value
8147 of the last one of them. Normally it returns the value of the last
8150 *** You can now arrange to call a function whenever Emacs is idle for
8151 a certain length of time. To do this, call run-with-idle-timer. A
8152 call looks like this:
8154 (run-with-idle-timer SECS REPEAT FUNCTION ARGS...)
8156 SECS says how many seconds of idleness should elapse before the timer
8157 runs. It may be an integer or a floating point number. When the
8158 timer becomes ripe, the action is to call FUNCTION with arguments
8161 Emacs becomes idle whenever it finishes executing a keyboard or mouse
8162 command. It remains idle until it receives another keyboard or mouse
8165 REPEAT, if non-nil, means this timer should be activated again each
8166 time Emacs becomes idle and remains idle for SECS seconds The timer
8167 does not repeat if Emacs *remains* idle; it runs at most once after
8168 each time Emacs becomes idle.
8170 If REPEAT is nil, the timer runs just once, the first time Emacs is
8171 idle for SECS seconds.
8173 *** post-command-idle-hook is now obsolete; you shouldn't use it at
8174 all, because it interferes with the idle timer mechanism. If your
8175 programs use post-command-idle-hook, convert them to use idle timers
8178 *** y-or-n-p-with-timeout lets you ask a question but give up if
8179 there is no answer within a certain time.
8181 (y-or-n-p-with-timeout PROMPT SECONDS DEFAULT-VALUE)
8183 asks the question PROMPT (just like y-or-n-p). If the user answers
8184 within SECONDS seconds, it returns the answer that the user gave.
8185 Otherwise it gives up after SECONDS seconds, and returns DEFAULT-VALUE.
8187 ** Minor change to `encode-time': you can now pass more than seven
8188 arguments. If you do that, the first six arguments have the usual
8189 meaning, the last argument is interpreted as the time zone, and the
8190 arguments in between are ignored.
8192 This means that it works to use the list returned by `decode-time' as
8193 the list of arguments for `encode-time'.
8195 ** The default value of load-path now includes the directory
8196 /usr/local/share/emacs/VERSION/site-lisp In addition to
8197 /usr/local/share/emacs/site-lisp. You can use this new directory for
8198 site-specific Lisp packages that belong with a particular Emacs
8201 It is not unusual for a Lisp package that works well in one Emacs
8202 version to cause trouble in another. Sometimes packages need updating
8203 for incompatible changes; sometimes they look at internal data that
8204 has changed; sometimes the package has been installed in Emacs itself
8205 and the installed version should be used. Whatever the reason for the
8206 problem, this new feature makes it easier to solve.
8208 ** When your program contains a fixed file name (like .completions or
8209 .abbrev.defs), the file name usually needs to be different on operating
8210 systems with limited file name syntax.
8212 Now you can avoid ad-hoc conditionals by using the function
8213 convert-standard-filename to convert the file name to a proper form
8214 for each operating system. Here is an example of use, from the file
8217 (defvar save-completions-file-name
8218 (convert-standard-filename "~/.completions")
8219 "*The filename to save completions to.")
8221 This sets the variable save-completions-file-name to a value that
8222 depends on the operating system, because the definition of
8223 convert-standard-filename depends on the operating system. On
8224 Unix-like systems, it returns the specified file name unchanged. On
8225 MS-DOS, it adapts the name to fit the limitations of that system.
8227 ** The interactive spec N now returns the numeric prefix argument
8228 rather than the raw prefix argument. (It still reads a number using the
8229 minibuffer if there is no prefix argument at all.)
8231 ** When a process is deleted, this no longer disconnects the process
8232 marker from its buffer position.
8234 ** The variable garbage-collection-messages now controls whether
8235 Emacs displays a message at the beginning and end of garbage collection.
8236 The default is nil, meaning there are no messages.
8238 ** The variable debug-ignored-errors specifies certain kinds of errors
8239 that should not enter the debugger. Its value is a list of error
8240 condition symbols and/or regular expressions. If the error has any
8241 of the condition symbols listed, or if any of the regular expressions
8242 matches the error message, then that error does not enter the debugger,
8243 regardless of the value of debug-on-error.
8245 This variable is initialized to match certain common but uninteresting
8246 errors that happen often during editing.
8248 ** The new function error-message-string converts an error datum
8249 into its error message. The error datum is what condition-case
8250 puts into the variable, to describe the error that happened.
8252 ** Anything that changes which buffer appears in a given window
8253 now runs the window-scroll-functions for that window.
8255 ** The new function get-buffer-window-list returns a list of windows displaying
8256 a buffer. The function is called with the buffer (a buffer object or a buffer
8257 name) and two optional arguments specifying the minibuffer windows and frames
8258 to search. Therefore this function takes optional args like next-window etc.,
8259 and not get-buffer-window.
8261 ** buffer-substring now runs the hook buffer-access-fontify-functions,
8262 calling each function with two arguments--the range of the buffer
8263 being accessed. buffer-substring-no-properties does not call them.
8265 If you use this feature, you should set the variable
8266 buffer-access-fontified-property to a non-nil symbol, which is a
8267 property name. Then, if all the characters in the buffer range have a
8268 non-nil value for that property, the buffer-access-fontify-functions
8269 are not called. When called, these functions should put a non-nil
8270 property on the text that they fontify, so that they won't get called
8271 over and over for the same text.
8273 ** Changes in lisp-mnt.el
8275 *** The lisp-mnt package can now recognize file headers that are written
8276 in the formats used by the `what' command and the RCS `ident' command:
8278 ;; @(#) HEADER: text
8281 in addition to the normal
8285 *** The commands lm-verify and lm-synopsis are now interactive. lm-verify
8286 checks that the library file has proper sections and headers, and
8287 lm-synopsis extracts first line "synopsis'"information.
8289 * For older news, see the file ONEWS.
8291 ----------------------------------------------------------------------
8292 Copyright information:
8294 Copyright (C) 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
8296 Permission is granted to anyone to make or distribute verbatim copies
8297 of this document as received, in any medium, provided that the
8298 copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved,
8299 thus giving the recipient permission to redistribute in turn.
8301 Permission is granted to distribute modified versions
8302 of this document, or of portions of it,
8303 under the above conditions, provided also that they
8304 carry prominent notices stating who last changed them.
8308 paragraph-separate: "[
\f]*$"