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1 GNU Emacs NEWS -- history of user-visible changes.
2
3 Copyright (C) 2007, 2008, 2009 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
4 See the end of the file for license conditions.
5
6 Please send Emacs bug reports to emacs-pretest-bug@gnu.org.
7 If possible, use M-x report-emacs-bug.
8
9 This file is about changes in Emacs version 23.
10
11 See files NEWS.22, NEWS.21, NEWS.20, NEWS.19, NEWS.18, and NEWS.1-17
12 for changes in older Emacs versions.
13
14 You can narrow news to a specific version by calling `view-emacs-news'
15 with a prefix argument or by typing C-u C-h C-n.
16
17
18 Temporary note:
19 +++ indicates that the appropriate manual has already been updated.
20 --- means no change in the manuals is called for.
21 When you add a new item, please add it without either +++ or ---
22 so we will look at it and add it to the manual.
23
24 \f
25 * Installation Changes in Emacs 23.2
26
27 ** New configure options for Emacs developers
28 These are not new features; only the configure flags are new.
29
30 *** --enable-profiling builds Emacs with profiling enabled.
31 This might not work on all platforms.
32
33 *** --enable-checking[=OPTIONS] builds emacs with extra runtime checks.
34
35 ---
36 ** `make install' now consistently ignores umask, creating a
37 world-readable install.
38
39 * Startup Changes in Emacs 23.2
40
41 ** Command-line option -Q (--quick) now also disables loading X resources.
42 On Windows, this option causes Emacs to ignore Registry settings,
43 though environment variables set on the Registry are still honored.
44
45 *** The new variable `inhibit-x-resources' shows whether X resources
46 were loaded.
47
48 * Changes in Emacs 23.2
49
50 ** Unibyte sessions are now considered obsolete.
51 I.e. the use of the environment variable EMACS_UNIBYTE, or command line
52 arguments --unibyte, --multibyte, --no-multibyte, and --no-unibyte
53 is deprecated. Similarly for custom-izing enable-multibyte-characters, or
54 setting default-enable-multibyte-characters.
55
56 ** The default value of `trash-directory' has changed to nil, which
57 means that `move-file-to-trash' trashes files according to
58 freedesktop.org specifications, the same method used by the Gnome,
59 KDE, and XFCE desktops. (This change has no effect on Windows, which
60 uses `system-move-file-to-trash' for trashing.)
61
62 +++
63 ** Emacs frames can be maximized.
64 The command line arguments -mm/--maximized and the value maximized to the
65 frame parameter fullscreen makes the Emacs frame maximized.
66
67 +++
68 ** New frame parameter sticky makes Emacs frames sticky in virtual desktops.
69
70 ** The pointer now becomes invisible when typing.
71 Customize make-pointer-invisible to turn it off.
72
73 ** Killing a buffer with a running process now asks a confirmation.
74 You can remove this query in two ways: either removing
75 `process-kill-buffer-query-function' from `kill-buffer-query-functions' or
76 setting the appropriate process flag with `set-process-query-on-exit-flag'.
77
78 ** The variable `load-in-progress' won't get corrupted by binding it
79 with `let'. In certain situations, loading an Emacs Lisp file from
80 source while in the midst of loading another file (e.g., with
81 `require' or `autoload') could cause the value of `load-in-progress'
82 to be corrupted once the outer load completed. Most code doesn't care
83 about this, but some (like c-mode) may check it.
84
85 ** File-local variable changes
86
87 *** Specifying a minor mode as a local variables enables that mode,
88 unconditionally. The previous behavior, toggling the mode, was
89 neither reliable nor generally desirable.
90
91 *** New commands for adding and removing file-local variables:
92 `add-file-local-variable', `delete-file-local-variable',
93 `add-file-local-variable-prop-line', and
94 `delete-file-local-variable-prop-line'.
95
96 *** New commands for adding and removing directory-local variables,
97 and copying them to and from file-local variable lists:
98 `add-dir-local-variable', `delete-dir-local-variable',
99 `copy-dir-locals-to-file-locals',
100 `copy-dir-locals-to-file-locals-prop-line' and
101 `copy-file-locals-to-dir-locals'.
102
103 ** New coding system `utf-8-hfs' is available in
104 international/ucs-normalize.el. It is suitable for
105 default-file-name-coding-system on Mac OS X.
106
107 \f
108 * Editing Changes in Emacs 23.2
109
110 ** Selection changes
111 +++
112 *** If `select-active-regions' is t, any active region automatically
113 becomes the primary selection (for interaction with other window
114 applications). If you enable this, you might want to bind
115 `mouse-yank-primary' to Mouse-2.
116
117 *** When `save-interprogram-paste-before-kill' is non-nil, emacs will
118 not clobber the the interprogram paste when something is killed in it
119 by saving the former in the `kill-ring' before the latter.
120
121 ** When `kill-do-not-save-duplicates' is non-nil, identical subsequent
122 kills are not duplicated in the `kill-ring'.
123
124 +++
125 ** The default value for `blink-matching-paren-distance' has been increased.
126
127 ** The new completion-style `initials' is available.
128 For instance, this can complete M-x lch to list-command-history.
129
130 \f
131 * Changes in Specialized Modes and Packages in Emacs 23.2
132
133 ** .calc.el and .abbrev_defs obey user-emacs-directory.
134
135 ** Calc graphing commands (`g f' etc.) now work on MS-Windows,
136 if you have the native Windows port of Gnuplot version 3.8 or later
137 installed.
138
139 ** Calendar and diary
140
141 *** Fancy diary display is now the default.
142 If you prefer the simple display, customize `diary-display-function'.
143
144 *** The diary's fancy display now enables view-mode.
145
146 ---
147 *** The command `calendar-current-date' accepts an optional argument
148 giving an offset from today.
149
150 ** Desktop
151 ---
152 *** The default value for `desktop-buffers-not-to-save' is nil.
153 This means Desktop will try restoring all buffers, when you restart
154 your Emacs session. Also, `desktop-buffers-not-to-save' is only
155 effective for buffers that have no associated file. If you want to
156 exempt buffers that do correspond to files, customize the value of
157 `desktop-files-not-to-save' instead.
158
159 ** FIXME mail-user-agent change
160 This probably affects a lot of documentation.
161
162 ** FIXME gdb-mi
163
164 ** Info
165
166 *** The new command `Info-virtual-index' bound to "I" displays a menu of
167 matched topics found in the index.
168
169 *** The new command `info-finder' replaces finder.el with a virtual Info
170 manual that generates an Info file which gives the same information
171 through a menu structure.
172
173 +++
174 ** New connection methods in Tramp.
175 The new connection method "rsyncc" has been introduced. On systems
176 which support GVFS-Fuse, Tramp offers also the new connection methods
177 "dav", "davs", "obex" and "synce".
178
179 ** nXML mode is now the default for editing XML files.
180
181 ** VC and related modes
182
183 *** FIXME: add info about the new VC functions: vc-root-diff and
184 vc-root-print-log once they stabilize.
185
186 *** When a file is not found, VC will not try to check it out of RCS anymore.
187
188 *** vc-git changes
189
190 **** The new variable vc-git-add-signoff can be used to add a
191 Signed-off-by line when committing.
192
193 **** vc-dir displays the stash status
194
195 *** log-edit-strip-single-file-name controls whether or not single filenames
196 are stripped when copying text from the ChangeLog to the *VC-Log* buffer.
197
198 ** Miscellaneous
199
200 *** The new command `async-shell-command' bound globally to `M-&' executes
201 the command asynchronously without the need to manually add ampersand to
202 the end of the command. Its output appears in the buffer `*Async Shell
203 Command*'.
204
205 +++
206 *** Autorevert Tail mode now works now for remote files.
207
208 ---
209 *** Elint now uses compilation-mode, and recognizes more built-in
210 functions and variables.
211
212 \f
213 * New Modes and Packages in Emacs 23.2
214
215 ** js.el is a new major mode for JavaScript files.
216
217 \f
218 * Lisp changes in Emacs 23.2
219
220 ** eval-next-after-load is obsolete.
221 ** New hook `after-load-functions' run after loading an Elisp file.
222
223 ** You can control which binding is preferentially shown in menus and
224 docstrings by adding a `:advertised-binding' property to the corresponding
225 command's symbol. That property can hold a single binding or a list
226 of bindings.
227
228 ** New macro with-silent-modifications to tweak text properties without
229 affecting the buffer's modification state.
230 ** All the default-FOO variables that hold the default value of the FOO
231 variable, are now declared obsolete.
232
233 ** read-key is a function halfway between read-event and read-key-sequence.
234 It reads a single key, but obeys input and escape sequence decoding.
235
236 ** start-process-shell-command and start-file-process-shell-command
237 now only take a single `command' argument.
238
239 ** The variable `process-file-side-effects' shall be bound to nil, if
240 a `process-file' call does not change a remote file. By this, file
241 name handlers like Tramp can apply optimizations.
242
243 ** Hash tables have a new printed representation that is readable.
244 The feature `hashtable-print-readable' identifies this new
245 functionality.
246
247 ** Functions performing Unicode normalization are added. They are:
248 ucs-normalize-NFD-region, ucs-normalize-NFD-string,
249 ucs-normalize-NFC-region, ucs-normalize-NFC-string,
250 ucs-normalize-NFKD-region, ucs-normalize-NFKD-string,
251 ucs-normalize-NFKC-region, ucs-normalize-NFKC-string,
252 ucs-normalize-HFS-NFD-region, ucs-normalize-HFS-NFD-string,
253 ucs-normalize-HFS-NFC-region, ucs-normalize-HFS-NFC-string.
254
255 ** completion-annotate-function specifies how to compute annotations
256 for completions displayed in *Completions*.
257
258 +++
259 ** Face aliases can now be marked as obsolete, using the macro
260 `define-obsolete-face-alias'.
261
262 ---
263 ** Changing the file-names generated by byte-compilation by redefining
264 the function `byte-compile-dest-file' before loading bytecomp.el is obsolete.
265 Instead, customize byte-compile-dest-file-function.
266
267 * Changes in Emacs 23.2 on non-free operating systems
268
269 ---
270 ** On MS-Windows, `display-time' now displays the system load average
271 as well as the time, as it does on GNU and Unix.
272
273 \f
274 * Installation Changes in Emacs 23.1
275
276 ** The default X toolkit is now Gtk+, rather than Lucid.
277 The configure option `--with-gtk' has been removed. Gtk is now the
278 default toolkit, but you can use --with-x-toolkit=gtk if necessary.
279
280 ** New font code.
281 Fonts are handled by new code capable of dealing with multiple font
282 backends. This uses the freetype and fontconfig libraries.
283
284 *** Emacs now accepts font names supplied in the fontconfig format
285 (e.g. "monospace-12:bold") and GTK format (e.g. "Monospace Bold 12").
286
287 *** Added support for local fonts (fonts installed on the machine
288 where Emacs is running).
289
290 *** Added support for the Xft library for antialiasing.
291
292 *** Added support for the otf library for complex text layout by
293 OpenType fonts.
294
295 *** Added support for the m17n library for text shaping.
296
297 ** Changes to image support
298
299 *** configure now checks for libgif before libungif when searching for
300 a GIF library.
301
302 *** Emacs now supports the SVG image format through librsvg2.
303
304 *** Emacs now supports multi-page TIFF images.
305
306 ** New NeXTSTEP-based port
307 This provides support for GNUstep (via the GNUstep libraries) and Mac
308 OS X (via the Cocoa libraries).
309
310 Specify --with-ns to configure for this. By default, a self-contained
311 app will be built (containing all lisp). To install/share lisp with
312 other emacsen (e.g. X11 build) use --disable-ns-self-contained. See
313 nextstep/README and nextstep/INSTALL in the Emacs source directory.
314
315 ** Mac OS X is no longer supported via Carbon.
316 Use the NeXTSTEP port, described above.
317
318 ** The new configuration option "--with-dbus" enables D-Bus language
319 bindings for Emacs.
320
321 ** Support for many obsolete platforms has been removed.
322 See the list at the end of etc/MACHINES for details.
323
324 *** Support for systems without alloca has been removed.
325
326 *** Support for Sun windows has been removed.
327
328 *** The `emacstool' utility has been removed.
329
330 ** The following platforms will be removed in a future Emacs version:
331 If you are still using Emacs on one of these platforms, please email
332 emacs-devel@gnu.org to inform the Emacs developers.
333
334 *** Old GNU/Linux systems based on libc version 5.
335
336 *** Old FreeBSD, NetBSD, and OpenBSD systems based on the COFF
337 executable format.
338
339 *** Solaris versions 2.6 and below.
340
341 *** Solaris on IBM RS6000 machines.
342
343 *** UNIX System V (the original SysV, not later platforms based on it).
344
345 *** Unixware on non-x86 machines.
346
347 *** Platforms not supporting shared libraries (i.e., requiring the
348 NO_SHARED_LIBS compilation flag).
349
350 ** The configure options `--with-gcc', `--without-gcc' have been removed.
351 Configure will use gcc by default. Set the CC environment variable if
352 you need control over which C compiler is used.
353
354 ** The refcards are now shipped as PDF files.
355
356 ** The manuals are now licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License v1.3,
357 or any later version.
358
359 ** Emacs 23 comes with a new set of default icons.
360 Various resolutions are available as etc/images/icons/hicolor/*/apps/emacs.png.
361 The Emacs 22 icon is available as `emacs22.png' in the same location.
362 \f
363 * Changes in Emacs 23.1
364
365 ** Improved X Window System support
366
367 *** Emacs now supports using both X displays and ttys in one session.
368 With an Emacs server active (M-x server-start), `emacsclient -t'
369 creates a tty frame connected to the running emacs server. You can
370 use any number of different ttys. `emacsclient -c' creates a new X11
371 frame on the current $DISPLAY (or a tty frame if $DISPLAY is not set).
372 There may be problems if a display exits unexpectedly and Emacs is compiled
373 with Gtk+, see etc/PROBLEMS.
374
375 You can test for the presence of this feature in your Lisp code by
376 testing for the `multi-tty' feature.
377
378 *** Emacs starts in the background, as a daemon, when given the
379 --daemon command line argument. It disconnects from the terminal and
380 starts the server. Clients can connect and create graphical or
381 terminal frames using emacsclient.
382
383 **** emacsclient starts emacs in daemon mode and connects to it when
384 --alternate-editor="" is used (or when the evironment variable
385 ALTERNATE_EDITOR is set to "") and emacsclient cannot connect to an
386 emacs server.
387
388 *** The new command close-display-connection closes a connection to a
389 remote display. There are some bugs for Gtk+. See etc/PROBLEMS.
390
391 *** Emacs now supports the XEmbed specification.
392 You can embed Emacs in another application on X11. The new command line
393 option --parent-id is used to pass the parent window id to Emacs. See
394 http://standards.freedesktop.org/xembed-spec/xembed-spec-latest.html
395 for details about XEmbed.
396
397 *** Emacs can now set the frame opacity.
398 The opacity of a frame can be controlled by setting the `alpha' frame
399 parameter. This only takes effect on a compositing window manager for
400 the X Window System, such as Compiz, Beryl and Compiz Fusion, on Mac
401 OS X, or on Windows 2000 and later versions of Windows.
402
403 The alpha parameter should be an integer between 0 (transparent) and
404 100 (opaque), or a float number between 0.0 and 1.0. It can also be a
405 cons cell (ACTIVE . INACTIVE), where ACTIVE is the opacity of an
406 active frame and INACTIVE is the opacity of non-active frames.
407
408 The variable `frame-alpha-lower-limit' defines a lower bound for the
409 opacity; the default is 20.
410
411 ** Internationalization changes
412
413 *** The Emacs character set is now a superset of Unicode.
414 (It has about four times the code space, which should be plenty).
415
416 The internal encoding used for buffers and strings is now
417 Unicode-based and called `utf-8-emacs' (`emacs-internal' is an alias
418 for this). This encoding is backward-compatible with Unicode's UTF-8
419 encoding. The internal encoding previously used by Emacs,
420 `emacs-mule', is still available for reading and writing files.
421
422 During byte-compilation, Emacs 23 uses `utf-8-emacs' to write files.
423 As a result, byte-compiled files containing non-ASCII characters can't
424 be read by earlier versions of Emacs. Files compiled by Emacs 20, 21,
425 or 22 are loaded correctly as `emacs-mule' (whether or not they
426 contain multibyte characters). This takes somewhat more time, so it
427 may be worth recompiling existing .elc files which don't need to be
428 shared with older Emacsen.
429
430 *** There are new coding systems/aliases; see M-x list-coding-systems.
431
432 *** There is a new charset implementation with many new charsets.
433 See M-x list-character-sets. New charsets can be defined conveniently
434 as tables of unicodes.
435
436 *** There are new language environments for Chinese-GBK,
437 Chinese-GB18030, Khmer, Bengali, Punjabi, Gujarati, Oriya, Telugu,
438 Sinhala, and TaiViet.
439
440 *** The minor modes unify-8859-on-encoding-mode and
441 unify-8859-on-decoding-mode are obsolete.
442
443 *** `ucs-insert' is bound to `C-x 8 RET' and in addition to hex numbers
444 accepts numbers in hash notation (e.g. #o21430 for octal, or #10r8984 for
445 decimal). It also accepts Unicode character names with completion.
446
447 *** The `cyrillic-translit' input method supports many new characters.
448 Common typographical characters available from Unicode were added to
449 `cyrillic-translit': punctuation marks, accented characters, fractions,
450 and others.
451
452 ** Emacs now supports serial port access on GNU/Linux, Unix, and
453 Windows. The new command `serial-term' starts an interactive terminal
454 on a serial port. The serial port can be configured at runtime with
455 the mode-line mouse menu.
456
457 ** Menu Bar changes
458
459 *** In the Options menu, the "Set Default Font" item applies the
460 selected font to the `default' face on all frames, not just the
461 current frame. Furthermore, if Emacs is compiled with both GTK and
462 Fontconfig support, the "Set Default Font" item uses the GTK font
463 selection dialog instead of an Emacs pop-up menu.
464
465 *** The font setting chosen by "Set Default Font" is saved if the
466 "Save Options" item is used.
467
468 *** The Tools menu contains a new Encryption/Decryption submenu.
469 This contains commands provided by EasyPG, the newly-included
470 interface to GnuPG (see New Modes and Packages).
471
472 *** In the Options menu, the "Truncate Long Lines in the Buffer" entry
473 has been replaced with a submenu offering three different ways to
474 handle long lines: truncation, continuation at the window edge, and
475 the new word wrapping behavior (see Editing Changes, below).
476
477 *** Improvements to menus for major and minor modes
478 More major and minor modes now have a mode specific menu, and existing
479 mode menus have been improved to include more functionality.
480
481 ** Mode-line changes
482
483 *** The mode-line displays a `@', instead of `-', if the
484 default-directory for the current buffer is on a remote machine.
485
486 *** The mode-line displays a mode menu when mouse-1 is clicked on a
487 minor mode, in the same way as it already did for major modes.
488
489 *** The `mode-line-emphasis' face is used to highlight certain
490 mode-line information (e.g. waiting for a VC command to finish).
491
492 *** The mode-line tooltips have been improved to provide more details.
493
494 *** The VC, line/colum number and minor mode indicators on the mode
495 line are now interactive: mouse-1 can be used on them to pop up a menu.
496
497 ** File deletion can make use of the Recycle Bin or system Trash folder.
498 Set `delete-by-moving-to-trash' non-nil to use this. Deleted files
499 and directories will then be sent to the Recycle Bin on Windows, and
500 to `trash-directory' on other systems.
501
502 ** Directory-local variables can now be defined.
503 By default, Emacs looks in .dir-locals.el for directory-local
504 variables. For more information, see `dir-locals-set-directory-class'
505 and `dir-locals-set-class-variables'.
506
507 ** Emacs can now use `auth-source' for authentication.
508 `smtpmail' and `url' (Tramp and Gnus also) use `auth-source' to obtain
509 login names and passwords. The match, if found, is reported
510 in *Messages* with the password blanked out.
511
512 ** `where-is-preferred-modifier' can specify your favorite modifier.
513
514 \f
515 * Startup Changes in Emacs 23.1
516
517 ** The option `inhibit-startup-screen' (with aliases to old names
518 `inhibit-splash-screen' and `inhibit-startup-message') doesn't inhibit
519 display of the initial message in the *scratch* buffer. If you don't
520 want to display the initial message in the *scratch* buffer at startup,
521 you can set the option `initial-scratch-message' to nil.
522
523 ** New user option `initial-buffer-choice' specifies what to display
524 after starting Emacs: startup screen, *scratch* buffer, visiting a
525 file or directory.
526
527 ** New alias `argv' for `command-line-args-left'
528 This is a convenience alias, so that one can write `(pop argv)'
529 inside of --eval command line arguments in order to access
530 following arguments.
531
532 ** The abbrev file is no longer read at startup in batch mode.
533
534 ** Emacs now supports invocation by an X session manager.
535 It can save a session and restore it later. See the documentation of
536 the functions `emacs-session-save' and `emacs-session-restore'.
537 (Actually, this feature was introduced with Emacs 22, but it was not
538 documented.)
539 \f
540 * Incompatible Editing Changes in Emacs 23.1
541
542 ** In Dired, `dired-flag-garbage-files' is rebound from `&' to `%&'
543 on the regexp command prefix map.
544
545 ** In Dired-x, all command guesses for ! are now added to the default
546 list accessible by M-n instead of pushing all guesses temporarily into
547 the history list.
548
549 ** In Isearch mode, a special case of typing `C-w' at the beginning of
550 the minibuffer that toggles word search (i.e. using key sequences
551 `C-s RET C-w' or `C-s M-e C-w') is obsolete. You can use the global key
552 `M-s w' to start word search, or type `M-s w' in Isearch mode to
553 toggle word search. To start nonincremental word search you can now use
554 `M-s w RET' and `M-s w C-r RET' instead of `C-s RET C-w' and `C-r RET C-w'.
555
556 ** In Info, `Info-search' is unbound from `M-s' to allow using `M-s w'
557 for word search as well as other search commands from the global prefix
558 key `M-s'. `Info-search' is still bound to `s', and also incremental
559 search commands `C-s', `C-M-s', `C-r', `C-M-r' are available for searching
560 through multiple Info nodes, together with their nonincremental versions
561 `C-s RET', `C-r RET', `C-M-s RET', `C-M-r RET', `M-s w RET'.
562
563 ** In Text mode, `center-line' and `center-paragraph' are rebound from
564 `M-s' and `M-S' to global keys `M-o M-s' and `M-o M-S' on the global
565 prefix map `M-o', which is intended for such formatting commands.
566
567 ** The following input methods were removed in Emacs 22.2, but this was
568 not advertised: danish-alt-postfix, esperanto-alt-postfix,
569 finnish-alt-postfix, german-alt-postfix, icelandic-alt-postfix,
570 norwegian-alt-postfix, scandinavian-alt-postfix, spanish-alt-postfix,
571 and swedish-alt-postfix. Use the versions without "alt-", which are
572 identical.
573
574 \f
575 * Editing Changes in Emacs 23.1
576
577 ** The C-n and C-p line-motion commands now move by screen lines,
578 taking continued lines and variable-width characters into account.
579 Setting `line-move-visual' to nil reverts this to the previous
580 behavior (i.e., motion by logical lines based on buffer contents
581 alone).
582
583 ** C-x C-c now invokes `save-buffers-kill-terminal', and C-z now
584 invokes `suspend-frame'. These changes are for compatibility with the
585 new multi-tty support (see `Improved X Window System support' above).
586
587 ** Mark changes
588
589 *** Transient Mark mode is now on by default.
590
591 *** mark-even-if-inactive now defaults to t
592
593 *** When Transient Mark mode is on, C-SPC C-SPC pushes a mark without
594 activating it.
595
596 *** When Transient Mark mode is on, M-q now fills the region if the
597 region is active. Otherwise, it fills the current paragraph.
598
599 *** When Transient Mark mode is on, M-$ now checks spelling of the
600 region if the region is active. Otherwise, it checks spelling of the
601 word at point.
602
603 *** When Transient Mark mode is on, TAB now indents the region if the
604 region is active.
605
606 *** The variable `use-empty-active-region' controls whether an empty
607 active region in Transient Mark mode should make commands operate on
608 that empty region.
609
610 ** Temporarily active regions
611
612 *** The new variable shift-select-mode, non-nil by default, controls
613 shift-selection. When Shift Select mode is on, shift-translated
614 motion keys (e.g. S-left and S-down) activate and extend a temporary
615 region, similar to mouse-selection.
616
617 *** Temporarily active regions, created using shift-selection or
618 mouse-selection, are not necessarily deactivated in the next command.
619 They are only deactivated after point motion commands that are not
620 shift-translated, or after commands that would ordinarily deactivate
621 the mark in Transient Mark mode (e.g., any command that modifies the
622 buffer).
623
624 ** Minibuffer and completion changes
625
626 *** Emacs may ask for confirmation before opening a non-existent file
627 or buffer. By default, Emacs requests confirmation if you type RET
628 immediately after TAB, and the resulting input is not an existing file
629 or buffer; this usually happens when the minibuffer input did not
630 complete far enough and you entered RET by mistake. In that case,
631 Emacs puts the message "[Confirm]" in the minibuffer; type RET again
632 to create the file or buffer.
633
634 The new variable confirm-nonexistent-file-or-buffer determines whether
635 Emacs asks for confirmation. The default value is `after-completion'.
636 If you change it to t, Emacs always asks for confirmation; if you
637 change it to nil, Emacs never asks for confirmation.
638
639 *** The rules for performing completion have been changed.
640 When generating completion alternatives, Emacs now takes the
641 minibuffer text after point, if any, into account: this text is
642 treated as a substring of the remaining part of the completion
643 alternative (i.e., the part not matched by the minibuffer text before
644 point). If no completion alternatives are found this way, Emacs
645 attempts to perform partial-completion. If still no completion
646 alternatives are found, we fall back on the Emacs 22 rules for
647 performing completion.
648
649 The new variable `completion-styles' can be customized to choose your
650 favorite completion style.
651
652 *** When M-n in the minibuffer reaches the end of the list of defaults,
653 it adds the completion list to the end, so next M-n continues putting
654 completion items to the minibuffer. The same principle applies to
655 incremental search commands as well: C-s or C-M-s starts searching
656 the default values and after the end of defaults they continue
657 searching minibuffer completion items.
658
659 *** Minibuffer input of shell commands now comes with completion.
660
661 *** In the `C-x d' (Dired) prompt, typing M-n gives the visited file
662 name of the current buffer.
663
664 *** In the M-! (shell-command) prompt, M-n provides some default commands.
665 These are guessed using the file extension of the current file, based
666 on the file-handlers specified in the operating system's `mailcap'
667 file. The ! command in Dired (dired-do-shell-command) works
668 similarly, using the file displayed on the current line.
669
670 *** A list of regexp default values is available via M-n for `occur',
671 `keep-lines', `flush-lines' and `how-many'. This list includes the active
672 region in transient-mark-mode, the word under the cursor, the last Isearch
673 regexp, the last Isearch string and the last replacement regexp.
674
675 *** When enable-recursive-minibuffers is non-nil, operations which use
676 switch-to-buffer (such as C-x b and C-x C-f) do not fail any more when
677 used in a minibuffer or a dedicated window. Instead, they fallback on
678 using pop-to-buffer, which will use some other window. This change
679 has no effect when enable-recursive-minibuffers is nil (the default).
680
681 *** Isearch started in the minibuffer searches in the minibuffer history.
682 Reverse Isearch commands (C-r, C-M-r) search in previous minibuffer
683 history elements, and forward Isearch commands (C-s, C-M-s) search in
684 next history elements. When the reverse search reaches the first history
685 element, it wraps to the last history element, and the forward search
686 wraps to the first history element. When the search is terminated, the
687 history element containing the search string becomes the current.
688
689 *** The variable read-file-name-completion-ignore-case overrides
690 completion-ignore-case for file name completion.
691
692 *** The variable read-buffer-completion-ignore-case overrides
693 completion-ignore-case for buffer name completion.
694
695 *** The new command `minibuffer-force-complete' chooses one of the
696 possible completions, rather than stopping at the common prefix.
697
698 *** If `completion-auto-help' is `lazy', Emacs shows the completions
699 buffer only on the second attempt to complete. This was already
700 supported in `partial-completion-mode'.
701
702 ** Face changes
703
704 *** S-down-mouse-1 now pops up a menu for changing the font and text
705 size of the default face in the current buffer. The face is changed
706 via face remapping (see Lisp changes, below).
707
708 *** New commands to change the default face size in the current buffer.
709 To increase it, type `C-x C-+' or `C-x C-='. To decrease it, type
710 `C-x C--'. To restore the default (global) face size, type `C-x C-0'.
711 These work via Text Scale mode, a new minor mode.
712
713 The final key in the above commands may be repeated without the
714 leading `C-x', e.g. `C-x C-= C-= C-=' increases the face height by
715 three steps. Each step scales the height of the default face by the
716 value of the variable `text-scale-mode-step'.
717
718 *** The commands buffer-face-mode and buffer-face-set can be used to
719 remap the default face in the current buffer. See "Buffer Face mode",
720 under New Modes and Packages.
721
722 ** Primary selection changes
723
724 *** You can disable kill ring commands from accessing the primary
725 selection by setting `x-select-enable-primary' to nil.
726
727 ** Continuation lines can now be wrapped at word boundaries
728 (word-wrapping). This is controlled by the new per-buffer variable
729 `word-wrap'. Word wrapping does not take place if continuation lines
730 are not shown, e.g. if truncate-lines is non-nil. The most convenient
731 way to enable word-wrapping is using the new minor mode Visual Line
732 mode; in addition to setting `word-wrap' to t, this rebinds some
733 editing commands to work on screen lines rather than text lines. See
734 New Modes and Packages, below.
735
736 ** Window management changes
737
738 *** truncate-partial-width-windows now accepts integer values, which
739 specify a minimum window width for partial-width windows, below which
740 lines are truncated. The default has been changed to 50.
741
742 *** The new command balance-windows-area balances windows both
743 vertically and horizontally.
744
745 *** pop-to-buffer now always sets input focus when the popped-to window
746 is on a different frame.
747
748 ** Miscellaneous changes:
749
750 *** C-l is bound to the new command recenter-top-bottom, rather than recenter.
751 This moves the current line to window center, top and bottom on
752 successive invocations.
753
754 *** scroll-preserve-screen-position also preserves the column position.
755
756 *** If `yank-pop-change-selection' is t, rotating the kill ring also
757 updates the selection or clipboard to the current yank, just as M-w
758 would do so with the text it copies to the kill ring.
759
760 *** C-M-% now shows replacement as it would look in the buffer, with
761 `\N' and `\&' substituted according to the match. Old behavior can be
762 restored by customizing `query-replace-show-replacement'.
763
764 *** The command shell prompts for the default directory, when it is
765 called with a prefix and the default directory is a remote file name.
766 This is because some file name handlers (like ange-ftp) are not able to
767 run processes remotely.
768
769 *** The new command kill-matching-buffers kills buffers whose name
770 matches a regexp.
771
772 *** The value of comment-style now defaults to `indent'.
773 Thefore, comment-start markers are inserted at the current indentation
774 of the region to comment, rather than the leftmost column.
775
776 *** The new commands `pp-macroexpand-expression' and
777 `pp-macroexpand-last-sexp' pretty-print macro expansions.
778
779 *** The new command `set-file-modes' allows to set file's mode bits.
780 The mode bits can be specified in symbolic notation, like with GNU
781 Coreutils, in addition to an octal number. `chmod' is a new
782 convenience alias for this function.
783
784 *** `next-error-recenter' specifies how next-error should recenter the
785 visited source file. Its value can be a number (for example, 0 for
786 top line, -1 for bottom line), or nil for no recentering.
787
788 *** When typing in a password in the echo area, C-y yanks the current
789 kill into the password.
790
791 *** Tooltip frame parameters `font' and `color' in `tooltip-frame-parameters'
792 are ignored. Customize the `tooltip' face instead.
793
794 *** `mkdir' is a new convenience alias for `make-directory'.
795 \f
796 * New Modes and Packages in Emacs 23.1
797
798 ** Auto Composition Mode is a minor mode that composes characters
799 automatically when they are displayed. It is globally on by default.
800 It uses `auto-composition-function' (default `auto-compose-chars').
801
802 ** Bubbles, a new game, is similar to SameGame.
803
804 ** Buffer Face mode is a minor mode for remapping the default face in
805 the current buffer. The variable `buffer-face-mode-face' specifies
806 the face to remap to. The command `buffer-face-set' prompts for a
807 face name, sets `buffer-face-mode-face' to it, and enables
808 buffer-face-mode. See "Face changes", under Editing Changes, for a
809 description of face remapping.
810
811 ** butterfly flips the desired bit on the drive platter.
812 See http://xkcd.com/378/
813
814 ** bug-reference.el provides clickable links to bug reports.
815
816 ** dbus.el provides D-Bus language bindings.
817 D-Bus is an inter-process communication mechanism for applications
818 residing on the same host. See the manual for details.
819
820 ** DocView mode allows viewing of PDF, PostScript and DVI documents.
821 One can also search for a regular expression in the document. For
822 details, see the commentary in doc-view.el.
823
824 PDF and DVI files are now opened in Doc View mode by default.
825
826 In Postcript mode, C-c C-c launches Doc View minor mode for viewing
827 the postscript file.
828
829 ** EasyPG provides an interface to the GNU Privacy Guard (GnuPG).
830 It includes a GnuPG keyring browser, cryptographic operations on
831 regions and files, and automatic encryption of *.gpg files. For
832 details, see the EasyPG Assistant User's Manual.
833
834 ** json.el is a library for parsing and generating JSON
835 (JavaScript Object Notation), a lightweight data-interchange format.
836
837 ** linum.el is a new minor mode to display line numbers for the
838 current buffer.
839
840 ** mairix.el is an interface to mairix, a free tool for indexing and
841 searching locally stored mail. It allows you to query mairix and
842 display the search results with Rmail, Gnus and VM. Note that there
843 is an existing Gnus back end, nnmairix.el, which should be used with
844 Maildir/MH setups.
845
846 ** minibuffer-depth-indicate-mode shows the minibuffer depth in the prompt.
847
848 ** nXML Mode
849 This is a new mode for editing XML documents. It allows a schema to
850 be associated with the XML document being edited, using Relax NG as
851 the schema language. The schema is used to provide two key features:
852
853 *** Continuous validation. nXML validates as you type, highlighting
854 any invalid parts of your document.
855
856 *** Completion. nXML can assist you in entering an element name,
857 attribute name or data value by using information about what is
858 allowed by the schema in that context.
859
860 ** proced.el provides a Dired-like interface for operating on
861 processes. Proced makes an Emacs buffer containing a listing of the
862 current processes. You can use the normal Emacs commands to move
863 around in this buffer, and special Proced commands to operate on the
864 processes listed. It is currently only functional on GNU/Linux,
865 MS-Windows and Solaris.
866
867 ** Remember Mode is a mode for jotting down things to remember.
868 Notes can be saved to a Diary file. For details, see the Remember
869 Manual.
870
871 ** RST mode is a major mode for editing reStructuredText files.
872
873 ** Ruby mode is a major mode for Ruby files.
874
875 ** Visual Line mode provides support for editing by visual lines.
876 It turns on word-wrapping in the current buffer, and rebinds C-a, C-e,
877 and C-k to commands that operate by visual lines instead of logical
878 lines. This is a more reliable replacement for longlines-mode.
879 This can also be turned on using the menu bar, via
880 Options -> Line Wrapping in this Buffer -> Word Wrap
881
882 ** xesam.el is an implementation of Xesam, an interface to (desktop)
883 search engines like Beagle, Strigi, and Tracker. The Xesam API
884 requires D-Bus for communication.
885
886 ** zeroconf.el offers service discovery and service publishing
887 interfaces according to the zeroconf specification. It communicates
888 with Avahi, a zeroconf implementation, via D-Bus messages on systems
889 which have installed this software.
890
891 ** There is a new `whitespace' package.
892 (The pre-existing one has been renamed to `old-whitespace'.)
893 Now, besides reporting bogus blanks, the whitespace package has a
894 minor mode and a global minor mode to visualize blanks (TAB, (HARD)
895 SPACE and NEWLINE). The visualization is made via faces and/or display
896 table. It can also indicate lines that extend beyond a given column,
897 trailing blanks, and empty lines at the start or end of a buffer.
898 See `whitespace-style' for more details. The `whitespace-action' option
899 specifies what to do when a buffer is visited, killed, or written.
900
901 \f
902 * Changes in Specialized Modes and Packages in Emacs 23.1
903
904 ** Abbrev has been rewritten in Elisp and extended with more flexibility.
905
906 *** New functions: abbrev-get, abbrev-put, abbrev-table-get, abbrev-table-put,
907 abbrev-table-p, abbrev-insert, abbrev-table-menu.
908
909 *** Special hook `abbrev-expand-functions' obsoletes `pre-abbrev-expand-hook'.
910
911 *** `make-abbrev-table', `define-abbrev', `define-abbrev-table' all take
912 extra arguments for arbitrary properties.
913
914 *** New variable `abbrev-minor-mode-table-alist'.
915
916 *** `local-abbrev-table' can hold a list of abbrev-tables.
917
918 *** Abbrevs have now the following special properties:
919 `:count', `:system', `:enable-function', `:case-fixed'.
920
921 *** Abbrev-tables have now the following special properties:
922 `:parents', `:case-fixed', `:enable-function', `:regexp',
923 `abbrev-table-modiff'.
924
925 ** Apropos
926
927 *** `apropos-library' describes the elements defined in a given library.
928
929 *** Set `apropos-compact-layout' is you want a more compact (but wider) layout.
930
931 ** Archive Mode has basic support to browse Rar archives.
932 Note, however, that the free version of the unrar command only handles
933 versions 1 and 2 of the Rar format.
934
935 ** BibTeX mode
936
937 *** New command `bibtex-initialize' (re)initializes BibTeX buffers.
938
939 *** New `bibtex-entry-format' options `whitespace', `braces', and
940 `string', disabled by default.
941
942 *** New variable `bibtex-cite-matcher-alist' contains rules to
943 identify cited keys in BibTeX entries, used by `bibtex-find-crossref'.
944
945 *** Command `bibtex-url' allows multiple URLs per entry.
946
947 ** Calendar and diary
948
949 *** There is a new date style, `iso', essentially year/month/day.
950 The variable `european-calendar-style' is obsolete - use `calendar-date-style'.
951 Similarly, the commands `american-calendar' and `european-calendar'
952 should be replaced by `calendar-set-date-style'.
953
954 *** The calendar namespace has been rationalized.
955 All functions and variables now begin with a `calendar-', `diary-', or
956 `holiday-' prefix. The various calendar systems have secondary
957 prefixes, eg `calendar-french-'. The old names you are likely to use
958 directly still exist, for the time being, as aliases, but please start
959 using the new names.
960
961 *** The whitespace in the calendar layout can be customized.
962 See the variables:
963 calendar-left-margin, calendar-intermonth-spacing, calendar-column-width,
964 calendar-day-header-width, and calendar-day-digit-width.
965
966 *** Text (e.g. ISO weeks) can be displayed between the calendar months.
967 See the variables calendar-intermonth-header and calendar-intermonth-text.
968
969 *** The function `holiday-chinese' computes holidays on the Chinese calendar.
970 It has been used to add items to the list `holiday-oriental-holidays'.
971
972 *** `diary-remind' accepts a negative number -DAYS as a shorthand for
973 the list (1 2 ... DAYS).
974
975 ** Change Log mode
976
977 *** The new command C-c C-f (change-log-find-file) finds the file
978 associated with the current log entry.
979
980 *** The new command C-c C-c (change-log-goto-source) goes to the
981 source code associated with a log entry.
982
983 ** Compile and grep modes
984
985 *** The mode-line entry for the *compilation* and *grep* buffer is color coded.
986 It has different colors for to show that: (a) the command is still
987 running, (b) successful completion, (c) error.
988
989 *** compilation-auto-jump-to-first-error tells `compile' to jump to
990 the first error encountered during compilations.
991
992 *** compilation-scroll-output accepts a new value, `first-error', which
993 says to stop auto scrolling at the first error that occurs.
994
995 *** The `cc' alias for C++ files in `grep-file-aliases' has been
996 improved. `hh' can be used to match C++ header files and `cchh' both
997 C++ sources and headers.
998
999 ** Copyright
1000
1001 *** You can specify your copyright holders' names.
1002 Only copyright lines with holders matching `copyright-names-regexp' are
1003 considered for update.
1004
1005 *** Copyrights can be at the end of the buffer.
1006 This is controlled by `copyright-at-end-flag' (used by, e.g., change-log-mode).
1007
1008 ** Custom
1009
1010 *** defcustom accepts new keyword arguments, `:safe' and `:risky', which
1011 set a variable's `safe-local-variable' and `risky-local-variable' property.
1012
1013 ** Diff mode
1014
1015 *** diff-refine-hunk highlights word-level details of changes in a diff hunk.
1016 It's used automatically as you move through hunks, see
1017 diff-auto-refine-mode. It is bound to `C-c C-b'.
1018
1019 *** diff-add-change-log-entries-other-window iterates through the diff
1020 buffer and tries to create ChangeLog entries for each change.
1021 It is bound to `C-x 4 A'.
1022
1023 *** Turning on `whitespace-mode' in a diff buffer will show trailing
1024 whitespace problems in the modified lines.
1025
1026 ** Dired
1027
1028 *** In Dired, C-x C-q now runs the command wdired-change-to-wdired-mode,
1029 and C-x C-q in wdired-mode exits it with asking a question about
1030 saving changes.
1031
1032 *** `&' runs the command `dired-do-async-shell-command' that executes
1033 the command asynchronously without the need to manually add ampersand
1034 to the end of the command. Its output appears in the buffer `*Async Shell
1035 Command*'.
1036
1037 *** `M-s f C-s' and `M-s f M-C-s' run Isearch that matches only at file names.
1038 When a new user option `dired-isearch-filenames' is t, then even ordinary
1039 Isearch started with `C-s' and `C-M-s' matches only at file names in the
1040 Dired buffer. When `dired-isearch-filenames' is `dwim' then activation of
1041 file name Isearch depends on the position of point - if point is on a file
1042 name initially, then Isearch matches only file names, otherwise it matches
1043 everywhere in the Dired buffer. You can toggle file names matching on or
1044 off by typing `M-s f' in Isearch mode.
1045
1046 *** `M-s a C-s' and `M-s a M-C-s' run multi-file Isearch on the marked files.
1047 They visit the first marked file in the sequence and display the usual Isearch
1048 prompt for a string or a regexp where all Isearch commands are available.
1049
1050 *** `Q' in Dired provides two new keys for multi-file replacement.
1051 The upper case key `Y' replaces all remaining matches in all remaining files
1052 with no more questions. The upper case key `N' stops doing replacements
1053 in the current file and skips to the next file. These multi-file keys
1054 are available for all commands that use `tags-query-replace'
1055 including `dired-do-query-replace-regexp', `vc-dir-query-replace-regexp',
1056 `reftex-query-replace-document'.
1057
1058 ** Fortran
1059
1060 *** The line length of fixed-form Fortran is not fixed at 72 any more.
1061 Customize the variable `fortran-line-length' to change it.
1062
1063 *** In Fortran mode, M-; is now bound to the standard comment-dwim,
1064 rather than fortran-indent-comment.
1065
1066 *** (The increasingly misnamed) F90 mode supports Fortran 2003 syntax.
1067
1068 ** Gnus
1069
1070 *** The Gnus package has been updated
1071 There are many news features, bug fixes and improvements; see the file
1072 GNUS-NEWS or the node "No Gnus" in the Gnus manual for details.
1073
1074 *** In Emacs 23, Gnus uses Emacs' new internal coding system `utf-8-emacs' for
1075 saving articles drafts and ~/.newsrc.eld. These file may not be read
1076 correctly in Emacs 22 and below. If you want to Gnus across different Emacs
1077 versions, you may set `mm-auto-save-coding-system' to `emacs-mule'.
1078
1079 *** Passwords are consistently loaded through `auth-source'
1080 Gnus can use `auth-source' for POP and IMAP passwords. Also see that
1081 `smtpmail' and `url' support `auth-source' for SMTP and HTTP/HTTPS/RSS
1082 authentication respectively.
1083
1084 ** Help mode
1085
1086 *** New macro `with-help-window' should set up help windows better
1087 than `with-output-to-temp-buffer' with `print-help-return-message'.
1088
1089 *** New option `help-window-select' permits to customize whether help
1090 window shall be automatically selected when invoking help.
1091
1092 *** New variable `help-window-point-marker' permits one to specify a new
1093 position for point in help window (for example in `view-lossage').
1094
1095 ** Isearch
1096
1097 *** New command `isearch-forward-word' bound globally to `M-s w' starts
1098 incremental word search. New command `isearch-toggle-word' bound to the
1099 same key `M-s w' in Isearch mode toggles word searching on or off
1100 while Isearch is active.
1101
1102 *** New command `isearch-highlight-regexp' bound to `M-s h r' in Isearch
1103 mode runs `highlight-regexp' (`hi-lock-face-buffer') with the current
1104 search string as its regexp argument. The same key `M-s h r' and
1105 other keys on the `M-s h' prefix are bound globally to the command
1106 `highlight-regexp' and other hi-lock commands.
1107
1108 *** New command `isearch-occur' bound to `M-s o' in Isearch mode
1109 runs `occur' with the current search string. The same key `M-s o'
1110 is bound globally to the command `occur'.
1111
1112 *** Isearch can now search through multiple ChangeLog files.
1113 When running Isearch in a ChangeLog file, if the search fails,
1114 then another C-s tries searching the previous ChangeLog,
1115 if there is one (e.g. going from ChangeLog to ChangeLog.12).
1116 This is enabled if multi-isearch-search is non-nil.
1117
1118 *** Two new commands to start Isearch on a list of marked buffers
1119 for buff-menu.el and ibuffer.el are bound to the keys `M-s a C-s' and
1120 `M-s a M-C-s'.
1121
1122 *** The part of an Isearch that failed to match is highlighted in
1123 `isearch-fail' face.
1124
1125 *** `C-h C-h' in Isearch mode displays isearch-specific Help screen,
1126 `C-h b' displays all Isearch key bindings, `C-h k' displays the full
1127 documentation of the given Isearch key sequence, `C-h m' displays
1128 documentation of Isearch mode. All the rest Help commands exit Isearch mode
1129 and execute their global definitions.
1130
1131 *** When started in the minibuffer, Isearch searches in the minibuffer
1132 history. See `Minibuffer changes', above.
1133
1134 ** MH-E
1135
1136 *** Upgraded to MH-E version 8.2. See MH-E-NEWS for details.
1137
1138 ** Python
1139 *** The file etc/emacs.py now supports both Python 2 and 3, meaning
1140 that either version can be used as inferior Python by python.el.
1141
1142 *** Python mode now has `pdbtrack' functionality. When using pdb to
1143 debug a Python program, pdbtrack notices the pdb prompt and displays
1144 the source file and line that the program is stopped at, much the same
1145 way as gud-mode does for debugging C programs with gdb.
1146
1147 ** Recentf
1148
1149 *** The default value of `recentf-keep' prevents from checking of
1150 remote files, if there is no established connection to the
1151 corresponding remote host.
1152
1153 ** Rmail
1154
1155 *** Rmail no longer converts the messages to Babyl format.
1156 Instead, it uses UNIX mbox format, both on disk and in Rmail buffers,
1157 and does conversion and decoding when a message is displayed.
1158
1159 The first time you visit an Rmail file in Babyl format, Rmail
1160 automatically converts it to mbox format. This is a one-time
1161 conversion, but it can take a few minutes, depending on how fast is
1162 your machine and on the size of the file. You should find the rest of
1163 Rmail usage unaltered.
1164
1165 However, M-x set-rmail-inbox-list now lasts only for one session
1166 because there is no way to save the list of inbox files in an
1167 mbox-format file.
1168
1169 Also, whereas with Babyl format M-x find-file would switch to Rmail
1170 mode, with mbox format this is no longer the case (there being no way
1171 to add an "-*- rmail-*-" cookie to an mbox file). Use C-u M-x rmail
1172 instead.
1173
1174 If you have written any extensions to Rmail, they are likely to need
1175 updating. Conceptually, the Rmail buffer that you see is no longer
1176 just a narrowed portion of the whole. So you cannot access the whole
1177 of a message (or message collection) by a simple save-restriction and
1178 widen. Instead, there are two buffers: the rmail-buffer, and the
1179 rmail-view-buffer. The former is the buffer that you see, the latter
1180 is invisible. Most of the time, the invisible `view' buffer contains
1181 the full contents of the Rmail file, and the Rmail buffer contains a
1182 decoded copy of the current message (with only a subset of the
1183 headers). In this state, Rmail is said to be `swapped'.
1184
1185 You may find the following functions useful:
1186
1187 `rmail-get-header' and `rmail-set-header' get or set the value of a
1188 message header, whether or not it is currently visible.
1189
1190 `rmail-apply-in-message' is a general purpose function that calls a
1191 function (with arguments) which you specify on the full text of a given
1192 message. To further narrow to just the headers, search forward for "\n\n".
1193
1194 *** The new command `rmail-mime' displays MIME messages.
1195 It is bound to `v' in Rmail buffers and summaries. It displays plain
1196 text and multipart messages in a temporary buffer, and offers buttons
1197 to save attachments.
1198
1199 *** The command `rmail-redecode-body' no longer accepts the optional arg RAW.
1200 Since Rmail now holds messages in their original undecoded form in a
1201 separate buffer, `rmail-redecode-body' no longer encodes the original
1202 message, and therefore there should be no need to avoid encoding it.
1203
1204 *** The o command is now `rmail-output'. It is an all-purpose command
1205 for copying messages from Rmail and appending them to files. It
1206 handles Babyl-format files as well as mbox-format files, and it
1207 handles both kinds properly when they are visited in Emacs. It always
1208 copies the full headers of the message.
1209
1210 *** The C-o command is now `rmail-output-as-seen'. It uses
1211 the message as displayed, appending it to an mbox file.
1212
1213 *** The modified status of the Rmail buffer is reported in the mode-line.
1214 Previously, this information was hidden.
1215
1216 ** TeX modes
1217
1218 *** New option latex-indent-within-escaped-parens
1219 permits to customize indentation of LaTeX environments delimited
1220 by escaped parens.
1221
1222 ** T-mouse Mode
1223
1224 *** If the gpm mouse server is running and t-mouse-mode is enabled,
1225 Emacs uses a Unix socket in a GNU/Linux console to talk to server,
1226 rather than faking events using the client program mev. This C level
1227 approach provides mouse highlighting and help echoing in the
1228 minibuffer.
1229
1230 ** Tramp
1231
1232 *** New connection methods.
1233 The new methods "plinkx", "plink2", "psftp", "sftp" and "fish" have
1234 been introduced. There are also new so-called gateway methods
1235 "tunnel" and "socks".
1236
1237 *** IPv6 addresses.
1238 IPv6 addresses are supported now as host names. They must be embedded
1239 in square brackets, like in "/ssh:[::1]:".
1240
1241 *** Multihop syntax has been removed.
1242 The pseudo-method "multi" has been removed. Instead, multi hops
1243 can be specified by the new variable `tramp-default-proxies-alist'.
1244
1245 *** More default settings.
1246 Default values can be set via the variables `tramp-default-user',
1247 `tramp-default-user-alist' and `tramp-default-host'.
1248
1249 *** Connection information is cached.
1250 In order to reduce connection setup, information about used
1251 connections is kept persistently in a file. The name of this file is
1252 defined in the variable `tramp-persistency-file-name'.
1253
1254 *** Control of remote processes.
1255 Running processes on a remote host can be controlled by settings in
1256 `tramp-remote-path' and `tramp-remote-process-environment'.
1257
1258 *** Success of remote copy is checked.
1259 When the variable `file-precious-flag' is set, the success of a remote
1260 file copy is checked via the file's checksum.
1261
1262 *** Passwords can be read from an authentification file.
1263 Tramp uses the package `auth-source' to read passwords from a file, if
1264 necessary.
1265
1266 ** VC and related modes
1267
1268 *** VC now supports applying VC operations to a set of files at a time.
1269 This enables VC to work much more effectively with changeset-oriented
1270 version-control systems such as Subversion, GNU Arch, Mercurial, Git
1271 and Bzr. VC will now pass a multiple-file commit to these systems as
1272 a single changeset.
1273
1274 *** vc-dir is a new command that displays file names and their VC
1275 status. It allows to apply various VC operations to a file, a
1276 directory or a set of files/directories.
1277
1278 *** VC switches are no longer appended, rather the first non-nil value is used.
1279 (This was for the most part true in Emacs 22, but was not advertised).
1280 This is because there is an increasing variety of VC systems, and they
1281 do not all accept the same "common" options. For example, a CVS diff
1282 command used to append the values of `vc-cvs-diff-switches',
1283 `vc-diff-switches', and `diff-switches'. Now the first non-nil value
1284 from that sequence is used. The special value `t' means "no switches".
1285
1286 *** Clicking on the VC mode-line entry now pops the VC menu.
1287
1288 *** The VC mode-line entry now has a tooltip that explains the VC file status.
1289
1290 *** In VC Annotate mode, the key bindings have changed to use lower
1291 case keys instead of the upper case keys used in the past.
1292
1293 *** In VC Annotate mode, for VC systems that support changesets, you can
1294 see the diff for the whole changeset (not only for the current file)
1295 by typing the D key. Using the "Show changeset diff of revision at
1296 line" menu entry does the same thing.
1297
1298 *** In VC Annotate mode, you can type v to toggle the annotation visibility.
1299
1300 *** In VC Annotate mode, you can type f to show the file revision on
1301 the current line.
1302
1303 *** Asynchronous VC commands display [Waiting...] in the mode-line
1304 of the corresponding buffer as long as the asynchronous process is
1305 active.
1306
1307 *** Log entries can be modified using the key "e" in log-view.
1308 For now only CVS, RCS, SCCS and SVN support this functionality.
1309 This is done by the `modify-change-comment' backend function.
1310
1311 *** In log-view-mode, for VC systems that support changesets, you can
1312 see the diff for the whole changeset (not only for the current file)
1313 by typing the D key or using the "Changeset Diff" menu entry.
1314
1315 *** In Log Edit mode, C-c C-d now shows the diff for the files involved.
1316
1317 *** vc-git supports the "git grep" command.
1318
1319 *** VC Support for Meta-CVS has been removed for lack of a maintainer able
1320 to update it to the new VC.
1321
1322 ** Miscellaneous
1323
1324 *** comint-mode uses `start-file-process' now (see Lisp Changes).
1325 If `default-directory' is a remote file name, subprocesses are started
1326 on the corresponding remote system.
1327
1328 *** Eldoc highlights the function argument under point
1329 with the face `eldoc-highlight-function-argument'.
1330
1331 *** In Etags, the --members option is now the default.
1332 Use --no-members if you want the old default behavior of not tagging
1333 struct members in C, members variables in C++ and variables in PHP.
1334
1335 *** The `gdb' command only works with the graphical interface now.
1336 Use `gud-gdb' if you want the (old) text command mode.
1337
1338 *** goto-address.el provides two new minor modes, goto-address-mode and
1339 goto-address-prog-mode, which buttonize URLS and email addresses.
1340
1341 *** The new command `eshell/info' runs info in an eshell buffer.
1342
1343 *** The new variable `ffap-rfc-directories' specifies a list of local
1344 directories in which `ffap-rfc' will first search for RFCs.
1345
1346 *** hide-ifdef-mode allows shadowing ifdef-blocks instead of hiding them.
1347 See option `hide-ifdef-shadow' and function `hide-ifdef-toggle-shadowing'.
1348
1349 *** `icomplete-prospects-height' now supercedes `icomplete-prospects-length'.
1350
1351 *** Info displays breadcrumbs in the header of the page.
1352 See Info-breadcrumbs-depth to control it.
1353
1354 *** net-utils has an `iwconfig' command, similar to the existing `ifconfig'.
1355 It is used to configure wireless interfaces.
1356
1357 *** The pcmpl-unix package supports hostname completion for ssh and scp.
1358
1359 *** sgml-electric-tag-pair-mode lets you simultaneously edit matched tag pairs.
1360
1361 *** smerge-refine highlights word-level details of changes in conflict.
1362 It's used automatically as you move through conflicts, see
1363 smerge-auto-refine-mode.
1364
1365 *** talk.el has been extended for multiple tty support.
1366
1367 *** A new command `display-time-world' has been added to the Time
1368 package. It creates a buffer with an updating time display using
1369 several time zones.
1370
1371 *** The appearance of superscript and subscript in TeX is more customizable.
1372 See the documentation of the variables: tex-fontify-script,
1373 tex-font-script-display, tex-suscript-height-ratio, and
1374 tex-suscript-height-minimum.
1375
1376 *** view-remove-frame-by-deleting is now by default t
1377 since users found iconification of view-mode frames distracting.
1378
1379 *** WoMan tries to add locale-specific manual page directories to the
1380 search path. This can be disabled by setting `woman-locale' to nil.
1381
1382 \f
1383 * Changes in Emacs 23.1 on non-free operating systems
1384
1385 ** Case is now considered significant in completion on MS-Windows.
1386 The default value of `completion-ignore-case' is now nil on
1387 MS-Windows, the same as it is for other operating systems. The
1388 variable doesn't apply to reading a file name -- in that case Emacs
1389 heeds `read-file-name-completion-ignore-case' instead.
1390
1391 ** IPv6 is supported on MS-Windows.
1392 Emacs now supports IPv6 on Windows XP and later, and earlier versions
1393 of Windows with third party IPv6 stacks installed. In Emacs 22, IPv6 was
1394 supported on other platforms, but not on Windows due to using the winsock
1395 1.1 header file, even though Emacs was linking to the winsock 2 library.
1396
1397 ** Busy cursor (hourglass) now displays on MS-Windows.
1398 When Emacs is busy, an hourglass mouse cursor is displayed on Windows.
1399 In Emacs 22 only X supported the busy cursor.
1400
1401 ** Battery status is available on MS-Windows
1402 Emacs can now display the battery status in the mode-line when enabled with
1403 display-battery-mode or from the Options menu. More verbose battery
1404 information is also available with the command `battery'. In Emacs 22
1405 battery status was supported only on GNU/Linux and Mac.
1406
1407 ** More keys available on MS-Windows.
1408 Keys normally associated with IMEs, and some exotic keys not normally found
1409 on standard keyboards have been given names so they can be bound to functions
1410 inside Emacs. If there are keys on your keyboard that have not been exposed
1411 to Emacs in the past, try C-h k to see if they are available now.
1412
1413 Emacs can now bind functions to the extra buttons for media player and
1414 browser control present on some keyboards. These buttons are disabled
1415 by default, since enabling them prevents their system-wide use when
1416 Emacs has focus. To enable them, set the variable
1417 w32-pass-multimedia-buttons to nil. See the doc string of that variable
1418 for the list of extra keys that are available.
1419
1420 ** BDF fonts no longer supported on MS-Windows.
1421 The font backend was completely rewritten for this release. The focus
1422 on Windows has been getting acceptable performance and full unicode
1423 support, including complex script shaping for native Windows fonts. A
1424 rewrite of the BDF font support has not happened due to lack of time
1425 and developers. If demand still exists for such a backend even with
1426 the improved language support for native Windows fonts, future
1427 development in this direction will most likely be based on the
1428 freetype library, giving access to a wider range of font formats.
1429
1430 \f
1431 * Incompatible Lisp Changes in Emacs 23.1
1432
1433 ** Variables cannot be both buffer-local and frame-local any more.
1434
1435 ** `functionp' returns nil for special forms.
1436 I.e., it only returns t for objects that can be passed to `funcall'.
1437
1438 ** The behavior of map-char-table has changed. It may call the
1439 specified function with a cons (FROM . TO) as a key if characters in
1440 that range have the same value.
1441
1442 ** Process changes
1443
1444 *** The function `dired-call-process' has been removed.
1445
1446 *** The multibyteness of process filters is now determined by the
1447 coding-system used for decoding. The functions
1448 `process-filter-multibyte-p' and `set-process-filter-multibyte' are
1449 obsolete.
1450
1451 ** The variable `byte-compile-warnings' can now be a list starting with `not',
1452 meaning to disable the specified warnings. The meaning of this list
1453 may therefore be the reverse of what you expect (of course, this is
1454 only an issue if you make use of the new `not' syntax). Rather than
1455 checking/manipulating elements directly, use the new functions
1456 `byte-compile-warning-enabled-p', `byte-compile-disable-warning', and
1457 `byte-compile-enable-warning.'
1458
1459 ** `mode-name' is no longer guaranteed to be a string.
1460 Use `(format-mode-line mode-name)' to ensure a string value.
1461
1462 ** The function x-font-family-list has been removed.
1463 Use the new function font-family-list (see Lisp Changes, below).
1464
1465 ** Internationalization changes
1466
1467 *** The value of the function `charset-id' is now always 0.
1468
1469 *** The functions `register-char-codings' and `coding-system-spec'
1470 have been removed.
1471
1472 *** The cpXXX coding systems are now supported automatically.
1473 The functions cp-...-codepage, which you had to use in Emacs 22 to
1474 enable support for these coding systems, have been deleted.
1475
1476 *** The following features have been removed. They were used for
1477 displaying various scripts with specific fonts, and are no longer
1478 needed now that OpenType font support is available:
1479
1480 **** `devanagari' and `devan-util', and all associated devanagari-* and
1481 dev-* functions and variables (formerly used for Devanagari script).
1482
1483 **** `kannada' and `knd-util', and all associated kannada-* and knd-*
1484 functions and variables (formerly used for Kannada script).
1485
1486 **** `malayalam' and `mlm-util', and all associated malayalam-* and
1487 mlm-* functions and variables (formerly used for Malayalam script).
1488
1489 **** `tamil' and `tml-util, and all associated tamil-* and tml-*
1490 functions and variables (formerly used for Tamil script).
1491
1492 *** The meaning of NAME argument of `set-fontset-font' is changed.
1493 Previously nil is accepted as the default fontset. Now, nil is for
1494 the fontset of the selected frame and t is for the default fontset.
1495
1496 *** The meaning of FONTSET argument of `print-fontset' is changed.
1497 Now, nil is for the fontset of the selected frame and t is for the
1498 default fontset.
1499
1500 ** If a function in write-region-annotate-functions returns with a
1501 different buffer current, Emacs no longer kills that buffer
1502 automatically. This behavior existed in previous versions of Emacs,
1503 but was undocumented. To kill a buffer after write-region, give the
1504 variable `write-region-post-annotation-function' a buffer-local value
1505 of `kill-buffer'.
1506
1507 ** The variable temp-file-name-pattern has been removed.
1508 This variable was only used by call-process-region, which now uses
1509 temporary-file-directory instead.
1510
1511 ** The COUNT and SYSTEM-FLAG arguments to define-abbrev have been
1512 removed. The function now takes extra arguments for specifying
1513 arbitrary abbrev properties.
1514
1515 ** end-of-defun-function is now guaranteed to work only when called
1516 from the start of a defun. It must now leave point exactly at the end
1517 of defun, since `end-of-defun' now itself moves forward over
1518 whitespace after calling it.
1519
1520 \f
1521 * Lisp Changes in Emacs 23.1
1522
1523 ** The new variable `generate-autoload-cookie' controls the magic comment
1524 string used by `update-file-autoloads' to find autoloaded forms. The
1525 variable `generated-autoload-file' similarly controls the name of the
1526 file where `update-file-autoloads' writes the calls to `autoload'.
1527 The default values are ";;;###autoload" and `loaddefs.el',
1528 respectively.
1529
1530 ** New primitives `list-system-processes' and `process-attributes'
1531 let Lisp programs access the processes that are running on the local
1532 machine. See the doc strings of these functions for more details.
1533 Not all platforms support accessing this information; on those that
1534 don't, these primitives will return nil.
1535
1536 ** New variable `user-emacs-directory'.
1537 Use this instead of "~/.emacs.d".
1538
1539 ** If a local hook function has a non-nil `permanent-local-hook'
1540 property, `kill-all-local-variables' does not remove it from the local
1541 value of the hook variable; it remains even if you change major modes.
1542
1543 ** `frame-inherited-parameters' lets new frames inherit parameters from
1544 the selected frame.
1545
1546 ** New keymap `input-decode-map' overrides like key-translation-map, but
1547 applies before function-key-map. Also it is terminal-local contrary to
1548 key-translation-map. Terminal-specific key-sequences are generally added to
1549 this map rather than to function-key-map now.
1550
1551 ** `ignore-errors' is now a standard macro (does not require the CL package).
1552
1553 ** `interprogram-paste-function' can now return one string or a list
1554 of strings. In the latter case, Emacs puts the second and following
1555 strings on the kill ring.
1556
1557 ** In `condition-case', a handler can specify "let the debugger run first".
1558 You do this by writing `debug' in the list of conditions to be handled,
1559 like this:
1560
1561 (condition-case nil
1562 (foo bar)
1563 ((debug error) nil))
1564
1565 ** clone-indirect-buffer now runs the clone-indirect-buffer-hook.
1566
1567 ** `beginning-of-defun-function' now takes one argument, the count given to
1568 `beginning-of-defun'. (N.B. `end-of-defun-function' doesn't take any
1569 arguments.)
1570
1571 ** `file-remote-p' has new optional parameters IDENTIFICATION and CONNECTED.
1572 IDENTIFICATION specifies which part of the remote identifier has to be
1573 returned. With CONNECTED passed non-nil, it is checked whether a
1574 remote connection has been established already.
1575
1576 ** The new macro `declare-function' suppresses compiler warnings about
1577 undefined functions.
1578
1579 ** Changes to interactive function handling
1580
1581 *** The new interactive spec code ^ says to first call
1582 handle-shift-selection if shift-select-mode is non-nil, before reading
1583 the command arguments. This is used for shift-selection (see above).
1584
1585 *** Built-in functions can now have an interactive specification that
1586 is not a prompt string. If the `intspec' parameter of a `DEFUN'
1587 starts with a `(', the string is evaluated as a Lisp form.
1588
1589 *** The interactive-form of a function can be added post-facto via the
1590 `interactive-form' symbol property. Mostly useful to add complex
1591 interactive forms to subroutines.
1592
1593 ** Region changes
1594
1595 *** Commands should use `use-region-p' to test whether there is
1596 an active region that they should operate on.
1597
1598 *** `region-active-p' returns non-nil when Transient Mark mode is
1599 enabled and the mark is active. Most commands that act specially on
1600 the active region in Transient Mark mode should use `use-region-p'
1601 instead of `region-active-p', because `use-region-p' obeys the new
1602 user option `use-empty-active-region' (see Editing Changes, above).
1603
1604 *** If a command sets `transient-mark-mode' to (only . OLDVAL), that
1605 means to activate transient-mark-mode temporarily, until the next
1606 unshifted point motion command or mark deactivation. Afterwards,
1607 reset transient-mark-mode to the value OLDVAL. The values `only' and
1608 `identity', introduced in Emacs 22, are now deprecated.
1609
1610 ** Emacs session information
1611
1612 *** The new variables `before-init-time' and `after-init-time' record the
1613 value of `current-time' before and after Emacs loads the init files.
1614
1615 *** The new function `emacs-uptime' returns the uptime of an Emacs instance.
1616
1617 *** The new function `emacs-init-time' returns the duration of the
1618 Emacs initialization.
1619
1620 ** Changes affecting display-buffer
1621
1622 *** display-buffer tries to be smarter when splitting windows.
1623 The new option split-window-preferred-function lets you specify your own
1624 function to pop up new windows. Its default value split-window-sensibly
1625 can split a window either vertically or horizontally, whichever seems
1626 more suitable in the current configuration. You can tune the behavior
1627 of split-window-sensibly by customizing split-height-threshold and the
1628 new option split-width-threshold. Both options now take the value nil
1629 to inhibit splitting in one direction. Setting split-width-threshold to
1630 nil inhibits horizontal splitting and gets you the behavior of Emacs 22
1631 in this respect. In any case, display-buffer may now split the largest
1632 window vertically even when it is not as wide as the containing frame.
1633
1634 *** If pop-up-frames has the value `graphic-only', display-buffer only
1635 makes a separate frame on graphic displays.
1636
1637 *** select-frame and set-frame-selected-window have a new optional
1638 argument NORECORD. If non-nil, this will avoid messing with the order
1639 of recently selected windows and the buffer list.
1640
1641 ** Window parameters can now be defined.
1642 These are analogous to frame parameters, but are associated with
1643 individual windows.
1644
1645 *** The new functions window-parameters, window-parameter, and
1646 set-window-parameter are used to query and set window parameters.
1647
1648 ** Minibuffer and completion changes
1649
1650 *** A list of default values can be specified for the DEFAULT argument of
1651 functions `read-from-minibuffer', `read-string', `read-command',
1652 `read-variable', `read-buffer', `completing-read'. Elements of this list
1653 are available for inserting into the minibuffer by typing `M-n'.
1654 For empty input these functions return the first element of this list.
1655
1656 *** New function `read-regexp' uses the regexp history and some useful
1657 regexp defaults (string at point, last Isearch/replacement regexp/string)
1658 via M-n when reading a regexp in the minibuffer.
1659
1660 *** minibuffer-local-must-match-filename-map is now named
1661 minibuffer-local-filename-must-match-map.
1662
1663 *** The `require-match' argument to `completing-read' accepts the new
1664 values `confirm-only' and `confirm-after-completion'.
1665
1666 ** Search and replacement changes
1667
1668 *** The regexp form \(?<num>:<regexp>\) specifies the group number explicitly.
1669
1670 *** New function `match-substitute-replacement' returns the result of
1671 `replace-match' without actually using it in the buffer.
1672
1673 *** The new variable `replace-search-function' determines the function
1674 to use for searching in query-replace and replace-string. The
1675 function it specifies is called by `perform-replace' when its 4th
1676 argument is nil.
1677
1678 *** The new variable `replace-re-search-function' determines the
1679 function to use for searching in `query-replace-regexp',
1680 `replace-regexp', `query-replace-regexp-eval', and
1681 `map-query-replace-regexp'. The function it specifies is called by
1682 `perform-replace' when its 4th argument is non-nil.
1683
1684 *** New keymap `search-map' bound to `M-s' provides global bindings
1685 for search related commands.
1686
1687 *** New keymap `multi-query-replace-map' contains additonal keys bound
1688 to `automatic-all' and `exit-current' for multi-buffer interactive replacement.
1689
1690 *** The variable `inhibit-changing-match-data', if non-nil, prevents
1691 the search and match primitives from changing the match data.
1692
1693 *** New functions `word-search-forward-lax' and `word-search-backward-lax'.
1694 These are like `word-search-forward and `word-search-backward', except
1695 that the end of the search string need not match a word boundary,
1696 unless it ends in whitespace.
1697
1698 ** File handling changes
1699
1700 *** set-file-modes is now interactive and can take the mode value in
1701 symbolic notation thanks to auxiliary functions.
1702
1703 *** file-local-variables-alist stores an alist of file-local
1704 variables defined in the current buffer.
1705
1706 ** Face-remapping
1707
1708 *** Each face can be remapped to a different face definition using the
1709 variable `face-remapping-alist'. This is an alist that maps faces to
1710 replacement definitions (which can be face names, lists of face names,
1711 or attribute/value plists. If this variable is buffer-local, the
1712 remapping occurs only in that buffer.
1713
1714 *** text-scale-mode remaps the default face to a larger or smaller
1715 size in the current buffer. This feature is used by the Buffer Face
1716 menu and the new `C-x C-+', `C-x C--', and `C-x C-0' commands (see
1717 Editing Changes, above).
1718
1719 *** New functions:
1720
1721 **** `face-remap-add-relative' adds a face remapping entry to the
1722 current buffer.
1723
1724 **** ``face-remap-remove-relative' removes a face remapping entry from
1725 the current buffer.
1726
1727 **** `face-remap-reset-base' restores a face to its global definition.
1728
1729 **** `face-remap-set-base' sets the base remapping of a face.
1730
1731 ** Process changes
1732
1733 *** The new function `start-file-process' is similar to `start-process',
1734 but obeys file handlers. The file handler is chosen based on
1735 `default-directory'. The functions `start-file-process-shell-command'
1736 and `process-file-shell-command' are also new; they call internally
1737 `start-file-process' and `process-file', respectively.
1738
1739 *** The new function `process-lines' executes an external program and
1740 returns its output as a list of lines.
1741
1742 ** Character code, representation, and charset changes.
1743
1744 *** In multibyte buffers and strings, characters are represented by
1745 UTF-8 byte sequences. The character code space is now 0x0..0x3FFFFF
1746 with no gap; code points 0x0..0x10FFFF are Unicode characters of the
1747 same code points, while code points 0x3FFF80..0x3FFFFF are raw 8-bit
1748 bytes.
1749
1750 *** Generic characters no longer exist.
1751
1752 *** The concept of a charset has changed. A single character may
1753 belong to multiple charsets (e.g. a-grave, U+00E0, belongs to charsets
1754 unicode, iso-8859-1, iso-8859-3, etc).
1755
1756 **** The dimension of a charset is now 1, 2, 3, or 4, and the size of
1757 each dimension is no longer limited to 94 or 96.
1758
1759 **** A dynamic charset priority list is used to infer the charset of
1760 characters for display.
1761
1762 *** The functions `split-char' and `make-char' now accept up to 4
1763 positional codes instead of just 2.
1764
1765 *** The functions `encode-char' and `decode-char' now accept any character sets.
1766
1767 *** The function `define-charset' now accepts a completely different
1768 form of arguments (old-style arguments still work).
1769
1770 *** The value of the function `char-charset' depends on the current
1771 priorities of charsets.
1772
1773 *** The function get-char-code-property now accepts many Unicode base
1774 character properties. They are `name', `general-category',
1775 `canonical-combining-class', `bidi-class', `decomposition',
1776 `decimal-digit-value', `digit-value', `numeric-value', `mirrored',
1777 `old-name', `iso-10646-comment', `uppercase', `lowercase', and
1778 `titlecase'.
1779
1780 *** The functions `modify-syntax-entry' and `modify-category-entry' now
1781 accept a cons of characters as the first argument, and modify all
1782 entries in that range of characters.
1783
1784 *** Use of `translation-table-for-input' for character code unification
1785 is now obsolete, since Emacs 23.1 and later uses Unicode as basis for
1786 internal representation of characters.
1787
1788 *** New functions:
1789
1790 **** `characterp' returns t if and only if the argument is a character.
1791 This replaces `char-valid-p', which is now obsolete.
1792
1793 **** `max-char' returns the maximum character code (currently #x3FFFFF).
1794
1795 **** `define-charset-alias' defines an alias of a charset.
1796
1797 **** `set-charset-priority' sets priorities of charsets.
1798
1799 **** `charset-priority-list' returns a prioritized list of charsets.
1800
1801 **** `unibyte-string' makes a unibyte string from bytes.
1802
1803 **** `define-char-code-property' defines a character code property.
1804
1805 **** `char-code-property-description' returns the description string of
1806 a character code property.
1807
1808 *** New variables:
1809
1810 **** `find-word-boundary-function-table' is a char-table of functions to
1811 search for a word boundary.
1812
1813 **** `char-script-table' is a char-table of script names.
1814
1815 **** `char-width-table' is a char-table of character widths.
1816
1817 **** `print-charset-text-property' controls how to handle `charset' text
1818 property on printing a string.
1819
1820 **** `printable-chars' is a char-table of printable characters.
1821
1822 ** Code conversion changes
1823
1824 *** The new function `define-coding-system' should be used to define a
1825 coding system instead of `make-coding-system' (which is now obsolete).
1826
1827 *** The functions `encode-coding-region' and `decode-coding-region'
1828 have an optional 4th argument to specify where the result of
1829 conversion should go.
1830
1831 *** The functions `encode-coding-string' and `decode-coding-string'
1832 have an optional 4th argument specifying a buffer to store the result
1833 of conversion.
1834
1835 *** The new variable `inhibit-null-byte-detection' controls whether to
1836 consider text with null bytes as binary data. By default, it is
1837 `nil', and Emacs uses `no-conversion' for any text containing null
1838 bytes.
1839
1840 *** The functions `set-coding-priority' and `make-coding-system' are obsolete.
1841
1842 *** New functions:
1843
1844 **** `with-coding-priority' executes Lisp code using the specified
1845 coding system priority order.
1846
1847 **** `check-coding-systems-region' checks if the text in the region is
1848 encodable by the specified coding systems.
1849
1850 **** `coding-system-aliases' returns a list of aliases of a coding system.
1851
1852 **** `coding-system-charset-list' returns a list of charsets supported
1853 by a coding system.
1854
1855 **** `coding-system-priority-list' returns a list of coding systems
1856 ordered by their priorities.
1857
1858 **** `set-coding-system-priority' sets priorities of coding systems.
1859
1860 **** `coding-system-from-name' returns a coding system matching with
1861 the argument name.
1862
1863
1864 ** There is a new input method, Robin, different from Quail.
1865 It has three functionalities:
1866 i) a simple input method (converts an ASCII sequence into a string).
1867 ii) converts an existing buffer substring into another string
1868 iii) reverse conversion (each character produced by a
1869 robin rule can hold the original ASCII sequence as a char-code-property)
1870
1871 *** The new function `robin-define-package' defines a Robin package.
1872
1873 *** The new function `robin-modify-package' modifies an existing Robin package.
1874
1875 *** The new function `robin-use-package' starts using a Robin package
1876 as an input method.
1877
1878 *** The new function `string-to-unibyte' is like `string-as-unibyte'
1879 but signals an error if STRING contains a non-ASCII, non-eight-bit
1880 character.
1881
1882 ** Changes related to the new font backend
1883
1884 *** Which font backends to use can be specified by the X resource
1885 "FontBackend". For instance, to use both X core fonts and Xft fonts:
1886
1887 Emacs.FontBackend: x,xft
1888
1889 If this resource is not set, Emacs tries to use all font backends
1890 available on your graphic device.
1891
1892 *** New frame parameter `font-backend' specifies a list of
1893 font-backends supported by the frame's graphic device. On X, they are
1894 currently `x' and `xft'.
1895
1896 *** The function `set-fontset-font' now accepts a script name as the
1897 second argument, and has an optional 5th argument to control how to
1898 set the font.
1899
1900 *** New functions:
1901
1902 **** `fontp' checks if the argument is a font-spec or font-entity.
1903
1904 **** `font-spec' creates a new font-spec object.
1905
1906 **** `font-get' returns a font property value.
1907
1908 **** `font-put' sets a font property value.
1909
1910 **** `font-face-attributes' returns a plist of face attributes set by a font.
1911
1912 **** `list-fonts' returns a list of font-entities matching a font spec.
1913
1914 **** `find-font' returns the font-entity best matching the given font spec.
1915
1916 **** `font-family-list' returns a list of family names of available fonts.
1917
1918 **** `font-xlfd-name' returns an XLFD name of a given font spec, font
1919 entity, or font object.
1920
1921 **** `clear-font-cache' clears all font caches.
1922
1923 ** Changes related to multiple-terminal (multi-tty) support
1924
1925 *** $TERM is now set to `dumb' for subprocesses. If you want to know the
1926 $TERM inherited by Emacs you will have to look inside initial-environment.
1927
1928 *** $DISPLAY is now dynamically inherited from the frame's `display'.
1929
1930 *** The `window-system' variable is now frame-local. The new
1931 `initial-window-system' variable contains the `window-system' value
1932 for the first frame. `window-system' is also now a function that
1933 takes a frame argument.
1934
1935 *** The `keyboard-translate-table' variable and the terminal and
1936 keyboard coding systems are now terminal-local.
1937
1938 *** You can specify a terminal device (`tty' parameter) and a terminal
1939 type (`tty-type' parameter) to `make-terminal-frame'.
1940
1941 *** The function `make-frame-on-display' now works during a tty
1942 session.
1943
1944 *** A new `terminal' data type.
1945 The functions `get-device-terminal', `terminal-parameters',
1946 `terminal-parameter', `set-terminal-parameter' use this data type.
1947
1948 *** Function key sequences are now mapped using `local-function-key-map',
1949 a new variable. This inherits from the global variable function-key-map,
1950 which is not used directly any more.
1951
1952 *** New hooks:
1953
1954 **** before-hack-local-variables-hook is called after setting new
1955 variable file-local-variables-alist, and before actually applying the
1956 file-local variables.
1957
1958 **** `suspend-tty-functions' and `resume-tty-functions' are called
1959 after a tty frame has been suspended or resumed, respectively. The
1960 functions are called with the terminal id of the frame being
1961 suspended/resumed as a parameter.
1962
1963 **** The special hook `delete-terminal-functions' is called before
1964 deleting a terminal.
1965
1966 *** New functions:
1967
1968 **** `delete-terminal'
1969
1970 **** `suspend-tty'
1971
1972 **** `resume-tty'.
1973
1974 *** `initial-environment' holds the environment inherited from Emacs's parent.
1975
1976 ** Redisplay changes
1977
1978 *** For underlined characters, the distance between the underline and
1979 the baseline is controlled by a new variable, `underline-minimum-offset'.
1980
1981 *** You can now pass the value of the `invisible' property to
1982 invisible-p to check whether it would cause the text to be invisible.
1983 This is convenient when checking invisibility of text with no buffer
1984 position (e.g. in before/after-strings).
1985
1986 *** `clear-image-cache' can be told to flush only images of a specific file.
1987
1988 *** `vertical-motion' can now be given a goal column.
1989 It now accepts a cons cell (COLS . LINES) in its first argument, which
1990 says to stop, where possible, at a pixel x-position equal to COLS
1991 times the default column width.
1992
1993 *** redisplay-end-trigger-functions, set-window-redisplay-end-trigger,
1994 and window-redisplay-end-trigger are obsolete. Use `jit-lock-register'
1995 instead.
1996
1997 *** The new variables `wrap-prefix' and `line-prefix' specify display
1998 specs which are appended at display-time to every continuation line
1999 and non-continuation line, respectively. In addition, Emacs
2000 recognizes the `wrap-prefix' and `line-prefix' text or overlay
2001 properties; these have the same effects as the variables of the same
2002 name, but take precedence.
2003
2004 ** The Lisp interpreter now treats non-breaking space as whitespace.
2005
2006 ** Miscellaneous new functions
2007
2008 *** `apply-partially' performs a "curried" application of a function.
2009
2010 *** `buffer-swap-text' swaps text between two buffers. This can be
2011 useful for modes such as tar-mode, archive-mode, RMAIL.
2012
2013 *** `combine-and-quote-strings' produces a single string from a list of strings
2014 sticking a separator string in between each pair, and quoting those
2015 strings that include the separator as their substring. Useful for
2016 consing shell command lines from the individual arguments.
2017
2018 *** `custom-note-var-changed' tells Custom to treat the change in a
2019 certain variable as having been made within Custom.
2020
2021 *** `face-all-attributes' returns an alist describing all the basic
2022 attributes of a given face.
2023
2024 *** `format-seconds' converts a number of seconds into a readable
2025 string of days, hours, etc.
2026
2027 *** `image-refresh' refreshes all images associated with a given image
2028 specification.
2029
2030 *** `locate-user-emacs-file' helps packages to select the appropriate
2031 place to save user-specific files. It defaults to `user-emacs-directory'
2032 unless the file already exists at $HOME.
2033
2034 *** `read-color' reads a color name using the minibuffer.
2035
2036 *** `read-shell-command' does what its name says, with completion. It
2037 uses the minibuffer-local-shell-command-map for that.
2038
2039 *** `split-string-and-unquote' splits a string into a list of substrings
2040 on the boundaries of a given delimiter, and unquotes the substrings that
2041 are quoted. Useful for taking apart shell commands.
2042
2043 *** The two new functions `looking-at-p' and `string-match-p' can do
2044 the same matching as `looking-at' and `string-match' without changing
2045 the match data.
2046
2047 *** The two new functions `make-serial-process' and
2048 `serial-process-configure' provide a Lisp interface to the new serial
2049 port support (see Emacs changes, above).
2050
2051 ** Miscellaneous new variables
2052
2053 *** `auto-save-include-big-deletions', if non-nil, means auto-save is
2054 not turned off automatically after a big deletion.
2055
2056 *** `read-circle', if nil, disables the reading of recursive Lisp
2057 structures using the #N= and #N# syntax.
2058
2059 *** `this-command-keys-shift-translated' is non-nil if the key
2060 sequence invoking the current command was found by shift-translation.
2061
2062 *** `window-point-insertion-type' determines the insertion-type of the
2063 marker used for window-point.
2064
2065 *** bookmark provides `bookmark-make-record-function' so special major
2066 modes like Info can teach bookmark.el how to save and restore the
2067 relevant data.
2068
2069 *** `fill-forward-paragraph-function' specifies which function the
2070 filling code should use to find paragraph boundaries.
2071
2072 \f
2073 * New Packages for Lisp Programming in Emacs 23.1
2074
2075 ** The new package avl-tree.el deals with the AVL tree data structure.
2076
2077 ** The new package check-declare.el verifies the accuracy of
2078 declare-function macros (see Lisp Changes, above).
2079
2080 ** find-cmd.el can build `find' commands using lisp syntax.
2081
2082 ** The package misearch.el has been added. It allows Isearch to search
2083 through multiple buffers. A variable `multi-isearch-next-buffer-function'
2084 defines the function to call to get the next buffer to search in the series
2085 of multiple buffers. Top-level commands `multi-isearch-buffers',
2086 `multi-isearch-buffers-regexp', `multi-isearch-files' and
2087 `multi-isearch-files-regexp' accept a single argument that specifies
2088 a list of buffers/files to search for a string/regexp.
2089
2090 ** The new major mode `special-mode' is intended as a parent for
2091 major modes such as those that set the "'mode-class 'special" property.
2092
2093 \f
2094 ----------------------------------------------------------------------
2095 This file is part of GNU Emacs.
2096
2097 GNU Emacs is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
2098 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
2099 the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
2100 (at your option) any later version.
2101
2102 GNU Emacs is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
2103 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
2104 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
2105 GNU General Public License for more details.
2106
2107 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
2108 along with GNU Emacs. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
2109
2110 \f
2111 Local variables:
2112 mode: outline
2113 paragraph-separate: "[ \f]*$"
2114 end:
2115
2116 arch-tag: e759449d-88b3-4de4-9900-3a6c3dfa23e2