1 GNU Emacs NEWS -- history of user-visible changes. 2001-03-15
2 Copyright (C) 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
3 See the end for copying conditions.
5 Please send Emacs bug reports to bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org.
6 For older news, see the file ONEWS
9 +++ indicates that the appropriate manual has already been updated.
10 --- means no change in the manuals is called for.
11 When you add a new item, please add it without either +++ or ---
15 * Installation Changes in Emacs 21.3
17 ** Emacs now supports new configure options `--program-prefix',
18 `--program-suffix' and `--program-transform-name' that affect the names of
22 ** Leim is now part of the Emacs distribution.
23 You no longer need to download a separate tarball in order to build
27 ** Support for FreeBSD/Alpha has been added.
30 ** Support for BSD/OS 5.0 was added.
33 * Changes in Emacs 21.3
36 ** Emacs now supports ICCCM Extended Segments in X selections.
38 Some versions of X, notably XFree86, use Extended Segments to encode
39 in X selections characters that belong to character sets which are not
40 part of the list of standard charsets supported by the ICCCM spec.
41 Examples of such non-standard character sets include ISO 8859-14, ISO
42 8859-15, KOI8-R, and BIG5. The new coding system
43 `compound-text-with-extensions' supports these extensions, and is now
44 used by default for encoding and decoding X selections. If you don't
45 want this support, set `selection-coding-system' to `compound-text'.
48 ** The parameters of automatic hscrolling can now be customized.
49 The variable `automatic-hscroll-margin' determines how many columns
50 away from the window edge point is allowed to get before automatic
51 hscrolling will horizontally scroll the window. The default value is 5.
53 The variable `automatic-hscroll-step' determines how many columns
54 automatic hscrolling will scroll the window when point gets too close
55 to the window edge. If its value is zero, the default, Emacs scrolls
56 the window so as to center point. If its value is an integer, it says
57 how many columns to scroll. If the value is a floating-point number,
58 it gives the fraction of the window's width to scroll the window.
60 ** New display feature: focus follows mouse. If you set the variable
61 x-autoselect-window to non-nil value, moving the mouse to a different
62 Emacs window will select that window. The default is nil, so that
63 this feature is not enabled.
65 ** The new command `describe-text-at' pops up a buffer with description
66 of text properties, overlays, and widgets at point, and lets you get
67 more information about them, by clicking on mouse-sensitive areas or
68 moving there and pressing RET.
70 ** Emacs normally highlights mouse sensitive text whenever the mouse
71 is over the text. By setting the new variable `mouse-highlight', you
72 can optionally enable mouse highlighting only after you move the
73 mouse, so that highlighting disappears when you press a key. You can
74 also disable mouse highlighting.
76 ** font-lock: in modes like C and Lisp where the fontification assumes that
77 an open-paren in column 0 is always outside of any string or comment,
78 font-lock now highlights any such open-paren-in-column-zero in bold-red
79 if it is inside a string or a comment, to indicate that it can cause
80 trouble with fontification and/or indentation.
83 ** There's a new face `minibuffer-prompt'.
84 Emacs adds this face to the list of text properties stored in the
85 variable `minibuffer-prompt-properties', which is used to display the
89 ** The new face `mode-line-inactive' is used to display the mode line
90 of non-selected windows. The `mode-line' face is now used to display
91 the mode line of the currently selected window.
93 The new variable `mode-line-in-non-selected-windows' controls whether
94 the `mode-line-inactive' face is used.
96 ** A menu item "Show/Hide" was added to the top-level menu "Options".
97 This menu allows you to turn various display features on and off (like
98 tool bar and the menu bar itself). You can also move the vertical
99 scroll bar to either side here or turn it off completely. There is also
100 a menu-item to toggle displaying of current date and time, current line
101 and column number in the mode-line.
103 ** Speedbar has moved from the "Tools" top level menu to "Show/Hide".
105 ** Emacs can now indicate in the mode-line the presence of new e-mails in
106 directory in addition to file. See the documentation of the user option
107 `display-time-mail-directory'.
110 ** The new option `Info-scroll-prefer-subnodes' causes Info to behave
111 like the stand-alone Info reader (from the GNU Texinfo package) as far
112 as motion between nodes and their subnodes is concerned. If it is t
113 (the default), Emacs behaves as before when you type SPC in a menu: it
114 visits the subnode pointed to by the first menu entry. If this option
115 is nil, SPC scrolls to the end of the current node, and only then goes
116 to the first menu item, like the stand-alone reader does.
118 This change was already in Emacs 21.1, but wasn't advertised in the
122 ** LDAP support now defaults to ldapsearch from OpenLDAP version 2.
125 ** You can now disable pc-selection-mode after enabling it.
126 M-x pc-selection-mode behaves like a proper minor mode, and with no
127 argument it toggles the mode.
129 Turning off PC-Selection mode restores the global key bindings
130 that were replaced by turning on the mode.
132 ** Changes in support of colors on character terminals
135 *** The new command-line option --color=MODE lets you specify a standard
136 mode for a tty color support. It is meant to be used on character
137 terminals whose capabilities are not set correctly in the terminal
138 database, or with terminal emulators which support colors, but don't
139 set the TERM environment variable to a name of a color-capable
140 terminal. "emacs --color" uses the same color commands as GNU `ls'
141 when invoked with "ls --color", so if your terminal can support colors
142 in "ls --color", it will support "emacs --color" as well. See the
143 user manual for the possible values of the MODE parameter.
146 *** Emacs now supports several character terminals which provide more
147 than 8 colors. For example, for `xterm', 16-color, 88-color, and
148 256-color modes are supported. Emacs automatically notes at startup
149 the extended number of colors, and defines the appropriate entries for
153 *** There's a new support for colors on `rxvt' terminal emulator.
156 ** Emacs can now be invoked in full-screen mode on a windowed display.
158 When Emacs is invoked on a window system, the new command-line options
159 `--fullwidth', `--fullheight', and `--fullscreen' produce a frame
160 whose width, height, or both width and height take up the entire
161 screen size. (For now, this works only on GNU and Unix systems, and
162 not with every window manager.)
164 ** Info-index finally offers completion.
166 ** shell-mode now supports programmable completion using `pcomplete'.
168 ** Controlling the left and right fringe widths.
170 The left and right fringe widths can now be controlled by setting the
171 `left-fringe' and `right-fringe' frame parameters to an integer value
172 specifying the width in pixels. Setting the width to 0 effectively
173 removes the corresponding fringe.
175 The actual fringe widths may deviate from the specified widths, since
176 the combined fringe widths must match an integral number of columns.
177 The extra width is distributed evenly between the left and right fringe.
178 For force a specific fringe width, specify the width as a negative
179 integer (if both widths are negative, only the left fringe gets the
182 Setting the width to nil (the default), restores the default fringe
183 width which is the minimum number of pixels necessary to display any
184 of the currently defined fringe bitmaps. The width of the built-in
185 fringe bitmaps is 8 pixels.
187 ** Changes in C-h bindings:
189 C-h e displays the *Messages* buffer.
191 C-h followed by a control character is used for displaying files
194 C-h C-f displays the FAQ.
195 C-h C-e displays the PROBLEMS file.
197 The info-search bindings on C-h C-f, C-h C-k and C-h C-i
198 have been moved to C-h F, C-h K and C-h S.
200 C-h c, C-h k, C-h w, and C-h f now handle remapped interactive commands.
202 - C-h c and C-h k report the actual command (after possible remapping)
203 run by the key sequence.
205 - C-h w and C-h f on a command which has been remapped now report the
206 command it is remapped to, and the keys which can be used to run
209 For example, if C-k is bound to kill-line, and kill-line is remapped
210 to new-kill-line, these commands now report:
212 - C-h c and C-h k C-k reports:
213 C-k runs the command new-kill-line
215 - C-h w and C-h f kill-line reports:
216 kill-line is remapped to new-kill-line which is on C-k, <deleteline>
218 - C-h w and C-h f new-kill-line reports:
219 new-kill-line is on C-k
221 ** C-w in incremental search now grabs either a character or a word,
222 making the decision in a heuristic way. This new job is done by the
223 command `isearch-yank-word-or-char'. To restore the old behavior,
224 bind C-w to `isearch-yank-word' in `isearch-mode-map'.
226 ** In GUD mode when talking to GDB, C-x C-a C-j "jumps" the program
227 counter to the specified source line (the one where point is).
229 ** GUD mode improvements for jdb:
231 *** Search for source files using jdb classpath and class
232 information. Fast startup since there is no need to scan all
233 source files up front. There is also no need to create and maintain
234 lists of source directories to scan. Look at `gud-jdb-use-classpath'
235 and `gud-jdb-classpath' customization variables documentation.
237 *** Supports the standard breakpoint (gud-break, gud-clear)
238 set/clear operations from java source files under the classpath, stack
239 traversal (gud-up, gud-down), and run until current stack finish
242 *** Supports new jdb (Java 1.2 and later) in addition to oldjdb
245 *** The previous method of searching for source files has been
246 preserved in case someone still wants/needs to use it.
247 Set gud-jdb-use-classpath to nil.
249 Added Customization Variables
251 *** gud-jdb-command-name. What command line to use to invoke jdb.
253 *** gud-jdb-use-classpath. Allows selection of java source file searching
254 method: set to t for new method, nil to scan gud-jdb-directories for
255 java sources (previous method).
257 *** gud-jdb-directories. List of directories to scan and search for java
258 classes using the original gud-jdb method (if gud-jdb-use-classpath
263 *** Do not allow debugger output history variable to grow without bounds.
265 ** hide-ifdef-mode now uses overlays rather than selective-display
266 to hide its text. This should be mostly transparent but slightly
267 changes the behavior of motion commands line C-e and C-p.
269 ** In Dired's ! command (dired-do-shell-command), `*' and `?' now
270 control substitution of the file names only when they are surrounded
271 by whitespace. This means you can now use them as shell wildcards
272 too. If you want to use just plain `*' as a wildcard, type `*""'; the
273 doublequotes make no difference in the shell, but they prevent
274 special treatment in `dired-do-shell-command'.
276 ** Unquoted `$' in file names do not signal an error any more when
277 the corresponding environment variable does not exist.
278 Instead, the `$ENVVAR' text is left as is, so that `$$' quoting
279 is only rarely needed.
281 ** jit-lock can now be delayed with `jit-lock-defer-time'.
283 If this variable is non-nil, its value should be the amount of Emacs
284 idle time in seconds to wait before starting fontification. For
285 example, if you set `jit-lock-defer-time' to 0.25, fontification will
286 only happen after 0.25s of idle time.
289 ** Marking commands extend the region when invoked multiple times. If
290 you hit M-C-SPC (mark-sexp), M-@ (mark-word), M-h (mark-paragraph), or
291 C-M-h (mark-defun) repeatedly, the marked region will now be extended
292 each time, so you can mark the next two sexps with M-C-SPC M-C-SPC,
293 for example. This feature also works for mark-end-of-sentence, if you
296 ** In the *Occur* buffer, `o' switches to it in another window, and
297 C-o displays the current line's occurrence in another window without
300 ** When you specify a frame size with --geometry, the size applies to
301 all frames you create. A position specified with --geometry only
302 affects the initial frame.
305 ** M-h (mark-paragraph) now accepts a prefix arg.
306 With positive arg, M-h marks the current and the following paragraphs;
307 if the arg is negative, it marks the current and the preceding
310 ** In Dired, the w command now copies the current line's file name
313 ** The variables dired-free-space-program and dired-free-space-args
314 have been renamed to directory-free-space-program and
315 directory-free-space-args, and they now apply whenever Emacs puts a
316 directory listing into a buffer.
318 ** mouse-wheels can now scroll a specific fraction of the window
319 (rather than a fixed number of lines) and the scrolling is `progressive'.
321 ** The keyboard-coding-system is now automatically set based on
322 your current locale settings. If it turns out that your terminal
323 does not support the encoding implied by your locale (for example,
324 it inserts non-ASCII chars if you hit M-i), you will need to add
326 (set-keyboard-coding-system nil)
328 to your .emacs to revert to the old behavior.
330 ** A new coding system `euc-tw' has been added for traditional Chinese
331 in CNS encoding; it accepts both Big 5 and CNS as input; on saving,
332 Big 5 is then converted to CNS.
335 ** Emacs now reads the standard abbrevs file ~/.abbrev_defs
336 automatically at startup, if it exists. When Emacs offers to save
337 modified buffers, it saves the abbrevs too if they have changed. It
338 can do this either silently or asking for confirmation first,
339 according to the value of `save-abbrevs'.
341 ** Display of hollow cursors now obeys the buffer-local value (if any)
342 of `cursor-in-non-selected-windows' in the buffer that the cursor
345 ** The default values of `tooltip-delay' and `tooltip-hide-delay'
348 ** On terminals whose erase-char is ^H (Backspace), Emacs
349 now uses normal-erase-is-backspace-mode.
353 *** In Prolog, etags creates tags for rules in addition to predicates.
355 *** In Perl, packages are tags. Subroutine tags are named from their
356 package. You can jump to sub tags as you did before, by the sub name, or
357 additionally by looking for package::sub.
359 *** New language PHP: tags are functions, classes and defines. If
360 the --members option is specified to etags, tags are vars also.
363 ** The command line option --no-windows has been changed to
364 --no-window-system. The old one still works, but is deprecated.
366 ** `buffer-menu' and `list-buffers' now list buffers whose names begin
367 with a space, if they visit files.
369 ** You can now customize fill-nobreak-predicate to control where
370 filling can break lines. We provide two sample predicates,
371 fill-single-word-nobreak-p and fill-french-nobreak-p.
373 ** New user option `add-log-always-start-new-record'.
374 When this option is enabled, M-x add-change-log-entry will always
375 start a new record regardless of when the last record is.
377 ** New user option `sgml-xml'.
378 When this option is enabled, SGML tags are inserted in XML style,
379 i.e., there is always a closing tag.
380 When not customized, it becomes buffer-local when it can be inferred
381 from the file name or buffer contents.
383 ** New user option `isearch-resume-enabled'.
384 This option can be disabled, to avoid the normal behaviour of isearch
385 which puts calls to `isearch-resume' in the command history.
387 ** When the *scratch* buffer is recreated, its mode is set from
388 initial-major-mode, which normally is lisp-interaction-mode,
389 instead of using default-major-mode.
391 ** Byte compiler warning and error messages have been brought more
392 in line with the output of other GNU tools.
394 ** Lisp-mode now uses font-lock-doc-face for the docstrings.
396 ** perl-mode has a new variable `perl-indent-continued-arguments'.
398 ** `special-display-buffer-names' and `special-display-regexps' now
399 understand two new boolean pseudo-frame-parameters `same-frame' and
402 ** When pure storage overflows while dumping, Emacs now prints how
403 much pure storage it will approximately need.
405 ** M-x setenv now expands environment variables of the form `$foo' and
406 `${foo}' in the specified new value of the environment variable. To
407 include a `$' in the value, use `$$'.
410 ** File-name completion can now ignore directories.
411 If an element of the list in `completion-ignored-extensions' ends in a
412 slash `/', it indicates a subdirectory that should be ignored when
413 completing file names. Elements of `completion-ignored-extensions'
414 which do not end in a slash are never considered when a completion
415 candidate is a directory.
417 ** New user option `inhibit-startup-buffer-menu'.
418 When loading many files, for instance with `emacs *', Emacs normally
419 displays a buffer menu. This option turns the buffer menu off.
421 ** Rmail now displays 5-digit message ids in its summary buffer.
423 ** When using M-x revert-buffer in a compilation buffer to rerun a
424 compilation, it is now made sure that the compilation buffer is reused
425 in case it has been renamed.
427 ** On MS Windows, the "system caret" now follows the cursor.
428 This enables Emacs to work better with programs that need to track
429 the cursor, for example screen magnifiers and text to speech programs.
431 ** Tooltips now work on MS Windows.
432 See the Emacs 21.1 NEWS entry for tooltips for details.
434 ** Pointing devices with more than 3 buttons are now supported on MS Windows.
435 The new variable `w32-pass-extra-mouse-buttons-to-system' controls
436 whether Emacs should handle the extra buttons itself (the default), or
437 pass them to Windows to be handled with system-wide functions.
439 ** Under X11, it is possible to swap Alt and Meta (and Super and Hyper).
440 The new variables `x-alt-keysym', `x-hyper-keysym', `x-meta-keysym',
441 and `x-super-keysym' can be used to choose which keysyms Emacs should
442 use for the modifiers. For example, the following two lines swap
444 (setq x-alt-keysym 'meta)
445 (setq x-meta-keysym 'alt)
448 ** A French translation of the `Emacs Survival Guide' is available.
451 ** A French translation of the Emacs Tutorial is available.
453 ** New modes and packages
456 *** Calc is now part of the Emacs distribution.
458 Calc is an advanced desk calculator and mathematical tool written in
459 Emacs Lisp. Its documentation is in a separate manual; within Emacs,
460 type "C-h i m calc RET" to read that manual. A reference card is
461 available in `etc/calccard.tex' and `etc/calccard.ps'.
464 *** The Emacs Lisp Reference Manual is now part of the distribution.
466 The ELisp reference manual in Info format is built as part of the
467 Emacs build procedure and installed together with the Emacs User
468 Manual. A menu item was added to the menu bar that makes it easy
469 accessible (Help->More Manuals->Emacs Lisp Reference).
471 *** The Introduction to Programming in Emacs Lisp manual is now part of
474 This manual is now part of the standard distribution and is installed,
475 together with the Emacs User Manual, into the Info directory. A menu
476 item was added to the menu bar that makes it easy accessible
477 (Help->More Manuals->Introduction to Emacs Lisp).
479 *** The ruler-mode.el library provides a minor mode for displaying an
480 "active" ruler in the header line. You can use the mouse to visually
481 change the `fill-column', `window-margins' and `tab-stop-list'
484 *** The reveal.el package provides the minor modes `reveal-mode' and
485 `global-reveal-mode' which will make text visible on the fly as you
486 move your cursor into hidden region of the buffer.
487 It should work with any package that uses overlays to hide parts
488 of a buffer, such as outline-minor-mode, hs-minor-mode, hide-ifdef-mode, ...
490 *** master-mode.el implements a minor mode for scrolling a slave
491 buffer without leaving your current buffer, the master buffer.
493 It can be used by sql.el, for example: the SQL buffer is the master
494 and its SQLi buffer is the slave. This allows you to scroll the SQLi
495 buffer containing the output from the SQL buffer containing the
498 This is how to use sql.el and master.el together: the variable
499 sql-buffer contains the slave buffer. It is a local variable in the
502 (add-hook 'sql-mode-hook
505 (master-set-slave sql-buffer))))
506 (add-hook 'sql-set-sqli-hook
508 (master-set-slave sql-buffer))))
511 * Lisp Changes in Emacs 21.3
513 ** Interactive commands can be remapped through keymaps.
515 This is an alternative to using defadvice or substitute-key-definition
516 to modify the behaviour of a key binding using the normal keymap
517 binding and lookup functionality.
519 When a key sequence is bound to a command, and that command is
520 remapped to another command, that command is run instead of the
524 Suppose that minor mode my-mode has defined the commands
525 my-kill-line and my-kill-word, and it wants C-k (and any other key
526 bound to kill-line) to run the command my-kill-line instead of
527 kill-line, and likewise it wants to run my-kill-word instead of
530 Instead of rebinding C-k and the other keys in the minor mode map,
531 command remapping allows you to directly map kill-line into
532 my-kill-line and kill-word into my-kill-word through the minor mode
533 map using define-key:
535 (define-key my-mode-map [remap kill-line] 'my-kill-line)
536 (define-key my-mode-map [remap kill-word] 'my-kill-word)
538 Now, when my-mode is enabled, and the user enters C-k or M-d,
539 the commands my-kill-line and my-kill-word are run.
541 Notice that only one level of remapping is supported. In the above
542 example, this means that if my-kill-line is remapped to other-kill,
543 then C-k still runs my-kill-line.
545 The following changes have been made to provide command remapping:
547 - Command remappings are defined using `define-key' with a prefix-key
548 `remap', i.e. `(define-key MAP [remap CMD] DEF)' remaps command CMD
549 to definition DEF in keymap MAP. The definition is not limited to
550 another command; it can be anything accepted for a normal binding.
552 - The new function `remap-command' returns the binding for a remapped
553 command in the current keymaps, or nil if it isn't remapped.
555 - key-binding now remaps interactive commands unless the optional
556 third argument NO-REMAP is non-nil.
558 - where-is-internal now returns nil for a remapped command (e.g.
559 kill-line if my-mode is enabled), and the actual key binding for
560 the command it is remapped to (e.g. C-k for my-kill-line).
561 It also has a new optional fifth argument, NO-REMAP, which inhibits
562 remapping if non-nil (e.g. it returns C-k for kill-line and
563 <kill-line> for my-kill-line).
565 - The new variable `this-original-command' contains the original
566 command before remapping. It is equal to `this-command' when the
567 command was not remapped.
569 ** Atomic change groups.
571 To perform some changes in the current buffer "atomically" so that
572 they either all succeed or are all undone, use `atomic-change-group'
573 around the code that makes changes. For instance:
579 If an error (or other nonlocal exit) occurs inside the body of
580 `atomic-change-group', it unmakes all the changes in that buffer that
581 were during the execution of the body. The change group has no effect
582 on any other buffers--any such changes remain.
584 If you need something more sophisticated, you can directly call the
585 lower-level functions that `atomic-change-group' uses. Here is how.
587 To set up a change group for one buffer, call `prepare-change-group'.
588 Specify the buffer as argument; it defaults to the current buffer.
589 This function returns a "handle" for the change group. You must save
590 the handle to activate the change group and then finish it.
592 Before you change the buffer again, you must activate the change
593 group. Pass the handle to `activate-change-group' afterward to
596 After you make the changes, you must finish the change group. You can
597 either accept the changes or cancel them all. Call
598 `accept-change-group' to accept the changes in the group as final;
599 call `cancel-change-group' to undo them all.
601 You should use `unwind-protect' to make sure the group is always
602 finished. The call to `activate-change-group' should be inside the
603 `unwind-protect', in case the user types C-g just after it runs.
604 (This is one reason why `prepare-change-group' and
605 `activate-change-group' are separate functions.) Once you finish the
606 group, don't use the handle again--don't try to finish the same group
609 To make a multibuffer change group, call `prepare-change-group' once
610 for each buffer you want to cover, then use `nconc' to combine the
611 returned values, like this:
613 (nconc (prepare-change-group buffer-1)
614 (prepare-change-group buffer-2))
616 You can then activate the multibuffer change group with a single call
617 to `activate-change-group', and finish it with a single call to
618 `accept-change-group' or `cancel-change-group'.
620 Nested use of several change groups for the same buffer works as you
621 would expect. Non-nested use of change groups for the same buffer
622 will lead to undesirable results, so don't let it happen; the first
623 change group you start for any given buffer should be the last one
626 ** New function substring-no-properties.
629 *** The meanings of scroll-up-aggressively and scroll-down-aggressively
630 have been interchanged, so that the former now controls scrolling up,
631 and the latter now controls scrolling down.
634 ** New function window-body-height.
636 This is like window-height but does not count the mode line
640 ** The function `atan' now accepts an optional second argument.
642 When called with 2 arguments, as in `(atan Y X)', `atan' returns the
643 angle in radians between the vector [X, Y] and the X axis. (This is
644 equivalent to the standard C library function `atan2'.)
647 ** You can now make a window as short as one line.
649 A window that is just one line tall does not display either a mode
650 line or a header line, even if the variables `mode-line-format' and
651 `header-line-format' call for them. A window that is two lines tall
652 cannot display both a mode line and a header line at once; if the
653 variables call for both, only the mode line actually appears.
656 ** The new frame parameter `tty-color-mode' specifies the mode to use
657 for color support on character terminal frames. Its value can be a
658 number of colors to support, or a symbol. See the Emacs Lisp
659 Reference manual for more detailed documentation.
661 ** Already true in Emacs 21.1, but not emphasized clearly enough:
663 Multibyte buffers can now faithfully record all 256 character codes
664 from 0 to 255. As a result, most of the past reasons to use unibyte
665 buffers no longer exist. We only know of three reasons to use them
668 1. If you prefer to use unibyte text all of the time.
670 2. For reading files into temporary buffers, when you want to avoid
671 the time it takes to convert the format.
673 3. For binary files where format conversion would be pointless and
676 ** If text has a `keymap' property, that keymap takes precedence
677 over minor mode keymaps.
679 ** A hex escape in a string forces the string to be multibyte.
680 An octal escape makes it unibyte.
682 ** The position after an invisible, intangible character
683 is considered an unacceptable value for point;
684 intangibility processing effectively treats the following character
685 as part of the intangible region even if it is not itself intangible.
687 Thus, point can go before an invisible, intangible region, but not
688 after it. This prevents C-f and C-b from appearing to stand still on
692 ** define-abbrev now accepts an optional argument SYSTEM-FLAG. If
693 non-nil, this marks the abbrev as a "system" abbrev, which means that
694 it won't be stored in the user's abbrevs file if he saves the abbrevs.
695 Major modes that predefine some abbrevs should always specify this
698 ** Support for Mocklisp has been removed.
700 ** The function insert-string is now obsolete.
702 ** The precedence of file-name-handlers has been changed.
703 Instead of blindly choosing the first handler that matches,
704 find-file-name-handler now gives precedence to a file-name handler
705 that matches near the end of the file name. More specifically, the
706 handler whose (match-beginning 0) is the largest is chosen.
707 In case of ties, the old "first matched" rule applies.
709 ** Dense keymaps now handle inheritance correctly.
710 Previously a dense keymap would hide all of the simple-char key
711 bindings of the parent keymap.
713 ** jit-lock obeys a new text-property `jit-lock-defer-multiline'.
714 If a piece of text with that property gets contextually refontified
715 (see jit-lock-defer-contextually), then all of that text will
716 be refontified. This is useful when the syntax of a textual element
717 depends on text several lines further down (and when font-lock-multiline
718 is not appropriate to solve that problem). For example in Perl:
726 Adding/removing the last `e' changes the `bar' from being a piece of
727 text to being a piece of code, so you'd put a jit-lock-defer-multiline
728 property over the second half of the command to force (deferred)
729 refontification of `bar' whenever the `e' is added/removed.
731 ** describe-vector now takes a second argument `describer' which is
732 called to print the entries' values. It defaults to `princ'.
734 ** defcustom and other custom declarations now use a default group
735 (the last group defined in the same file) when no :group was given.
737 ** emacsserver now runs pre-command-hook and post-command-hook when
738 it receives a request from emacsclient.
740 ** The variable `recursive-load-depth-limit' has been deleted.
741 Emacs now signals an error if the same file is loaded with more
742 than 3 levels of nesting.
744 ** The default values of paragraph-start and indent-line-function have
745 been changed to reflect those used in Text mode rather than those used
746 in Indented-Text mode.
748 ** If a major mode function has a non-nil `no-clone-indirect'
749 property, `clone-indirect-buffer' signals an error if you use
752 ** If you set `query-replace-skip-read-only' non-nil,
753 `query-replace' and related functions simply ignore
754 a match if part of it has a read-only property.
756 ** In `replace-match', the replacement text no longer inherits
757 properties from surrounding text.
759 ** New function `buffer-local-value'.
761 - Function: buffer-local-value variable buffer
763 This function returns the buffer-local binding of VARIABLE (a symbol)
764 in buffer BUFFER. If VARIABLE does not have a buffer-local binding in
765 buffer BUFFER, it returns the default value of VARIABLE instead.
767 ** The default value of `paragraph-start' and `indent-line-function' has
768 been changed to reflect the one used in Text mode rather than the one
769 used in Indented Text mode.
771 ** New function `text-clone-create'. Text clones are chunks of text
772 that are kept identical by transparently propagating changes from one
775 ** font-lock can manage arbitrary text-properties beside `face'.
776 *** the FACENAME returned in font-lock-keywords can be a list
777 of the form (face FACE PROP1 VAL1 PROP@ VAL2 ...) so you can set
778 other properties than `face'.
779 *** font-lock-extra-managed-props can be set to make sure those extra
780 properties are automatically cleaned up by font-lock.
782 ** The new function `run-mode-hooks' and the new macro `delay-mode-hooks'
783 are used by define-derived-mode to make sure the mode hook for the
784 parent mode is run at the end of the child mode.
786 ** `provide' and `featurep' now accept an optional second argument
787 to test/provide subfeatures. Also `provide' now checks `after-load-alist'
788 and run any code associated with the provided feature.
790 ** The variable `compilation-parse-errors-filename-function' can
791 be used to transform filenames found in compilation output.
794 ** Functions `file-name-sans-extension' and `file-name-extension' now
795 ignore the leading dots in file names, so that file names such as
796 `.emacs' are treated as extensionless.
798 ** Functions `user-uid' and `user-real-uid' now return floats if the
799 user UID doesn't fit in a Lisp integer. Function `user-full-name'
800 accepts a float as UID parameter.
802 ** `define-key-after' now accepts keys longer than 1.
804 ** `define-derived-mode' now accepts nil as the parent.
806 ** The local variable `no-byte-compile' in elisp files is now obeyed.
808 ** New functions `keymap-prompt' and `current-active-maps'.
810 ** New function `describe-buffer-bindings'.
812 ** New vars `exec-suffixes' and `load-suffixes' used when
813 searching for an executable resp. an elisp file.
815 ** Variable aliases have been implemented
817 - Macro: defvaralias ALIAS-VAR BASE-VAR
819 This defines the symbol ALIAS-VAR as a variable alias for symbol
820 BASE-VAR. This means that retrieving the value of ALIAS-VAR returns
821 the value of BASE-VAR, and changing the value of ALIAS-VAR changes the
824 - Function: indirect-variable VARIABLE
826 This function returns the variable at the end of the chain of aliases
827 of VARIABLE. If VARIABLE is not a symbol, or if VARIABLE is not
828 defined as an alias, the function returns VARIABLE.
830 It might be noteworthy that variables aliases work for all kinds of
831 variables, including buffer-local and frame-local variables.
833 ** Functions from `post-gc-hook' are run at the end of garbage
834 collection. The hook is run with GC inhibited, so use it with care.
836 ** If the second argument to `copy-file' is the name of a directory,
837 the file is copied to that directory instead of signaling an error.
839 ** The variables most-positive-fixnum and most-negative-fixnum
840 have been moved from the CL package to the core.
842 ** On MS Windows, locale-coding-system is used to interact with the OS.
843 The Windows specific variable w32-system-coding-system, which was
844 formerly used for that purpose is now an alias for locale-coding-system.
848 *** The new package syntax.el provides an efficient way to find the
849 current syntactic context (as returned by parse-partial-sexp).
851 *** The TCL package tcl-mode.el was replaced by tcl.el.
852 This was actually done in Emacs-21.1, and was not documented.
854 *** The new package Ibuffer provides a powerful, completely
855 customizable replacement for buff-menu.el.
858 * Installation Changes in Emacs 21.1
860 See the INSTALL file for information on installing extra libraries and
861 fonts to take advantage of the new graphical features and extra
862 charsets in this release.
864 ** Support for GNU/Linux on IA64 machines has been added.
866 ** Support for LynxOS has been added.
868 ** There are new configure options associated with the support for
869 images and toolkit scrollbars. Use the --help option in `configure'
872 ** You can build a 64-bit Emacs for SPARC/Solaris systems which
873 support 64-bit executables and also on Irix 6.5. This increases the
874 maximum buffer size. See etc/MACHINES for instructions. Changes to
875 build on other 64-bit systems should be straightforward modulo any
876 necessary changes to unexec.
878 ** There is a new configure option `--disable-largefile' to omit
879 Unix-98-style support for large files if that is available.
881 ** There is a new configure option `--without-xim' that instructs
882 Emacs to not use X Input Methods (XIM), if these are available.
884 ** `movemail' defaults to supporting POP. You can turn this off using
885 the --without-pop configure option, should that be necessary.
887 ** This version can be built for the Macintosh, but does not implement
888 all of the new display features described below. The port currently
889 lacks unexec, asynchronous processes, and networking support. See the
890 "Emacs and the Mac OS" appendix in the Emacs manual, for the
891 description of aspects specific to the Mac.
893 ** Note that the MS-Windows port does not yet implement various of the
894 new display features described below.
897 * Changes in Emacs 21.1
899 ** Emacs has a new redisplay engine.
901 The new redisplay handles characters of variable width and height.
902 Italic text can be used without redisplay problems. Fonts containing
903 oversized characters, i.e. characters larger than the logical height
904 of a font can be used. Images of various formats can be displayed in
907 ** Emacs has a new face implementation.
909 The new faces no longer fundamentally use X font names to specify the
910 font. Instead, each face has several independent attributes--family,
911 height, width, weight and slant--that it may or may not specify.
912 These attributes can be merged from various faces, and then together
915 Faces are supported on terminals that can display color or fonts.
916 These terminal capabilities are auto-detected. Details can be found
917 under Lisp changes, below.
919 ** Emacs can display faces on TTY frames.
921 Emacs automatically detects terminals that are able to display colors.
922 Faces with a weight greater than normal are displayed extra-bright, if
923 the terminal supports it. Faces with a weight less than normal and
924 italic faces are displayed dimmed, if the terminal supports it.
925 Underlined faces are displayed underlined if possible. Other face
926 attributes such as `overline', `strike-through', and `box' are ignored
929 The command-line options `-fg COLOR', `-bg COLOR', and `-rv' are now
930 supported on character terminals.
932 Emacs automatically remaps all X-style color specifications to one of
933 the colors supported by the terminal. This means you could have the
934 same color customizations that work both on a windowed display and on
935 a TTY or when Emacs is invoked with the -nw option.
937 ** New default font is Courier 12pt under X.
941 Emacs supports playing sound files on GNU/Linux and FreeBSD (Voxware
942 driver and native BSD driver, a.k.a. Luigi's driver). Currently
943 supported file formats are RIFF-WAVE (*.wav) and Sun Audio (*.au).
944 You must configure Emacs with the option `--with-sound=yes' to enable
947 ** Emacs now resizes mini-windows if appropriate.
949 If a message is longer than one line, or minibuffer contents are
950 longer than one line, Emacs can resize the minibuffer window unless it
951 is on a frame of its own. You can control resizing and the maximum
952 minibuffer window size by setting the following variables:
954 - User option: max-mini-window-height
956 Maximum height for resizing mini-windows. If a float, it specifies a
957 fraction of the mini-window frame's height. If an integer, it
958 specifies a number of lines.
962 - User option: resize-mini-windows
964 How to resize mini-windows. If nil, don't resize. If t, always
965 resize to fit the size of the text. If `grow-only', let mini-windows
966 grow only, until they become empty, at which point they are shrunk
969 Default is `grow-only'.
973 Emacs now runs with the LessTif toolkit (see
974 <http://www.lesstif.org>). You will need version 0.92.26, or later.
976 ** LessTif/Motif file selection dialog.
978 When Emacs is configured to use LessTif or Motif, reading a file name
979 from a menu will pop up a file selection dialog if `use-dialog-box' is
982 ** File selection dialog on MS-Windows is supported.
984 When a file is visited by clicking File->Open, the MS-Windows version
985 now pops up a standard file selection dialog where you can select a
986 file to visit. File->Save As also pops up that dialog.
988 ** Toolkit scroll bars.
990 Emacs now uses toolkit scroll bars if available. When configured for
991 LessTif/Motif, it will use that toolkit's scroll bar. Otherwise, when
992 configured for Lucid and Athena widgets, it will use the Xaw3d scroll
993 bar if Xaw3d is available. You can turn off the use of toolkit scroll
994 bars by specifying `--with-toolkit-scroll-bars=no' when configuring
997 When you encounter problems with the Xaw3d scroll bar, watch out how
998 Xaw3d is compiled on your system. If the Makefile generated from
999 Xaw3d's Imakefile contains a `-DNARROWPROTO' compiler option, and your
1000 Emacs system configuration file `s/your-system.h' does not contain a
1001 define for NARROWPROTO, you might consider adding it. Take
1002 `s/freebsd.h' as an example.
1004 Alternatively, if you don't have access to the Xaw3d source code, take
1005 a look at your system's imake configuration file, for example in the
1006 directory `/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/config' (paths are different on
1007 different systems). You will find files `*.cf' there. If your
1008 system's cf-file contains a line like `#define NeedWidePrototypes NO',
1009 add a `#define NARROWPROTO' to your Emacs system configuration file.
1011 The reason for this is that one Xaw3d function uses `double' or
1012 `float' function parameters depending on the setting of NARROWPROTO.
1013 This is not a problem when Imakefiles are used because each system's
1014 imake configuration file contains the necessary information. Since
1015 Emacs doesn't use imake, this has do be done manually.
1017 ** Tool bar support.
1019 Emacs supports a tool bar at the top of a frame under X. For details
1020 of how to define a tool bar, see the page describing Lisp-level
1021 changes. Tool-bar global minor mode controls whether or not it is
1022 displayed and is on by default. The appearance of the bar is improved
1023 if Emacs has been built with XPM image support. Otherwise monochrome
1026 To make the tool bar more useful, we need contributions of extra icons
1027 for specific modes (with copyright assignments).
1031 Tooltips are small X windows displaying a help string at the current
1032 mouse position. The Lisp package `tooltip' implements them. You can
1033 turn them off via the user option `tooltip-mode'.
1035 Tooltips also provides support for GUD debugging. If activated,
1036 variable values can be displayed in tooltips by pointing at them with
1037 the mouse in source buffers. You can customize various aspects of the
1038 tooltip display in the group `tooltip'.
1040 ** Automatic Hscrolling
1042 Horizontal scrolling now happens automatically if
1043 `automatic-hscrolling' is set (the default). This setting can be
1046 If a window is scrolled horizontally with set-window-hscroll, or
1047 scroll-left/scroll-right (C-x <, C-x >), this serves as a lower bound
1048 for automatic horizontal scrolling. Automatic scrolling will scroll
1049 the text more to the left if necessary, but won't scroll the text more
1050 to the right than the column set with set-window-hscroll etc.
1052 ** When using a windowing terminal, each Emacs window now has a cursor
1053 of its own. By default, when a window is selected, the cursor is
1054 solid; otherwise, it is hollow. The user-option
1055 `cursor-in-non-selected-windows' controls how to display the
1056 cursor in non-selected windows. If nil, no cursor is shown, if
1057 non-nil a hollow box cursor is shown.
1059 ** Fringes to the left and right of windows are used to display
1060 truncation marks, continuation marks, overlay arrows and alike. The
1061 foreground, background, and stipple of these areas can be changed by
1062 customizing face `fringe'.
1064 ** The mode line under X is now drawn with shadows by default.
1065 You can change its appearance by modifying the face `mode-line'.
1066 In particular, setting the `:box' attribute to nil turns off the 3D
1067 appearance of the mode line. (The 3D appearance makes the mode line
1068 occupy more space, and thus might cause the first or the last line of
1069 the window to be partially obscured.)
1071 The variable `mode-line-inverse-video', which was used in older
1072 versions of emacs to make the mode-line stand out, is now deprecated.
1073 However, setting it to nil will cause the `mode-line' face to be
1074 ignored, and mode-lines to be drawn using the default text face.
1076 ** Mouse-sensitive mode line.
1078 Different parts of the mode line have been made mouse-sensitive on all
1079 systems which support the mouse. Moving the mouse to a
1080 mouse-sensitive part in the mode line changes the appearance of the
1081 mouse pointer to an arrow, and help about available mouse actions is
1082 displayed either in the echo area, or in the tooltip window if you
1085 Currently, the following actions have been defined:
1087 - Mouse-1 on the buffer name in the mode line goes to the next buffer.
1089 - Mouse-3 on the buffer-name goes to the previous buffer.
1091 - Mouse-2 on the read-only or modified status in the mode line (`%' or
1092 `*') toggles the status.
1094 - Mouse-3 on the mode name displays a minor-mode menu.
1096 ** Hourglass pointer
1098 Emacs can optionally display an hourglass pointer under X. You can
1099 turn the display on or off by customizing group `cursor'.
1103 M-x blink-cursor-mode toggles a blinking cursor under X and on
1104 terminals having terminal capabilities `vi', `vs', and `ve'. Blinking
1105 and related parameters like frequency and delay can be customized in
1108 ** New font-lock support mode `jit-lock-mode'.
1110 This support mode is roughly equivalent to `lazy-lock' but is
1111 generally faster. It supports stealth and deferred fontification.
1112 See the documentation of the function `jit-lock-mode' for more
1115 Font-lock uses jit-lock-mode as default support mode, so you don't
1116 have to do anything to activate it.
1118 ** The default binding of the Delete key has changed.
1120 The new user-option `normal-erase-is-backspace' can be set to
1121 determine the effect of the Delete and Backspace function keys.
1123 On window systems, the default value of this option is chosen
1124 according to the keyboard used. If the keyboard has both a Backspace
1125 key and a Delete key, and both are mapped to their usual meanings, the
1126 option's default value is set to t, so that Backspace can be used to
1127 delete backward, and Delete can be used to delete forward. On
1128 keyboards which either have only one key (usually labeled DEL), or two
1129 keys DEL and BS which produce the same effect, the option's value is
1130 set to nil, and these keys delete backward.
1132 If not running under a window system, setting this option accomplishes
1133 a similar effect by mapping C-h, which is usually generated by the
1134 Backspace key, to DEL, and by mapping DEL to C-d via
1135 `keyboard-translate'. The former functionality of C-h is available on
1136 the F1 key. You should probably not use this setting on a text-only
1137 terminal if you don't have both Backspace, Delete and F1 keys.
1139 Programmatically, you can call function normal-erase-is-backspace-mode
1140 to toggle the behavior of the Delete and Backspace keys.
1142 ** The default for user-option `next-line-add-newlines' has been
1143 changed to nil, i.e. C-n will no longer add newlines at the end of a
1146 ** The <home> and <end> keys now move to the beginning or end of the
1147 current line, respectively. C-<home> and C-<end> move to the
1148 beginning and end of the buffer.
1150 ** Emacs now checks for recursive loads of Lisp files. If the
1151 recursion depth exceeds `recursive-load-depth-limit', an error is
1154 ** When an error is signaled during the loading of the user's init
1155 file, Emacs now pops up the *Messages* buffer.
1157 ** Emacs now refuses to load compiled Lisp files which weren't
1158 compiled with Emacs. Set `load-dangerous-libraries' to t to change
1161 The reason for this change is an incompatible change in XEmacs's byte
1162 compiler. Files compiled with XEmacs can contain byte codes that let
1165 ** Toggle buttons and radio buttons in menus.
1167 When compiled with LessTif (or Motif) support, Emacs uses toolkit
1168 widgets for radio and toggle buttons in menus. When configured for
1169 Lucid, Emacs draws radio buttons and toggle buttons similar to Motif.
1171 ** The menu bar configuration has changed. The new configuration is
1172 more CUA-compliant. The most significant change is that Options is
1173 now a separate menu-bar item, with Mule and Customize as its submenus.
1175 ** Item Save Options on the Options menu allows saving options set
1178 ** Highlighting of trailing whitespace.
1180 When `show-trailing-whitespace' is non-nil, Emacs displays trailing
1181 whitespace in the face `trailing-whitespace'. Trailing whitespace is
1182 defined as spaces or tabs at the end of a line. To avoid busy
1183 highlighting when entering new text, trailing whitespace is not
1184 displayed if point is at the end of the line containing the
1187 ** C-x 5 1 runs the new command delete-other-frames which deletes
1188 all frames except the selected one.
1190 ** The new user-option `confirm-kill-emacs' can be customized to
1191 let Emacs ask for confirmation before exiting.
1193 ** The header line in an Info buffer is now displayed as an emacs
1194 header-line (which is like a mode-line, but at the top of the window),
1195 so that it remains visible even when the buffer has been scrolled.
1196 This behavior may be disabled by customizing the option
1197 `Info-use-header-line'.
1199 ** Polish, Czech, German, and French translations of Emacs' reference card
1200 have been added. They are named `pl-refcard.tex', `cs-refcard.tex',
1201 `de-refcard.tex' and `fr-refcard.tex'. Postscript files are included.
1203 ** An `Emacs Survival Guide', etc/survival.tex, is available.
1205 ** A reference card for Dired has been added. Its name is
1206 `dired-ref.tex'. A French translation is available in
1209 ** C-down-mouse-3 is bound differently. Now if the menu bar is not
1210 displayed it pops up a menu containing the items which would be on the
1211 menu bar. If the menu bar is displayed, it pops up the major mode
1212 menu or the Edit menu if there is no major mode menu.
1214 ** Variable `load-path' is no longer customizable through Customize.
1216 You can no longer use `M-x customize-variable' to customize `load-path'
1217 because it now contains a version-dependent component. You can still
1218 use `add-to-list' and `setq' to customize this variable in your
1219 `~/.emacs' init file or to modify it from any Lisp program in general.
1221 ** C-u C-x = provides detailed information about the character at
1222 point in a pop-up window.
1224 ** Emacs can now support 'wheeled' mice (such as the MS IntelliMouse)
1225 under XFree86. To enable this, use the `mouse-wheel-mode' command, or
1226 customize the variable `mouse-wheel-mode'.
1228 The variables `mouse-wheel-follow-mouse' and `mouse-wheel-scroll-amount'
1229 determine where and by how much buffers are scrolled.
1231 ** Emacs' auto-save list files are now by default stored in a
1232 sub-directory `.emacs.d/auto-save-list/' of the user's home directory.
1233 (On MS-DOS, this subdirectory's name is `_emacs.d/auto-save.list/'.)
1234 You can customize `auto-save-list-file-prefix' to change this location.
1236 ** The function `getenv' is now callable interactively.
1238 ** The new user-option `even-window-heights' can be set to nil
1239 to prevent `display-buffer' from evening out window heights.
1241 ** The new command M-x delete-trailing-whitespace RET will delete the
1242 trailing whitespace within the current restriction. You can also add
1243 this function to `write-file-hooks' or `local-write-file-hooks'.
1245 ** When visiting a file with M-x find-file-literally, no newlines will
1246 be added to the end of the buffer even if `require-final-newline' is
1249 ** The new user-option `find-file-suppress-same-file-warnings' can be
1250 set to suppress warnings ``X and Y are the same file'' when visiting a
1251 file that is already visited under a different name.
1253 ** The new user-option `electric-help-shrink-window' can be set to
1254 nil to prevent adjusting the help window size to the buffer size.
1256 ** New command M-x describe-character-set reads a character set name
1257 and displays information about that.
1259 ** The new variable `auto-mode-interpreter-regexp' contains a regular
1260 expression matching interpreters, for file mode determination.
1262 This regular expression is matched against the first line of a file to
1263 determine the file's mode in `set-auto-mode' when Emacs can't deduce a
1264 mode from the file's name. If it matches, the file is assumed to be
1265 interpreted by the interpreter matched by the second group of the
1266 regular expression. The mode is then determined as the mode
1267 associated with that interpreter in `interpreter-mode-alist'.
1269 ** New function executable-make-buffer-file-executable-if-script-p is
1270 suitable as an after-save-hook as an alternative to `executable-chmod'.
1272 ** The most preferred coding-system is now used to save a buffer if
1273 buffer-file-coding-system is `undecided' and it is safe for the buffer
1274 contents. (The most preferred is set by set-language-environment or
1275 by M-x prefer-coding-system.) Thus if you visit an ASCII file and
1276 insert a non-ASCII character from your current language environment,
1277 the file will be saved silently with the appropriate coding.
1278 Previously you would be prompted for a safe coding system.
1280 ** The many obsolete language `setup-...-environment' commands have
1281 been removed -- use `set-language-environment'.
1283 ** The new Custom option `keyboard-coding-system' specifies a coding
1284 system for keyboard input.
1286 ** New variable `inhibit-iso-escape-detection' determines if Emacs'
1287 coding system detection algorithm should pay attention to ISO2022's
1288 escape sequences. If this variable is non-nil, the algorithm ignores
1289 such escape sequences. The default value is nil, and it is
1290 recommended not to change it except for the special case that you
1291 always want to read any escape code verbatim. If you just want to
1292 read a specific file without decoding escape codes, use C-x RET c
1293 (`universal-coding-system-argument'). For instance, C-x RET c latin-1
1294 RET C-x C-f filename RET.
1296 ** Variable `default-korean-keyboard' is initialized properly from the
1297 environment variable `HANGUL_KEYBOARD_TYPE'.
1299 ** New command M-x list-charset-chars reads a character set name and
1300 displays all characters in that character set.
1302 ** M-x set-terminal-coding-system (C-x RET t) now allows CCL-based
1303 coding systems such as cpXXX and cyrillic-koi8.
1305 ** Emacs now attempts to determine the initial language environment
1306 and preferred and locale coding systems systematically from the
1307 LC_ALL, LC_CTYPE, and LANG environment variables during startup.
1309 ** New language environments `Polish', `Latin-8' and `Latin-9'.
1310 Latin-8 and Latin-9 correspond respectively to the ISO character sets
1311 8859-14 (Celtic) and 8859-15 (updated Latin-1, with the Euro sign).
1312 GNU Intlfonts doesn't support these yet but recent X releases have
1313 8859-15. See etc/INSTALL for information on obtaining extra fonts.
1314 There are new Leim input methods for Latin-8 and Latin-9 prefix (only)
1317 ** New language environments `Dutch' and `Spanish'.
1318 These new environments mainly select appropriate translations
1321 ** In Ethiopic language environment, special key bindings for
1322 function keys are changed as follows. This is to conform to "Emacs
1323 Lisp Coding Convention".
1325 new command old-binding
1326 --- ------- -----------
1327 f3 ethio-fidel-to-sera-buffer f5
1328 S-f3 ethio-fidel-to-sera-region f5
1329 C-f3 ethio-fidel-to-sera-mail-or-marker f5
1331 f4 ethio-sera-to-fidel-buffer unchanged
1332 S-f4 ethio-sera-to-fidel-region unchanged
1333 C-f4 ethio-sera-to-fidel-mail-or-marker unchanged
1335 S-f5 ethio-toggle-punctuation f3
1336 S-f6 ethio-modify-vowel f6
1337 S-f7 ethio-replace-space f7
1338 S-f8 ethio-input-special-character f8
1339 S-f9 ethio-replace-space unchanged
1340 C-f9 ethio-toggle-space f2
1342 ** There are new Leim input methods.
1343 New input methods "turkish-postfix", "turkish-alt-postfix",
1344 "greek-mizuochi", "TeX", and "greek-babel" are now part of the Leim
1347 ** The rule of input method "slovak" is slightly changed. Now the
1348 rules for translating "q" and "Q" to "`" (backquote) are deleted, thus
1349 typing them inserts "q" and "Q" respectively. Rules for translating
1350 "=q", "+q", "=Q", and "+Q" to "`" are also deleted. Now, to input
1351 "`", you must type "=q".
1353 ** When your terminal can't display characters from some of the ISO
1354 8859 character sets but can display Latin-1, you can display
1355 more-or-less mnemonic sequences of ASCII/Latin-1 characters instead of
1356 empty boxes (under a window system) or question marks (not under a
1357 window system). Customize the option `latin1-display' to turn this
1360 ** M-; now calls comment-dwim which tries to do something clever based
1361 on the context. M-x kill-comment is now an alias to comment-kill,
1362 defined in newcomment.el. You can choose different styles of region
1363 commenting with the variable `comment-style'.
1365 ** New user options `display-time-mail-face' and
1366 `display-time-use-mail-icon' control the appearance of mode-line mail
1367 indicator used by the display-time package. On a suitable display the
1368 indicator can be an icon and is mouse-sensitive.
1370 ** On window-systems, additional space can be put between text lines
1371 on the display using several methods
1373 - By setting frame parameter `line-spacing' to PIXELS. PIXELS must be
1374 a positive integer, and specifies that PIXELS number of pixels should
1375 be put below text lines on the affected frame or frames.
1377 - By setting X resource `lineSpacing', class `LineSpacing'. This is
1378 equivalent to specifying the frame parameter.
1380 - By specifying `--line-spacing=N' or `-lsp N' on the command line.
1382 - By setting buffer-local variable `line-spacing'. The meaning is
1383 the same, but applies to the a particular buffer only.
1385 ** The new command `clone-indirect-buffer' can be used to create
1386 an indirect buffer that is a twin copy of the current buffer. The
1387 command `clone-indirect-buffer-other-window', bound to C-x 4 c,
1388 does the same but displays the indirect buffer in another window.
1390 ** New user options `backup-directory-alist' and
1391 `make-backup-file-name-function' control the placement of backups,
1392 typically in a single directory or in an invisible sub-directory.
1394 ** New commands iso-iso2sgml and iso-sgml2iso convert between Latin-1
1395 characters and the corresponding SGML (HTML) entities.
1397 ** New X resources recognized
1399 *** The X resource `synchronous', class `Synchronous', specifies
1400 whether Emacs should run in synchronous mode. Synchronous mode
1401 is useful for debugging X problems.
1405 emacs.synchronous: true
1407 *** The X resource `visualClass, class `VisualClass', specifies the
1408 visual Emacs should use. The resource's value should be a string of
1409 the form `CLASS-DEPTH', where CLASS is the name of the visual class,
1410 and DEPTH is the requested color depth as a decimal number. Valid
1411 visual class names are
1420 Visual class names specified as X resource are case-insensitive, i.e.
1421 `pseudocolor', `Pseudocolor' and `PseudoColor' all have the same
1424 The program `xdpyinfo' can be used to list the visual classes
1425 supported on your display, and which depths they have. If
1426 `visualClass' is not specified, Emacs uses the display's default
1431 emacs.visualClass: TrueColor-8
1433 *** The X resource `privateColormap', class `PrivateColormap',
1434 specifies that Emacs should use a private colormap if it is using the
1435 default visual, and that visual is of class PseudoColor. Recognized
1436 resource values are `true' or `on'.
1440 emacs.privateColormap: true
1442 ** Faces and frame parameters.
1444 There are four new faces `scroll-bar', `border', `cursor' and `mouse'.
1445 Setting the frame parameters `scroll-bar-foreground' and
1446 `scroll-bar-background' sets foreground and background color of face
1447 `scroll-bar' and vice versa. Setting frame parameter `border-color'
1448 sets the background color of face `border' and vice versa. Likewise
1449 for frame parameters `cursor-color' and face `cursor', and frame
1450 parameter `mouse-color' and face `mouse'.
1452 Changing frame parameter `font' sets font-related attributes of the
1453 `default' face and vice versa. Setting frame parameters
1454 `foreground-color' or `background-color' sets the colors of the
1455 `default' face and vice versa.
1459 The face `menu' can be used to change colors and font of Emacs' menus.
1461 ** New frame parameter `screen-gamma' for gamma correction.
1463 The new frame parameter `screen-gamma' specifies gamma-correction for
1464 colors. Its value may be nil, the default, in which case no gamma
1465 correction occurs, or a number > 0, usually a float, that specifies
1466 the screen gamma of a frame's display.
1468 PC monitors usually have a screen gamma of 2.2. smaller values result
1469 in darker colors. You might want to try a screen gamma of 1.5 for LCD
1470 color displays. The viewing gamma Emacs uses is 0.4545. (1/2.2).
1472 The X resource name of this parameter is `screenGamma', class
1475 ** Tabs and variable-width text.
1477 Tabs are now displayed with stretch properties; the width of a tab is
1478 defined as a multiple of the normal character width of a frame, and is
1479 independent of the fonts used in the text where the tab appears.
1480 Thus, tabs can be used to line up text in different fonts.
1482 ** Enhancements of the Lucid menu bar
1484 *** The Lucid menu bar now supports the resource "margin".
1486 emacs.pane.menubar.margin: 5
1488 The default margin is 4 which makes the menu bar appear like the
1491 *** Arrows that indicate sub-menus are now drawn with shadows, as in
1494 ** A block cursor can be drawn as wide as the glyph under it under X.
1496 As an example: if a block cursor is over a tab character, it will be
1497 drawn as wide as that tab on the display. To do this, set
1498 `x-stretch-cursor' to a non-nil value.
1500 ** Empty display lines at the end of a buffer may be marked with a
1501 bitmap (this is similar to the tilde displayed by vi and Less).
1503 This behavior is activated by setting the buffer-local variable
1504 `indicate-empty-lines' to a non-nil value. The default value of this
1505 variable is found in `default-indicate-empty-lines'.
1507 ** There is a new "aggressive" scrolling method.
1509 When scrolling up because point is above the window start, if the
1510 value of the buffer-local variable `scroll-up-aggressively' is a
1511 number, Emacs chooses a new window start so that point ends up that
1512 fraction of the window's height from the top of the window.
1514 When scrolling down because point is below the window end, if the
1515 value of the buffer-local variable `scroll-down-aggressively' is a
1516 number, Emacs chooses a new window start so that point ends up that
1517 fraction of the window's height from the bottom of the window.
1519 ** You can now easily create new *Info* buffers using either
1520 M-x clone-buffer, C-u m <entry> RET or C-u g <entry> RET.
1521 M-x clone-buffer can also be used on *Help* and several other special
1524 ** The command `Info-search' now uses a search history.
1526 ** Listing buffers with M-x list-buffers (C-x C-b) now shows
1527 abbreviated file names. Abbreviations can be customized by changing
1528 `directory-abbrev-alist'.
1530 ** A new variable, backup-by-copying-when-privileged-mismatch, gives
1531 the highest file uid for which backup-by-copying-when-mismatch will be
1532 forced on. The assumption is that uids less than or equal to this
1533 value are special uids (root, bin, daemon, etc.--not real system
1534 users) and that files owned by these users should not change ownership,
1535 even if your system policy allows users other than root to edit them.
1537 The default is 200; set the variable to nil to disable the feature.
1539 ** The rectangle commands now avoid inserting undesirable spaces,
1540 notably at the end of lines.
1542 All these functions have been rewritten to avoid inserting unwanted
1543 spaces, and an optional prefix now allows them to behave the old way.
1545 ** The function `replace-rectangle' is an alias for `string-rectangle'.
1547 ** The new command M-x string-insert-rectangle is like `string-rectangle',
1548 but inserts text instead of replacing it.
1550 ** The new command M-x query-replace-regexp-eval acts like
1551 query-replace-regexp, but takes a Lisp expression which is evaluated
1552 after each match to get the replacement text.
1554 ** M-x query-replace recognizes a new command `e' (or `E') that lets
1555 you edit the replacement string.
1557 ** The new command mail-abbrev-complete-alias, bound to `M-TAB'
1558 (if you load the library `mailabbrev'), lets you complete mail aliases
1559 in the text, analogous to lisp-complete-symbol.
1561 ** The variable `echo-keystrokes' may now have a floating point value.
1563 ** If your init file is compiled (.emacs.elc), `user-init-file' is set
1564 to the source name (.emacs.el), if that exists, after loading it.
1566 ** The help string specified for a menu-item whose definition contains
1567 the property `:help HELP' is now displayed under X, on MS-Windows, and
1568 MS-DOS, either in the echo area or with tooltips. Many standard menus
1569 displayed by Emacs now have help strings.
1572 ** New user option `read-mail-command' specifies a command to use to
1573 read mail from the menu etc.
1575 ** The environment variable `EMACSLOCKDIR' is no longer used on MS-Windows.
1576 This environment variable was used when creating lock files. Emacs on
1577 MS-Windows does not use this variable anymore. This change was made
1578 before Emacs 21.1, but wasn't documented until now.
1580 ** Highlighting of mouse-sensitive regions is now supported in the
1581 MS-DOS version of Emacs.
1583 ** The new command `msdos-set-mouse-buttons' forces the MS-DOS version
1584 of Emacs to behave as if the mouse had a specified number of buttons.
1585 This comes handy with mice that don't report their number of buttons
1586 correctly. One example is the wheeled mice, which report 3 buttons,
1587 but clicks on the middle button are not passed to the MS-DOS version
1590 ** Customize changes
1592 *** Customize now supports comments about customized items. Use the
1593 `State' menu to add comments, or give a prefix argument to
1594 M-x customize-set-variable or M-x customize-set-value. Note that
1595 customization comments will cause the customizations to fail in
1596 earlier versions of Emacs.
1598 *** The new option `custom-buffer-done-function' says whether to kill
1599 Custom buffers when you've done with them or just bury them (the
1602 *** If Emacs was invoked with the `-q' or `--no-init-file' options, it
1603 does not allow you to save customizations in your `~/.emacs' init
1604 file. This is because saving customizations from such a session would
1605 wipe out all the other customizationss you might have on your init
1608 ** If Emacs was invoked with the `-q' or `--no-init-file' options, it
1609 does not save disabled and enabled commands for future sessions, to
1610 avoid overwriting existing customizations of this kind that are
1611 already in your init file.
1613 ** New features in evaluation commands
1615 *** The commands to evaluate Lisp expressions, such as C-M-x in Lisp
1616 modes, C-j in Lisp Interaction mode, and M-:, now bind the variables
1617 print-level, print-length, and debug-on-error based on the new
1618 customizable variables eval-expression-print-level,
1619 eval-expression-print-length, and eval-expression-debug-on-error.
1621 The default values for the first two of these variables are 12 and 4
1622 respectively, which means that `eval-expression' now prints at most
1623 the first 12 members of a list and at most 4 nesting levels deep (if
1624 the list is longer or deeper than that, an ellipsis `...' is
1627 <RET> or <mouse-2> on the printed text toggles between an abbreviated
1628 printed representation and an unabbreviated one.
1630 The default value of eval-expression-debug-on-error is t, so any error
1631 during evaluation produces a backtrace.
1633 *** The function `eval-defun' (C-M-x) now loads Edebug and instruments
1634 code when called with a prefix argument.
1638 Note: This release contains changes that might not be compatible with
1639 current user setups (although it's believed that these
1640 incompatibilities will only show in very uncommon circumstances).
1641 However, since the impact is uncertain, these changes may be rolled
1642 back depending on user feedback. Therefore there's no forward
1643 compatibility guarantee wrt the new features introduced in this
1646 *** The hardcoded switch to "java" style in Java mode is gone.
1647 CC Mode used to automatically set the style to "java" when Java mode
1648 is entered. This has now been removed since it caused too much
1651 However, to keep backward compatibility to a certain extent, the
1652 default value for c-default-style now specifies the "java" style for
1653 java-mode, but "gnu" for all other modes (as before). So you won't
1654 notice the change if you haven't touched that variable.
1656 *** New cleanups, space-before-funcall and compact-empty-funcall.
1657 Two new cleanups have been added to c-cleanup-list:
1659 space-before-funcall causes a space to be inserted before the opening
1660 parenthesis of a function call, which gives the style "foo (bar)".
1662 compact-empty-funcall causes any space before a function call opening
1663 parenthesis to be removed if there are no arguments to the function.
1664 It's typically useful together with space-before-funcall to get the
1665 style "foo (bar)" and "foo()".
1667 *** Some keywords now automatically trigger reindentation.
1668 Keywords like "else", "while", "catch" and "finally" have been made
1669 "electric" to make them reindent automatically when they continue an
1670 earlier statement. An example:
1672 for (i = 0; i < 17; i++)
1674 res += a[i]->offset;
1677 Here, the "else" should be indented like the preceding "if", since it
1678 continues that statement. CC Mode will automatically reindent it after
1679 the "else" has been typed in full, since it's not until then it's
1680 possible to decide whether it's a new statement or a continuation of
1683 CC Mode uses Abbrev mode to achieve this, which is therefore turned on
1686 *** M-a and M-e now moves by sentence in multiline strings.
1687 Previously these two keys only moved by sentence in comments, which
1688 meant that sentence movement didn't work in strings containing
1689 documentation or other natural language text.
1691 The reason it's only activated in multiline strings (i.e. strings that
1692 contain a newline, even when escaped by a '\') is to avoid stopping in
1693 the short strings that often reside inside statements. Multiline
1694 strings almost always contain text in a natural language, as opposed
1695 to other strings that typically contain format specifications,
1696 commands, etc. Also, it's not that bothersome that M-a and M-e misses
1697 sentences in single line strings, since they're short anyway.
1699 *** Support for autodoc comments in Pike mode.
1700 Autodoc comments for Pike are used to extract documentation from the
1701 source, like Javadoc in Java. Pike mode now recognize this markup in
1702 comment prefixes and paragraph starts.
1704 *** The comment prefix regexps on c-comment-prefix may be mode specific.
1705 When c-comment-prefix is an association list, it specifies the comment
1706 line prefix on a per-mode basis, like c-default-style does. This
1707 change came about to support the special autodoc comment prefix in
1710 *** Better handling of syntactic errors.
1711 The recovery after unbalanced parens earlier in the buffer has been
1712 improved; CC Mode now reports them by dinging and giving a message
1713 stating the offending line, but still recovers and indent the
1714 following lines in a sane way (most of the time). An "else" with no
1715 matching "if" is handled similarly. If an error is discovered while
1716 indenting a region, the whole region is still indented and the error
1717 is reported afterwards.
1719 *** Lineup functions may now return absolute columns.
1720 A lineup function can give an absolute column to indent the line to by
1721 returning a vector with the desired column as the first element.
1723 *** More robust and warning-free byte compilation.
1724 Although this is strictly not a user visible change (well, depending
1725 on the view of a user), it's still worth mentioning that CC Mode now
1726 can be compiled in the standard ways without causing trouble. Some
1727 code have also been moved between the subpackages to enhance the
1728 modularity somewhat. Thanks to Martin Buchholz for doing the
1731 *** c-style-variables-are-local-p now defaults to t.
1732 This is an incompatible change that has been made to make the behavior
1733 of the style system wrt global variable settings less confusing for
1734 non-advanced users. If you know what this variable does you might
1735 want to set it to nil in your .emacs, otherwise you probably don't
1738 Defaulting c-style-variables-are-local-p to t avoids the confusing
1739 situation that occurs when a user sets some style variables globally
1740 and edits both a Java and a non-Java file in the same Emacs session.
1741 If the style variables aren't buffer local in this case, loading of
1742 the second file will cause the default style (either "gnu" or "java"
1743 by default) to override the global settings made by the user.
1745 *** New initialization procedure for the style system.
1746 When the initial style for a buffer is determined by CC Mode (from the
1747 variable c-default-style), the global values of style variables now
1748 take precedence over the values specified by the chosen style. This
1749 is different than the old behavior: previously, the style-specific
1750 settings would override the global settings. This change makes it
1751 possible to do simple configuration in the intuitive way with
1752 Customize or with setq lines in one's .emacs file.
1754 By default, the global value of every style variable is the new
1755 special symbol set-from-style, which causes the value to be taken from
1756 the style system. This means that in effect, only an explicit setting
1757 of a style variable will cause the "overriding" behavior described
1760 Also note that global settings override style-specific settings *only*
1761 when the initial style of a buffer is chosen by a CC Mode major mode
1762 function. When a style is chosen in other ways --- for example, by a
1763 call like (c-set-style "gnu") in a hook, or via M-x c-set-style ---
1764 then the style-specific values take precedence over any global style
1765 values. In Lisp terms, global values override style-specific values
1766 only when the new second argument to c-set-style is non-nil; see the
1767 function documentation for more info.
1769 The purpose of these changes is to make it easier for users,
1770 especially novice users, to do simple customizations with Customize or
1771 with setq in their .emacs files. On the other hand, the new system is
1772 intended to be compatible with advanced users' customizations as well,
1773 such as those that choose styles in hooks or whatnot. This new system
1774 is believed to be almost entirely compatible with current
1775 configurations, in spite of the changed precedence between style and
1776 global variable settings when a buffer's default style is set.
1778 (Thanks to Eric Eide for clarifying this explanation a bit.)
1780 **** c-offsets-alist is now a customizable variable.
1781 This became possible as a result of the new initialization behavior.
1783 This variable is treated slightly differently from the other style
1784 variables; instead of using the symbol set-from-style, it will be
1785 completed with the syntactic symbols it doesn't already contain when
1786 the style is first initialized. This means it now defaults to the
1787 empty list to make all syntactic elements get their values from the
1790 **** Compatibility variable to restore the old behavior.
1791 In case your configuration doesn't work with this change, you can set
1792 c-old-style-variable-behavior to non-nil to get the old behavior back
1795 *** Improvements to line breaking and text filling.
1796 CC Mode now handles this more intelligently and seamlessly wrt the
1797 surrounding code, especially inside comments. For details see the new
1798 chapter about this in the manual.
1800 **** New variable to recognize comment line prefix decorations.
1801 The variable c-comment-prefix-regexp has been added to properly
1802 recognize the line prefix in both block and line comments. It's
1803 primarily used to initialize the various paragraph recognition and
1804 adaptive filling variables that the text handling functions uses.
1806 **** New variable c-block-comment-prefix.
1807 This is a generalization of the now obsolete variable
1808 c-comment-continuation-stars to handle arbitrary strings.
1810 **** CC Mode now uses adaptive fill mode.
1811 This to make it adapt better to the paragraph style inside comments.
1813 It's also possible to use other adaptive filling packages inside CC
1814 Mode, notably Kyle E. Jones' Filladapt mode (http://wonderworks.com/).
1815 A new convenience function c-setup-filladapt sets up Filladapt for use
1818 Note though that the 2.12 version of Filladapt lacks a feature that
1819 causes it to work suboptimally when c-comment-prefix-regexp can match
1820 the empty string (which it commonly does). A patch for that is
1821 available from the CC Mode web site (http://www.python.org/emacs/
1824 **** The variables `c-hanging-comment-starter-p' and
1825 `c-hanging-comment-ender-p', which controlled how comment starters and
1826 enders were filled, are not used anymore. The new version of the
1827 function `c-fill-paragraph' keeps the comment starters and enders as
1828 they were before the filling.
1830 **** It's now possible to selectively turn off auto filling.
1831 The variable c-ignore-auto-fill is used to ignore auto fill mode in
1832 specific contexts, e.g. in preprocessor directives and in string
1835 **** New context sensitive line break function c-context-line-break.
1836 It works like newline-and-indent in normal code, and adapts the line
1837 prefix according to the comment style when used inside comments. If
1838 you're normally using newline-and-indent, you might want to switch to
1841 *** Fixes to IDL mode.
1842 It now does a better job in recognizing only the constructs relevant
1843 to IDL. E.g. it no longer matches "class" as the beginning of a
1844 struct block, but it does match the CORBA 2.3 "valuetype" keyword.
1845 Thanks to Eric Eide.
1847 *** Improvements to the Whitesmith style.
1848 It now keeps the style consistently on all levels and both when
1849 opening braces hangs and when they don't.
1851 **** New lineup function c-lineup-whitesmith-in-block.
1853 *** New lineup functions c-lineup-template-args and c-indent-multi-line-block.
1854 See their docstrings for details. c-lineup-template-args does a
1855 better job of tracking the brackets used as parens in C++ templates,
1856 and is used by default to line up continued template arguments.
1858 *** c-lineup-comment now preserves alignment with a comment on the
1859 previous line. It used to instead preserve comments that started in
1860 the column specified by comment-column.
1862 *** c-lineup-C-comments handles "free form" text comments.
1863 In comments with a long delimiter line at the start, the indentation
1864 is kept unchanged for lines that start with an empty comment line
1865 prefix. This is intended for the type of large block comments that
1866 contain documentation with its own formatting. In these you normally
1867 don't want CC Mode to change the indentation.
1869 *** The `c' syntactic symbol is now relative to the comment start
1870 instead of the previous line, to make integers usable as lineup
1873 *** All lineup functions have gotten docstrings.
1875 *** More preprocessor directive movement functions.
1876 c-down-conditional does the reverse of c-up-conditional.
1877 c-up-conditional-with-else and c-down-conditional-with-else are
1878 variants of these that also stops at "#else" lines (suggested by Don
1881 *** Minor improvements to many movement functions in tricky situations.
1885 *** New variable `dired-recursive-deletes' determines if the delete
1886 command will delete non-empty directories recursively. The default
1887 is, delete only empty directories.
1889 *** New variable `dired-recursive-copies' determines if the copy
1890 command will copy directories recursively. The default is, do not
1891 copy directories recursively.
1893 *** In command `dired-do-shell-command' (usually bound to `!') a `?'
1894 in the shell command has a special meaning similar to `*', but with
1895 the difference that the command will be run on each file individually.
1897 *** The new command `dired-find-alternate-file' (usually bound to `a')
1898 replaces the Dired buffer with the buffer for an alternate file or
1901 *** The new command `dired-show-file-type' (usually bound to `y') shows
1902 a message in the echo area describing what type of file the point is on.
1903 This command invokes the external program `file' do its work, and so
1904 will only work on systems with that program, and will be only as
1905 accurate or inaccurate as it is.
1907 *** Dired now properly handles undo changes of adding/removing `-R'
1910 *** Dired commands that prompt for a destination file now allow the use
1911 of the `M-n' command in the minibuffer to insert the source filename,
1912 which the user can then edit. This only works if there is a single
1913 source file, not when operating on multiple marked files.
1917 The Gnus NEWS entries are short, but they reflect sweeping changes in
1918 four areas: Article display treatment, MIME treatment,
1919 internationalization and mail-fetching.
1921 *** The mail-fetching functions have changed. See the manual for the
1922 many details. In particular, all procmail fetching variables are gone.
1924 If you used procmail like in
1926 (setq nnmail-use-procmail t)
1927 (setq nnmail-spool-file 'procmail)
1928 (setq nnmail-procmail-directory "~/mail/incoming/")
1929 (setq nnmail-procmail-suffix "\\.in")
1931 this now has changed to
1934 '((directory :path "~/mail/incoming/"
1937 More information is available in the info doc at Select Methods ->
1938 Getting Mail -> Mail Sources
1940 *** Gnus is now a MIME-capable reader. This affects many parts of
1941 Gnus, and adds a slew of new commands. See the manual for details.
1942 Separate MIME packages like RMIME, mime-compose etc., will probably no
1943 longer work; remove them and use the native facilities.
1945 The FLIM/SEMI package still works with Emacs 21, but if you want to
1946 use the native facilities, you must remove any mailcap.el[c] that was
1947 installed by FLIM/SEMI version 1.13 or earlier.
1949 *** Gnus has also been multilingualized. This also affects too many
1950 parts of Gnus to summarize here, and adds many new variables. There
1951 are built-in facilities equivalent to those of gnus-mule.el, which is
1952 now just a compatibility layer.
1954 *** gnus-mule.el is now just a compatibility layer over the built-in
1957 *** gnus-auto-select-first can now be a function to be
1958 called to position point.
1960 *** The user can now decide which extra headers should be included in
1961 summary buffers and NOV files.
1963 *** `gnus-article-display-hook' has been removed. Instead, a number
1964 of variables starting with `gnus-treat-' have been added.
1966 *** The Gnus posting styles have been redone again and now work in a
1967 subtly different manner.
1969 *** New web-based backends have been added: nnslashdot, nnwarchive
1970 and nnultimate. nnweb has been revamped, again, to keep up with
1971 ever-changing layouts.
1973 *** Gnus can now read IMAP mail via nnimap.
1975 *** There is image support of various kinds and some sound support.
1977 ** Changes in Texinfo mode.
1979 *** A couple of new key bindings have been added for inserting Texinfo
1983 -------------------------
1987 C-c C-c q @quotation
1989 C-c C-o @<block> ... @end <block>
1992 *** The " key now inserts either " or `` or '' depending on context.
1994 ** Changes in Outline mode.
1996 There is now support for Imenu to index headings. A new command
1997 `outline-headers-as-kill' copies the visible headings in the region to
1998 the kill ring, e.g. to produce a table of contents.
2000 ** Changes to Emacs Server
2002 *** The new option `server-kill-new-buffers' specifies what to do
2003 with buffers when done with them. If non-nil, the default, buffers
2004 are killed, unless they were already present before visiting them with
2005 Emacs Server. If nil, `server-temp-file-regexp' specifies which
2006 buffers to kill, as before.
2008 Please note that only buffers are killed that still have a client,
2009 i.e. buffers visited with `emacsclient --no-wait' are never killed in
2012 ** Both emacsclient and Emacs itself now accept command line options
2013 of the form +LINE:COLUMN in addition to +LINE.
2015 ** Changes to Show Paren mode.
2017 *** Overlays used by Show Paren mode now use a priority property.
2018 The new user option show-paren-priority specifies the priority to
2019 use. Default is 1000.
2021 ** New command M-x check-parens can be used to find unbalanced paren
2022 groups and strings in buffers in Lisp mode (or other modes).
2024 ** Changes to hideshow.el
2026 *** Generalized block selection and traversal
2028 A block is now recognized by its start and end regexps (both strings),
2029 and an integer specifying which sub-expression in the start regexp
2030 serves as the place where a `forward-sexp'-like function can operate.
2031 See the documentation of variable `hs-special-modes-alist'.
2033 *** During incremental search, if Hideshow minor mode is active,
2034 hidden blocks are temporarily shown. The variable `hs-headline' can
2035 be used in the mode line format to show the line at the beginning of
2038 *** User option `hs-hide-all-non-comment-function' specifies a
2039 function to be called at each top-level block beginning, instead of
2040 the normal block-hiding function.
2042 *** The command `hs-show-region' has been removed.
2044 *** The key bindings have changed to fit the Emacs conventions,
2045 roughly imitating those of Outline minor mode. Notably, the prefix
2046 for all bindings is now `C-c @'. For details, see the documentation
2047 for `hs-minor-mode'.
2049 *** The variable `hs-show-hidden-short-form' has been removed, and
2050 hideshow.el now always behaves as if this variable were set to t.
2052 ** Changes to Change Log mode and Add-Log functions
2054 *** If you invoke `add-change-log-entry' from a backup file, it makes
2055 an entry appropriate for the file's parent. This is useful for making
2056 log entries by comparing a version with deleted functions.
2058 **** New command M-x change-log-merge merges another log into the
2061 *** New command M-x change-log-redate fixes any old-style date entries
2064 *** Change Log mode now adds a file's version number to change log
2065 entries if user-option `change-log-version-info-enabled' is non-nil.
2066 Unless the file is under version control the search for a file's
2067 version number is performed based on regular expressions from
2068 `change-log-version-number-regexp-list' which can be customized.
2069 Version numbers are only found in the first 10 percent of a file.
2071 *** Change Log mode now defines its own faces for font-lock highlighting.
2073 ** Changes to cmuscheme
2075 *** The user-option `scheme-program-name' has been renamed
2076 `cmuscheme-program-name' due to conflicts with xscheme.el.
2078 ** Changes in Font Lock
2080 *** The new function `font-lock-remove-keywords' can be used to remove
2081 font-lock keywords from the current buffer or from a specific major mode.
2083 *** Multi-line patterns are now supported. Modes using this, should
2084 set font-lock-multiline to t in their font-lock-defaults.
2086 *** `font-lock-syntactic-face-function' allows major-modes to choose
2087 the face used for each string/comment.
2089 *** A new standard face `font-lock-doc-face'.
2090 Meant for Lisp docstrings, Javadoc comments and other "documentation in code".
2092 ** Changes to Shell mode
2094 *** The `shell' command now accepts an optional argument to specify the buffer
2095 to use, which defaults to "*shell*". When used interactively, a
2096 non-default buffer may be specified by giving the `shell' command a
2097 prefix argument (causing it to prompt for the buffer name).
2099 ** Comint (subshell) changes
2101 These changes generally affect all modes derived from comint mode, which
2102 include shell-mode, gdb-mode, scheme-interaction-mode, etc.
2104 *** Comint now by default interprets some carriage-control characters.
2105 Comint now removes CRs from CR LF sequences, and treats single CRs and
2106 BSs in the output in a way similar to a terminal (by deleting to the
2107 beginning of the line, or deleting the previous character,
2108 respectively). This is achieved by adding `comint-carriage-motion' to
2109 the `comint-output-filter-functions' hook by default.
2111 *** By default, comint no longer uses the variable `comint-prompt-regexp'
2112 to distinguish prompts from user-input. Instead, it notices which
2113 parts of the text were output by the process, and which entered by the
2114 user, and attaches `field' properties to allow emacs commands to use
2115 this information. Common movement commands, notably beginning-of-line,
2116 respect field boundaries in a fairly natural manner. To disable this
2117 feature, and use the old behavior, customize the user option
2118 `comint-use-prompt-regexp-instead-of-fields'.
2120 *** Comint now includes new features to send commands to running processes
2121 and redirect the output to a designated buffer or buffers.
2123 *** The command M-x comint-redirect-send-command reads a command and
2124 buffer name from the mini-buffer. The command is sent to the current
2125 buffer's process, and its output is inserted into the specified buffer.
2127 The command M-x comint-redirect-send-command-to-process acts like
2128 M-x comint-redirect-send-command but additionally reads the name of
2129 the buffer whose process should be used from the mini-buffer.
2131 *** Packages based on comint now highlight user input and program prompts,
2132 and support choosing previous input with mouse-2. To control these features,
2133 see the user-options `comint-highlight-input' and `comint-highlight-prompt'.
2135 *** The new command `comint-write-output' (usually bound to `C-c C-s')
2136 saves the output from the most recent command to a file. With a prefix
2137 argument, it appends to the file.
2139 *** The command `comint-kill-output' has been renamed `comint-delete-output'
2140 (usually bound to `C-c C-o'); the old name is aliased to it for
2143 *** The new function `comint-add-to-input-history' adds commands to the input
2146 *** The new variable `comint-input-history-ignore' is a regexp for
2147 identifying history lines that should be ignored, like tcsh time-stamp
2148 strings, starting with a `#'. The default value of this variable is "^#".
2150 ** Changes to Rmail mode
2152 *** The new user-option rmail-user-mail-address-regexp can be
2153 set to fine tune the identification of the correspondent when
2154 receiving new mail. If it matches the address of the sender, the
2155 recipient is taken as correspondent of a mail. If nil, the default,
2156 `user-login-name' and `user-mail-address' are used to exclude yourself
2159 Usually you don't have to set this variable, except if you collect
2160 mails sent by you under different user names. Then it should be a
2161 regexp matching your mail addresses.
2163 *** The new user-option rmail-confirm-expunge controls whether and how
2164 to ask for confirmation before expunging deleted messages from an
2165 Rmail file. You can choose between no confirmation, confirmation
2166 with y-or-n-p, or confirmation with yes-or-no-p. Default is to ask
2167 for confirmation with yes-or-no-p.
2169 *** RET is now bound in the Rmail summary to rmail-summary-goto-msg,
2172 *** There is a new user option `rmail-digest-end-regexps' that
2173 specifies the regular expressions to detect the line that ends a
2176 *** The new user option `rmail-automatic-folder-directives' specifies
2177 in which folder to put messages automatically.
2179 *** The new function `rmail-redecode-body' allows to fix a message
2180 with non-ASCII characters if Emacs happens to decode it incorrectly
2181 due to missing or malformed "charset=" header.
2183 ** The new user-option `mail-envelope-from' can be used to specify
2184 an envelope-from address different from user-mail-address.
2186 ** The variable mail-specify-envelope-from controls whether to
2187 use the -f option when sending mail.
2189 ** The Rmail command `o' (`rmail-output-to-rmail-file') now writes the
2190 current message in the internal `emacs-mule' encoding, rather than in
2191 the encoding taken from the variable `buffer-file-coding-system'.
2192 This allows to save messages whose characters cannot be safely encoded
2193 by the buffer's coding system, and makes sure the message will be
2194 displayed correctly when you later visit the target Rmail file.
2196 If you want your Rmail files be encoded in a specific coding system
2197 other than `emacs-mule', you can customize the variable
2198 `rmail-file-coding-system' to set its value to that coding system.
2200 ** Changes to TeX mode
2202 *** The default mode has been changed from `plain-tex-mode' to
2205 *** latex-mode now has a simple indentation algorithm.
2207 *** M-f and M-p jump around \begin...\end pairs.
2209 *** Added support for outline-minor-mode.
2211 ** Changes to RefTeX mode
2213 *** RefTeX has new support for index generation. Index entries can be
2214 created with `C-c <', with completion available on index keys.
2215 Pressing `C-c /' indexes the word at the cursor with a default
2216 macro. `C-c >' compiles all index entries into an alphabetically
2217 sorted *Index* buffer which looks like the final index. Entries
2218 can be edited from that buffer.
2220 *** Label and citation key selection now allow to select several
2221 items and reference them together (use `m' to mark items, `a' or
2222 `A' to use all marked entries).
2224 *** reftex.el has been split into a number of smaller files to reduce
2225 memory use when only a part of RefTeX is being used.
2227 *** a new command `reftex-view-crossref-from-bibtex' (bound to `C-c &'
2228 in BibTeX-mode) can be called in a BibTeX database buffer in order
2229 to show locations in LaTeX documents where a particular entry has
2232 ** Emacs Lisp mode now allows multiple levels of outline headings.
2233 The level of a heading is determined from the number of leading
2234 semicolons in a heading line. Toplevel forms starting with a `('
2235 in column 1 are always made leaves.
2237 ** The M-x time-stamp command (most commonly used on write-file-hooks)
2238 has the following new features:
2240 *** The patterns for finding the time stamp and for updating a pattern
2241 may match text spanning multiple lines. For example, some people like
2242 to have the filename and date on separate lines. The new variable
2243 time-stamp-inserts-lines controls the matching for multi-line patterns.
2245 *** More than one time stamp can be updated in the same file. This
2246 feature is useful if you need separate time stamps in a program source
2247 file to both include in formatted documentation and insert in the
2248 compiled binary. The same time-stamp will be written at each matching
2249 pattern. The variable time-stamp-count enables this new feature; it
2252 ** Partial Completion mode now completes environment variables in
2257 *** The command `ispell' now spell-checks a region if
2258 transient-mark-mode is on, and the mark is active. Otherwise it
2259 spell-checks the current buffer.
2261 *** Support for synchronous subprocesses - DOS/Windoze - has been
2264 *** An "alignment error" bug was fixed when a manual spelling
2265 correction is made and re-checked.
2267 *** An Italian, Portuguese, and Slovak dictionary definition has been added.
2269 *** Region skipping performance has been vastly improved in some
2272 *** Spell checking HTML buffers has been improved and isn't so strict
2275 *** The buffer-local words are now always placed on a new line at the
2278 *** Spell checking now works in the MS-DOS version of Emacs.
2280 ** Makefile mode changes
2282 *** The mode now uses the abbrev table `makefile-mode-abbrev-table'.
2284 *** Conditionals and include statements are now highlighted when
2285 Fontlock mode is active.
2289 *** Isearch now puts a call to `isearch-resume' in the command history,
2290 so that searches can be resumed.
2292 *** In Isearch mode, C-M-s and C-M-r are now bound like C-s and C-r,
2293 respectively, i.e. you can repeat a regexp isearch with the same keys
2294 that started the search.
2296 *** In Isearch mode, mouse-2 in the echo area now yanks the current
2297 selection into the search string rather than giving an error.
2299 *** There is a new lazy highlighting feature in incremental search.
2301 Lazy highlighting is switched on/off by customizing variable
2302 `isearch-lazy-highlight'. When active, all matches for the current
2303 search string are highlighted. The current match is highlighted as
2304 before using face `isearch' or `region'. All other matches are
2305 highlighted using face `isearch-lazy-highlight-face' which defaults to
2306 `secondary-selection'.
2308 The extra highlighting makes it easier to anticipate where the cursor
2309 will end up each time you press C-s or C-r to repeat a pending search.
2310 Highlighting of these additional matches happens in a deferred fashion
2311 using "idle timers," so the cycles needed do not rob isearch of its
2312 usual snappy response.
2314 If `isearch-lazy-highlight-cleanup' is set to t, highlights for
2315 matches are automatically cleared when you end the search. If it is
2316 set to nil, you can remove the highlights manually with `M-x
2317 isearch-lazy-highlight-cleanup'.
2321 VC has been overhauled internally. It is now modular, making it
2322 easier to plug-in arbitrary version control backends. (See Lisp
2323 Changes for details on the new structure.) As a result, the mechanism
2324 to enable and disable support for particular version systems has
2325 changed: everything is now controlled by the new variable
2326 `vc-handled-backends'. Its value is a list of symbols that identify
2327 version systems; the default is '(RCS CVS SCCS). When finding a file,
2328 each of the backends in that list is tried in order to see whether the
2329 file is registered in that backend.
2331 When registering a new file, VC first tries each of the listed
2332 backends to see if any of them considers itself "responsible" for the
2333 directory of the file (e.g. because a corresponding subdirectory for
2334 master files exists). If none of the backends is responsible, then
2335 the first backend in the list that could register the file is chosen.
2336 As a consequence, the variable `vc-default-back-end' is now obsolete.
2338 The old variable `vc-master-templates' is also obsolete, although VC
2339 still supports it for backward compatibility. To define templates for
2340 RCS or SCCS, you should rather use the new variables
2341 vc-{rcs,sccs}-master-templates. (There is no such feature under CVS
2342 where it doesn't make sense.)
2344 The variables `vc-ignore-vc-files' and `vc-handle-cvs' are also
2345 obsolete now, you must set `vc-handled-backends' to nil or exclude
2346 `CVS' from the list, respectively, to achieve their effect now.
2350 The variable `vc-checkout-carefully' is obsolete: the corresponding
2351 checks are always done now.
2353 VC Dired buffers are now kept up-to-date during all version control
2356 `vc-diff' output is now displayed in `diff-mode'.
2357 `vc-print-log' uses `log-view-mode'.
2358 `vc-log-mode' (used for *VC-Log*) has been replaced by `log-edit-mode'.
2360 The command C-x v m (vc-merge) now accepts an empty argument as the
2361 first revision number. This means that any recent changes on the
2362 current branch should be picked up from the repository and merged into
2363 the working file (``merge news'').
2365 The commands C-x v s (vc-create-snapshot) and C-x v r
2366 (vc-retrieve-snapshot) now ask for a directory name from which to work
2369 *** Multiple Backends
2371 VC now lets you register files in more than one backend. This is
2372 useful, for example, if you are working with a slow remote CVS
2373 repository. You can then use RCS for local editing, and occasionally
2374 commit your changes back to CVS, or pick up changes from CVS into your
2377 To make this work, the ``more local'' backend (RCS in our example)
2378 should come first in `vc-handled-backends', and the ``more remote''
2379 backend (CVS) should come later. (The default value of
2380 `vc-handled-backends' already has it that way.)
2382 You can then commit changes to another backend (say, RCS), by typing
2383 C-u C-x v v RCS RET (i.e. vc-next-action now accepts a backend name as
2384 a revision number). VC registers the file in the more local backend
2385 if that hasn't already happened, and commits to a branch based on the
2386 current revision number from the more remote backend.
2388 If a file is registered in multiple backends, you can switch to
2389 another one using C-x v b (vc-switch-backend). This does not change
2390 any files, it only changes VC's perspective on the file. Use this to
2391 pick up changes from CVS while working under RCS locally.
2393 After you are done with your local RCS editing, you can commit your
2394 changes back to CVS using C-u C-x v v CVS RET. In this case, the
2395 local RCS archive is removed after the commit, and the log entry
2396 buffer is initialized to contain the entire RCS change log of the file.
2400 There is a new user option, `vc-cvs-stay-local'. If it is `t' (the
2401 default), then VC avoids network queries for files registered in
2402 remote repositories. The state of such files is then only determined
2403 by heuristics and past information. `vc-cvs-stay-local' can also be a
2404 regexp to match against repository hostnames; only files from hosts
2405 that match it are treated locally. If the variable is nil, then VC
2406 queries the repository just as often as it does for local files.
2408 If `vc-cvs-stay-local' is on, then VC also makes local backups of
2409 repository versions. This means that ordinary diffs (C-x v =) and
2410 revert operations (C-x v u) can be done completely locally, without
2411 any repository interactions at all. The name of a local version
2412 backup of FILE is FILE.~REV.~, where REV is the repository version
2413 number. This format is similar to that used by C-x v ~
2414 (vc-version-other-window), except for the trailing dot. As a matter
2415 of fact, the two features can each use the files created by the other,
2416 the only difference being that files with a trailing `.' are deleted
2417 automatically after commit. (This feature doesn't work on MS-DOS,
2418 since DOS disallows more than a single dot in the trunk of a file
2421 If `vc-cvs-stay-local' is on, and there have been changes in the
2422 repository, VC notifies you about it when you actually try to commit.
2423 If you want to check for updates from the repository without trying to
2424 commit, you can either use C-x v m RET to perform an update on the
2425 current file, or you can use C-x v r RET to get an update for an
2426 entire directory tree.
2428 The new user option `vc-cvs-use-edit' indicates whether VC should call
2429 "cvs edit" to make files writeable; it defaults to `t'. (This option
2430 is only meaningful if the CVSREAD variable is set, or if files are
2431 "watched" by other developers.)
2433 The commands C-x v s (vc-create-snapshot) and C-x v r
2434 (vc-retrieve-snapshot) are now also implemented for CVS. If you give
2435 an empty snapshot name to the latter, that performs a `cvs update',
2436 starting at the given directory.
2438 *** Lisp Changes in VC
2440 VC has been restructured internally to make it modular. You can now
2441 add support for arbitrary version control backends by writing a
2442 library that provides a certain set of backend-specific functions, and
2443 then telling VC to use that library. For example, to add support for
2444 a version system named SYS, you write a library named vc-sys.el, which
2445 provides a number of functions vc-sys-... (see commentary at the top
2446 of vc.el for a detailed list of them). To make VC use that library,
2447 you need to put it somewhere into Emacs' load path and add the symbol
2448 `SYS' to the list `vc-handled-backends'.
2450 ** The customizable EDT emulation package now supports the EDT
2451 SUBS command and EDT scroll margins. It also works with more
2452 terminal/keyboard configurations and it now works under XEmacs.
2453 See etc/edt-user.doc for more information.
2455 ** New modes and packages
2457 *** The new global minor mode `minibuffer-electric-default-mode'
2458 automatically hides the `(default ...)' part of minibuffer prompts when
2459 the default is not applicable.
2461 *** Artist is an Emacs lisp package that allows you to draw lines,
2462 rectangles and ellipses by using your mouse and/or keyboard. The
2463 shapes are made up with the ascii characters |, -, / and \.
2467 - Intersecting: When a `|' intersects with a `-', a `+' is
2468 drawn, like this: | \ /
2472 - Rubber-banding: When drawing lines you can interactively see the
2473 result while holding the mouse button down and moving the mouse. If
2474 your machine is not fast enough (a 386 is a bit too slow, but a
2475 pentium is well enough), you can turn this feature off. You will
2476 then see 1's and 2's which mark the 1st and 2nd endpoint of the line
2479 - Arrows: After having drawn a (straight) line or a (straight)
2480 poly-line, you can set arrows on the line-ends by typing < or >.
2482 - Flood-filling: You can fill any area with a certain character by
2485 - Cut copy and paste: You can cut, copy and paste rectangular
2486 regions. Artist also interfaces with the rect package (this can be
2487 turned off if it causes you any trouble) so anything you cut in
2488 artist can be yanked with C-x r y and vice versa.
2490 - Drawing with keys: Everything you can do with the mouse, you can
2491 also do without the mouse.
2493 - Aspect-ratio: You can set the variable artist-aspect-ratio to
2494 reflect the height-width ratio for the font you are using. Squares
2495 and circles are then drawn square/round. Note, that once your
2496 ascii-file is shown with font with a different height-width ratio,
2497 the squares won't be square and the circles won't be round.
2499 - Drawing operations: The following drawing operations are implemented:
2501 lines straight-lines
2503 poly-lines straight poly-lines
2505 text (see-thru) text (overwrite)
2506 spray-can setting size for spraying
2507 vaporize line vaporize lines
2508 erase characters erase rectangles
2510 Straight lines are lines that go horizontally, vertically or
2511 diagonally. Plain lines go in any direction. The operations in
2512 the right column are accessed by holding down the shift key while
2515 It is possible to vaporize (erase) entire lines and connected lines
2516 (rectangles for example) as long as the lines being vaporized are
2517 straight and connected at their endpoints. Vaporizing is inspired
2518 by the drawrect package by Jari Aalto <jari.aalto@poboxes.com>.
2520 - Picture mode compatibility: Artist is picture mode compatible (this
2523 *** The new package Eshell is an operating system command shell
2524 implemented entirely in Emacs Lisp. Use `M-x eshell' to invoke it.
2525 It functions similarly to bash and zsh, and allows running of Lisp
2526 functions and external commands using the same syntax. It supports
2527 history lists, aliases, extended globbing, smart scrolling, etc. It
2528 will work on any platform Emacs has been ported to. And since most of
2529 the basic commands -- ls, rm, mv, cp, ln, du, cat, etc. -- have been
2530 rewritten in Lisp, it offers an operating-system independent shell,
2531 all within the scope of your Emacs process.
2533 *** The new package timeclock.el is a mode is for keeping track of time
2534 intervals. You can use it for whatever purpose you like, but the
2535 typical scenario is to keep track of how much time you spend working
2536 on certain projects.
2538 *** The new package hi-lock.el provides commands to highlight matches
2539 of interactively entered regexps. For example,
2541 M-x highlight-regexp RET clearly RET RET
2543 will highlight all occurrences of `clearly' using a yellow background
2544 face. New occurrences of `clearly' will be highlighted as they are
2545 typed. `M-x unhighlight-regexp RET' will remove the highlighting.
2546 Any existing face can be used for highlighting and a set of
2547 appropriate faces is provided. The regexps can be written into the
2548 current buffer in a form that will be recognized the next time the
2549 corresponding file is read. There are commands to highlight matches
2550 to phrases and to highlight entire lines containing a match.
2552 *** The new package zone.el plays games with Emacs' display when
2555 *** The new package tildify.el allows to add hard spaces or other text
2556 fragments in accordance with the current major mode.
2558 *** The new package xml.el provides a simple but generic XML
2559 parser. It doesn't parse the DTDs however.
2561 *** The comment operations are now provided by the newcomment.el
2562 package which allows different styles of comment-region and should
2563 be more robust while offering the same functionality.
2564 `comment-region' now doesn't always comment a-line-at-a-time, but only
2565 comments the region, breaking the line at point if necessary.
2567 *** The Ebrowse package implements a C++ class browser and tags
2568 facilities tailored for use with C++. It is documented in a
2569 separate Texinfo file.
2571 *** The PCL-CVS package available by either running M-x cvs-examine or
2572 by visiting a CVS administrative directory (with a prefix argument)
2573 provides an alternative interface to VC-dired for CVS. It comes with
2574 `log-view-mode' to view RCS and SCCS logs and `log-edit-mode' used to
2575 enter check-in log messages.
2577 *** The new package called `woman' allows to browse Unix man pages
2578 without invoking external programs.
2580 The command `M-x woman' formats manual pages entirely in Emacs Lisp
2581 and then displays them, like `M-x manual-entry' does. Unlike
2582 `manual-entry', `woman' does not invoke any external programs, so it
2583 is useful on systems such as MS-DOS/MS-Windows where the `man' and
2584 Groff or `troff' commands are not readily available.
2586 The command `M-x woman-find-file' asks for the file name of a man
2587 page, then formats and displays it like `M-x woman' does.
2589 *** The new command M-x re-builder offers a convenient interface for
2590 authoring regular expressions with immediate visual feedback.
2592 The buffer from which the command was called becomes the target for
2593 the regexp editor popping up in a separate window. Matching text in
2594 the target buffer is immediately color marked during the editing.
2595 Each sub-expression of the regexp will show up in a different face so
2596 even complex regexps can be edited and verified on target data in a
2599 On displays not supporting faces the matches instead blink like
2600 matching parens to make them stand out. On such a setup you will
2601 probably also want to use the sub-expression mode when the regexp
2602 contains such to get feedback about their respective limits.
2604 *** glasses-mode is a minor mode that makes
2605 unreadableIdentifiersLikeThis readable. It works as glasses, without
2606 actually modifying content of a buffer.
2608 *** The package ebnf2ps translates an EBNF to a syntactic chart in
2611 Currently accepts ad-hoc EBNF, ISO EBNF and Bison/Yacc.
2613 The ad-hoc default EBNF syntax has the following elements:
2615 ; comment (until end of line)
2619 $A default non-terminal
2620 $"C" default terminal
2621 $?C? default special
2622 A = B. production (A is the header and B the body)
2623 C D sequence (C occurs before D)
2624 C | D alternative (C or D occurs)
2625 A - B exception (A excluding B, B without any non-terminal)
2626 n * A repetition (A repeats n (integer) times)
2627 (C) group (expression C is grouped together)
2628 [C] optional (C may or not occurs)
2629 C+ one or more occurrences of C
2630 {C}+ one or more occurrences of C
2631 {C}* zero or more occurrences of C
2632 {C} zero or more occurrences of C
2633 C / D equivalent to: C {D C}*
2634 {C || D}+ equivalent to: C {D C}*
2635 {C || D}* equivalent to: [C {D C}*]
2636 {C || D} equivalent to: [C {D C}*]
2638 Please, see ebnf2ps documentation for EBNF syntax and how to use it.
2640 *** The package align.el will align columns within a region, using M-x
2641 align. Its mode-specific rules, based on regular expressions,
2642 determine where the columns should be split. In C and C++, for
2643 example, it will align variable names in declaration lists, or the
2644 equal signs of assignments.
2646 *** `paragraph-indent-minor-mode' is a new minor mode supporting
2647 paragraphs in the same style as `paragraph-indent-text-mode'.
2649 *** bs.el is a new package for buffer selection similar to
2650 list-buffers or electric-buffer-list. Use M-x bs-show to display a
2651 buffer menu with this package. See the Custom group `bs'.
2653 *** find-lisp.el is a package emulating the Unix find command in Lisp.
2655 *** calculator.el is a small calculator package that is intended to
2656 replace desktop calculators such as xcalc and calc.exe. Actually, it
2657 is not too small - it has more features than most desktop calculators,
2658 and can be customized easily to get many more functions. It should
2659 not be confused with "calc" which is a much bigger mathematical tool
2660 which answers different needs.
2662 *** The minor modes cwarn-mode and global-cwarn-mode highlights
2663 suspicious C and C++ constructions. Currently, assignments inside
2664 expressions, semicolon following `if', `for' and `while' (except, of
2665 course, after a `do .. while' statement), and C++ functions with
2666 reference parameters are recognized. The modes require font-lock mode
2669 *** smerge-mode.el provides `smerge-mode', a simple minor-mode for files
2670 containing diff3-style conflict markers, such as generated by RCS.
2672 *** 5x5.el is a simple puzzle game.
2674 *** hl-line.el provides `hl-line-mode', a minor mode to highlight the
2675 current line in the current buffer. It also provides
2676 `global-hl-line-mode' to provide the same behaviour in all buffers.
2678 *** ansi-color.el translates ANSI terminal escapes into text-properties.
2680 Please note: if `ansi-color-for-comint-mode' and
2681 `global-font-lock-mode' are non-nil, loading ansi-color.el will
2682 disable font-lock and add `ansi-color-apply' to
2683 `comint-preoutput-filter-functions' for all shell-mode buffers. This
2684 displays the output of "ls --color=yes" using the correct foreground
2685 and background colors.
2687 *** delphi.el provides a major mode for editing the Delphi (Object
2690 *** quickurl.el provides a simple method of inserting a URL based on
2693 *** sql.el provides an interface to SQL data bases.
2695 *** fortune.el uses the fortune program to create mail/news signatures.
2697 *** whitespace.el is a package for warning about and cleaning bogus
2698 whitespace in a file.
2700 *** PostScript mode (ps-mode) is a new major mode for editing PostScript
2701 files. It offers: interaction with a PostScript interpreter, including
2702 (very basic) error handling; fontification, easily customizable for
2703 interpreter messages; auto-indentation; insertion of EPSF templates and
2704 often used code snippets; viewing of BoundingBox; commenting out /
2705 uncommenting regions; conversion of 8bit characters to PostScript octal
2706 codes. All functionality is accessible through a menu.
2708 *** delim-col helps to prettify columns in a text region or rectangle.
2710 Here is an example of columns:
2713 dog pineapple car EXTRA
2714 porcupine strawberry airplane
2716 Doing the following settings:
2718 (setq delimit-columns-str-before "[ ")
2719 (setq delimit-columns-str-after " ]")
2720 (setq delimit-columns-str-separator ", ")
2721 (setq delimit-columns-separator "\t")
2724 Selecting the lines above and typing:
2726 M-x delimit-columns-region
2730 [ horse , apple , bus , ]
2731 [ dog , pineapple , car , EXTRA ]
2732 [ porcupine, strawberry, airplane, ]
2734 delim-col has the following options:
2736 delimit-columns-str-before Specify a string to be inserted
2739 delimit-columns-str-separator Specify a string to be inserted
2740 between each column.
2742 delimit-columns-str-after Specify a string to be inserted
2745 delimit-columns-separator Specify a regexp which separates
2748 delim-col has the following commands:
2750 delimit-columns-region Prettify all columns in a text region.
2751 delimit-columns-rectangle Prettify all columns in a text rectangle.
2753 *** Recentf mode maintains a menu for visiting files that were
2754 operated on recently. User option recentf-menu-filter specifies a
2755 menu filter function to change the menu appearance. For example, the
2756 recent file list can be displayed:
2758 - organized by major modes, directories or user defined rules.
2759 - sorted by file paths, file names, ascending or descending.
2760 - showing paths relative to the current default-directory
2762 The `recentf-filter-changer' menu filter function allows to
2763 dynamically change the menu appearance.
2765 *** elide-head.el provides a mechanism for eliding boilerplate header
2768 *** footnote.el provides `footnote-mode', a minor mode supporting use
2769 of footnotes. It is intended for use with Message mode, but isn't
2770 specific to Message mode.
2772 *** diff-mode.el provides `diff-mode', a major mode for
2773 viewing/editing context diffs (patches). It is selected for files
2774 with extension `.diff', `.diffs', `.patch' and `.rej'.
2776 *** EUDC, the Emacs Unified Directory Client, provides a common user
2777 interface to access directory servers using different directory
2778 protocols. It has a separate manual.
2780 *** autoconf.el provides a major mode for editing configure.in files
2781 for Autoconf, selected automatically.
2783 *** windmove.el provides moving between windows.
2785 *** crm.el provides a facility to read multiple strings from the
2786 minibuffer with completion.
2788 *** todo-mode.el provides management of TODO lists and integration
2789 with the diary features.
2791 *** autoarg.el provides a feature reported from Twenex Emacs whereby
2792 numeric keys supply prefix args rather than self inserting.
2794 *** The function `turn-off-auto-fill' unconditionally turns off Auto
2797 *** pcomplete.el is a library that provides programmable completion
2798 facilities for Emacs, similar to what zsh and tcsh offer. The main
2799 difference is that completion functions are written in Lisp, meaning
2800 they can be profiled, debugged, etc.
2802 *** antlr-mode is a new major mode for editing ANTLR grammar files.
2803 It is automatically turned on for files whose names have the extension
2806 ** Changes in sort.el
2808 The function sort-numeric-fields interprets numbers starting with `0'
2809 as octal and numbers starting with `0x' or `0X' as hexadecimal. The
2810 new user-option sort-numeric-base can be used to specify a default
2813 ** Changes to Ange-ftp
2815 *** Ange-ftp allows you to specify of a port number in remote file
2816 names cleanly. It is appended to the host name, separated by a hash
2817 sign, e.g. `/foo@bar.org#666:mumble'. (This syntax comes from EFS.)
2819 *** If the new user-option `ange-ftp-try-passive-mode' is set, passive
2820 ftp mode will be used if the ftp client supports that.
2822 *** Ange-ftp handles the output of the w32-style clients which
2823 output ^M at the end of lines.
2825 ** The recommended way of using Iswitchb is via the new global minor
2826 mode `iswitchb-mode'.
2828 ** Just loading the msb package doesn't switch on Msb mode anymore.
2829 If you have `(require 'msb)' in your .emacs, please replace it with
2832 ** Flyspell mode has various new options. See the `flyspell' Custom
2835 ** The user option `backward-delete-char-untabify-method' controls the
2836 behavior of `backward-delete-char-untabify'. The following values
2839 `untabify' -- turn a tab to many spaces, then delete one space;
2840 `hungry' -- delete all whitespace, both tabs and spaces;
2841 `all' -- delete all whitespace, including tabs, spaces and newlines;
2842 nil -- just delete one character.
2844 Default value is `untabify'.
2846 [This change was made in Emacs 20.3 but not mentioned then.]
2848 ** In Cperl mode `cperl-invalid-face' should now be a normal face
2849 symbol, not double-quoted.
2851 ** Some packages are declared obsolete, to be removed in a future
2852 version. They are: auto-show, c-mode, hilit19, hscroll, ooutline,
2853 profile, rnews, rnewspost, and sc. Their implementations have been
2854 moved to lisp/obsolete.
2856 ** auto-compression mode is no longer enabled just by loading jka-compr.el.
2857 To control it, set `auto-compression-mode' via Custom or use the
2858 `auto-compression-mode' command.
2860 ** `browse-url-gnome-moz' is a new option for
2861 `browse-url-browser-function', invoking Mozilla in GNOME, and
2862 `browse-url-kde' can be chosen for invoking the KDE browser.
2864 ** The user-option `browse-url-new-window-p' has been renamed to
2865 `browse-url-new-window-flag'.
2867 ** The functions `keep-lines', `flush-lines' and `how-many' now
2868 operate on the active region in Transient Mark mode.
2870 ** `gnus-user-agent' is a new possibility for `mail-user-agent'. It
2871 is like `message-user-agent', but with all the Gnus paraphernalia.
2873 ** The Strokes package has been updated. If your Emacs has XPM
2874 support, you can use it for pictographic editing. In Strokes mode,
2875 use C-mouse-2 to compose a complex stoke and insert it into the
2876 buffer. You can encode or decode a strokes buffer with new commands
2877 M-x strokes-encode-buffer and M-x strokes-decode-buffer. There is a
2878 new command M-x strokes-list-strokes.
2880 ** Hexl contains a new command `hexl-insert-hex-string' which inserts
2881 a string of hexadecimal numbers read from the mini-buffer.
2883 ** Hexl mode allows to insert non-ASCII characters.
2885 The non-ASCII characters are encoded using the same encoding as the
2886 file you are visiting in Hexl mode.
2888 ** Shell script mode changes.
2890 Shell script mode (sh-script) can now indent scripts for shells
2891 derived from sh and rc. The indentation style is customizable, and
2892 sh-script can attempt to "learn" the current buffer's style.
2896 *** In DOS, etags looks for file.cgz if it cannot find file.c.
2898 *** New option --ignore-case-regex is an alternative to --regex. It is now
2899 possible to bind a regexp to a language, by prepending the regexp with
2900 {lang}, where lang is one of the languages that `etags --help' prints out.
2901 This feature is useful especially for regex files, where each line contains
2902 a regular expression. The manual contains details.
2904 *** In C and derived languages, etags creates tags for function
2905 declarations when given the --declarations option.
2907 *** In C++, tags are created for "operator". The tags have the form
2908 "operator+", without spaces between the keyword and the operator.
2910 *** You shouldn't generally need any more the -C or -c++ option: etags
2911 automatically switches to C++ parsing when it meets the `class' or
2912 `template' keywords.
2914 *** Etags now is able to delve at arbitrary deeps into nested structures in
2915 C-like languages. Previously, it was limited to one or two brace levels.
2917 *** New language Ada: tags are functions, procedures, packages, tasks, and
2920 *** In Fortran, `procedure' is not tagged.
2922 *** In Java, tags are created for "interface".
2924 *** In Lisp, "(defstruct (foo", "(defun (operator" and similar constructs
2927 *** In makefiles, tags the targets.
2929 *** In Perl, the --globals option tags global variables. my and local
2930 variables are tagged.
2932 *** New language Python: def and class at the beginning of a line are tags.
2934 *** .ss files are Scheme files, .pdb is Postscript with C syntax, .psw is
2937 ** Changes in etags.el
2939 *** The new user-option tags-case-fold-search can be used to make
2940 tags operations case-sensitive or case-insensitive. The default
2941 is to use the same setting as case-fold-search.
2943 *** You can display additional output with M-x tags-apropos by setting
2944 the new variable tags-apropos-additional-actions.
2946 If non-nil, the variable's value should be a list of triples (TITLE
2947 FUNCTION TO-SEARCH). For each triple, M-x tags-apropos processes
2948 TO-SEARCH and lists tags from it. TO-SEARCH should be an alist,
2949 obarray, or symbol. If it is a symbol, the symbol's value is used.
2951 TITLE is a string to use to label the list of tags from TO-SEARCH.
2953 FUNCTION is a function to call when an entry is selected in the Tags
2954 List buffer. It is called with one argument, the selected symbol.
2956 A useful example value for this variable might be something like:
2958 '(("Emacs Lisp" Info-goto-emacs-command-node obarray)
2959 ("Common Lisp" common-lisp-hyperspec common-lisp-hyperspec-obarray)
2960 ("SCWM" scwm-documentation scwm-obarray))
2962 *** The face tags-tag-face can be used to customize the appearance
2963 of tags in the output of M-x tags-apropos.
2965 *** Setting tags-apropos-verbose to a non-nil value displays the
2966 names of tags files in the *Tags List* buffer.
2968 *** You can now search for tags that are part of the filename itself.
2969 If you have tagged the files topfile.c subdir/subfile.c
2970 /tmp/tempfile.c, you can now search for tags "topfile.c", "subfile.c",
2971 "dir/sub", "tempfile", "tempfile.c". If the tag matches the file name,
2972 point will go to the beginning of the file.
2974 *** Compressed files are now transparently supported if
2975 auto-compression-mode is active. You can tag (with Etags) and search
2976 (with find-tag) both compressed and uncompressed files.
2978 *** Tags commands like M-x tags-search no longer change point
2979 in buffers where no match is found. In buffers where a match is
2980 found, the original value of point is pushed on the marker ring.
2982 ** Fortran mode has a new command `fortran-strip-sequence-nos' to
2983 remove text past column 72. The syntax class of `\' in Fortran is now
2984 appropriate for C-style escape sequences in strings.
2986 ** SGML mode's default `sgml-validate-command' is now `nsgmls'.
2988 ** A new command `view-emacs-problems' (C-h P) displays the PROBLEMS file.
2990 ** The Dabbrev package has a new user-option `dabbrev-ignored-regexps'
2991 containing a list of regular expressions. Buffers matching a regular
2992 expression from that list, are not checked.
2994 ** Emacs can now figure out modification times of remote files.
2995 When you do C-x C-f /user@host:/path/file RET and edit the file,
2996 and someone else modifies the file, you will be prompted to revert
2997 the buffer, just like for the local files.
2999 ** The buffer menu (C-x C-b) no longer lists the *Buffer List* buffer.
3001 ** When invoked with a prefix argument, the command `list-abbrevs' now
3002 displays local abbrevs, only.
3004 ** Refill minor mode provides preliminary support for keeping
3005 paragraphs filled as you modify them.
3007 ** The variable `double-click-fuzz' specifies how much the mouse
3008 may be moved between clicks that are recognized as a pair. Its value
3009 is measured in pixels.
3011 ** The new global minor mode `auto-image-file-mode' allows image files
3012 to be visited as images.
3014 ** Two new user-options `grep-command' and `grep-find-command'
3015 were added to compile.el.
3017 ** Withdrawn packages
3019 *** mldrag.el has been removed. mouse.el provides the same
3020 functionality with aliases for the mldrag functions.
3022 *** eval-reg.el has been obsoleted by changes to edebug.el and removed.
3024 *** ph.el has been obsoleted by EUDC and removed.
3027 * Incompatible Lisp changes
3029 There are a few Lisp changes which are not backwards-compatible and
3030 may require changes to existing code. Here is a list for reference.
3031 See the sections below for details.
3033 ** Since `format' preserves text properties, the idiom
3034 `(format "%s" foo)' no longer works to copy and remove properties.
3035 Use `copy-sequence' to copy the string, then use `set-text-properties'
3036 to remove the properties of the copy.
3038 ** Since the `keymap' text property now has significance, some code
3039 which uses both `local-map' and `keymap' properties (for portability)
3040 may, for instance, give rise to duplicate menus when the keymaps from
3041 these properties are active.
3043 ** The change in the treatment of non-ASCII characters in search
3044 ranges may affect some code.
3046 ** A non-nil value for the LOCAL arg of add-hook makes the hook
3047 buffer-local even if `make-local-hook' hasn't been called, which might
3048 make a difference to some code.
3050 ** The new treatment of the minibuffer prompt might affect code which
3051 operates on the minibuffer.
3053 ** The new character sets `eight-bit-control' and `eight-bit-graphic'
3054 cause `no-conversion' and `emacs-mule-unix' coding systems to produce
3055 different results when reading files with non-ASCII characters
3056 (previously, both coding systems would produce the same results).
3057 Specifically, `no-conversion' interprets each 8-bit byte as a separate
3058 character. This makes `no-conversion' inappropriate for reading
3059 multibyte text, e.g. buffers written to disk in their internal MULE
3060 encoding (auto-saving does that, for example). If a Lisp program
3061 reads such files with `no-conversion', each byte of the multibyte
3062 sequence, including the MULE leading codes such as \201, is treated as
3063 a separate character, which prevents them from being interpreted in
3064 the buffer as multibyte characters.
3066 Therefore, Lisp programs that read files which contain the internal
3067 MULE encoding should use `emacs-mule-unix'. `no-conversion' is only
3068 appropriate for reading truly binary files.
3070 ** Code that relies on the obsolete `before-change-function' and
3071 `after-change-function' to detect buffer changes will now fail. Use
3072 `before-change-functions' and `after-change-functions' instead.
3074 ** Code that uses `concat' with integer args now gets an error, as
3077 ** The function base64-decode-string now always returns a unibyte
3080 ** Not a Lisp incompatibility as such but, with the introduction of
3081 extra private charsets, there is now only one slot free for a new
3082 dimension-2 private charset. User code which tries to add more than
3083 one extra will fail unless you rebuild Emacs with some standard
3084 charset(s) removed; that is probably inadvisable because it changes
3085 the emacs-mule encoding. Also, files stored in the emacs-mule
3086 encoding using Emacs 20 with additional private charsets defined will
3087 probably not be read correctly by Emacs 21.
3089 ** The variable `directory-sep-char' is slated for removal.
3090 Not really a change (yet), but a projected one that you should be
3091 aware of: The variable `directory-sep-char' is deprecated, and should
3092 not be used. It was always ignored on GNU/Linux and Unix systems and
3093 on MS-DOS, but the MS-Windows port tried to support it by adapting the
3094 behavior of certain primitives to the value of this variable. It
3095 turned out that such support cannot be reliable, so it was decided to
3096 remove this variable in the near future. Lisp programs are well
3097 advised not to set it to anything but '/', because any different value
3098 will not have any effect when support for this variable is removed.
3101 * Lisp changes made after edition 2.6 of the Emacs Lisp Manual,
3102 (Display-related features are described in a page of their own below.)
3104 ** Function assq-delete-all replaces function assoc-delete-all.
3106 ** The new function animate-string, from lisp/play/animate.el
3107 allows the animated display of strings.
3109 ** The new function `interactive-form' can be used to obtain the
3110 interactive form of a function.
3112 ** The keyword :set-after in defcustom allows to specify dependencies
3113 between custom options. Example:
3115 (defcustom default-input-method nil
3116 "*Default input method for multilingual text (a string).
3117 This is the input method activated automatically by the command
3118 `toggle-input-method' (\\[toggle-input-method])."
3120 :type '(choice (const nil) string)
3121 :set-after '(current-language-environment))
3123 This specifies that default-input-method should be set after
3124 current-language-environment even if default-input-method appears
3125 first in a custom-set-variables statement.
3127 ** The new hook `kbd-macro-termination-hook' is run at the end of
3128 function execute-kbd-macro. Functions on this hook are called with no
3129 args. The hook is run independent of how the macro was terminated
3130 (signal or normal termination).
3132 ** Functions `butlast' and `nbutlast' for removing trailing elements
3133 from a list are now available without requiring the CL package.
3135 ** The new user-option `even-window-heights' can be set to nil
3136 to prevent `display-buffer' from evening out window heights.
3138 ** The user-option `face-font-registry-alternatives' specifies
3139 alternative font registry names to try when looking for a font.
3141 ** Function `md5' calculates the MD5 "message digest"/"checksum".
3143 ** Function `delete-frame' runs `delete-frame-hook' before actually
3144 deleting the frame. The hook is called with one arg, the frame
3147 ** `add-hook' now makes the hook local if called with a non-nil LOCAL arg.
3149 ** The treatment of non-ASCII characters in search ranges has changed.
3150 If a range in a regular expression or the arg of
3151 skip-chars-forward/backward starts with a unibyte character C and ends
3152 with a multibyte character C2, the range is divided into two: one is
3153 C..?\377, the other is C1..C2, where C1 is the first character of C2's
3156 ** The new function `display-message-or-buffer' displays a message in
3157 the echo area or pops up a buffer, depending on the length of the
3160 ** The new macro `with-auto-compression-mode' allows evaluating an
3161 expression with auto-compression-mode enabled.
3163 ** In image specifications, `:heuristic-mask' has been replaced
3164 with the more general `:mask' property.
3166 ** Image specifications accept more `:conversion's.
3168 ** A `?' can be used in a symbol name without escaping it with a
3171 ** Reading from the mini-buffer now reads from standard input if Emacs
3172 is running in batch mode. For example,
3174 (message "%s" (read t))
3176 will read a Lisp expression from standard input and print the result
3179 ** The argument of `down-list', `backward-up-list', `up-list',
3180 `kill-sexp', `backward-kill-sexp' and `mark-sexp' is now optional.
3182 ** If `display-buffer-reuse-frames' is set, function `display-buffer'
3183 will raise frames displaying a buffer, instead of creating a new
3186 ** Two new functions for removing elements from lists/sequences
3189 - Function: remove ELT SEQ
3191 Return a copy of SEQ with all occurrences of ELT removed. SEQ must be
3192 a list, vector, or string. The comparison is done with `equal'.
3194 - Function: remq ELT LIST
3196 Return a copy of LIST with all occurrences of ELT removed. The
3197 comparison is done with `eq'.
3199 ** The function `delete' now also works with vectors and strings.
3201 ** The meaning of the `:weakness WEAK' argument of make-hash-table
3202 has been changed: WEAK can now have new values `key-or-value' and
3203 `key-and-value', in addition the `nil', `key', `value', and `t'.
3205 ** Function `aset' stores any multibyte character in any string
3206 without signaling "Attempt to change char length of a string". It may
3207 convert a unibyte string to multibyte if necessary.
3209 ** The value of the `help-echo' text property is called as a function
3210 or evaluated, if it is not a string already, to obtain a help string.
3212 ** Function `make-obsolete' now has an optional arg to say when the
3213 function was declared obsolete.
3215 ** Function `plist-member' is renamed from `widget-plist-member' (which is
3216 retained as an alias).
3218 ** Easy-menu's :filter now works as in XEmacs.
3219 It takes the unconverted (i.e. XEmacs) form of the menu and the result
3220 is automatically converted to Emacs' form.
3222 ** The new function `window-list' has been defined
3224 - Function: window-list &optional FRAME WINDOW MINIBUF
3226 Return a list of windows on FRAME, starting with WINDOW. FRAME nil or
3227 omitted means use the selected frame. WINDOW nil or omitted means use
3228 the selected window. MINIBUF t means include the minibuffer window,
3229 even if it isn't active. MINIBUF nil or omitted means include the
3230 minibuffer window only if it's active. MINIBUF neither nil nor t
3231 means never include the minibuffer window.
3233 ** There's a new function `get-window-with-predicate' defined as follows
3235 - Function: get-window-with-predicate PREDICATE &optional MINIBUF ALL-FRAMES DEFAULT
3237 Return a window satisfying PREDICATE.
3239 This function cycles through all visible windows using `walk-windows',
3240 calling PREDICATE on each one. PREDICATE is called with a window as
3241 argument. The first window for which PREDICATE returns a non-nil
3242 value is returned. If no window satisfies PREDICATE, DEFAULT is
3245 Optional second arg MINIBUF t means count the minibuffer window even
3246 if not active. MINIBUF nil or omitted means count the minibuffer iff
3247 it is active. MINIBUF neither t nor nil means not to count the
3248 minibuffer even if it is active.
3250 Several frames may share a single minibuffer; if the minibuffer
3251 counts, all windows on all frames that share that minibuffer count
3252 too. Therefore, if you are using a separate minibuffer frame
3253 and the minibuffer is active and MINIBUF says it counts,
3254 `walk-windows' includes the windows in the frame from which you
3255 entered the minibuffer, as well as the minibuffer window.
3257 ALL-FRAMES is the optional third argument.
3258 ALL-FRAMES nil or omitted means cycle within the frames as specified above.
3259 ALL-FRAMES = `visible' means include windows on all visible frames.
3260 ALL-FRAMES = 0 means include windows on all visible and iconified frames.
3261 ALL-FRAMES = t means include windows on all frames including invisible frames.
3262 If ALL-FRAMES is a frame, it means include windows on that frame.
3263 Anything else means restrict to the selected frame.
3265 ** The function `single-key-description' now encloses function key and
3266 event names in angle brackets. When called with a second optional
3267 argument non-nil, angle brackets won't be printed.
3269 ** If the variable `message-truncate-lines' is bound to t around a
3270 call to `message', the echo area will not be resized to display that
3271 message; it will be truncated instead, as it was done in 20.x.
3272 Default value is nil.
3274 ** The user option `line-number-display-limit' can now be set to nil,
3277 ** The new user option `line-number-display-limit-width' controls
3278 the maximum width of lines in a buffer for which Emacs displays line
3279 numbers in the mode line. The default is 200.
3281 ** `select-safe-coding-system' now also checks the most preferred
3282 coding-system if buffer-file-coding-system is `undecided' and
3283 DEFAULT-CODING-SYSTEM is not specified,
3285 ** The function `subr-arity' provides information about the argument
3286 list of a primitive.
3288 ** `where-is-internal' now also accepts a list of keymaps.
3290 ** The text property `keymap' specifies a key map which overrides the
3291 buffer's local map and the map specified by the `local-map' property.
3292 This is probably what most current uses of `local-map' want, rather
3293 than replacing the local map.
3295 ** The obsolete variables `before-change-function' and
3296 `after-change-function' are no longer acted upon and have been
3297 removed. Use `before-change-functions' and `after-change-functions'
3300 ** The function `apropos-mode' runs the hook `apropos-mode-hook'.
3302 ** `concat' no longer accepts individual integer arguments,
3303 as promised long ago.
3305 ** The new function `float-time' returns the current time as a float.
3307 ** The new variable auto-coding-regexp-alist specifies coding systems
3308 for reading specific files, analogous to auto-coding-alist, but
3309 patterns are checked against file contents instead of file names.
3312 * Lisp changes in Emacs 21.1 (see following page for display-related features)
3314 ** The new package rx.el provides an alternative sexp notation for
3315 regular expressions.
3317 - Function: rx-to-string SEXP
3319 Translate SEXP into a regular expression in string notation.
3323 Translate SEXP into a regular expression in string notation.
3325 The following are valid subforms of regular expressions in sexp
3329 matches string STRING literally.
3332 matches character CHAR literally.
3335 matches any character except a newline.
3338 matches any character
3341 matches any character in SET. SET may be a character or string.
3342 Ranges of characters can be specified as `A-Z' in strings.
3348 matches any character not in SET
3351 matches the empty string, but only at the beginning of a line
3352 in the text being matched
3355 is similar to `line-start' but matches only at the end of a line
3358 matches the empty string, but only at the beginning of the
3359 string being matched against.
3362 matches the empty string, but only at the end of the
3363 string being matched against.
3366 matches the empty string, but only at the beginning of the
3367 buffer being matched against.
3370 matches the empty string, but only at the end of the
3371 buffer being matched against.
3374 matches the empty string, but only at point.
3377 matches the empty string, but only at the beginning or end of a
3381 matches the empty string, but only at the end of a word.
3384 matches the empty string, but only at the beginning or end of a
3387 `(not word-boundary)'
3388 matches the empty string, but not at the beginning or end of a
3392 matches 0 through 9.
3395 matches ASCII control characters.
3398 matches 0 through 9, a through f and A through F.
3401 matches space and tab only.
3404 matches graphic characters--everything except ASCII control chars,
3408 matches printing characters--everything except ASCII control chars
3412 matches letters and digits. (But at present, for multibyte characters,
3413 it matches anything that has word syntax.)
3416 matches letters. (But at present, for multibyte characters,
3417 it matches anything that has word syntax.)
3420 matches ASCII (unibyte) characters.
3423 matches non-ASCII (multibyte) characters.
3426 matches anything lower-case.
3429 matches anything upper-case.
3432 matches punctuation. (But at present, for multibyte characters,
3433 it matches anything that has non-word syntax.)
3436 matches anything that has whitespace syntax.
3439 matches anything that has word syntax.
3442 matches a character with syntax SYNTAX. SYNTAX must be one
3443 of the following symbols.
3445 `whitespace' (\\s- in string notation)
3446 `punctuation' (\\s.)
3449 `open-parenthesis' (\\s()
3450 `close-parenthesis' (\\s))
3451 `expression-prefix' (\\s')
3452 `string-quote' (\\s\")
3453 `paired-delimiter' (\\s$)
3455 `character-quote' (\\s/)
3456 `comment-start' (\\s<)
3457 `comment-end' (\\s>)
3459 `(not (syntax SYNTAX))'
3460 matches a character that has not syntax SYNTAX.
3462 `(category CATEGORY)'
3463 matches a character with category CATEGORY. CATEGORY must be
3464 either a character to use for C, or one of the following symbols.
3466 `consonant' (\\c0 in string notation)
3468 `upper-diacritical-mark' (\\c2)
3469 `lower-diacritical-mark' (\\c3)
3473 `vowel-modifying-diacritical-mark' (\\c7)
3475 `semivowel-lower' (\\c9)
3476 `not-at-end-of-line' (\\c<)
3477 `not-at-beginning-of-line' (\\c>)
3478 `alpha-numeric-two-byte' (\\cA)
3479 `chinse-two-byte' (\\cC)
3480 `greek-two-byte' (\\cG)
3481 `japanese-hiragana-two-byte' (\\cH)
3482 `indian-tow-byte' (\\cI)
3483 `japanese-katakana-two-byte' (\\cK)
3484 `korean-hangul-two-byte' (\\cN)
3485 `cyrillic-two-byte' (\\cY)
3494 `japanese-katakana' (\\ck)
3498 `japanese-roman' (\\cr)
3505 `(not (category CATEGORY))'
3506 matches a character that has not category CATEGORY.
3508 `(and SEXP1 SEXP2 ...)'
3509 matches what SEXP1 matches, followed by what SEXP2 matches, etc.
3511 `(submatch SEXP1 SEXP2 ...)'
3512 like `and', but makes the match accessible with `match-end',
3513 `match-beginning', and `match-string'.
3515 `(group SEXP1 SEXP2 ...)'
3516 another name for `submatch'.
3518 `(or SEXP1 SEXP2 ...)'
3519 matches anything that matches SEXP1 or SEXP2, etc. If all
3520 args are strings, use `regexp-opt' to optimize the resulting
3523 `(minimal-match SEXP)'
3524 produce a non-greedy regexp for SEXP. Normally, regexps matching
3525 zero or more occurrances of something are \"greedy\" in that they
3526 match as much as they can, as long as the overall regexp can
3527 still match. A non-greedy regexp matches as little as possible.
3529 `(maximal-match SEXP)'
3530 produce a greedy regexp for SEXP. This is the default.
3532 `(zero-or-more SEXP)'
3533 matches zero or more occurrences of what SEXP matches.
3536 like `zero-or-more'.
3539 like `zero-or-more', but always produces a greedy regexp.
3542 like `zero-or-more', but always produces a non-greedy regexp.
3544 `(one-or-more SEXP)'
3545 matches one or more occurrences of A.
3551 like `one-or-more', but always produces a greedy regexp.
3554 like `one-or-more', but always produces a non-greedy regexp.
3556 `(zero-or-one SEXP)'
3557 matches zero or one occurrences of A.
3563 like `zero-or-one', but always produces a greedy regexp.
3566 like `zero-or-one', but always produces a non-greedy regexp.
3569 matches N occurrences of what SEXP matches.
3572 matches N to M occurrences of what SEXP matches.
3575 evaluate FORM and insert result. If result is a string,
3579 include REGEXP in string notation in the result.
3581 *** The features `md5' and `overlay' are now provided by default.
3583 *** The special form `save-restriction' now works correctly even if the
3584 buffer is widened inside the save-restriction and changes made outside
3585 the original restriction. Previously, doing this would cause the saved
3586 restriction to be restored incorrectly.
3588 *** The functions `find-charset-region' and `find-charset-string' include
3589 `eight-bit-control' and/or `eight-bit-graphic' in the returned list
3590 when they find 8-bit characters. Previously, they included `ascii' in a
3591 multibyte buffer and `unknown' in a unibyte buffer.
3593 *** The functions `set-buffer-multibyte', `string-as-multibyte' and
3594 `string-as-unibyte' change the byte sequence of a buffer or a string
3595 if it contains a character from the `eight-bit-control' character set.
3597 *** The handling of multibyte sequences in a multibyte buffer is
3598 changed. Previously, a byte sequence matching the pattern
3599 [\200-\237][\240-\377]+ was interpreted as a single character
3600 regardless of the length of the trailing bytes [\240-\377]+. Thus, if
3601 the sequence was longer than what the leading byte indicated, the
3602 extra trailing bytes were ignored by Lisp functions. Now such extra
3603 bytes are independent 8-bit characters belonging to the charset
3606 ** Fontsets are now implemented using char-tables.
3608 A fontset can now be specified for each independent character, for
3609 a group of characters or for a character set rather than just for a
3610 character set as previously.
3612 *** The arguments of the function `set-fontset-font' are changed.
3613 They are NAME, CHARACTER, FONTNAME, and optional FRAME. The function
3614 modifies fontset NAME to use FONTNAME for CHARACTER.
3616 CHARACTER may be a cons (FROM . TO), where FROM and TO are non-generic
3617 characters. In that case FONTNAME is used for all characters in the
3618 range FROM and TO (inclusive). CHARACTER may be a charset. In that
3619 case FONTNAME is used for all character in the charset.
3621 FONTNAME may be a cons (FAMILY . REGISTRY), where FAMILY is the family
3622 name of a font and REGISTRY is a registry name of a font.
3624 *** Variable x-charset-registry has been deleted. The default charset
3625 registries of character sets are set in the default fontset
3628 *** The function `create-fontset-from-fontset-spec' ignores the second
3629 argument STYLE-VARIANT. It never creates style-variant fontsets.
3631 ** The method of composing characters is changed. Now character
3632 composition is done by a special text property `composition' in
3633 buffers and strings.
3635 *** Charset composition is deleted. Emacs never creates a `composite
3636 character' which is an independent character with a unique character
3637 code. Thus the following functions handling `composite characters'
3638 have been deleted: composite-char-component,
3639 composite-char-component-count, composite-char-composition-rule,
3640 composite-char-composition-rule and decompose-composite-char delete.
3641 The variables leading-code-composition and min-composite-char have
3644 *** Three more glyph reference points are added. They can be used to
3645 specify a composition rule. See the documentation of the variable
3646 `reference-point-alist' for more detail.
3648 *** The function `compose-region' takes new arguments COMPONENTS and
3649 MODIFICATION-FUNC. With COMPONENTS, you can specify not only a
3650 composition rule but also characters to be composed. Such characters
3651 may differ between buffer and string text.
3653 *** The function `compose-string' takes new arguments START, END,
3654 COMPONENTS, and MODIFICATION-FUNC.
3656 *** The function `compose-string' puts text property `composition'
3657 directly on the argument STRING instead of returning a new string.
3658 Likewise, the function `decompose-string' just removes text property
3659 `composition' from STRING.
3661 *** The new function `find-composition' returns information about
3662 a composition at a specified position in a buffer or a string.
3664 *** The function `decompose-composite-char' is now labeled as
3667 ** The new coding system `mac-roman' is primarily intended for use on
3668 the Macintosh but may be used generally for Macintosh-encoded text.
3670 ** The new character sets `mule-unicode-0100-24ff',
3671 `mule-unicode-2500-33ff', and `mule-unicode-e000-ffff' have been
3672 introduced for Unicode characters in the range U+0100..U+24FF,
3673 U+2500..U+33FF, U+E000..U+FFFF respectively.
3675 Note that the character sets are not yet unified in Emacs, so
3676 characters which belong to charsets such as Latin-2, Greek, Hebrew,
3677 etc. and the same characters in the `mule-unicode-*' charsets are
3678 different characters, as far as Emacs is concerned. For example, text
3679 which includes Unicode characters from the Latin-2 locale cannot be
3680 encoded by Emacs with ISO 8859-2 coding system.
3682 ** The new coding system `mule-utf-8' has been added.
3683 It provides limited support for decoding/encoding UTF-8 text. For
3684 details, please see the documentation string of this coding system.
3686 ** The new character sets `japanese-jisx0213-1' and
3687 `japanese-jisx0213-2' have been introduced for the new Japanese
3688 standard JIS X 0213 Plane 1 and Plane 2.
3690 ** The new character sets `latin-iso8859-14' and `latin-iso8859-15'
3691 have been introduced.
3693 ** The new character sets `eight-bit-control' and `eight-bit-graphic'
3694 have been introduced for 8-bit characters in the ranges 0x80..0x9F and
3695 0xA0..0xFF respectively. Note that the multibyte representation of
3696 eight-bit-control is never exposed; this leads to an exception in the
3697 emacs-mule coding system, which encodes everything else to the
3698 buffer/string internal representation. Note that to search for
3699 eight-bit-graphic characters in a multibyte buffer, the search string
3700 must be multibyte, otherwise such characters will be converted to
3701 their multibyte equivalent.
3703 ** If the APPEND argument of `write-region' is an integer, it seeks to
3704 that offset in the file before writing.
3706 ** The function `add-minor-mode' has been added for convenience and
3707 compatibility with XEmacs (and is used internally by define-minor-mode).
3709 ** The function `shell-command' now sets the default directory of the
3710 `*Shell Command Output*' buffer to the default directory of the buffer
3711 from which the command was issued.
3713 ** The functions `query-replace', `query-replace-regexp',
3714 `query-replace-regexp-eval' `map-query-replace-regexp',
3715 `replace-string', `replace-regexp', and `perform-replace' take two
3716 additional optional arguments START and END that specify the region to
3719 ** The new function `count-screen-lines' is a more flexible alternative
3720 to `window-buffer-height'.
3722 - Function: count-screen-lines &optional BEG END COUNT-FINAL-NEWLINE WINDOW
3724 Return the number of screen lines in the region between BEG and END.
3725 The number of screen lines may be different from the number of actual
3726 lines, due to line breaking, display table, etc.
3728 Optional arguments BEG and END default to `point-min' and `point-max'
3731 If region ends with a newline, ignore it unless optional third argument
3732 COUNT-FINAL-NEWLINE is non-nil.
3734 The optional fourth argument WINDOW specifies the window used for
3735 obtaining parameters such as width, horizontal scrolling, and so
3736 on. The default is to use the selected window's parameters.
3738 Like `vertical-motion', `count-screen-lines' always uses the current
3739 buffer, regardless of which buffer is displayed in WINDOW. This makes
3740 possible to use `count-screen-lines' in any buffer, whether or not it
3741 is currently displayed in some window.
3743 ** The new function `mapc' is like `mapcar' but doesn't collect the
3744 argument function's results.
3746 ** The functions base64-decode-region and base64-decode-string now
3747 signal an error instead of returning nil if decoding fails. Also,
3748 `base64-decode-string' now always returns a unibyte string (in Emacs
3749 20, it returned a multibyte string when the result was a valid multibyte
3752 ** The function sendmail-user-agent-compose now recognizes a `body'
3753 header in the list of headers passed to it.
3755 ** The new function member-ignore-case works like `member', but
3756 ignores differences in case and text representation.
3758 ** The buffer-local variable cursor-type can be used to specify the
3759 cursor to use in windows displaying a buffer. Values are interpreted
3762 t use the cursor specified for the frame (default)
3763 nil don't display a cursor
3764 `bar' display a bar cursor with default width
3765 (bar . WIDTH) display a bar cursor with width WIDTH
3766 others display a box cursor.
3768 ** The variable open-paren-in-column-0-is-defun-start controls whether
3769 an open parenthesis in column 0 is considered to be the start of a
3770 defun. If set, the default, it is considered a defun start. If not
3771 set, an open parenthesis in column 0 has no special meaning.
3773 ** The new function `string-to-syntax' can be used to translate syntax
3774 specifications in string form as accepted by `modify-syntax-entry' to
3775 the cons-cell form that is used for the values of the `syntax-table'
3776 text property, and in `font-lock-syntactic-keywords'.
3780 (string-to-syntax "()")
3783 ** Emacs' reader supports CL read syntax for integers in bases
3786 *** `#BINTEGER' or `#bINTEGER' reads INTEGER in binary (radix 2).
3787 INTEGER optionally contains a sign.
3794 *** `#OINTEGER' or `#oINTEGER' reads INTEGER in octal (radix 8).
3799 *** `#XINTEGER' or `#xINTEGER' reads INTEGER in hexadecimal (radix 16).
3804 *** `#RADIXrINTEGER' reads INTEGER in radix RADIX, 2 <= RADIX <= 36.
3811 ** The function `documentation-property' now evaluates the value of
3812 the given property to obtain a string if it doesn't refer to etc/DOC
3815 ** If called for a symbol, the function `documentation' now looks for
3816 a `function-documentation' property of that symbol. If it has a non-nil
3817 value, the documentation is taken from that value. If the value is
3818 not a string, it is evaluated to obtain a string.
3820 ** The last argument of `define-key-after' defaults to t for convenience.
3822 ** The new function `replace-regexp-in-string' replaces all matches
3823 for a regexp in a string.
3825 ** `mouse-position' now runs the abnormal hook
3826 `mouse-position-function'.
3828 ** The function string-to-number now returns a float for numbers
3829 that don't fit into a Lisp integer.
3831 ** The variable keyword-symbols-constants-flag has been removed.
3832 Keywords are now always considered constants.
3834 ** The new function `delete-and-extract-region' deletes text and
3837 ** The function `clear-this-command-keys' now also clears the vector
3838 returned by function `recent-keys'.
3840 ** Variables `beginning-of-defun-function' and `end-of-defun-function'
3841 can be used to define handlers for the functions that find defuns.
3842 Major modes can define these locally instead of rebinding C-M-a
3843 etc. if the normal conventions for defuns are not appropriate for the
3846 ** easy-mmode-define-minor-mode now takes an additional BODY argument
3847 and is renamed `define-minor-mode'.
3849 ** If an abbrev has a hook function which is a symbol, and that symbol
3850 has a non-nil `no-self-insert' property, the return value of the hook
3851 function specifies whether an expansion has been done or not. If it
3852 returns nil, abbrev-expand also returns nil, meaning "no expansion has
3855 When abbrev expansion is done by typing a self-inserting character,
3856 and the abbrev has a hook with the `no-self-insert' property, and the
3857 hook function returns non-nil meaning expansion has been done,
3858 then the self-inserting character is not inserted.
3860 ** The function `intern-soft' now accepts a symbol as first argument.
3861 In this case, that exact symbol is looked up in the specified obarray,
3862 and the function's value is nil if it is not found.
3864 ** The new macro `with-syntax-table' can be used to evaluate forms
3865 with the syntax table of the current buffer temporarily set to a
3868 (with-syntax-table TABLE &rest BODY)
3870 Evaluate BODY with syntax table of current buffer set to a copy of
3871 TABLE. The current syntax table is saved, BODY is evaluated, and the
3872 saved table is restored, even in case of an abnormal exit. Value is
3875 ** Regular expressions now support intervals \{n,m\} as well as
3876 Perl's shy-groups \(?:...\) and non-greedy *? +? and ?? operators.
3877 Also back-references like \2 are now considered as an error if the
3878 corresponding subgroup does not exist (or is not closed yet).
3879 Previously it would have been silently turned into `2' (ignoring the `\').
3881 ** The optional argument BUFFER of function file-local-copy has been
3882 removed since it wasn't used by anything.
3884 ** The file name argument of function `file-locked-p' is now required
3885 instead of being optional.
3887 ** The new built-in error `text-read-only' is signaled when trying to
3888 modify read-only text.
3890 ** New functions and variables for locales.
3892 The new variable `locale-coding-system' specifies how to encode and
3893 decode strings passed to low-level message functions like strerror and
3894 time functions like strftime. The new variables
3895 `system-messages-locale' and `system-time-locale' give the system
3896 locales to be used when invoking these two types of functions.
3898 The new function `set-locale-environment' sets the language
3899 environment, preferred coding system, and locale coding system from
3900 the system locale as specified by the LC_ALL, LC_CTYPE, and LANG
3901 environment variables. Normally, it is invoked during startup and need
3902 not be invoked thereafter. It uses the new variables
3903 `locale-language-names', `locale-charset-language-names', and
3904 `locale-preferred-coding-systems' to make its decisions.
3906 ** syntax tables now understand nested comments.
3907 To declare a comment syntax as allowing nesting, just add an `n'
3908 modifier to either of the characters of the comment end and the comment
3911 ** The function `pixmap-spec-p' has been renamed `bitmap-spec-p'
3912 because `bitmap' is more in line with the usual X terminology.
3914 ** New function `propertize'
3916 The new function `propertize' can be used to conveniently construct
3917 strings with text properties.
3919 - Function: propertize STRING &rest PROPERTIES
3921 Value is a copy of STRING with text properties assigned as specified
3922 by PROPERTIES. PROPERTIES is a sequence of pairs PROPERTY VALUE, with
3923 PROPERTY being the name of a text property and VALUE being the
3924 specified value of that property. Example:
3926 (propertize "foo" 'face 'bold 'read-only t)
3928 ** push and pop macros.
3930 Simple versions of the push and pop macros of Common Lisp
3931 are now defined in Emacs Lisp. These macros allow only symbols
3932 as the place that holds the list to be changed.
3934 (push NEWELT LISTNAME) add NEWELT to the front of LISTNAME's value.
3935 (pop LISTNAME) return first elt of LISTNAME, and remove it
3936 (thus altering the value of LISTNAME).
3938 ** New dolist and dotimes macros.
3940 Simple versions of the dolist and dotimes macros of Common Lisp
3941 are now defined in Emacs Lisp.
3943 (dolist (VAR LIST [RESULT]) BODY...)
3944 Execute body once for each element of LIST,
3945 using the variable VAR to hold the current element.
3946 Then return the value of RESULT, or nil if RESULT is omitted.
3948 (dotimes (VAR COUNT [RESULT]) BODY...)
3949 Execute BODY with VAR bound to successive integers running from 0,
3950 inclusive, to COUNT, exclusive.
3951 Then return the value of RESULT, or nil if RESULT is omitted.
3953 ** Regular expressions now support Posix character classes such as
3954 [:alpha:], [:space:] and so on. These must be used within a character
3955 class--for instance, [-[:digit:].+] matches digits or a period
3958 [:digit:] matches 0 through 9
3959 [:cntrl:] matches ASCII control characters
3960 [:xdigit:] matches 0 through 9, a through f and A through F.
3961 [:blank:] matches space and tab only
3962 [:graph:] matches graphic characters--everything except ASCII control chars,
3964 [:print:] matches printing characters--everything except ASCII control chars
3966 [:alnum:] matches letters and digits.
3967 (But at present, for multibyte characters,
3968 it matches anything that has word syntax.)
3969 [:alpha:] matches letters.
3970 (But at present, for multibyte characters,
3971 it matches anything that has word syntax.)
3972 [:ascii:] matches ASCII (unibyte) characters.
3973 [:nonascii:] matches non-ASCII (multibyte) characters.
3974 [:lower:] matches anything lower-case.
3975 [:punct:] matches punctuation.
3976 (But at present, for multibyte characters,
3977 it matches anything that has non-word syntax.)
3978 [:space:] matches anything that has whitespace syntax.
3979 [:upper:] matches anything upper-case.
3980 [:word:] matches anything that has word syntax.
3982 ** Emacs now has built-in hash tables.
3984 The following functions are defined for hash tables:
3986 - Function: make-hash-table ARGS
3988 The argument list ARGS consists of keyword/argument pairs. All arguments
3989 are optional. The following arguments are defined:
3993 TEST must be a symbol specifying how to compare keys. Default is `eql'.
3994 Predefined are `eq', `eql' and `equal'. If TEST is not predefined,
3995 it must have been defined with `define-hash-table-test'.
3999 SIZE must be an integer > 0 giving a hint to the implementation how
4000 many elements will be put in the hash table. Default size is 65.
4002 :rehash-size REHASH-SIZE
4004 REHASH-SIZE specifies by how much to grow a hash table once it becomes
4005 full. If REHASH-SIZE is an integer, add that to the hash table's old
4006 size to get the new size. Otherwise, REHASH-SIZE must be a float >
4007 1.0, and the new size is computed by multiplying REHASH-SIZE with the
4008 old size. Default rehash size is 1.5.
4010 :rehash-threshold THRESHOLD
4012 THRESHOLD must be a float > 0 and <= 1.0 specifying when to resize the
4013 hash table. It is resized when the ratio of (number of entries) /
4014 (size of hash table) is >= THRESHOLD. Default threshold is 0.8.
4018 WEAK must be either nil, one of the symbols `key, `value',
4019 `key-or-value', `key-and-value', or t, meaning the same as
4020 `key-and-value'. Entries are removed from weak tables during garbage
4021 collection if their key and/or value are not referenced elsewhere
4022 outside of the hash table. Default are non-weak hash tables.
4024 - Function: makehash &optional TEST
4026 Similar to make-hash-table, but only TEST can be specified.
4028 - Function: hash-table-p TABLE
4030 Returns non-nil if TABLE is a hash table object.
4032 - Function: copy-hash-table TABLE
4034 Returns a copy of TABLE. Only the table itself is copied, keys and
4037 - Function: hash-table-count TABLE
4039 Returns the number of entries in TABLE.
4041 - Function: hash-table-rehash-size TABLE
4043 Returns the rehash size of TABLE.
4045 - Function: hash-table-rehash-threshold TABLE
4047 Returns the rehash threshold of TABLE.
4049 - Function: hash-table-rehash-size TABLE
4051 Returns the size of TABLE.
4053 - Function: hash-table-test TABLE
4055 Returns the test TABLE uses to compare keys.
4057 - Function: hash-table-weakness TABLE
4059 Returns the weakness specified for TABLE.
4061 - Function: clrhash TABLE
4065 - Function: gethash KEY TABLE &optional DEFAULT
4067 Look up KEY in TABLE and return its associated VALUE or DEFAULT if
4070 - Function: puthash KEY VALUE TABLE
4072 Associate KEY with VALUE in TABLE. If KEY is already associated with
4073 another value, replace the old value with VALUE.
4075 - Function: remhash KEY TABLE
4077 Remove KEY from TABLE if it is there.
4079 - Function: maphash FUNCTION TABLE
4081 Call FUNCTION for all elements in TABLE. FUNCTION must take two
4082 arguments KEY and VALUE.
4084 - Function: sxhash OBJ
4086 Return a hash code for Lisp object OBJ.
4088 - Function: define-hash-table-test NAME TEST-FN HASH-FN
4090 Define a new hash table test named NAME. If NAME is specified as
4091 a test in `make-hash-table', the table created will use TEST-FN for
4092 comparing keys, and HASH-FN to compute hash codes for keys. Test
4093 and hash function are stored as symbol property `hash-table-test'
4094 of NAME with a value of (TEST-FN HASH-FN).
4096 TEST-FN must take two arguments and return non-nil if they are the same.
4098 HASH-FN must take one argument and return an integer that is the hash
4099 code of the argument. The function should use the whole range of
4100 integer values for hash code computation, including negative integers.
4102 Example: The following creates a hash table whose keys are supposed to
4103 be strings that are compared case-insensitively.
4105 (defun case-fold-string= (a b)
4106 (compare-strings a nil nil b nil nil t))
4108 (defun case-fold-string-hash (a)
4109 (sxhash (upcase a)))
4111 (define-hash-table-test 'case-fold 'case-fold-string=
4112 'case-fold-string-hash))
4114 (make-hash-table :test 'case-fold)
4116 ** The Lisp reader handles circular structure.
4118 It now works to use the #N= and #N# constructs to represent
4119 circular structures. For example, #1=(a . #1#) represents
4120 a cons cell which is its own cdr.
4122 ** The Lisp printer handles circular structure.
4124 If you bind print-circle to a non-nil value, the Lisp printer outputs
4125 #N= and #N# constructs to represent circular and shared structure.
4127 ** If the second argument to `move-to-column' is anything but nil or
4128 t, that means replace a tab with spaces if necessary to reach the
4129 specified column, but do not add spaces at the end of the line if it
4130 is too short to reach that column.
4132 ** perform-replace has a new feature: the REPLACEMENTS argument may
4133 now be a cons cell (FUNCTION . DATA). This means to call FUNCTION
4134 after each match to get the replacement text. FUNCTION is called with
4135 two arguments: DATA, and the number of replacements already made.
4137 If the FROM-STRING contains any upper-case letters,
4138 perform-replace also turns off `case-fold-search' temporarily
4139 and inserts the replacement text without altering case in it.
4141 ** The function buffer-size now accepts an optional argument
4142 to specify which buffer to return the size of.
4144 ** The calendar motion commands now run the normal hook
4145 calendar-move-hook after moving point.
4147 ** The new variable small-temporary-file-directory specifies a
4148 directory to use for creating temporary files that are likely to be
4149 small. (Certain Emacs features use this directory.) If
4150 small-temporary-file-directory is nil, they use
4151 temporary-file-directory instead.
4153 ** The variable `inhibit-modification-hooks', if non-nil, inhibits all
4154 the hooks that track changes in the buffer. This affects
4155 `before-change-functions' and `after-change-functions', as well as
4156 hooks attached to text properties and overlay properties.
4158 ** assq-delete-all is a new function that deletes all the
4159 elements of an alist which have a car `eq' to a particular value.
4161 ** make-temp-file provides a more reliable way to create a temporary file.
4163 make-temp-file is used like make-temp-name, except that it actually
4164 creates the file before it returns. This prevents a timing error,
4165 ensuring that no other job can use the same name for a temporary file.
4167 ** New exclusive-open feature in `write-region'
4169 The optional seventh arg is now called MUSTBENEW. If non-nil, it insists
4170 on a check for an existing file with the same name. If MUSTBENEW
4171 is `excl', that means to get an error if the file already exists;
4172 never overwrite. If MUSTBENEW is neither nil nor `excl', that means
4173 ask for confirmation before overwriting, but do go ahead and
4174 overwrite the file if the user gives confirmation.
4176 If the MUSTBENEW argument in `write-region' is `excl',
4177 that means to use a special feature in the `open' system call
4178 to get an error if the file exists at that time.
4179 The error reported is `file-already-exists'.
4181 ** Function `format' now handles text properties.
4183 Text properties of the format string are applied to the result string.
4184 If the result string is longer than the format string, text properties
4185 ending at the end of the format string are extended to the end of the
4188 Text properties from string arguments are applied to the result
4189 string where arguments appear in the result string.
4193 (let ((s1 "hello, %s")
4195 (put-text-property 0 (length s1) 'face 'bold s1)
4196 (put-text-property 0 (length s2) 'face 'italic s2)
4199 results in a bold-face string with an italic `world' at the end.
4201 ** Messages can now be displayed with text properties.
4203 Text properties are handled as described above for function `format'.
4204 The following example displays a bold-face message with an italic
4207 (let ((msg "hello, %s!")
4209 (put-text-property 0 (length msg) 'face 'bold msg)
4210 (put-text-property 0 (length arg) 'face 'italic arg)
4215 Emacs supports playing sound files on GNU/Linux and the free BSDs
4216 (Voxware driver and native BSD driver, aka as Luigi's driver).
4218 Currently supported file formats are RIFF-WAVE (*.wav) and Sun Audio
4219 (*.au). You must configure Emacs with the option `--with-sound=yes'
4220 to enable sound support.
4222 Sound files can be played by calling (play-sound SOUND). SOUND is a
4223 list of the form `(sound PROPERTY...)'. The function is only defined
4224 when sound support is present for the system on which Emacs runs. The
4225 functions runs `play-sound-functions' with one argument which is the
4226 sound to play, before playing the sound.
4228 The following sound properties are supported:
4232 FILE is a file name. If FILE isn't an absolute name, it will be
4233 searched relative to `data-directory'.
4237 DATA is a string containing sound data. Either :file or :data
4238 may be present, but not both.
4242 VOLUME must be an integer in the range 0..100 or a float in the range
4243 0..1. This property is optional.
4247 DEVICE is a string specifying the system device on which to play the
4248 sound. The default device is system-dependent.
4250 Other properties are ignored.
4252 An alternative interface is called as
4253 (play-sound-file FILE &optional VOLUME DEVICE).
4255 ** `multimedia' is a new Finder keyword and Custom group.
4257 ** keywordp is a new predicate to test efficiently for an object being
4260 ** Changes to garbage collection
4262 *** The function garbage-collect now additionally returns the number
4263 of live and free strings.
4265 *** There is a new variable `strings-consed' holding the number of
4266 strings that have been consed so far.
4269 * Lisp-level Display features added after release 2.6 of the Emacs
4272 ** The user-option `resize-mini-windows' controls how Emacs resizes
4275 ** The function `pos-visible-in-window-p' now has a third optional
4276 argument, PARTIALLY. If a character is only partially visible, nil is
4277 returned, unless PARTIALLY is non-nil.
4279 ** On window systems, `glyph-table' is no longer used.
4281 ** Help strings in menu items are now used to provide `help-echo' text.
4283 ** The function `image-size' can be used to determine the size of an
4286 - Function: image-size SPEC &optional PIXELS FRAME
4288 Return the size of an image as a pair (WIDTH . HEIGHT).
4290 SPEC is an image specification. PIXELS non-nil means return sizes
4291 measured in pixels, otherwise return sizes measured in canonical
4292 character units (fractions of the width/height of the frame's default
4293 font). FRAME is the frame on which the image will be displayed.
4294 FRAME nil or omitted means use the selected frame.
4296 ** The function `image-mask-p' can be used to determine if an image
4299 - Function: image-mask-p SPEC &optional FRAME
4301 Return t if image SPEC has a mask bitmap.
4302 FRAME is the frame on which the image will be displayed. FRAME nil
4303 or omitted means use the selected frame.
4305 ** The function `find-image' can be used to find a usable image
4306 satisfying one of a list of specifications.
4308 ** The STRING argument of `put-image' and `insert-image' is now
4311 ** Image specifications may contain the property `:ascent center' (see
4315 * New Lisp-level Display features in Emacs 21.1
4317 ** The function tty-suppress-bold-inverse-default-colors can be used
4318 to make Emacs avoid displaying text with bold black foreground on TTYs.
4320 Some terminals, notably PC consoles, emulate bold text by displaying
4321 text in brighter colors. On such a console, a bold black foreground
4322 is displayed in a gray color. If this turns out to be hard to read on
4323 your monitor---the problem occurred with the mode line on
4324 laptops---you can instruct Emacs to ignore the text's boldness, and to
4325 just display it black instead.
4327 This situation can't be detected automatically. You will have to put
4330 (tty-suppress-bold-inverse-default-colors t)
4334 ** New face implementation.
4336 Emacs faces have been reimplemented from scratch. They don't use XLFD
4337 font names anymore and face merging now works as expected.
4341 Each face can specify the following display attributes:
4343 1. Font family or fontset alias name.
4345 2. Relative proportionate width, aka character set width or set
4346 width (swidth), e.g. `semi-compressed'.
4348 3. Font height in 1/10pt
4350 4. Font weight, e.g. `bold'.
4352 5. Font slant, e.g. `italic'.
4354 6. Foreground color.
4356 7. Background color.
4358 8. Whether or not characters should be underlined, and in what color.
4360 9. Whether or not characters should be displayed in inverse video.
4362 10. A background stipple, a bitmap.
4364 11. Whether or not characters should be overlined, and in what color.
4366 12. Whether or not characters should be strike-through, and in what
4369 13. Whether or not a box should be drawn around characters, its
4370 color, the width of the box lines, and 3D appearance.
4372 Faces are frame-local by nature because Emacs allows to define the
4373 same named face (face names are symbols) differently for different
4374 frames. Each frame has an alist of face definitions for all named
4375 faces. The value of a named face in such an alist is a Lisp vector
4376 with the symbol `face' in slot 0, and a slot for each of the face
4377 attributes mentioned above.
4379 There is also a global face alist `face-new-frame-defaults'. Face
4380 definitions from this list are used to initialize faces of newly
4383 A face doesn't have to specify all attributes. Those not specified
4384 have a nil value. Faces specifying all attributes are called
4389 The display style of a given character in the text is determined by
4390 combining several faces. This process is called `face merging'. Any
4391 aspect of the display style that isn't specified by overlays or text
4392 properties is taken from the `default' face. Since it is made sure
4393 that the default face is always fully-specified, face merging always
4394 results in a fully-specified face.
4396 *** Face realization.
4398 After all face attributes for a character have been determined by
4399 merging faces of that character, that face is `realized'. The
4400 realization process maps face attributes to what is physically
4401 available on the system where Emacs runs. The result is a `realized
4402 face' in form of an internal structure which is stored in the face
4403 cache of the frame on which it was realized.
4405 Face realization is done in the context of the charset of the
4406 character to display because different fonts and encodings are used
4407 for different charsets. In other words, for characters of different
4408 charsets, different realized faces are needed to display them.
4410 Except for composite characters, faces are always realized for a
4411 specific character set and contain a specific font, even if the face
4412 being realized specifies a fontset. The reason is that the result of
4413 the new font selection stage is better than what can be done with
4414 statically defined font name patterns in fontsets.
4416 In unibyte text, Emacs' charsets aren't applicable; function
4417 `char-charset' reports ASCII for all characters, including those >
4418 0x7f. The X registry and encoding of fonts to use is determined from
4419 the variable `face-default-registry' in this case. The variable is
4420 initialized at Emacs startup time from the font the user specified for
4423 Currently all unibyte text, i.e. all buffers with
4424 `enable-multibyte-characters' nil are displayed with fonts of the same
4425 registry and encoding `face-default-registry'. This is consistent
4426 with the fact that languages can also be set globally, only.
4428 **** Clearing face caches.
4430 The Lisp function `clear-face-cache' can be called to clear face caches
4431 on all frames. If called with a non-nil argument, it will also unload
4436 Font selection tries to find the best available matching font for a
4437 given (charset, face) combination. This is done slightly differently
4438 for faces specifying a fontset, or a font family name.
4440 If the face specifies a fontset name, that fontset determines a
4441 pattern for fonts of the given charset. If the face specifies a font
4442 family, a font pattern is constructed. Charset symbols have a
4443 property `x-charset-registry' for that purpose that maps a charset to
4444 an XLFD registry and encoding in the font pattern constructed.
4446 Available fonts on the system on which Emacs runs are then matched
4447 against the font pattern. The result of font selection is the best
4448 match for the given face attributes in this font list.
4450 Font selection can be influenced by the user.
4452 The user can specify the relative importance he gives the face
4453 attributes width, height, weight, and slant by setting
4454 face-font-selection-order (faces.el) to a list of face attribute
4455 names. The default is (:width :height :weight :slant), and means
4456 that font selection first tries to find a good match for the font
4457 width specified by a face, then---within fonts with that width---tries
4458 to find a best match for the specified font height, etc.
4460 Setting `face-font-family-alternatives' allows the user to specify
4461 alternative font families to try if a family specified by a face
4464 Setting `face-font-registry-alternatives' allows the user to specify
4465 all alternative font registry names to try for a face specifying a
4468 Please note that the interpretations of the above two variables are
4471 Setting face-ignored-fonts allows the user to ignore specific fonts.
4476 Emacs can make use of scalable fonts but doesn't do so by default,
4477 since the use of too many or too big scalable fonts may crash XFree86
4480 To enable scalable font use, set the variable
4481 `scalable-fonts-allowed'. A value of nil, the default, means never use
4482 scalable fonts. A value of t means any scalable font may be used.
4483 Otherwise, the value must be a list of regular expressions. A
4484 scalable font may then be used if it matches a regular expression from
4487 (setq scalable-fonts-allowed '("muleindian-2$"))
4489 allows the use of scalable fonts with registry `muleindian-2'.
4491 *** Functions and variables related to font selection.
4493 - Function: x-family-fonts &optional FAMILY FRAME
4495 Return a list of available fonts of family FAMILY on FRAME. If FAMILY
4496 is omitted or nil, list all families. Otherwise, FAMILY must be a
4497 string, possibly containing wildcards `?' and `*'.
4499 If FRAME is omitted or nil, use the selected frame. Each element of
4500 the result is a vector [FAMILY WIDTH POINT-SIZE WEIGHT SLANT FIXED-P
4501 FULL REGISTRY-AND-ENCODING]. FAMILY is the font family name.
4502 POINT-SIZE is the size of the font in 1/10 pt. WIDTH, WEIGHT, and
4503 SLANT are symbols describing the width, weight and slant of the font.
4504 These symbols are the same as for face attributes. FIXED-P is non-nil
4505 if the font is fixed-pitch. FULL is the full name of the font, and
4506 REGISTRY-AND-ENCODING is a string giving the registry and encoding of
4507 the font. The result list is sorted according to the current setting
4508 of the face font sort order.
4510 - Function: x-font-family-list
4512 Return a list of available font families on FRAME. If FRAME is
4513 omitted or nil, use the selected frame. Value is a list of conses
4514 (FAMILY . FIXED-P) where FAMILY is a font family, and FIXED-P is
4515 non-nil if fonts of that family are fixed-pitch.
4517 - Variable: font-list-limit
4519 Limit for font matching. If an integer > 0, font matching functions
4520 won't load more than that number of fonts when searching for a
4521 matching font. The default is currently 100.
4523 *** Setting face attributes.
4525 For the most part, the new face implementation is interface-compatible
4526 with the old one. Old face attribute related functions are now
4527 implemented in terms of the new functions `set-face-attribute' and
4530 Face attributes are identified by their names which are keyword
4531 symbols. All attributes can be set to `unspecified'.
4533 The following attributes are recognized:
4537 VALUE must be a string specifying the font family, e.g. ``courier'',
4538 or a fontset alias name. If a font family is specified, wild-cards `*'
4539 and `?' are allowed.
4543 VALUE specifies the relative proportionate width of the font to use.
4544 It must be one of the symbols `ultra-condensed', `extra-condensed',
4545 `condensed', `semi-condensed', `normal', `semi-expanded', `expanded',
4546 `extra-expanded', or `ultra-expanded'.
4550 VALUE must be either an integer specifying the height of the font to use
4551 in 1/10 pt, a floating point number specifying the amount by which to
4552 scale any underlying face, or a function, which is called with the old
4553 height (from the underlying face), and should return the new height.
4557 VALUE specifies the weight of the font to use. It must be one of the
4558 symbols `ultra-bold', `extra-bold', `bold', `semi-bold', `normal',
4559 `semi-light', `light', `extra-light', `ultra-light'.
4563 VALUE specifies the slant of the font to use. It must be one of the
4564 symbols `italic', `oblique', `normal', `reverse-italic', or
4567 `:foreground', `:background'
4569 VALUE must be a color name, a string.
4573 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be underlined. If
4574 VALUE is t, underline with foreground color of the face. If VALUE is
4575 a string, underline with that color. If VALUE is nil, explicitly
4580 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be overlined. If
4581 VALUE is t, overline with foreground color of the face. If VALUE is a
4582 string, overline with that color. If VALUE is nil, explicitly don't
4587 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be drawn with a line
4588 striking through them. If VALUE is t, use the foreground color of the
4589 face. If VALUE is a string, strike-through with that color. If VALUE
4590 is nil, explicitly don't strike through.
4594 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should have a box drawn
4595 around them. If VALUE is nil, explicitly don't draw boxes. If
4596 VALUE is t, draw a box with lines of width 1 in the foreground color
4597 of the face. If VALUE is a string, the string must be a color name,
4598 and the box is drawn in that color with a line width of 1. Otherwise,
4599 VALUE must be a property list of the form `(:line-width WIDTH
4600 :color COLOR :style STYLE)'. If a keyword/value pair is missing from
4601 the property list, a default value will be used for the value, as
4602 specified below. WIDTH specifies the width of the lines to draw; it
4603 defaults to 1. COLOR is the name of the color to draw in, default is
4604 the foreground color of the face for simple boxes, and the background
4605 color of the face for 3D boxes. STYLE specifies whether a 3D box
4606 should be draw. If STYLE is `released-button', draw a box looking
4607 like a released 3D button. If STYLE is `pressed-button' draw a box
4608 that appears like a pressed button. If STYLE is nil, the default if
4609 the property list doesn't contain a style specification, draw a 2D
4614 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be displayed in
4615 inverse video. VALUE must be one of t or nil.
4619 If VALUE is a string, it must be the name of a file of pixmap data.
4620 The directories listed in the `x-bitmap-file-path' variable are
4621 searched. Alternatively, VALUE may be a list of the form (WIDTH
4622 HEIGHT DATA) where WIDTH and HEIGHT are the size in pixels, and DATA
4623 is a string containing the raw bits of the bitmap. VALUE nil means
4624 explicitly don't use a stipple pattern.
4626 For convenience, attributes `:family', `:width', `:height', `:weight',
4627 and `:slant' may also be set in one step from an X font name:
4631 Set font-related face attributes from VALUE. VALUE must be a valid
4632 XLFD font name. If it is a font name pattern, the first matching font
4633 is used--this is for compatibility with the behavior of previous
4636 For compatibility with Emacs 20, keywords `:bold' and `:italic' can
4637 be used to specify that a bold or italic font should be used. VALUE
4638 must be t or nil in that case. A value of `unspecified' is not allowed."
4640 Please see also the documentation of `set-face-attribute' and
4645 VALUE is the name of a face from which to inherit attributes, or a list
4646 of face names. Attributes from inherited faces are merged into the face
4647 like an underlying face would be, with higher priority than underlying faces.
4649 *** Face attributes and X resources
4651 The following X resource names can be used to set face attributes
4654 Face attribute X resource class
4655 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
4656 :family attributeFamily . Face.AttributeFamily
4657 :width attributeWidth Face.AttributeWidth
4658 :height attributeHeight Face.AttributeHeight
4659 :weight attributeWeight Face.AttributeWeight
4660 :slant attributeSlant Face.AttributeSlant
4661 foreground attributeForeground Face.AttributeForeground
4662 :background attributeBackground . Face.AttributeBackground
4663 :overline attributeOverline Face.AttributeOverline
4664 :strike-through attributeStrikeThrough Face.AttributeStrikeThrough
4665 :box attributeBox Face.AttributeBox
4666 :underline attributeUnderline Face.AttributeUnderline
4667 :inverse-video attributeInverse Face.AttributeInverse
4668 :stipple attributeStipple Face.AttributeStipple
4669 or attributeBackgroundPixmap
4670 Face.AttributeBackgroundPixmap
4671 :font attributeFont Face.AttributeFont
4672 :bold attributeBold Face.AttributeBold
4673 :italic attributeItalic . Face.AttributeItalic
4674 :font attributeFont Face.AttributeFont
4676 *** Text property `face'.
4678 The value of the `face' text property can now be a single face
4679 specification or a list of such specifications. Each face
4680 specification can be
4682 1. A symbol or string naming a Lisp face.
4684 2. A property list of the form (KEYWORD VALUE ...) where each
4685 KEYWORD is a face attribute name, and VALUE is an appropriate value
4686 for that attribute. Please see the doc string of `set-face-attribute'
4687 for face attribute names.
4689 3. Conses of the form (FOREGROUND-COLOR . COLOR) or
4690 (BACKGROUND-COLOR . COLOR) where COLOR is a color name. This is
4691 for compatibility with previous Emacs versions.
4693 ** Support functions for colors on text-only terminals.
4695 The function `tty-color-define' can be used to define colors for use
4696 on TTY and MSDOS frames. It maps a color name to a color number on
4697 the terminal. Emacs defines a couple of common color mappings by
4698 default. You can get defined colors with a call to
4699 `defined-colors'. The function `tty-color-clear' can be
4700 used to clear the mapping table.
4702 ** Unified support for colors independent of frame type.
4704 The new functions `defined-colors', `color-defined-p', `color-values',
4705 and `display-color-p' work for any type of frame. On frames whose
4706 type is neither x nor w32, these functions transparently map X-style
4707 color specifications to the closest colors supported by the frame
4708 display. Lisp programs should use these new functions instead of the
4709 old `x-defined-colors', `x-color-defined-p', `x-color-values', and
4710 `x-display-color-p'. (The old function names are still available for
4711 compatibility; they are now aliases of the new names.) Lisp programs
4712 should no more look at the value of the variable window-system to
4713 modify their color-related behavior.
4715 The primitives `color-gray-p' and `color-supported-p' also work for
4718 ** Platform-independent functions to describe display capabilities.
4720 The new functions `display-mouse-p', `display-popup-menus-p',
4721 `display-graphic-p', `display-selections-p', `display-screens',
4722 `display-pixel-width', `display-pixel-height', `display-mm-width',
4723 `display-mm-height', `display-backing-store', `display-save-under',
4724 `display-planes', `display-color-cells', `display-visual-class', and
4725 `display-grayscale-p' describe the basic capabilities of a particular
4726 display. Lisp programs should call these functions instead of testing
4727 the value of the variables `window-system' or `system-type', or calling
4728 platform-specific functions such as `x-display-pixel-width'.
4730 The new function `display-images-p' returns non-nil if a particular
4731 display can display image files.
4733 ** The minibuffer prompt is now actually inserted in the minibuffer.
4735 This makes it possible to scroll through the prompt, if you want to.
4736 To disallow this completely (like previous versions of emacs), customize
4737 the variable `minibuffer-prompt-properties', and turn on the
4738 `Inviolable' option.
4740 The function `minibuffer-prompt-end' returns the current position of the
4741 end of the minibuffer prompt, if the minibuffer is current.
4742 Otherwise, it returns `(point-min)'.
4744 ** New `field' abstraction in buffers.
4746 There is now code to support an abstraction called `fields' in emacs
4747 buffers. A field is a contiguous region of text with the same `field'
4748 property (which can be a text property or an overlay).
4750 Many emacs functions, such as forward-word, forward-sentence,
4751 forward-paragraph, beginning-of-line, etc., stop moving when they come
4752 to the boundary between fields; beginning-of-line and end-of-line will
4753 not let the point move past the field boundary, but other movement
4754 commands continue into the next field if repeated. Stopping at field
4755 boundaries can be suppressed programmatically by binding
4756 `inhibit-field-text-motion' to a non-nil value around calls to these
4759 Now that the minibuffer prompt is inserted into the minibuffer, it is in
4760 a separate field from the user-input part of the buffer, so that common
4761 editing commands treat the user's text separately from the prompt.
4763 The following functions are defined for operating on fields:
4765 - Function: constrain-to-field NEW-POS OLD-POS &optional ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE ONLY-IN-LINE INHIBIT-CAPTURE-PROPERTY
4767 Return the position closest to NEW-POS that is in the same field as OLD-POS.
4769 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
4770 If NEW-POS is nil, then the current point is used instead, and set to the
4771 constrained position if that is different.
4773 If OLD-POS is at the boundary of two fields, then the allowable
4774 positions for NEW-POS depends on the value of the optional argument
4775 ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE: If ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE is nil, then NEW-POS is
4776 constrained to the field that has the same `field' char-property
4777 as any new characters inserted at OLD-POS, whereas if ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE
4778 is non-nil, NEW-POS is constrained to the union of the two adjacent
4779 fields. Additionally, if two fields are separated by another field with
4780 the special value `boundary', then any point within this special field is
4781 also considered to be `on the boundary'.
4783 If the optional argument ONLY-IN-LINE is non-nil and constraining
4784 NEW-POS would move it to a different line, NEW-POS is returned
4785 unconstrained. This useful for commands that move by line, like
4786 C-n or C-a, which should generally respect field boundaries
4787 only in the case where they can still move to the right line.
4789 If the optional argument INHIBIT-CAPTURE-PROPERTY is non-nil, and OLD-POS has
4790 a non-nil property of that name, then any field boundaries are ignored.
4792 Field boundaries are not noticed if `inhibit-field-text-motion' is non-nil.
4794 - Function: delete-field &optional POS
4796 Delete the field surrounding POS.
4797 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
4798 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
4800 - Function: field-beginning &optional POS ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE
4802 Return the beginning of the field surrounding POS.
4803 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
4804 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
4805 If ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE is non-nil and POS is at the beginning of its
4806 field, then the beginning of the *previous* field is returned.
4808 - Function: field-end &optional POS ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE
4810 Return the end of the field surrounding POS.
4811 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
4812 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
4813 If ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE is non-nil and POS is at the end of its field,
4814 then the end of the *following* field is returned.
4816 - Function: field-string &optional POS
4818 Return the contents of the field surrounding POS as a string.
4819 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
4820 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
4822 - Function: field-string-no-properties &optional POS
4824 Return the contents of the field around POS, without text-properties.
4825 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
4826 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
4830 Emacs can now display images. Images are inserted into text by giving
4831 strings or buffer text a `display' text property containing one of
4832 (AREA IMAGE) or IMAGE. The display of the `display' property value
4833 replaces the display of the characters having that property.
4835 If the property value has the form (AREA IMAGE), AREA must be one of
4836 `(margin left-margin)', `(margin right-margin)' or `(margin nil)'. If
4837 AREA is `(margin nil)', IMAGE will be displayed in the text area of a
4838 window, otherwise it will be displayed in the left or right marginal
4841 IMAGE is an image specification.
4843 *** Image specifications
4845 Image specifications are lists of the form `(image PROPS)' where PROPS
4846 is a property list whose keys are keyword symbols. Each
4847 specifications must contain a property `:type TYPE' with TYPE being a
4848 symbol specifying the image type, e.g. `xbm'. Properties not
4849 described below are ignored.
4851 The following is a list of properties all image types share.
4855 ASCENT must be a number in the range 0..100, or the symbol `center'.
4856 If it is a number, it specifies the percentage of the image's height
4857 to use for its ascent.
4859 If not specified, ASCENT defaults to the value 50 which means that the
4860 image will be centered with the base line of the row it appears in.
4862 If ASCENT is `center' the image is vertically centered around a
4863 centerline which is the vertical center of text drawn at the position
4864 of the image, in the manner specified by the text properties and
4865 overlays that apply to the image.
4869 MARGIN must be either a number >= 0 specifying how many pixels to put
4870 as margin around the image, or a pair (X . Y) with X specifying the
4871 horizontal margin and Y specifying the vertical margin. Default is 0.
4875 RELIEF is analogous to the `:relief' attribute of faces. Puts a relief
4880 Apply an image algorithm to the image before displaying it.
4882 ALGO `laplace' or `emboss' means apply a Laplace or ``emboss''
4883 edge-detection algorithm to the image.
4885 ALGO `(edge-detection :matrix MATRIX :color-adjust ADJUST)' means
4886 apply a general edge-detection algorithm. MATRIX must be either a
4887 nine-element list or a nine-element vector of numbers. A pixel at
4888 position x/y in the transformed image is computed from original pixels
4889 around that position. MATRIX specifies, for each pixel in the
4890 neighborhood of x/y, a factor with which that pixel will influence the
4891 transformed pixel; element 0 specifies the factor for the pixel at
4892 x-1/y-1, element 1 the factor for the pixel at x/y-1 etc. as shown
4895 (x-1/y-1 x/y-1 x+1/y-1
4897 x-1/y+1 x/y+1 x+1/y+1)
4899 The resulting pixel is computed from the color intensity of the color
4900 resulting from summing up the RGB values of surrounding pixels,
4901 multiplied by the specified factors, and dividing that sum by the sum
4902 of the factors' absolute values.
4904 Laplace edge-detection currently uses a matrix of
4910 Emboss edge-detection uses a matrix of
4916 ALGO `disabled' means transform the image so that it looks
4921 If MASK is `heuristic' or `(heuristic BG)', build a clipping mask for
4922 the image, so that the background of a frame is visible behind the
4923 image. If BG is not specified, or if BG is t, determine the
4924 background color of the image by looking at the 4 corners of the
4925 image, assuming the most frequently occurring color from the corners is
4926 the background color of the image. Otherwise, BG must be a list `(RED
4927 GREEN BLUE)' specifying the color to assume for the background of the
4930 If MASK is nil, remove a mask from the image, if it has one. Images
4931 in some formats include a mask which can be removed by specifying
4936 Load image from FILE. If FILE is not absolute after expanding it,
4937 search for the image in `data-directory'. Some image types support
4938 building images from data. When this is done, no `:file' property
4939 may be present in the image specification.
4943 Get image data from DATA. (As of this writing, this is not yet
4944 supported for image type `postscript'). Either :file or :data may be
4945 present in an image specification, but not both. All image types
4946 support strings as DATA, some types allow additional types of DATA.
4948 *** Supported image types
4950 **** XBM, image type `xbm'.
4952 XBM images don't require an external library. Additional image
4953 properties supported are
4957 FG must be a string specifying the image foreground color, or nil
4958 meaning to use the default. Default is the frame's foreground.
4962 BG must be a string specifying the image foreground color, or nil
4963 meaning to use the default. Default is the frame's background color.
4965 XBM images can be constructed from data instead of file. In this
4966 case, the image specification must contain the following properties
4967 instead of a `:file' property.
4971 WIDTH specifies the width of the image in pixels.
4975 HEIGHT specifies the height of the image in pixels.
4981 1. a string large enough to hold the bitmap data, i.e. it must
4982 have a size >= (WIDTH + 7) / 8 * HEIGHT
4984 2. a bool-vector of size >= WIDTH * HEIGHT
4986 3. a vector of strings or bool-vectors, one for each line of the
4989 4. a string that's an in-memory XBM file. Neither width nor
4990 height may be specified in this case because these are defined
4993 **** XPM, image type `xpm'
4995 XPM images require the external library `libXpm', package
4996 `xpm-3.4k.tar.gz', version 3.4k or later. Make sure the library is
4997 found when Emacs is configured by supplying appropriate paths via
4998 `--x-includes' and `--x-libraries'.
5000 Additional image properties supported are:
5002 `:color-symbols SYMBOLS'
5004 SYMBOLS must be a list of pairs (NAME . COLOR), with NAME being the
5005 name of color as it appears in an XPM file, and COLOR being an X color
5008 XPM images can be built from memory instead of files. In that case,
5009 add a `:data' property instead of a `:file' property.
5011 The XPM library uses libz in its implementation so that it is able
5012 to display compressed images.
5014 **** PBM, image type `pbm'
5016 PBM images don't require an external library. Color, gray-scale and
5017 mono images are supported. Additional image properties supported for
5022 FG must be a string specifying the image foreground color, or nil
5023 meaning to use the default. Default is the frame's foreground.
5027 BG must be a string specifying the image foreground color, or nil
5028 meaning to use the default. Default is the frame's background color.
5030 **** JPEG, image type `jpeg'
5032 Support for JPEG images requires the external library `libjpeg',
5033 package `jpegsrc.v6a.tar.gz', or later. Additional image properties
5036 **** TIFF, image type `tiff'
5038 Support for TIFF images requires the external library `libtiff',
5039 package `tiff-v3.4-tar.gz', or later. There are no additional image
5042 **** GIF, image type `gif'
5044 Support for GIF images requires the external library `libungif', package
5045 `libungif-4.1.0', or later.
5047 Additional image properties supported are:
5051 INDEX must be an integer >= 0. Load image number INDEX from a
5052 multi-image GIF file. An error is signaled if INDEX is too large.
5054 This could be used to implement limited support for animated GIFs.
5055 For example, the following function displays a multi-image GIF file
5056 at point-min in the current buffer, switching between sub-images
5059 (defun show-anim (file max)
5060 "Display multi-image GIF file FILE which contains MAX subimages."
5061 (display-anim (current-buffer) file 0 max t))
5063 (defun display-anim (buffer file idx max first-time)
5066 (let ((img (create-image file nil nil :index idx)))
5069 (goto-char (point-min))
5070 (unless first-time (delete-char 1))
5071 (insert-image img "x"))
5072 (run-with-timer 0.1 nil 'display-anim buffer file (1+ idx) max nil)))
5074 **** PNG, image type `png'
5076 Support for PNG images requires the external library `libpng',
5077 package `libpng-1.0.2.tar.gz', or later. There are no additional image
5080 **** Ghostscript, image type `postscript'.
5082 Additional image properties supported are:
5086 WIDTH is width of the image in pt (1/72 inch). WIDTH must be an
5087 integer. This is a required property.
5091 HEIGHT specifies the height of the image in pt (1/72 inch). HEIGHT
5092 must be a integer. This is an required property.
5096 BOX must be a list or vector of 4 integers giving the bounding box of
5097 the PS image, analogous to the `BoundingBox' comment found in PS
5098 files. This is an required property.
5100 Part of the Ghostscript interface is implemented in Lisp. See
5105 The variable `image-types' contains a list of those image types
5106 which are supported in the current configuration.
5108 Images are stored in an image cache and removed from the cache when
5109 they haven't been displayed for `image-cache-eviction-delay seconds.
5110 The function `clear-image-cache' can be used to clear the image cache
5111 manually. Images in the cache are compared with `equal', i.e. all
5112 images with `equal' specifications share the same image.
5114 *** Simplified image API, image.el
5116 The new Lisp package image.el contains functions that simplify image
5117 creation and putting images into text. The function `create-image'
5118 can be used to create images. The macro `defimage' can be used to
5119 define an image based on available image types. The functions
5120 `put-image' and `insert-image' can be used to insert an image into a
5125 Windows can now have margins which are used for special text
5128 To give a window margins, either set the buffer-local variables
5129 `left-margin-width' and `right-margin-width', or call
5130 `set-window-margins'. The function `window-margins' can be used to
5131 obtain the current settings. To make `left-margin-width' and
5132 `right-margin-width' take effect, you must set them before displaying
5133 the buffer in a window, or use `set-window-buffer' to force an update
5134 of the display margins.
5136 You can put text in margins by giving it a `display' text property
5137 containing a pair of the form `(LOCATION . VALUE)', where LOCATION is
5138 one of `left-margin' or `right-margin' or nil. VALUE can be either a
5139 string, an image specification or a stretch specification (see later
5144 Emacs displays short help messages in the echo area, when the mouse
5145 moves over a tool-bar item or a piece of text that has a text property
5146 `help-echo'. This feature also applies to strings in the mode line
5147 that have a `help-echo' property.
5149 If the value of the `help-echo' property is a function, that function
5150 is called with three arguments WINDOW, OBJECT and POSITION. WINDOW is
5151 the window in which the help was found.
5153 If OBJECT is a buffer, POS is the position in the buffer where the
5154 `help-echo' text property was found.
5156 If OBJECT is an overlay, that overlay has a `help-echo' property, and
5157 POS is the position in the overlay's buffer under the mouse.
5159 If OBJECT is a string (an overlay string or a string displayed with
5160 the `display' property), POS is the position in that string under the
5163 If the value of the `help-echo' property is neither a function nor a
5164 string, it is evaluated to obtain a help string.
5166 For tool-bar and menu-bar items, their key definition is used to
5167 determine the help to display. If their definition contains a
5168 property `:help FORM', FORM is evaluated to determine the help string.
5169 For tool-bar items without a help form, the caption of the item is
5170 used as help string.
5172 The hook `show-help-function' can be set to a function that displays
5173 the help string differently. For example, enabling a tooltip window
5174 causes the help display to appear there instead of in the echo area.
5176 ** Vertical fractional scrolling.
5178 The display of text in windows can be scrolled smoothly in pixels.
5179 This is useful, for example, for making parts of large images visible.
5181 The function `window-vscroll' returns the current value of vertical
5182 scrolling, a non-negative fraction of the canonical character height.
5183 The function `set-window-vscroll' can be used to set the vertical
5184 scrolling value. Here is an example of how these function might be
5187 (global-set-key [A-down]
5190 (set-window-vscroll (selected-window)
5191 (+ 0.5 (window-vscroll)))))
5192 (global-set-key [A-up]
5195 (set-window-vscroll (selected-window)
5196 (- (window-vscroll) 0.5)))))
5198 ** New hook `fontification-functions'.
5200 Functions from `fontification-functions' are called from redisplay
5201 when it encounters a region of text that is not yet fontified. This
5202 variable automatically becomes buffer-local when set. Each function
5203 is called with one argument, POS.
5205 At least one of the hook functions should fontify one or more
5206 characters starting at POS in the current buffer. It should mark them
5207 as fontified by giving them a non-nil value of the `fontified' text
5208 property. It may be reasonable for these functions to check for the
5209 `fontified' property and not put it back on, but they do not have to.
5211 ** Tool bar support.
5213 Emacs supports a tool bar at the top of a frame under X. The frame
5214 parameter `tool-bar-lines' (X resource "toolBar", class "ToolBar")
5215 controls how may lines to reserve for the tool bar. A zero value
5216 suppresses the tool bar. If the value is non-zero and
5217 `auto-resize-tool-bars' is non-nil the tool bar's size will be changed
5218 automatically so that all tool bar items are visible.
5220 *** Tool bar item definitions
5222 Tool bar items are defined using `define-key' with a prefix-key
5223 `tool-bar'. For example `(define-key global-map [tool-bar item1] ITEM)'
5224 where ITEM is a list `(menu-item CAPTION BINDING PROPS...)'.
5226 CAPTION is the caption of the item, If it's not a string, it is
5227 evaluated to get a string. The caption is currently not displayed in
5228 the tool bar, but it is displayed if the item doesn't have a `:help'
5229 property (see below).
5231 BINDING is the tool bar item's binding. Tool bar items with keymaps as
5232 binding are currently ignored.
5234 The following properties are recognized:
5238 FORM is evaluated and specifies whether the tool bar item is enabled
5243 FORM is evaluated and specifies whether the tool bar item is displayed.
5247 FUNCTION is called with one parameter, the same list BINDING in which
5248 FUNCTION is specified as the filter. The value FUNCTION returns is
5249 used instead of BINDING to display this item.
5251 `:button (TYPE SELECTED)'
5253 TYPE must be one of `:radio' or `:toggle'. SELECTED is evaluated
5254 and specifies whether the button is selected (pressed) or not.
5258 IMAGES is either a single image specification or a vector of four
5259 image specifications. If it is a vector, this table lists the
5260 meaning of each of the four elements:
5262 Index Use when item is
5263 ----------------------------------------
5264 0 enabled and selected
5265 1 enabled and deselected
5266 2 disabled and selected
5267 3 disabled and deselected
5269 If IMAGE is a single image specification, a Laplace edge-detection
5270 algorithm is used on that image to draw the image in disabled state.
5272 `:help HELP-STRING'.
5274 Gives a help string to display for the tool bar item. This help
5275 is displayed when the mouse is moved over the item.
5277 The function `toolbar-add-item' is a convenience function for adding
5278 toolbar items generally, and `tool-bar-add-item-from-menu' can be used
5279 to define a toolbar item with a binding copied from an item on the
5282 The default bindings use a menu-item :filter to derive the tool-bar
5283 dynamically from variable `tool-bar-map' which may be set
5284 buffer-locally to override the global map.
5286 *** Tool-bar-related variables.
5288 If `auto-resize-tool-bar' is non-nil, the tool bar will automatically
5289 resize to show all defined tool bar items. It will never grow larger
5290 than 1/4 of the frame's size.
5292 If `auto-raise-tool-bar-buttons' is non-nil, tool bar buttons will be
5293 raised when the mouse moves over them.
5295 You can add extra space between tool bar items by setting
5296 `tool-bar-button-margin' to a positive integer specifying a number of
5297 pixels, or a pair of integers (X . Y) specifying horizontal and
5298 vertical margins . Default is 1.
5300 You can change the shadow thickness of tool bar buttons by setting
5301 `tool-bar-button-relief' to an integer. Default is 3.
5303 *** Tool-bar clicks with modifiers.
5305 You can bind commands to clicks with control, shift, meta etc. on
5308 (define-key global-map [tool-bar shell]
5309 '(menu-item "Shell" shell
5310 :image (image :type xpm :file "shell.xpm")))
5312 is the original tool bar item definition, then
5314 (define-key global-map [tool-bar S-shell] 'some-command)
5316 makes a binding to run `some-command' for a shifted click on the same
5319 ** Mode line changes.
5321 *** Mouse-sensitive mode line.
5323 The mode line can be made mouse-sensitive by displaying strings there
5324 that have a `local-map' text property. There are three ways to display
5325 a string with a `local-map' property in the mode line.
5327 1. The mode line spec contains a variable whose string value has
5328 a `local-map' text property.
5330 2. The mode line spec contains a format specifier (e.g. `%12b'), and
5331 that format specifier has a `local-map' property.
5333 3. The mode line spec contains a list containing `:eval FORM'. FORM
5334 is evaluated. If the result is a string, and that string has a
5335 `local-map' property.
5337 The same mechanism is used to determine the `face' and `help-echo'
5338 properties of strings in the mode line. See `bindings.el' for an
5341 *** If a mode line element has the form `(:eval FORM)', FORM is
5342 evaluated and the result is used as mode line element.
5344 *** You can suppress mode-line display by setting the buffer-local
5345 variable mode-line-format to nil.
5347 *** A headerline can now be displayed at the top of a window.
5349 This mode line's contents are controlled by the new variable
5350 `header-line-format' and `default-header-line-format' which are
5351 completely analogous to `mode-line-format' and
5352 `default-mode-line-format'. A value of nil means don't display a top
5355 The appearance of top mode lines is controlled by the face
5358 The function `coordinates-in-window-p' returns `header-line' for a
5359 position in the header-line.
5361 ** Text property `display'
5363 The `display' text property is used to insert images into text,
5364 replace text with other text, display text in marginal area, and it is
5365 also used to control other aspects of how text displays. The value of
5366 the `display' property should be a display specification, as described
5367 below, or a list or vector containing display specifications.
5369 *** Replacing text, displaying text in marginal areas
5371 To replace the text having the `display' property with some other
5372 text, use a display specification of the form `(LOCATION STRING)'.
5374 If LOCATION is `(margin left-margin)', STRING is displayed in the left
5375 marginal area, if it is `(margin right-margin)', it is displayed in
5376 the right marginal area, and if LOCATION is `(margin nil)' STRING
5377 is displayed in the text. In the latter case you can also use the
5378 simpler form STRING as property value.
5380 *** Variable width and height spaces
5382 To display a space of fractional width or height, use a display
5383 specification of the form `(LOCATION STRECH)'. If LOCATION is
5384 `(margin left-margin)', the space is displayed in the left marginal
5385 area, if it is `(margin right-margin)', it is displayed in the right
5386 marginal area, and if LOCATION is `(margin nil)' the space is
5387 displayed in the text. In the latter case you can also use the
5388 simpler form STRETCH as property value.
5390 The stretch specification STRETCH itself is a list of the form `(space
5391 PROPS)', where PROPS is a property list which can contain the
5392 properties described below.
5394 The display of the fractional space replaces the display of the
5395 characters having the `display' property.
5399 Specifies that the space width should be WIDTH times the normal
5400 character width. WIDTH can be an integer or floating point number.
5402 - :relative-width FACTOR
5404 Specifies that the width of the stretch should be computed from the
5405 first character in a group of consecutive characters that have the
5406 same `display' property. The computation is done by multiplying the
5407 width of that character by FACTOR.
5411 Specifies that the space should be wide enough to reach HPOS. The
5412 value HPOS is measured in units of the normal character width.
5414 Exactly one of the above properties should be used.
5418 Specifies the height of the space, as HEIGHT, measured in terms of the
5421 - :relative-height FACTOR
5423 The height of the space is computed as the product of the height
5424 of the text having the `display' property and FACTOR.
5428 Specifies that ASCENT percent of the height of the stretch should be
5429 used for the ascent of the stretch, i.e. for the part above the
5430 baseline. The value of ASCENT must be a non-negative number less or
5433 You should not use both `:height' and `:relative-height' together.
5437 A display specification for an image has the form `(LOCATION
5438 . IMAGE)', where IMAGE is an image specification. The image replaces,
5439 in the display, the characters having this display specification in
5440 their `display' text property. If LOCATION is `(margin left-margin)',
5441 the image will be displayed in the left marginal area, if it is
5442 `(margin right-margin)' it will be displayed in the right marginal
5443 area, and if LOCATION is `(margin nil)' the image will be displayed in
5444 the text. In the latter case you can also use the simpler form IMAGE
5445 as display specification.
5447 *** Other display properties
5449 - (space-width FACTOR)
5451 Specifies that space characters in the text having that property
5452 should be displayed FACTOR times as wide as normal; FACTOR must be an
5457 Display text having this property in a font that is smaller or larger.
5459 If HEIGHT is a list of the form `(+ N)', where N is an integer, that
5460 means to use a font that is N steps larger. If HEIGHT is a list of
5461 the form `(- N)', that means to use a font that is N steps smaller. A
5462 ``step'' is defined by the set of available fonts; each size for which
5463 a font is available counts as a step.
5465 If HEIGHT is a number, that means to use a font that is HEIGHT times
5466 as tall as the frame's default font.
5468 If HEIGHT is a symbol, it is called as a function with the current
5469 height as argument. The function should return the new height to use.
5471 Otherwise, HEIGHT is evaluated to get the new height, with the symbol
5472 `height' bound to the current specified font height.
5476 FACTOR must be a number, specifying a multiple of the current
5477 font's height. If it is positive, that means to display the characters
5478 raised. If it is negative, that means to display them lower down. The
5479 amount of raising or lowering is computed without taking account of the
5480 `height' subproperty.
5482 *** Conditional display properties
5484 All display specifications can be conditionalized. If a specification
5485 has the form `(when CONDITION . SPEC)', the specification SPEC applies
5486 only when CONDITION yields a non-nil value when evaluated. During the
5487 evaluation, `object' is bound to the string or buffer having the
5488 conditional display property; `position' and `buffer-position' are
5489 bound to the position within `object' and the buffer position where
5490 the display property was found, respectively. Both positions can be
5491 different when object is a string.
5493 The normal specification consisting of SPEC only is equivalent to
5496 ** New menu separator types.
5498 Emacs now supports more than one menu separator type. Menu items with
5499 item names consisting of dashes only (including zero dashes) are
5500 treated like before. In addition, the following item names are used
5501 to specify other menu separator types.
5503 - `--no-line' or `--space', or `--:space', or `--:noLine'
5505 No separator lines are drawn, but a small space is inserted where the
5508 - `--single-line' or `--:singleLine'
5510 A single line in the menu's foreground color.
5512 - `--double-line' or `--:doubleLine'
5514 A double line in the menu's foreground color.
5516 - `--single-dashed-line' or `--:singleDashedLine'
5518 A single dashed line in the menu's foreground color.
5520 - `--double-dashed-line' or `--:doubleDashedLine'
5522 A double dashed line in the menu's foreground color.
5524 - `--shadow-etched-in' or `--:shadowEtchedIn'
5526 A single line with 3D sunken appearance. This is the form
5527 displayed for item names consisting of dashes only.
5529 - `--shadow-etched-out' or `--:shadowEtchedOut'
5531 A single line with 3D raised appearance.
5533 - `--shadow-etched-in-dash' or `--:shadowEtchedInDash'
5535 A single dashed line with 3D sunken appearance.
5537 - `--shadow-etched-out-dash' or `--:shadowEtchedOutDash'
5539 A single dashed line with 3D raise appearance.
5541 - `--shadow-double-etched-in' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedIn'
5543 Two lines with 3D sunken appearance.
5545 - `--shadow-double-etched-out' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedOut'
5547 Two lines with 3D raised appearance.
5549 - `--shadow-double-etched-in-dash' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedInDash'
5551 Two dashed lines with 3D sunken appearance.
5553 - `--shadow-double-etched-out-dash' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedOutDash'
5555 Two dashed lines with 3D raised appearance.
5557 Under LessTif/Motif, the last four separator types are displayed like
5558 the corresponding single-line separators.
5560 ** New frame parameters for scroll bar colors.
5562 The new frame parameters `scroll-bar-foreground' and
5563 `scroll-bar-background' can be used to change scroll bar colors.
5564 Their value must be either a color name, a string, or nil to specify
5565 that scroll bars should use a default color. For toolkit scroll bars,
5566 default colors are toolkit specific. For non-toolkit scroll bars, the
5567 default background is the background color of the frame, and the
5568 default foreground is black.
5570 The X resource name of these parameters are `scrollBarForeground'
5571 (class ScrollBarForeground) and `scrollBarBackground' (class
5572 `ScrollBarBackground').
5574 Setting these parameters overrides toolkit specific X resource
5575 settings for scroll bar colors.
5577 ** You can set `redisplay-dont-pause' to a non-nil value to prevent
5578 display updates from being interrupted when input is pending.
5580 ** Changing a window's width may now change its window start if it
5581 starts on a continuation line. The new window start is computed based
5582 on the window's new width, starting from the start of the continued
5583 line as the start of the screen line with the minimum distance from
5584 the original window start.
5586 ** The variable `hscroll-step' and the functions
5587 `hscroll-point-visible' and `hscroll-window-column' have been removed
5588 now that proper horizontal scrolling is implemented.
5590 ** Windows can now be made fixed-width and/or fixed-height.
5592 A window is fixed-size if its buffer has a buffer-local variable
5593 `window-size-fixed' whose value is not nil. A value of `height' makes
5594 windows fixed-height, a value of `width' makes them fixed-width, any
5595 other non-nil value makes them both fixed-width and fixed-height.
5597 The following code makes all windows displaying the current buffer
5598 fixed-width and fixed-height.
5600 (set (make-local-variable 'window-size-fixed) t)
5602 A call to enlarge-window on a window gives an error if that window is
5603 fixed-width and it is tried to change the window's width, or if the
5604 window is fixed-height, and it is tried to change its height. To
5605 change the size of a fixed-size window, bind `window-size-fixed'
5606 temporarily to nil, for example
5608 (let ((window-size-fixed nil))
5609 (enlarge-window 10))
5611 Likewise, an attempt to split a fixed-height window vertically,
5612 or a fixed-width window horizontally results in a error.
5614 ** The cursor-type frame parameter is now supported on MS-DOS
5615 terminals. When Emacs starts, it by default changes the cursor shape
5616 to a solid box, as it does on Unix. The `cursor-type' frame parameter
5617 overrides this as it does on Unix, except that the bar cursor is
5618 horizontal rather than vertical (since the MS-DOS display doesn't
5619 support a vertical-bar cursor).
5623 * Emacs 20.7 is a bug-fix release with few user-visible changes
5625 ** It is now possible to use CCL-based coding systems for keyboard
5628 ** ange-ftp now handles FTP security extensions, like Kerberos.
5630 ** Rmail has been extended to recognize more forms of digest messages.
5632 ** Now, most coding systems set in keyboard coding system work not
5633 only for character input, but also in incremental search. The
5634 exceptions are such coding systems that handle 2-byte character sets
5635 (e.g euc-kr, euc-jp) and that use ISO's escape sequence
5636 (e.g. iso-2022-jp). They are ignored in incremental search.
5638 ** Support for Macintosh PowerPC-based machines running GNU/Linux has
5642 * Emacs 20.6 is a bug-fix release with one user-visible change
5644 ** Support for ARM-based non-RISCiX machines has been added.
5648 * Emacs 20.5 is a bug-fix release with no user-visible changes.
5650 ** Not new, but not mentioned before:
5651 M-w when Transient Mark mode is enabled disables the mark.
5653 * Changes in Emacs 20.4
5655 ** Init file may be called .emacs.el.
5657 You can now call the Emacs init file `.emacs.el'.
5658 Formerly the name had to be `.emacs'. If you use the name
5659 `.emacs.el', you can byte-compile the file in the usual way.
5661 If both `.emacs' and `.emacs.el' exist, the latter file
5662 is the one that is used.
5664 ** shell-command, and shell-command-on-region, now return
5665 the exit code of the command (unless it is asynchronous).
5666 Also, you can specify a place to put the error output,
5667 separate from the command's regular output.
5668 Interactively, the variable shell-command-default-error-buffer
5669 says where to put error output; set it to a buffer name.
5670 In calls from Lisp, an optional argument ERROR-BUFFER specifies
5673 When you specify a non-nil error buffer (or buffer name), any error
5674 output is inserted before point in that buffer, with \f\n to separate
5675 it from the previous batch of error output. The error buffer is not
5676 cleared, so error output from successive commands accumulates there.
5678 ** Setting the default value of enable-multibyte-characters to nil in
5679 the .emacs file, either explicitly using setq-default, or via Custom,
5680 is now essentially equivalent to using --unibyte: all buffers
5681 created during startup will be made unibyte after loading .emacs.
5683 ** C-x C-f now handles the wildcards * and ? in file names. For
5684 example, typing C-x C-f c*.c RET visits all the files whose names
5685 match c*.c. To visit a file whose name contains * or ?, add the
5686 quoting sequence /: to the beginning of the file name.
5688 ** The M-x commands keep-lines, flush-lines and count-matches
5689 now have the same feature as occur and query-replace:
5690 if the pattern contains any upper case letters, then
5691 they never ignore case.
5693 ** The end-of-line format conversion feature previously mentioned
5694 under `* Emacs 20.1 changes for MS-DOS and MS-Windows' actually
5695 applies to all operating systems. Emacs recognizes from the contents
5696 of a file what convention it uses to separate lines--newline, CRLF, or
5697 just CR--and automatically converts the contents to the normal Emacs
5698 convention (using newline to separate lines) for editing. This is a
5699 part of the general feature of coding system conversion.
5701 If you subsequently save the buffer, Emacs converts the text back to
5702 the same format that was used in the file before.
5704 You can turn off end-of-line conversion by setting the variable
5705 `inhibit-eol-conversion' to non-nil, e.g. with Custom in the MULE group.
5707 ** The character set property `prefered-coding-system' has been
5708 renamed to `preferred-coding-system', for the sake of correct spelling.
5709 This is a fairly internal feature, so few programs should be affected.
5711 ** Mode-line display of end-of-line format is changed.
5712 The indication of the end-of-line format of the file visited by a
5713 buffer is now more explicit when that format is not the usual one for
5714 your operating system. For example, the DOS-style end-of-line format
5715 is displayed as "(DOS)" on Unix and GNU/Linux systems. The usual
5716 end-of-line format is still displayed as a single character (colon for
5717 Unix, backslash for DOS and Windows, and forward slash for the Mac).
5719 The values of the variables eol-mnemonic-unix, eol-mnemonic-dos,
5720 eol-mnemonic-mac, and eol-mnemonic-undecided, which are strings,
5721 control what is displayed in the mode line for each end-of-line
5722 format. You can now customize these variables.
5724 ** In the previous version of Emacs, tar-mode didn't work well if a
5725 filename contained non-ASCII characters. Now this is fixed. Such a
5726 filename is decoded by file-name-coding-system if the default value of
5727 enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil.
5729 ** The command temp-buffer-resize-mode toggles a minor mode
5730 in which temporary buffers (such as help buffers) are given
5731 windows just big enough to hold the whole contents.
5733 ** If you use completion.el, you must now run the function
5734 dynamic-completion-mode to enable it. Just loading the file
5735 doesn't have any effect.
5737 ** In Flyspell mode, the default is now to make just one Ispell process,
5740 ** If you use iswitchb but do not call (iswitchb-default-keybindings) to
5741 use the default keybindings, you will need to add the following line:
5742 (add-hook 'minibuffer-setup-hook 'iswitchb-minibuffer-setup)
5744 ** Auto-show mode is no longer enabled just by loading auto-show.el.
5745 To control it, set `auto-show-mode' via Custom or use the
5746 `auto-show-mode' command.
5748 ** Handling of X fonts' ascent/descent parameters has been changed to
5749 avoid redisplay problems. As a consequence, compared with previous
5750 versions the line spacing and frame size now differ with some font
5751 choices, typically increasing by a pixel per line. This change
5752 occurred in version 20.3 but was not documented then.
5754 ** If you select the bar cursor style, it uses the frame's
5755 cursor-color, rather than the cursor foreground pixel.
5757 ** In multibyte mode, Rmail decodes incoming MIME messages using the
5758 character set specified in the message. If you want to disable this
5759 feature, set the variable rmail-decode-mime-charset to nil.
5761 ** Not new, but not mentioned previously in NEWS: when you use #! at
5762 the beginning of a file to make it executable and specify an
5763 interpreter program, Emacs looks on the second line for the -*- mode
5764 and variable specification, as well as on the first line.
5766 ** Support for IBM codepage encoding of non-ASCII characters.
5768 The new command M-x codepage-setup creates a special coding system
5769 that can be used to convert text between a specific IBM codepage and
5770 one of the character sets built into Emacs which matches that
5771 codepage. For example, codepage 850 corresponds to Latin-1 character
5772 set, codepage 855 corresponds to Cyrillic-ISO character set, etc.
5774 Windows codepages 1250, 1251 and some others, where Windows deviates
5775 from the corresponding ISO character set, are also supported.
5777 IBM box-drawing characters and other glyphs which don't have
5778 equivalents in the corresponding ISO character set, are converted to
5779 a character defined by dos-unsupported-char-glyph on MS-DOS, and to
5780 `?' on other systems.
5782 IBM codepages are widely used on MS-DOS and MS-Windows, so this
5783 feature is most useful on those platforms, but it can also be used on
5786 Emacs compiled for MS-DOS automatically loads the support for the
5787 current codepage when it starts.
5791 *** When mail is sent using compose-mail (C-x m), and if
5792 `mail-send-nonascii' is set to the new default value `mime',
5793 appropriate MIME headers are added. The headers are added only if
5794 non-ASCII characters are present in the body of the mail, and no other
5795 MIME headers are already present. For example, the following three
5796 headers are added if the coding system used in the *mail* buffer is
5800 Content-type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
5801 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
5803 *** The new variable default-sendmail-coding-system specifies the
5804 default way to encode outgoing mail. This has higher priority than
5805 default-buffer-file-coding-system but has lower priority than
5806 sendmail-coding-system and the local value of
5807 buffer-file-coding-system.
5809 You should not set this variable manually. Instead, set
5810 sendmail-coding-system to specify a fixed encoding for all outgoing
5813 *** When you try to send a message that contains non-ASCII characters,
5814 if the coding system specified by those variables doesn't handle them,
5815 Emacs will ask you to select a suitable coding system while showing a
5816 list of possible coding systems.
5820 *** c-default-style can now take an association list that maps major
5821 modes to style names. When this variable is an alist, Java mode no
5822 longer hardcodes a setting to "java" style. See the variable's
5823 docstring for details.
5825 *** It's now possible to put a list as the offset on a syntactic
5826 symbol. The list is evaluated recursively until a non-nil offset is
5827 found. This is useful to combine several lineup functions to act in a
5828 prioritized order on a single line. However, none of the supplied
5829 lineup functions use this feature currently.
5831 *** New syntactic symbol catch-clause, which is used on the "catch" and
5832 "finally" lines in try-catch constructs in C++ and Java.
5834 *** New cleanup brace-catch-brace on c-cleanup-list, which does for
5835 "catch" lines what brace-elseif-brace does for "else if" lines.
5837 *** The braces of Java anonymous inner classes are treated separately
5838 from the braces of other classes in auto-newline mode. Two new
5839 symbols inexpr-class-open and inexpr-class-close may be used on
5840 c-hanging-braces-alist to control the automatic newlines used for
5843 *** Support for the Pike language added, along with new Pike specific
5844 syntactic symbols: inlambda, lambda-intro-cont
5846 *** Support for Java anonymous classes via new syntactic symbol
5847 inexpr-class. New syntactic symbol inexpr-statement for Pike
5848 support and gcc-style statements inside expressions. New lineup
5849 function c-lineup-inexpr-block.
5851 *** New syntactic symbol brace-entry-open which is used in brace lists
5852 (i.e. static initializers) when a list entry starts with an open
5853 brace. These used to be recognized as brace-list-entry's.
5854 c-electric-brace also recognizes brace-entry-open braces
5855 (brace-list-entry's can no longer be electrified).
5857 *** New command c-indent-line-or-region, not bound by default.
5859 *** `#' is only electric when typed in the indentation of a line.
5861 *** Parentheses are now electric (via the new command c-electric-paren)
5862 for auto-reindenting lines when parens are typed.
5864 *** In "gnu" style, inline-open offset is now set to zero.
5866 *** Uniform handling of the inclass syntactic symbol. The indentation
5867 associated with it is now always relative to the class opening brace.
5868 This means that the indentation behavior has changed in some
5869 circumstances, but only if you've put anything besides 0 on the
5870 class-open syntactic symbol (none of the default styles do that).
5874 *** New functionality for using Gnus as an offline newsreader has been
5875 added. A plethora of new commands and modes have been added. See the
5876 Gnus manual for the full story.
5878 *** The nndraft backend has returned, but works differently than
5879 before. All Message buffers are now also articles in the nndraft
5880 group, which is created automatically.
5882 *** `gnus-alter-header-function' can now be used to alter header
5885 *** `gnus-summary-goto-article' now accept Message-ID's.
5887 *** A new Message command for deleting text in the body of a message
5888 outside the region: `C-c C-v'.
5890 *** You can now post to component group in nnvirtual groups with
5893 *** `nntp-rlogin-program' -- new variable to ease customization.
5895 *** `C-u C-c C-c' in `gnus-article-edit-mode' will now inhibit
5896 re-highlighting of the article buffer.
5898 *** New element in `gnus-boring-article-headers' -- `long-to'.
5900 *** `M-i' symbolic prefix command. See the section "Symbolic
5901 Prefixes" in the Gnus manual for details.
5903 *** `L' and `I' in the summary buffer now take the symbolic prefix
5904 `a' to add the score rule to the "all.SCORE" file.
5906 *** `gnus-simplify-subject-functions' variable to allow greater
5907 control over simplification.
5909 *** `A T' -- new command for fetching the current thread.
5911 *** `/ T' -- new command for including the current thread in the
5914 *** `M-RET' is a new Message command for breaking cited text.
5916 *** \\1-expressions are now valid in `nnmail-split-methods'.
5918 *** The `custom-face-lookup' function has been removed.
5919 If you used this function in your initialization files, you must
5920 rewrite them to use `face-spec-set' instead.
5922 *** Canceling now uses the current select method. Symbolic prefix
5923 `a' forces normal posting method.
5925 *** New command to translate M******** sm*rtq**t*s into proper text
5928 *** For easier debugging of nntp, you can set `nntp-record-commands'
5931 *** nntp now uses ~/.authinfo, a .netrc-like file, for controlling
5932 where and how to send AUTHINFO to NNTP servers.
5934 *** A command for editing group parameters from the summary buffer
5937 *** A history of where mails have been split is available.
5939 *** A new article date command has been added -- `article-date-iso8601'.
5941 *** Subjects can be simplified when threading by setting
5942 `gnus-score-thread-simplify'.
5944 *** A new function for citing in Message has been added --
5945 `message-cite-original-without-signature'.
5947 *** `article-strip-all-blank-lines' -- new article command.
5949 *** A new Message command to kill to the end of the article has
5952 *** A minimum adaptive score can be specified by using the
5953 `gnus-adaptive-word-minimum' variable.
5955 *** The "lapsed date" article header can be kept continually
5956 updated by the `gnus-start-date-timer' command.
5958 *** Web listserv archives can be read with the nnlistserv backend.
5960 *** Old dejanews archives can now be read by nnweb.
5962 *** `gnus-posting-styles' has been re-activated.
5964 ** Changes to TeX and LaTeX mode
5966 *** The new variable `tex-start-options-string' can be used to give
5967 options for the TeX run. The default value causes TeX to run in
5968 nonstopmode. For an interactive TeX run set it to nil or "".
5970 *** The command `tex-feed-input' sends input to the Tex Shell. In a
5971 TeX buffer it is bound to the keys C-RET, C-c RET, and C-c C-m (some
5972 of these keys may not work on all systems). For instance, if you run
5973 TeX interactively and if the TeX run stops because of an error, you
5974 can continue it without leaving the TeX buffer by typing C-RET.
5976 *** The Tex Shell Buffer is now in `compilation-shell-minor-mode'.
5977 All error-parsing commands of the Compilation major mode are available
5978 but bound to keys that don't collide with the shell. Thus you can use
5979 the Tex Shell for command line executions like a usual shell.
5981 *** The commands `tex-validate-region' and `tex-validate-buffer' check
5982 the matching of braces and $'s. The errors are listed in a *Occur*
5983 buffer and you can use C-c C-c or mouse-2 to go to a particular
5986 ** Changes to RefTeX mode
5988 *** The table of contents buffer can now also display labels and
5989 file boundaries in addition to sections. Use `l', `i', and `c' keys.
5991 *** Labels derived from context (the section heading) are now
5992 lowercase by default. To make the label legal in LaTeX, latin-1
5993 characters will lose their accent. All Mule characters will be
5994 removed from the label.
5996 *** The automatic display of cross reference information can also use
5997 a window instead of the echo area. See variable `reftex-auto-view-crossref'.
5999 *** kpsewhich can be used by RefTeX to find TeX and BibTeX files. See the
6000 customization group `reftex-finding-files'.
6002 *** The option `reftex-bibfile-ignore-list' has been renamed to
6003 `reftex-bibfile-ignore-regexps' and indeed can be fed with regular
6006 *** Multiple Selection buffers are now hidden buffers.
6008 ** New/deleted modes and packages
6010 *** The package snmp-mode.el provides major modes for editing SNMP and
6011 SNMPv2 MIBs. It has entries on `auto-mode-alist'.
6013 *** The package sql.el provides a major mode, M-x sql-mode, for
6014 editing SQL files, and M-x sql-interactive-mode for interacting with
6015 SQL interpreters. It has an entry on `auto-mode-alist'.
6017 *** M-x highlight-changes-mode provides a minor mode displaying buffer
6018 changes with a special face.
6020 *** ispell4.el has been deleted. It got in the way of ispell.el and
6021 this was hard to fix reliably. It has long been obsolete -- use
6022 Ispell 3.1 and ispell.el.
6024 * MS-DOS changes in Emacs 20.4
6026 ** Emacs compiled for MS-DOS now supports MULE features better.
6027 This includes support for display of all ISO 8859-N character sets,
6028 conversion to and from IBM codepage encoding of non-ASCII characters,
6029 and automatic setup of the MULE environment at startup. For details,
6030 check out the section `MS-DOS and MULE' in the manual.
6032 The MS-DOS installation procedure automatically configures and builds
6033 Emacs with input method support if it finds an unpacked Leim
6034 distribution when the config.bat script is run.
6036 ** Formerly, the value of lpr-command did not affect printing on
6037 MS-DOS unless print-region-function was set to nil, but now it
6038 controls whether an external program is invoked or output is written
6039 directly to a printer port. Similarly, in the previous version of
6040 Emacs, the value of ps-lpr-command did not affect PostScript printing
6041 on MS-DOS unless ps-printer-name was set to something other than a
6042 string (eg. t or `pipe'), but now it controls whether an external
6043 program is used. (These changes were made so that configuration of
6044 printing variables would be almost identical across all platforms.)
6046 ** In the previous version of Emacs, PostScript and non-PostScript
6047 output was piped to external programs, but because most print programs
6048 available for MS-DOS and MS-Windows cannot read data from their standard
6049 input, on those systems the data to be output is now written to a
6050 temporary file whose name is passed as the last argument to the external
6053 An exception is made for `print', a standard program on Windows NT,
6054 and `nprint', a standard program on Novell Netware. For both of these
6055 programs, the command line is constructed in the appropriate syntax
6056 automatically, using only the value of printer-name or ps-printer-name
6057 as appropriate--the value of the relevant `-switches' variable is
6058 ignored, as both programs have no useful switches.
6060 ** The value of the variable dos-printer (cf. dos-ps-printer), if it has
6061 a value, overrides the value of printer-name (cf. ps-printer-name), on
6062 MS-DOS and MS-Windows only. This has been true since version 20.3, but
6063 was not documented clearly before.
6065 ** All the Emacs games now work on MS-DOS terminals.
6066 This includes Tetris and Snake.
6068 * Lisp changes in Emacs 20.4
6070 ** New functions line-beginning-position and line-end-position
6071 return the position of the beginning or end of the current line.
6072 They both accept an optional argument, which has the same
6073 meaning as the argument to beginning-of-line or end-of-line.
6075 ** find-file and allied functions now have an optional argument
6076 WILDCARD. If this is non-nil, they do wildcard processing,
6077 and visit all files that match the wildcard pattern.
6079 ** Changes in the file-attributes function.
6081 *** The file size returned by file-attributes may be an integer or a float.
6082 It is an integer if the size fits in a Lisp integer, float otherwise.
6084 *** The inode number returned by file-attributes may be an integer (if
6085 the number fits in a Lisp integer) or a cons cell containing two
6088 ** The new function directory-files-and-attributes returns a list of
6089 files in a directory and their attributes. It accepts the same
6090 arguments as directory-files and has similar semantics, except that
6091 file names and attributes are returned.
6093 ** The new function file-attributes-lessp is a helper function for
6094 sorting the list generated by directory-files-and-attributes. It
6095 accepts two arguments, each a list of a file name and its attributes.
6096 It compares the file names of each according to string-lessp and
6099 ** The new function file-expand-wildcards expands a wildcard-pattern
6100 to produce a list of existing files that match the pattern.
6102 ** New functions for base64 conversion:
6104 The function base64-encode-region converts a part of the buffer
6105 into the base64 code used in MIME. base64-decode-region
6106 performs the opposite conversion. Line-breaking is supported
6109 Functions base64-encode-string and base64-decode-string do a similar
6110 job on the text in a string. They return the value as a new string.
6113 The new function process-running-child-p
6114 will tell you if a subprocess has given control of its
6115 terminal to its own child process.
6117 ** interrupt-process and such functions have a new feature:
6118 when the second argument is `lambda', they send a signal
6119 to the running child of the subshell, if any, but if the shell
6120 itself owns its terminal, no signal is sent.
6122 ** There are new widget types `plist' and `alist' which can
6123 be used for customizing variables whose values are plists or alists.
6125 ** easymenu.el now understands `:key-sequence' and `:style button'.
6126 :included is an alias for :visible.
6128 easy-menu-add-item now understands the values returned by
6129 easy-menu-remove-item and easy-menu-item-present-p. This can be used
6130 to move or copy menu entries.
6132 ** Multibyte editing changes
6134 *** The definitions of sref and char-bytes are changed. Now, sref is
6135 an alias of aref and char-bytes always returns 1. This change is to
6136 make some Emacs Lisp code which works on 20.2 and earlier also
6137 work on the latest Emacs. Such code uses a combination of sref and
6138 char-bytes in a loop typically as below:
6139 (setq char (sref str idx)
6140 idx (+ idx (char-bytes idx)))
6141 The byte-compiler now warns that this is obsolete.
6143 If you want to know how many bytes a specific multibyte character
6144 (say, CH) occupies in a multibyte buffer, use this code:
6145 (charset-bytes (char-charset ch))
6147 *** In multibyte mode, when you narrow a buffer to some region, and the
6148 region is preceded or followed by non-ASCII codes, inserting or
6149 deleting at the head or the end of the region may signal this error:
6151 Byte combining across boundary of accessible buffer text inhibited
6153 This is to avoid some bytes being combined together into a character
6154 across the boundary.
6156 *** The functions find-charset-region and find-charset-string include
6157 `unknown' in the returned list in the following cases:
6158 o The current buffer or the target string is unibyte and
6159 contains 8-bit characters.
6160 o The current buffer or the target string is multibyte and
6161 contains invalid characters.
6163 *** The functions decode-coding-region and encode-coding-region remove
6164 text properties of the target region. Ideally, they should correctly
6165 preserve text properties, but for the moment, it's hard. Removing
6166 text properties is better than preserving them in a less-than-correct
6169 *** prefer-coding-system sets EOL conversion of default coding systems.
6170 If the argument to prefer-coding-system specifies a certain type of
6171 end of line conversion, the default coding systems set by
6172 prefer-coding-system will specify that conversion type for end of line.
6174 *** The new function thai-compose-string can be used to properly
6175 compose Thai characters in a string.
6177 ** The primitive `define-prefix-command' now takes an optional third
6178 argument NAME, which should be a string. It supplies the menu name
6179 for the created keymap. Keymaps created in order to be displayed as
6180 menus should always use the third argument.
6182 ** The meanings of optional second arguments for read-char,
6183 read-event, and read-char-exclusive are flipped. Now the second
6184 arguments are INHERIT-INPUT-METHOD. These functions use the current
6185 input method (if any) if and only if INHERIT-INPUT-METHOD is non-nil.
6187 ** The new function clear-this-command-keys empties out the contents
6188 of the vector that (this-command-keys) returns. This is useful in
6189 programs that read passwords, to prevent the passwords from echoing
6190 inadvertently as part of the next command in certain cases.
6192 ** The new macro `with-temp-message' displays a temporary message in
6193 the echo area, while executing some Lisp code. Like `progn', it
6194 returns the value of the last form, but it also restores the previous
6197 (with-temp-message MESSAGE &rest BODY)
6199 ** The function `require' now takes an optional third argument
6200 NOERROR. If it is non-nil, then there is no error if the
6201 requested feature cannot be loaded.
6203 ** In the function modify-face, an argument of (nil) for the
6204 foreground color, background color or stipple pattern
6205 means to clear out that attribute.
6207 ** The `outer-window-id' frame property of an X frame
6208 gives the window number of the outermost X window for the frame.
6210 ** Temporary buffers made with with-output-to-temp-buffer are now
6211 read-only by default, and normally use the major mode Help mode
6212 unless you put them in some other non-Fundamental mode before the
6213 end of with-output-to-temp-buffer.
6215 ** The new functions gap-position and gap-size return information on
6216 the gap of the current buffer.
6218 ** The new functions position-bytes and byte-to-position provide a way
6219 to convert between character positions and byte positions in the
6222 ** vc.el defines two new macros, `edit-vc-file' and `with-vc-file', to
6223 facilitate working with version-controlled files from Lisp programs.
6224 These macros check out a given file automatically if needed, and check
6225 it back in after any modifications have been made.
6227 * Installation Changes in Emacs 20.3
6229 ** The default value of load-path now includes most subdirectories of
6230 the site-specific directories /usr/local/share/emacs/site-lisp and
6231 /usr/local/share/emacs/VERSION/site-lisp, in addition to those
6232 directories themselves. Both immediate subdirectories and
6233 subdirectories multiple levels down are added to load-path.
6235 Not all subdirectories are included, though. Subdirectories whose
6236 names do not start with a letter or digit are excluded.
6237 Subdirectories named RCS or CVS are excluded. Also, a subdirectory
6238 which contains a file named `.nosearch' is excluded. You can use
6239 these methods to prevent certain subdirectories from being searched.
6241 Emacs finds these subdirectories and adds them to load-path when it
6242 starts up. While it would be cleaner to find the subdirectories each
6243 time Emacs loads a file, that would be much slower.
6245 This feature is an incompatible change. If you have stored some Emacs
6246 Lisp files in a subdirectory of the site-lisp directory specifically
6247 to prevent them from being used, you will need to rename the
6248 subdirectory to start with a non-alphanumeric character, or create a
6249 `.nosearch' file in it, in order to continue to achieve the desired
6252 ** Emacs no longer includes an old version of the C preprocessor from
6253 GCC. This was formerly used to help compile Emacs with C compilers
6254 that had limits on the significant length of an identifier, but in
6255 fact we stopped supporting such compilers some time ago.
6257 * Changes in Emacs 20.3
6259 ** The new command C-x z (repeat) repeats the previous command
6260 including its argument. If you repeat the z afterward,
6261 it repeats the command additional times; thus, you can
6262 perform many repetitions with one keystroke per repetition.
6264 ** Emacs now supports "selective undo" which undoes only within a
6265 specified region. To do this, set point and mark around the desired
6266 region and type C-u C-x u (or C-u C-_). You can then continue undoing
6267 further, within the same region, by repeating the ordinary undo
6268 command C-x u or C-_. This will keep undoing changes that were made
6269 within the region you originally specified, until either all of them
6270 are undone, or it encounters a change which crosses the edge of that
6273 In Transient Mark mode, undoing when a region is active requests
6276 ** If you specify --unibyte when starting Emacs, then all buffers are
6277 unibyte, except when a Lisp program specifically creates a multibyte
6278 buffer. Setting the environment variable EMACS_UNIBYTE has the same
6279 effect. The --no-unibyte option overrides EMACS_UNIBYTE and directs
6280 Emacs to run normally in multibyte mode.
6282 The option --unibyte does not affect the reading of Emacs Lisp files,
6283 though. If you want a Lisp file to be read in unibyte mode, use
6284 -*-unibyte: t;-*- on its first line. That will force Emacs to
6285 load that file in unibyte mode, regardless of how Emacs was started.
6287 ** toggle-enable-multibyte-characters no longer has a key binding and
6288 no longer appears in the menu bar. We've realized that changing the
6289 enable-multibyte-characters variable in an existing buffer is
6290 something that most users not do.
6292 ** You can specify a coding system to use for the next cut or paste
6293 operations through the window system with the command C-x RET X.
6294 The coding system can make a difference for communication with other
6297 C-x RET x specifies a coding system for all subsequent cutting and
6300 ** You can specify the printer to use for commands that do printing by
6301 setting the variable `printer-name'. Just what a printer name looks
6302 like depends on your operating system. You can specify a different
6303 printer for the Postscript printing commands by setting
6306 ** Emacs now supports on-the-fly spell checking by the means of a
6307 minor mode. It is called M-x flyspell-mode. You don't have to remember
6308 any other special commands to use it, and you will hardly notice it
6309 except when you make a spelling error. Flyspell works by highlighting
6310 incorrect words as soon as they are completed or as soon as the cursor
6313 Flyspell mode works with whichever dictionary you have selected for
6314 Ispell in Emacs. In TeX mode, it understands TeX syntax so as not
6315 to be confused by TeX commands.
6317 You can correct a misspelled word by editing it into something
6318 correct. You can also correct it, or accept it as correct, by
6319 clicking on the word with Mouse-2; that gives you a pop-up menu
6320 of various alternative replacements and actions.
6322 Flyspell mode also proposes "automatic" corrections. M-TAB replaces
6323 the current misspelled word with a possible correction. If several
6324 corrections are made possible, M-TAB cycles through them in
6325 alphabetical order, or in order of decreasing likelihood if
6326 flyspell-sort-corrections is nil.
6328 Flyspell mode also flags an error when a word is repeated, if
6329 flyspell-mark-duplications-flag is non-nil.
6331 ** Changes in input method usage.
6333 Now you can use arrow keys (right, left, down, up) for selecting among
6334 the alternatives just the same way as you do by C-f, C-b, C-n, and C-p
6337 You can use the ENTER key to accept the current conversion.
6339 If you type TAB to display a list of alternatives, you can select one
6340 of the alternatives with Mouse-2.
6342 The meaning of the variable `input-method-verbose-flag' is changed so
6343 that you can set it to t, nil, `default', or `complex-only'.
6345 If the value is nil, extra guidance is never given.
6347 If the value is t, extra guidance is always given.
6349 If the value is `complex-only', extra guidance is always given only
6350 when you are using complex input methods such as chinese-py.
6352 If the value is `default' (this is the default), extra guidance is
6353 given in the following case:
6354 o When you are using a complex input method.
6355 o When you are using a simple input method but not in the minibuffer.
6357 If you are using Emacs through a very slow line, setting
6358 input-method-verbose-flag to nil or to complex-only is a good choice,
6359 and if you are using an input method you are not familiar with,
6360 setting it to t is helpful.
6362 The old command select-input-method is now called set-input-method.
6364 In the language environment "Korean", you can use the following
6366 Shift-SPC toggle-korean-input-method
6367 C-F9 quail-hangul-switch-symbol-ksc
6368 F9 quail-hangul-switch-hanja
6369 These key bindings are canceled when you switch to another language
6372 ** The minibuffer history of file names now records the specified file
6373 names, not the entire minibuffer input. For example, if the
6374 minibuffer starts out with /usr/foo/, you might type in /etc/passwd to
6377 /usr/foo//etc/passwd
6379 which stands for the file /etc/passwd.
6381 Formerly, this used to put /usr/foo//etc/passwd in the history list.
6382 Now this puts just /etc/passwd in the history list.
6384 ** If you are root, Emacs sets backup-by-copying-when-mismatch to t
6385 at startup, so that saving a file will be sure to preserve
6386 its owner and group.
6388 ** find-func.el can now also find the place of definition of Emacs
6389 Lisp variables in user-loaded libraries.
6391 ** C-x r t (string-rectangle) now deletes the existing rectangle
6392 contents before inserting the specified string on each line.
6394 ** There is a new command delete-whitespace-rectangle
6395 which deletes whitespace starting from a particular column
6396 in all the lines on a rectangle. The column is specified
6397 by the left edge of the rectangle.
6399 ** You can now store a number into a register with C-u NUMBER C-x r n REG,
6400 increment it by INC with C-u INC C-x r + REG (to increment by one, omit
6401 C-u INC), and insert it in the buffer with C-x r g REG. This is useful
6402 for writing keyboard macros.
6404 ** The new command M-x speedbar displays a frame in which directories,
6405 files, and tags can be displayed, manipulated, and jumped to. The
6406 frame defaults to 20 characters in width, and is the same height as
6407 the frame that it was started from. Some major modes define
6408 additional commands for the speedbar, including Rmail, GUD/GDB, and
6411 ** query-replace-regexp is now bound to C-M-%.
6413 ** In Transient Mark mode, when the region is active, M-x
6414 query-replace and the other replace commands now operate on the region
6417 ** M-x write-region, when used interactively, now asks for
6418 confirmation before overwriting an existing file. When you call
6419 the function from a Lisp program, a new optional argument CONFIRM
6420 says whether to ask for confirmation in this case.
6422 ** If you use find-file-literally and the file is already visited
6423 non-literally, the command asks you whether to revisit the file
6424 literally. If you say no, it signals an error.
6426 ** Major modes defined with the "derived mode" feature
6427 now use the proper name for the mode hook: WHATEVER-mode-hook.
6428 Formerly they used the name WHATEVER-mode-hooks, but that is
6429 inconsistent with Emacs conventions.
6431 ** shell-command-on-region (and shell-command) reports success or
6432 failure if the command produces no output.
6434 ** Set focus-follows-mouse to nil if your window system or window
6435 manager does not transfer focus to another window when you just move
6438 ** mouse-menu-buffer-maxlen has been renamed to
6439 mouse-buffer-menu-maxlen to be consistent with the other related
6440 function and variable names.
6442 ** The new variable auto-coding-alist specifies coding systems for
6443 reading specific files. This has higher priority than
6444 file-coding-system-alist.
6446 ** If you set the variable unibyte-display-via-language-environment to
6447 t, then Emacs displays non-ASCII characters are displayed by
6448 converting them to the equivalent multibyte characters according to
6449 the current language environment. As a result, they are displayed
6450 according to the current fontset.
6452 ** C-q's handling of codes in the range 0200 through 0377 is changed.
6454 The codes in the range 0200 through 0237 are inserted as one byte of
6455 that code regardless of the values of nonascii-translation-table and
6456 nonascii-insert-offset.
6458 For the codes in the range 0240 through 0377, if
6459 enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil and nonascii-translation-table
6460 nor nonascii-insert-offset can't convert them to valid multibyte
6461 characters, they are converted to Latin-1 characters.
6463 ** If you try to find a file that is not read-accessible, you now get
6464 an error, rather than an empty buffer and a warning.
6466 ** In the minibuffer history commands M-r and M-s, an upper case
6467 letter in the regular expression forces case-sensitive search.
6469 ** In the *Help* buffer, cross-references to commands and variables
6470 are inferred and hyperlinked. Use C-h m in Help mode for the relevant
6473 ** M-x apropos-command, with a prefix argument, no longer looks for
6474 user option variables--instead it looks for noninteractive functions.
6476 Meanwhile, the command apropos-variable normally searches for
6477 user option variables; with a prefix argument, it looks at
6478 all variables that have documentation.
6480 ** When you type a long line in the minibuffer, and the minibuffer
6481 shows just one line, automatically scrolling works in a special way
6482 that shows you overlap with the previous line of text. The variable
6483 minibuffer-scroll-overlap controls how many characters of overlap
6484 it should show; the default is 20.
6486 Meanwhile, Resize Minibuffer mode is still available; in that mode,
6487 the minibuffer grows taller (up to a point) as needed to show the whole
6490 ** The new command M-x customize-changed-options lets you customize
6491 all the options whose meanings or default values have changed in
6492 recent Emacs versions. You specify a previous Emacs version number as
6493 argument, and the command creates a customization buffer showing all
6494 the customizable options which were changed since that version.
6495 Newly added options are included as well.
6497 If you don't specify a particular version number argument,
6498 then the customization buffer shows all the customizable options
6499 for which Emacs versions of changes are recorded.
6501 This function is also bound to the Changed Options entry in the
6504 ** When you run M-x grep with a prefix argument, it figures out
6505 the tag around point and puts that into the default grep command.
6507 ** The new command M-* (pop-tag-mark) pops back through a history of
6508 buffer positions from which M-. or other tag-finding commands were
6511 ** The new variable comment-padding specifies the number of spaces
6512 that `comment-region' will insert before the actual text of the comment.
6515 ** In Fortran mode the characters `.', `_' and `$' now have symbol
6516 syntax, not word syntax. Fortran mode now supports `imenu' and has
6517 new commands fortran-join-line (M-^) and fortran-narrow-to-subprogram
6518 (C-x n d). M-q can be used to fill a statement or comment block
6521 ** GUD now supports jdb, the Java debugger, and pdb, the Python debugger.
6523 ** If you set the variable add-log-keep-changes-together to a non-nil
6524 value, the command `C-x 4 a' will automatically notice when you make
6525 two entries in one day for one file, and combine them.
6527 ** You can use the command M-x diary-mail-entries to mail yourself a
6528 reminder about upcoming diary entries. See the documentation string
6529 for a sample shell script for calling this function automatically
6534 *** All you need to do to enable use of the Desktop package, is to set
6535 the variable desktop-enable to t with Custom.
6537 *** Minor modes are now restored. Which minor modes are restored
6538 and how modes are restored is controlled by `desktop-minor-mode-table'.
6540 ** There is no need to do anything special, now, to enable Gnus to
6541 read and post multi-lingual articles.
6543 ** Outline mode has now support for showing hidden outlines when
6544 doing an isearch. In order for this to happen search-invisible should
6545 be set to open (the default). If an isearch match is inside a hidden
6546 outline the outline is made visible. If you continue pressing C-s and
6547 the match moves outside the formerly invisible outline, the outline is
6548 made invisible again.
6550 ** Mail reading and sending changes
6552 *** The Rmail e command now switches to displaying the whole header of
6553 the message before it lets you edit the message. This is so that any
6554 changes you make in the header will not be lost if you subsequently
6557 *** The w command in Rmail, which writes the message body into a file,
6558 now works in the summary buffer as well. (The command to delete the
6559 summary buffer is now Q.) The default file name for the w command, if
6560 the message has no subject, is stored in the variable
6561 rmail-default-body-file.
6563 *** Most of the commands and modes that operate on mail and netnews no
6564 longer depend on the value of mail-header-separator. Instead, they
6565 handle whatever separator the buffer happens to use.
6567 *** If you set mail-signature to a value which is not t, nil, or a string,
6568 it should be an expression. When you send a message, this expression
6569 is evaluated to insert the signature.
6571 *** The new Lisp library feedmail.el (version 8) enhances processing of
6572 outbound email messages. It works in coordination with other email
6573 handling packages (e.g., rmail, VM, gnus) and is responsible for
6574 putting final touches on messages and actually submitting them for
6575 transmission. Users of the emacs program "fakemail" might be
6576 especially interested in trying feedmail.
6578 feedmail is not enabled by default. See comments at the top of
6579 feedmail.el for set-up instructions. Among the bigger features
6580 provided by feedmail are:
6582 **** you can park outgoing messages into a disk-based queue and
6583 stimulate sending some or all of them later (handy for laptop users);
6584 there is also a queue for draft messages
6586 **** you can get one last look at the prepped outbound message and
6587 be prompted for confirmation
6589 **** does smart filling of address headers
6591 **** can generate a MESSAGE-ID: line and a DATE: line; the date can be
6592 the time the message was written or the time it is being sent; this
6593 can make FCC copies more closely resemble copies that recipients get
6595 **** you can specify an arbitrary function for actually transmitting
6596 the message; included in feedmail are interfaces for /bin/[r]mail,
6597 /usr/lib/sendmail, and elisp smtpmail; it's easy to write a new
6598 function for something else (10-20 lines of elisp)
6602 *** The Dired function dired-do-toggle, which toggles marked and unmarked
6603 files, is now bound to "t" instead of "T".
6605 *** dired-at-point has been added to ffap.el. It allows one to easily
6606 run Dired on the directory name at point.
6608 *** Dired has a new command: %g. It searches the contents of
6609 files in the directory and marks each file that contains a match
6610 for a specified regexp.
6614 *** New option vc-ignore-vc-files lets you turn off version control
6617 *** VC Dired has been completely rewritten. It is now much
6618 faster, especially for CVS, and works very similar to ordinary
6621 VC Dired is invoked by typing C-x v d and entering the name of the
6622 directory to display. By default, VC Dired gives you a recursive
6623 listing of all files at or below the given directory which are
6624 currently locked (for CVS, all files not up-to-date are shown).
6626 You can change the listing format by setting vc-dired-recurse to nil,
6627 then it shows only the given directory, and you may also set
6628 vc-dired-terse-display to nil, then it shows all files under version
6629 control plus the names of any subdirectories, so that you can type `i'
6630 on such lines to insert them manually, as in ordinary Dired.
6632 All Dired commands operate normally in VC Dired, except for `v', which
6633 is redefined as the version control prefix. That means you may type
6634 `v l', `v =' etc. to invoke `vc-print-log', `vc-diff' and the like on
6635 the file named in the current Dired buffer line. `v v' invokes
6636 `vc-next-action' on this file, or on all files currently marked.
6638 The new command `v t' (vc-dired-toggle-terse-mode) allows you to
6639 toggle between terse display (only locked files) and full display (all
6640 VC files plus subdirectories). There is also a special command,
6641 `* l', to mark all files currently locked.
6643 Giving a prefix argument to C-x v d now does the same thing as in
6644 ordinary Dired: it allows you to supply additional options for the ls
6645 command in the minibuffer, to fine-tune VC Dired's output.
6647 *** Under CVS, if you merge changes from the repository into a working
6648 file, and CVS detects conflicts, VC now offers to start an ediff
6649 session to resolve them.
6651 Alternatively, you can use the new command `vc-resolve-conflicts' to
6652 resolve conflicts in a file at any time. It works in any buffer that
6653 contains conflict markers as generated by rcsmerge (which is what CVS
6656 *** You can now transfer changes between branches, using the new
6657 command vc-merge (C-x v m). It is implemented for RCS and CVS. When
6658 you invoke it in a buffer under version-control, you can specify
6659 either an entire branch or a pair of versions, and the changes on that
6660 branch or between the two versions are merged into the working file.
6661 If this results in any conflicts, they may be resolved interactively,
6664 ** Changes in Font Lock
6666 *** The face and variable previously known as font-lock-reference-face
6667 are now called font-lock-constant-face to better reflect their typical
6668 use for highlighting constants and labels. (Its face properties are
6669 unchanged.) The variable font-lock-reference-face remains for now for
6670 compatibility reasons, but its value is font-lock-constant-face.
6672 ** Frame name display changes
6674 *** The command set-frame-name lets you set the name of the current
6675 frame. You can use the new command select-frame-by-name to select and
6676 raise a frame; this is mostly useful on character-only terminals, or
6677 when many frames are invisible or iconified.
6679 *** On character-only terminal (not a window system), changing the
6680 frame name is now reflected on the mode line and in the Buffers/Frames
6683 ** Comint (subshell) changes
6685 *** In Comint modes, the commands to kill, stop or interrupt a
6686 subjob now also kill pending input. This is for compatibility
6687 with ordinary shells, where the signal characters do this.
6689 *** There are new commands in Comint mode.
6691 C-c C-x fetches the "next" line from the input history;
6692 that is, the line after the last line you got.
6693 You can use this command to fetch successive lines, one by one.
6695 C-c SPC accumulates lines of input. More precisely, it arranges to
6696 send the current line together with the following line, when you send
6699 C-c C-a if repeated twice consecutively now moves to the process mark,
6700 which separates the pending input from the subprocess output and the
6701 previously sent input.
6703 C-c M-r now runs comint-previous-matching-input-from-input;
6704 it searches for a previous command, using the current pending input
6705 as the search string.
6707 *** New option compilation-scroll-output can be set to scroll
6708 automatically in compilation-mode windows.
6712 *** Multiline macros are now handled, both as they affect indentation,
6713 and as recognized syntax. New syntactic symbol cpp-macro-cont is
6714 assigned to second and subsequent lines of a multiline macro
6717 *** A new style "user" which captures all non-hook-ified
6718 (i.e. top-level) .emacs file variable settings and customizations.
6719 Style "cc-mode" is an alias for "user" and is deprecated. "gnu"
6720 style is still the default however.
6722 *** "java" style now conforms to Sun's JDK coding style.
6724 *** There are new commands c-beginning-of-defun, c-end-of-defun which
6725 are alternatives which you could bind to C-M-a and C-M-e if you prefer
6726 them. They do not have key bindings by default.
6728 *** New and improved implementations of M-a (c-beginning-of-statement)
6729 and M-e (c-end-of-statement).
6731 *** C++ namespace blocks are supported, with new syntactic symbols
6732 namespace-open, namespace-close, and innamespace.
6734 *** File local variable settings of c-file-style and c-file-offsets
6735 makes the style variables local to that buffer only.
6737 *** New indentation functions c-lineup-close-paren,
6738 c-indent-one-line-block, c-lineup-dont-change.
6740 *** Improvements (hopefully!) to the way CC Mode is loaded. You
6741 should now be able to do a (require 'cc-mode) to get the entire
6742 package loaded properly for customization in your .emacs file. A new
6743 variable c-initialize-on-load controls this and is t by default.
6745 ** Changes to hippie-expand.
6747 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-dabbrev-skip-space'. If
6748 non-nil, trailing spaces may be included in the abbreviation to search for,
6749 which then gives the same behavior as the original `dabbrev-expand'.
6751 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-dabbrev-as-symbol'. If
6752 non-nil, characters of syntax '_' is considered part of the word when
6753 expanding dynamically.
6755 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-no-restriction'. If
6756 non-nil, narrowed buffers are widened before they are searched.
6758 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-only-buffers'. If
6759 non-empty, buffers searched are restricted to the types specified in
6760 this list. Useful for example when constructing new special-purpose
6761 expansion functions with `make-hippie-expand-function'.
6763 *** Text properties of the expansion are no longer copied.
6765 ** Changes in BibTeX mode.
6767 *** Any titleword matching a regexp in the new variable
6768 bibtex-autokey-titleword-ignore (case sensitive) is ignored during
6769 automatic key generation. This replaces variable
6770 bibtex-autokey-titleword-first-ignore, which only checked for matches
6771 against the first word in the title.
6773 *** Autokey generation now uses all words from the title, not just
6774 capitalized words. To avoid conflicts with existing customizations,
6775 bibtex-autokey-titleword-ignore is set up such that words starting with
6776 lowerkey characters will still be ignored. Thus, if you want to use
6777 lowercase words from the title, you will have to overwrite the
6778 bibtex-autokey-titleword-ignore standard setting.
6780 *** Case conversion of names and title words for automatic key
6781 generation is more flexible. Variable bibtex-autokey-preserve-case is
6782 replaced by bibtex-autokey-titleword-case-convert and
6783 bibtex-autokey-name-case-convert.
6785 ** Changes in vcursor.el.
6787 *** Support for character terminals is available: there is a new keymap
6788 and the vcursor will appear as an arrow between buffer text. A
6789 variable `vcursor-interpret-input' allows input from the vcursor to be
6790 entered exactly as if typed. Numerous functions, including
6791 `vcursor-compare-windows', have been rewritten to improve consistency
6792 in the selection of windows and corresponding keymaps.
6794 *** vcursor options can now be altered with M-x customize under the
6795 Editing group once the package is loaded.
6797 *** Loading vcursor now does not define keys by default, as this is
6798 generally a bad side effect. Use M-x customize to set
6799 vcursor-key-bindings to t to restore the old behavior.
6801 *** vcursor-auto-disable can be `copy', which turns off copying from the
6802 vcursor, but doesn't disable it, after any non-vcursor command.
6806 *** You can now spell check comments and strings in the current
6807 buffer with M-x ispell-comments-and-strings. Comments and strings
6808 are identified by syntax tables in effect.
6810 *** Generic region skipping implemented.
6811 A single buffer can be broken into a number of regions where text will
6812 and will not be checked. The definitions of the regions can be user
6813 defined. New applications and improvements made available by this
6816 o URLs are automatically skipped
6817 o EMail message checking is vastly improved.
6819 *** Ispell can highlight the erroneous word even on non-window terminals.
6821 ** Changes to RefTeX mode
6823 RefTeX has been updated in order to make it more usable with very
6824 large projects (like a several volume math book). The parser has been
6825 re-written from scratch. To get maximum speed from RefTeX, check the
6826 section `Optimizations' in the manual.
6828 *** New recursive parser.
6830 The old version of RefTeX created a single large buffer containing the
6831 entire multifile document in order to parse the document. The new
6832 recursive parser scans the individual files.
6834 *** Parsing only part of a document.
6836 Reparsing of changed document parts can now be made faster by enabling
6837 partial scans. To use this feature, read the documentation string of
6838 the variable `reftex-enable-partial-scans' and set the variable to t.
6840 (setq reftex-enable-partial-scans t)
6842 *** Storing parsing information in a file.
6844 This can improve startup times considerably. To turn it on, use
6846 (setq reftex-save-parse-info t)
6848 *** Using multiple selection buffers
6850 If the creation of label selection buffers is too slow (this happens
6851 for large documents), you can reuse these buffers by setting
6853 (setq reftex-use-multiple-selection-buffers t)
6855 *** References to external documents.
6857 The LaTeX package `xr' allows to cross-reference labels in external
6858 documents. RefTeX can provide information about the external
6859 documents as well. To use this feature, set up the \externaldocument
6860 macros required by the `xr' package and rescan the document with
6861 RefTeX. The external labels can then be accessed with the `x' key in
6862 the selection buffer provided by `reftex-reference' (bound to `C-c )').
6863 The `x' key also works in the table of contents buffer.
6865 *** Many more labeled LaTeX environments are recognized by default.
6867 The built-in command list now covers all the standard LaTeX commands,
6868 and all of the major packages included in the LaTeX distribution.
6870 Also, RefTeX now understands the \appendix macro and changes
6871 the enumeration of sections in the *toc* buffer accordingly.
6873 *** Mouse support for selection and *toc* buffers
6875 The mouse can now be used to select items in the selection and *toc*
6876 buffers. See also the new option `reftex-highlight-selection'.
6878 *** New keymaps for selection and table of contents modes.
6880 The selection processes for labels and citation keys, and the table of
6881 contents buffer now have their own keymaps: `reftex-select-label-map',
6882 `reftex-select-bib-map', `reftex-toc-map'. The selection processes
6883 have a number of new keys predefined. In particular, TAB lets you
6884 enter a label with completion. Check the on-the-fly help (press `?'
6885 at the selection prompt) or read the Info documentation to find out
6888 *** Support for the varioref package
6890 The `v' key in the label selection buffer toggles \ref versus \vref.
6894 Three new hooks can be used to redefine the way labels, references,
6895 and citations are created. These hooks are
6896 `reftex-format-label-function', `reftex-format-ref-function',
6897 `reftex-format-cite-function'.
6899 *** Citations outside LaTeX
6901 The command `reftex-citation' may also be used outside LaTeX (e.g. in
6902 a mail buffer). See the Info documentation for details.
6904 *** Short context is no longer fontified.
6906 The short context in the label menu no longer copies the
6907 fontification from the text in the buffer. If you prefer it to be
6910 (setq reftex-refontify-context t)
6912 ** file-cache-minibuffer-complete now accepts a prefix argument.
6913 With a prefix argument, it does not try to do completion of
6914 the file name within its directory; it only checks for other
6915 directories that contain the same file name.
6917 Thus, given the file name Makefile, and assuming that a file
6918 Makefile.in exists in the same directory, ordinary
6919 file-cache-minibuffer-complete will try to complete Makefile to
6920 Makefile.in and will therefore never look for other directories that
6921 have Makefile. A prefix argument tells it not to look for longer
6922 names such as Makefile.in, so that instead it will look for other
6923 directories--just as if the name were already complete in its present
6926 ** New modes and packages
6928 *** There is a new alternative major mode for Perl, Cperl mode.
6929 It has many more features than Perl mode, and some people prefer
6930 it, but some do not.
6932 *** There is a new major mode, M-x vhdl-mode, for editing files of VHDL
6935 *** M-x which-function-mode enables a minor mode that displays the
6936 current function name continuously in the mode line, as you move
6939 Which Function mode is effective in major modes which support Imenu.
6941 *** Gametree is a major mode for editing game analysis trees. The author
6942 uses it for keeping notes about his postal Chess games, but it should
6943 be helpful for other two-player games as well, as long as they have an
6944 established system of notation similar to Chess.
6946 *** The new minor mode checkdoc-minor-mode provides Emacs Lisp
6947 documentation string checking for style and spelling. The style
6948 guidelines are found in the Emacs Lisp programming manual.
6950 *** The net-utils package makes some common networking features
6951 available in Emacs. Some of these functions are wrappers around
6952 system utilities (ping, nslookup, etc); others are implementations of
6953 simple protocols (finger, whois) in Emacs Lisp. There are also
6954 functions to make simple connections to TCP/IP ports for debugging and
6957 *** highlight-changes-mode is a minor mode that uses colors to
6958 identify recently changed parts of the buffer text.
6960 *** The new package `midnight' lets you specify things to be done
6961 within Emacs at midnight--by default, kill buffers that you have not
6962 used in a considerable time. To use this feature, customize
6963 the user option `midnight-mode' to t.
6965 *** The file generic-x.el defines a number of simple major modes.
6967 apache-generic-mode: For Apache and NCSA httpd configuration files
6968 samba-generic-mode: Samba configuration files
6969 fvwm-generic-mode: For fvwm initialization files
6970 x-resource-generic-mode: For X resource files
6971 hosts-generic-mode: For hosts files (.rhosts, /etc/hosts, etc)
6972 mailagent-rules-generic-mode: For mailagent .rules files
6973 javascript-generic-mode: For JavaScript files
6974 vrml-generic-mode: For VRML files
6975 java-manifest-generic-mode: For Java MANIFEST files
6976 java-properties-generic-mode: For Java property files
6977 mailrc-generic-mode: For .mailrc files
6979 Platform-specific modes:
6981 prototype-generic-mode: For Solaris/Sys V prototype files
6982 pkginfo-generic-mode: For Solaris/Sys V pkginfo files
6983 alias-generic-mode: For C shell alias files
6984 inf-generic-mode: For MS-Windows INF files
6985 ini-generic-mode: For MS-Windows INI files
6986 reg-generic-mode: For MS-Windows Registry files
6987 bat-generic-mode: For MS-Windows BAT scripts
6988 rc-generic-mode: For MS-Windows Resource files
6989 rul-generic-mode: For InstallShield scripts
6991 * Lisp changes in Emacs 20.3 since the Emacs Lisp Manual was published
6993 ** If you want a Lisp file to be read in unibyte mode,
6994 use -*-unibyte: t;-*- on its first line.
6995 That will force Emacs to read that file in unibyte mode.
6996 Otherwise, the file will be loaded and byte-compiled in multibyte mode.
6998 Thus, each lisp file is read in a consistent way regardless of whether
6999 you started Emacs with --unibyte, so that a Lisp program gives
7000 consistent results regardless of how Emacs was started.
7002 ** The new function assoc-default is useful for searching an alist,
7003 and using a default value if the key is not found there. You can
7004 specify a comparison predicate, so this function is useful for
7005 searching comparing a string against an alist of regular expressions.
7007 ** The functions unibyte-char-to-multibyte and
7008 multibyte-char-to-unibyte convert between unibyte and multibyte
7009 character codes, in a way that is appropriate for the current language
7012 ** The functions read-event, read-char and read-char-exclusive now
7013 take two optional arguments. PROMPT, if non-nil, specifies a prompt
7014 string. SUPPRESS-INPUT-METHOD, if non-nil, says to disable the
7015 current input method for reading this one event.
7017 ** Two new variables print-escape-nonascii and print-escape-multibyte
7018 now control whether to output certain characters as
7019 backslash-sequences. print-escape-nonascii applies to single-byte
7020 non-ASCII characters; print-escape-multibyte applies to multibyte
7021 characters. Both of these variables are used only when printing
7022 in readable fashion (prin1 uses them, princ does not).
7024 * Lisp changes in Emacs 20.3 before the Emacs Lisp Manual was published
7026 ** Compiled Emacs Lisp files made with the modified "MBSK" version
7027 of Emacs 20.2 do not work in Emacs 20.3.
7029 ** Buffer positions are now measured in characters, as they were
7030 in Emacs 19 and before. This means that (forward-char 1)
7031 always increases point by 1.
7033 The function chars-in-region now just subtracts its arguments. It is
7034 considered obsolete. The function char-boundary-p has been deleted.
7036 See below for additional changes relating to multibyte characters.
7038 ** defcustom, defface and defgroup now accept the keyword `:version'.
7039 Use this to specify in which version of Emacs a certain variable's
7040 default value changed. For example,
7042 (defcustom foo-max 34 "*Maximum number of foo's allowed."
7047 (defgroup foo-group nil "The foo group."
7050 If an entire new group is added or the variables in it have the
7051 default values changed, then just add a `:version' to that group. It
7052 is recommended that new packages added to the distribution contain a
7053 `:version' in the top level group.
7055 This information is used to control the customize-changed-options command.
7057 ** It is now an error to change the value of a symbol whose name
7058 starts with a colon--if it is interned in the standard obarray.
7060 However, setting such a symbol to its proper value, which is that
7061 symbol itself, is not an error. This is for the sake of programs that
7062 support previous Emacs versions by explicitly setting these variables
7065 If you set the variable keyword-symbols-constant-flag to nil,
7066 this error is suppressed, and you can set these symbols to any
7069 ** There is a new debugger command, R.
7070 It evaluates an expression like e, but saves the result
7071 in the buffer *Debugger-record*.
7073 ** Frame-local variables.
7075 You can now make a variable local to various frames. To do this, call
7076 the function make-variable-frame-local; this enables frames to have
7077 local bindings for that variable.
7079 These frame-local bindings are actually frame parameters: you create a
7080 frame-local binding in a specific frame by calling
7081 modify-frame-parameters and specifying the variable name as the
7084 Buffer-local bindings take precedence over frame-local bindings.
7085 Thus, if the current buffer has a buffer-local binding, that binding is
7086 active; otherwise, if the selected frame has a frame-local binding,
7087 that binding is active; otherwise, the default binding is active.
7089 It would not be hard to implement window-local bindings, but it is not
7090 clear that this would be very useful; windows tend to come and go in a
7091 very transitory fashion, so that trying to produce any specific effect
7092 through a window-local binding would not be very robust.
7094 ** `sregexq' and `sregex' are two new functions for constructing
7095 "symbolic regular expressions." These are Lisp expressions that, when
7096 evaluated, yield conventional string-based regexps. The symbolic form
7097 makes it easier to construct, read, and maintain complex patterns.
7098 See the documentation in sregex.el.
7100 ** parse-partial-sexp's return value has an additional element which
7101 is used to pass information along if you pass it to another call to
7102 parse-partial-sexp, starting its scan where the first call ended.
7103 The contents of this field are not yet finalized.
7105 ** eval-region now accepts a fourth optional argument READ-FUNCTION.
7106 If it is non-nil, that function is used instead of `read'.
7108 ** unload-feature by default removes the feature's functions from
7109 known hooks to avoid trouble, but a package providing FEATURE can
7110 define a hook FEATURE-unload-hook to be run by unload-feature instead.
7112 ** read-from-minibuffer no longer returns the argument DEFAULT-VALUE
7113 when the user enters empty input. It now returns the null string, as
7114 it did in Emacs 19. The default value is made available in the
7115 history via M-n, but it is not applied here as a default.
7117 The other, more specialized minibuffer-reading functions continue to
7118 return the default value (not the null string) when the user enters
7121 ** The new variable read-buffer-function controls which routine to use
7122 for selecting buffers. For example, if you set this variable to
7123 `iswitchb-read-buffer', iswitchb will be used to read buffer names.
7124 Other functions can also be used if they accept the same arguments as
7125 `read-buffer' and return the selected buffer name as a string.
7127 ** The new function read-passwd reads a password from the terminal,
7128 echoing a period for each character typed. It takes three arguments:
7129 a prompt string, a flag which says "read it twice to make sure", and a
7130 default password to use if the user enters nothing.
7132 ** The variable fill-nobreak-predicate gives major modes a way to
7133 specify not to break a line at certain places. Its value is a
7134 function which is called with no arguments, with point located at the
7135 place where a break is being considered. If the function returns
7136 non-nil, then the line won't be broken there.
7138 ** window-end now takes an optional second argument, UPDATE.
7139 If this is non-nil, then the function always returns an accurate
7140 up-to-date value for the buffer position corresponding to the
7141 end of the window, even if this requires computation.
7143 ** other-buffer now takes an optional argument FRAME
7144 which specifies which frame's buffer list to use.
7145 If it is nil, that means use the selected frame's buffer list.
7147 ** The new variable buffer-display-time, always local in every buffer,
7148 holds the value of (current-time) as of the last time that a window
7149 was directed to display this buffer.
7151 ** It is now meaningful to compare two window-configuration objects
7152 with `equal'. Two window-configuration objects are equal if they
7153 describe equivalent arrangements of windows, in the same frame--in
7154 other words, if they would give the same results if passed to
7155 set-window-configuration.
7157 ** compare-window-configurations is a new function that compares two
7158 window configurations loosely. It ignores differences in saved buffer
7159 positions and scrolling, and considers only the structure and sizes of
7160 windows and the choice of buffers to display.
7162 ** The variable minor-mode-overriding-map-alist allows major modes to
7163 override the key bindings of a minor mode. The elements of this alist
7164 look like the elements of minor-mode-map-alist: (VARIABLE . KEYMAP).
7166 If the VARIABLE in an element of minor-mode-overriding-map-alist has a
7167 non-nil value, the paired KEYMAP is active, and totally overrides the
7168 map (if any) specified for the same variable in minor-mode-map-alist.
7170 minor-mode-overriding-map-alist is automatically local in all buffers,
7171 and it is meant to be set by major modes.
7173 ** The function match-string-no-properties is like match-string
7174 except that it discards all text properties from the result.
7176 ** The function load-average now accepts an optional argument
7177 USE-FLOATS. If it is non-nil, the load average values are returned as
7178 floating point numbers, rather than as integers to be divided by 100.
7180 ** The new variable temporary-file-directory specifies the directory
7181 to use for creating temporary files. The default value is determined
7182 in a reasonable way for your operating system; on GNU and Unix systems
7183 it is based on the TMP and TMPDIR environment variables.
7187 *** easymenu.el now uses the new menu item format and supports the
7188 keywords :visible and :filter. The existing keyword :keys is now
7191 The variable `easy-menu-precalculate-equivalent-keybindings' controls
7192 a new feature which calculates keyboard equivalents for the menu when
7193 you define the menu. The default is t. If you rarely use menus, you
7194 can set the variable to nil to disable this precalculation feature;
7195 then the calculation is done only if you use the menu bar.
7197 *** A new format for menu items is supported.
7199 In a keymap, a key binding that has the format
7200 (STRING . REAL-BINDING) or (STRING HELP-STRING . REAL-BINDING)
7201 defines a menu item. Now a menu item definition may also be a list that
7202 starts with the symbol `menu-item'.
7205 (menu-item ITEM-NAME) or
7206 (menu-item ITEM-NAME REAL-BINDING . ITEM-PROPERTY-LIST)
7207 where ITEM-NAME is an expression which evaluates to the menu item
7208 string, and ITEM-PROPERTY-LIST has the form of a property list.
7209 The supported properties include
7211 :enable FORM Evaluate FORM to determine whether the
7213 :visible FORM Evaluate FORM to determine whether the
7214 item should appear in the menu.
7216 FILTER-FN is a function of one argument,
7217 which will be REAL-BINDING.
7218 It should return a binding to use instead.
7220 DESCRIPTION is a string that describes an equivalent keyboard
7221 binding for REAL-BINDING. DESCRIPTION is expanded with
7222 `substitute-command-keys' before it is used.
7223 :key-sequence KEY-SEQUENCE
7224 KEY-SEQUENCE is a key-sequence for an equivalent
7227 This means that the command normally has no
7228 keyboard equivalent.
7229 :help HELP HELP is the extra help string (not currently used).
7230 :button (TYPE . SELECTED)
7231 TYPE is :toggle or :radio.
7232 SELECTED is a form, to be evaluated, and its
7233 value says whether this button is currently selected.
7235 Buttons are at the moment only simulated by prefixes in the menu.
7236 Eventually ordinary X-buttons may be supported.
7238 (menu-item ITEM-NAME) defines unselectable item.
7242 *** The new event type `mouse-wheel' is generated by a wheel on a
7243 mouse (such as the MS Intellimouse). The event contains a delta that
7244 corresponds to the amount and direction that the wheel is rotated,
7245 which is typically used to implement a scroll or zoom. The format is:
7247 (mouse-wheel POSITION DELTA)
7249 where POSITION is a list describing the position of the event in the
7250 same format as a mouse-click event, and DELTA is a signed number
7251 indicating the number of increments by which the wheel was rotated. A
7252 negative DELTA indicates that the wheel was rotated backwards, towards
7253 the user, and a positive DELTA indicates that the wheel was rotated
7254 forward, away from the user.
7256 As of now, this event type is generated only on MS Windows.
7258 *** The new event type `drag-n-drop' is generated when a group of
7259 files is selected in an application outside of Emacs, and then dragged
7260 and dropped onto an Emacs frame. The event contains a list of
7261 filenames that were dragged and dropped, which are then typically
7262 loaded into Emacs. The format is:
7264 (drag-n-drop POSITION FILES)
7266 where POSITION is a list describing the position of the event in the
7267 same format as a mouse-click event, and FILES is the list of filenames
7268 that were dragged and dropped.
7270 As of now, this event type is generated only on MS Windows.
7272 ** Changes relating to multibyte characters.
7274 *** The variable enable-multibyte-characters is now read-only;
7275 any attempt to set it directly signals an error. The only way
7276 to change this value in an existing buffer is with set-buffer-multibyte.
7278 *** In a string constant, `\ ' now stands for "nothing at all". You
7279 can use it to terminate a hex escape which is followed by a character
7280 that could otherwise be read as part of the hex escape.
7282 *** String indices are now measured in characters, as they were
7283 in Emacs 19 and before.
7285 The function chars-in-string has been deleted.
7286 The function concat-chars has been renamed to `string'.
7288 *** The function set-buffer-multibyte sets the flag in the current
7289 buffer that says whether the buffer uses multibyte representation or
7290 unibyte representation. If the argument is nil, it selects unibyte
7291 representation. Otherwise it selects multibyte representation.
7293 This function does not change the contents of the buffer, viewed
7294 as a sequence of bytes. However, it does change the contents
7295 viewed as characters; a sequence of two bytes which is treated as
7296 one character when the buffer uses multibyte representation
7297 will count as two characters using unibyte representation.
7299 This function sets enable-multibyte-characters to record which
7300 representation is in use. It also adjusts various data in the buffer
7301 (including its markers, overlays and text properties) so that they are
7302 consistent with the new representation.
7304 *** string-make-multibyte takes a string and converts it to multibyte
7305 representation. Most of the time, you don't need to care
7306 about the representation, because Emacs converts when necessary;
7307 however, it makes a difference when you compare strings.
7309 The conversion of non-ASCII characters works by adding the value of
7310 nonascii-insert-offset to each character, or by translating them
7311 using the table nonascii-translation-table.
7313 *** string-make-unibyte takes a string and converts it to unibyte
7314 representation. Most of the time, you don't need to care about the
7315 representation, but it makes a difference when you compare strings.
7317 The conversion from multibyte to unibyte representation
7318 loses information; the only time Emacs performs it automatically
7319 is when inserting a multibyte string into a unibyte buffer.
7321 *** string-as-multibyte takes a string, and returns another string
7322 which contains the same bytes, but treats them as multibyte.
7324 *** string-as-unibyte takes a string, and returns another string
7325 which contains the same bytes, but treats them as unibyte.
7327 *** The new function compare-strings lets you compare
7328 portions of two strings. Unibyte strings are converted to multibyte,
7329 so that a unibyte string can match a multibyte string.
7330 You can specify whether to ignore case or not.
7332 *** assoc-ignore-case now uses compare-strings so that
7333 it can treat unibyte and multibyte strings as equal.
7335 *** Regular expression operations and buffer string searches now
7336 convert the search pattern to multibyte or unibyte to accord with the
7337 buffer or string being searched.
7339 One consequence is that you cannot always use \200-\377 inside of
7340 [...] to match all non-ASCII characters. This does still work when
7341 searching or matching a unibyte buffer or string, but not when
7342 searching or matching a multibyte string. Unfortunately, there is no
7343 obvious choice of syntax to use within [...] for that job. But, what
7344 you want is just to match all non-ASCII characters, the regular
7345 expression [^\0-\177] works for it.
7347 *** Structure of coding system changed.
7349 All coding systems (including aliases and subsidiaries) are named
7350 by symbols; the symbol's `coding-system' property is a vector
7351 which defines the coding system. Aliases share the same vector
7352 as the principal name, so that altering the contents of this
7353 vector affects the principal name and its aliases. You can define
7354 your own alias name of a coding system by the function
7355 define-coding-system-alias.
7357 The coding system definition includes a property list of its own. Use
7358 the new functions `coding-system-get' and `coding-system-put' to
7359 access such coding system properties as post-read-conversion,
7360 pre-write-conversion, character-translation-table-for-decode,
7361 character-translation-table-for-encode, mime-charset, and
7362 safe-charsets. For instance, (coding-system-get 'iso-latin-1
7363 'mime-charset) gives the corresponding MIME-charset parameter
7366 Among the coding system properties listed above, safe-charsets is new.
7367 The value of this property is a list of character sets which this
7368 coding system can correctly encode and decode. For instance:
7369 (coding-system-get 'iso-latin-1 'safe-charsets) => (ascii latin-iso8859-1)
7371 Here, "correctly encode" means that the encoded character sets can
7372 also be handled safely by systems other than Emacs as far as they
7373 are capable of that coding system. Though, Emacs itself can encode
7374 the other character sets and read it back correctly.
7376 *** The new function select-safe-coding-system can be used to find a
7377 proper coding system for encoding the specified region or string.
7378 This function requires a user interaction.
7380 *** The new functions find-coding-systems-region and
7381 find-coding-systems-string are helper functions used by
7382 select-safe-coding-system. They return a list of all proper coding
7383 systems to encode a text in some region or string. If you don't want
7384 a user interaction, use one of these functions instead of
7385 select-safe-coding-system.
7387 *** The explicit encoding and decoding functions, such as
7388 decode-coding-region and encode-coding-string, now set
7389 last-coding-system-used to reflect the actual way encoding or decoding
7392 *** The new function detect-coding-with-language-environment can be
7393 used to detect a coding system of text according to priorities of
7394 coding systems used by some specific language environment.
7396 *** The functions detect-coding-region and detect-coding-string always
7397 return a list if the arg HIGHEST is nil. Thus, if only ASCII
7398 characters are found, they now return a list of single element
7399 `undecided' or its subsidiaries.
7401 *** The new functions coding-system-change-eol-conversion and
7402 coding-system-change-text-conversion can be used to get a different
7403 coding system than what specified only in how end-of-line or text is
7406 *** The new function set-selection-coding-system can be used to set a
7407 coding system for communicating with other X clients.
7409 *** The function `map-char-table' now passes as argument only valid
7410 character codes, plus generic characters that stand for entire
7411 character sets or entire subrows of a character set. In other words,
7412 each time `map-char-table' calls its FUNCTION argument, the key value
7413 either will be a valid individual character code, or will stand for a
7414 range of characters.
7416 *** The new function `char-valid-p' can be used for checking whether a
7417 Lisp object is a valid character code or not.
7419 *** The new function `charset-after' returns a charset of a character
7420 in the current buffer at position POS.
7422 *** Input methods are now implemented using the variable
7423 input-method-function. If this is non-nil, its value should be a
7424 function; then, whenever Emacs reads an input event that is a printing
7425 character with no modifier bits, it calls that function, passing the
7426 event as an argument. Often this function will read more input, first
7427 binding input-method-function to nil.
7429 The return value should be a list of the events resulting from input
7430 method processing. These events will be processed sequentially as
7431 input, before resorting to unread-command-events. Events returned by
7432 the input method function are not passed to the input method function,
7433 not even if they are printing characters with no modifier bits.
7435 The input method function is not called when reading the second and
7436 subsequent events of a key sequence.
7438 *** You can customize any language environment by using
7439 set-language-environment-hook and exit-language-environment-hook.
7441 The hook `exit-language-environment-hook' should be used to undo
7442 customizations that you made with set-language-environment-hook. For
7443 instance, if you set up a special key binding for a specific language
7444 environment by set-language-environment-hook, you should set up
7445 exit-language-environment-hook to restore the normal key binding.
7447 * Changes in Emacs 20.1
7449 ** Emacs has a new facility for customization of its many user
7450 options. It is called M-x customize. With this facility you can look
7451 at the many user options in an organized way; they are grouped into a
7454 M-x customize also knows what sorts of values are legitimate for each
7455 user option and ensures that you don't use invalid values.
7457 With M-x customize, you can set options either for the present Emacs
7458 session or permanently. (Permanent settings are stored automatically
7459 in your .emacs file.)
7461 ** Scroll bars are now on the left side of the window.
7462 You can change this with M-x customize-option scroll-bar-mode.
7464 ** The mode line no longer includes the string `Emacs'.
7465 This makes more space in the mode line for other information.
7467 ** When you select a region with the mouse, it is highlighted
7468 immediately afterward. At that time, if you type the DELETE key, it
7471 The BACKSPACE key, and the ASCII character DEL, do not do this; they
7472 delete the character before point, as usual.
7474 ** In an incremental search the whole current match is highlighted
7475 on terminals which support this. (You can disable this feature
7476 by setting search-highlight to nil.)
7478 ** In the minibuffer, in some cases, you can now use M-n to
7479 insert the default value into the minibuffer as text. In effect,
7480 the default value (if the minibuffer routines know it) is tacked
7481 onto the history "in the future". (The more normal use of the
7482 history list is to use M-p to insert minibuffer input used in the
7485 ** In Text mode, now only blank lines separate paragraphs.
7486 This makes it possible to get the full benefit of Adaptive Fill mode
7487 in Text mode, and other modes derived from it (such as Mail mode).
7488 TAB in Text mode now runs the command indent-relative; this
7489 makes a practical difference only when you use indented paragraphs.
7491 As a result, the old Indented Text mode is now identical to Text mode,
7492 and is an alias for it.
7494 If you want spaces at the beginning of a line to start a paragraph,
7495 use the new mode, Paragraph Indent Text mode.
7497 ** Scrolling changes
7499 *** Scroll commands to scroll a whole screen now preserve the screen
7500 position of the cursor, if scroll-preserve-screen-position is non-nil.
7502 In this mode, if you scroll several screens back and forth, finishing
7503 on the same screen where you started, the cursor goes back to the line
7506 *** If you set scroll-conservatively to a small number, then when you
7507 move point a short distance off the screen, Emacs will scroll the
7508 screen just far enough to bring point back on screen, provided that
7509 does not exceed `scroll-conservatively' lines.
7511 *** The new variable scroll-margin says how close point can come to the
7512 top or bottom of a window. It is a number of screen lines; if point
7513 comes within that many lines of the top or bottom of the window, Emacs
7514 recenters the window.
7516 ** International character set support (MULE)
7518 Emacs now supports a wide variety of international character sets,
7519 including European variants of the Latin alphabet, as well as Chinese,
7520 Devanagari (Hindi and Marathi), Ethiopian, Greek, IPA, Japanese,
7521 Korean, Lao, Russian, Thai, Tibetan, and Vietnamese scripts. These
7522 features have been merged from the modified version of Emacs known as
7523 MULE (for "MULti-lingual Enhancement to GNU Emacs")
7525 Users of these scripts have established many more-or-less standard
7526 coding systems for storing files. Emacs uses a single multibyte
7527 character encoding within Emacs buffers; it can translate from a wide
7528 variety of coding systems when reading a file and can translate back
7529 into any of these coding systems when saving a file.
7531 Keyboards, even in the countries where these character sets are used,
7532 generally don't have keys for all the characters in them. So Emacs
7533 supports various "input methods", typically one for each script or
7534 language, to make it possible to type them.
7536 The Emacs internal multibyte encoding represents a non-ASCII
7537 character as a sequence of bytes in the range 0200 through 0377.
7539 The new prefix key C-x RET is used for commands that pertain
7540 to multibyte characters, coding systems, and input methods.
7542 You can disable multibyte character support as follows:
7544 (setq-default enable-multibyte-characters nil)
7546 Calling the function standard-display-european turns off multibyte
7547 characters, unless you specify a non-nil value for the second
7548 argument, AUTO. This provides compatibility for people who are
7549 already using standard-display-european to continue using unibyte
7550 characters for their work until they want to change.
7554 An input method is a kind of character conversion which is designed
7555 specifically for interactive input. In Emacs, typically each language
7556 has its own input method (though sometimes several languages which use
7557 the same characters can share one input method). Some languages
7558 support several input methods.
7560 The simplest kind of input method works by mapping ASCII letters into
7561 another alphabet. This is how the Greek and Russian input methods
7564 A more powerful technique is composition: converting sequences of
7565 characters into one letter. Many European input methods use
7566 composition to produce a single non-ASCII letter from a sequence which
7567 consists of a letter followed by diacritics. For example, a' is one
7568 sequence of two characters that might be converted into a single
7571 The input methods for syllabic scripts typically use mapping followed
7572 by conversion. The input methods for Thai and Korean work this way.
7573 First, letters are mapped into symbols for particular sounds or tone
7574 marks; then, sequences of these which make up a whole syllable are
7575 mapped into one syllable sign--most often a "composite character".
7577 None of these methods works very well for Chinese and Japanese, so
7578 they are handled specially. First you input a whole word using
7579 phonetic spelling; then, after the word is in the buffer, Emacs
7580 converts it into one or more characters using a large dictionary.
7582 Since there is more than one way to represent a phonetically spelled
7583 word using Chinese characters, Emacs can only guess which one to use;
7584 typically these input methods give you a way to say "guess again" if
7585 the first guess is wrong.
7587 *** The command C-x RET m (toggle-enable-multibyte-characters)
7588 turns multibyte character support on or off for the current buffer.
7590 If multibyte character support is turned off in a buffer, then each
7591 byte is a single character, even codes 0200 through 0377--exactly as
7592 they did in Emacs 19.34. This includes the features for support for
7593 the European characters, ISO Latin-1 and ISO Latin-2.
7595 However, there is no need to turn off multibyte character support to
7596 use ISO Latin-1 or ISO Latin-2; the Emacs multibyte character set
7597 includes all the characters in these character sets, and Emacs can
7598 translate automatically to and from either one.
7600 *** Visiting a file in unibyte mode.
7602 Turning off multibyte character support in the buffer after visiting a
7603 file with multibyte code conversion will display the multibyte
7604 sequences already in the buffer, byte by byte. This is probably not
7607 If you want to edit a file of unibyte characters (Latin-1, for
7608 example), you can do it by specifying `no-conversion' as the coding
7609 system when reading the file. This coding system also turns off
7610 multibyte characters in that buffer.
7612 If you turn off multibyte character support entirely, this turns off
7613 character conversion as well.
7615 *** Displaying international characters on X Windows.
7617 A font for X typically displays just one alphabet or script.
7618 Therefore, displaying the entire range of characters Emacs supports
7619 requires using many fonts.
7621 Therefore, Emacs now supports "fontsets". Each fontset is a
7622 collection of fonts, each assigned to a range of character codes.
7624 A fontset has a name, like a font. Individual fonts are defined by
7625 the X server; fontsets are defined within Emacs itself. But once you
7626 have defined a fontset, you can use it in a face or a frame just as
7627 you would use a font.
7629 If a fontset specifies no font for a certain character, or if it
7630 specifies a font that does not exist on your system, then it cannot
7631 display that character. It will display an empty box instead.
7633 The fontset height and width are determined by the ASCII characters
7634 (that is, by the font in the fontset which is used for ASCII
7637 *** Defining fontsets.
7639 Emacs does not use any fontset by default. Its default font is still
7640 chosen as in previous versions. You can tell Emacs to use a fontset
7641 with the `-fn' option or the `Font' X resource.
7643 Emacs creates a standard fontset automatically according to the value
7644 of standard-fontset-spec. This fontset's short name is
7645 `fontset-standard'. Bold, italic, and bold-italic variants of the
7646 standard fontset are created automatically.
7648 If you specify a default ASCII font with the `Font' resource or `-fn'
7649 argument, a fontset is generated from it. This works by replacing the
7650 FOUNDARY, FAMILY, ADD_STYLE, and AVERAGE_WIDTH fields of the font name
7651 with `*' then using this to specify a fontset. This fontset's short
7652 name is `fontset-startup'.
7654 Emacs checks resources of the form Fontset-N where N is 0, 1, 2...
7655 The resource value should have this form:
7656 FONTSET-NAME, [CHARSET-NAME:FONT-NAME]...
7657 FONTSET-NAME should have the form of a standard X font name, except:
7658 * most fields should be just the wild card "*".
7659 * the CHARSET_REGISTRY field should be "fontset"
7660 * the CHARSET_ENCODING field can be any nickname of the fontset.
7661 The construct CHARSET-NAME:FONT-NAME can be repeated any number
7662 of times; each time specifies the font for one character set.
7663 CHARSET-NAME should be the name of a character set, and FONT-NAME
7664 should specify an actual font to use for that character set.
7666 Each of these fontsets has an alias which is made from the
7667 last two font name fields, CHARSET_REGISTRY and CHARSET_ENCODING.
7668 You can refer to the fontset by that alias or by its full name.
7670 For any character sets that you don't mention, Emacs tries to choose a
7671 font by substituting into FONTSET-NAME. For instance, with the
7673 Emacs*Fontset-0: -*-fixed-medium-r-normal-*-24-*-*-*-*-*-fontset-24
7674 the font for ASCII is generated as below:
7675 -*-fixed-medium-r-normal-*-24-*-ISO8859-1
7676 Here is the substitution rule:
7677 Change CHARSET_REGISTRY and CHARSET_ENCODING to that of the charset
7678 defined in the variable x-charset-registries. For instance, ASCII has
7679 the entry (ascii . "ISO8859-1") in this variable. Then, reduce
7680 sequences of wild cards -*-...-*- with a single wildcard -*-.
7681 (This is to prevent use of auto-scaled fonts.)
7683 The function which processes the fontset resource value to create the
7684 fontset is called create-fontset-from-fontset-spec. You can also call
7685 that function explicitly to create a fontset.
7687 With the X resource Emacs.Font, you can specify a fontset name just
7688 like an actual font name. But be careful not to specify a fontset
7689 name in a wildcard resource like Emacs*Font--that tries to specify the
7690 fontset for other purposes including menus, and they cannot handle
7693 *** The command M-x set-language-environment sets certain global Emacs
7694 defaults for a particular choice of language.
7696 Selecting a language environment typically specifies a default input
7697 method and which coding systems to recognize automatically when
7698 visiting files. However, it does not try to reread files you have
7699 already visited; the text in those buffers is not affected. The
7700 language environment may also specify a default choice of coding
7701 system for new files that you create.
7703 It makes no difference which buffer is current when you use
7704 set-language-environment, because these defaults apply globally to the
7705 whole Emacs session.
7707 For example, M-x set-language-environment RET Latin-1 RET
7708 chooses the Latin-1 character set. In the .emacs file, you can do this
7709 with (set-language-environment "Latin-1").
7711 *** The command C-x RET f (set-buffer-file-coding-system)
7712 specifies the file coding system for the current buffer. This
7713 specifies what sort of character code translation to do when saving
7714 the file. As an argument, you must specify the name of one of the
7715 coding systems that Emacs supports.
7717 *** The command C-x RET c (universal-coding-system-argument)
7718 lets you specify a coding system when you read or write a file.
7719 This command uses the minibuffer to read a coding system name.
7720 After you exit the minibuffer, the specified coding system
7721 is used for *the immediately following command*.
7723 So if the immediately following command is a command to read or
7724 write a file, it uses the specified coding system for that file.
7726 If the immediately following command does not use the coding system,
7727 then C-x RET c ultimately has no effect.
7729 For example, C-x RET c iso-8859-1 RET C-x C-f temp RET
7730 visits the file `temp' treating it as ISO Latin-1.
7732 *** You can specify the coding system for a file using the -*-
7733 construct. Include `coding: CODINGSYSTEM;' inside the -*-...-*-
7734 to specify use of coding system CODINGSYSTEM. You can also
7735 specify the coding system in a local variable list at the end
7738 *** The command C-x RET t (set-terminal-coding-system) specifies
7739 the coding system for terminal output. If you specify a character
7740 code for terminal output, all characters output to the terminal are
7741 translated into that character code.
7743 This feature is useful for certain character-only terminals built in
7744 various countries to support the languages of those countries.
7746 By default, output to the terminal is not translated at all.
7748 *** The command C-x RET k (set-keyboard-coding-system) specifies
7749 the coding system for keyboard input.
7751 Character code translation of keyboard input is useful for terminals
7752 with keys that send non-ASCII graphic characters--for example,
7753 some terminals designed for ISO Latin-1 or subsets of it.
7755 By default, keyboard input is not translated at all.
7757 Character code translation of keyboard input is similar to using an
7758 input method, in that both define sequences of keyboard input that
7759 translate into single characters. However, input methods are designed
7760 to be convenient for interactive use, while the code translations are
7761 designed to work with terminals.
7763 *** The command C-x RET p (set-buffer-process-coding-system)
7764 specifies the coding system for input and output to a subprocess.
7765 This command applies to the current buffer; normally, each subprocess
7766 has its own buffer, and thus you can use this command to specify
7767 translation to and from a particular subprocess by giving the command
7768 in the corresponding buffer.
7770 By default, process input and output are not translated at all.
7772 *** The variable file-name-coding-system specifies the coding system
7773 to use for encoding file names before operating on them.
7774 It is also used for decoding file names obtained from the system.
7776 *** The command C-\ (toggle-input-method) activates or deactivates
7777 an input method. If no input method has been selected before, the
7778 command prompts for you to specify the language and input method you
7781 C-u C-\ (select-input-method) lets you switch to a different input
7782 method. C-h C-\ (or C-h I) describes the current input method.
7784 *** Some input methods remap the keyboard to emulate various keyboard
7785 layouts commonly used for particular scripts. How to do this
7786 remapping properly depends on your actual keyboard layout. To specify
7787 which layout your keyboard has, use M-x quail-set-keyboard-layout.
7789 *** The command C-h C (describe-coding-system) displays
7790 the coding systems currently selected for various purposes, plus
7791 related information.
7793 *** The command C-h h (view-hello-file) displays a file called
7794 HELLO, which has examples of text in many languages, using various
7797 *** The command C-h L (describe-language-support) displays
7798 information about the support for a particular language.
7799 You specify the language as an argument.
7801 *** The mode line now contains a letter or character that identifies
7802 the coding system used in the visited file. It normally follows the
7805 A dash indicates the default state of affairs: no code conversion
7806 (except CRLF => newline if appropriate). `=' means no conversion
7807 whatsoever. The ISO 8859 coding systems are represented by digits
7808 1 through 9. Other coding systems are represented by letters:
7810 A alternativnyj (Russian)
7812 C cn-gb-2312 (Chinese)
7813 C iso-2022-cn (Chinese)
7814 D in-is13194-devanagari (Indian languages)
7815 E euc-japan (Japanese)
7816 I iso-2022-cjk or iso-2022-ss2 (Chinese, Japanese, Korean)
7817 J junet (iso-2022-7) or old-jis (iso-2022-jp-1978-irv) (Japanese)
7818 K euc-korea (Korean)
7821 S shift_jis (Japanese)
7824 V viscii or vscii (Vietnamese)
7825 i iso-2022-lock (Chinese, Japanese, Korean)
7826 k iso-2022-kr (Korean)
7830 When you are using a character-only terminal (not a window system),
7831 two additional characters appear in between the dash and the file
7832 coding system. These two characters describe the coding system for
7833 keyboard input, and the coding system for terminal output.
7835 *** The new variable rmail-file-coding-system specifies the code
7836 conversion to use for RMAIL files. The default value is nil.
7838 When you read mail with Rmail, each message is decoded automatically
7839 into Emacs' internal format. This has nothing to do with
7840 rmail-file-coding-system. That variable controls reading and writing
7841 Rmail files themselves.
7843 *** The new variable sendmail-coding-system specifies the code
7844 conversion for outgoing mail. The default value is nil.
7846 Actually, there are three different ways of specifying the coding system
7849 - If you use C-x RET f in the mail buffer, that takes priority.
7850 - Otherwise, if you set sendmail-coding-system non-nil, that specifies it.
7851 - Otherwise, the default coding system for new files is used,
7852 if that is non-nil. That comes from your language environment.
7853 - Otherwise, Latin-1 is used.
7855 *** The command C-h t (help-with-tutorial) accepts a prefix argument
7856 to specify the language for the tutorial file. Currently, English,
7857 Japanese, Korean and Thai are supported. We welcome additional
7860 ** An easy new way to visit a file with no code or format conversion
7861 of any kind: Use M-x find-file-literally. There is also a command
7862 insert-file-literally which inserts a file into the current buffer
7863 without any conversion.
7865 ** C-q's handling of octal character codes is changed.
7866 You can now specify any number of octal digits.
7867 RET terminates the digits and is discarded;
7868 any other non-digit terminates the digits and is then used as input.
7870 ** There are new commands for looking up Info documentation for
7871 functions, variables and file names used in your programs.
7873 Type M-x info-lookup-symbol to look up a symbol in the buffer at point.
7874 Type M-x info-lookup-file to look up a file in the buffer at point.
7876 Precisely which Info files are used to look it up depends on the major
7877 mode. For example, in C mode, the GNU libc manual is used.
7879 ** M-TAB in most programming language modes now runs the command
7880 complete-symbol. This command performs completion on the symbol name
7881 in the buffer before point.
7883 With a numeric argument, it performs completion based on the set of
7884 symbols documented in the Info files for the programming language that
7887 With no argument, it does completion based on the current tags tables,
7888 just like the old binding of M-TAB (complete-tag).
7890 ** File locking works with NFS now.
7892 The lock file for FILENAME is now a symbolic link named .#FILENAME,
7893 in the same directory as FILENAME.
7895 This means that collision detection between two different machines now
7896 works reasonably well; it also means that no file server or directory
7897 can become a bottleneck.
7899 The new method does have drawbacks. It means that collision detection
7900 does not operate when you edit a file in a directory where you cannot
7901 create new files. Collision detection also doesn't operate when the
7902 file server does not support symbolic links. But these conditions are
7903 rare, and the ability to have collision detection while using NFS is
7904 so useful that the change is worth while.
7906 When Emacs or a system crashes, this may leave behind lock files which
7907 are stale. So you may occasionally get warnings about spurious
7908 collisions. When you determine that the collision is spurious, just
7909 tell Emacs to go ahead anyway.
7911 ** If you wish to use Show Paren mode to display matching parentheses,
7912 it is no longer sufficient to load paren.el. Instead you must call
7915 ** If you wish to use Delete Selection mode to replace a highlighted
7916 selection when you insert new text, it is no longer sufficient to load
7917 delsel.el. Instead you must call the function delete-selection-mode.
7919 ** If you wish to use Partial Completion mode to complete partial words
7920 within symbols or filenames, it is no longer sufficient to load
7921 complete.el. Instead you must call the function partial-completion-mode.
7923 ** If you wish to use uniquify to rename buffers for you,
7924 it is no longer sufficient to load uniquify.el. You must also
7925 set uniquify-buffer-name-style to one of the non-nil legitimate values.
7927 ** Changes in View mode.
7929 *** Several new commands are available in View mode.
7930 Do H in view mode for a list of commands.
7932 *** There are two new commands for entering View mode:
7933 view-file-other-frame and view-buffer-other-frame.
7935 *** Exiting View mode does a better job of restoring windows to their
7938 *** New customization variable view-scroll-auto-exit. If non-nil,
7939 scrolling past end of buffer makes view mode exit.
7941 *** New customization variable view-exits-all-viewing-windows. If
7942 non-nil, view-mode will at exit restore all windows viewing buffer,
7943 not just the selected window.
7945 *** New customization variable view-read-only. If non-nil, visiting a
7946 read-only file automatically enters View mode, and toggle-read-only
7947 turns View mode on or off.
7949 *** New customization variable view-remove-frame-by-deleting controls
7950 how to remove a not needed frame at view mode exit. If non-nil,
7951 delete the frame, if nil make an icon of it.
7953 ** C-x v l, the command to print a file's version control log,
7954 now positions point at the entry for the file's current branch version.
7956 ** C-x v =, the command to compare a file with the last checked-in version,
7957 has a new feature. If the file is currently not locked, so that it is
7958 presumably identical to the last checked-in version, the command now asks
7959 which version to compare with.
7961 ** When using hideshow.el, incremental search can temporarily show hidden
7962 blocks if a match is inside the block.
7964 The block is hidden again if the search is continued and the next match
7965 is outside the block. By customizing the variable
7966 isearch-hide-immediately you can choose to hide all the temporarily
7967 shown blocks only when exiting from incremental search.
7969 By customizing the variable hs-isearch-open you can choose what kind
7970 of blocks to temporarily show during isearch: comment blocks, code
7971 blocks, all of them or none.
7973 ** The new command C-x 4 0 (kill-buffer-and-window) kills the
7974 current buffer and deletes the selected window. It asks for
7977 ** C-x C-w, which saves the buffer into a specified file name,
7978 now changes the major mode according to that file name.
7979 However, the mode will not be changed if
7980 (1) a local variables list or the `-*-' line specifies a major mode, or
7981 (2) the current major mode is a "special" mode,
7982 not suitable for ordinary files, or
7983 (3) the new file name does not particularly specify any mode.
7985 This applies to M-x set-visited-file-name as well.
7987 However, if you set change-major-mode-with-file-name to nil, then
7988 these commands do not change the major mode.
7990 ** M-x occur changes.
7992 *** If the argument to M-x occur contains upper case letters,
7993 it performs a case-sensitive search.
7995 *** In the *Occur* buffer made by M-x occur,
7996 if you type g or M-x revert-buffer, this repeats the search
7997 using the same regular expression and the same buffer as before.
7999 ** In Transient Mark mode, the region in any one buffer is highlighted
8000 in just one window at a time. At first, it is highlighted in the
8001 window where you set the mark. The buffer's highlighting remains in
8002 that window unless you select to another window which shows the same
8003 buffer--then the highlighting moves to that window.
8005 ** The feature to suggest key bindings when you use M-x now operates
8006 after the command finishes. The message suggesting key bindings
8007 appears temporarily in the echo area. The previous echo area contents
8008 come back after a few seconds, in case they contain useful information.
8010 ** Each frame now independently records the order for recently
8011 selected buffers, so that the default for C-x b is now based on the
8012 buffers recently selected in the selected frame.
8014 ** Outline mode changes.
8016 *** Outline mode now uses overlays (this is the former noutline.el).
8018 *** Incremental searches skip over invisible text in Outline mode.
8020 ** When a minibuffer window is active but not the selected window, if
8021 you try to use the minibuffer, you used to get a nested minibuffer.
8022 Now, this not only gives an error, it also cancels the minibuffer that
8025 The motive for this change is so that beginning users do not
8026 unknowingly move away from minibuffers, leaving them active, and then
8029 If you want to be able to have recursive minibuffers, you must
8030 set enable-recursive-minibuffers to non-nil.
8032 ** Changes in dynamic abbrevs.
8034 *** Expanding dynamic abbrevs with M-/ is now smarter about case
8035 conversion. If the expansion has mixed case not counting the first
8036 character, and the abbreviation matches the beginning of the expansion
8037 including case, then the expansion is copied verbatim.
8039 The expansion is also copied verbatim if the abbreviation itself has
8040 mixed case. And using SPC M-/ to copy an additional word always
8041 copies it verbatim except when the previous copied word is all caps.
8043 *** The values of `dabbrev-case-replace' and `dabbrev-case-fold-search'
8044 are no longer Lisp expressions. They have simply three possible
8047 `dabbrev-case-replace' has these three values: nil (don't preserve
8048 case), t (do), or `case-replace' (do like M-x query-replace).
8049 `dabbrev-case-fold-search' has these three values: nil (don't ignore
8050 case), t (do), or `case-fold-search' (do like search).
8052 ** Minibuffer history lists are truncated automatically now to a
8053 certain length. The variable history-length specifies how long they
8054 can be. The default value is 30.
8056 ** Changes in Mail mode.
8058 *** The key C-x m no longer runs the `mail' command directly.
8059 Instead, it runs the command `compose-mail', which invokes the mail
8060 composition mechanism you have selected with the variable
8061 `mail-user-agent'. The default choice of user agent is
8062 `sendmail-user-agent', which gives behavior compatible with the old
8065 C-x 4 m now runs compose-mail-other-window, and C-x 5 m runs
8066 compose-mail-other-frame.
8068 *** While composing a reply to a mail message, from Rmail, you can use
8069 the command C-c C-r to cite just the region from the message you are
8070 replying to. This copies the text which is the selected region in the
8071 buffer that shows the original message.
8073 *** The command C-c C-i inserts a file at the end of the message,
8074 with separator lines around the contents.
8076 *** The command M-x expand-mail-aliases expands all mail aliases
8077 in suitable mail headers. Emacs automatically extracts mail alias
8078 definitions from your mail alias file (e.g., ~/.mailrc). You do not
8079 need to expand mail aliases yourself before sending mail.
8081 *** New features in the mail-complete command.
8083 **** The mail-complete command now inserts the user's full name,
8084 for local users or if that is known. The variable mail-complete-style
8085 controls the style to use, and whether to do this at all.
8086 Its values are like those of mail-from-style.
8088 **** The variable mail-passwd-command lets you specify a shell command
8089 to run to fetch a set of password-entries that add to the ones in
8092 **** The variable mail-passwd-file now specifies a list of files to read
8093 to get the list of user ids. By default, one file is used:
8096 ** You can "quote" a file name to inhibit special significance of
8097 special syntax, by adding `/:' to the beginning. Thus, if you have a
8098 directory named `/foo:', you can prevent it from being treated as a
8099 reference to a remote host named `foo' by writing it as `/:/foo:'.
8101 Emacs uses this new construct automatically when necessary, such as
8102 when you start it with a working directory whose name might otherwise
8103 be taken to be magic.
8105 ** There is a new command M-x grep-find which uses find to select
8106 files to search through, and grep to scan them. The output is
8107 available in a Compile mode buffer, as with M-x grep.
8109 M-x grep now uses the -e option if the grep program supports that.
8110 (-e prevents problems if the search pattern starts with a dash.)
8112 ** In Dired, the & command now flags for deletion the files whose names
8113 suggest they are probably not needed in the long run.
8115 In Dired, * is now a prefix key for mark-related commands.
8117 new key dired.el binding old key
8118 ------- ---------------- -------
8119 * c dired-change-marks c
8121 * * dired-mark-executables * (binding deleted)
8122 * / dired-mark-directories / (binding deleted)
8123 * @ dired-mark-symlinks @ (binding deleted)
8125 * DEL dired-unmark-backward DEL
8126 * ? dired-unmark-all-files C-M-?
8127 * ! dired-unmark-all-marks
8128 * % dired-mark-files-regexp % m
8129 * C-n dired-next-marked-file M-}
8130 * C-p dired-prev-marked-file M-{
8134 *** When Rmail cannot convert your incoming mail into Babyl format, it
8135 saves the new mail in the file RMAILOSE.n, where n is an integer
8136 chosen to make a unique name. This way, Rmail will not keep crashing
8137 each time you run it.
8139 *** In Rmail, the variable rmail-summary-line-count-flag now controls
8140 whether to include the line count in the summary. Non-nil means yes.
8142 *** In Rmail summary buffers, d and C-d (the commands to delete
8143 messages) now take repeat counts as arguments. A negative argument
8144 means to move in the opposite direction.
8146 *** In Rmail, the t command now takes an optional argument which lets
8147 you specify whether to show the message headers in full or pruned.
8149 *** In Rmail, the new command w (rmail-output-body-to-file) writes
8150 just the body of the current message into a file, without the headers.
8151 It takes the file name from the message subject, by default, but you
8152 can edit that file name in the minibuffer before it is actually used
8157 *** nntp.el has been totally rewritten in an asynchronous fashion.
8159 *** Article prefetching functionality has been moved up into
8162 *** Scoring can now be performed with logical operators like
8163 `and', `or', `not', and parent redirection.
8165 *** Article washing status can be displayed in the
8168 *** gnus.el has been split into many smaller files.
8170 *** Suppression of duplicate articles based on Message-ID.
8172 (setq gnus-suppress-duplicates t)
8174 *** New variables for specifying what score and adapt files
8175 are to be considered home score and adapt files. See
8176 `gnus-home-score-file' and `gnus-home-adapt-files'.
8178 *** Groups can inherit group parameters from parent topics.
8180 *** Article editing has been revamped and is now usable.
8182 *** Signatures can be recognized in more intelligent fashions.
8183 See `gnus-signature-separator' and `gnus-signature-limit'.
8185 *** Summary pick mode has been made to look more nn-like.
8186 Line numbers are displayed and the `.' command can be
8187 used to pick articles.
8189 *** Commands for moving the .newsrc.eld from one server to
8190 another have been added.
8192 `M-x gnus-change-server'
8194 *** A way to specify that "uninteresting" fields be suppressed when
8195 generating lines in buffers.
8197 *** Several commands in the group buffer can be undone with
8200 *** Scoring can be done on words using the new score type `w'.
8202 *** Adaptive scoring can be done on a Subject word-by-word basis:
8204 (setq gnus-use-adaptive-scoring '(word))
8206 *** Scores can be decayed.
8208 (setq gnus-decay-scores t)
8210 *** Scoring can be performed using a regexp on the Date header. The
8211 Date is normalized to compact ISO 8601 format first.
8213 *** A new command has been added to remove all data on articles from
8216 `M-x gnus-group-clear-data-on-native-groups'
8218 *** A new command for reading collections of documents
8219 (nndoc with nnvirtual on top) has been added -- `C-M-d'.
8221 *** Process mark sets can be pushed and popped.
8223 *** A new mail-to-news backend makes it possible to post
8224 even when the NNTP server doesn't allow posting.
8226 *** A new backend for reading searches from Web search engines
8227 (DejaNews, Alta Vista, InReference) has been added.
8229 Use the `G w' command in the group buffer to create such
8232 *** Groups inside topics can now be sorted using the standard
8233 sorting functions, and each topic can be sorted independently.
8235 See the commands under the `T S' submap.
8237 *** Subsets of the groups can be sorted independently.
8239 See the commands under the `G P' submap.
8241 *** Cached articles can be pulled into the groups.
8243 Use the `Y c' command.
8245 *** Score files are now applied in a more reliable order.
8247 *** Reports on where mail messages end up can be generated.
8249 `M-x nnmail-split-history'
8251 *** More hooks and functions have been added to remove junk
8252 from incoming mail before saving the mail.
8254 See `nnmail-prepare-incoming-header-hook'.
8256 *** The nnml mail backend now understands compressed article files.
8258 *** To enable Gnus to read/post multi-lingual articles, you must execute
8259 the following code, for instance, in your .emacs.
8261 (add-hook 'gnus-startup-hook 'gnus-mule-initialize)
8263 Then, when you start Gnus, it will decode non-ASCII text automatically
8264 and show appropriate characters. (Note: if you are using gnus-mime
8265 from the SEMI package, formerly known as TM, you should NOT add this
8266 hook to gnus-startup-hook; gnus-mime has its own method of handling
8269 Since it is impossible to distinguish all coding systems
8270 automatically, you may need to specify a choice of coding system for a
8271 particular news group. This can be done by:
8273 (gnus-mule-add-group NEWSGROUP 'CODING-SYSTEM)
8275 Here NEWSGROUP should be a string which names a newsgroup or a tree
8276 of newsgroups. If NEWSGROUP is "XXX.YYY", all news groups under
8277 "XXX.YYY" (including "XXX.YYY.ZZZ") will use the specified coding
8278 system. CODING-SYSTEM specifies which coding system to use (for both
8279 for reading and posting).
8281 CODING-SYSTEM can also be a cons cell of the form
8282 (READ-CODING-SYSTEM . POST-CODING-SYSTEM)
8283 Then READ-CODING-SYSTEM is used when you read messages from the
8284 newsgroups, while POST-CODING-SYSTEM is used when you post messages
8287 Emacs knows the right coding systems for certain newsgroups by
8288 default. Here are some of these default settings:
8290 (gnus-mule-add-group "fj" 'iso-2022-7)
8291 (gnus-mule-add-group "alt.chinese.text" 'hz-gb-2312)
8292 (gnus-mule-add-group "alt.hk" 'hz-gb-2312)
8293 (gnus-mule-add-group "alt.chinese.text.big5" 'cn-big5)
8294 (gnus-mule-add-group "soc.culture.vietnamese" '(nil . viqr))
8296 When you reply by mail to an article, these settings are ignored;
8297 the mail is encoded according to sendmail-coding-system, as usual.
8301 *** If you edit primarily one style of C (or C++, Objective-C, Java)
8302 code, you may want to make the CC Mode style variables have global
8303 values so that you can set them directly in your .emacs file. To do
8304 this, set c-style-variables-are-local-p to nil in your .emacs file.
8305 Note that this only takes effect if you do it *before* cc-mode.el is
8308 If you typically edit more than one style of C (or C++, Objective-C,
8309 Java) code in a single Emacs session, you may want to make the CC Mode
8310 style variables have buffer local values. By default, all buffers
8311 share the same style variable settings; to make them buffer local, set
8312 c-style-variables-are-local-p to t in your .emacs file. Note that you
8313 must do this *before* CC Mode is loaded.
8315 *** The new variable c-indentation-style holds the C style name
8316 of the current buffer.
8318 *** The variable c-block-comments-indent-p has been deleted, because
8319 it is no longer necessary. C mode now handles all the supported styles
8320 of block comments, with no need to say which one you will use.
8322 *** There is a new indentation style "python", which specifies the C
8323 style that the Python developers like.
8325 *** There is a new c-cleanup-list option: brace-elseif-brace.
8326 This says to put ...} else if (...) {... on one line,
8327 just as brace-else-brace says to put ...} else {... on one line.
8331 *** In vc-retrieve-snapshot (C-x v r), if you don't specify a snapshot
8332 name, it retrieves the *latest* versions of all files in the current
8333 directory and its subdirectories (aside from files already locked).
8335 This feature is useful if your RCS directory is a link to a common
8336 master directory, and you want to pick up changes made by other
8339 You can do the same thing for an individual file by typing C-u C-x C-q
8340 RET in a buffer visiting that file.
8342 *** VC can now handle files under CVS that are being "watched" by
8343 other developers. Such files are made read-only by CVS. To get a
8344 writable copy, type C-x C-q in a buffer visiting such a file. VC then
8345 calls "cvs edit", which notifies the other developers of it.
8347 *** vc-version-diff (C-u C-x v =) now suggests reasonable defaults for
8348 version numbers, based on the current state of the file.
8350 ** Calendar changes.
8352 *** A new function, list-holidays, allows you list holidays or
8353 subclasses of holidays for ranges of years. Related menu items allow
8354 you do this for the year of the selected date, or the
8355 following/previous years.
8357 *** There is now support for the Baha'i calendar system. Use `pb' in
8358 the *Calendar* buffer to display the current Baha'i date. The Baha'i
8359 calendar, or "Badi calendar" is a system of 19 months with 19 days
8360 each, and 4 intercalary days (5 during a Gregorian leap year). The
8361 calendar begins May 23, 1844, with each of the months named after a
8362 supposed attribute of God.
8366 There are some new user variables and subgroups for customizing the page
8369 *** Headers & Footers (subgroup)
8371 Some printer systems print a header page and force the first page to
8372 be printed on the back of the header page when using duplex. If your
8373 printer system has this behavior, set variable
8374 `ps-banner-page-when-duplexing' to t.
8376 If variable `ps-banner-page-when-duplexing' is non-nil, it prints a
8377 blank page as the very first printed page. So, it behaves as if the
8378 very first character of buffer (or region) were a form feed ^L (\014).
8380 The variable `ps-spool-config' specifies who is responsible for
8381 setting duplex mode and page size. Valid values are:
8383 lpr-switches duplex and page size are configured by `ps-lpr-switches'.
8384 Don't forget to set `ps-lpr-switches' to select duplex
8385 printing for your printer.
8387 setpagedevice duplex and page size are configured by ps-print using the
8388 setpagedevice PostScript operator.
8390 nil duplex and page size are configured by ps-print *not* using
8391 the setpagedevice PostScript operator.
8393 The variable `ps-spool-tumble' specifies how the page images on
8394 opposite sides of a sheet are oriented with respect to each other. If
8395 `ps-spool-tumble' is nil, ps-print produces output suitable for
8396 bindings on the left or right. If `ps-spool-tumble' is non-nil,
8397 ps-print produces output suitable for bindings at the top or bottom.
8398 This variable takes effect only if `ps-spool-duplex' is non-nil.
8399 The default value is nil.
8401 The variable `ps-header-frame-alist' specifies a header frame
8402 properties alist. Valid frame properties are:
8404 fore-color Specify the foreground frame color.
8405 Value should be a float number between 0.0 (black
8406 color) and 1.0 (white color), or a string which is a
8407 color name, or a list of 3 float numbers which
8408 correspond to the Red Green Blue color scale, each
8409 float number between 0.0 (dark color) and 1.0 (bright
8410 color). The default is 0 ("black").
8412 back-color Specify the background frame color (similar to fore-color).
8413 The default is 0.9 ("gray90").
8415 shadow-color Specify the shadow color (similar to fore-color).
8416 The default is 0 ("black").
8418 border-color Specify the border color (similar to fore-color).
8419 The default is 0 ("black").
8421 border-width Specify the border width.
8424 Any other property is ignored.
8426 Don't change this alist directly; instead use Custom, or the
8427 `ps-value', `ps-get', `ps-put' and `ps-del' functions (see there for
8430 Ps-print can also print footers. The footer variables are:
8431 `ps-print-footer', `ps-footer-offset', `ps-print-footer-frame',
8432 `ps-footer-font-family', `ps-footer-font-size', `ps-footer-line-pad',
8433 `ps-footer-lines', `ps-left-footer', `ps-right-footer' and
8434 `ps-footer-frame-alist'. These variables are similar to those
8435 controlling headers.
8437 *** Color management (subgroup)
8439 If `ps-print-color-p' is non-nil, the buffer's text will be printed in
8442 *** Face Management (subgroup)
8444 If you need to print without worrying about face background colors,
8445 set the variable `ps-use-face-background' which specifies if face
8446 background should be used. Valid values are:
8448 t always use face background color.
8449 nil never use face background color.
8450 (face...) list of faces whose background color will be used.
8452 *** N-up printing (subgroup)
8454 The variable `ps-n-up-printing' specifies the number of pages per
8457 The variable `ps-n-up-margin' specifies the margin in points (pt)
8458 between the sheet border and the n-up printing.
8460 If variable `ps-n-up-border-p' is non-nil, a border is drawn around
8463 The variable `ps-n-up-filling' specifies how the page matrix is filled
8464 on each sheet of paper. Following are the valid values for
8465 `ps-n-up-filling' with a filling example using a 3x4 page matrix:
8467 `left-top' 1 2 3 4 `left-bottom' 9 10 11 12
8471 `right-top' 4 3 2 1 `right-bottom' 12 11 10 9
8475 `top-left' 1 4 7 10 `bottom-left' 3 6 9 12
8479 `top-right' 10 7 4 1 `bottom-right' 12 9 6 3
8483 Any other value is treated as `left-top'.
8485 *** Zebra stripes (subgroup)
8487 The variable `ps-zebra-color' controls the zebra stripes grayscale or
8490 The variable `ps-zebra-stripe-follow' specifies how zebra stripes
8491 continue on next page. Visually, valid values are (the character `+'
8492 to the right of each column indicates that a line is printed):
8494 `nil' `follow' `full' `full-follow'
8495 Current Page -------- ----------- --------- ----------------
8496 1 XXXXX + 1 XXXXXXXX + 1 XXXXXX + 1 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8497 2 XXXXX + 2 XXXXXXXX + 2 XXXXXX + 2 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8498 3 XXXXX + 3 XXXXXXXX + 3 XXXXXX + 3 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8502 7 XXXXX + 7 XXXXXXXX + 7 XXXXXX + 7 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8503 8 XXXXX + 8 XXXXXXXX + 8 XXXXXX + 8 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8504 9 XXXXX + 9 XXXXXXXX + 9 XXXXXX + 9 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8507 -------- ----------- --------- ----------------
8508 Next Page -------- ----------- --------- ----------------
8509 12 XXXXX + 12 + 10 XXXXXX + 10 +
8510 13 XXXXX + 13 XXXXXXXX + 11 XXXXXX + 11 +
8511 14 XXXXX + 14 XXXXXXXX + 12 XXXXXX + 12 +
8512 15 + 15 XXXXXXXX + 13 + 13 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8513 16 + 16 + 14 + 14 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8514 17 + 17 + 15 + 15 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8515 18 XXXXX + 18 + 16 XXXXXX + 16 +
8516 19 XXXXX + 19 XXXXXXXX + 17 XXXXXX + 17 +
8517 20 XXXXX + 20 XXXXXXXX + 18 XXXXXX + 18 +
8520 -------- ----------- --------- ----------------
8522 Any other value is treated as `nil'.
8525 *** Printer management (subgroup)
8527 The variable `ps-printer-name-option' determines the option used by
8528 some utilities to indicate the printer name; it's used only when
8529 `ps-printer-name' is a non-empty string. If you're using the lpr
8530 utility to print, for example, `ps-printer-name-option' should be set
8533 The variable `ps-manual-feed' indicates if the printer requires manual
8534 paper feeding. If it's nil, automatic feeding takes place. If it's
8535 non-nil, manual feeding takes place.
8537 The variable `ps-end-with-control-d' specifies whether C-d (\x04)
8538 should be inserted at end of the generated PostScript. Non-nil means
8541 *** Page settings (subgroup)
8543 If variable `ps-warn-paper-type' is nil, it's *not* treated as an
8544 error if the PostScript printer doesn't have a paper with the size
8545 indicated by `ps-paper-type'; the default paper size will be used
8546 instead. If `ps-warn-paper-type' is non-nil, an error is signaled if
8547 the PostScript printer doesn't support a paper with the size indicated
8548 by `ps-paper-type'. This is used when `ps-spool-config' is set to
8551 The variable `ps-print-upside-down' determines the orientation for
8552 printing pages: nil means `normal' printing, non-nil means
8553 `upside-down' printing (that is, the page is rotated by 180 degrees).
8555 The variable `ps-selected-pages' specifies which pages to print. If
8556 it's nil, all pages are printed. If it's a list, list elements may be
8557 integers specifying a single page to print, or cons cells (FROM . TO)
8558 specifying to print from page FROM to TO. Invalid list elements, that
8559 is integers smaller than one, or elements whose FROM is greater than
8560 its TO, are ignored.
8562 The variable `ps-even-or-odd-pages' specifies how to print even/odd
8563 pages. Valid values are:
8565 nil print all pages.
8567 `even-page' print only even pages.
8569 `odd-page' print only odd pages.
8571 `even-sheet' print only even sheets.
8572 That is, if `ps-n-up-printing' is 1, it behaves like
8573 `even-page', but for values greater than 1, it'll
8574 print only the even sheet of paper.
8576 `odd-sheet' print only odd sheets.
8577 That is, if `ps-n-up-printing' is 1, it behaves like
8578 `odd-page'; but for values greater than 1, it'll print
8579 only the odd sheet of paper.
8581 Any other value is treated as nil.
8583 If you set `ps-selected-pages' (see there for documentation), pages
8584 are filtered by `ps-selected-pages', and then by
8585 `ps-even-or-odd-pages'. For example, if we have:
8587 (setq ps-selected-pages '(1 4 (6 . 10) (12 . 16) 20))
8589 and we combine this with `ps-even-or-odd-pages' and
8590 `ps-n-up-printing', we get:
8592 `ps-n-up-printing' = 1:
8593 `ps-even-or-odd-pages' PAGES PRINTED
8594 nil 1, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 20
8595 even-page 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, 16, 20
8596 odd-page 1, 7, 9, 13, 15
8597 even-sheet 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, 16, 20
8598 odd-sheet 1, 7, 9, 13, 15
8600 `ps-n-up-printing' = 2:
8601 `ps-even-or-odd-pages' PAGES PRINTED
8602 nil 1/4, 6/7, 8/9, 10/12, 13/14, 15/16, 20
8603 even-page 4/6, 8/10, 12/14, 16/20
8604 odd-page 1/7, 9/13, 15
8605 even-sheet 6/7, 10/12, 15/16
8606 odd-sheet 1/4, 8/9, 13/14, 20
8608 *** Miscellany (subgroup)
8610 The variable `ps-error-handler-message' specifies where error handler
8611 messages should be sent.
8613 It is also possible to add a user-defined PostScript prologue code in
8614 front of all generated prologue code by setting the variable
8615 `ps-user-defined-prologue'.
8617 The variable `ps-line-number-font' specifies the font for line numbers.
8619 The variable `ps-line-number-font-size' specifies the font size in
8620 points for line numbers.
8622 The variable `ps-line-number-color' specifies the color for line
8623 numbers. See `ps-zebra-color' for documentation.
8625 The variable `ps-line-number-step' specifies the interval in which
8626 line numbers are printed. For example, if `ps-line-number-step' is set
8627 to 2, the printing will look like:
8639 integer an integer specifying the interval in which line numbers are
8640 printed. If it's smaller than or equal to zero, 1
8643 `zebra' specifies that only the line number of the first line in a
8644 zebra stripe is to be printed.
8646 Any other value is treated as `zebra'.
8648 The variable `ps-line-number-start' specifies the starting point in
8649 the interval given by `ps-line-number-step'. For example, if
8650 `ps-line-number-step' is set to 3, and `ps-line-number-start' is set to
8651 3, the output will look like:
8665 The variable `ps-postscript-code-directory' specifies the directory
8666 where the PostScript prologue file used by ps-print is found.
8668 The variable `ps-line-spacing' determines the line spacing in points,
8669 for ordinary text, when generating PostScript (similar to
8672 The variable `ps-paragraph-spacing' determines the paragraph spacing,
8673 in points, for ordinary text, when generating PostScript (similar to
8676 The variable `ps-paragraph-regexp' specifies the paragraph delimiter.
8678 The variable `ps-begin-cut-regexp' and `ps-end-cut-regexp' specify the
8679 start and end of a region to cut out when printing.
8681 ** hideshow changes.
8683 *** now supports hiding of blocks of single line comments (like // for
8686 *** Support for java-mode added.
8688 *** When doing `hs-hide-all' it is now possible to also hide the comments
8689 in the file if `hs-hide-comments-when-hiding-all' is set.
8691 *** The new function `hs-hide-initial-comment' hides the comments at
8692 the beginning of the files. Finally those huge RCS logs don't stay in your
8693 way! This is run by default when entering the `hs-minor-mode'.
8695 *** Now uses overlays instead of `selective-display', so is more
8696 robust and a lot faster.
8698 *** A block beginning can span multiple lines.
8700 *** The new variable `hs-show-hidden-short-form' if t, directs hideshow
8701 to show only the beginning of a block when it is hidden. See the
8702 documentation for more details.
8704 ** Changes in Enriched mode.
8706 *** When you visit a file in enriched-mode, Emacs will make sure it is
8707 filled to the current fill-column. This behavior is now independent
8708 of the size of the window. When you save the file, the fill-column in
8709 use is stored as well, so that the whole buffer need not be refilled
8710 the next time unless the fill-column is different.
8712 *** use-hard-newlines is now a minor mode. When it is enabled, Emacs
8713 distinguishes between hard and soft newlines, and treats hard newlines
8714 as paragraph boundaries. Otherwise all newlines inserted are marked
8715 as soft, and paragraph boundaries are determined solely from the text.
8721 The variables font-lock-face-attributes, font-lock-display-type and
8722 font-lock-background-mode are now obsolete; the recommended way to specify the
8723 faces to use for Font Lock mode is with M-x customize-group on the new custom
8724 group font-lock-highlighting-faces. If you set font-lock-face-attributes in
8725 your ~/.emacs file, Font Lock mode will respect its value. However, you should
8726 consider converting from setting that variable to using M-x customize.
8728 You can still use X resources to specify Font Lock face appearances.
8730 *** Maximum decoration
8732 Fontification now uses the maximum level of decoration supported by
8733 default. Previously, fontification used a mode-specific default level
8734 of decoration, which is typically the minimum level of decoration
8735 supported. You can set font-lock-maximum-decoration to nil
8736 to get the old behavior.
8740 Support is now provided for Java, Objective-C, AWK and SIMULA modes.
8742 Note that Font Lock mode can be turned on without knowing exactly what modes
8743 support Font Lock mode, via the command global-font-lock-mode.
8745 *** Configurable support
8747 Support for C, C++, Objective-C and Java can be more easily configured for
8748 additional types and classes via the new variables c-font-lock-extra-types,
8749 c++-font-lock-extra-types, objc-font-lock-extra-types and, you guessed it,
8750 java-font-lock-extra-types. These value of each of these variables should be a
8751 list of regexps matching the extra type names. For example, the default value
8752 of c-font-lock-extra-types is ("\\sw+_t") which means fontification follows the
8753 convention that C type names end in _t. This results in slower fontification.
8755 Of course, you can change the variables that specify fontification in whatever
8756 way you wish, typically by adding regexps. However, these new variables make
8757 it easier to make specific and common changes for the fontification of types.
8759 *** Adding highlighting patterns to existing support
8761 You can use the new function font-lock-add-keywords to add your own
8762 highlighting patterns, such as for project-local or user-specific constructs,
8765 For example, to highlight `FIXME:' words in C comments, put:
8767 (font-lock-add-keywords 'c-mode '(("\\<FIXME:" 0 font-lock-warning-face t)))
8773 Font Lock now defines two new faces, font-lock-builtin-face and
8774 font-lock-warning-face. These are intended to highlight builtin keywords,
8775 distinct from a language's normal keywords, and objects that should be brought
8776 to user attention, respectively. Various modes now use these new faces.
8778 *** Changes to fast-lock support mode
8780 The fast-lock package, one of the two Font Lock support modes, can now process
8781 cache files silently. You can use the new variable fast-lock-verbose, in the
8782 same way as font-lock-verbose, to control this feature.
8784 *** Changes to lazy-lock support mode
8786 The lazy-lock package, one of the two Font Lock support modes, can now fontify
8787 according to the true syntactic context relative to other lines. You can use
8788 the new variable lazy-lock-defer-contextually to control this feature. If
8789 non-nil, changes to the buffer will cause subsequent lines in the buffer to be
8790 refontified after lazy-lock-defer-time seconds of idle time. If nil, then only
8791 the modified lines will be refontified; this is the same as the previous Lazy
8792 Lock mode behaviour and the behaviour of Font Lock mode.
8794 This feature is useful in modes where strings or comments can span lines.
8795 For example, if a string or comment terminating character is deleted, then if
8796 this feature is enabled subsequent lines in the buffer will be correctly
8797 refontified to reflect their new syntactic context. Previously, only the line
8798 containing the deleted character would be refontified and you would have to use
8799 the command M-g M-g (font-lock-fontify-block) to refontify some lines.
8801 As a consequence of this new feature, two other variables have changed:
8803 Variable `lazy-lock-defer-driven' is renamed `lazy-lock-defer-on-scrolling'.
8804 Variable `lazy-lock-defer-time' can now only be a time, i.e., a number.
8805 Buffer modes for which on-the-fly deferral applies can be specified via the
8806 new variable `lazy-lock-defer-on-the-fly'.
8808 If you set these variables in your ~/.emacs, then you may have to change those
8811 ** Ada mode changes.
8813 *** There is now better support for using find-file.el with Ada mode.
8814 If you switch between spec and body, the cursor stays in the same
8815 procedure (modulo overloading). If a spec has no body file yet, but
8816 you try to switch to its body file, Ada mode now generates procedure
8819 *** There are two new commands:
8820 - `ada-make-local' : invokes gnatmake on the current buffer
8821 - `ada-check-syntax' : check syntax of current buffer.
8823 The user options `ada-compiler-make', `ada-make-options',
8824 `ada-language-version', `ada-compiler-syntax-check', and
8825 `ada-compile-options' are used within these commands.
8827 *** Ada mode can now work with Outline minor mode. The outline level
8828 is calculated from the indenting, not from syntactic constructs.
8829 Outlining does not work if your code is not correctly indented.
8831 *** The new function `ada-gnat-style' converts the buffer to the style of
8832 formatting used in GNAT. It places two blanks after a comment start,
8833 places one blank between a word end and an opening '(', and puts one
8834 space between a comma and the beginning of a word.
8836 ** Scheme mode changes.
8838 *** Scheme mode indentation now uses many of the facilities of Lisp
8839 mode; therefore, the variables to customize it are the variables used
8840 for Lisp mode which have names starting with `lisp-'. The variables
8841 with names starting with `scheme-' which used to do this no longer
8844 If you want to use different indentation for Scheme and Lisp, this is
8845 still possible, but now you must do it by adding a hook to
8846 scheme-mode-hook, which could work by setting the `lisp-' indentation
8847 variables as buffer-local variables.
8849 *** DSSSL mode is a variant of Scheme mode, for editing DSSSL scripts.
8852 ** Changes to the emacsclient program
8854 *** If a socket can't be found, and environment variables LOGNAME or
8855 USER are set, emacsclient now looks for a socket based on the UID
8856 associated with the name. That is an emacsclient running as root
8857 can connect to an Emacs server started by a non-root user.
8859 *** The emacsclient program now accepts an option --no-wait which tells
8860 it to return immediately without waiting for you to "finish" the
8863 *** The new option --alternate-editor allows to specify an editor to
8864 use if Emacs is not running. The environment variable
8865 ALTERNATE_EDITOR can be used for the same effect; the command line
8866 option takes precedence.
8868 ** M-x eldoc-mode enables a minor mode in which the echo area
8869 constantly shows the parameter list for function being called at point
8870 (in Emacs Lisp and Lisp Interaction modes only).
8872 ** C-x n d now runs the new command narrow-to-defun,
8873 which narrows the accessible parts of the buffer to just
8876 ** Emacs now handles the `--' argument in the standard way; all
8877 following arguments are treated as ordinary file names.
8879 ** On MSDOS and Windows, the bookmark file is now called _emacs.bmk,
8880 and the saved desktop file is now called _emacs.desktop (truncated if
8883 ** When you kill a buffer that visits a file,
8884 if there are any registers that save positions in the file,
8885 these register values no longer become completely useless.
8886 If you try to go to such a register with C-x j, then you are
8887 asked whether to visit the file again. If you say yes,
8888 it visits the file and then goes to the same position.
8890 ** When you visit a file that changes frequently outside Emacs--for
8891 example, a log of output from a process that continues to run--it may
8892 be useful for Emacs to revert the file without querying you whenever
8893 you visit the file afresh with C-x C-f.
8895 You can request this behavior for certain files by setting the
8896 variable revert-without-query to a list of regular expressions. If a
8897 file's name matches any of these regular expressions, find-file and
8898 revert-buffer revert the buffer without asking for permission--but
8899 only if you have not edited the buffer text yourself.
8901 ** set-default-font has been renamed to set-frame-font
8902 since it applies only to the current frame.
8904 ** In TeX mode, you can use the variable tex-main-file to specify the
8905 file for tex-file to run TeX on. (By default, tex-main-file is nil,
8906 and tex-file runs TeX on the current visited file.)
8908 This is useful when you are editing a document that consists of
8909 multiple files. In each of the included files, you can set up a local
8910 variable list which specifies the top-level file of your document for
8911 tex-main-file. Then tex-file will run TeX on the whole document
8912 instead of just the file you are editing.
8916 RefTeX mode is a new minor mode with special support for \label, \ref
8917 and \cite macros in LaTeX documents. RefTeX distinguishes labels of
8918 different environments (equation, figure, ...) and has full support for
8919 multifile documents. To use it, select a buffer with a LaTeX document and
8920 turn the mode on with M-x reftex-mode. Here are the main user commands:
8923 Creates a label semi-automatically. RefTeX is context sensitive and
8924 knows which kind of label is needed.
8926 C-c ) reftex-reference
8927 Offers in a menu all labels in the document, along with context of the
8928 label definition. The selected label is referenced as \ref{LABEL}.
8930 C-c [ reftex-citation
8931 Prompts for a regular expression and displays a list of matching BibTeX
8932 database entries. The selected entry is cited with a \cite{KEY} macro.
8934 C-c & reftex-view-crossref
8935 Views the cross reference of a \ref or \cite command near point.
8938 Shows a table of contents of the (multifile) document. From there you
8939 can quickly jump to every section.
8941 Under X, RefTeX installs a "Ref" menu in the menu bar, with additional
8942 commands. Press `?' to get help when a prompt mentions this feature.
8943 Full documentation and customization examples are in the file
8944 reftex.el. You can use the finder to view the file documentation:
8945 C-h p --> tex --> reftex.el
8947 ** Changes in BibTeX mode.
8949 *** Info documentation is now available.
8951 *** Don't allow parentheses in string constants anymore. This confused
8952 both the BibTeX program and Emacs BibTeX mode.
8954 *** Renamed variable bibtex-mode-user-optional-fields to
8955 bibtex-user-optional-fields.
8957 *** Removed variable bibtex-include-OPTannote
8958 (use bibtex-user-optional-fields instead).
8960 *** New interactive functions to copy and kill fields and complete
8961 entries to the BibTeX kill ring, from where they can be yanked back by
8962 appropriate functions.
8964 *** New interactive functions for repositioning and marking of
8965 entries. They are bound by default to C-M-l and C-M-h.
8967 *** New hook bibtex-clean-entry-hook. It is called after entry has
8970 *** New variable bibtex-field-delimiters, which replaces variables
8971 bibtex-field-{left|right}-delimiter.
8973 *** New variable bibtex-entry-delimiters to determine how entries
8976 *** Allow preinitialization of fields. See documentation of
8977 bibtex-user-optional-fields, bibtex-entry-field-alist, and
8978 bibtex-include-OPTkey for details.
8980 *** Book and InBook entries require either an author or an editor
8981 field. This is now supported by bibtex.el. Alternative fields are
8982 prefixed with `ALT'.
8984 *** New variable bibtex-entry-format, which replaces variable
8985 bibtex-clean-entry-zap-empty-opts and allows specification of many
8986 formatting options performed on cleaning an entry (see variable
8989 *** Even more control on how automatic keys are generated. See
8990 documentation of bibtex-generate-autokey for details. Transcriptions
8991 for foreign languages other than German are now handled, too.
8993 *** New boolean user option bibtex-comma-after-last-field to decide if
8994 comma should be inserted at end of last field.
8996 *** New boolean user option bibtex-align-at-equal-sign to determine if
8997 alignment should be made at left side of field contents or at equal
8998 signs. New user options to control entry layout (e.g. indentation).
9000 *** New function bibtex-fill-entry to realign entries.
9002 *** New function bibtex-reformat to reformat region or buffer.
9004 *** New function bibtex-convert-alien to convert a BibTeX database
9007 *** New function bibtex-complete-key (similar to bibtex-complete-string)
9008 to complete prefix to a key defined in buffer. Mainly useful in
9011 *** New function bibtex-count-entries to count entries in buffer or
9014 *** Added support for imenu.
9016 *** The function `bibtex-validate' now checks current region instead
9017 of buffer if mark is active. Now it shows all errors of buffer in a
9018 `compilation mode' buffer. You can use the normal commands (e.g.
9019 `next-error') for compilation modes to jump to errors.
9021 *** New variable `bibtex-string-file-path' to determine where the files
9022 from `bibtex-string-files' are searched.
9024 ** Iso Accents mode now supports Latin-3 as an alternative.
9026 ** The command next-error now opens blocks hidden by hideshow.
9028 ** The function using-unix-filesystems has been replaced by the
9029 functions add-untranslated-filesystem and remove-untranslated-filesystem.
9030 Each of these functions takes the name of a drive letter or directory
9033 When a filesystem is added as untranslated, all files on it are read
9034 and written in binary mode (no cr/lf translation is performed).
9036 ** browse-url changes
9038 *** New methods for: Grail (browse-url-generic), MMM (browse-url-mmm),
9039 Lynx in a separate xterm (browse-url-lynx-xterm) or in an Emacs window
9040 (browse-url-lynx-emacs), remote W3 (browse-url-w3-gnudoit), generic
9041 non-remote-controlled browsers (browse-url-generic) and associated
9042 customization variables.
9044 *** New commands `browse-url-of-region' and `browse-url'.
9046 *** URLs marked up with <URL:...> (RFC1738) work if broken across
9047 lines. Browsing methods can be associated with URL regexps
9048 (e.g. mailto: URLs) via `browse-url-browser-function'.
9052 *** Clicking Mouse-2 on a brief command description in Ediff control panel
9053 pops up the Info file for this command.
9055 *** There is now a variable, ediff-autostore-merges, which controls whether
9056 the result of a merge is saved in a file. By default, this is done only when
9057 merge is done from a session group (eg, when merging files in two different
9060 *** Since Emacs 19.31 (this hasn't been announced before), Ediff can compare
9061 and merge groups of files residing in different directories, or revisions of
9062 files in the same directory.
9064 *** Since Emacs 19.31, Ediff can apply multi-file patches interactively.
9065 The patches must be in the context format or GNU unified format. (The bug
9066 related to the GNU format has now been fixed.)
9070 *** The startup file is now .viper instead of .vip
9071 *** All variable/function names have been changed to start with viper-
9073 *** C-\ now simulates the meta-key in all Viper states.
9074 *** C-z in Insert state now escapes to Vi for the duration of the next
9075 Viper command. In Vi and Insert states, C-z behaves as before.
9076 *** C-c \ escapes to Vi for one command if Viper is in Insert or Emacs states.
9077 *** _ is no longer the meta-key in Vi state.
9078 *** The variable viper-insert-state-cursor-color can be used to change cursor
9079 color when Viper is in insert state.
9080 *** If search lands the cursor near the top or the bottom of the window,
9081 Viper pulls the window up or down to expose more context. The variable
9082 viper-adjust-window-after-search controls this behavior.
9086 *** In C, C++, Objective C and Java, Etags tags global variables by
9087 default. The resulting tags files are inflated by 30% on average.
9088 Use --no-globals to turn this feature off. Etags can also tag
9089 variables which are members of structure-like constructs, but it does
9090 not by default. Use --members to turn this feature on.
9092 *** C++ member functions are now recognized as tags.
9094 *** Java is tagged like C++. In addition, "extends" and "implements"
9095 constructs are tagged. Files are recognised by the extension .java.
9097 *** Etags can now handle programs written in Postscript. Files are
9098 recognised by the extensions .ps and .pdb (Postscript with C syntax).
9099 In Postscript, tags are lines that start with a slash.
9101 *** Etags now handles Objective C and Objective C++ code. The usual C and
9102 C++ tags are recognized in these languages; in addition, etags
9103 recognizes special Objective C syntax for classes, class categories,
9104 methods and protocols.
9106 *** Etags also handles Cobol. Files are recognised by the extension
9107 .cobol. The tagged lines are those containing a word that begins in
9108 column 8 and ends in a full stop, i.e. anything that could be a
9111 *** Regexps in Etags now support intervals, as in ed or grep. The syntax of
9112 an interval is \{M,N\}, and it means to match the preceding expression
9113 at least M times and as many as N times.
9115 ** The format for specifying a custom format for time-stamp to insert
9116 in files has changed slightly.
9118 With the new enhancements to the functionality of format-time-string,
9119 time-stamp-format will change to be eventually compatible with it.
9120 This conversion is being done in two steps to maintain compatibility
9121 with old time-stamp-format values.
9123 In the new scheme, alternate case is signified by the number-sign
9124 (`#') modifier, rather than changing the case of the format character.
9125 This feature is as yet incompletely implemented for compatibility
9128 In the old time-stamp-format, all numeric fields defaulted to their
9129 natural width. (With format-time-string, each format has a
9130 fixed-width default.) In this version, you can specify the colon
9131 (`:') modifier to a numeric conversion to mean "give me the historical
9132 time-stamp-format width default." Do not use colon if you are
9133 specifying an explicit width, as in "%02d".
9135 Numbers are no longer truncated to the requested width, except in the
9136 case of "%02y", which continues to give a two-digit year. Digit
9137 truncation probably wasn't being used for anything else anyway.
9139 The new formats will work with old versions of Emacs. New formats are
9140 being recommended now to allow time-stamp-format to change in the
9141 future to be compatible with format-time-string. The new forms being
9142 recommended now will continue to work then.
9144 See the documentation string for the variable time-stamp-format for
9147 ** There are some additional major modes:
9149 dcl-mode, for editing VMS DCL files.
9150 m4-mode, for editing files of m4 input.
9151 meta-mode, for editing MetaFont and MetaPost source files.
9153 ** In Shell mode, the command shell-copy-environment-variable lets you
9154 copy the value of a specified environment variable from the subshell
9157 ** New Lisp packages include:
9159 *** battery.el displays battery status for laptops.
9161 *** M-x bruce (named after Lenny Bruce) is a program that might
9162 be used for adding some indecent words to your email.
9164 *** M-x crisp-mode enables an emulation for the CRiSP editor.
9166 *** M-x dirtrack arranges for better tracking of directory changes
9169 *** The new library elint.el provides for linting of Emacs Lisp code.
9170 See the documentation for `elint-initialize', `elint-current-buffer'
9173 *** M-x expand-add-abbrevs defines a special kind of abbrev which is
9174 meant for programming constructs. These abbrevs expand like ordinary
9175 ones, when you type SPC, but only at the end of a line and not within
9176 strings or comments.
9178 These abbrevs can act as templates: you can define places within an
9179 abbrev for insertion of additional text. Once you expand the abbrev,
9180 you can then use C-x a p and C-x a n to move back and forth to these
9181 insertion points. Thus you can conveniently insert additional text
9184 *** filecache.el remembers the location of files so that you
9185 can visit them by short forms of their names.
9187 *** find-func.el lets you find the definition of the user-loaded
9188 Emacs Lisp function at point.
9190 *** M-x handwrite converts text to a "handwritten" picture.
9192 *** M-x iswitchb-buffer is a command for switching to a buffer, much like
9193 switch-buffer, but it reads the argument in a more helpful way.
9195 *** M-x landmark implements a neural network for landmark learning.
9197 *** M-x locate provides a convenient interface to the `locate' program.
9199 *** M4 mode is a new mode for editing files of m4 input.
9201 *** mantemp.el creates C++ manual template instantiations
9202 from the GCC error messages which indicate which instantiations are needed.
9204 *** mouse-copy.el provides a one-click copy and move feature.
9205 You can drag a region with M-mouse-1, and it is automatically
9206 inserted at point. M-Shift-mouse-1 deletes the text from its
9207 original place after inserting the copy.
9209 *** mouse-drag.el lets you do scrolling by dragging Mouse-2
9212 You click the mouse and move; that distance either translates into the
9213 velocity to scroll (with mouse-drag-throw) or the distance to scroll
9214 (with mouse-drag-drag). Horizontal scrolling is enabled when needed.
9216 Enable mouse-drag with:
9217 (global-set-key [down-mouse-2] 'mouse-drag-throw)
9219 (global-set-key [down-mouse-2] 'mouse-drag-drag)
9221 *** mspools.el is useful for determining which mail folders have
9222 mail waiting to be read in them. It works with procmail.
9224 *** Octave mode is a major mode for editing files of input for Octave.
9225 It comes with a facility for communicating with an Octave subprocess.
9229 The ogonek package provides functions for changing the coding of
9230 Polish diacritic characters in buffers. Codings known from various
9231 platforms are supported such as ISO8859-2, Mazovia, IBM Latin2, and
9232 TeX. For example, you can change the coding from Mazovia to
9233 ISO8859-2. Another example is a change of coding from ISO8859-2 to
9234 prefix notation (in which `/a' stands for the aogonek character, for
9235 instance) and vice versa.
9237 To use this package load it using
9238 M-x load-library [enter] ogonek
9239 Then, you may get an explanation by calling one of
9240 M-x ogonek-jak -- in Polish
9241 M-x ogonek-how -- in English
9242 The info specifies the commands and variables provided as well as the
9243 ways of customization in `.emacs'.
9245 *** Interface to ph.
9247 Emacs provides a client interface to CCSO Nameservers (ph/qi)
9249 The CCSO nameserver is used in many universities to provide directory
9250 services about people. ph.el provides a convenient Emacs interface to
9253 *** uce.el is useful for replying to unsolicited commercial email.
9255 *** vcursor.el implements a "virtual cursor" feature.
9256 You can move the virtual cursor with special commands
9257 while the real cursor does not move.
9259 *** webjump.el is a "hot list" package which you can set up
9260 for visiting your favorite web sites.
9262 *** M-x winner-mode is a minor mode which saves window configurations,
9263 so you can move back to other configurations that you have recently used.
9267 Movemail no longer needs to be installed setuid root in order for POP
9268 mail retrieval to function properly. This is because it no longer
9269 supports the RPOP (reserved-port POP) protocol; instead, it uses the
9270 user's POP password to authenticate to the mail server.
9272 This change was made earlier, but not reported in NEWS before.
9274 * Emacs 20.1 changes for MS-DOS and MS-Windows.
9276 ** Changes in handling MS-DOS/MS-Windows text files.
9278 Emacs handles three different conventions for representing
9279 end-of-line: CRLF for MSDOS, LF for Unix and GNU, and CR (used on the
9280 Macintosh). Emacs determines which convention is used in a specific
9281 file based on the contents of that file (except for certain special
9282 file names), and when it saves the file, it uses the same convention.
9284 To save the file and change the end-of-line convention, you can use
9285 C-x RET f (set-buffer-file-coding-system) to specify a different
9286 coding system for the buffer. Then, when you save the file, the newly
9287 specified coding system will take effect. For example, to save with
9288 LF, specify undecided-unix (or some other ...-unix coding system); to
9289 save with CRLF, specify undecided-dos.
9291 * Lisp Changes in Emacs 20.1
9293 ** Byte-compiled files made with Emacs 20 will, in general, work in
9294 Emacs 19 as well, as long as the source code runs in Emacs 19. And
9295 vice versa: byte-compiled files made with Emacs 19 should also run in
9296 Emacs 20, as long as the program itself works in Emacs 20.
9298 ** Windows-specific functions and variables have been renamed
9299 to start with w32- instead of win32-.
9301 In hacker language, calling something a "win" is a form of praise. We
9302 don't want to praise a non-free Microsoft system, so we don't call it
9305 ** Basic Lisp changes
9307 *** A symbol whose name starts with a colon now automatically
9308 evaluates to itself. Therefore such a symbol can be used as a constant.
9310 *** The defined purpose of `defconst' has been changed. It should now
9311 be used only for values that should not be changed whether by a program
9314 The actual behavior of defconst has not been changed.
9316 *** There are new macros `when' and `unless'
9318 (when CONDITION BODY...) is short for (if CONDITION (progn BODY...))
9319 (unless CONDITION BODY...) is short for (if CONDITION nil BODY...)
9321 *** Emacs now defines functions caar, cadr, cdar and cddr with their
9322 usual Lisp meanings. For example, caar returns the car of the car of
9325 *** equal, when comparing strings, now ignores their text properties.
9327 *** The new function `functionp' tests whether an object is a function.
9329 *** arrayp now returns t for char-tables and bool-vectors.
9331 *** Certain primitives which use characters (as integers) now get an
9332 error if the integer is not a valid character code. These primitives
9333 include insert-char, char-to-string, and the %c construct in the
9336 *** The `require' function now insists on adding a suffix, either .el
9337 or .elc, to the file name. Thus, (require 'foo) will not use a file
9338 whose name is just foo. It insists on foo.el or foo.elc.
9340 *** The `autoload' function, when the file name does not contain
9341 either a directory name or the suffix .el or .elc, insists on
9342 adding one of these suffixes.
9344 *** string-to-number now takes an optional second argument BASE
9345 which specifies the base to use when converting an integer.
9346 If BASE is omitted, base 10 is used.
9348 We have not implemented other radices for floating point numbers,
9349 because that would be much more work and does not seem useful.
9351 *** substring now handles vectors as well as strings.
9353 *** The Common Lisp function eql is no longer defined normally.
9354 You must load the `cl' library to define it.
9356 *** The new macro `with-current-buffer' lets you evaluate an expression
9357 conveniently with a different current buffer. It looks like this:
9359 (with-current-buffer BUFFER BODY-FORMS...)
9361 BUFFER is the expression that says which buffer to use.
9362 BODY-FORMS say what to do in that buffer.
9364 *** The new primitive `save-current-buffer' saves and restores the
9365 choice of current buffer, like `save-excursion', but without saving or
9366 restoring the value of point or the mark. `with-current-buffer'
9367 works using `save-current-buffer'.
9369 *** The new macro `with-temp-file' lets you do some work in a new buffer and
9370 write the output to a specified file. Like `progn', it returns the value
9373 *** The new macro `with-temp-buffer' lets you do some work in a new buffer,
9374 which is discarded after use. Like `progn', it returns the value of the
9375 last form. If you wish to return the buffer contents, use (buffer-string)
9378 *** The new function split-string takes a string, splits it at certain
9379 characters, and returns a list of the substrings in between the
9382 For example, (split-string "foo bar lose" " +") returns ("foo" "bar" "lose").
9384 *** The new macro with-output-to-string executes some Lisp expressions
9385 with standard-output set up so that all output feeds into a string.
9386 Then it returns that string.
9388 For example, if the current buffer name is `foo',
9390 (with-output-to-string
9391 (princ "The buffer is ")
9392 (princ (buffer-name)))
9394 returns "The buffer is foo".
9396 ** Non-ASCII characters are now supported, if enable-multibyte-characters
9399 These characters have character codes above 256. When inserted in the
9400 buffer or stored in a string, they are represented as multibyte
9401 characters that occupy several buffer positions each.
9403 *** When enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil, a single character in
9404 a buffer or string can be two or more bytes (as many as four).
9406 Buffers and strings are still made up of unibyte elements;
9407 character positions and string indices are always measured in bytes.
9408 Therefore, moving forward one character can increase the buffer
9409 position by 2, 3 or 4. The function forward-char moves by whole
9410 characters, and therefore is no longer equivalent to
9411 (lambda (n) (goto-char (+ (point) n))).
9413 ASCII characters (codes 0 through 127) are still single bytes, always.
9414 Sequences of byte values 128 through 255 are used to represent
9415 non-ASCII characters. These sequences are called "multibyte
9418 The first byte of a multibyte character is always in the range 128
9419 through 159 (octal 0200 through 0237). These values are called
9420 "leading codes". The second and subsequent bytes are always in the
9421 range 160 through 255 (octal 0240 through 0377). The first byte, the
9422 leading code, determines how many bytes long the sequence is.
9424 *** The function forward-char moves over characters, and therefore
9425 (forward-char 1) may increase point by more than 1 if it moves over a
9426 multibyte character. Likewise, delete-char always deletes a
9427 character, which may be more than one buffer position.
9429 This means that some Lisp programs, which assume that a character is
9430 always one buffer position, need to be changed.
9432 However, all ASCII characters are always one buffer position.
9434 *** The regexp [\200-\377] no longer matches all non-ASCII characters,
9435 because when enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil, these characters
9436 have codes that are not in the range octal 200 to octal 377. However,
9437 the regexp [^\000-\177] does match all non-ASCII characters,
9440 *** The function char-boundary-p returns non-nil if position POS is
9441 between two characters in the buffer (not in the middle of a
9444 When the value is non-nil, it says what kind of character follows POS:
9446 0 if POS is at an ASCII character or at the end of range,
9447 1 if POS is before a 2-byte length multi-byte form,
9448 2 if POS is at a head of 3-byte length multi-byte form,
9449 3 if POS is at a head of 4-byte length multi-byte form,
9450 4 if POS is at a head of multi-byte form of a composite character.
9452 *** The function char-bytes returns how many bytes the character CHAR uses.
9454 *** Strings can contain multibyte characters. The function
9455 `length' returns the string length counting bytes, which may be
9456 more than the number of characters.
9458 You can include a multibyte character in a string constant by writing
9459 it literally. You can also represent it with a hex escape,
9460 \xNNNNNNN..., using as many digits as necessary. Any character which
9461 is not a valid hex digit terminates this construct. If you want to
9462 follow it with a character that is a hex digit, write backslash and
9463 newline in between; that will terminate the hex escape.
9465 *** The function concat-chars takes arguments which are characters
9466 and returns a string containing those characters.
9468 *** The function sref access a multibyte character in a string.
9469 (sref STRING INDX) returns the character in STRING at INDEX. INDEX
9470 counts from zero. If INDEX is at a position in the middle of a
9471 character, sref signals an error.
9473 *** The function chars-in-string returns the number of characters
9474 in a string. This is less than the length of the string, if the
9475 string contains multibyte characters (the length counts bytes).
9477 *** The function chars-in-region returns the number of characters
9478 in a region from BEG to END. This is less than (- END BEG) if the
9479 region contains multibyte characters (the length counts bytes).
9481 *** The function string-to-list converts a string to a list of
9482 the characters in it. string-to-vector converts a string
9483 to a vector of the characters in it.
9485 *** The function store-substring alters part of the contents
9486 of a string. You call it as follows:
9488 (store-substring STRING IDX OBJ)
9490 This says to alter STRING, by storing OBJ starting at index IDX in
9491 STRING. OBJ may be either a character or a (smaller) string.
9492 This function really does alter the contents of STRING.
9493 Since it is impossible to change the length of an existing string,
9494 it is an error if OBJ doesn't fit within STRING's actual length.
9496 *** char-width returns the width (in columns) of the character CHAR,
9497 if it were displayed in the current buffer and the selected window.
9499 *** string-width returns the width (in columns) of the text in STRING,
9500 if it were displayed in the current buffer and the selected window.
9502 *** truncate-string-to-width shortens a string, if necessary,
9503 to fit within a certain number of columns. (Of course, it does
9504 not alter the string that you give it; it returns a new string
9505 which contains all or just part of the existing string.)
9507 (truncate-string-to-width STR END-COLUMN &optional START-COLUMN PADDING)
9509 This returns the part of STR up to column END-COLUMN.
9511 The optional argument START-COLUMN specifies the starting column.
9512 If this is non-nil, then the first START-COLUMN columns of the string
9513 are not included in the resulting value.
9515 The optional argument PADDING, if non-nil, is a padding character to be added
9516 at the beginning and end the resulting string, to extend it to exactly
9517 WIDTH columns. If PADDING is nil, that means do not pad; then, if STRING
9518 is narrower than WIDTH, the value is equal to STRING.
9520 If PADDING and START-COLUMN are both non-nil, and if there is no clean
9521 place in STRING that corresponds to START-COLUMN (because one
9522 character extends across that column), then the padding character
9523 PADDING is added one or more times at the beginning of the result
9524 string, so that its columns line up as if it really did start at
9525 column START-COLUMN.
9527 *** When the functions in the list after-change-functions are called,
9528 the third argument is the number of bytes in the pre-change text, not
9529 necessarily the number of characters. It is, in effect, the
9530 difference in buffer position between the beginning and the end of the
9531 changed text, before the change.
9533 *** The characters Emacs uses are classified in various character
9534 sets, each of which has a name which is a symbol. In general there is
9535 one character set for each script, not for each language.
9537 **** The function charsetp tests whether an object is a character set name.
9539 **** The variable charset-list holds a list of character set names.
9541 **** char-charset, given a character code, returns the name of the character
9542 set that the character belongs to. (The value is a symbol.)
9544 **** split-char, given a character code, returns a list containing the
9545 name of the character set, followed by one or two byte-values
9546 which identify the character within that character set.
9548 **** make-char, given a character set name and one or two subsequent
9549 byte-values, constructs a character code. This is roughly the
9550 opposite of split-char.
9552 **** find-charset-region returns a list of the character sets
9553 of all the characters between BEG and END.
9555 **** find-charset-string returns a list of the character sets
9556 of all the characters in a string.
9558 *** Here are the Lisp facilities for working with coding systems
9559 and specifying coding systems.
9561 **** The function coding-system-list returns a list of all coding
9562 system names (symbols). With optional argument t, it returns a list
9563 of all distinct base coding systems, not including variants.
9564 (Variant coding systems are those like latin-1-dos, latin-1-unix
9565 and latin-1-mac which specify the end-of-line conversion as well
9566 as what to do about code conversion.)
9568 **** coding-system-p tests a symbol to see if it is a coding system
9569 name. It returns t if so, nil if not.
9571 **** file-coding-system-alist specifies which coding systems to use
9572 for certain file names. It works like network-coding-system-alist,
9573 except that the PATTERN is matched against the file name.
9575 Each element has the format (PATTERN . VAL), where PATTERN determines
9576 which file names the element applies to. PATTERN should be a regexp
9577 to match against a file name.
9579 VAL is a coding system, a cons cell containing two coding systems, or
9580 a function symbol. If VAL is a coding system, it is used for both
9581 decoding what received from the network stream and encoding what sent
9582 to the network stream. If VAL is a cons cell containing two coding
9583 systems, the car specifies the coding system for decoding, and the cdr
9584 specifies the coding system for encoding.
9586 If VAL is a function symbol, the function must return a coding system
9587 or a cons cell containing two coding systems, which is used as above.
9589 **** The variable network-coding-system-alist specifies
9590 the coding system to use for network sockets.
9592 Each element has the format (PATTERN . VAL), where PATTERN determines
9593 which network sockets the element applies to. PATTERN should be
9594 either a port number or a regular expression matching some network
9597 VAL is a coding system, a cons cell containing two coding systems, or
9598 a function symbol. If VAL is a coding system, it is used for both
9599 decoding what received from the network stream and encoding what sent
9600 to the network stream. If VAL is a cons cell containing two coding
9601 systems, the car specifies the coding system for decoding, and the cdr
9602 specifies the coding system for encoding.
9604 If VAL is a function symbol, the function must return a coding system
9605 or a cons cell containing two coding systems, which is used as above.
9607 **** process-coding-system-alist specifies which coding systems to use
9608 for certain subprocess. It works like network-coding-system-alist,
9609 except that the PATTERN is matched against the program name used to
9610 start the subprocess.
9612 **** The variable default-process-coding-system specifies the coding
9613 systems to use for subprocess (and net connection) input and output,
9614 when nothing else specifies what to do. The value is a cons cell
9615 (OUTPUT-CODING . INPUT-CODING). OUTPUT-CODING applies to output
9616 to the subprocess, and INPUT-CODING applies to input from it.
9618 **** The variable coding-system-for-write, if non-nil, specifies the
9619 coding system to use for writing a file, or for output to a synchronous
9622 It also applies to any asynchronous subprocess or network connection,
9623 but in a different way: the value of coding-system-for-write when you
9624 start the subprocess or connection affects that subprocess or
9625 connection permanently or until overridden.
9627 The variable coding-system-for-write takes precedence over
9628 file-coding-system-alist, process-coding-system-alist and
9629 network-coding-system-alist, and all other methods of specifying a
9630 coding system for output. But most of the time this variable is nil.
9631 It exists so that Lisp programs can bind it to a specific coding
9632 system for one operation at a time.
9634 **** coding-system-for-read applies similarly to input from
9635 files, subprocesses or network connections.
9637 **** The function process-coding-system tells you what
9638 coding systems(s) an existing subprocess is using.
9639 The value is a cons cell,
9640 (DECODING-CODING-SYSTEM . ENCODING-CODING-SYSTEM)
9641 where DECODING-CODING-SYSTEM is used for decoding output from
9642 the subprocess, and ENCODING-CODING-SYSTEM is used for encoding
9643 input to the subprocess.
9645 **** The function set-process-coding-system can be used to
9646 change the coding systems in use for an existing subprocess.
9648 ** Emacs has a new facility to help users manage the many
9649 customization options. To make a Lisp program work with this facility,
9650 you need to use the new macros defgroup and defcustom.
9652 You use defcustom instead of defvar, for defining a user option
9653 variable. The difference is that you specify two additional pieces of
9654 information (usually): the "type" which says what values are
9655 legitimate, and the "group" which specifies the hierarchy for
9658 Thus, instead of writing
9660 (defvar foo-blurgoze nil
9661 "*Non-nil means that foo will act very blurgozely.")
9663 you would now write this:
9665 (defcustom foo-blurgoze nil
9666 "*Non-nil means that foo will act very blurgozely."
9670 The type `boolean' means that this variable has only
9671 two meaningful states: nil and non-nil. Other type values
9672 describe other possibilities; see the manual for Custom
9673 for a description of them.
9675 The "group" argument is used to specify a group which the option
9676 should belong to. You define a new group like this:
9678 (defgroup ispell nil
9679 "Spell checking using Ispell."
9682 The "group" argument in defgroup specifies the parent group. The root
9683 group is called `emacs'; it should not contain any variables itself,
9684 but only other groups. The immediate subgroups of `emacs' correspond
9685 to the keywords used by C-h p. Under these subgroups come
9686 second-level subgroups that belong to individual packages.
9688 Each Emacs package should have its own set of groups. A simple
9689 package should have just one group; a more complex package should
9690 have a hierarchy of its own groups. The sole or root group of a
9691 package should be a subgroup of one or more of the "keyword"
9692 first-level subgroups.
9694 ** New `widget' library for inserting UI components in buffers.
9696 This library, used by the new custom library, is documented in a
9697 separate manual that accompanies Emacs.
9701 The easy-mmode package provides macros and functions that make
9702 developing minor modes easier. Roughly, the programmer has to code
9703 only the functionality of the minor mode. All the rest--toggles,
9704 predicate, and documentation--can be done in one call to the macro
9705 `easy-mmode-define-minor-mode' (see the documentation). See also
9706 `easy-mmode-define-keymap'.
9708 ** Text property changes
9710 *** The `intangible' property now works on overlays as well as on a
9713 *** The new functions next-char-property-change and
9714 previous-char-property-change scan through the buffer looking for a
9715 place where either a text property or an overlay might change. The
9716 functions take two arguments, POSITION and LIMIT. POSITION is the
9717 starting position for the scan. LIMIT says where to stop the scan.
9719 If no property change is found before LIMIT, the value is LIMIT. If
9720 LIMIT is nil, scan goes to the beginning or end of the accessible part
9721 of the buffer. If no property change is found, the value is the
9722 position of the beginning or end of the buffer.
9724 *** In the `local-map' text property or overlay property, the property
9725 value can now be a symbol whose function definition is a keymap. This
9726 is an alternative to using the keymap itself.
9728 ** Changes in invisibility features
9730 *** Isearch can now temporarily show parts of the buffer which are
9731 hidden by an overlay with a invisible property, when the search match
9732 is inside that portion of the buffer. To enable this the overlay
9733 should have a isearch-open-invisible property which is a function that
9734 would be called having the overlay as an argument, the function should
9735 make the overlay visible.
9737 During incremental search the overlays are shown by modifying the
9738 invisible and intangible properties, if beside this more actions are
9739 needed the overlay should have a isearch-open-invisible-temporary
9740 which is a function. The function is called with 2 arguments: one is
9741 the overlay and the second is nil when it should show the overlay and
9742 t when it should hide it.
9744 *** add-to-invisibility-spec, remove-from-invisibility-spec
9746 Modes that use overlays to hide portions of a buffer should set the
9747 invisible property of the overlay to the mode's name (or another symbol)
9748 and modify the `buffer-invisibility-spec' to include that symbol.
9749 Use `add-to-invisibility-spec' and `remove-from-invisibility-spec' to
9750 manipulate the `buffer-invisibility-spec'.
9751 Here is an example of how to do this:
9753 ;; If we want to display an ellipsis:
9754 (add-to-invisibility-spec '(my-symbol . t))
9755 ;; If you don't want ellipsis:
9756 (add-to-invisibility-spec 'my-symbol)
9759 (overlay-put (make-overlay beginning end) 'invisible 'my-symbol)
9762 ;; When done with the overlays:
9763 (remove-from-invisibility-spec '(my-symbol . t))
9765 (remove-from-invisibility-spec 'my-symbol)
9767 ** Changes in syntax parsing.
9769 *** The syntax-directed buffer-scan functions (such as
9770 `parse-partial-sexp', `forward-word' and similar functions) can now
9771 obey syntax information specified by text properties, if the variable
9772 `parse-sexp-lookup-properties' is non-nil.
9774 If the value of `parse-sexp-lookup-properties' is nil, the behavior
9775 is as before: the syntax-table of the current buffer is always
9776 used to determine the syntax of the character at the position.
9778 When `parse-sexp-lookup-properties' is non-nil, the syntax of a
9779 character in the buffer is calculated thus:
9781 a) if the `syntax-table' text-property of that character
9782 is a cons, this cons becomes the syntax-type;
9784 Valid values of `syntax-table' text-property are: nil, a valid
9785 syntax-table, and a valid syntax-table element, i.e.,
9786 a cons cell of the form (SYNTAX-CODE . MATCHING-CHAR).
9788 b) if the character's `syntax-table' text-property
9789 is a syntax table, this syntax table is used
9790 (instead of the syntax-table of the current buffer) to
9791 determine the syntax type of the character.
9793 c) otherwise the syntax-type is determined by the syntax-table
9794 of the current buffer.
9796 *** The meaning of \s in regular expressions is also affected by the
9797 value of `parse-sexp-lookup-properties'. The details are the same as
9798 for the syntax-directed buffer-scan functions.
9800 *** There are two new syntax-codes, `!' and `|' (numeric values 14
9801 and 15). A character with a code `!' starts a comment which is ended
9802 only by another character with the same code (unless quoted). A
9803 character with a code `|' starts a string which is ended only by
9804 another character with the same code (unless quoted).
9806 These codes are mainly meant for use as values of the `syntax-table'
9809 *** The function `parse-partial-sexp' has new semantics for the sixth
9810 arg COMMENTSTOP. If it is `syntax-table', parse stops after the start
9811 of a comment or a string, or after end of a comment or a string.
9813 *** The state-list which the return value from `parse-partial-sexp'
9814 (and can also be used as an argument) now has an optional ninth
9815 element: the character address of the start of last comment or string;
9816 nil if none. The fourth and eighth elements have special values if the
9817 string/comment is started by a "!" or "|" syntax-code.
9819 *** Since new features of `parse-partial-sexp' allow a complete
9820 syntactic parsing, `font-lock' no longer supports
9821 `font-lock-comment-start-regexp'.
9823 ** Changes in face features
9825 *** The face functions are now unconditionally defined in Emacs, even
9826 if it does not support displaying on a device that supports faces.
9828 *** The function face-documentation returns the documentation string
9829 of a face (or nil if it doesn't have one).
9831 *** The function face-bold-p returns t if a face should be bold.
9832 set-face-bold-p sets that flag.
9834 *** The function face-italic-p returns t if a face should be italic.
9835 set-face-italic-p sets that flag.
9837 *** You can now specify foreground and background colors for text
9838 by adding elements of the form (foreground-color . COLOR-NAME)
9839 and (background-color . COLOR-NAME) to the list of faces in
9840 the `face' property (either the character's text property or an
9843 This means that you no longer need to create named faces to use
9844 arbitrary colors in a Lisp package.
9846 ** Changes in file-handling functions
9848 *** File-access primitive functions no longer discard an extra redundant
9849 directory name from the beginning of the file name. In other words,
9850 they no longer do anything special with // or /~. That conversion
9851 is now done only in substitute-in-file-name.
9853 This makes it possible for a Lisp program to open a file whose name
9856 *** If copy-file is unable to set the date of the output file,
9857 it now signals an error with the condition file-date-error.
9859 *** The inode number returned by file-attributes may be an integer (if
9860 the number fits in a Lisp integer) or a list of integers.
9862 *** insert-file-contents can now read from a special file,
9863 as long as the arguments VISIT and REPLACE are nil.
9865 *** The RAWFILE arg to find-file-noselect, if non-nil, now suppresses
9866 character code conversion as well as other things.
9868 Meanwhile, this feature does work with remote file names
9869 (formerly it did not).
9871 *** Lisp packages which create temporary files should use the TMPDIR
9872 environment variable to decide which directory to put them in.
9874 *** interpreter-mode-alist elements now specify regexps
9875 instead of constant strings.
9877 *** expand-file-name no longer treats `//' or `/~' specially. It used
9878 to delete all the text of a file name up through the first slash of
9879 any `//' or `/~' sequence. Now it passes them straight through.
9881 substitute-in-file-name continues to treat those sequences specially,
9882 in the same way as before.
9884 *** The variable `format-alist' is more general now.
9885 The FROM-FN and TO-FN in a format definition can now be strings
9886 which specify shell commands to use as filters to perform conversion.
9888 *** The new function access-file tries to open a file, and signals an
9889 error if that fails. If the open succeeds, access-file does nothing
9890 else, and returns nil.
9892 *** The function insert-directory now signals an error if the specified
9893 directory cannot be listed.
9895 ** Changes in minibuffer input
9897 *** The functions read-buffer, read-variable, read-command, read-string
9898 read-file-name, read-from-minibuffer and completing-read now take an
9899 additional argument which specifies the default value. If this
9900 argument is non-nil, it should be a string; that string is used in two
9903 It is returned if the user enters empty input.
9904 It is available through the history command M-n.
9906 *** The functions read-string, read-from-minibuffer,
9907 read-no-blanks-input and completing-read now take an additional
9908 argument INHERIT-INPUT-METHOD. If this is non-nil, then the
9909 minibuffer inherits the current input method and the setting of
9910 enable-multibyte-characters from the previously current buffer.
9912 In an interactive spec, you can use M instead of s to read an
9913 argument in this way.
9915 *** All minibuffer input functions discard text properties
9916 from the text you enter in the minibuffer, unless the variable
9917 minibuffer-allow-text-properties is non-nil.
9919 ** Echo area features
9921 *** Clearing the echo area now runs the normal hook
9922 echo-area-clear-hook. Note that the echo area can be used while the
9923 minibuffer is active; in that case, the minibuffer is still active
9924 after the echo area is cleared.
9926 *** The function current-message returns the message currently displayed
9927 in the echo area, or nil if there is none.
9929 ** Keyboard input features
9931 *** tty-erase-char is a new variable that reports which character was
9932 set up as the terminal's erase character when time Emacs was started.
9934 *** num-nonmacro-input-events is the total number of input events
9935 received so far from the terminal. It does not count those generated
9938 ** Frame-related changes
9940 *** make-frame runs the normal hook before-make-frame-hook just before
9941 creating a frame, and just after creating a frame it runs the abnormal
9942 hook after-make-frame-functions with the new frame as arg.
9944 *** The new hook window-configuration-change-hook is now run every time
9945 the window configuration has changed. The frame whose configuration
9946 has changed is the selected frame when the hook is run.
9948 *** Each frame now independently records the order for recently
9949 selected buffers, in its buffer-list frame parameter, so that the
9950 value of other-buffer is now based on the buffers recently displayed
9951 in the selected frame.
9953 *** The value of the frame parameter vertical-scroll-bars
9954 is now `left', `right' or nil. A non-nil value specifies
9955 which side of the window to put the scroll bars on.
9957 ** X Windows features
9959 *** You can examine X resources for other applications by binding
9960 x-resource-class around a call to x-get-resource. The usual value of
9961 x-resource-class is "Emacs", which is the correct value for Emacs.
9963 *** In menus, checkboxes and radio buttons now actually work.
9964 The menu displays the current status of the box or button.
9966 *** The function x-list-fonts now takes an optional fourth argument
9967 MAXIMUM which sets a limit on how many matching fonts to return.
9968 A smaller value of MAXIMUM makes the function faster.
9970 If the only question is whether *any* font matches the pattern,
9971 it is good to supply 1 for this argument.
9973 ** Subprocess features
9975 *** A reminder: it is no longer necessary for subprocess filter
9976 functions and sentinels to do save-match-data, because Emacs does this
9979 *** The new function shell-command-to-string executes a shell command
9980 and returns the output from the command as a string.
9982 *** The new function process-contact returns t for a child process,
9983 and (HOSTNAME SERVICE) for a net connection.
9985 ** An error in running pre-command-hook or post-command-hook
9986 does clear the variable to nil. The documentation was wrong before.
9988 ** In define-key-after, if AFTER is t, the new binding now always goes
9989 at the end of the keymap. If the keymap is a menu, this means it
9990 goes after the other menu items.
9992 ** If you have a program that makes several changes in the same area
9993 of the buffer, you can use the macro combine-after-change-calls
9994 around that Lisp code to make it faster when after-change hooks
9997 The macro arranges to call the after-change functions just once for a
9998 series of several changes--if that seems safe.
10000 Don't alter the variables after-change-functions and
10001 after-change-function within the body of a combine-after-change-calls
10004 ** If you define an abbrev (with define-abbrev) whose EXPANSION
10005 is not a string, then the abbrev does not expand in the usual sense,
10006 but its hook is still run.
10008 ** Normally, the Lisp debugger is not used (even if you have enabled it)
10009 for errors that are handled by condition-case.
10011 If you set debug-on-signal to a non-nil value, then the debugger is called
10012 regardless of whether there is a handler for the condition. This is
10013 useful for debugging problems that happen inside of a condition-case.
10015 This mode of operation seems to be unreliable in other ways. Errors that
10016 are normal and ought to be handled, perhaps in timers or process
10017 filters, will instead invoke the debugger. So don't say you weren't
10020 ** The new variable ring-bell-function lets you specify your own
10021 way for Emacs to "ring the bell".
10023 ** If run-at-time's TIME argument is t, the action is repeated at
10024 integral multiples of REPEAT from the epoch; this is useful for
10025 functions like display-time.
10027 ** You can use the function locate-library to find the precise file
10028 name of a Lisp library. This isn't new, but wasn't documented before.
10030 ** Commands for entering view mode have new optional arguments that
10031 can be used from Lisp. Low-level entrance to and exit from view mode
10032 is done by functions view-mode-enter and view-mode-exit.
10034 ** batch-byte-compile-file now makes Emacs return a nonzero status code
10035 if there is an error in compilation.
10037 ** pop-to-buffer, switch-to-buffer-other-window and
10038 switch-to-buffer-other-frame now accept an additional optional
10039 argument NORECORD, much like switch-to-buffer. If it is non-nil,
10040 they don't put the buffer at the front of the buffer list.
10042 ** If your .emacs file leaves the *scratch* buffer non-empty,
10043 Emacs does not display the startup message, so as to avoid changing
10044 the *scratch* buffer.
10046 ** The new function regexp-opt returns an efficient regexp to match a string.
10047 The arguments are STRINGS and (optionally) PAREN. This function can be used
10048 where regexp matching or searching is intensively used and speed is important,
10049 e.g., in Font Lock mode.
10051 ** The variable buffer-display-count is local to each buffer,
10052 and is incremented each time the buffer is displayed in a window.
10053 It starts at 0 when the buffer is created.
10055 ** The new function compose-mail starts composing a mail message
10056 using the user's chosen mail composition agent (specified with the
10057 variable mail-user-agent). It has variants compose-mail-other-window
10058 and compose-mail-other-frame.
10060 ** The `user-full-name' function now takes an optional parameter which
10061 can either be a number (the UID) or a string (the login name). The
10062 full name of the specified user will be returned.
10064 ** Lisp packages that load files of customizations, or any other sort
10065 of user profile, should obey the variable init-file-user in deciding
10066 where to find it. They should load the profile of the user name found
10067 in that variable. If init-file-user is nil, meaning that the -q
10068 option was used, then Lisp packages should not load the customization
10071 ** format-time-string now allows you to specify the field width
10072 and type of padding. This works as in printf: you write the field
10073 width as digits in the middle of a %-construct. If you start
10074 the field width with 0, it means to pad with zeros.
10076 For example, %S normally specifies the number of seconds since the
10077 minute; %03S means to pad this with zeros to 3 positions, %_3S to pad
10078 with spaces to 3 positions. Plain %3S pads with zeros, because that
10079 is how %S normally pads to two positions.
10081 ** thing-at-point now supports a new kind of "thing": url.
10083 ** imenu.el changes.
10085 You can now specify a function to be run when selecting an
10086 item from menu created by imenu.
10088 An example of using this feature: if we define imenu items for the
10089 #include directives in a C file, we can open the included file when we
10090 select one of those items.
10092 * For older news, see the file ONEWS
10094 ----------------------------------------------------------------------
10095 Copyright information:
10097 Copyright (C) 1999, 2000, 2001 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
10099 Permission is granted to anyone to make or distribute verbatim copies
10100 of this document as received, in any medium, provided that the
10101 copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved,
10102 thus giving the recipient permission to redistribute in turn.
10104 Permission is granted to distribute modified versions
10105 of this document, or of portions of it,
10106 under the above conditions, provided also that they
10107 carry prominent notices stating who last changed them.
10111 paragraph-separate: "[
\f]*$"