1 GNU Emacs NEWS -- history of user-visible changes. 2001-03-15
2 Copyright (C) 1999, 2000, 2001 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
8 Temporary note: +++ indicates that the appropriate manual
9 has already been updated. --- means no change in the manuals
12 * Installation Changes in Emacs 21.3
14 ** Emacs now supports new configure options `--program-prefix',
15 `--program-suffix' and `--program-transform-name' that affect the names of
19 * Changes in Emacs 21.3
21 ** Unquoted `$' in file names do not signal an error any more when
22 the corresponding environment variable does not exist.
23 Instead, the `$ENVVAR' text is left as is, so that `$$' quoting
24 is only rarely needed.
26 ** jit-lock can now be delayed with `jit-lock-defer-time'.
28 If this variable is non-nil, its value should be the amount of Emacs
29 idle time inseconds to wait before starting fontification. For
30 example, if you set `jit-lock-defer-time' to 0.25, fontification will
31 only happen after 0.25s of idle time.
33 ** If you hit M-C-SPC (mark-sexp) repeatedly, the marked region
34 will now be extended each time, so you can mark the next two sexps with
35 M-C-SPC M-C-SPC, for example.
37 ** mouse-wheels can now scroll a specific fraction of the window
38 (rather than a fixed number of lines) and the scrolling is `progressive'.
40 ** The keyboard-coding-system is now automatically set based on
41 your current locale settings. If it turns out that your terminal
42 does not support the encoding implied by your locale (for example,
43 it inserts non-ASCII chars if you hit M-i), you will need to add
45 (set-keyboard-coding-system nil)
47 to your .emacs to revert to the old behavior.
50 ** Emacs now reads the standard abbrevs file ~/.abbrev_defs
51 automatically at startup, if it exists. And it always offers to save
52 abbrevs (if you have changed them) when if offers to save modified
55 ** Display of hollow cursors now obeys the buffer-local value (if any)
56 of `cursor-in-non-selected-windows' in the buffer that the cursor
59 ** The default values of `tooltip-delay' and `tooltip-hide-delay'
62 ** On terminals whose erase-char is ^H (Backspace), Emacs
63 now uses normal-erase-is-backspace-mode.
66 ** The command line option --no-windows has been changed to
67 --no-window-system. The old one still works, but is deprecated.
69 ** `buffer-menu' and `list-buffers' now list buffers whose names begin
70 with a space, if they visit files.
72 ** You can now customize fill-nobreak-predicate to control where
73 filling can break lines. We provide two sample predicates,
74 fill-single-word-nobreak-p and fill-french-nobreak-p.
76 ** New user option `add-log-always-start-new-record'.
77 When this option is enabled, M-x add-change-log-entry will always
78 start a new record regardless of when the last record is.
80 ** New user option `sgml-xml'.
81 When this option is enabled, SGML tags are inserted in XML style,
82 i.e., there is always a closing tag.
83 When not customized, it becomes buffer-local when it can be inferred
84 from the file name or buffer contents.
86 ** When the *scratch* buffer is recreated, its mode is set from
87 initial-major-mode, which normally is lisp-interaction-mode,
88 instead of using default-major-mode.
90 ** Byte compiler warning and error messages have been brought more
91 in line with the output of other GNU tools.
93 ** Lisp-mode now uses font-lock-doc-face for the docstrings.
95 ** perl-mode has a new variable `perl-indent-continued-arguments'.
97 ** `special-display-buffer-names' and `special-display-regexps' now
98 understand two new boolean pseudo-frame-parameters `same-frame' and
101 ** When pure storage overflows while dumping, Emacs now prints how
102 much pure storage it will approximately need.
104 ** M-x setenv now expands environment variables of the form `$foo' and
105 `${foo}' in the specified new value of the environment variable. To
106 include a `$' in the value, use `$$'.
109 ** File-name completion can now ignore directories.
110 If an element of the list in `completion-ignored-extensions' ends in a
111 slash `/', it indicates a subdirectory that should be ignored when
112 completing file names. Elements of `completion-ignored-extensions'
113 which do not end in a slash are never considered when a completion
114 candidate is a directory.
116 ** New user option `inhibit-startup-buffer-menu'.
117 When loading many files, for instance with `emacs *', Emacs normally
118 displays a buffer menu. This option turns the buffer menu off.
120 ** Rmail now displays 5-digit message ids in its summary buffer.
122 ** When using M-x revert-buffer in a compilation buffer to rerun a
123 compilation, it is now made sure that the compilation buffer is reused
124 in case it has been renamed.
126 ** On MS Windows, the "system caret" now follows the cursor.
127 This enables Emacs to work better with programs that need to track
128 the cursor, for example screen magnifiers and text to speech programs.
130 ** Tooltips now work on MS Windows.
131 See the Emacs 21.1 NEWS entry for tooltips for details.
134 ** A French translation of the `Emacs Survival Guide' is available.
137 ** A French translation of the Emacs Tutorial is available.
139 ** New modes and packages
142 *** Calc is now part of the Emacs distribution.
144 Calc is an advanced desk calculator and mathematical tool written in
145 Emacs Lisp. Its documentation is in a separate manual; within Emacs,
146 type "C-h i m calc RET" to read that manual. A reference card is
147 available in `etc/calccard.tex' and `etc/calccard.ps'.
150 *** The Emacs Lisp Reference Manual is now part of the distribution.
152 The ELisp reference manual in Info format is built as part of the
153 Emacs build procedure and installed together with the Emacs User
156 *** The Introduction to Programming in Emacs Lisp manual is now part of
159 This manual is now part of the standard distribution and is installed,
160 together with the Emacs User Manual, into the Info directory.
162 *** The ruler-mode.el library provides a minor mode for displaying an
163 "active" ruler in the header line. You can use the mouse to visually
164 change the `fill-column', `window-margins' and `tab-stop-list'
167 *** master-mode.el implements a minor mode for scrolling a slave
168 buffer without leaving your current buffer, the master buffer.
170 It can be used by sql.el, for example: the SQL buffer is the master
171 and its SQLi buffer is the slave. This allows you to scroll the SQLi
172 buffer containing the output from the SQL buffer containing the
175 This is how to use sql.el and master.el together: the variable
176 sql-buffer contains the slave buffer. It is a local variable in the
179 (add-hook 'sql-mode-hook
182 (master-set-slave sql-buffer))))
183 (add-hook 'sql-set-sqli-hook
185 (master-set-slave sql-buffer))))
188 * Lisp Changes in Emacs 21.3
190 ** The precedence of file-name-handlers has been changed.
191 Instead of blindly choosing the first handler that matches,
192 find-file-name-handler now gives precedence to a file-name handler
193 that matches near the end of the file name. More specifically, the
194 handler whose (match-beginning 0) is the largest is chosen.
195 In case of ties, the old "first matched" rule applies.
197 ** Dense keymaps now handle inheritance correctly.
198 To that end, binding a key to t now behaves the same as binding it to
199 nil (it shadows parent bindings but not bindings in keymaps of lower
202 ** jit-lock obeys a new text-property `jit-lock-defer-multiline'.
203 If a piece of text with that property gets contextually refontified
204 (see jit-lock-defer-contextually), then all of that text will
205 be refontified. This is useful when the syntax of a textual element
206 depends on text several lines further down (and when font-lock-multiline
207 is not appropriate to solve that problem). For example in Perl:
215 Adding/removing the last `e' changes the `bar' from being a piece of
216 text to being a piece of code, so you'd put a jit-lock-defer-multiline
217 property over the second half of the command to force (deferred)
218 refontification of `bar' whenever the `e' is added/removed.
220 ** describe-vector now takes a second argument `describer' which is
221 called to print the entries' values. It default to `princ'.
223 ** defcustom and other custom declarations now use a default group
224 (the last group defined in the same file) when no :group was given.
226 ** emacsserver now runs pre-command-hook and post-command-hook when
227 it receives a request from emacsclient.
229 ** The variable `recursive-load-depth-limit' has been deleted.
230 Emacs now signals an error if the same file is loaded with more
231 than 3 levels of nesting.
233 ** The default values of paragraph-start and indent-line-function have
234 been changed to reflect those used in Text mode rather than those used
235 in Indented-Text mode.
237 ** If a major mode function has a non-nil `no-clone-indirect'
238 property, `clone-indirect-buffer' signals an error if you use
241 ** If you set `query-replace-skip-read-only' non-nil,
242 `query-replace' and related functions simply ignore
243 a match if part of it has a read-only property.
245 ** In `replace-match', the replacement text no longer inherits
246 properties from surrounding text.
248 ** New function `buffer-local-value'.
250 - Function: buffer-local-value variable buffer
252 This function returns the buffer-local binding of VARIABLE (a symbol)
253 in buffer BUFFER. If VARIABLE does not have a buffer-local binding in
254 buffer BUFFER, it returns the default value of VARIABLE instead.
256 ** The default value of `paragraph-start' and `indent-line-function' has
257 been changed to reflect the one used in Text mode rather than the one
258 used in Indented Text mode.
260 ** New function `text-clone-create'. Text clones are chunks of text
261 that are kept identical by transparently propagating changes from one
264 ** font-lock can manage arbitrary text-properties beside `face'.
265 *** the FACENAME returned in font-lock-keywords can be a list
266 of the form (face FACE PROP1 VAL1 PROP@ VAL2 ...) so you can set
267 other properties than `face'.
268 *** font-lock-extra-managed-props can be set to make sure those extra
269 properties are automatically cleaned up by font-lock.
271 ** The new function `run-mode-hooks' and the new macro `delay-mode-hooks'
272 are used by define-derived-mode to make sure the mode hook for the
273 parent mode is run at the end of the child mode.
275 ** `provide' and `featurep' now accept an optional second argument
276 to test/provide subfeatures. Also `provide' now checks `after-load-alist'
277 and run any code associated with the provided feature.
279 ** The variable `compilation-parse-errors-filename-function' can
280 be used to transform filenames found in compilation output.
283 ** Functions `file-name-sans-extension' and `file-name-extension' now
284 ignore the leading dots in file names, so that file names such as
285 `.emacs' are treated as extensionless.
287 ** Functions `user-uid' and `user-real-uid' now return floats if the
288 user UID doesn't fit in a Lisp integer. Function `user-full-name'
289 accepts a float as UID parameter.
291 ** `define-key-after' now accepts keys longer than 1.
293 ** `define-derived-mode' now accepts nil as the parent.
295 ** The local variable `no-byte-compile' in elisp files is now obeyed.
297 ** New functions `keymap-prompt' and `current-active-maps'.
299 ** New function `describe-buffer-bindings'.
301 ** New vars `exec-suffixes' and `load-suffixes' used when
302 searching for an executable resp. an elisp file.
304 ** Variable aliases have been implemented
306 - Macro: defvaralias ALIAS-VAR BASE-VAR
308 This defines the symbol ALIAS-VAR as a variable alias for symbol
309 BASE-VAR. This means that retrieving the value of ALIAS-VAR returns
310 the value of BASE-VAR, and changing the value of ALIAS-VAR changes the
313 - Function: indirect-variable VARIABLE
315 This function returns the variable at the end of the chain of aliases
316 of VARIABLE. If VARIABLE is not a symbol, or if VARIABLE is not
317 defined as an alias, the function returns VARIABLE.
319 It might be noteworthy that variables aliases work for all kinds of
320 variables, including buffer-local and frame-local variables.
322 ** Functions from `post-gc-hook' are run at the end of garbage
323 collection. The hook is run with GC inhibited, so use it with care.
325 ** If the second argument to `copy-file' is the name of a directory,
326 the file is copied to that directory instead of signaling an error.
328 ** The variables most-positive-fixnum and most-negative-fixnum
329 have been moved from the CL package to the core.
331 ** On MS Windows, locale-coding-system is used to interact with the OS.
332 The Windows specific variable w32-system-coding-system, which was
333 formerly used for that purpose is now an alias for locale-coding-system.
337 *** The new package syntax.el provides an efficient way to find the
338 current syntactic context (as returned by parse-partial-sexp).
340 *** The TCL package tcl-mode.el was replaced by tcl.el.
341 This was actually done in Emacs-21.1 was not documented.
344 * Installation Changes in Emacs 21.1
346 See the INSTALL file for information on installing extra libraries and
347 fonts to take advantage of the new graphical features and extra
348 charsets in this release.
350 ** Support for GNU/Linux on IA64 machines has been added.
352 ** Support for LynxOS has been added.
354 ** There are new configure options associated with the support for
355 images and toolkit scrollbars. Use the --help option in `configure'
358 ** You can build a 64-bit Emacs for SPARC/Solaris systems which
359 support 64-bit executables and also on Irix 6.5. This increases the
360 maximum buffer size. See etc/MACHINES for instructions. Changes to
361 build on other 64-bit systems should be straightforward modulo any
362 necessary changes to unexec.
364 ** There is a new configure option `--disable-largefile' to omit
365 Unix-98-style support for large files if that is available.
367 ** There is a new configure option `--without-xim' that instructs
368 Emacs to not use X Input Methods (XIM), if these are available.
370 ** `movemail' defaults to supporting POP. You can turn this off using
371 the --without-pop configure option, should that be necessary.
373 ** This version can be built for the Macintosh, but does not implement
374 all of the new display features described below. The port currently
375 lacks unexec, asynchronous processes, and networking support. See the
376 "Emacs and the Mac OS" appendix in the Emacs manual, for the
377 description of aspects specific to the Mac.
379 ** Note that the MS-Windows port does not yet implement various of the
380 new display features described below.
383 * Changes in Emacs 21.1
385 ** Emacs has a new redisplay engine.
387 The new redisplay handles characters of variable width and height.
388 Italic text can be used without redisplay problems. Fonts containing
389 oversized characters, i.e. characters larger than the logical height
390 of a font can be used. Images of various formats can be displayed in
393 ** Emacs has a new face implementation.
395 The new faces no longer fundamentally use X font names to specify the
396 font. Instead, each face has several independent attributes--family,
397 height, width, weight and slant--that it may or may not specify.
398 These attributes can be merged from various faces, and then together
401 Faces are supported on terminals that can display color or fonts.
402 These terminal capabilities are auto-detected. Details can be found
403 under Lisp changes, below.
405 ** Emacs can display faces on TTY frames.
407 Emacs automatically detects terminals that are able to display colors.
408 Faces with a weight greater than normal are displayed extra-bright, if
409 the terminal supports it. Faces with a weight less than normal and
410 italic faces are displayed dimmed, if the terminal supports it.
411 Underlined faces are displayed underlined if possible. Other face
412 attributes such as `overline', `strike-through', and `box' are ignored
415 The command-line options `-fg COLOR', `-bg COLOR', and `-rv' are now
416 supported on character terminals.
418 Emacs automatically remaps all X-style color specifications to one of
419 the colors supported by the terminal. This means you could have the
420 same color customizations that work both on a windowed display and on
421 a TTY or when Emacs is invoked with the -nw option.
423 ** New default font is Courier 12pt under X.
427 Emacs supports playing sound files on GNU/Linux and FreeBSD (Voxware
428 driver and native BSD driver, a.k.a. Luigi's driver). Currently
429 supported file formats are RIFF-WAVE (*.wav) and Sun Audio (*.au).
430 You must configure Emacs with the option `--with-sound=yes' to enable
433 ** Emacs now resizes mini-windows if appropriate.
435 If a message is longer than one line, or minibuffer contents are
436 longer than one line, Emacs can resize the minibuffer window unless it
437 is on a frame of its own. You can control resizing and the maximum
438 minibuffer window size by setting the following variables:
440 - User option: max-mini-window-height
442 Maximum height for resizing mini-windows. If a float, it specifies a
443 fraction of the mini-window frame's height. If an integer, it
444 specifies a number of lines.
448 - User option: resize-mini-windows
450 How to resize mini-windows. If nil, don't resize. If t, always
451 resize to fit the size of the text. If `grow-only', let mini-windows
452 grow only, until they become empty, at which point they are shrunk
455 Default is `grow-only'.
459 Emacs now runs with the LessTif toolkit (see
460 <http://www.lesstif.org>). You will need version 0.92.26, or later.
462 ** LessTif/Motif file selection dialog.
464 When Emacs is configured to use LessTif or Motif, reading a file name
465 from a menu will pop up a file selection dialog if `use-dialog-box' is
468 ** File selection dialog on MS-Windows is supported.
470 When a file is visited by clicking File->Open, the MS-Windows version
471 now pops up a standard file selection dialog where you can select a
472 file to visit. File->Save As also pops up that dialog.
474 ** Toolkit scroll bars.
476 Emacs now uses toolkit scroll bars if available. When configured for
477 LessTif/Motif, it will use that toolkit's scroll bar. Otherwise, when
478 configured for Lucid and Athena widgets, it will use the Xaw3d scroll
479 bar if Xaw3d is available. You can turn off the use of toolkit scroll
480 bars by specifying `--with-toolkit-scroll-bars=no' when configuring
483 When you encounter problems with the Xaw3d scroll bar, watch out how
484 Xaw3d is compiled on your system. If the Makefile generated from
485 Xaw3d's Imakefile contains a `-DNARROWPROTO' compiler option, and your
486 Emacs system configuration file `s/your-system.h' does not contain a
487 define for NARROWPROTO, you might consider adding it. Take
488 `s/freebsd.h' as an example.
490 Alternatively, if you don't have access to the Xaw3d source code, take
491 a look at your system's imake configuration file, for example in the
492 directory `/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/config' (paths are different on
493 different systems). You will find files `*.cf' there. If your
494 system's cf-file contains a line like `#define NeedWidePrototypes NO',
495 add a `#define NARROWPROTO' to your Emacs system configuration file.
497 The reason for this is that one Xaw3d function uses `double' or
498 `float' function parameters depending on the setting of NARROWPROTO.
499 This is not a problem when Imakefiles are used because each system's
500 imake configuration file contains the necessary information. Since
501 Emacs doesn't use imake, this has do be done manually.
505 Emacs supports a tool bar at the top of a frame under X. For details
506 of how to define a tool bar, see the page describing Lisp-level
507 changes. Tool-bar global minor mode controls whether or not it is
508 displayed and is on by default. The appearance of the bar is improved
509 if Emacs has been built with XPM image support. Otherwise monochrome
512 To make the tool bar more useful, we need contributions of extra icons
513 for specific modes (with copyright assignments).
517 Tooltips are small X windows displaying a help string at the current
518 mouse position. The Lisp package `tooltip' implements them. You can
519 turn them off via the user option `tooltip-mode'.
521 Tooltips also provides support for GUD debugging. If activated,
522 variable values can be displayed in tooltips by pointing at them with
523 the mouse in source buffers. You can customize various aspects of the
524 tooltip display in the group `tooltip'.
526 ** Automatic Hscrolling
528 Horizontal scrolling now happens automatically if
529 `automatic-hscrolling' is set (the default). This setting can be
532 If a window is scrolled horizontally with set-window-hscroll, or
533 scroll-left/scroll-right (C-x <, C-x >), this serves as a lower bound
534 for automatic horizontal scrolling. Automatic scrolling will scroll
535 the text more to the left if necessary, but won't scroll the text more
536 to the right than the column set with set-window-hscroll etc.
538 ** When using a windowing terminal, each Emacs window now has a cursor
539 of its own. By default, when a window is selected, the cursor is
540 solid; otherwise, it is hollow. The user-option
541 `cursor-in-non-selected-windows' controls how to display the
542 cursor in non-selected windows. If nil, no cursor is shown, if
543 non-nil a hollow box cursor is shown.
545 ** Fringes to the left and right of windows are used to display
546 truncation marks, continuation marks, overlay arrows and alike. The
547 foreground, background, and stipple of these areas can be changed by
548 customizing face `fringe'.
550 ** The mode line under X is now drawn with shadows by default.
551 You can change its appearance by modifying the face `mode-line'.
552 In particular, setting the `:box' attribute to nil turns off the 3D
553 appearance of the mode line. (The 3D appearance makes the mode line
554 occupy more space, and thus might cause the first or the last line of
555 the window to be partially obscured.)
557 The variable `mode-line-inverse-video', which was used in older
558 versions of emacs to make the mode-line stand out, is now deprecated.
559 However, setting it to nil will cause the `mode-line' face to be
560 ignored, and mode-lines to be drawn using the default text face.
562 ** Mouse-sensitive mode line.
564 Different parts of the mode line have been made mouse-sensitive on all
565 systems which support the mouse. Moving the mouse to a
566 mouse-sensitive part in the mode line changes the appearance of the
567 mouse pointer to an arrow, and help about available mouse actions is
568 displayed either in the echo area, or in the tooltip window if you
571 Currently, the following actions have been defined:
573 - Mouse-1 on the buffer name in the mode line goes to the next buffer.
575 - Mouse-3 on the buffer-name goes to the previous buffer.
577 - Mouse-2 on the read-only or modified status in the mode line (`%' or
578 `*') toggles the status.
580 - Mouse-3 on the mode name displays a minor-mode menu.
584 Emacs can optionally display an hourglass pointer under X. You can
585 turn the display on or off by customizing group `cursor'.
589 M-x blink-cursor-mode toggles a blinking cursor under X and on
590 terminals having terminal capabilities `vi', `vs', and `ve'. Blinking
591 and related parameters like frequency and delay can be customized in
594 ** New font-lock support mode `jit-lock-mode'.
596 This support mode is roughly equivalent to `lazy-lock' but is
597 generally faster. It supports stealth and deferred fontification.
598 See the documentation of the function `jit-lock-mode' for more
601 Font-lock uses jit-lock-mode as default support mode, so you don't
602 have to do anything to activate it.
604 ** The default binding of the Delete key has changed.
606 The new user-option `normal-erase-is-backspace' can be set to
607 determine the effect of the Delete and Backspace function keys.
609 On window systems, the default value of this option is chosen
610 according to the keyboard used. If the keyboard has both a Backspace
611 key and a Delete key, and both are mapped to their usual meanings, the
612 option's default value is set to t, so that Backspace can be used to
613 delete backward, and Delete can be used to delete forward. On
614 keyboards which either have only one key (usually labeled DEL), or two
615 keys DEL and BS which produce the same effect, the option's value is
616 set to nil, and these keys delete backward.
618 If not running under a window system, setting this option accomplishes
619 a similar effect by mapping C-h, which is usually generated by the
620 Backspace key, to DEL, and by mapping DEL to C-d via
621 `keyboard-translate'. The former functionality of C-h is available on
622 the F1 key. You should probably not use this setting on a text-only
623 terminal if you don't have both Backspace, Delete and F1 keys.
625 Programmatically, you can call function normal-erase-is-backspace-mode
626 to toggle the behavior of the Delete and Backspace keys.
628 ** The default for user-option `next-line-add-newlines' has been
629 changed to nil, i.e. C-n will no longer add newlines at the end of a
632 ** The <home> and <end> keys now move to the beginning or end of the
633 current line, respectively. C-<home> and C-<end> move to the
634 beginning and end of the buffer.
636 ** Emacs now checks for recursive loads of Lisp files. If the
637 recursion depth exceeds `recursive-load-depth-limit', an error is
640 ** When an error is signaled during the loading of the user's init
641 file, Emacs now pops up the *Messages* buffer.
643 ** Emacs now refuses to load compiled Lisp files which weren't
644 compiled with Emacs. Set `load-dangerous-libraries' to t to change
647 The reason for this change is an incompatible change in XEmacs's byte
648 compiler. Files compiled with XEmacs can contain byte codes that let
651 ** Toggle buttons and radio buttons in menus.
653 When compiled with LessTif (or Motif) support, Emacs uses toolkit
654 widgets for radio and toggle buttons in menus. When configured for
655 Lucid, Emacs draws radio buttons and toggle buttons similar to Motif.
657 ** The menu bar configuration has changed. The new configuration is
658 more CUA-compliant. The most significant change is that Options is
659 now a separate menu-bar item, with Mule and Customize as its submenus.
661 ** Item Save Options on the Options menu allows saving options set
664 ** Highlighting of trailing whitespace.
666 When `show-trailing-whitespace' is non-nil, Emacs displays trailing
667 whitespace in the face `trailing-whitespace'. Trailing whitespace is
668 defined as spaces or tabs at the end of a line. To avoid busy
669 highlighting when entering new text, trailing whitespace is not
670 displayed if point is at the end of the line containing the
673 ** C-x 5 1 runs the new command delete-other-frames which deletes
674 all frames except the selected one.
676 ** The new user-option `confirm-kill-emacs' can be customized to
677 let Emacs ask for confirmation before exiting.
679 ** The header line in an Info buffer is now displayed as an emacs
680 header-line (which is like a mode-line, but at the top of the window),
681 so that it remains visible even when the buffer has been scrolled.
682 This behavior may be disabled by customizing the option
683 `Info-use-header-line'.
685 ** Polish, Czech, German, and French translations of Emacs' reference card
686 have been added. They are named `pl-refcard.tex', `cs-refcard.tex',
687 `de-refcard.tex' and `fr-refcard.tex'. Postscript files are included.
689 ** An `Emacs Survival Guide', etc/survival.tex, is available.
691 ** A reference card for Dired has been added. Its name is
692 `dired-ref.tex'. A French translation is available in
695 ** C-down-mouse-3 is bound differently. Now if the menu bar is not
696 displayed it pops up a menu containing the items which would be on the
697 menu bar. If the menu bar is displayed, it pops up the major mode
698 menu or the Edit menu if there is no major mode menu.
700 ** Variable `load-path' is no longer customizable through Customize.
702 You can no longer use `M-x customize-variable' to customize `load-path'
703 because it now contains a version-dependent component. You can still
704 use `add-to-list' and `setq' to customize this variable in your
705 `~/.emacs' init file or to modify it from any Lisp program in general.
707 ** C-u C-x = provides detailed information about the character at
708 point in a pop-up window.
710 ** Emacs can now support 'wheeled' mice (such as the MS IntelliMouse)
711 under XFree86. To enable this, use the `mouse-wheel-mode' command, or
712 customize the variable `mouse-wheel-mode'.
714 The variables `mouse-wheel-follow-mouse' and `mouse-wheel-scroll-amount'
715 determine where and by how much buffers are scrolled.
717 ** Emacs' auto-save list files are now by default stored in a
718 sub-directory `.emacs.d/auto-save-list/' of the user's home directory.
719 (On MS-DOS, this subdirectory's name is `_emacs.d/auto-save.list/'.)
720 You can customize `auto-save-list-file-prefix' to change this location.
722 ** The function `getenv' is now callable interactively.
724 ** The new user-option `even-window-heights' can be set to nil
725 to prevent `display-buffer' from evening out window heights.
727 ** The new command M-x delete-trailing-whitespace RET will delete the
728 trailing whitespace within the current restriction. You can also add
729 this function to `write-file-hooks' or `local-write-file-hooks'.
731 ** When visiting a file with M-x find-file-literally, no newlines will
732 be added to the end of the buffer even if `require-final-newline' is
735 ** The new user-option `find-file-suppress-same-file-warnings' can be
736 set to suppress warnings ``X and Y are the same file'' when visiting a
737 file that is already visited under a different name.
739 ** The new user-option `electric-help-shrink-window' can be set to
740 nil to prevent adjusting the help window size to the buffer size.
742 ** New command M-x describe-character-set reads a character set name
743 and displays information about that.
745 ** The new variable `auto-mode-interpreter-regexp' contains a regular
746 expression matching interpreters, for file mode determination.
748 This regular expression is matched against the first line of a file to
749 determine the file's mode in `set-auto-mode' when Emacs can't deduce a
750 mode from the file's name. If it matches, the file is assumed to be
751 interpreted by the interpreter matched by the second group of the
752 regular expression. The mode is then determined as the mode
753 associated with that interpreter in `interpreter-mode-alist'.
755 ** New function executable-make-buffer-file-executable-if-script-p is
756 suitable as an after-save-hook as an alternative to `executable-chmod'.
758 ** The most preferred coding-system is now used to save a buffer if
759 buffer-file-coding-system is `undecided' and it is safe for the buffer
760 contents. (The most preferred is set by set-language-environment or
761 by M-x prefer-coding-system.) Thus if you visit an ASCII file and
762 insert a non-ASCII character from your current language environment,
763 the file will be saved silently with the appropriate coding.
764 Previously you would be prompted for a safe coding system.
766 ** The many obsolete language `setup-...-environment' commands have
767 been removed -- use `set-language-environment'.
769 ** The new Custom option `keyboard-coding-system' specifies a coding
770 system for keyboard input.
772 ** New variable `inhibit-iso-escape-detection' determines if Emacs'
773 coding system detection algorithm should pay attention to ISO2022's
774 escape sequences. If this variable is non-nil, the algorithm ignores
775 such escape sequences. The default value is nil, and it is
776 recommended not to change it except for the special case that you
777 always want to read any escape code verbatim. If you just want to
778 read a specific file without decoding escape codes, use C-x RET c
779 (`universal-coding-system-argument'). For instance, C-x RET c latin-1
780 RET C-x C-f filename RET.
782 ** Variable `default-korean-keyboard' is initialized properly from the
783 environment variable `HANGUL_KEYBOARD_TYPE'.
785 ** New command M-x list-charset-chars reads a character set name and
786 displays all characters in that character set.
788 ** M-x set-terminal-coding-system (C-x RET t) now allows CCL-based
789 coding systems such as cpXXX and cyrillic-koi8.
791 ** Emacs now attempts to determine the initial language environment
792 and preferred and locale coding systems systematically from the
793 LC_ALL, LC_CTYPE, and LANG environment variables during startup.
795 ** New language environments `Polish', `Latin-8' and `Latin-9'.
796 Latin-8 and Latin-9 correspond respectively to the ISO character sets
797 8859-14 (Celtic) and 8859-15 (updated Latin-1, with the Euro sign).
798 GNU Intlfonts doesn't support these yet but recent X releases have
799 8859-15. See etc/INSTALL for information on obtaining extra fonts.
800 There are new Leim input methods for Latin-8 and Latin-9 prefix (only)
803 ** New language environments `Dutch' and `Spanish'.
804 These new environments mainly select appropriate translations
807 ** In Ethiopic language environment, special key bindings for
808 function keys are changed as follows. This is to conform to "Emacs
809 Lisp Coding Convention".
811 new command old-binding
812 --- ------- -----------
813 f3 ethio-fidel-to-sera-buffer f5
814 S-f3 ethio-fidel-to-sera-region f5
815 C-f3 ethio-fidel-to-sera-mail-or-marker f5
817 f4 ethio-sera-to-fidel-buffer unchanged
818 S-f4 ethio-sera-to-fidel-region unchanged
819 C-f4 ethio-sera-to-fidel-mail-or-marker unchanged
821 S-f5 ethio-toggle-punctuation f3
822 S-f6 ethio-modify-vowel f6
823 S-f7 ethio-replace-space f7
824 S-f8 ethio-input-special-character f8
825 S-f9 ethio-replace-space unchanged
826 C-f9 ethio-toggle-space f2
828 ** There are new Leim input methods.
829 New input methods "turkish-postfix", "turkish-alt-postfix",
830 "greek-mizuochi", "TeX", and "greek-babel" are now part of the Leim
833 ** The rule of input method "slovak" is slightly changed. Now the
834 rules for translating "q" and "Q" to "`" (backquote) are deleted, thus
835 typing them inserts "q" and "Q" respectively. Rules for translating
836 "=q", "+q", "=Q", and "+Q" to "`" are also deleted. Now, to input
837 "`", you must type "=q".
839 ** When your terminal can't display characters from some of the ISO
840 8859 character sets but can display Latin-1, you can display
841 more-or-less mnemonic sequences of ASCII/Latin-1 characters instead of
842 empty boxes (under a window system) or question marks (not under a
843 window system). Customize the option `latin1-display' to turn this
846 ** M-; now calls comment-dwim which tries to do something clever based
847 on the context. M-x kill-comment is now an alias to comment-kill,
848 defined in newcomment.el. You can choose different styles of region
849 commenting with the variable `comment-style'.
851 ** New user options `display-time-mail-face' and
852 `display-time-use-mail-icon' control the appearance of mode-line mail
853 indicator used by the display-time package. On a suitable display the
854 indicator can be an icon and is mouse-sensitive.
856 ** On window-systems, additional space can be put between text lines
857 on the display using several methods
859 - By setting frame parameter `line-spacing' to PIXELS. PIXELS must be
860 a positive integer, and specifies that PIXELS number of pixels should
861 be put below text lines on the affected frame or frames.
863 - By setting X resource `lineSpacing', class `LineSpacing'. This is
864 equivalent to specifying the frame parameter.
866 - By specifying `--line-spacing=N' or `-lsp N' on the command line.
868 - By setting buffer-local variable `line-spacing'. The meaning is
869 the same, but applies to the a particular buffer only.
871 ** The new command `clone-indirect-buffer' can be used to create
872 an indirect buffer that is a twin copy of the current buffer. The
873 command `clone-indirect-buffer-other-window', bound to C-x 4 c,
874 does the same but displays the indirect buffer in another window.
876 ** New user options `backup-directory-alist' and
877 `make-backup-file-name-function' control the placement of backups,
878 typically in a single directory or in an invisible sub-directory.
880 ** New commands iso-iso2sgml and iso-sgml2iso convert between Latin-1
881 characters and the corresponding SGML (HTML) entities.
883 ** New X resources recognized
885 *** The X resource `synchronous', class `Synchronous', specifies
886 whether Emacs should run in synchronous mode. Synchronous mode
887 is useful for debugging X problems.
891 emacs.synchronous: true
893 *** The X resource `visualClass, class `VisualClass', specifies the
894 visual Emacs should use. The resource's value should be a string of
895 the form `CLASS-DEPTH', where CLASS is the name of the visual class,
896 and DEPTH is the requested color depth as a decimal number. Valid
897 visual class names are
906 Visual class names specified as X resource are case-insensitive, i.e.
907 `pseudocolor', `Pseudocolor' and `PseudoColor' all have the same
910 The program `xdpyinfo' can be used to list the visual classes
911 supported on your display, and which depths they have. If
912 `visualClass' is not specified, Emacs uses the display's default
917 emacs.visualClass: TrueColor-8
919 *** The X resource `privateColormap', class `PrivateColormap',
920 specifies that Emacs should use a private colormap if it is using the
921 default visual, and that visual is of class PseudoColor. Recognized
922 resource values are `true' or `on'.
926 emacs.privateColormap: true
928 ** Faces and frame parameters.
930 There are four new faces `scroll-bar', `border', `cursor' and `mouse'.
931 Setting the frame parameters `scroll-bar-foreground' and
932 `scroll-bar-background' sets foreground and background color of face
933 `scroll-bar' and vice versa. Setting frame parameter `border-color'
934 sets the background color of face `border' and vice versa. Likewise
935 for frame parameters `cursor-color' and face `cursor', and frame
936 parameter `mouse-color' and face `mouse'.
938 Changing frame parameter `font' sets font-related attributes of the
939 `default' face and vice versa. Setting frame parameters
940 `foreground-color' or `background-color' sets the colors of the
941 `default' face and vice versa.
945 The face `menu' can be used to change colors and font of Emacs' menus.
947 ** New frame parameter `screen-gamma' for gamma correction.
949 The new frame parameter `screen-gamma' specifies gamma-correction for
950 colors. Its value may be nil, the default, in which case no gamma
951 correction occurs, or a number > 0, usually a float, that specifies
952 the screen gamma of a frame's display.
954 PC monitors usually have a screen gamma of 2.2. smaller values result
955 in darker colors. You might want to try a screen gamma of 1.5 for LCD
956 color displays. The viewing gamma Emacs uses is 0.4545. (1/2.2).
958 The X resource name of this parameter is `screenGamma', class
961 ** Tabs and variable-width text.
963 Tabs are now displayed with stretch properties; the width of a tab is
964 defined as a multiple of the normal character width of a frame, and is
965 independent of the fonts used in the text where the tab appears.
966 Thus, tabs can be used to line up text in different fonts.
968 ** Enhancements of the Lucid menu bar
970 *** The Lucid menu bar now supports the resource "margin".
972 emacs.pane.menubar.margin: 5
974 The default margin is 4 which makes the menu bar appear like the
977 *** Arrows that indicate sub-menus are now drawn with shadows, as in
980 ** A block cursor can be drawn as wide as the glyph under it under X.
982 As an example: if a block cursor is over a tab character, it will be
983 drawn as wide as that tab on the display. To do this, set
984 `x-stretch-cursor' to a non-nil value.
986 ** Empty display lines at the end of a buffer may be marked with a
987 bitmap (this is similar to the tilde displayed by vi and Less).
989 This behavior is activated by setting the buffer-local variable
990 `indicate-empty-lines' to a non-nil value. The default value of this
991 variable is found in `default-indicate-empty-lines'.
993 ** There is a new "aggressive" scrolling method.
995 When scrolling up because point is above the window start, if the
996 value of the buffer-local variable `scroll-up-aggressively' is a
997 number, Emacs chooses a new window start so that point ends up that
998 fraction of the window's height from the top of the window.
1000 When scrolling down because point is below the window end, if the
1001 value of the buffer-local variable `scroll-down-aggressively' is a
1002 number, Emacs chooses a new window start so that point ends up that
1003 fraction of the window's height from the bottom of the window.
1005 ** You can now easily create new *Info* buffers using either
1006 M-x clone-buffer, C-u m <entry> RET or C-u g <entry> RET.
1007 M-x clone-buffer can also be used on *Help* and several other special
1010 ** The command `Info-search' now uses a search history.
1012 ** Listing buffers with M-x list-buffers (C-x C-b) now shows
1013 abbreviated file names. Abbreviations can be customized by changing
1014 `directory-abbrev-alist'.
1016 ** A new variable, backup-by-copying-when-privileged-mismatch, gives
1017 the highest file uid for which backup-by-copying-when-mismatch will be
1018 forced on. The assumption is that uids less than or equal to this
1019 value are special uids (root, bin, daemon, etc.--not real system
1020 users) and that files owned by these users should not change ownership,
1021 even if your system policy allows users other than root to edit them.
1023 The default is 200; set the variable to nil to disable the feature.
1025 ** The rectangle commands now avoid inserting undesirable spaces,
1026 notably at the end of lines.
1028 All these functions have been rewritten to avoid inserting unwanted
1029 spaces, and an optional prefix now allows them to behave the old way.
1031 ** The function `replace-rectangle' is an alias for `string-rectangle'.
1033 ** The new command M-x string-insert-rectangle is like `string-rectangle',
1034 but inserts text instead of replacing it.
1036 ** The new command M-x query-replace-regexp-eval acts like
1037 query-replace-regexp, but takes a Lisp expression which is evaluated
1038 after each match to get the replacement text.
1040 ** M-x query-replace recognizes a new command `e' (or `E') that lets
1041 you edit the replacement string.
1043 ** The new command mail-abbrev-complete-alias, bound to `M-TAB'
1044 (if you load the library `mailabbrev'), lets you complete mail aliases
1045 in the text, analogous to lisp-complete-symbol.
1047 ** The variable `echo-keystrokes' may now have a floating point value.
1049 ** If your init file is compiled (.emacs.elc), `user-init-file' is set
1050 to the source name (.emacs.el), if that exists, after loading it.
1052 ** The help string specified for a menu-item whose definition contains
1053 the property `:help HELP' is now displayed under X, on MS-Windows, and
1054 MS-DOS, either in the echo area or with tooltips. Many standard menus
1055 displayed by Emacs now have help strings.
1058 ** New user option `read-mail-command' specifies a command to use to
1059 read mail from the menu etc.
1061 ** The environment variable `EMACSLOCKDIR' is no longer used on MS-Windows.
1062 This environment variable was used when creating lock files. Emacs on
1063 MS-Windows does not use this variable anymore. This change was made
1064 before Emacs 21.1, but wasn't documented until now.
1066 ** Highlighting of mouse-sensitive regions is now supported in the
1067 MS-DOS version of Emacs.
1069 ** The new command `msdos-set-mouse-buttons' forces the MS-DOS version
1070 of Emacs to behave as if the mouse had a specified number of buttons.
1071 This comes handy with mice that don't report their number of buttons
1072 correctly. One example is the wheeled mice, which report 3 buttons,
1073 but clicks on the middle button are not passed to the MS-DOS version
1076 ** Customize changes
1078 *** Customize now supports comments about customized items. Use the
1079 `State' menu to add comments, or give a prefix argument to
1080 M-x customize-set-variable or M-x customize-set-value. Note that
1081 customization comments will cause the customizations to fail in
1082 earlier versions of Emacs.
1084 *** The new option `custom-buffer-done-function' says whether to kill
1085 Custom buffers when you've done with them or just bury them (the
1088 *** If Emacs was invoked with the `-q' or `--no-init-file' options, it
1089 does not allow you to save customizations in your `~/.emacs' init
1090 file. This is because saving customizations from such a session would
1091 wipe out all the other customizationss you might have on your init
1094 ** New features in evaluation commands
1096 *** The commands to evaluate Lisp expressions, such as C-M-x in Lisp
1097 modes, C-j in Lisp Interaction mode, and M-:, now bind the variables
1098 print-level, print-length, and debug-on-error based on the new
1099 customizable variables eval-expression-print-level,
1100 eval-expression-print-length, and eval-expression-debug-on-error.
1102 The default values for the first two of these variables are 12 and 4
1103 respectively, which means that `eval-expression' now prints at most
1104 the first 12 members of a list and at most 4 nesting levels deep (if
1105 the list is longer or deeper than that, an ellipsis `...' is
1108 <RET> or <mouse-2> on the printed text toggles between an abbreviated
1109 printed representation and an unabbreviated one.
1111 The default value of eval-expression-debug-on-error is t, so any error
1112 during evaluation produces a backtrace.
1114 *** The function `eval-defun' (C-M-x) now loads Edebug and instruments
1115 code when called with a prefix argument.
1119 Note: This release contains changes that might not be compatible with
1120 current user setups (although it's believed that these
1121 incompatibilities will only show in very uncommon circumstances).
1122 However, since the impact is uncertain, these changes may be rolled
1123 back depending on user feedback. Therefore there's no forward
1124 compatibility guarantee wrt the new features introduced in this
1127 *** The hardcoded switch to "java" style in Java mode is gone.
1128 CC Mode used to automatically set the style to "java" when Java mode
1129 is entered. This has now been removed since it caused too much
1132 However, to keep backward compatibility to a certain extent, the
1133 default value for c-default-style now specifies the "java" style for
1134 java-mode, but "gnu" for all other modes (as before). So you won't
1135 notice the change if you haven't touched that variable.
1137 *** New cleanups, space-before-funcall and compact-empty-funcall.
1138 Two new cleanups have been added to c-cleanup-list:
1140 space-before-funcall causes a space to be inserted before the opening
1141 parenthesis of a function call, which gives the style "foo (bar)".
1143 compact-empty-funcall causes any space before a function call opening
1144 parenthesis to be removed if there are no arguments to the function.
1145 It's typically useful together with space-before-funcall to get the
1146 style "foo (bar)" and "foo()".
1148 *** Some keywords now automatically trigger reindentation.
1149 Keywords like "else", "while", "catch" and "finally" have been made
1150 "electric" to make them reindent automatically when they continue an
1151 earlier statement. An example:
1153 for (i = 0; i < 17; i++)
1155 res += a[i]->offset;
1158 Here, the "else" should be indented like the preceding "if", since it
1159 continues that statement. CC Mode will automatically reindent it after
1160 the "else" has been typed in full, since it's not until then it's
1161 possible to decide whether it's a new statement or a continuation of
1164 CC Mode uses Abbrev mode to achieve this, which is therefore turned on
1167 *** M-a and M-e now moves by sentence in multiline strings.
1168 Previously these two keys only moved by sentence in comments, which
1169 meant that sentence movement didn't work in strings containing
1170 documentation or other natural language text.
1172 The reason it's only activated in multiline strings (i.e. strings that
1173 contain a newline, even when escaped by a '\') is to avoid stopping in
1174 the short strings that often reside inside statements. Multiline
1175 strings almost always contain text in a natural language, as opposed
1176 to other strings that typically contain format specifications,
1177 commands, etc. Also, it's not that bothersome that M-a and M-e misses
1178 sentences in single line strings, since they're short anyway.
1180 *** Support for autodoc comments in Pike mode.
1181 Autodoc comments for Pike are used to extract documentation from the
1182 source, like Javadoc in Java. Pike mode now recognize this markup in
1183 comment prefixes and paragraph starts.
1185 *** The comment prefix regexps on c-comment-prefix may be mode specific.
1186 When c-comment-prefix is an association list, it specifies the comment
1187 line prefix on a per-mode basis, like c-default-style does. This
1188 change came about to support the special autodoc comment prefix in
1191 *** Better handling of syntactic errors.
1192 The recovery after unbalanced parens earlier in the buffer has been
1193 improved; CC Mode now reports them by dinging and giving a message
1194 stating the offending line, but still recovers and indent the
1195 following lines in a sane way (most of the time). An "else" with no
1196 matching "if" is handled similarly. If an error is discovered while
1197 indenting a region, the whole region is still indented and the error
1198 is reported afterwards.
1200 *** Lineup functions may now return absolute columns.
1201 A lineup function can give an absolute column to indent the line to by
1202 returning a vector with the desired column as the first element.
1204 *** More robust and warning-free byte compilation.
1205 Although this is strictly not a user visible change (well, depending
1206 on the view of a user), it's still worth mentioning that CC Mode now
1207 can be compiled in the standard ways without causing trouble. Some
1208 code have also been moved between the subpackages to enhance the
1209 modularity somewhat. Thanks to Martin Buchholz for doing the
1212 *** c-style-variables-are-local-p now defaults to t.
1213 This is an incompatible change that has been made to make the behavior
1214 of the style system wrt global variable settings less confusing for
1215 non-advanced users. If you know what this variable does you might
1216 want to set it to nil in your .emacs, otherwise you probably don't
1219 Defaulting c-style-variables-are-local-p to t avoids the confusing
1220 situation that occurs when a user sets some style variables globally
1221 and edits both a Java and a non-Java file in the same Emacs session.
1222 If the style variables aren't buffer local in this case, loading of
1223 the second file will cause the default style (either "gnu" or "java"
1224 by default) to override the global settings made by the user.
1226 *** New initialization procedure for the style system.
1227 When the initial style for a buffer is determined by CC Mode (from the
1228 variable c-default-style), the global values of style variables now
1229 take precedence over the values specified by the chosen style. This
1230 is different than the old behavior: previously, the style-specific
1231 settings would override the global settings. This change makes it
1232 possible to do simple configuration in the intuitive way with
1233 Customize or with setq lines in one's .emacs file.
1235 By default, the global value of every style variable is the new
1236 special symbol set-from-style, which causes the value to be taken from
1237 the style system. This means that in effect, only an explicit setting
1238 of a style variable will cause the "overriding" behavior described
1241 Also note that global settings override style-specific settings *only*
1242 when the initial style of a buffer is chosen by a CC Mode major mode
1243 function. When a style is chosen in other ways --- for example, by a
1244 call like (c-set-style "gnu") in a hook, or via M-x c-set-style ---
1245 then the style-specific values take precedence over any global style
1246 values. In Lisp terms, global values override style-specific values
1247 only when the new second argument to c-set-style is non-nil; see the
1248 function documentation for more info.
1250 The purpose of these changes is to make it easier for users,
1251 especially novice users, to do simple customizations with Customize or
1252 with setq in their .emacs files. On the other hand, the new system is
1253 intended to be compatible with advanced users' customizations as well,
1254 such as those that choose styles in hooks or whatnot. This new system
1255 is believed to be almost entirely compatible with current
1256 configurations, in spite of the changed precedence between style and
1257 global variable settings when a buffer's default style is set.
1259 (Thanks to Eric Eide for clarifying this explanation a bit.)
1261 **** c-offsets-alist is now a customizable variable.
1262 This became possible as a result of the new initialization behavior.
1264 This variable is treated slightly differently from the other style
1265 variables; instead of using the symbol set-from-style, it will be
1266 completed with the syntactic symbols it doesn't already contain when
1267 the style is first initialized. This means it now defaults to the
1268 empty list to make all syntactic elements get their values from the
1271 **** Compatibility variable to restore the old behavior.
1272 In case your configuration doesn't work with this change, you can set
1273 c-old-style-variable-behavior to non-nil to get the old behavior back
1276 *** Improvements to line breaking and text filling.
1277 CC Mode now handles this more intelligently and seamlessly wrt the
1278 surrounding code, especially inside comments. For details see the new
1279 chapter about this in the manual.
1281 **** New variable to recognize comment line prefix decorations.
1282 The variable c-comment-prefix-regexp has been added to properly
1283 recognize the line prefix in both block and line comments. It's
1284 primarily used to initialize the various paragraph recognition and
1285 adaptive filling variables that the text handling functions uses.
1287 **** New variable c-block-comment-prefix.
1288 This is a generalization of the now obsolete variable
1289 c-comment-continuation-stars to handle arbitrary strings.
1291 **** CC Mode now uses adaptive fill mode.
1292 This to make it adapt better to the paragraph style inside comments.
1294 It's also possible to use other adaptive filling packages inside CC
1295 Mode, notably Kyle E. Jones' Filladapt mode (http://wonderworks.com/).
1296 A new convenience function c-setup-filladapt sets up Filladapt for use
1299 Note though that the 2.12 version of Filladapt lacks a feature that
1300 causes it to work suboptimally when c-comment-prefix-regexp can match
1301 the empty string (which it commonly does). A patch for that is
1302 available from the CC Mode web site (http://www.python.org/emacs/
1305 **** The variables `c-hanging-comment-starter-p' and
1306 `c-hanging-comment-ender-p', which controlled how comment starters and
1307 enders were filled, are not used anymore. The new version of the
1308 function `c-fill-paragraph' keeps the comment starters and enders as
1309 they were before the filling.
1311 **** It's now possible to selectively turn off auto filling.
1312 The variable c-ignore-auto-fill is used to ignore auto fill mode in
1313 specific contexts, e.g. in preprocessor directives and in string
1316 **** New context sensitive line break function c-context-line-break.
1317 It works like newline-and-indent in normal code, and adapts the line
1318 prefix according to the comment style when used inside comments. If
1319 you're normally using newline-and-indent, you might want to switch to
1322 *** Fixes to IDL mode.
1323 It now does a better job in recognizing only the constructs relevant
1324 to IDL. E.g. it no longer matches "class" as the beginning of a
1325 struct block, but it does match the CORBA 2.3 "valuetype" keyword.
1326 Thanks to Eric Eide.
1328 *** Improvements to the Whitesmith style.
1329 It now keeps the style consistently on all levels and both when
1330 opening braces hangs and when they don't.
1332 **** New lineup function c-lineup-whitesmith-in-block.
1334 *** New lineup functions c-lineup-template-args and c-indent-multi-line-block.
1335 See their docstrings for details. c-lineup-template-args does a
1336 better job of tracking the brackets used as parens in C++ templates,
1337 and is used by default to line up continued template arguments.
1339 *** c-lineup-comment now preserves alignment with a comment on the
1340 previous line. It used to instead preserve comments that started in
1341 the column specified by comment-column.
1343 *** c-lineup-C-comments handles "free form" text comments.
1344 In comments with a long delimiter line at the start, the indentation
1345 is kept unchanged for lines that start with an empty comment line
1346 prefix. This is intended for the type of large block comments that
1347 contain documentation with its own formatting. In these you normally
1348 don't want CC Mode to change the indentation.
1350 *** The `c' syntactic symbol is now relative to the comment start
1351 instead of the previous line, to make integers usable as lineup
1354 *** All lineup functions have gotten docstrings.
1356 *** More preprocessor directive movement functions.
1357 c-down-conditional does the reverse of c-up-conditional.
1358 c-up-conditional-with-else and c-down-conditional-with-else are
1359 variants of these that also stops at "#else" lines (suggested by Don
1362 *** Minor improvements to many movement functions in tricky situations.
1366 *** New variable `dired-recursive-deletes' determines if the delete
1367 command will delete non-empty directories recursively. The default
1368 is, delete only empty directories.
1370 *** New variable `dired-recursive-copies' determines if the copy
1371 command will copy directories recursively. The default is, do not
1372 copy directories recursively.
1374 *** In command `dired-do-shell-command' (usually bound to `!') a `?'
1375 in the shell command has a special meaning similar to `*', but with
1376 the difference that the command will be run on each file individually.
1378 *** The new command `dired-find-alternate-file' (usually bound to `a')
1379 replaces the Dired buffer with the buffer for an alternate file or
1382 *** The new command `dired-show-file-type' (usually bound to `y') shows
1383 a message in the echo area describing what type of file the point is on.
1384 This command invokes the external program `file' do its work, and so
1385 will only work on systems with that program, and will be only as
1386 accurate or inaccurate as it is.
1388 *** Dired now properly handles undo changes of adding/removing `-R'
1391 *** Dired commands that prompt for a destination file now allow the use
1392 of the `M-n' command in the minibuffer to insert the source filename,
1393 which the user can then edit. This only works if there is a single
1394 source file, not when operating on multiple marked files.
1398 The Gnus NEWS entries are short, but they reflect sweeping changes in
1399 four areas: Article display treatment, MIME treatment,
1400 internationalization and mail-fetching.
1402 *** The mail-fetching functions have changed. See the manual for the
1403 many details. In particular, all procmail fetching variables are gone.
1405 If you used procmail like in
1407 (setq nnmail-use-procmail t)
1408 (setq nnmail-spool-file 'procmail)
1409 (setq nnmail-procmail-directory "~/mail/incoming/")
1410 (setq nnmail-procmail-suffix "\\.in")
1412 this now has changed to
1415 '((directory :path "~/mail/incoming/"
1418 More information is available in the info doc at Select Methods ->
1419 Getting Mail -> Mail Sources
1421 *** Gnus is now a MIME-capable reader. This affects many parts of
1422 Gnus, and adds a slew of new commands. See the manual for details.
1423 Separate MIME packages like RMIME, mime-compose etc., will probably no
1424 longer work; remove them and use the native facilities.
1426 The FLIM/SEMI package still works with Emacs 21, but if you want to
1427 use the native facilities, you must remove any mailcap.el[c] that was
1428 installed by FLIM/SEMI version 1.13 or earlier.
1430 *** Gnus has also been multilingualized. This also affects too many
1431 parts of Gnus to summarize here, and adds many new variables. There
1432 are built-in facilities equivalent to those of gnus-mule.el, which is
1433 now just a compatibility layer.
1435 *** gnus-mule.el is now just a compatibility layer over the built-in
1438 *** gnus-auto-select-first can now be a function to be
1439 called to position point.
1441 *** The user can now decide which extra headers should be included in
1442 summary buffers and NOV files.
1444 *** `gnus-article-display-hook' has been removed. Instead, a number
1445 of variables starting with `gnus-treat-' have been added.
1447 *** The Gnus posting styles have been redone again and now work in a
1448 subtly different manner.
1450 *** New web-based backends have been added: nnslashdot, nnwarchive
1451 and nnultimate. nnweb has been revamped, again, to keep up with
1452 ever-changing layouts.
1454 *** Gnus can now read IMAP mail via nnimap.
1456 *** There is image support of various kinds and some sound support.
1458 ** Changes in Texinfo mode.
1460 *** A couple of new key bindings have been added for inserting Texinfo
1464 -------------------------
1468 C-c C-c q @quotation
1470 C-c C-o @<block> ... @end <block>
1473 *** The " key now inserts either " or `` or '' depending on context.
1475 ** Changes in Outline mode.
1477 There is now support for Imenu to index headings. A new command
1478 `outline-headers-as-kill' copies the visible headings in the region to
1479 the kill ring, e.g. to produce a table of contents.
1481 ** Changes to Emacs Server
1483 *** The new option `server-kill-new-buffers' specifies what to do
1484 with buffers when done with them. If non-nil, the default, buffers
1485 are killed, unless they were already present before visiting them with
1486 Emacs Server. If nil, `server-temp-file-regexp' specifies which
1487 buffers to kill, as before.
1489 Please note that only buffers are killed that still have a client,
1490 i.e. buffers visited with `emacsclient --no-wait' are never killed in
1493 ** Both emacsclient and Emacs itself now accept command line options
1494 of the form +LINE:COLUMN in addition to +LINE.
1496 ** Changes to Show Paren mode.
1498 *** Overlays used by Show Paren mode now use a priority property.
1499 The new user option show-paren-priority specifies the priority to
1500 use. Default is 1000.
1502 ** New command M-x check-parens can be used to find unbalanced paren
1503 groups and strings in buffers in Lisp mode (or other modes).
1505 ** Changes to hideshow.el
1507 *** Generalized block selection and traversal
1509 A block is now recognized by its start and end regexps (both strings),
1510 and an integer specifying which sub-expression in the start regexp
1511 serves as the place where a `forward-sexp'-like function can operate.
1512 See the documentation of variable `hs-special-modes-alist'.
1514 *** During incremental search, if Hideshow minor mode is active,
1515 hidden blocks are temporarily shown. The variable `hs-headline' can
1516 be used in the mode line format to show the line at the beginning of
1519 *** User option `hs-hide-all-non-comment-function' specifies a
1520 function to be called at each top-level block beginning, instead of
1521 the normal block-hiding function.
1523 *** The command `hs-show-region' has been removed.
1525 *** The key bindings have changed to fit the Emacs conventions,
1526 roughly imitating those of Outline minor mode. Notably, the prefix
1527 for all bindings is now `C-c @'. For details, see the documentation
1528 for `hs-minor-mode'.
1530 *** The variable `hs-show-hidden-short-form' has been removed, and
1531 hideshow.el now always behaves as if this variable were set to t.
1533 ** Changes to Change Log mode and Add-Log functions
1535 *** If you invoke `add-change-log-entry' from a backup file, it makes
1536 an entry appropriate for the file's parent. This is useful for making
1537 log entries by comparing a version with deleted functions.
1539 **** New command M-x change-log-merge merges another log into the
1542 *** New command M-x change-log-redate fixes any old-style date entries
1545 *** Change Log mode now adds a file's version number to change log
1546 entries if user-option `change-log-version-info-enabled' is non-nil.
1547 Unless the file is under version control the search for a file's
1548 version number is performed based on regular expressions from
1549 `change-log-version-number-regexp-list' which can be customized.
1550 Version numbers are only found in the first 10 percent of a file.
1552 *** Change Log mode now defines its own faces for font-lock highlighting.
1554 ** Changes to cmuscheme
1556 *** The user-option `scheme-program-name' has been renamed
1557 `cmuscheme-program-name' due to conflicts with xscheme.el.
1559 ** Changes in Font Lock
1561 *** The new function `font-lock-remove-keywords' can be used to remove
1562 font-lock keywords from the current buffer or from a specific major mode.
1564 *** Multi-line patterns are now supported. Modes using this, should
1565 set font-lock-multiline to t in their font-lock-defaults.
1567 *** `font-lock-syntactic-face-function' allows major-modes to choose
1568 the face used for each string/comment.
1570 *** A new standard face `font-lock-doc-face'.
1571 Meant for Lisp docstrings, Javadoc comments and other "documentation in code".
1573 ** Changes to Shell mode
1575 *** The `shell' command now accepts an optional argument to specify the buffer
1576 to use, which defaults to "*shell*". When used interactively, a
1577 non-default buffer may be specified by giving the `shell' command a
1578 prefix argument (causing it to prompt for the buffer name).
1580 ** Comint (subshell) changes
1582 These changes generally affect all modes derived from comint mode, which
1583 include shell-mode, gdb-mode, scheme-interaction-mode, etc.
1585 *** Comint now by default interprets some carriage-control characters.
1586 Comint now removes CRs from CR LF sequences, and treats single CRs and
1587 BSs in the output in a way similar to a terminal (by deleting to the
1588 beginning of the line, or deleting the previous character,
1589 respectively). This is achieved by adding `comint-carriage-motion' to
1590 the `comint-output-filter-functions' hook by default.
1592 *** By default, comint no longer uses the variable `comint-prompt-regexp'
1593 to distinguish prompts from user-input. Instead, it notices which
1594 parts of the text were output by the process, and which entered by the
1595 user, and attaches `field' properties to allow emacs commands to use
1596 this information. Common movement commands, notably beginning-of-line,
1597 respect field boundaries in a fairly natural manner. To disable this
1598 feature, and use the old behavior, customize the user option
1599 `comint-use-prompt-regexp-instead-of-fields'.
1601 *** Comint now includes new features to send commands to running processes
1602 and redirect the output to a designated buffer or buffers.
1604 *** The command M-x comint-redirect-send-command reads a command and
1605 buffer name from the mini-buffer. The command is sent to the current
1606 buffer's process, and its output is inserted into the specified buffer.
1608 The command M-x comint-redirect-send-command-to-process acts like
1609 M-x comint-redirect-send-command but additionally reads the name of
1610 the buffer whose process should be used from the mini-buffer.
1612 *** Packages based on comint now highlight user input and program prompts,
1613 and support choosing previous input with mouse-2. To control these features,
1614 see the user-options `comint-highlight-input' and `comint-highlight-prompt'.
1616 *** The new command `comint-write-output' (usually bound to `C-c C-s')
1617 saves the output from the most recent command to a file. With a prefix
1618 argument, it appends to the file.
1620 *** The command `comint-kill-output' has been renamed `comint-delete-output'
1621 (usually bound to `C-c C-o'); the old name is aliased to it for
1624 *** The new function `comint-add-to-input-history' adds commands to the input
1627 *** The new variable `comint-input-history-ignore' is a regexp for
1628 identifying history lines that should be ignored, like tcsh time-stamp
1629 strings, starting with a `#'. The default value of this variable is "^#".
1631 ** Changes to Rmail mode
1633 *** The new user-option rmail-user-mail-address-regexp can be
1634 set to fine tune the identification of the correspondent when
1635 receiving new mail. If it matches the address of the sender, the
1636 recipient is taken as correspondent of a mail. If nil, the default,
1637 `user-login-name' and `user-mail-address' are used to exclude yourself
1640 Usually you don't have to set this variable, except if you collect
1641 mails sent by you under different user names. Then it should be a
1642 regexp matching your mail addresses.
1644 *** The new user-option rmail-confirm-expunge controls whether and how
1645 to ask for confirmation before expunging deleted messages from an
1646 Rmail file. You can choose between no confirmation, confirmation
1647 with y-or-n-p, or confirmation with yes-or-no-p. Default is to ask
1648 for confirmation with yes-or-no-p.
1650 *** RET is now bound in the Rmail summary to rmail-summary-goto-msg,
1653 *** There is a new user option `rmail-digest-end-regexps' that
1654 specifies the regular expressions to detect the line that ends a
1657 *** The new user option `rmail-automatic-folder-directives' specifies
1658 in which folder to put messages automatically.
1660 *** The new function `rmail-redecode-body' allows to fix a message
1661 with non-ASCII characters if Emacs happens to decode it incorrectly
1662 due to missing or malformed "charset=" header.
1664 ** The new user-option `mail-envelope-from' can be used to specify
1665 an envelope-from address different from user-mail-address.
1667 ** The variable mail-specify-envelope-from controls whether to
1668 use the -f option when sending mail.
1670 ** The Rmail command `o' (`rmail-output-to-rmail-file') now writes the
1671 current message in the internal `emacs-mule' encoding, rather than in
1672 the encoding taken from the variable `buffer-file-coding-system'.
1673 This allows to save messages whose characters cannot be safely encoded
1674 by the buffer's coding system, and makes sure the message will be
1675 displayed correctly when you later visit the target Rmail file.
1677 If you want your Rmail files be encoded in a specific coding system
1678 other than `emacs-mule', you can customize the variable
1679 `rmail-file-coding-system' to set its value to that coding system.
1681 ** Changes to TeX mode
1683 *** The default mode has been changed from `plain-tex-mode' to
1686 *** latex-mode now has a simple indentation algorithm.
1688 *** M-f and M-p jump around \begin...\end pairs.
1690 *** Added support for outline-minor-mode.
1692 ** Changes to RefTeX mode
1694 *** RefTeX has new support for index generation. Index entries can be
1695 created with `C-c <', with completion available on index keys.
1696 Pressing `C-c /' indexes the word at the cursor with a default
1697 macro. `C-c >' compiles all index entries into an alphabetically
1698 sorted *Index* buffer which looks like the final index. Entries
1699 can be edited from that buffer.
1701 *** Label and citation key selection now allow to select several
1702 items and reference them together (use `m' to mark items, `a' or
1703 `A' to use all marked entries).
1705 *** reftex.el has been split into a number of smaller files to reduce
1706 memory use when only a part of RefTeX is being used.
1708 *** a new command `reftex-view-crossref-from-bibtex' (bound to `C-c &'
1709 in BibTeX-mode) can be called in a BibTeX database buffer in order
1710 to show locations in LaTeX documents where a particular entry has
1713 ** Emacs Lisp mode now allows multiple levels of outline headings.
1714 The level of a heading is determined from the number of leading
1715 semicolons in a heading line. Toplevel forms starting with a `('
1716 in column 1 are always made leaves.
1718 ** The M-x time-stamp command (most commonly used on write-file-hooks)
1719 has the following new features:
1721 *** The patterns for finding the time stamp and for updating a pattern
1722 may match text spanning multiple lines. For example, some people like
1723 to have the filename and date on separate lines. The new variable
1724 time-stamp-inserts-lines controls the matching for multi-line patterns.
1726 *** More than one time stamp can be updated in the same file. This
1727 feature is useful if you need separate time stamps in a program source
1728 file to both include in formatted documentation and insert in the
1729 compiled binary. The same time-stamp will be written at each matching
1730 pattern. The variable time-stamp-count enables this new feature; it
1733 ** Partial Completion mode now completes environment variables in
1738 *** The command `ispell' now spell-checks a region if
1739 transient-mark-mode is on, and the mark is active. Otherwise it
1740 spell-checks the current buffer.
1742 *** Support for synchronous subprocesses - DOS/Windoze - has been
1745 *** An "alignment error" bug was fixed when a manual spelling
1746 correction is made and re-checked.
1748 *** An Italian, Portuguese, and Slovak dictionary definition has been added.
1750 *** Region skipping performance has been vastly improved in some
1753 *** Spell checking HTML buffers has been improved and isn't so strict
1756 *** The buffer-local words are now always placed on a new line at the
1759 *** Spell checking now works in the MS-DOS version of Emacs.
1761 ** Makefile mode changes
1763 *** The mode now uses the abbrev table `makefile-mode-abbrev-table'.
1765 *** Conditionals and include statements are now highlighted when
1766 Fontlock mode is active.
1770 *** Isearch now puts a call to `isearch-resume' in the command history,
1771 so that searches can be resumed.
1773 *** In Isearch mode, C-M-s and C-M-r are now bound like C-s and C-r,
1774 respectively, i.e. you can repeat a regexp isearch with the same keys
1775 that started the search.
1777 *** In Isearch mode, mouse-2 in the echo area now yanks the current
1778 selection into the search string rather than giving an error.
1780 *** There is a new lazy highlighting feature in incremental search.
1782 Lazy highlighting is switched on/off by customizing variable
1783 `isearch-lazy-highlight'. When active, all matches for the current
1784 search string are highlighted. The current match is highlighted as
1785 before using face `isearch' or `region'. All other matches are
1786 highlighted using face `isearch-lazy-highlight-face' which defaults to
1787 `secondary-selection'.
1789 The extra highlighting makes it easier to anticipate where the cursor
1790 will end up each time you press C-s or C-r to repeat a pending search.
1791 Highlighting of these additional matches happens in a deferred fashion
1792 using "idle timers," so the cycles needed do not rob isearch of its
1793 usual snappy response.
1795 If `isearch-lazy-highlight-cleanup' is set to t, highlights for
1796 matches are automatically cleared when you end the search. If it is
1797 set to nil, you can remove the highlights manually with `M-x
1798 isearch-lazy-highlight-cleanup'.
1802 VC has been overhauled internally. It is now modular, making it
1803 easier to plug-in arbitrary version control backends. (See Lisp
1804 Changes for details on the new structure.) As a result, the mechanism
1805 to enable and disable support for particular version systems has
1806 changed: everything is now controlled by the new variable
1807 `vc-handled-backends'. Its value is a list of symbols that identify
1808 version systems; the default is '(RCS CVS SCCS). When finding a file,
1809 each of the backends in that list is tried in order to see whether the
1810 file is registered in that backend.
1812 When registering a new file, VC first tries each of the listed
1813 backends to see if any of them considers itself "responsible" for the
1814 directory of the file (e.g. because a corresponding subdirectory for
1815 master files exists). If none of the backends is responsible, then
1816 the first backend in the list that could register the file is chosen.
1817 As a consequence, the variable `vc-default-back-end' is now obsolete.
1819 The old variable `vc-master-templates' is also obsolete, although VC
1820 still supports it for backward compatibility. To define templates for
1821 RCS or SCCS, you should rather use the new variables
1822 vc-{rcs,sccs}-master-templates. (There is no such feature under CVS
1823 where it doesn't make sense.)
1825 The variables `vc-ignore-vc-files' and `vc-handle-cvs' are also
1826 obsolete now, you must set `vc-handled-backends' to nil or exclude
1827 `CVS' from the list, respectively, to achieve their effect now.
1831 The variable `vc-checkout-carefully' is obsolete: the corresponding
1832 checks are always done now.
1834 VC Dired buffers are now kept up-to-date during all version control
1837 `vc-diff' output is now displayed in `diff-mode'.
1838 `vc-print-log' uses `log-view-mode'.
1839 `vc-log-mode' (used for *VC-Log*) has been replaced by `log-edit-mode'.
1841 The command C-x v m (vc-merge) now accepts an empty argument as the
1842 first revision number. This means that any recent changes on the
1843 current branch should be picked up from the repository and merged into
1844 the working file (``merge news'').
1846 The commands C-x v s (vc-create-snapshot) and C-x v r
1847 (vc-retrieve-snapshot) now ask for a directory name from which to work
1850 *** Multiple Backends
1852 VC now lets you register files in more than one backend. This is
1853 useful, for example, if you are working with a slow remote CVS
1854 repository. You can then use RCS for local editing, and occasionally
1855 commit your changes back to CVS, or pick up changes from CVS into your
1858 To make this work, the ``more local'' backend (RCS in our example)
1859 should come first in `vc-handled-backends', and the ``more remote''
1860 backend (CVS) should come later. (The default value of
1861 `vc-handled-backends' already has it that way.)
1863 You can then commit changes to another backend (say, RCS), by typing
1864 C-u C-x v v RCS RET (i.e. vc-next-action now accepts a backend name as
1865 a revision number). VC registers the file in the more local backend
1866 if that hasn't already happened, and commits to a branch based on the
1867 current revision number from the more remote backend.
1869 If a file is registered in multiple backends, you can switch to
1870 another one using C-x v b (vc-switch-backend). This does not change
1871 any files, it only changes VC's perspective on the file. Use this to
1872 pick up changes from CVS while working under RCS locally.
1874 After you are done with your local RCS editing, you can commit your
1875 changes back to CVS using C-u C-x v v CVS RET. In this case, the
1876 local RCS archive is removed after the commit, and the log entry
1877 buffer is initialized to contain the entire RCS change log of the file.
1881 There is a new user option, `vc-cvs-stay-local'. If it is `t' (the
1882 default), then VC avoids network queries for files registered in
1883 remote repositories. The state of such files is then only determined
1884 by heuristics and past information. `vc-cvs-stay-local' can also be a
1885 regexp to match against repository hostnames; only files from hosts
1886 that match it are treated locally. If the variable is nil, then VC
1887 queries the repository just as often as it does for local files.
1889 If `vc-cvs-stay-local' is on, then VC also makes local backups of
1890 repository versions. This means that ordinary diffs (C-x v =) and
1891 revert operations (C-x v u) can be done completely locally, without
1892 any repository interactions at all. The name of a local version
1893 backup of FILE is FILE.~REV.~, where REV is the repository version
1894 number. This format is similar to that used by C-x v ~
1895 (vc-version-other-window), except for the trailing dot. As a matter
1896 of fact, the two features can each use the files created by the other,
1897 the only difference being that files with a trailing `.' are deleted
1898 automatically after commit. (This feature doesn't work on MS-DOS,
1899 since DOS disallows more than a single dot in the trunk of a file
1902 If `vc-cvs-stay-local' is on, and there have been changes in the
1903 repository, VC notifies you about it when you actually try to commit.
1904 If you want to check for updates from the repository without trying to
1905 commit, you can either use C-x v m RET to perform an update on the
1906 current file, or you can use C-x v r RET to get an update for an
1907 entire directory tree.
1909 The new user option `vc-cvs-use-edit' indicates whether VC should call
1910 "cvs edit" to make files writeable; it defaults to `t'. (This option
1911 is only meaningful if the CVSREAD variable is set, or if files are
1912 "watched" by other developers.)
1914 The commands C-x v s (vc-create-snapshot) and C-x v r
1915 (vc-retrieve-snapshot) are now also implemented for CVS. If you give
1916 an empty snapshot name to the latter, that performs a `cvs update',
1917 starting at the given directory.
1919 *** Lisp Changes in VC
1921 VC has been restructured internally to make it modular. You can now
1922 add support for arbitrary version control backends by writing a
1923 library that provides a certain set of backend-specific functions, and
1924 then telling VC to use that library. For example, to add support for
1925 a version system named SYS, you write a library named vc-sys.el, which
1926 provides a number of functions vc-sys-... (see commentary at the top
1927 of vc.el for a detailed list of them). To make VC use that library,
1928 you need to put it somewhere into Emacs' load path and add the symbol
1929 `SYS' to the list `vc-handled-backends'.
1931 ** The customizable EDT emulation package now supports the EDT
1932 SUBS command and EDT scroll margins. It also works with more
1933 terminal/keyboard configurations and it now works under XEmacs.
1934 See etc/edt-user.doc for more information.
1936 ** New modes and packages
1938 *** The new global minor mode `minibuffer-electric-default-mode'
1939 automatically hides the `(default ...)' part of minibuffer prompts when
1940 the default is not applicable.
1942 *** Artist is an Emacs lisp package that allows you to draw lines,
1943 rectangles and ellipses by using your mouse and/or keyboard. The
1944 shapes are made up with the ascii characters |, -, / and \.
1948 - Intersecting: When a `|' intersects with a `-', a `+' is
1949 drawn, like this: | \ /
1953 - Rubber-banding: When drawing lines you can interactively see the
1954 result while holding the mouse button down and moving the mouse. If
1955 your machine is not fast enough (a 386 is a bit too slow, but a
1956 pentium is well enough), you can turn this feature off. You will
1957 then see 1's and 2's which mark the 1st and 2nd endpoint of the line
1960 - Arrows: After having drawn a (straight) line or a (straight)
1961 poly-line, you can set arrows on the line-ends by typing < or >.
1963 - Flood-filling: You can fill any area with a certain character by
1966 - Cut copy and paste: You can cut, copy and paste rectangular
1967 regions. Artist also interfaces with the rect package (this can be
1968 turned off if it causes you any trouble) so anything you cut in
1969 artist can be yanked with C-x r y and vice versa.
1971 - Drawing with keys: Everything you can do with the mouse, you can
1972 also do without the mouse.
1974 - Aspect-ratio: You can set the variable artist-aspect-ratio to
1975 reflect the height-width ratio for the font you are using. Squares
1976 and circles are then drawn square/round. Note, that once your
1977 ascii-file is shown with font with a different height-width ratio,
1978 the squares won't be square and the circles won't be round.
1980 - Drawing operations: The following drawing operations are implemented:
1982 lines straight-lines
1984 poly-lines straight poly-lines
1986 text (see-thru) text (overwrite)
1987 spray-can setting size for spraying
1988 vaporize line vaporize lines
1989 erase characters erase rectangles
1991 Straight lines are lines that go horizontally, vertically or
1992 diagonally. Plain lines go in any direction. The operations in
1993 the right column are accessed by holding down the shift key while
1996 It is possible to vaporize (erase) entire lines and connected lines
1997 (rectangles for example) as long as the lines being vaporized are
1998 straight and connected at their endpoints. Vaporizing is inspired
1999 by the drawrect package by Jari Aalto <jari.aalto@poboxes.com>.
2001 - Picture mode compatibility: Artist is picture mode compatible (this
2004 *** The new package Eshell is an operating system command shell
2005 implemented entirely in Emacs Lisp. Use `M-x eshell' to invoke it.
2006 It functions similarly to bash and zsh, and allows running of Lisp
2007 functions and external commands using the same syntax. It supports
2008 history lists, aliases, extended globbing, smart scrolling, etc. It
2009 will work on any platform Emacs has been ported to. And since most of
2010 the basic commands -- ls, rm, mv, cp, ln, du, cat, etc. -- have been
2011 rewritten in Lisp, it offers an operating-system independent shell,
2012 all within the scope of your Emacs process.
2014 *** The new package timeclock.el is a mode is for keeping track of time
2015 intervals. You can use it for whatever purpose you like, but the
2016 typical scenario is to keep track of how much time you spend working
2017 on certain projects.
2019 *** The new package hi-lock.el provides commands to highlight matches
2020 of interactively entered regexps. For example,
2022 M-x highlight-regexp RET clearly RET RET
2024 will highlight all occurrences of `clearly' using a yellow background
2025 face. New occurrences of `clearly' will be highlighted as they are
2026 typed. `M-x unhighlight-regexp RET' will remove the highlighting.
2027 Any existing face can be used for highlighting and a set of
2028 appropriate faces is provided. The regexps can be written into the
2029 current buffer in a form that will be recognized the next time the
2030 corresponding file is read. There are commands to highlight matches
2031 to phrases and to highlight entire lines containing a match.
2033 *** The new package zone.el plays games with Emacs' display when
2036 *** The new package tildify.el allows to add hard spaces or other text
2037 fragments in accordance with the current major mode.
2039 *** The new package xml.el provides a simple but generic XML
2040 parser. It doesn't parse the DTDs however.
2042 *** The comment operations are now provided by the newcomment.el
2043 package which allows different styles of comment-region and should
2044 be more robust while offering the same functionality.
2045 `comment-region' now doesn't always comment a-line-at-a-time, but only
2046 comments the region, breaking the line at point if necessary.
2048 *** The Ebrowse package implements a C++ class browser and tags
2049 facilities tailored for use with C++. It is documented in a
2050 separate Texinfo file.
2052 *** The PCL-CVS package available by either running M-x cvs-examine or
2053 by visiting a CVS administrative directory (with a prefix argument)
2054 provides an alternative interface to VC-dired for CVS. It comes with
2055 `log-view-mode' to view RCS and SCCS logs and `log-edit-mode' used to
2056 enter check-in log messages.
2058 *** The new package called `woman' allows to browse Unix man pages
2059 without invoking external programs.
2061 The command `M-x woman' formats manual pages entirely in Emacs Lisp
2062 and then displays them, like `M-x manual-entry' does. Unlike
2063 `manual-entry', `woman' does not invoke any external programs, so it
2064 is useful on systems such as MS-DOS/MS-Windows where the `man' and
2065 Groff or `troff' commands are not readily available.
2067 The command `M-x woman-find-file' asks for the file name of a man
2068 page, then formats and displays it like `M-x woman' does.
2070 *** The new command M-x re-builder offers a convenient interface for
2071 authoring regular expressions with immediate visual feedback.
2073 The buffer from which the command was called becomes the target for
2074 the regexp editor popping up in a separate window. Matching text in
2075 the target buffer is immediately color marked during the editing.
2076 Each sub-expression of the regexp will show up in a different face so
2077 even complex regexps can be edited and verified on target data in a
2080 On displays not supporting faces the matches instead blink like
2081 matching parens to make them stand out. On such a setup you will
2082 probably also want to use the sub-expression mode when the regexp
2083 contains such to get feedback about their respective limits.
2085 *** glasses-mode is a minor mode that makes
2086 unreadableIdentifiersLikeThis readable. It works as glasses, without
2087 actually modifying content of a buffer.
2089 *** The package ebnf2ps translates an EBNF to a syntactic chart in
2092 Currently accepts ad-hoc EBNF, ISO EBNF and Bison/Yacc.
2094 The ad-hoc default EBNF syntax has the following elements:
2096 ; comment (until end of line)
2100 $A default non-terminal
2101 $"C" default terminal
2102 $?C? default special
2103 A = B. production (A is the header and B the body)
2104 C D sequence (C occurs before D)
2105 C | D alternative (C or D occurs)
2106 A - B exception (A excluding B, B without any non-terminal)
2107 n * A repetition (A repeats n (integer) times)
2108 (C) group (expression C is grouped together)
2109 [C] optional (C may or not occurs)
2110 C+ one or more occurrences of C
2111 {C}+ one or more occurrences of C
2112 {C}* zero or more occurrences of C
2113 {C} zero or more occurrences of C
2114 C / D equivalent to: C {D C}*
2115 {C || D}+ equivalent to: C {D C}*
2116 {C || D}* equivalent to: [C {D C}*]
2117 {C || D} equivalent to: [C {D C}*]
2119 Please, see ebnf2ps documentation for EBNF syntax and how to use it.
2121 *** The package align.el will align columns within a region, using M-x
2122 align. Its mode-specific rules, based on regular expressions,
2123 determine where the columns should be split. In C and C++, for
2124 example, it will align variable names in declaration lists, or the
2125 equal signs of assignments.
2127 *** `paragraph-indent-minor-mode' is a new minor mode supporting
2128 paragraphs in the same style as `paragraph-indent-text-mode'.
2130 *** bs.el is a new package for buffer selection similar to
2131 list-buffers or electric-buffer-list. Use M-x bs-show to display a
2132 buffer menu with this package. See the Custom group `bs'.
2134 *** find-lisp.el is a package emulating the Unix find command in Lisp.
2136 *** calculator.el is a small calculator package that is intended to
2137 replace desktop calculators such as xcalc and calc.exe. Actually, it
2138 is not too small - it has more features than most desktop calculators,
2139 and can be customized easily to get many more functions. It should
2140 not be confused with "calc" which is a much bigger mathematical tool
2141 which answers different needs.
2143 *** The minor modes cwarn-mode and global-cwarn-mode highlights
2144 suspicious C and C++ constructions. Currently, assignments inside
2145 expressions, semicolon following `if', `for' and `while' (except, of
2146 course, after a `do .. while' statement), and C++ functions with
2147 reference parameters are recognized. The modes require font-lock mode
2150 *** smerge-mode.el provides `smerge-mode', a simple minor-mode for files
2151 containing diff3-style conflict markers, such as generated by RCS.
2153 *** 5x5.el is a simple puzzle game.
2155 *** hl-line.el provides `hl-line-mode', a minor mode to highlight the
2156 current line in the current buffer. It also provides
2157 `global-hl-line-mode' to provide the same behaviour in all buffers.
2159 *** ansi-color.el translates ANSI terminal escapes into text-properties.
2161 Please note: if `ansi-color-for-comint-mode' and
2162 `global-font-lock-mode' are non-nil, loading ansi-color.el will
2163 disable font-lock and add `ansi-color-apply' to
2164 `comint-preoutput-filter-functions' for all shell-mode buffers. This
2165 displays the output of "ls --color=yes" using the correct foreground
2166 and background colors.
2168 *** delphi.el provides a major mode for editing the Delphi (Object
2171 *** quickurl.el provides a simple method of inserting a URL based on
2174 *** sql.el provides an interface to SQL data bases.
2176 *** fortune.el uses the fortune program to create mail/news signatures.
2178 *** whitespace.el is a package for warning about and cleaning bogus
2179 whitespace in a file.
2181 *** PostScript mode (ps-mode) is a new major mode for editing PostScript
2182 files. It offers: interaction with a PostScript interpreter, including
2183 (very basic) error handling; fontification, easily customizable for
2184 interpreter messages; auto-indentation; insertion of EPSF templates and
2185 often used code snippets; viewing of BoundingBox; commenting out /
2186 uncommenting regions; conversion of 8bit characters to PostScript octal
2187 codes. All functionality is accessible through a menu.
2189 *** delim-col helps to prettify columns in a text region or rectangle.
2191 Here is an example of columns:
2194 dog pineapple car EXTRA
2195 porcupine strawberry airplane
2197 Doing the following settings:
2199 (setq delimit-columns-str-before "[ ")
2200 (setq delimit-columns-str-after " ]")
2201 (setq delimit-columns-str-separator ", ")
2202 (setq delimit-columns-separator "\t")
2205 Selecting the lines above and typing:
2207 M-x delimit-columns-region
2211 [ horse , apple , bus , ]
2212 [ dog , pineapple , car , EXTRA ]
2213 [ porcupine, strawberry, airplane, ]
2215 delim-col has the following options:
2217 delimit-columns-str-before Specify a string to be inserted
2220 delimit-columns-str-separator Specify a string to be inserted
2221 between each column.
2223 delimit-columns-str-after Specify a string to be inserted
2226 delimit-columns-separator Specify a regexp which separates
2229 delim-col has the following commands:
2231 delimit-columns-region Prettify all columns in a text region.
2232 delimit-columns-rectangle Prettify all columns in a text rectangle.
2234 *** Recentf mode maintains a menu for visiting files that were
2235 operated on recently. User option recentf-menu-filter specifies a
2236 menu filter function to change the menu appearance. For example, the
2237 recent file list can be displayed:
2239 - organized by major modes, directories or user defined rules.
2240 - sorted by file paths, file names, ascending or descending.
2241 - showing paths relative to the current default-directory
2243 The `recentf-filter-changer' menu filter function allows to
2244 dynamically change the menu appearance.
2246 *** elide-head.el provides a mechanism for eliding boilerplate header
2249 *** footnote.el provides `footnote-mode', a minor mode supporting use
2250 of footnotes. It is intended for use with Message mode, but isn't
2251 specific to Message mode.
2253 *** diff-mode.el provides `diff-mode', a major mode for
2254 viewing/editing context diffs (patches). It is selected for files
2255 with extension `.diff', `.diffs', `.patch' and `.rej'.
2257 *** EUDC, the Emacs Unified Directory Client, provides a common user
2258 interface to access directory servers using different directory
2259 protocols. It has a separate manual.
2261 *** autoconf.el provides a major mode for editing configure.in files
2262 for Autoconf, selected automatically.
2264 *** windmove.el provides moving between windows.
2266 *** crm.el provides a facility to read multiple strings from the
2267 minibuffer with completion.
2269 *** todo-mode.el provides management of TODO lists and integration
2270 with the diary features.
2272 *** autoarg.el provides a feature reported from Twenex Emacs whereby
2273 numeric keys supply prefix args rather than self inserting.
2275 *** The function `turn-off-auto-fill' unconditionally turns off Auto
2278 *** pcomplete.el is a library that provides programmable completion
2279 facilities for Emacs, similar to what zsh and tcsh offer. The main
2280 difference is that completion functions are written in Lisp, meaning
2281 they can be profiled, debugged, etc.
2283 *** antlr-mode is a new major mode for editing ANTLR grammar files.
2284 It is automatically turned on for files whose names have the extension
2287 ** Changes in sort.el
2289 The function sort-numeric-fields interprets numbers starting with `0'
2290 as octal and numbers starting with `0x' or `0X' as hexadecimal. The
2291 new user-option sort-numeric-base can be used to specify a default
2294 ** Changes to Ange-ftp
2296 *** Ange-ftp allows you to specify of a port number in remote file
2297 names cleanly. It is appended to the host name, separated by a hash
2298 sign, e.g. `/foo@bar.org#666:mumble'. (This syntax comes from EFS.)
2300 *** If the new user-option `ange-ftp-try-passive-mode' is set, passive
2301 ftp mode will be used if the ftp client supports that.
2303 *** Ange-ftp handles the output of the w32-style clients which
2304 output ^M at the end of lines.
2306 ** The recommended way of using Iswitchb is via the new global minor
2307 mode `iswitchb-mode'.
2309 ** Just loading the msb package doesn't switch on Msb mode anymore.
2310 If you have `(require 'msb)' in your .emacs, please replace it with
2313 ** Flyspell mode has various new options. See the `flyspell' Custom
2316 ** The user option `backward-delete-char-untabify-method' controls the
2317 behavior of `backward-delete-char-untabify'. The following values
2320 `untabify' -- turn a tab to many spaces, then delete one space;
2321 `hungry' -- delete all whitespace, both tabs and spaces;
2322 `all' -- delete all whitespace, including tabs, spaces and newlines;
2323 nil -- just delete one character.
2325 Default value is `untabify'.
2327 [This change was made in Emacs 20.3 but not mentioned then.]
2329 ** In Cperl mode `cperl-invalid-face' should now be a normal face
2330 symbol, not double-quoted.
2332 ** Some packages are declared obsolete, to be removed in a future
2333 version. They are: auto-show, c-mode, hilit19, hscroll, ooutline,
2334 profile, rnews, rnewspost, and sc. Their implementations have been
2335 moved to lisp/obsolete.
2337 ** auto-compression mode is no longer enabled just by loading jka-compr.el.
2338 To control it, set `auto-compression-mode' via Custom or use the
2339 `auto-compression-mode' command.
2341 ** `browse-url-gnome-moz' is a new option for
2342 `browse-url-browser-function', invoking Mozilla in GNOME, and
2343 `browse-url-kde' can be chosen for invoking the KDE browser.
2345 ** The user-option `browse-url-new-window-p' has been renamed to
2346 `browse-url-new-window-flag'.
2348 ** The functions `keep-lines', `flush-lines' and `how-many' now
2349 operate on the active region in Transient Mark mode.
2351 ** `gnus-user-agent' is a new possibility for `mail-user-agent'. It
2352 is like `message-user-agent', but with all the Gnus paraphernalia.
2354 ** The Strokes package has been updated. If your Emacs has XPM
2355 support, you can use it for pictographic editing. In Strokes mode,
2356 use C-mouse-2 to compose a complex stoke and insert it into the
2357 buffer. You can encode or decode a strokes buffer with new commands
2358 M-x strokes-encode-buffer and M-x strokes-decode-buffer. There is a
2359 new command M-x strokes-list-strokes.
2361 ** Hexl contains a new command `hexl-insert-hex-string' which inserts
2362 a string of hexadecimal numbers read from the mini-buffer.
2364 ** Hexl mode allows to insert non-ASCII characters.
2366 The non-ASCII characters are encoded using the same encoding as the
2367 file you are visiting in Hexl mode.
2369 ** Shell script mode changes.
2371 Shell script mode (sh-script) can now indent scripts for shells
2372 derived from sh and rc. The indentation style is customizable, and
2373 sh-script can attempt to "learn" the current buffer's style.
2377 *** In DOS, etags looks for file.cgz if it cannot find file.c.
2379 *** New option --ignore-case-regex is an alternative to --regex. It is now
2380 possible to bind a regexp to a language, by prepending the regexp with
2381 {lang}, where lang is one of the languages that `etags --help' prints out.
2382 This feature is useful especially for regex files, where each line contains
2383 a regular expression. The manual contains details.
2385 *** In C and derived languages, etags creates tags for function
2386 declarations when given the --declarations option.
2388 *** In C++, tags are created for "operator". The tags have the form
2389 "operator+", without spaces between the keyword and the operator.
2391 *** You shouldn't generally need any more the -C or -c++ option: etags
2392 automatically switches to C++ parsing when it meets the `class' or
2393 `template' keywords.
2395 *** Etags now is able to delve at arbitrary deeps into nested structures in
2396 C-like languages. Previously, it was limited to one or two brace levels.
2398 *** New language Ada: tags are functions, procedures, packages, tasks, and
2401 *** In Fortran, `procedure' is not tagged.
2403 *** In Java, tags are created for "interface".
2405 *** In Lisp, "(defstruct (foo", "(defun (operator" and similar constructs
2408 *** In makefiles, tags the targets.
2410 *** In Perl, the --globals option tags global variables. my and local
2411 variables are tagged.
2413 *** New language Python: def and class at the beginning of a line are tags.
2415 *** .ss files are Scheme files, .pdb is Postscript with C syntax, .psw is
2418 ** Changes in etags.el
2420 *** The new user-option tags-case-fold-search can be used to make
2421 tags operations case-sensitive or case-insensitive. The default
2422 is to use the same setting as case-fold-search.
2424 *** You can display additional output with M-x tags-apropos by setting
2425 the new variable tags-apropos-additional-actions.
2427 If non-nil, the variable's value should be a list of triples (TITLE
2428 FUNCTION TO-SEARCH). For each triple, M-x tags-apropos processes
2429 TO-SEARCH and lists tags from it. TO-SEARCH should be an alist,
2430 obarray, or symbol. If it is a symbol, the symbol's value is used.
2432 TITLE is a string to use to label the list of tags from TO-SEARCH.
2434 FUNCTION is a function to call when an entry is selected in the Tags
2435 List buffer. It is called with one argument, the selected symbol.
2437 A useful example value for this variable might be something like:
2439 '(("Emacs Lisp" Info-goto-emacs-command-node obarray)
2440 ("Common Lisp" common-lisp-hyperspec common-lisp-hyperspec-obarray)
2441 ("SCWM" scwm-documentation scwm-obarray))
2443 *** The face tags-tag-face can be used to customize the appearance
2444 of tags in the output of M-x tags-apropos.
2446 *** Setting tags-apropos-verbose to a non-nil value displays the
2447 names of tags files in the *Tags List* buffer.
2449 *** You can now search for tags that are part of the filename itself.
2450 If you have tagged the files topfile.c subdir/subfile.c
2451 /tmp/tempfile.c, you can now search for tags "topfile.c", "subfile.c",
2452 "dir/sub", "tempfile", "tempfile.c". If the tag matches the file name,
2453 point will go to the beginning of the file.
2455 *** Compressed files are now transparently supported if
2456 auto-compression-mode is active. You can tag (with Etags) and search
2457 (with find-tag) both compressed and uncompressed files.
2459 *** Tags commands like M-x tags-search no longer change point
2460 in buffers where no match is found. In buffers where a match is
2461 found, the original value of point is pushed on the marker ring.
2463 ** Fortran mode has a new command `fortran-strip-sequence-nos' to
2464 remove text past column 72. The syntax class of `\' in Fortran is now
2465 appropriate for C-style escape sequences in strings.
2467 ** SGML mode's default `sgml-validate-command' is now `nsgmls'.
2469 ** A new command `view-emacs-problems' (C-h P) displays the PROBLEMS file.
2471 ** The Dabbrev package has a new user-option `dabbrev-ignored-regexps'
2472 containing a list of regular expressions. Buffers matching a regular
2473 expression from that list, are not checked.
2475 ** Emacs can now figure out modification times of remote files.
2476 When you do C-x C-f /user@host:/path/file RET and edit the file,
2477 and someone else modifies the file, you will be prompted to revert
2478 the buffer, just like for the local files.
2480 ** The buffer menu (C-x C-b) no longer lists the *Buffer List* buffer.
2482 ** When invoked with a prefix argument, the command `list-abbrevs' now
2483 displays local abbrevs, only.
2485 ** Refill minor mode provides preliminary support for keeping
2486 paragraphs filled as you modify them.
2488 ** The variable `double-click-fuzz' specifies how much the mouse
2489 may be moved between clicks that are recognized as a pair. Its value
2490 is measured in pixels.
2492 ** The new global minor mode `auto-image-file-mode' allows image files
2493 to be visited as images.
2495 ** Two new user-options `grep-command' and `grep-find-command'
2496 were added to compile.el.
2498 ** Withdrawn packages
2500 *** mldrag.el has been removed. mouse.el provides the same
2501 functionality with aliases for the mldrag functions.
2503 *** eval-reg.el has been obsoleted by changes to edebug.el and removed.
2505 *** ph.el has been obsoleted by EUDC and removed.
2508 * Incompatible Lisp changes
2510 There are a few Lisp changes which are not backwards-compatible and
2511 may require changes to existing code. Here is a list for reference.
2512 See the sections below for details.
2514 ** Since `format' preserves text properties, the idiom
2515 `(format "%s" foo)' no longer works to copy and remove properties.
2516 Use `copy-sequence' to copy the string, then use `set-text-properties'
2517 to remove the properties of the copy.
2519 ** Since the `keymap' text property now has significance, some code
2520 which uses both `local-map' and `keymap' properties (for portability)
2521 may, for instance, give rise to duplicate menus when the keymaps from
2522 these properties are active.
2524 ** The change in the treatment of non-ASCII characters in search
2525 ranges may affect some code.
2527 ** A non-nil value for the LOCAL arg of add-hook makes the hook
2528 buffer-local even if `make-local-hook' hasn't been called, which might
2529 make a difference to some code.
2531 ** The new treatment of the minibuffer prompt might affect code which
2532 operates on the minibuffer.
2534 ** The new character sets `eight-bit-control' and `eight-bit-graphic'
2535 cause `no-conversion' and `emacs-mule-unix' coding systems to produce
2536 different results when reading files with non-ASCII characters
2537 (previously, both coding systems would produce the same results).
2538 Specifically, `no-conversion' interprets each 8-bit byte as a separate
2539 character. This makes `no-conversion' inappropriate for reading
2540 multibyte text, e.g. buffers written to disk in their internal MULE
2541 encoding (auto-saving does that, for example). If a Lisp program
2542 reads such files with `no-conversion', each byte of the multibyte
2543 sequence, including the MULE leading codes such as \201, is treated as
2544 a separate character, which prevents them from being interpreted in
2545 the buffer as multibyte characters.
2547 Therefore, Lisp programs that read files which contain the internal
2548 MULE encoding should use `emacs-mule-unix'. `no-conversion' is only
2549 appropriate for reading truly binary files.
2551 ** Code that relies on the obsolete `before-change-function' and
2552 `after-change-function' to detect buffer changes will now fail. Use
2553 `before-change-functions' and `after-change-functions' instead.
2555 ** Code that uses `concat' with integer args now gets an error, as
2558 ** The function base64-decode-string now always returns a unibyte
2561 ** Not a Lisp incompatibility as such but, with the introduction of
2562 extra private charsets, there is now only one slot free for a new
2563 dimension-2 private charset. User code which tries to add more than
2564 one extra will fail unless you rebuild Emacs with some standard
2565 charset(s) removed; that is probably inadvisable because it changes
2566 the emacs-mule encoding. Also, files stored in the emacs-mule
2567 encoding using Emacs 20 with additional private charsets defined will
2568 probably not be read correctly by Emacs 21.
2570 ** The variable `directory-sep-char' is slated for removal.
2571 Not really a change (yet), but a projected one that you should be
2572 aware of: The variable `directory-sep-char' is deprecated, and should
2573 not be used. It was always ignored on GNU/Linux and Unix systems and
2574 on MS-DOS, but the MS-Windows port tried to support it by adapting the
2575 behavior of certain primitives to the value of this variable. It
2576 turned out that such support cannot be reliable, so it was decided to
2577 remove this variable in the near future. Lisp programs are well
2578 advised not to set it to anything but '/', because any different value
2579 will not have any effect when support for this variable is removed.
2582 * Lisp changes made after edition 2.6 of the Emacs Lisp Manual,
2583 (Display-related features are described in a page of their own below.)
2585 ** Function assq-delete-all replaces function assoc-delete-all.
2587 ** The new function animate-string, from lisp/play/animate.el
2588 allows the animated display of strings.
2590 ** The new function `interactive-form' can be used to obtain the
2591 interactive form of a function.
2593 ** The keyword :set-after in defcustom allows to specify dependencies
2594 between custom options. Example:
2596 (defcustom default-input-method nil
2597 "*Default input method for multilingual text (a string).
2598 This is the input method activated automatically by the command
2599 `toggle-input-method' (\\[toggle-input-method])."
2601 :type '(choice (const nil) string)
2602 :set-after '(current-language-environment))
2604 This specifies that default-input-method should be set after
2605 current-language-environment even if default-input-method appears
2606 first in a custom-set-variables statement.
2608 ** The new hook `kbd-macro-termination-hook' is run at the end of
2609 function execute-kbd-macro. Functions on this hook are called with no
2610 args. The hook is run independent of how the macro was terminated
2611 (signal or normal termination).
2613 ** Functions `butlast' and `nbutlast' for removing trailing elements
2614 from a list are now available without requiring the CL package.
2616 ** The new user-option `even-window-heights' can be set to nil
2617 to prevent `display-buffer' from evening out window heights.
2619 ** The user-option `face-font-registry-alternatives' specifies
2620 alternative font registry names to try when looking for a font.
2622 ** Function `md5' calculates the MD5 "message digest"/"checksum".
2624 ** Function `delete-frame' runs `delete-frame-hook' before actually
2625 deleting the frame. The hook is called with one arg, the frame
2628 ** `add-hook' now makes the hook local if called with a non-nil LOCAL arg.
2630 ** The treatment of non-ASCII characters in search ranges has changed.
2631 If a range in a regular expression or the arg of
2632 skip-chars-forward/backward starts with a unibyte character C and ends
2633 with a multibyte character C2, the range is divided into two: one is
2634 C..?\377, the other is C1..C2, where C1 is the first character of C2's
2637 ** The new function `display-message-or-buffer' displays a message in
2638 the echo area or pops up a buffer, depending on the length of the
2641 ** The new macro `with-auto-compression-mode' allows evaluating an
2642 expression with auto-compression-mode enabled.
2644 ** In image specifications, `:heuristic-mask' has been replaced
2645 with the more general `:mask' property.
2647 ** Image specifications accept more `:conversion's.
2649 ** A `?' can be used in a symbol name without escaping it with a
2652 ** Reading from the mini-buffer now reads from standard input if Emacs
2653 is running in batch mode. For example,
2655 (message "%s" (read t))
2657 will read a Lisp expression from standard input and print the result
2660 ** The argument of `down-list', `backward-up-list', `up-list',
2661 `kill-sexp', `backward-kill-sexp' and `mark-sexp' is now optional.
2663 ** If `display-buffer-reuse-frames' is set, function `display-buffer'
2664 will raise frames displaying a buffer, instead of creating a new
2667 ** Two new functions for removing elements from lists/sequences
2670 - Function: remove ELT SEQ
2672 Return a copy of SEQ with all occurrences of ELT removed. SEQ must be
2673 a list, vector, or string. The comparison is done with `equal'.
2675 - Function: remq ELT LIST
2677 Return a copy of LIST with all occurrences of ELT removed. The
2678 comparison is done with `eq'.
2680 ** The function `delete' now also works with vectors and strings.
2682 ** The meaning of the `:weakness WEAK' argument of make-hash-table
2683 has been changed: WEAK can now have new values `key-or-value' and
2684 `key-and-value', in addition the `nil', `key', `value', and `t'.
2686 ** Function `aset' stores any multibyte character in any string
2687 without signaling "Attempt to change char length of a string". It may
2688 convert a unibyte string to multibyte if necessary.
2690 ** The value of the `help-echo' text property is called as a function
2691 or evaluated, if it is not a string already, to obtain a help string.
2693 ** Function `make-obsolete' now has an optional arg to say when the
2694 function was declared obsolete.
2696 ** Function `plist-member' is renamed from `widget-plist-member' (which is
2697 retained as an alias).
2699 ** Easy-menu's :filter now works as in XEmacs.
2700 It takes the unconverted (i.e. XEmacs) form of the menu and the result
2701 is automatically converted to Emacs' form.
2703 ** The new function `window-list' has been defined
2705 - Function: window-list &optional FRAME WINDOW MINIBUF
2707 Return a list of windows on FRAME, starting with WINDOW. FRAME nil or
2708 omitted means use the selected frame. WINDOW nil or omitted means use
2709 the selected window. MINIBUF t means include the minibuffer window,
2710 even if it isn't active. MINIBUF nil or omitted means include the
2711 minibuffer window only if it's active. MINIBUF neither nil nor t
2712 means never include the minibuffer window.
2714 ** There's a new function `get-window-with-predicate' defined as follows
2716 - Function: get-window-with-predicate PREDICATE &optional MINIBUF ALL-FRAMES DEFAULT
2718 Return a window satisfying PREDICATE.
2720 This function cycles through all visible windows using `walk-windows',
2721 calling PREDICATE on each one. PREDICATE is called with a window as
2722 argument. The first window for which PREDICATE returns a non-nil
2723 value is returned. If no window satisfies PREDICATE, DEFAULT is
2726 Optional second arg MINIBUF t means count the minibuffer window even
2727 if not active. MINIBUF nil or omitted means count the minibuffer iff
2728 it is active. MINIBUF neither t nor nil means not to count the
2729 minibuffer even if it is active.
2731 Several frames may share a single minibuffer; if the minibuffer
2732 counts, all windows on all frames that share that minibuffer count
2733 too. Therefore, if you are using a separate minibuffer frame
2734 and the minibuffer is active and MINIBUF says it counts,
2735 `walk-windows' includes the windows in the frame from which you
2736 entered the minibuffer, as well as the minibuffer window.
2738 ALL-FRAMES is the optional third argument.
2739 ALL-FRAMES nil or omitted means cycle within the frames as specified above.
2740 ALL-FRAMES = `visible' means include windows on all visible frames.
2741 ALL-FRAMES = 0 means include windows on all visible and iconified frames.
2742 ALL-FRAMES = t means include windows on all frames including invisible frames.
2743 If ALL-FRAMES is a frame, it means include windows on that frame.
2744 Anything else means restrict to the selected frame.
2746 ** The function `single-key-description' now encloses function key and
2747 event names in angle brackets. When called with a second optional
2748 argument non-nil, angle brackets won't be printed.
2750 ** If the variable `message-truncate-lines' is bound to t around a
2751 call to `message', the echo area will not be resized to display that
2752 message; it will be truncated instead, as it was done in 20.x.
2753 Default value is nil.
2755 ** The user option `line-number-display-limit' can now be set to nil,
2758 ** The new user option `line-number-display-limit-width' controls
2759 the maximum width of lines in a buffer for which Emacs displays line
2760 numbers in the mode line. The default is 200.
2762 ** `select-safe-coding-system' now also checks the most preferred
2763 coding-system if buffer-file-coding-system is `undecided' and
2764 DEFAULT-CODING-SYSTEM is not specified,
2766 ** The function `subr-arity' provides information about the argument
2767 list of a primitive.
2769 ** `where-is-internal' now also accepts a list of keymaps.
2771 ** The text property `keymap' specifies a key map which overrides the
2772 buffer's local map and the map specified by the `local-map' property.
2773 This is probably what most current uses of `local-map' want, rather
2774 than replacing the local map.
2776 ** The obsolete variables `before-change-function' and
2777 `after-change-function' are no longer acted upon and have been
2778 removed. Use `before-change-functions' and `after-change-functions'
2781 ** The function `apropos-mode' runs the hook `apropos-mode-hook'.
2783 ** `concat' no longer accepts individual integer arguments,
2784 as promised long ago.
2786 ** The new function `float-time' returns the current time as a float.
2788 ** The new variable auto-coding-regexp-alist specifies coding systems
2789 for reading specific files, analogous to auto-coding-alist, but
2790 patterns are checked against file contents instead of file names.
2793 * Lisp changes in Emacs 21.1 (see following page for display-related features)
2795 Note that +++ before an item means the Lisp manual has been updated.
2796 --- means that I have decided it does not need to be in the Lisp manual.
2797 When you add a new item, please add it without either +++ or ---
2798 so I will know I still need to look at it -- rms.
2800 ** The new package rx.el provides an alternative sexp notation for
2801 regular expressions.
2803 - Function: rx-to-string SEXP
2805 Translate SEXP into a regular expression in string notation.
2809 Translate SEXP into a regular expression in string notation.
2811 The following are valid subforms of regular expressions in sexp
2815 matches string STRING literally.
2818 matches character CHAR literally.
2821 matches any character except a newline.
2824 matches any character
2827 matches any character in SET. SET may be a character or string.
2828 Ranges of characters can be specified as `A-Z' in strings.
2834 matches any character not in SET
2837 matches the empty string, but only at the beginning of a line
2838 in the text being matched
2841 is similar to `line-start' but matches only at the end of a line
2844 matches the empty string, but only at the beginning of the
2845 string being matched against.
2848 matches the empty string, but only at the end of the
2849 string being matched against.
2852 matches the empty string, but only at the beginning of the
2853 buffer being matched against.
2856 matches the empty string, but only at the end of the
2857 buffer being matched against.
2860 matches the empty string, but only at point.
2863 matches the empty string, but only at the beginning or end of a
2867 matches the empty string, but only at the end of a word.
2870 matches the empty string, but only at the beginning or end of a
2873 `(not word-boundary)'
2874 matches the empty string, but not at the beginning or end of a
2878 matches 0 through 9.
2881 matches ASCII control characters.
2884 matches 0 through 9, a through f and A through F.
2887 matches space and tab only.
2890 matches graphic characters--everything except ASCII control chars,
2894 matches printing characters--everything except ASCII control chars
2898 matches letters and digits. (But at present, for multibyte characters,
2899 it matches anything that has word syntax.)
2902 matches letters. (But at present, for multibyte characters,
2903 it matches anything that has word syntax.)
2906 matches ASCII (unibyte) characters.
2909 matches non-ASCII (multibyte) characters.
2912 matches anything lower-case.
2915 matches anything upper-case.
2918 matches punctuation. (But at present, for multibyte characters,
2919 it matches anything that has non-word syntax.)
2922 matches anything that has whitespace syntax.
2925 matches anything that has word syntax.
2928 matches a character with syntax SYNTAX. SYNTAX must be one
2929 of the following symbols.
2931 `whitespace' (\\s- in string notation)
2932 `punctuation' (\\s.)
2935 `open-parenthesis' (\\s()
2936 `close-parenthesis' (\\s))
2937 `expression-prefix' (\\s')
2938 `string-quote' (\\s\")
2939 `paired-delimiter' (\\s$)
2941 `character-quote' (\\s/)
2942 `comment-start' (\\s<)
2943 `comment-end' (\\s>)
2945 `(not (syntax SYNTAX))'
2946 matches a character that has not syntax SYNTAX.
2948 `(category CATEGORY)'
2949 matches a character with category CATEGORY. CATEGORY must be
2950 either a character to use for C, or one of the following symbols.
2952 `consonant' (\\c0 in string notation)
2954 `upper-diacritical-mark' (\\c2)
2955 `lower-diacritical-mark' (\\c3)
2959 `vowel-modifying-diacritical-mark' (\\c7)
2961 `semivowel-lower' (\\c9)
2962 `not-at-end-of-line' (\\c<)
2963 `not-at-beginning-of-line' (\\c>)
2964 `alpha-numeric-two-byte' (\\cA)
2965 `chinse-two-byte' (\\cC)
2966 `greek-two-byte' (\\cG)
2967 `japanese-hiragana-two-byte' (\\cH)
2968 `indian-tow-byte' (\\cI)
2969 `japanese-katakana-two-byte' (\\cK)
2970 `korean-hangul-two-byte' (\\cN)
2971 `cyrillic-two-byte' (\\cY)
2980 `japanese-katakana' (\\ck)
2984 `japanese-roman' (\\cr)
2991 `(not (category CATEGORY))'
2992 matches a character that has not category CATEGORY.
2994 `(and SEXP1 SEXP2 ...)'
2995 matches what SEXP1 matches, followed by what SEXP2 matches, etc.
2997 `(submatch SEXP1 SEXP2 ...)'
2998 like `and', but makes the match accessible with `match-end',
2999 `match-beginning', and `match-string'.
3001 `(group SEXP1 SEXP2 ...)'
3002 another name for `submatch'.
3004 `(or SEXP1 SEXP2 ...)'
3005 matches anything that matches SEXP1 or SEXP2, etc. If all
3006 args are strings, use `regexp-opt' to optimize the resulting
3009 `(minimal-match SEXP)'
3010 produce a non-greedy regexp for SEXP. Normally, regexps matching
3011 zero or more occurrances of something are \"greedy\" in that they
3012 match as much as they can, as long as the overall regexp can
3013 still match. A non-greedy regexp matches as little as possible.
3015 `(maximal-match SEXP)'
3016 produce a greedy regexp for SEXP. This is the default.
3018 `(zero-or-more SEXP)'
3019 matches zero or more occurrences of what SEXP matches.
3022 like `zero-or-more'.
3025 like `zero-or-more', but always produces a greedy regexp.
3028 like `zero-or-more', but always produces a non-greedy regexp.
3030 `(one-or-more SEXP)'
3031 matches one or more occurrences of A.
3037 like `one-or-more', but always produces a greedy regexp.
3040 like `one-or-more', but always produces a non-greedy regexp.
3042 `(zero-or-one SEXP)'
3043 matches zero or one occurrences of A.
3049 like `zero-or-one', but always produces a greedy regexp.
3052 like `zero-or-one', but always produces a non-greedy regexp.
3055 matches N occurrences of what SEXP matches.
3058 matches N to M occurrences of what SEXP matches.
3061 evaluate FORM and insert result. If result is a string,
3065 include REGEXP in string notation in the result.
3067 *** The features `md5' and `overlay' are now provided by default.
3069 *** The special form `save-restriction' now works correctly even if the
3070 buffer is widened inside the save-restriction and changes made outside
3071 the original restriction. Previously, doing this would cause the saved
3072 restriction to be restored incorrectly.
3074 *** The functions `find-charset-region' and `find-charset-string' include
3075 `eight-bit-control' and/or `eight-bit-graphic' in the returned list
3076 when they find 8-bit characters. Previously, they included `ascii' in a
3077 multibyte buffer and `unknown' in a unibyte buffer.
3079 *** The functions `set-buffer-multibyte', `string-as-multibyte' and
3080 `string-as-unibyte' change the byte sequence of a buffer or a string
3081 if it contains a character from the `eight-bit-control' character set.
3083 *** The handling of multibyte sequences in a multibyte buffer is
3084 changed. Previously, a byte sequence matching the pattern
3085 [\200-\237][\240-\377]+ was interpreted as a single character
3086 regardless of the length of the trailing bytes [\240-\377]+. Thus, if
3087 the sequence was longer than what the leading byte indicated, the
3088 extra trailing bytes were ignored by Lisp functions. Now such extra
3089 bytes are independent 8-bit characters belonging to the charset
3092 ** Fontsets are now implemented using char-tables.
3094 A fontset can now be specified for each independent character, for
3095 a group of characters or for a character set rather than just for a
3096 character set as previously.
3098 *** The arguments of the function `set-fontset-font' are changed.
3099 They are NAME, CHARACTER, FONTNAME, and optional FRAME. The function
3100 modifies fontset NAME to use FONTNAME for CHARACTER.
3102 CHARACTER may be a cons (FROM . TO), where FROM and TO are non-generic
3103 characters. In that case FONTNAME is used for all characters in the
3104 range FROM and TO (inclusive). CHARACTER may be a charset. In that
3105 case FONTNAME is used for all character in the charset.
3107 FONTNAME may be a cons (FAMILY . REGISTRY), where FAMILY is the family
3108 name of a font and REGISTRY is a registry name of a font.
3110 *** Variable x-charset-registry has been deleted. The default charset
3111 registries of character sets are set in the default fontset
3114 *** The function `create-fontset-from-fontset-spec' ignores the second
3115 argument STYLE-VARIANT. It never creates style-variant fontsets.
3117 ** The method of composing characters is changed. Now character
3118 composition is done by a special text property `composition' in
3119 buffers and strings.
3121 *** Charset composition is deleted. Emacs never creates a `composite
3122 character' which is an independent character with a unique character
3123 code. Thus the following functions handling `composite characters'
3124 have been deleted: composite-char-component,
3125 composite-char-component-count, composite-char-composition-rule,
3126 composite-char-composition-rule and decompose-composite-char delete.
3127 The variables leading-code-composition and min-composite-char have
3130 *** Three more glyph reference points are added. They can be used to
3131 specify a composition rule. See the documentation of the variable
3132 `reference-point-alist' for more detail.
3134 *** The function `compose-region' takes new arguments COMPONENTS and
3135 MODIFICATION-FUNC. With COMPONENTS, you can specify not only a
3136 composition rule but also characters to be composed. Such characters
3137 may differ between buffer and string text.
3139 *** The function `compose-string' takes new arguments START, END,
3140 COMPONENTS, and MODIFICATION-FUNC.
3142 *** The function `compose-string' puts text property `composition'
3143 directly on the argument STRING instead of returning a new string.
3144 Likewise, the function `decompose-string' just removes text property
3145 `composition' from STRING.
3147 *** The new function `find-composition' returns information about
3148 a composition at a specified position in a buffer or a string.
3150 *** The function `decompose-composite-char' is now labeled as
3153 ** The new coding system `mac-roman' is primarily intended for use on
3154 the Macintosh but may be used generally for Macintosh-encoded text.
3156 ** The new character sets `mule-unicode-0100-24ff',
3157 `mule-unicode-2500-33ff', and `mule-unicode-e000-ffff' have been
3158 introduced for Unicode characters in the range U+0100..U+24FF,
3159 U+2500..U+33FF, U+E000..U+FFFF respectively.
3161 Note that the character sets are not yet unified in Emacs, so
3162 characters which belong to charsets such as Latin-2, Greek, Hebrew,
3163 etc. and the same characters in the `mule-unicode-*' charsets are
3164 different characters, as far as Emacs is concerned. For example, text
3165 which includes Unicode characters from the Latin-2 locale cannot be
3166 encoded by Emacs with ISO 8859-2 coding system.
3168 ** The new coding system `mule-utf-8' has been added.
3169 It provides limited support for decoding/encoding UTF-8 text. For
3170 details, please see the documentation string of this coding system.
3172 ** The new character sets `japanese-jisx0213-1' and
3173 `japanese-jisx0213-2' have been introduced for the new Japanese
3174 standard JIS X 0213 Plane 1 and Plane 2.
3176 ** The new character sets `latin-iso8859-14' and `latin-iso8859-15'
3177 have been introduced.
3179 ** The new character sets `eight-bit-control' and `eight-bit-graphic'
3180 have been introduced for 8-bit characters in the ranges 0x80..0x9F and
3181 0xA0..0xFF respectively. Note that the multibyte representation of
3182 eight-bit-control is never exposed; this leads to an exception in the
3183 emacs-mule coding system, which encodes everything else to the
3184 buffer/string internal representation. Note that to search for
3185 eight-bit-graphic characters in a multibyte buffer, the search string
3186 must be multibyte, otherwise such characters will be converted to
3187 their multibyte equivalent.
3189 ** If the APPEND argument of `write-region' is an integer, it seeks to
3190 that offset in the file before writing.
3192 ** The function `add-minor-mode' has been added for convenience and
3193 compatibility with XEmacs (and is used internally by define-minor-mode).
3195 ** The function `shell-command' now sets the default directory of the
3196 `*Shell Command Output*' buffer to the default directory of the buffer
3197 from which the command was issued.
3199 ** The functions `query-replace', `query-replace-regexp',
3200 `query-replace-regexp-eval' `map-query-replace-regexp',
3201 `replace-string', `replace-regexp', and `perform-replace' take two
3202 additional optional arguments START and END that specify the region to
3205 ** The new function `count-screen-lines' is a more flexible alternative
3206 to `window-buffer-height'.
3208 - Function: count-screen-lines &optional BEG END COUNT-FINAL-NEWLINE WINDOW
3210 Return the number of screen lines in the region between BEG and END.
3211 The number of screen lines may be different from the number of actual
3212 lines, due to line breaking, display table, etc.
3214 Optional arguments BEG and END default to `point-min' and `point-max'
3217 If region ends with a newline, ignore it unless optional third argument
3218 COUNT-FINAL-NEWLINE is non-nil.
3220 The optional fourth argument WINDOW specifies the window used for
3221 obtaining parameters such as width, horizontal scrolling, and so
3222 on. The default is to use the selected window's parameters.
3224 Like `vertical-motion', `count-screen-lines' always uses the current
3225 buffer, regardless of which buffer is displayed in WINDOW. This makes
3226 possible to use `count-screen-lines' in any buffer, whether or not it
3227 is currently displayed in some window.
3229 ** The new function `mapc' is like `mapcar' but doesn't collect the
3230 argument function's results.
3232 ** The functions base64-decode-region and base64-decode-string now
3233 signal an error instead of returning nil if decoding fails. Also,
3234 `base64-decode-string' now always returns a unibyte string (in Emacs
3235 20, it returned a multibyte string when the result was a valid multibyte
3238 ** The function sendmail-user-agent-compose now recognizes a `body'
3239 header in the list of headers passed to it.
3241 ** The new function member-ignore-case works like `member', but
3242 ignores differences in case and text representation.
3244 ** The buffer-local variable cursor-type can be used to specify the
3245 cursor to use in windows displaying a buffer. Values are interpreted
3248 t use the cursor specified for the frame (default)
3249 nil don't display a cursor
3250 `bar' display a bar cursor with default width
3251 (bar . WIDTH) display a bar cursor with width WIDTH
3252 others display a box cursor.
3254 ** The variable open-paren-in-column-0-is-defun-start controls whether
3255 an open parenthesis in column 0 is considered to be the start of a
3256 defun. If set, the default, it is considered a defun start. If not
3257 set, an open parenthesis in column 0 has no special meaning.
3259 ** The new function `string-to-syntax' can be used to translate syntax
3260 specifications in string form as accepted by `modify-syntax-entry' to
3261 the cons-cell form that is used for the values of the `syntax-table'
3262 text property, and in `font-lock-syntactic-keywords'.
3266 (string-to-syntax "()")
3269 ** Emacs' reader supports CL read syntax for integers in bases
3272 *** `#BINTEGER' or `#bINTEGER' reads INTEGER in binary (radix 2).
3273 INTEGER optionally contains a sign.
3280 *** `#OINTEGER' or `#oINTEGER' reads INTEGER in octal (radix 8).
3285 *** `#XINTEGER' or `#xINTEGER' reads INTEGER in hexadecimal (radix 16).
3290 *** `#RADIXrINTEGER' reads INTEGER in radix RADIX, 2 <= RADIX <= 36.
3297 ** The function `documentation-property' now evaluates the value of
3298 the given property to obtain a string if it doesn't refer to etc/DOC
3301 ** If called for a symbol, the function `documentation' now looks for
3302 a `function-documentation' property of that symbol. If it has a non-nil
3303 value, the documentation is taken from that value. If the value is
3304 not a string, it is evaluated to obtain a string.
3306 ** The last argument of `define-key-after' defaults to t for convenience.
3308 ** The new function `replace-regexp-in-string' replaces all matches
3309 for a regexp in a string.
3311 ** `mouse-position' now runs the abnormal hook
3312 `mouse-position-function'.
3314 ** The function string-to-number now returns a float for numbers
3315 that don't fit into a Lisp integer.
3317 ** The variable keyword-symbols-constants-flag has been removed.
3318 Keywords are now always considered constants.
3320 ** The new function `delete-and-extract-region' deletes text and
3323 ** The function `clear-this-command-keys' now also clears the vector
3324 returned by function `recent-keys'.
3326 ** Variables `beginning-of-defun-function' and `end-of-defun-function'
3327 can be used to define handlers for the functions that find defuns.
3328 Major modes can define these locally instead of rebinding C-M-a
3329 etc. if the normal conventions for defuns are not appropriate for the
3332 ** easy-mmode-define-minor-mode now takes an additional BODY argument
3333 and is renamed `define-minor-mode'.
3335 ** If an abbrev has a hook function which is a symbol, and that symbol
3336 has a non-nil `no-self-insert' property, the return value of the hook
3337 function specifies whether an expansion has been done or not. If it
3338 returns nil, abbrev-expand also returns nil, meaning "no expansion has
3341 When abbrev expansion is done by typing a self-inserting character,
3342 and the abbrev has a hook with the `no-self-insert' property, and the
3343 hook function returns non-nil meaning expansion has been done,
3344 then the self-inserting character is not inserted.
3346 ** The function `intern-soft' now accepts a symbol as first argument.
3347 In this case, that exact symbol is looked up in the specified obarray,
3348 and the function's value is nil if it is not found.
3350 ** The new macro `with-syntax-table' can be used to evaluate forms
3351 with the syntax table of the current buffer temporarily set to a
3354 (with-syntax-table TABLE &rest BODY)
3356 Evaluate BODY with syntax table of current buffer set to a copy of
3357 TABLE. The current syntax table is saved, BODY is evaluated, and the
3358 saved table is restored, even in case of an abnormal exit. Value is
3361 ** Regular expressions now support intervals \{n,m\} as well as
3362 Perl's shy-groups \(?:...\) and non-greedy *? +? and ?? operators.
3363 Also back-references like \2 are now considered as an error if the
3364 corresponding subgroup does not exist (or is not closed yet).
3365 Previously it would have been silently turned into `2' (ignoring the `\').
3367 ** The optional argument BUFFER of function file-local-copy has been
3368 removed since it wasn't used by anything.
3370 ** The file name argument of function `file-locked-p' is now required
3371 instead of being optional.
3373 ** The new built-in error `text-read-only' is signaled when trying to
3374 modify read-only text.
3376 ** New functions and variables for locales.
3378 The new variable `locale-coding-system' specifies how to encode and
3379 decode strings passed to low-level message functions like strerror and
3380 time functions like strftime. The new variables
3381 `system-messages-locale' and `system-time-locale' give the system
3382 locales to be used when invoking these two types of functions.
3384 The new function `set-locale-environment' sets the language
3385 environment, preferred coding system, and locale coding system from
3386 the system locale as specified by the LC_ALL, LC_CTYPE, and LANG
3387 environment variables. Normally, it is invoked during startup and need
3388 not be invoked thereafter. It uses the new variables
3389 `locale-language-names', `locale-charset-language-names', and
3390 `locale-preferred-coding-systems' to make its decisions.
3392 ** syntax tables now understand nested comments.
3393 To declare a comment syntax as allowing nesting, just add an `n'
3394 modifier to either of the characters of the comment end and the comment
3397 ** The function `pixmap-spec-p' has been renamed `bitmap-spec-p'
3398 because `bitmap' is more in line with the usual X terminology.
3400 ** New function `propertize'
3402 The new function `propertize' can be used to conveniently construct
3403 strings with text properties.
3405 - Function: propertize STRING &rest PROPERTIES
3407 Value is a copy of STRING with text properties assigned as specified
3408 by PROPERTIES. PROPERTIES is a sequence of pairs PROPERTY VALUE, with
3409 PROPERTY being the name of a text property and VALUE being the
3410 specified value of that property. Example:
3412 (propertize "foo" 'face 'bold 'read-only t)
3414 ** push and pop macros.
3416 Simple versions of the push and pop macros of Common Lisp
3417 are now defined in Emacs Lisp. These macros allow only symbols
3418 as the place that holds the list to be changed.
3420 (push NEWELT LISTNAME) add NEWELT to the front of LISTNAME's value.
3421 (pop LISTNAME) return first elt of LISTNAME, and remove it
3422 (thus altering the value of LISTNAME).
3424 ** New dolist and dotimes macros.
3426 Simple versions of the dolist and dotimes macros of Common Lisp
3427 are now defined in Emacs Lisp.
3429 (dolist (VAR LIST [RESULT]) BODY...)
3430 Execute body once for each element of LIST,
3431 using the variable VAR to hold the current element.
3432 Then return the value of RESULT, or nil if RESULT is omitted.
3434 (dotimes (VAR COUNT [RESULT]) BODY...)
3435 Execute BODY with VAR bound to successive integers running from 0,
3436 inclusive, to COUNT, exclusive.
3437 Then return the value of RESULT, or nil if RESULT is omitted.
3439 ** Regular expressions now support Posix character classes such as
3440 [:alpha:], [:space:] and so on. These must be used within a character
3441 class--for instance, [-[:digit:].+] matches digits or a period
3444 [:digit:] matches 0 through 9
3445 [:cntrl:] matches ASCII control characters
3446 [:xdigit:] matches 0 through 9, a through f and A through F.
3447 [:blank:] matches space and tab only
3448 [:graph:] matches graphic characters--everything except ASCII control chars,
3450 [:print:] matches printing characters--everything except ASCII control chars
3452 [:alnum:] matches letters and digits.
3453 (But at present, for multibyte characters,
3454 it matches anything that has word syntax.)
3455 [:alpha:] matches letters.
3456 (But at present, for multibyte characters,
3457 it matches anything that has word syntax.)
3458 [:ascii:] matches ASCII (unibyte) characters.
3459 [:nonascii:] matches non-ASCII (multibyte) characters.
3460 [:lower:] matches anything lower-case.
3461 [:punct:] matches punctuation.
3462 (But at present, for multibyte characters,
3463 it matches anything that has non-word syntax.)
3464 [:space:] matches anything that has whitespace syntax.
3465 [:upper:] matches anything upper-case.
3466 [:word:] matches anything that has word syntax.
3468 ** Emacs now has built-in hash tables.
3470 The following functions are defined for hash tables:
3472 - Function: make-hash-table ARGS
3474 The argument list ARGS consists of keyword/argument pairs. All arguments
3475 are optional. The following arguments are defined:
3479 TEST must be a symbol specifying how to compare keys. Default is `eql'.
3480 Predefined are `eq', `eql' and `equal'. If TEST is not predefined,
3481 it must have been defined with `define-hash-table-test'.
3485 SIZE must be an integer > 0 giving a hint to the implementation how
3486 many elements will be put in the hash table. Default size is 65.
3488 :rehash-size REHASH-SIZE
3490 REHASH-SIZE specifies by how much to grow a hash table once it becomes
3491 full. If REHASH-SIZE is an integer, add that to the hash table's old
3492 size to get the new size. Otherwise, REHASH-SIZE must be a float >
3493 1.0, and the new size is computed by multiplying REHASH-SIZE with the
3494 old size. Default rehash size is 1.5.
3496 :rehash-threshold THRESHOLD
3498 THRESHOLD must be a float > 0 and <= 1.0 specifying when to resize the
3499 hash table. It is resized when the ratio of (number of entries) /
3500 (size of hash table) is >= THRESHOLD. Default threshold is 0.8.
3504 WEAK must be either nil, one of the symbols `key, `value',
3505 `key-or-value', `key-and-value', or t, meaning the same as
3506 `key-and-value'. Entries are removed from weak tables during garbage
3507 collection if their key and/or value are not referenced elsewhere
3508 outside of the hash table. Default are non-weak hash tables.
3510 - Function: makehash &optional TEST
3512 Similar to make-hash-table, but only TEST can be specified.
3514 - Function: hash-table-p TABLE
3516 Returns non-nil if TABLE is a hash table object.
3518 - Function: copy-hash-table TABLE
3520 Returns a copy of TABLE. Only the table itself is copied, keys and
3523 - Function: hash-table-count TABLE
3525 Returns the number of entries in TABLE.
3527 - Function: hash-table-rehash-size TABLE
3529 Returns the rehash size of TABLE.
3531 - Function: hash-table-rehash-threshold TABLE
3533 Returns the rehash threshold of TABLE.
3535 - Function: hash-table-rehash-size TABLE
3537 Returns the size of TABLE.
3539 - Function: hash-table-test TABLE
3541 Returns the test TABLE uses to compare keys.
3543 - Function: hash-table-weakness TABLE
3545 Returns the weakness specified for TABLE.
3547 - Function: clrhash TABLE
3551 - Function: gethash KEY TABLE &optional DEFAULT
3553 Look up KEY in TABLE and return its associated VALUE or DEFAULT if
3556 - Function: puthash KEY VALUE TABLE
3558 Associate KEY with VALUE in TABLE. If KEY is already associated with
3559 another value, replace the old value with VALUE.
3561 - Function: remhash KEY TABLE
3563 Remove KEY from TABLE if it is there.
3565 - Function: maphash FUNCTION TABLE
3567 Call FUNCTION for all elements in TABLE. FUNCTION must take two
3568 arguments KEY and VALUE.
3570 - Function: sxhash OBJ
3572 Return a hash code for Lisp object OBJ.
3574 - Function: define-hash-table-test NAME TEST-FN HASH-FN
3576 Define a new hash table test named NAME. If NAME is specified as
3577 a test in `make-hash-table', the table created will use TEST-FN for
3578 comparing keys, and HASH-FN to compute hash codes for keys. Test
3579 and hash function are stored as symbol property `hash-table-test'
3580 of NAME with a value of (TEST-FN HASH-FN).
3582 TEST-FN must take two arguments and return non-nil if they are the same.
3584 HASH-FN must take one argument and return an integer that is the hash
3585 code of the argument. The function should use the whole range of
3586 integer values for hash code computation, including negative integers.
3588 Example: The following creates a hash table whose keys are supposed to
3589 be strings that are compared case-insensitively.
3591 (defun case-fold-string= (a b)
3592 (compare-strings a nil nil b nil nil t))
3594 (defun case-fold-string-hash (a)
3595 (sxhash (upcase a)))
3597 (define-hash-table-test 'case-fold 'case-fold-string=
3598 'case-fold-string-hash))
3600 (make-hash-table :test 'case-fold)
3602 ** The Lisp reader handles circular structure.
3604 It now works to use the #N= and #N# constructs to represent
3605 circular structures. For example, #1=(a . #1#) represents
3606 a cons cell which is its own cdr.
3608 ** The Lisp printer handles circular structure.
3610 If you bind print-circle to a non-nil value, the Lisp printer outputs
3611 #N= and #N# constructs to represent circular and shared structure.
3613 ** If the second argument to `move-to-column' is anything but nil or
3614 t, that means replace a tab with spaces if necessary to reach the
3615 specified column, but do not add spaces at the end of the line if it
3616 is too short to reach that column.
3618 ** perform-replace has a new feature: the REPLACEMENTS argument may
3619 now be a cons cell (FUNCTION . DATA). This means to call FUNCTION
3620 after each match to get the replacement text. FUNCTION is called with
3621 two arguments: DATA, and the number of replacements already made.
3623 If the FROM-STRING contains any upper-case letters,
3624 perform-replace also turns off `case-fold-search' temporarily
3625 and inserts the replacement text without altering case in it.
3627 ** The function buffer-size now accepts an optional argument
3628 to specify which buffer to return the size of.
3630 ** The calendar motion commands now run the normal hook
3631 calendar-move-hook after moving point.
3633 ** The new variable small-temporary-file-directory specifies a
3634 directory to use for creating temporary files that are likely to be
3635 small. (Certain Emacs features use this directory.) If
3636 small-temporary-file-directory is nil, they use
3637 temporary-file-directory instead.
3639 ** The variable `inhibit-modification-hooks', if non-nil, inhibits all
3640 the hooks that track changes in the buffer. This affects
3641 `before-change-functions' and `after-change-functions', as well as
3642 hooks attached to text properties and overlay properties.
3644 ** assq-delete-all is a new function that deletes all the
3645 elements of an alist which have a car `eq' to a particular value.
3647 ** make-temp-file provides a more reliable way to create a temporary file.
3649 make-temp-file is used like make-temp-name, except that it actually
3650 creates the file before it returns. This prevents a timing error,
3651 ensuring that no other job can use the same name for a temporary file.
3653 ** New exclusive-open feature in `write-region'
3655 The optional seventh arg is now called MUSTBENEW. If non-nil, it insists
3656 on a check for an existing file with the same name. If MUSTBENEW
3657 is `excl', that means to get an error if the file already exists;
3658 never overwrite. If MUSTBENEW is neither nil nor `excl', that means
3659 ask for confirmation before overwriting, but do go ahead and
3660 overwrite the file if the user gives confirmation.
3662 If the MUSTBENEW argument in `write-region' is `excl',
3663 that means to use a special feature in the `open' system call
3664 to get an error if the file exists at that time.
3665 The error reported is `file-already-exists'.
3667 ** Function `format' now handles text properties.
3669 Text properties of the format string are applied to the result string.
3670 If the result string is longer than the format string, text properties
3671 ending at the end of the format string are extended to the end of the
3674 Text properties from string arguments are applied to the result
3675 string where arguments appear in the result string.
3679 (let ((s1 "hello, %s")
3681 (put-text-property 0 (length s1) 'face 'bold s1)
3682 (put-text-property 0 (length s2) 'face 'italic s2)
3685 results in a bold-face string with an italic `world' at the end.
3687 ** Messages can now be displayed with text properties.
3689 Text properties are handled as described above for function `format'.
3690 The following example displays a bold-face message with an italic
3693 (let ((msg "hello, %s!")
3695 (put-text-property 0 (length msg) 'face 'bold msg)
3696 (put-text-property 0 (length arg) 'face 'italic arg)
3701 Emacs supports playing sound files on GNU/Linux and the free BSDs
3702 (Voxware driver and native BSD driver, aka as Luigi's driver).
3704 Currently supported file formats are RIFF-WAVE (*.wav) and Sun Audio
3705 (*.au). You must configure Emacs with the option `--with-sound=yes'
3706 to enable sound support.
3708 Sound files can be played by calling (play-sound SOUND). SOUND is a
3709 list of the form `(sound PROPERTY...)'. The function is only defined
3710 when sound support is present for the system on which Emacs runs. The
3711 functions runs `play-sound-functions' with one argument which is the
3712 sound to play, before playing the sound.
3714 The following sound properties are supported:
3718 FILE is a file name. If FILE isn't an absolute name, it will be
3719 searched relative to `data-directory'.
3723 DATA is a string containing sound data. Either :file or :data
3724 may be present, but not both.
3728 VOLUME must be an integer in the range 0..100 or a float in the range
3729 0..1. This property is optional.
3733 DEVICE is a string specifying the system device on which to play the
3734 sound. The default device is system-dependent.
3736 Other properties are ignored.
3738 An alternative interface is called as
3739 (play-sound-file FILE &optional VOLUME DEVICE).
3741 ** `multimedia' is a new Finder keyword and Custom group.
3743 ** keywordp is a new predicate to test efficiently for an object being
3746 ** Changes to garbage collection
3748 *** The function garbage-collect now additionally returns the number
3749 of live and free strings.
3751 *** There is a new variable `strings-consed' holding the number of
3752 strings that have been consed so far.
3755 * Lisp-level Display features added after release 2.6 of the Emacs
3758 ** The user-option `resize-mini-windows' controls how Emacs resizes
3761 ** The function `pos-visible-in-window-p' now has a third optional
3762 argument, PARTIALLY. If a character is only partially visible, nil is
3763 returned, unless PARTIALLY is non-nil.
3765 ** On window systems, `glyph-table' is no longer used.
3767 ** Help strings in menu items are now used to provide `help-echo' text.
3769 ** The function `image-size' can be used to determine the size of an
3772 - Function: image-size SPEC &optional PIXELS FRAME
3774 Return the size of an image as a pair (WIDTH . HEIGHT).
3776 SPEC is an image specification. PIXELS non-nil means return sizes
3777 measured in pixels, otherwise return sizes measured in canonical
3778 character units (fractions of the width/height of the frame's default
3779 font). FRAME is the frame on which the image will be displayed.
3780 FRAME nil or omitted means use the selected frame.
3782 ** The function `image-mask-p' can be used to determine if an image
3785 - Function: image-mask-p SPEC &optional FRAME
3787 Return t if image SPEC has a mask bitmap.
3788 FRAME is the frame on which the image will be displayed. FRAME nil
3789 or omitted means use the selected frame.
3791 ** The function `find-image' can be used to find a usable image
3792 satisfying one of a list of specifications.
3794 ** The STRING argument of `put-image' and `insert-image' is now
3797 ** Image specifications may contain the property `:ascent center' (see
3801 * New Lisp-level Display features in Emacs 21.1
3803 Note that +++ before an item means the Lisp manual has been updated.
3804 --- means that I have decided it does not need to be in the Lisp manual.
3805 When you add a new item, please add it without either +++ or ---
3806 so I will know I still need to look at it -- rms.
3808 ** The function tty-suppress-bold-inverse-default-colors can be used
3809 to make Emacs avoid displaying text with bold black foreground on TTYs.
3811 Some terminals, notably PC consoles, emulate bold text by displaying
3812 text in brighter colors. On such a console, a bold black foreground
3813 is displayed in a gray color. If this turns out to be hard to read on
3814 your monitor---the problem occurred with the mode line on
3815 laptops---you can instruct Emacs to ignore the text's boldness, and to
3816 just display it black instead.
3818 This situation can't be detected automatically. You will have to put
3821 (tty-suppress-bold-inverse-default-colors t)
3825 ** New face implementation.
3827 Emacs faces have been reimplemented from scratch. They don't use XLFD
3828 font names anymore and face merging now works as expected.
3832 Each face can specify the following display attributes:
3834 1. Font family or fontset alias name.
3836 2. Relative proportionate width, aka character set width or set
3837 width (swidth), e.g. `semi-compressed'.
3839 3. Font height in 1/10pt
3841 4. Font weight, e.g. `bold'.
3843 5. Font slant, e.g. `italic'.
3845 6. Foreground color.
3847 7. Background color.
3849 8. Whether or not characters should be underlined, and in what color.
3851 9. Whether or not characters should be displayed in inverse video.
3853 10. A background stipple, a bitmap.
3855 11. Whether or not characters should be overlined, and in what color.
3857 12. Whether or not characters should be strike-through, and in what
3860 13. Whether or not a box should be drawn around characters, its
3861 color, the width of the box lines, and 3D appearance.
3863 Faces are frame-local by nature because Emacs allows to define the
3864 same named face (face names are symbols) differently for different
3865 frames. Each frame has an alist of face definitions for all named
3866 faces. The value of a named face in such an alist is a Lisp vector
3867 with the symbol `face' in slot 0, and a slot for each of the face
3868 attributes mentioned above.
3870 There is also a global face alist `face-new-frame-defaults'. Face
3871 definitions from this list are used to initialize faces of newly
3874 A face doesn't have to specify all attributes. Those not specified
3875 have a nil value. Faces specifying all attributes are called
3880 The display style of a given character in the text is determined by
3881 combining several faces. This process is called `face merging'. Any
3882 aspect of the display style that isn't specified by overlays or text
3883 properties is taken from the `default' face. Since it is made sure
3884 that the default face is always fully-specified, face merging always
3885 results in a fully-specified face.
3887 *** Face realization.
3889 After all face attributes for a character have been determined by
3890 merging faces of that character, that face is `realized'. The
3891 realization process maps face attributes to what is physically
3892 available on the system where Emacs runs. The result is a `realized
3893 face' in form of an internal structure which is stored in the face
3894 cache of the frame on which it was realized.
3896 Face realization is done in the context of the charset of the
3897 character to display because different fonts and encodings are used
3898 for different charsets. In other words, for characters of different
3899 charsets, different realized faces are needed to display them.
3901 Except for composite characters, faces are always realized for a
3902 specific character set and contain a specific font, even if the face
3903 being realized specifies a fontset. The reason is that the result of
3904 the new font selection stage is better than what can be done with
3905 statically defined font name patterns in fontsets.
3907 In unibyte text, Emacs' charsets aren't applicable; function
3908 `char-charset' reports ASCII for all characters, including those >
3909 0x7f. The X registry and encoding of fonts to use is determined from
3910 the variable `face-default-registry' in this case. The variable is
3911 initialized at Emacs startup time from the font the user specified for
3914 Currently all unibyte text, i.e. all buffers with
3915 `enable-multibyte-characters' nil are displayed with fonts of the same
3916 registry and encoding `face-default-registry'. This is consistent
3917 with the fact that languages can also be set globally, only.
3919 **** Clearing face caches.
3921 The Lisp function `clear-face-cache' can be called to clear face caches
3922 on all frames. If called with a non-nil argument, it will also unload
3927 Font selection tries to find the best available matching font for a
3928 given (charset, face) combination. This is done slightly differently
3929 for faces specifying a fontset, or a font family name.
3931 If the face specifies a fontset name, that fontset determines a
3932 pattern for fonts of the given charset. If the face specifies a font
3933 family, a font pattern is constructed. Charset symbols have a
3934 property `x-charset-registry' for that purpose that maps a charset to
3935 an XLFD registry and encoding in the font pattern constructed.
3937 Available fonts on the system on which Emacs runs are then matched
3938 against the font pattern. The result of font selection is the best
3939 match for the given face attributes in this font list.
3941 Font selection can be influenced by the user.
3943 The user can specify the relative importance he gives the face
3944 attributes width, height, weight, and slant by setting
3945 face-font-selection-order (faces.el) to a list of face attribute
3946 names. The default is (:width :height :weight :slant), and means
3947 that font selection first tries to find a good match for the font
3948 width specified by a face, then---within fonts with that width---tries
3949 to find a best match for the specified font height, etc.
3951 Setting `face-font-family-alternatives' allows the user to specify
3952 alternative font families to try if a family specified by a face
3955 Setting `face-font-registry-alternatives' allows the user to specify
3956 all alternative font registry names to try for a face specifying a
3959 Please note that the interpretations of the above two variables are
3962 Setting face-ignored-fonts allows the user to ignore specific fonts.
3967 Emacs can make use of scalable fonts but doesn't do so by default,
3968 since the use of too many or too big scalable fonts may crash XFree86
3971 To enable scalable font use, set the variable
3972 `scalable-fonts-allowed'. A value of nil, the default, means never use
3973 scalable fonts. A value of t means any scalable font may be used.
3974 Otherwise, the value must be a list of regular expressions. A
3975 scalable font may then be used if it matches a regular expression from
3978 (setq scalable-fonts-allowed '("muleindian-2$"))
3980 allows the use of scalable fonts with registry `muleindian-2'.
3982 *** Functions and variables related to font selection.
3984 - Function: x-family-fonts &optional FAMILY FRAME
3986 Return a list of available fonts of family FAMILY on FRAME. If FAMILY
3987 is omitted or nil, list all families. Otherwise, FAMILY must be a
3988 string, possibly containing wildcards `?' and `*'.
3990 If FRAME is omitted or nil, use the selected frame. Each element of
3991 the result is a vector [FAMILY WIDTH POINT-SIZE WEIGHT SLANT FIXED-P
3992 FULL REGISTRY-AND-ENCODING]. FAMILY is the font family name.
3993 POINT-SIZE is the size of the font in 1/10 pt. WIDTH, WEIGHT, and
3994 SLANT are symbols describing the width, weight and slant of the font.
3995 These symbols are the same as for face attributes. FIXED-P is non-nil
3996 if the font is fixed-pitch. FULL is the full name of the font, and
3997 REGISTRY-AND-ENCODING is a string giving the registry and encoding of
3998 the font. The result list is sorted according to the current setting
3999 of the face font sort order.
4001 - Function: x-font-family-list
4003 Return a list of available font families on FRAME. If FRAME is
4004 omitted or nil, use the selected frame. Value is a list of conses
4005 (FAMILY . FIXED-P) where FAMILY is a font family, and FIXED-P is
4006 non-nil if fonts of that family are fixed-pitch.
4008 - Variable: font-list-limit
4010 Limit for font matching. If an integer > 0, font matching functions
4011 won't load more than that number of fonts when searching for a
4012 matching font. The default is currently 100.
4014 *** Setting face attributes.
4016 For the most part, the new face implementation is interface-compatible
4017 with the old one. Old face attribute related functions are now
4018 implemented in terms of the new functions `set-face-attribute' and
4021 Face attributes are identified by their names which are keyword
4022 symbols. All attributes can be set to `unspecified'.
4024 The following attributes are recognized:
4028 VALUE must be a string specifying the font family, e.g. ``courier'',
4029 or a fontset alias name. If a font family is specified, wild-cards `*'
4030 and `?' are allowed.
4034 VALUE specifies the relative proportionate width of the font to use.
4035 It must be one of the symbols `ultra-condensed', `extra-condensed',
4036 `condensed', `semi-condensed', `normal', `semi-expanded', `expanded',
4037 `extra-expanded', or `ultra-expanded'.
4041 VALUE must be either an integer specifying the height of the font to use
4042 in 1/10 pt, a floating point number specifying the amount by which to
4043 scale any underlying face, or a function, which is called with the old
4044 height (from the underlying face), and should return the new height.
4048 VALUE specifies the weight of the font to use. It must be one of the
4049 symbols `ultra-bold', `extra-bold', `bold', `semi-bold', `normal',
4050 `semi-light', `light', `extra-light', `ultra-light'.
4054 VALUE specifies the slant of the font to use. It must be one of the
4055 symbols `italic', `oblique', `normal', `reverse-italic', or
4058 `:foreground', `:background'
4060 VALUE must be a color name, a string.
4064 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be underlined. If
4065 VALUE is t, underline with foreground color of the face. If VALUE is
4066 a string, underline with that color. If VALUE is nil, explicitly
4071 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be overlined. If
4072 VALUE is t, overline with foreground color of the face. If VALUE is a
4073 string, overline with that color. If VALUE is nil, explicitly don't
4078 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be drawn with a line
4079 striking through them. If VALUE is t, use the foreground color of the
4080 face. If VALUE is a string, strike-through with that color. If VALUE
4081 is nil, explicitly don't strike through.
4085 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should have a box drawn
4086 around them. If VALUE is nil, explicitly don't draw boxes. If
4087 VALUE is t, draw a box with lines of width 1 in the foreground color
4088 of the face. If VALUE is a string, the string must be a color name,
4089 and the box is drawn in that color with a line width of 1. Otherwise,
4090 VALUE must be a property list of the form `(:line-width WIDTH
4091 :color COLOR :style STYLE)'. If a keyword/value pair is missing from
4092 the property list, a default value will be used for the value, as
4093 specified below. WIDTH specifies the width of the lines to draw; it
4094 defaults to 1. COLOR is the name of the color to draw in, default is
4095 the foreground color of the face for simple boxes, and the background
4096 color of the face for 3D boxes. STYLE specifies whether a 3D box
4097 should be draw. If STYLE is `released-button', draw a box looking
4098 like a released 3D button. If STYLE is `pressed-button' draw a box
4099 that appears like a pressed button. If STYLE is nil, the default if
4100 the property list doesn't contain a style specification, draw a 2D
4105 VALUE specifies whether characters in FACE should be displayed in
4106 inverse video. VALUE must be one of t or nil.
4110 If VALUE is a string, it must be the name of a file of pixmap data.
4111 The directories listed in the `x-bitmap-file-path' variable are
4112 searched. Alternatively, VALUE may be a list of the form (WIDTH
4113 HEIGHT DATA) where WIDTH and HEIGHT are the size in pixels, and DATA
4114 is a string containing the raw bits of the bitmap. VALUE nil means
4115 explicitly don't use a stipple pattern.
4117 For convenience, attributes `:family', `:width', `:height', `:weight',
4118 and `:slant' may also be set in one step from an X font name:
4122 Set font-related face attributes from VALUE. VALUE must be a valid
4123 XLFD font name. If it is a font name pattern, the first matching font
4124 is used--this is for compatibility with the behavior of previous
4127 For compatibility with Emacs 20, keywords `:bold' and `:italic' can
4128 be used to specify that a bold or italic font should be used. VALUE
4129 must be t or nil in that case. A value of `unspecified' is not allowed."
4131 Please see also the documentation of `set-face-attribute' and
4136 VALUE is the name of a face from which to inherit attributes, or a list
4137 of face names. Attributes from inherited faces are merged into the face
4138 like an underlying face would be, with higher priority than underlying faces.
4140 *** Face attributes and X resources
4142 The following X resource names can be used to set face attributes
4145 Face attribute X resource class
4146 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
4147 :family attributeFamily . Face.AttributeFamily
4148 :width attributeWidth Face.AttributeWidth
4149 :height attributeHeight Face.AttributeHeight
4150 :weight attributeWeight Face.AttributeWeight
4151 :slant attributeSlant Face.AttributeSlant
4152 foreground attributeForeground Face.AttributeForeground
4153 :background attributeBackground . Face.AttributeBackground
4154 :overline attributeOverline Face.AttributeOverline
4155 :strike-through attributeStrikeThrough Face.AttributeStrikeThrough
4156 :box attributeBox Face.AttributeBox
4157 :underline attributeUnderline Face.AttributeUnderline
4158 :inverse-video attributeInverse Face.AttributeInverse
4159 :stipple attributeStipple Face.AttributeStipple
4160 or attributeBackgroundPixmap
4161 Face.AttributeBackgroundPixmap
4162 :font attributeFont Face.AttributeFont
4163 :bold attributeBold Face.AttributeBold
4164 :italic attributeItalic . Face.AttributeItalic
4165 :font attributeFont Face.AttributeFont
4167 *** Text property `face'.
4169 The value of the `face' text property can now be a single face
4170 specification or a list of such specifications. Each face
4171 specification can be
4173 1. A symbol or string naming a Lisp face.
4175 2. A property list of the form (KEYWORD VALUE ...) where each
4176 KEYWORD is a face attribute name, and VALUE is an appropriate value
4177 for that attribute. Please see the doc string of `set-face-attribute'
4178 for face attribute names.
4180 3. Conses of the form (FOREGROUND-COLOR . COLOR) or
4181 (BACKGROUND-COLOR . COLOR) where COLOR is a color name. This is
4182 for compatibility with previous Emacs versions.
4184 ** Support functions for colors on text-only terminals.
4186 The function `tty-color-define' can be used to define colors for use
4187 on TTY and MSDOS frames. It maps a color name to a color number on
4188 the terminal. Emacs defines a couple of common color mappings by
4189 default. You can get defined colors with a call to
4190 `defined-colors'. The function `tty-color-clear' can be
4191 used to clear the mapping table.
4193 ** Unified support for colors independent of frame type.
4195 The new functions `defined-colors', `color-defined-p', `color-values',
4196 and `display-color-p' work for any type of frame. On frames whose
4197 type is neither x nor w32, these functions transparently map X-style
4198 color specifications to the closest colors supported by the frame
4199 display. Lisp programs should use these new functions instead of the
4200 old `x-defined-colors', `x-color-defined-p', `x-color-values', and
4201 `x-display-color-p'. (The old function names are still available for
4202 compatibility; they are now aliases of the new names.) Lisp programs
4203 should no more look at the value of the variable window-system to
4204 modify their color-related behavior.
4206 The primitives `color-gray-p' and `color-supported-p' also work for
4209 ** Platform-independent functions to describe display capabilities.
4211 The new functions `display-mouse-p', `display-popup-menus-p',
4212 `display-graphic-p', `display-selections-p', `display-screens',
4213 `display-pixel-width', `display-pixel-height', `display-mm-width',
4214 `display-mm-height', `display-backing-store', `display-save-under',
4215 `display-planes', `display-color-cells', `display-visual-class', and
4216 `display-grayscale-p' describe the basic capabilities of a particular
4217 display. Lisp programs should call these functions instead of testing
4218 the value of the variables `window-system' or `system-type', or calling
4219 platform-specific functions such as `x-display-pixel-width'.
4221 The new function `display-images-p' returns non-nil if a particular
4222 display can display image files.
4224 ** The minibuffer prompt is now actually inserted in the minibuffer.
4226 This makes it possible to scroll through the prompt, if you want to.
4227 To disallow this completely (like previous versions of emacs), customize
4228 the variable `minibuffer-prompt-properties', and turn on the
4229 `Inviolable' option.
4231 The function minibuffer-prompt-end returns the current position of the
4232 end of the minibuffer prompt, if the minibuffer is current.
4233 Otherwise, it returns zero.
4235 ** New `field' abstraction in buffers.
4237 There is now code to support an abstraction called `fields' in emacs
4238 buffers. A field is a contiguous region of text with the same `field'
4239 property (which can be a text property or an overlay).
4241 Many emacs functions, such as forward-word, forward-sentence,
4242 forward-paragraph, beginning-of-line, etc., stop moving when they come
4243 to the boundary between fields; beginning-of-line and end-of-line will
4244 not let the point move past the field boundary, but other movement
4245 commands continue into the next field if repeated. Stopping at field
4246 boundaries can be suppressed programmatically by binding
4247 `inhibit-field-text-motion' to a non-nil value around calls to these
4250 Now that the minibuffer prompt is inserted into the minibuffer, it is in
4251 a separate field from the user-input part of the buffer, so that common
4252 editing commands treat the user's text separately from the prompt.
4254 The following functions are defined for operating on fields:
4256 - Function: constrain-to-field NEW-POS OLD-POS &optional ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE ONLY-IN-LINE INHIBIT-CAPTURE-PROPERTY
4258 Return the position closest to NEW-POS that is in the same field as OLD-POS.
4260 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
4261 If NEW-POS is nil, then the current point is used instead, and set to the
4262 constrained position if that is different.
4264 If OLD-POS is at the boundary of two fields, then the allowable
4265 positions for NEW-POS depends on the value of the optional argument
4266 ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE: If ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE is nil, then NEW-POS is
4267 constrained to the field that has the same `field' char-property
4268 as any new characters inserted at OLD-POS, whereas if ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE
4269 is non-nil, NEW-POS is constrained to the union of the two adjacent
4270 fields. Additionally, if two fields are separated by another field with
4271 the special value `boundary', then any point within this special field is
4272 also considered to be `on the boundary'.
4274 If the optional argument ONLY-IN-LINE is non-nil and constraining
4275 NEW-POS would move it to a different line, NEW-POS is returned
4276 unconstrained. This useful for commands that move by line, like
4277 C-n or C-a, which should generally respect field boundaries
4278 only in the case where they can still move to the right line.
4280 If the optional argument INHIBIT-CAPTURE-PROPERTY is non-nil, and OLD-POS has
4281 a non-nil property of that name, then any field boundaries are ignored.
4283 Field boundaries are not noticed if `inhibit-field-text-motion' is non-nil.
4285 - Function: delete-field &optional POS
4287 Delete the field surrounding POS.
4288 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
4289 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
4291 - Function: field-beginning &optional POS ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE
4293 Return the beginning of the field surrounding POS.
4294 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
4295 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
4296 If ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE is non-nil and POS is at the beginning of its
4297 field, then the beginning of the *previous* field is returned.
4299 - Function: field-end &optional POS ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE
4301 Return the end of the field surrounding POS.
4302 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
4303 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
4304 If ESCAPE-FROM-EDGE is non-nil and POS is at the end of its field,
4305 then the end of the *following* field is returned.
4307 - Function: field-string &optional POS
4309 Return the contents of the field surrounding POS as a string.
4310 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
4311 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
4313 - Function: field-string-no-properties &optional POS
4315 Return the contents of the field around POS, without text-properties.
4316 A field is a region of text with the same `field' property.
4317 If POS is nil, the value of point is used for POS.
4321 Emacs can now display images. Images are inserted into text by giving
4322 strings or buffer text a `display' text property containing one of
4323 (AREA IMAGE) or IMAGE. The display of the `display' property value
4324 replaces the display of the characters having that property.
4326 If the property value has the form (AREA IMAGE), AREA must be one of
4327 `(margin left-margin)', `(margin right-margin)' or `(margin nil)'. If
4328 AREA is `(margin nil)', IMAGE will be displayed in the text area of a
4329 window, otherwise it will be displayed in the left or right marginal
4332 IMAGE is an image specification.
4334 *** Image specifications
4336 Image specifications are lists of the form `(image PROPS)' where PROPS
4337 is a property list whose keys are keyword symbols. Each
4338 specifications must contain a property `:type TYPE' with TYPE being a
4339 symbol specifying the image type, e.g. `xbm'. Properties not
4340 described below are ignored.
4342 The following is a list of properties all image types share.
4346 ASCENT must be a number in the range 0..100, or the symbol `center'.
4347 If it is a number, it specifies the percentage of the image's height
4348 to use for its ascent.
4350 If not specified, ASCENT defaults to the value 50 which means that the
4351 image will be centered with the base line of the row it appears in.
4353 If ASCENT is `center' the image is vertically centered around a
4354 centerline which is the vertical center of text drawn at the position
4355 of the image, in the manner specified by the text properties and
4356 overlays that apply to the image.
4360 MARGIN must be either a number >= 0 specifying how many pixels to put
4361 as margin around the image, or a pair (X . Y) with X specifying the
4362 horizontal margin and Y specifying the vertical margin. Default is 0.
4366 RELIEF is analogous to the `:relief' attribute of faces. Puts a relief
4371 Apply an image algorithm to the image before displaying it.
4373 ALGO `laplace' or `emboss' means apply a Laplace or ``emboss''
4374 edge-detection algorithm to the image.
4376 ALGO `(edge-detection :matrix MATRIX :color-adjust ADJUST)' means
4377 apply a general edge-detection algorithm. MATRIX must be either a
4378 nine-element list or a nine-element vector of numbers. A pixel at
4379 position x/y in the transformed image is computed from original pixels
4380 around that position. MATRIX specifies, for each pixel in the
4381 neighborhood of x/y, a factor with which that pixel will influence the
4382 transformed pixel; element 0 specifies the factor for the pixel at
4383 x-1/y-1, element 1 the factor for the pixel at x/y-1 etc. as shown
4386 (x-1/y-1 x/y-1 x+1/y-1
4388 x-1/y+1 x/y+1 x+1/y+1)
4390 The resulting pixel is computed from the color intensity of the color
4391 resulting from summing up the RGB values of surrounding pixels,
4392 multiplied by the specified factors, and dividing that sum by the sum
4393 of the factors' absolute values.
4395 Laplace edge-detection currently uses a matrix of
4401 Emboss edge-detection uses a matrix of
4407 ALGO `disabled' means transform the image so that it looks
4412 If MASK is `heuristic' or `(heuristic BG)', build a clipping mask for
4413 the image, so that the background of a frame is visible behind the
4414 image. If BG is not specified, or if BG is t, determine the
4415 background color of the image by looking at the 4 corners of the
4416 image, assuming the most frequently occurring color from the corners is
4417 the background color of the image. Otherwise, BG must be a list `(RED
4418 GREEN BLUE)' specifying the color to assume for the background of the
4421 If MASK is nil, remove a mask from the image, if it has one. Images
4422 in some formats include a mask which can be removed by specifying
4427 Load image from FILE. If FILE is not absolute after expanding it,
4428 search for the image in `data-directory'. Some image types support
4429 building images from data. When this is done, no `:file' property
4430 may be present in the image specification.
4434 Get image data from DATA. (As of this writing, this is not yet
4435 supported for image type `postscript'). Either :file or :data may be
4436 present in an image specification, but not both. All image types
4437 support strings as DATA, some types allow additional types of DATA.
4439 *** Supported image types
4441 **** XBM, image type `xbm'.
4443 XBM images don't require an external library. Additional image
4444 properties supported are
4448 FG must be a string specifying the image foreground color, or nil
4449 meaning to use the default. Default is the frame's foreground.
4453 BG must be a string specifying the image foreground color, or nil
4454 meaning to use the default. Default is the frame's background color.
4456 XBM images can be constructed from data instead of file. In this
4457 case, the image specification must contain the following properties
4458 instead of a `:file' property.
4462 WIDTH specifies the width of the image in pixels.
4466 HEIGHT specifies the height of the image in pixels.
4472 1. a string large enough to hold the bitmap data, i.e. it must
4473 have a size >= (WIDTH + 7) / 8 * HEIGHT
4475 2. a bool-vector of size >= WIDTH * HEIGHT
4477 3. a vector of strings or bool-vectors, one for each line of the
4480 4. a string that's an in-memory XBM file. Neither width nor
4481 height may be specified in this case because these are defined
4484 **** XPM, image type `xpm'
4486 XPM images require the external library `libXpm', package
4487 `xpm-3.4k.tar.gz', version 3.4k or later. Make sure the library is
4488 found when Emacs is configured by supplying appropriate paths via
4489 `--x-includes' and `--x-libraries'.
4491 Additional image properties supported are:
4493 `:color-symbols SYMBOLS'
4495 SYMBOLS must be a list of pairs (NAME . COLOR), with NAME being the
4496 name of color as it appears in an XPM file, and COLOR being an X color
4499 XPM images can be built from memory instead of files. In that case,
4500 add a `:data' property instead of a `:file' property.
4502 The XPM library uses libz in its implementation so that it is able
4503 to display compressed images.
4505 **** PBM, image type `pbm'
4507 PBM images don't require an external library. Color, gray-scale and
4508 mono images are supported. Additional image properties supported for
4513 FG must be a string specifying the image foreground color, or nil
4514 meaning to use the default. Default is the frame's foreground.
4518 BG must be a string specifying the image foreground color, or nil
4519 meaning to use the default. Default is the frame's background color.
4521 **** JPEG, image type `jpeg'
4523 Support for JPEG images requires the external library `libjpeg',
4524 package `jpegsrc.v6a.tar.gz', or later. Additional image properties
4527 **** TIFF, image type `tiff'
4529 Support for TIFF images requires the external library `libtiff',
4530 package `tiff-v3.4-tar.gz', or later. There are no additional image
4533 **** GIF, image type `gif'
4535 Support for GIF images requires the external library `libungif', package
4536 `libungif-4.1.0', or later.
4538 Additional image properties supported are:
4542 INDEX must be an integer >= 0. Load image number INDEX from a
4543 multi-image GIF file. An error is signaled if INDEX is too large.
4545 This could be used to implement limited support for animated GIFs.
4546 For example, the following function displays a multi-image GIF file
4547 at point-min in the current buffer, switching between sub-images
4550 (defun show-anim (file max)
4551 "Display multi-image GIF file FILE which contains MAX subimages."
4552 (display-anim (current-buffer) file 0 max t))
4554 (defun display-anim (buffer file idx max first-time)
4557 (let ((img (create-image file nil nil :index idx)))
4560 (goto-char (point-min))
4561 (unless first-time (delete-char 1))
4562 (insert-image img "x"))
4563 (run-with-timer 0.1 nil 'display-anim buffer file (1+ idx) max nil)))
4565 **** PNG, image type `png'
4567 Support for PNG images requires the external library `libpng',
4568 package `libpng-1.0.2.tar.gz', or later. There are no additional image
4571 **** Ghostscript, image type `postscript'.
4573 Additional image properties supported are:
4577 WIDTH is width of the image in pt (1/72 inch). WIDTH must be an
4578 integer. This is a required property.
4582 HEIGHT specifies the height of the image in pt (1/72 inch). HEIGHT
4583 must be a integer. This is an required property.
4587 BOX must be a list or vector of 4 integers giving the bounding box of
4588 the PS image, analogous to the `BoundingBox' comment found in PS
4589 files. This is an required property.
4591 Part of the Ghostscript interface is implemented in Lisp. See
4596 The variable `image-types' contains a list of those image types
4597 which are supported in the current configuration.
4599 Images are stored in an image cache and removed from the cache when
4600 they haven't been displayed for `image-cache-eviction-delay seconds.
4601 The function `clear-image-cache' can be used to clear the image cache
4602 manually. Images in the cache are compared with `equal', i.e. all
4603 images with `equal' specifications share the same image.
4605 *** Simplified image API, image.el
4607 The new Lisp package image.el contains functions that simplify image
4608 creation and putting images into text. The function `create-image'
4609 can be used to create images. The macro `defimage' can be used to
4610 define an image based on available image types. The functions
4611 `put-image' and `insert-image' can be used to insert an image into a
4616 Windows can now have margins which are used for special text
4619 To give a window margins, either set the buffer-local variables
4620 `left-margin-width' and `right-margin-width', or call
4621 `set-window-margins'. The function `window-margins' can be used to
4622 obtain the current settings. To make `left-margin-width' and
4623 `right-margin-width' take effect, you must set them before displaying
4624 the buffer in a window, or use `set-window-buffer' to force an update
4625 of the display margins.
4627 You can put text in margins by giving it a `display' text property
4628 containing a pair of the form `(LOCATION . VALUE)', where LOCATION is
4629 one of `left-margin' or `right-margin' or nil. VALUE can be either a
4630 string, an image specification or a stretch specification (see later
4635 Emacs displays short help messages in the echo area, when the mouse
4636 moves over a tool-bar item or a piece of text that has a text property
4637 `help-echo'. This feature also applies to strings in the mode line
4638 that have a `help-echo' property.
4640 If the value of the `help-echo' property is a function, that function
4641 is called with three arguments WINDOW, OBJECT and POSITION. WINDOW is
4642 the window in which the help was found.
4644 If OBJECT is a buffer, POS is the position in the buffer where the
4645 `help-echo' text property was found.
4647 If OBJECT is an overlay, that overlay has a `help-echo' property, and
4648 POS is the position in the overlay's buffer under the mouse.
4650 If OBJECT is a string (an overlay string or a string displayed with
4651 the `display' property), POS is the position in that string under the
4654 If the value of the `help-echo' property is neither a function nor a
4655 string, it is evaluated to obtain a help string.
4657 For tool-bar and menu-bar items, their key definition is used to
4658 determine the help to display. If their definition contains a
4659 property `:help FORM', FORM is evaluated to determine the help string.
4660 For tool-bar items without a help form, the caption of the item is
4661 used as help string.
4663 The hook `show-help-function' can be set to a function that displays
4664 the help string differently. For example, enabling a tooltip window
4665 causes the help display to appear there instead of in the echo area.
4667 ** Vertical fractional scrolling.
4669 The display of text in windows can be scrolled smoothly in pixels.
4670 This is useful, for example, for making parts of large images visible.
4672 The function `window-vscroll' returns the current value of vertical
4673 scrolling, a non-negative fraction of the canonical character height.
4674 The function `set-window-vscroll' can be used to set the vertical
4675 scrolling value. Here is an example of how these function might be
4678 (global-set-key [A-down]
4681 (set-window-vscroll (selected-window)
4682 (+ 0.5 (window-vscroll)))))
4683 (global-set-key [A-up]
4686 (set-window-vscroll (selected-window)
4687 (- (window-vscroll) 0.5)))))
4689 ** New hook `fontification-functions'.
4691 Functions from `fontification-functions' are called from redisplay
4692 when it encounters a region of text that is not yet fontified. This
4693 variable automatically becomes buffer-local when set. Each function
4694 is called with one argument, POS.
4696 At least one of the hook functions should fontify one or more
4697 characters starting at POS in the current buffer. It should mark them
4698 as fontified by giving them a non-nil value of the `fontified' text
4699 property. It may be reasonable for these functions to check for the
4700 `fontified' property and not put it back on, but they do not have to.
4702 ** Tool bar support.
4704 Emacs supports a tool bar at the top of a frame under X. The frame
4705 parameter `tool-bar-lines' (X resource "toolBar", class "ToolBar")
4706 controls how may lines to reserve for the tool bar. A zero value
4707 suppresses the tool bar. If the value is non-zero and
4708 `auto-resize-tool-bars' is non-nil the tool bar's size will be changed
4709 automatically so that all tool bar items are visible.
4711 *** Tool bar item definitions
4713 Tool bar items are defined using `define-key' with a prefix-key
4714 `tool-bar'. For example `(define-key global-map [tool-bar item1] ITEM)'
4715 where ITEM is a list `(menu-item CAPTION BINDING PROPS...)'.
4717 CAPTION is the caption of the item, If it's not a string, it is
4718 evaluated to get a string. The caption is currently not displayed in
4719 the tool bar, but it is displayed if the item doesn't have a `:help'
4720 property (see below).
4722 BINDING is the tool bar item's binding. Tool bar items with keymaps as
4723 binding are currently ignored.
4725 The following properties are recognized:
4729 FORM is evaluated and specifies whether the tool bar item is enabled
4734 FORM is evaluated and specifies whether the tool bar item is displayed.
4738 FUNCTION is called with one parameter, the same list BINDING in which
4739 FUNCTION is specified as the filter. The value FUNCTION returns is
4740 used instead of BINDING to display this item.
4742 `:button (TYPE SELECTED)'
4744 TYPE must be one of `:radio' or `:toggle'. SELECTED is evaluated
4745 and specifies whether the button is selected (pressed) or not.
4749 IMAGES is either a single image specification or a vector of four
4750 image specifications. If it is a vector, this table lists the
4751 meaning of each of the four elements:
4753 Index Use when item is
4754 ----------------------------------------
4755 0 enabled and selected
4756 1 enabled and deselected
4757 2 disabled and selected
4758 3 disabled and deselected
4760 If IMAGE is a single image specification, a Laplace edge-detection
4761 algorithm is used on that image to draw the image in disabled state.
4763 `:help HELP-STRING'.
4765 Gives a help string to display for the tool bar item. This help
4766 is displayed when the mouse is moved over the item.
4768 The function `toolbar-add-item' is a convenience function for adding
4769 toolbar items generally, and `tool-bar-add-item-from-menu' can be used
4770 to define a toolbar item with a binding copied from an item on the
4773 The default bindings use a menu-item :filter to derive the tool-bar
4774 dynamically from variable `tool-bar-map' which may be set
4775 buffer-locally to override the global map.
4777 *** Tool-bar-related variables.
4779 If `auto-resize-tool-bar' is non-nil, the tool bar will automatically
4780 resize to show all defined tool bar items. It will never grow larger
4781 than 1/4 of the frame's size.
4783 If `auto-raise-tool-bar-buttons' is non-nil, tool bar buttons will be
4784 raised when the mouse moves over them.
4786 You can add extra space between tool bar items by setting
4787 `tool-bar-button-margin' to a positive integer specifying a number of
4788 pixels, or a pair of integers (X . Y) specifying horizontal and
4789 vertical margins . Default is 1.
4791 You can change the shadow thickness of tool bar buttons by setting
4792 `tool-bar-button-relief' to an integer. Default is 3.
4794 *** Tool-bar clicks with modifiers.
4796 You can bind commands to clicks with control, shift, meta etc. on
4799 (define-key global-map [tool-bar shell]
4800 '(menu-item "Shell" shell
4801 :image (image :type xpm :file "shell.xpm")))
4803 is the original tool bar item definition, then
4805 (define-key global-map [tool-bar S-shell] 'some-command)
4807 makes a binding to run `some-command' for a shifted click on the same
4810 ** Mode line changes.
4812 *** Mouse-sensitive mode line.
4814 The mode line can be made mouse-sensitive by displaying strings there
4815 that have a `local-map' text property. There are three ways to display
4816 a string with a `local-map' property in the mode line.
4818 1. The mode line spec contains a variable whose string value has
4819 a `local-map' text property.
4821 2. The mode line spec contains a format specifier (e.g. `%12b'), and
4822 that format specifier has a `local-map' property.
4824 3. The mode line spec contains a list containing `:eval FORM'. FORM
4825 is evaluated. If the result is a string, and that string has a
4826 `local-map' property.
4828 The same mechanism is used to determine the `face' and `help-echo'
4829 properties of strings in the mode line. See `bindings.el' for an
4832 *** If a mode line element has the form `(:eval FORM)', FORM is
4833 evaluated and the result is used as mode line element.
4835 *** You can suppress mode-line display by setting the buffer-local
4836 variable mode-line-format to nil.
4838 *** A headerline can now be displayed at the top of a window.
4840 This mode line's contents are controlled by the new variable
4841 `header-line-format' and `default-header-line-format' which are
4842 completely analogous to `mode-line-format' and
4843 `default-mode-line-format'. A value of nil means don't display a top
4846 The appearance of top mode lines is controlled by the face
4849 The function `coordinates-in-window-p' returns `header-line' for a
4850 position in the header-line.
4852 ** Text property `display'
4854 The `display' text property is used to insert images into text,
4855 replace text with other text, display text in marginal area, and it is
4856 also used to control other aspects of how text displays. The value of
4857 the `display' property should be a display specification, as described
4858 below, or a list or vector containing display specifications.
4860 *** Replacing text, displaying text in marginal areas
4862 To replace the text having the `display' property with some other
4863 text, use a display specification of the form `(LOCATION STRING)'.
4865 If LOCATION is `(margin left-margin)', STRING is displayed in the left
4866 marginal area, if it is `(margin right-margin)', it is displayed in
4867 the right marginal area, and if LOCATION is `(margin nil)' STRING
4868 is displayed in the text. In the latter case you can also use the
4869 simpler form STRING as property value.
4871 *** Variable width and height spaces
4873 To display a space of fractional width or height, use a display
4874 specification of the form `(LOCATION STRECH)'. If LOCATION is
4875 `(margin left-margin)', the space is displayed in the left marginal
4876 area, if it is `(margin right-margin)', it is displayed in the right
4877 marginal area, and if LOCATION is `(margin nil)' the space is
4878 displayed in the text. In the latter case you can also use the
4879 simpler form STRETCH as property value.
4881 The stretch specification STRETCH itself is a list of the form `(space
4882 PROPS)', where PROPS is a property list which can contain the
4883 properties described below.
4885 The display of the fractional space replaces the display of the
4886 characters having the `display' property.
4890 Specifies that the space width should be WIDTH times the normal
4891 character width. WIDTH can be an integer or floating point number.
4893 - :relative-width FACTOR
4895 Specifies that the width of the stretch should be computed from the
4896 first character in a group of consecutive characters that have the
4897 same `display' property. The computation is done by multiplying the
4898 width of that character by FACTOR.
4902 Specifies that the space should be wide enough to reach HPOS. The
4903 value HPOS is measured in units of the normal character width.
4905 Exactly one of the above properties should be used.
4909 Specifies the height of the space, as HEIGHT, measured in terms of the
4912 - :relative-height FACTOR
4914 The height of the space is computed as the product of the height
4915 of the text having the `display' property and FACTOR.
4919 Specifies that ASCENT percent of the height of the stretch should be
4920 used for the ascent of the stretch, i.e. for the part above the
4921 baseline. The value of ASCENT must be a non-negative number less or
4924 You should not use both `:height' and `:relative-height' together.
4928 A display specification for an image has the form `(LOCATION
4929 . IMAGE)', where IMAGE is an image specification. The image replaces,
4930 in the display, the characters having this display specification in
4931 their `display' text property. If LOCATION is `(margin left-margin)',
4932 the image will be displayed in the left marginal area, if it is
4933 `(margin right-margin)' it will be displayed in the right marginal
4934 area, and if LOCATION is `(margin nil)' the image will be displayed in
4935 the text. In the latter case you can also use the simpler form IMAGE
4936 as display specification.
4938 *** Other display properties
4940 - (space-width FACTOR)
4942 Specifies that space characters in the text having that property
4943 should be displayed FACTOR times as wide as normal; FACTOR must be an
4948 Display text having this property in a font that is smaller or larger.
4950 If HEIGHT is a list of the form `(+ N)', where N is an integer, that
4951 means to use a font that is N steps larger. If HEIGHT is a list of
4952 the form `(- N)', that means to use a font that is N steps smaller. A
4953 ``step'' is defined by the set of available fonts; each size for which
4954 a font is available counts as a step.
4956 If HEIGHT is a number, that means to use a font that is HEIGHT times
4957 as tall as the frame's default font.
4959 If HEIGHT is a symbol, it is called as a function with the current
4960 height as argument. The function should return the new height to use.
4962 Otherwise, HEIGHT is evaluated to get the new height, with the symbol
4963 `height' bound to the current specified font height.
4967 FACTOR must be a number, specifying a multiple of the current
4968 font's height. If it is positive, that means to display the characters
4969 raised. If it is negative, that means to display them lower down. The
4970 amount of raising or lowering is computed without taking account of the
4971 `height' subproperty.
4973 *** Conditional display properties
4975 All display specifications can be conditionalized. If a specification
4976 has the form `(when CONDITION . SPEC)', the specification SPEC applies
4977 only when CONDITION yields a non-nil value when evaluated. During the
4978 evaluation, `object' is bound to the string or buffer having the
4979 conditional display property; `position' and `buffer-position' are
4980 bound to the position within `object' and the buffer position where
4981 the display property was found, respectively. Both positions can be
4982 different when object is a string.
4984 The normal specification consisting of SPEC only is equivalent to
4987 ** New menu separator types.
4989 Emacs now supports more than one menu separator type. Menu items with
4990 item names consisting of dashes only (including zero dashes) are
4991 treated like before. In addition, the following item names are used
4992 to specify other menu separator types.
4994 - `--no-line' or `--space', or `--:space', or `--:noLine'
4996 No separator lines are drawn, but a small space is inserted where the
4999 - `--single-line' or `--:singleLine'
5001 A single line in the menu's foreground color.
5003 - `--double-line' or `--:doubleLine'
5005 A double line in the menu's foreground color.
5007 - `--single-dashed-line' or `--:singleDashedLine'
5009 A single dashed line in the menu's foreground color.
5011 - `--double-dashed-line' or `--:doubleDashedLine'
5013 A double dashed line in the menu's foreground color.
5015 - `--shadow-etched-in' or `--:shadowEtchedIn'
5017 A single line with 3D sunken appearance. This is the form
5018 displayed for item names consisting of dashes only.
5020 - `--shadow-etched-out' or `--:shadowEtchedOut'
5022 A single line with 3D raised appearance.
5024 - `--shadow-etched-in-dash' or `--:shadowEtchedInDash'
5026 A single dashed line with 3D sunken appearance.
5028 - `--shadow-etched-out-dash' or `--:shadowEtchedOutDash'
5030 A single dashed line with 3D raise appearance.
5032 - `--shadow-double-etched-in' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedIn'
5034 Two lines with 3D sunken appearance.
5036 - `--shadow-double-etched-out' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedOut'
5038 Two lines with 3D raised appearance.
5040 - `--shadow-double-etched-in-dash' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedInDash'
5042 Two dashed lines with 3D sunken appearance.
5044 - `--shadow-double-etched-out-dash' or `--:shadowDoubleEtchedOutDash'
5046 Two dashed lines with 3D raised appearance.
5048 Under LessTif/Motif, the last four separator types are displayed like
5049 the corresponding single-line separators.
5051 ** New frame parameters for scroll bar colors.
5053 The new frame parameters `scroll-bar-foreground' and
5054 `scroll-bar-background' can be used to change scroll bar colors.
5055 Their value must be either a color name, a string, or nil to specify
5056 that scroll bars should use a default color. For toolkit scroll bars,
5057 default colors are toolkit specific. For non-toolkit scroll bars, the
5058 default background is the background color of the frame, and the
5059 default foreground is black.
5061 The X resource name of these parameters are `scrollBarForeground'
5062 (class ScrollBarForeground) and `scrollBarBackground' (class
5063 `ScrollBarBackground').
5065 Setting these parameters overrides toolkit specific X resource
5066 settings for scroll bar colors.
5068 ** You can set `redisplay-dont-pause' to a non-nil value to prevent
5069 display updates from being interrupted when input is pending.
5071 ** Changing a window's width may now change its window start if it
5072 starts on a continuation line. The new window start is computed based
5073 on the window's new width, starting from the start of the continued
5074 line as the start of the screen line with the minimum distance from
5075 the original window start.
5077 ** The variable `hscroll-step' and the functions
5078 `hscroll-point-visible' and `hscroll-window-column' have been removed
5079 now that proper horizontal scrolling is implemented.
5081 ** Windows can now be made fixed-width and/or fixed-height.
5083 A window is fixed-size if its buffer has a buffer-local variable
5084 `window-size-fixed' whose value is not nil. A value of `height' makes
5085 windows fixed-height, a value of `width' makes them fixed-width, any
5086 other non-nil value makes them both fixed-width and fixed-height.
5088 The following code makes all windows displaying the current buffer
5089 fixed-width and fixed-height.
5091 (set (make-local-variable 'window-size-fixed) t)
5093 A call to enlarge-window on a window gives an error if that window is
5094 fixed-width and it is tried to change the window's width, or if the
5095 window is fixed-height, and it is tried to change its height. To
5096 change the size of a fixed-size window, bind `window-size-fixed'
5097 temporarily to nil, for example
5099 (let ((window-size-fixed nil))
5100 (enlarge-window 10))
5102 Likewise, an attempt to split a fixed-height window vertically,
5103 or a fixed-width window horizontally results in a error.
5105 ** The cursor-type frame parameter is now supported on MS-DOS
5106 terminals. When Emacs starts, it by default changes the cursor shape
5107 to a solid box, as it does on Unix. The `cursor-type' frame parameter
5108 overrides this as it does on Unix, except that the bar cursor is
5109 horizontal rather than vertical (since the MS-DOS display doesn't
5110 support a vertical-bar cursor).
5114 * Emacs 20.7 is a bug-fix release with few user-visible changes
5116 ** It is now possible to use CCL-based coding systems for keyboard
5119 ** ange-ftp now handles FTP security extensions, like Kerberos.
5121 ** Rmail has been extended to recognize more forms of digest messages.
5123 ** Now, most coding systems set in keyboard coding system work not
5124 only for character input, but also in incremental search. The
5125 exceptions are such coding systems that handle 2-byte character sets
5126 (e.g euc-kr, euc-jp) and that use ISO's escape sequence
5127 (e.g. iso-2022-jp). They are ignored in incremental search.
5129 ** Support for Macintosh PowerPC-based machines running GNU/Linux has
5133 * Emacs 20.6 is a bug-fix release with one user-visible change
5135 ** Support for ARM-based non-RISCiX machines has been added.
5139 * Emacs 20.5 is a bug-fix release with no user-visible changes.
5141 ** Not new, but not mentioned before:
5142 M-w when Transient Mark mode is enabled disables the mark.
5144 * Changes in Emacs 20.4
5146 ** Init file may be called .emacs.el.
5148 You can now call the Emacs init file `.emacs.el'.
5149 Formerly the name had to be `.emacs'. If you use the name
5150 `.emacs.el', you can byte-compile the file in the usual way.
5152 If both `.emacs' and `.emacs.el' exist, the latter file
5153 is the one that is used.
5155 ** shell-command, and shell-command-on-region, now return
5156 the exit code of the command (unless it is asynchronous).
5157 Also, you can specify a place to put the error output,
5158 separate from the command's regular output.
5159 Interactively, the variable shell-command-default-error-buffer
5160 says where to put error output; set it to a buffer name.
5161 In calls from Lisp, an optional argument ERROR-BUFFER specifies
5164 When you specify a non-nil error buffer (or buffer name), any error
5165 output is inserted before point in that buffer, with \f\n to separate
5166 it from the previous batch of error output. The error buffer is not
5167 cleared, so error output from successive commands accumulates there.
5169 ** Setting the default value of enable-multibyte-characters to nil in
5170 the .emacs file, either explicitly using setq-default, or via Custom,
5171 is now essentially equivalent to using --unibyte: all buffers
5172 created during startup will be made unibyte after loading .emacs.
5174 ** C-x C-f now handles the wildcards * and ? in file names. For
5175 example, typing C-x C-f c*.c RET visits all the files whose names
5176 match c*.c. To visit a file whose name contains * or ?, add the
5177 quoting sequence /: to the beginning of the file name.
5179 ** The M-x commands keep-lines, flush-lines and count-matches
5180 now have the same feature as occur and query-replace:
5181 if the pattern contains any upper case letters, then
5182 they never ignore case.
5184 ** The end-of-line format conversion feature previously mentioned
5185 under `* Emacs 20.1 changes for MS-DOS and MS-Windows' actually
5186 applies to all operating systems. Emacs recognizes from the contents
5187 of a file what convention it uses to separate lines--newline, CRLF, or
5188 just CR--and automatically converts the contents to the normal Emacs
5189 convention (using newline to separate lines) for editing. This is a
5190 part of the general feature of coding system conversion.
5192 If you subsequently save the buffer, Emacs converts the text back to
5193 the same format that was used in the file before.
5195 You can turn off end-of-line conversion by setting the variable
5196 `inhibit-eol-conversion' to non-nil, e.g. with Custom in the MULE group.
5198 ** The character set property `prefered-coding-system' has been
5199 renamed to `preferred-coding-system', for the sake of correct spelling.
5200 This is a fairly internal feature, so few programs should be affected.
5202 ** Mode-line display of end-of-line format is changed.
5203 The indication of the end-of-line format of the file visited by a
5204 buffer is now more explicit when that format is not the usual one for
5205 your operating system. For example, the DOS-style end-of-line format
5206 is displayed as "(DOS)" on Unix and GNU/Linux systems. The usual
5207 end-of-line format is still displayed as a single character (colon for
5208 Unix, backslash for DOS and Windows, and forward slash for the Mac).
5210 The values of the variables eol-mnemonic-unix, eol-mnemonic-dos,
5211 eol-mnemonic-mac, and eol-mnemonic-undecided, which are strings,
5212 control what is displayed in the mode line for each end-of-line
5213 format. You can now customize these variables.
5215 ** In the previous version of Emacs, tar-mode didn't work well if a
5216 filename contained non-ASCII characters. Now this is fixed. Such a
5217 filename is decoded by file-name-coding-system if the default value of
5218 enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil.
5220 ** The command temp-buffer-resize-mode toggles a minor mode
5221 in which temporary buffers (such as help buffers) are given
5222 windows just big enough to hold the whole contents.
5224 ** If you use completion.el, you must now run the function
5225 dynamic-completion-mode to enable it. Just loading the file
5226 doesn't have any effect.
5228 ** In Flyspell mode, the default is now to make just one Ispell process,
5231 ** If you use iswitchb but do not call (iswitchb-default-keybindings) to
5232 use the default keybindings, you will need to add the following line:
5233 (add-hook 'minibuffer-setup-hook 'iswitchb-minibuffer-setup)
5235 ** Auto-show mode is no longer enabled just by loading auto-show.el.
5236 To control it, set `auto-show-mode' via Custom or use the
5237 `auto-show-mode' command.
5239 ** Handling of X fonts' ascent/descent parameters has been changed to
5240 avoid redisplay problems. As a consequence, compared with previous
5241 versions the line spacing and frame size now differ with some font
5242 choices, typically increasing by a pixel per line. This change
5243 occurred in version 20.3 but was not documented then.
5245 ** If you select the bar cursor style, it uses the frame's
5246 cursor-color, rather than the cursor foreground pixel.
5248 ** In multibyte mode, Rmail decodes incoming MIME messages using the
5249 character set specified in the message. If you want to disable this
5250 feature, set the variable rmail-decode-mime-charset to nil.
5252 ** Not new, but not mentioned previously in NEWS: when you use #! at
5253 the beginning of a file to make it executable and specify an
5254 interpreter program, Emacs looks on the second line for the -*- mode
5255 and variable specification, as well as on the first line.
5257 ** Support for IBM codepage encoding of non-ASCII characters.
5259 The new command M-x codepage-setup creates a special coding system
5260 that can be used to convert text between a specific IBM codepage and
5261 one of the character sets built into Emacs which matches that
5262 codepage. For example, codepage 850 corresponds to Latin-1 character
5263 set, codepage 855 corresponds to Cyrillic-ISO character set, etc.
5265 Windows codepages 1250, 1251 and some others, where Windows deviates
5266 from the corresponding ISO character set, are also supported.
5268 IBM box-drawing characters and other glyphs which don't have
5269 equivalents in the corresponding ISO character set, are converted to
5270 a character defined by dos-unsupported-char-glyph on MS-DOS, and to
5271 `?' on other systems.
5273 IBM codepages are widely used on MS-DOS and MS-Windows, so this
5274 feature is most useful on those platforms, but it can also be used on
5277 Emacs compiled for MS-DOS automatically loads the support for the
5278 current codepage when it starts.
5282 *** When mail is sent using compose-mail (C-x m), and if
5283 `mail-send-nonascii' is set to the new default value `mime',
5284 appropriate MIME headers are added. The headers are added only if
5285 non-ASCII characters are present in the body of the mail, and no other
5286 MIME headers are already present. For example, the following three
5287 headers are added if the coding system used in the *mail* buffer is
5291 Content-type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
5292 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
5294 *** The new variable default-sendmail-coding-system specifies the
5295 default way to encode outgoing mail. This has higher priority than
5296 default-buffer-file-coding-system but has lower priority than
5297 sendmail-coding-system and the local value of
5298 buffer-file-coding-system.
5300 You should not set this variable manually. Instead, set
5301 sendmail-coding-system to specify a fixed encoding for all outgoing
5304 *** When you try to send a message that contains non-ASCII characters,
5305 if the coding system specified by those variables doesn't handle them,
5306 Emacs will ask you to select a suitable coding system while showing a
5307 list of possible coding systems.
5311 *** c-default-style can now take an association list that maps major
5312 modes to style names. When this variable is an alist, Java mode no
5313 longer hardcodes a setting to "java" style. See the variable's
5314 docstring for details.
5316 *** It's now possible to put a list as the offset on a syntactic
5317 symbol. The list is evaluated recursively until a non-nil offset is
5318 found. This is useful to combine several lineup functions to act in a
5319 prioritized order on a single line. However, none of the supplied
5320 lineup functions use this feature currently.
5322 *** New syntactic symbol catch-clause, which is used on the "catch" and
5323 "finally" lines in try-catch constructs in C++ and Java.
5325 *** New cleanup brace-catch-brace on c-cleanup-list, which does for
5326 "catch" lines what brace-elseif-brace does for "else if" lines.
5328 *** The braces of Java anonymous inner classes are treated separately
5329 from the braces of other classes in auto-newline mode. Two new
5330 symbols inexpr-class-open and inexpr-class-close may be used on
5331 c-hanging-braces-alist to control the automatic newlines used for
5334 *** Support for the Pike language added, along with new Pike specific
5335 syntactic symbols: inlambda, lambda-intro-cont
5337 *** Support for Java anonymous classes via new syntactic symbol
5338 inexpr-class. New syntactic symbol inexpr-statement for Pike
5339 support and gcc-style statements inside expressions. New lineup
5340 function c-lineup-inexpr-block.
5342 *** New syntactic symbol brace-entry-open which is used in brace lists
5343 (i.e. static initializers) when a list entry starts with an open
5344 brace. These used to be recognized as brace-list-entry's.
5345 c-electric-brace also recognizes brace-entry-open braces
5346 (brace-list-entry's can no longer be electrified).
5348 *** New command c-indent-line-or-region, not bound by default.
5350 *** `#' is only electric when typed in the indentation of a line.
5352 *** Parentheses are now electric (via the new command c-electric-paren)
5353 for auto-reindenting lines when parens are typed.
5355 *** In "gnu" style, inline-open offset is now set to zero.
5357 *** Uniform handling of the inclass syntactic symbol. The indentation
5358 associated with it is now always relative to the class opening brace.
5359 This means that the indentation behavior has changed in some
5360 circumstances, but only if you've put anything besides 0 on the
5361 class-open syntactic symbol (none of the default styles do that).
5365 *** New functionality for using Gnus as an offline newsreader has been
5366 added. A plethora of new commands and modes have been added. See the
5367 Gnus manual for the full story.
5369 *** The nndraft backend has returned, but works differently than
5370 before. All Message buffers are now also articles in the nndraft
5371 group, which is created automatically.
5373 *** `gnus-alter-header-function' can now be used to alter header
5376 *** `gnus-summary-goto-article' now accept Message-ID's.
5378 *** A new Message command for deleting text in the body of a message
5379 outside the region: `C-c C-v'.
5381 *** You can now post to component group in nnvirtual groups with
5384 *** `nntp-rlogin-program' -- new variable to ease customization.
5386 *** `C-u C-c C-c' in `gnus-article-edit-mode' will now inhibit
5387 re-highlighting of the article buffer.
5389 *** New element in `gnus-boring-article-headers' -- `long-to'.
5391 *** `M-i' symbolic prefix command. See the section "Symbolic
5392 Prefixes" in the Gnus manual for details.
5394 *** `L' and `I' in the summary buffer now take the symbolic prefix
5395 `a' to add the score rule to the "all.SCORE" file.
5397 *** `gnus-simplify-subject-functions' variable to allow greater
5398 control over simplification.
5400 *** `A T' -- new command for fetching the current thread.
5402 *** `/ T' -- new command for including the current thread in the
5405 *** `M-RET' is a new Message command for breaking cited text.
5407 *** \\1-expressions are now valid in `nnmail-split-methods'.
5409 *** The `custom-face-lookup' function has been removed.
5410 If you used this function in your initialization files, you must
5411 rewrite them to use `face-spec-set' instead.
5413 *** Canceling now uses the current select method. Symbolic prefix
5414 `a' forces normal posting method.
5416 *** New command to translate M******** sm*rtq**t*s into proper text
5419 *** For easier debugging of nntp, you can set `nntp-record-commands'
5422 *** nntp now uses ~/.authinfo, a .netrc-like file, for controlling
5423 where and how to send AUTHINFO to NNTP servers.
5425 *** A command for editing group parameters from the summary buffer
5428 *** A history of where mails have been split is available.
5430 *** A new article date command has been added -- `article-date-iso8601'.
5432 *** Subjects can be simplified when threading by setting
5433 `gnus-score-thread-simplify'.
5435 *** A new function for citing in Message has been added --
5436 `message-cite-original-without-signature'.
5438 *** `article-strip-all-blank-lines' -- new article command.
5440 *** A new Message command to kill to the end of the article has
5443 *** A minimum adaptive score can be specified by using the
5444 `gnus-adaptive-word-minimum' variable.
5446 *** The "lapsed date" article header can be kept continually
5447 updated by the `gnus-start-date-timer' command.
5449 *** Web listserv archives can be read with the nnlistserv backend.
5451 *** Old dejanews archives can now be read by nnweb.
5453 *** `gnus-posting-styles' has been re-activated.
5455 ** Changes to TeX and LaTeX mode
5457 *** The new variable `tex-start-options-string' can be used to give
5458 options for the TeX run. The default value causes TeX to run in
5459 nonstopmode. For an interactive TeX run set it to nil or "".
5461 *** The command `tex-feed-input' sends input to the Tex Shell. In a
5462 TeX buffer it is bound to the keys C-RET, C-c RET, and C-c C-m (some
5463 of these keys may not work on all systems). For instance, if you run
5464 TeX interactively and if the TeX run stops because of an error, you
5465 can continue it without leaving the TeX buffer by typing C-RET.
5467 *** The Tex Shell Buffer is now in `compilation-shell-minor-mode'.
5468 All error-parsing commands of the Compilation major mode are available
5469 but bound to keys that don't collide with the shell. Thus you can use
5470 the Tex Shell for command line executions like a usual shell.
5472 *** The commands `tex-validate-region' and `tex-validate-buffer' check
5473 the matching of braces and $'s. The errors are listed in a *Occur*
5474 buffer and you can use C-c C-c or mouse-2 to go to a particular
5477 ** Changes to RefTeX mode
5479 *** The table of contents buffer can now also display labels and
5480 file boundaries in addition to sections. Use `l', `i', and `c' keys.
5482 *** Labels derived from context (the section heading) are now
5483 lowercase by default. To make the label legal in LaTeX, latin-1
5484 characters will lose their accent. All Mule characters will be
5485 removed from the label.
5487 *** The automatic display of cross reference information can also use
5488 a window instead of the echo area. See variable `reftex-auto-view-crossref'.
5490 *** kpsewhich can be used by RefTeX to find TeX and BibTeX files. See the
5491 customization group `reftex-finding-files'.
5493 *** The option `reftex-bibfile-ignore-list' has been renamed to
5494 `reftex-bibfile-ignore-regexps' and indeed can be fed with regular
5497 *** Multiple Selection buffers are now hidden buffers.
5499 ** New/deleted modes and packages
5501 *** The package snmp-mode.el provides major modes for editing SNMP and
5502 SNMPv2 MIBs. It has entries on `auto-mode-alist'.
5504 *** The package sql.el provides a major mode, M-x sql-mode, for
5505 editing SQL files, and M-x sql-interactive-mode for interacting with
5506 SQL interpreters. It has an entry on `auto-mode-alist'.
5508 *** M-x highlight-changes-mode provides a minor mode displaying buffer
5509 changes with a special face.
5511 *** ispell4.el has been deleted. It got in the way of ispell.el and
5512 this was hard to fix reliably. It has long been obsolete -- use
5513 Ispell 3.1 and ispell.el.
5515 * MS-DOS changes in Emacs 20.4
5517 ** Emacs compiled for MS-DOS now supports MULE features better.
5518 This includes support for display of all ISO 8859-N character sets,
5519 conversion to and from IBM codepage encoding of non-ASCII characters,
5520 and automatic setup of the MULE environment at startup. For details,
5521 check out the section `MS-DOS and MULE' in the manual.
5523 The MS-DOS installation procedure automatically configures and builds
5524 Emacs with input method support if it finds an unpacked Leim
5525 distribution when the config.bat script is run.
5527 ** Formerly, the value of lpr-command did not affect printing on
5528 MS-DOS unless print-region-function was set to nil, but now it
5529 controls whether an external program is invoked or output is written
5530 directly to a printer port. Similarly, in the previous version of
5531 Emacs, the value of ps-lpr-command did not affect PostScript printing
5532 on MS-DOS unless ps-printer-name was set to something other than a
5533 string (eg. t or `pipe'), but now it controls whether an external
5534 program is used. (These changes were made so that configuration of
5535 printing variables would be almost identical across all platforms.)
5537 ** In the previous version of Emacs, PostScript and non-PostScript
5538 output was piped to external programs, but because most print programs
5539 available for MS-DOS and MS-Windows cannot read data from their standard
5540 input, on those systems the data to be output is now written to a
5541 temporary file whose name is passed as the last argument to the external
5544 An exception is made for `print', a standard program on Windows NT,
5545 and `nprint', a standard program on Novell Netware. For both of these
5546 programs, the command line is constructed in the appropriate syntax
5547 automatically, using only the value of printer-name or ps-printer-name
5548 as appropriate--the value of the relevant `-switches' variable is
5549 ignored, as both programs have no useful switches.
5551 ** The value of the variable dos-printer (cf. dos-ps-printer), if it has
5552 a value, overrides the value of printer-name (cf. ps-printer-name), on
5553 MS-DOS and MS-Windows only. This has been true since version 20.3, but
5554 was not documented clearly before.
5556 ** All the Emacs games now work on MS-DOS terminals.
5557 This includes Tetris and Snake.
5559 * Lisp changes in Emacs 20.4
5561 ** New functions line-beginning-position and line-end-position
5562 return the position of the beginning or end of the current line.
5563 They both accept an optional argument, which has the same
5564 meaning as the argument to beginning-of-line or end-of-line.
5566 ** find-file and allied functions now have an optional argument
5567 WILDCARD. If this is non-nil, they do wildcard processing,
5568 and visit all files that match the wildcard pattern.
5570 ** Changes in the file-attributes function.
5572 *** The file size returned by file-attributes may be an integer or a float.
5573 It is an integer if the size fits in a Lisp integer, float otherwise.
5575 *** The inode number returned by file-attributes may be an integer (if
5576 the number fits in a Lisp integer) or a cons cell containing two
5579 ** The new function directory-files-and-attributes returns a list of
5580 files in a directory and their attributes. It accepts the same
5581 arguments as directory-files and has similar semantics, except that
5582 file names and attributes are returned.
5584 ** The new function file-attributes-lessp is a helper function for
5585 sorting the list generated by directory-files-and-attributes. It
5586 accepts two arguments, each a list of a file name and its attributes.
5587 It compares the file names of each according to string-lessp and
5590 ** The new function file-expand-wildcards expands a wildcard-pattern
5591 to produce a list of existing files that match the pattern.
5593 ** New functions for base64 conversion:
5595 The function base64-encode-region converts a part of the buffer
5596 into the base64 code used in MIME. base64-decode-region
5597 performs the opposite conversion. Line-breaking is supported
5600 Functions base64-encode-string and base64-decode-string do a similar
5601 job on the text in a string. They return the value as a new string.
5604 The new function process-running-child-p
5605 will tell you if a subprocess has given control of its
5606 terminal to its own child process.
5608 ** interrupt-process and such functions have a new feature:
5609 when the second argument is `lambda', they send a signal
5610 to the running child of the subshell, if any, but if the shell
5611 itself owns its terminal, no signal is sent.
5613 ** There are new widget types `plist' and `alist' which can
5614 be used for customizing variables whose values are plists or alists.
5616 ** easymenu.el Now understands `:key-sequence' and `:style button'.
5617 :included is an alias for :visible.
5619 easy-menu-add-item now understands the values returned by
5620 easy-menu-remove-item and easy-menu-item-present-p. This can be used
5621 to move or copy menu entries.
5623 ** Multibyte editing changes
5625 *** The definitions of sref and char-bytes are changed. Now, sref is
5626 an alias of aref and char-bytes always returns 1. This change is to
5627 make some Emacs Lisp code which works on 20.2 and earlier also
5628 work on the latest Emacs. Such code uses a combination of sref and
5629 char-bytes in a loop typically as below:
5630 (setq char (sref str idx)
5631 idx (+ idx (char-bytes idx)))
5632 The byte-compiler now warns that this is obsolete.
5634 If you want to know how many bytes a specific multibyte character
5635 (say, CH) occupies in a multibyte buffer, use this code:
5636 (charset-bytes (char-charset ch))
5638 *** In multibyte mode, when you narrow a buffer to some region, and the
5639 region is preceded or followed by non-ASCII codes, inserting or
5640 deleting at the head or the end of the region may signal this error:
5642 Byte combining across boundary of accessible buffer text inhibited
5644 This is to avoid some bytes being combined together into a character
5645 across the boundary.
5647 *** The functions find-charset-region and find-charset-string include
5648 `unknown' in the returned list in the following cases:
5649 o The current buffer or the target string is unibyte and
5650 contains 8-bit characters.
5651 o The current buffer or the target string is multibyte and
5652 contains invalid characters.
5654 *** The functions decode-coding-region and encode-coding-region remove
5655 text properties of the target region. Ideally, they should correctly
5656 preserve text properties, but for the moment, it's hard. Removing
5657 text properties is better than preserving them in a less-than-correct
5660 *** prefer-coding-system sets EOL conversion of default coding systems.
5661 If the argument to prefer-coding-system specifies a certain type of
5662 end of line conversion, the default coding systems set by
5663 prefer-coding-system will specify that conversion type for end of line.
5665 *** The new function thai-compose-string can be used to properly
5666 compose Thai characters in a string.
5668 ** The primitive `define-prefix-command' now takes an optional third
5669 argument NAME, which should be a string. It supplies the menu name
5670 for the created keymap. Keymaps created in order to be displayed as
5671 menus should always use the third argument.
5673 ** The meanings of optional second arguments for read-char,
5674 read-event, and read-char-exclusive are flipped. Now the second
5675 arguments are INHERIT-INPUT-METHOD. These functions use the current
5676 input method (if any) if and only if INHERIT-INPUT-METHOD is non-nil.
5678 ** The new function clear-this-command-keys empties out the contents
5679 of the vector that (this-command-keys) returns. This is useful in
5680 programs that read passwords, to prevent the passwords from echoing
5681 inadvertently as part of the next command in certain cases.
5683 ** The new macro `with-temp-message' displays a temporary message in
5684 the echo area, while executing some Lisp code. Like `progn', it
5685 returns the value of the last form, but it also restores the previous
5688 (with-temp-message MESSAGE &rest BODY)
5690 ** The function `require' now takes an optional third argument
5691 NOERROR. If it is non-nil, then there is no error if the
5692 requested feature cannot be loaded.
5694 ** In the function modify-face, an argument of (nil) for the
5695 foreground color, background color or stipple pattern
5696 means to clear out that attribute.
5698 ** The `outer-window-id' frame property of an X frame
5699 gives the window number of the outermost X window for the frame.
5701 ** Temporary buffers made with with-output-to-temp-buffer are now
5702 read-only by default, and normally use the major mode Help mode
5703 unless you put them in some other non-Fundamental mode before the
5704 end of with-output-to-temp-buffer.
5706 ** The new functions gap-position and gap-size return information on
5707 the gap of the current buffer.
5709 ** The new functions position-bytes and byte-to-position provide a way
5710 to convert between character positions and byte positions in the
5713 ** vc.el defines two new macros, `edit-vc-file' and `with-vc-file', to
5714 facilitate working with version-controlled files from Lisp programs.
5715 These macros check out a given file automatically if needed, and check
5716 it back in after any modifications have been made.
5718 * Installation Changes in Emacs 20.3
5720 ** The default value of load-path now includes most subdirectories of
5721 the site-specific directories /usr/local/share/emacs/site-lisp and
5722 /usr/local/share/emacs/VERSION/site-lisp, in addition to those
5723 directories themselves. Both immediate subdirectories and
5724 subdirectories multiple levels down are added to load-path.
5726 Not all subdirectories are included, though. Subdirectories whose
5727 names do not start with a letter or digit are excluded.
5728 Subdirectories named RCS or CVS are excluded. Also, a subdirectory
5729 which contains a file named `.nosearch' is excluded. You can use
5730 these methods to prevent certain subdirectories from being searched.
5732 Emacs finds these subdirectories and adds them to load-path when it
5733 starts up. While it would be cleaner to find the subdirectories each
5734 time Emacs loads a file, that would be much slower.
5736 This feature is an incompatible change. If you have stored some Emacs
5737 Lisp files in a subdirectory of the site-lisp directory specifically
5738 to prevent them from being used, you will need to rename the
5739 subdirectory to start with a non-alphanumeric character, or create a
5740 `.nosearch' file in it, in order to continue to achieve the desired
5743 ** Emacs no longer includes an old version of the C preprocessor from
5744 GCC. This was formerly used to help compile Emacs with C compilers
5745 that had limits on the significant length of an identifier, but in
5746 fact we stopped supporting such compilers some time ago.
5748 * Changes in Emacs 20.3
5750 ** The new command C-x z (repeat) repeats the previous command
5751 including its argument. If you repeat the z afterward,
5752 it repeats the command additional times; thus, you can
5753 perform many repetitions with one keystroke per repetition.
5755 ** Emacs now supports "selective undo" which undoes only within a
5756 specified region. To do this, set point and mark around the desired
5757 region and type C-u C-x u (or C-u C-_). You can then continue undoing
5758 further, within the same region, by repeating the ordinary undo
5759 command C-x u or C-_. This will keep undoing changes that were made
5760 within the region you originally specified, until either all of them
5761 are undone, or it encounters a change which crosses the edge of that
5764 In Transient Mark mode, undoing when a region is active requests
5767 ** If you specify --unibyte when starting Emacs, then all buffers are
5768 unibyte, except when a Lisp program specifically creates a multibyte
5769 buffer. Setting the environment variable EMACS_UNIBYTE has the same
5770 effect. The --no-unibyte option overrides EMACS_UNIBYTE and directs
5771 Emacs to run normally in multibyte mode.
5773 The option --unibyte does not affect the reading of Emacs Lisp files,
5774 though. If you want a Lisp file to be read in unibyte mode, use
5775 -*-unibyte: t;-*- on its first line. That will force Emacs to
5776 load that file in unibyte mode, regardless of how Emacs was started.
5778 ** toggle-enable-multibyte-characters no longer has a key binding and
5779 no longer appears in the menu bar. We've realized that changing the
5780 enable-multibyte-characters variable in an existing buffer is
5781 something that most users not do.
5783 ** You can specify a coding system to use for the next cut or paste
5784 operations through the window system with the command C-x RET X.
5785 The coding system can make a difference for communication with other
5788 C-x RET x specifies a coding system for all subsequent cutting and
5791 ** You can specify the printer to use for commands that do printing by
5792 setting the variable `printer-name'. Just what a printer name looks
5793 like depends on your operating system. You can specify a different
5794 printer for the Postscript printing commands by setting
5797 ** Emacs now supports on-the-fly spell checking by the means of a
5798 minor mode. It is called M-x flyspell-mode. You don't have to remember
5799 any other special commands to use it, and you will hardly notice it
5800 except when you make a spelling error. Flyspell works by highlighting
5801 incorrect words as soon as they are completed or as soon as the cursor
5804 Flyspell mode works with whichever dictionary you have selected for
5805 Ispell in Emacs. In TeX mode, it understands TeX syntax so as not
5806 to be confused by TeX commands.
5808 You can correct a misspelled word by editing it into something
5809 correct. You can also correct it, or accept it as correct, by
5810 clicking on the word with Mouse-2; that gives you a pop-up menu
5811 of various alternative replacements and actions.
5813 Flyspell mode also proposes "automatic" corrections. M-TAB replaces
5814 the current misspelled word with a possible correction. If several
5815 corrections are made possible, M-TAB cycles through them in
5816 alphabetical order, or in order of decreasing likelihood if
5817 flyspell-sort-corrections is nil.
5819 Flyspell mode also flags an error when a word is repeated, if
5820 flyspell-mark-duplications-flag is non-nil.
5822 ** Changes in input method usage.
5824 Now you can use arrow keys (right, left, down, up) for selecting among
5825 the alternatives just the same way as you do by C-f, C-b, C-n, and C-p
5828 You can use the ENTER key to accept the current conversion.
5830 If you type TAB to display a list of alternatives, you can select one
5831 of the alternatives with Mouse-2.
5833 The meaning of the variable `input-method-verbose-flag' is changed so
5834 that you can set it to t, nil, `default', or `complex-only'.
5836 If the value is nil, extra guidance is never given.
5838 If the value is t, extra guidance is always given.
5840 If the value is `complex-only', extra guidance is always given only
5841 when you are using complex input methods such as chinese-py.
5843 If the value is `default' (this is the default), extra guidance is
5844 given in the following case:
5845 o When you are using a complex input method.
5846 o When you are using a simple input method but not in the minibuffer.
5848 If you are using Emacs through a very slow line, setting
5849 input-method-verbose-flag to nil or to complex-only is a good choice,
5850 and if you are using an input method you are not familiar with,
5851 setting it to t is helpful.
5853 The old command select-input-method is now called set-input-method.
5855 In the language environment "Korean", you can use the following
5857 Shift-SPC toggle-korean-input-method
5858 C-F9 quail-hangul-switch-symbol-ksc
5859 F9 quail-hangul-switch-hanja
5860 These key bindings are canceled when you switch to another language
5863 ** The minibuffer history of file names now records the specified file
5864 names, not the entire minibuffer input. For example, if the
5865 minibuffer starts out with /usr/foo/, you might type in /etc/passwd to
5868 /usr/foo//etc/passwd
5870 which stands for the file /etc/passwd.
5872 Formerly, this used to put /usr/foo//etc/passwd in the history list.
5873 Now this puts just /etc/passwd in the history list.
5875 ** If you are root, Emacs sets backup-by-copying-when-mismatch to t
5876 at startup, so that saving a file will be sure to preserve
5877 its owner and group.
5879 ** find-func.el can now also find the place of definition of Emacs
5880 Lisp variables in user-loaded libraries.
5882 ** C-x r t (string-rectangle) now deletes the existing rectangle
5883 contents before inserting the specified string on each line.
5885 ** There is a new command delete-whitespace-rectangle
5886 which deletes whitespace starting from a particular column
5887 in all the lines on a rectangle. The column is specified
5888 by the left edge of the rectangle.
5890 ** You can now store a number into a register with C-u NUMBER C-x r n REG,
5891 increment it by INC with C-u INC C-x r + REG (to increment by one, omit
5892 C-u INC), and insert it in the buffer with C-x r g REG. This is useful
5893 for writing keyboard macros.
5895 ** The new command M-x speedbar displays a frame in which directories,
5896 files, and tags can be displayed, manipulated, and jumped to. The
5897 frame defaults to 20 characters in width, and is the same height as
5898 the frame that it was started from. Some major modes define
5899 additional commands for the speedbar, including Rmail, GUD/GDB, and
5902 ** query-replace-regexp is now bound to C-M-%.
5904 ** In Transient Mark mode, when the region is active, M-x
5905 query-replace and the other replace commands now operate on the region
5908 ** M-x write-region, when used interactively, now asks for
5909 confirmation before overwriting an existing file. When you call
5910 the function from a Lisp program, a new optional argument CONFIRM
5911 says whether to ask for confirmation in this case.
5913 ** If you use find-file-literally and the file is already visited
5914 non-literally, the command asks you whether to revisit the file
5915 literally. If you say no, it signals an error.
5917 ** Major modes defined with the "derived mode" feature
5918 now use the proper name for the mode hook: WHATEVER-mode-hook.
5919 Formerly they used the name WHATEVER-mode-hooks, but that is
5920 inconsistent with Emacs conventions.
5922 ** shell-command-on-region (and shell-command) reports success or
5923 failure if the command produces no output.
5925 ** Set focus-follows-mouse to nil if your window system or window
5926 manager does not transfer focus to another window when you just move
5929 ** mouse-menu-buffer-maxlen has been renamed to
5930 mouse-buffer-menu-maxlen to be consistent with the other related
5931 function and variable names.
5933 ** The new variable auto-coding-alist specifies coding systems for
5934 reading specific files. This has higher priority than
5935 file-coding-system-alist.
5937 ** If you set the variable unibyte-display-via-language-environment to
5938 t, then Emacs displays non-ASCII characters are displayed by
5939 converting them to the equivalent multibyte characters according to
5940 the current language environment. As a result, they are displayed
5941 according to the current fontset.
5943 ** C-q's handling of codes in the range 0200 through 0377 is changed.
5945 The codes in the range 0200 through 0237 are inserted as one byte of
5946 that code regardless of the values of nonascii-translation-table and
5947 nonascii-insert-offset.
5949 For the codes in the range 0240 through 0377, if
5950 enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil and nonascii-translation-table
5951 nor nonascii-insert-offset can't convert them to valid multibyte
5952 characters, they are converted to Latin-1 characters.
5954 ** If you try to find a file that is not read-accessible, you now get
5955 an error, rather than an empty buffer and a warning.
5957 ** In the minibuffer history commands M-r and M-s, an upper case
5958 letter in the regular expression forces case-sensitive search.
5960 ** In the *Help* buffer, cross-references to commands and variables
5961 are inferred and hyperlinked. Use C-h m in Help mode for the relevant
5964 ** M-x apropos-command, with a prefix argument, no longer looks for
5965 user option variables--instead it looks for noninteractive functions.
5967 Meanwhile, the command apropos-variable normally searches for
5968 user option variables; with a prefix argument, it looks at
5969 all variables that have documentation.
5971 ** When you type a long line in the minibuffer, and the minibuffer
5972 shows just one line, automatically scrolling works in a special way
5973 that shows you overlap with the previous line of text. The variable
5974 minibuffer-scroll-overlap controls how many characters of overlap
5975 it should show; the default is 20.
5977 Meanwhile, Resize Minibuffer mode is still available; in that mode,
5978 the minibuffer grows taller (up to a point) as needed to show the whole
5981 ** The new command M-x customize-changed-options lets you customize
5982 all the options whose meanings or default values have changed in
5983 recent Emacs versions. You specify a previous Emacs version number as
5984 argument, and the command creates a customization buffer showing all
5985 the customizable options which were changed since that version.
5986 Newly added options are included as well.
5988 If you don't specify a particular version number argument,
5989 then the customization buffer shows all the customizable options
5990 for which Emacs versions of changes are recorded.
5992 This function is also bound to the Changed Options entry in the
5995 ** When you run M-x grep with a prefix argument, it figures out
5996 the tag around point and puts that into the default grep command.
5998 ** The new command M-* (pop-tag-mark) pops back through a history of
5999 buffer positions from which M-. or other tag-finding commands were
6002 ** The new variable comment-padding specifies the number of spaces
6003 that `comment-region' will insert before the actual text of the comment.
6006 ** In Fortran mode the characters `.', `_' and `$' now have symbol
6007 syntax, not word syntax. Fortran mode now supports `imenu' and has
6008 new commands fortran-join-line (M-^) and fortran-narrow-to-subprogram
6009 (C-x n d). M-q can be used to fill a statement or comment block
6012 ** GUD now supports jdb, the Java debugger, and pdb, the Python debugger.
6014 ** If you set the variable add-log-keep-changes-together to a non-nil
6015 value, the command `C-x 4 a' will automatically notice when you make
6016 two entries in one day for one file, and combine them.
6018 ** You can use the command M-x diary-mail-entries to mail yourself a
6019 reminder about upcoming diary entries. See the documentation string
6020 for a sample shell script for calling this function automatically
6025 *** All you need to do to enable use of the Desktop package, is to set
6026 the variable desktop-enable to t with Custom.
6028 *** Minor modes are now restored. Which minor modes are restored
6029 and how modes are restored is controlled by `desktop-minor-mode-table'.
6031 ** There is no need to do anything special, now, to enable Gnus to
6032 read and post multi-lingual articles.
6034 ** Outline mode has now support for showing hidden outlines when
6035 doing an isearch. In order for this to happen search-invisible should
6036 be set to open (the default). If an isearch match is inside a hidden
6037 outline the outline is made visible. If you continue pressing C-s and
6038 the match moves outside the formerly invisible outline, the outline is
6039 made invisible again.
6041 ** Mail reading and sending changes
6043 *** The Rmail e command now switches to displaying the whole header of
6044 the message before it lets you edit the message. This is so that any
6045 changes you make in the header will not be lost if you subsequently
6048 *** The w command in Rmail, which writes the message body into a file,
6049 now works in the summary buffer as well. (The command to delete the
6050 summary buffer is now Q.) The default file name for the w command, if
6051 the message has no subject, is stored in the variable
6052 rmail-default-body-file.
6054 *** Most of the commands and modes that operate on mail and netnews no
6055 longer depend on the value of mail-header-separator. Instead, they
6056 handle whatever separator the buffer happens to use.
6058 *** If you set mail-signature to a value which is not t, nil, or a string,
6059 it should be an expression. When you send a message, this expression
6060 is evaluated to insert the signature.
6062 *** The new Lisp library feedmail.el (version 8) enhances processing of
6063 outbound email messages. It works in coordination with other email
6064 handling packages (e.g., rmail, VM, gnus) and is responsible for
6065 putting final touches on messages and actually submitting them for
6066 transmission. Users of the emacs program "fakemail" might be
6067 especially interested in trying feedmail.
6069 feedmail is not enabled by default. See comments at the top of
6070 feedmail.el for set-up instructions. Among the bigger features
6071 provided by feedmail are:
6073 **** you can park outgoing messages into a disk-based queue and
6074 stimulate sending some or all of them later (handy for laptop users);
6075 there is also a queue for draft messages
6077 **** you can get one last look at the prepped outbound message and
6078 be prompted for confirmation
6080 **** does smart filling of address headers
6082 **** can generate a MESSAGE-ID: line and a DATE: line; the date can be
6083 the time the message was written or the time it is being sent; this
6084 can make FCC copies more closely resemble copies that recipients get
6086 **** you can specify an arbitrary function for actually transmitting
6087 the message; included in feedmail are interfaces for /bin/[r]mail,
6088 /usr/lib/sendmail, and elisp smtpmail; it's easy to write a new
6089 function for something else (10-20 lines of elisp)
6093 *** The Dired function dired-do-toggle, which toggles marked and unmarked
6094 files, is now bound to "t" instead of "T".
6096 *** dired-at-point has been added to ffap.el. It allows one to easily
6097 run Dired on the directory name at point.
6099 *** Dired has a new command: %g. It searches the contents of
6100 files in the directory and marks each file that contains a match
6101 for a specified regexp.
6105 *** New option vc-ignore-vc-files lets you turn off version control
6108 *** VC Dired has been completely rewritten. It is now much
6109 faster, especially for CVS, and works very similar to ordinary
6112 VC Dired is invoked by typing C-x v d and entering the name of the
6113 directory to display. By default, VC Dired gives you a recursive
6114 listing of all files at or below the given directory which are
6115 currently locked (for CVS, all files not up-to-date are shown).
6117 You can change the listing format by setting vc-dired-recurse to nil,
6118 then it shows only the given directory, and you may also set
6119 vc-dired-terse-display to nil, then it shows all files under version
6120 control plus the names of any subdirectories, so that you can type `i'
6121 on such lines to insert them manually, as in ordinary Dired.
6123 All Dired commands operate normally in VC Dired, except for `v', which
6124 is redefined as the version control prefix. That means you may type
6125 `v l', `v =' etc. to invoke `vc-print-log', `vc-diff' and the like on
6126 the file named in the current Dired buffer line. `v v' invokes
6127 `vc-next-action' on this file, or on all files currently marked.
6129 The new command `v t' (vc-dired-toggle-terse-mode) allows you to
6130 toggle between terse display (only locked files) and full display (all
6131 VC files plus subdirectories). There is also a special command,
6132 `* l', to mark all files currently locked.
6134 Giving a prefix argument to C-x v d now does the same thing as in
6135 ordinary Dired: it allows you to supply additional options for the ls
6136 command in the minibuffer, to fine-tune VC Dired's output.
6138 *** Under CVS, if you merge changes from the repository into a working
6139 file, and CVS detects conflicts, VC now offers to start an ediff
6140 session to resolve them.
6142 Alternatively, you can use the new command `vc-resolve-conflicts' to
6143 resolve conflicts in a file at any time. It works in any buffer that
6144 contains conflict markers as generated by rcsmerge (which is what CVS
6147 *** You can now transfer changes between branches, using the new
6148 command vc-merge (C-x v m). It is implemented for RCS and CVS. When
6149 you invoke it in a buffer under version-control, you can specify
6150 either an entire branch or a pair of versions, and the changes on that
6151 branch or between the two versions are merged into the working file.
6152 If this results in any conflicts, they may be resolved interactively,
6155 ** Changes in Font Lock
6157 *** The face and variable previously known as font-lock-reference-face
6158 are now called font-lock-constant-face to better reflect their typical
6159 use for highlighting constants and labels. (Its face properties are
6160 unchanged.) The variable font-lock-reference-face remains for now for
6161 compatibility reasons, but its value is font-lock-constant-face.
6163 ** Frame name display changes
6165 *** The command set-frame-name lets you set the name of the current
6166 frame. You can use the new command select-frame-by-name to select and
6167 raise a frame; this is mostly useful on character-only terminals, or
6168 when many frames are invisible or iconified.
6170 *** On character-only terminal (not a window system), changing the
6171 frame name is now reflected on the mode line and in the Buffers/Frames
6174 ** Comint (subshell) changes
6176 *** In Comint modes, the commands to kill, stop or interrupt a
6177 subjob now also kill pending input. This is for compatibility
6178 with ordinary shells, where the signal characters do this.
6180 *** There are new commands in Comint mode.
6182 C-c C-x fetches the "next" line from the input history;
6183 that is, the line after the last line you got.
6184 You can use this command to fetch successive lines, one by one.
6186 C-c SPC accumulates lines of input. More precisely, it arranges to
6187 send the current line together with the following line, when you send
6190 C-c C-a if repeated twice consecutively now moves to the process mark,
6191 which separates the pending input from the subprocess output and the
6192 previously sent input.
6194 C-c M-r now runs comint-previous-matching-input-from-input;
6195 it searches for a previous command, using the current pending input
6196 as the search string.
6198 *** New option compilation-scroll-output can be set to scroll
6199 automatically in compilation-mode windows.
6203 *** Multiline macros are now handled, both as they affect indentation,
6204 and as recognized syntax. New syntactic symbol cpp-macro-cont is
6205 assigned to second and subsequent lines of a multiline macro
6208 *** A new style "user" which captures all non-hook-ified
6209 (i.e. top-level) .emacs file variable settings and customizations.
6210 Style "cc-mode" is an alias for "user" and is deprecated. "gnu"
6211 style is still the default however.
6213 *** "java" style now conforms to Sun's JDK coding style.
6215 *** There are new commands c-beginning-of-defun, c-end-of-defun which
6216 are alternatives which you could bind to C-M-a and C-M-e if you prefer
6217 them. They do not have key bindings by default.
6219 *** New and improved implementations of M-a (c-beginning-of-statement)
6220 and M-e (c-end-of-statement).
6222 *** C++ namespace blocks are supported, with new syntactic symbols
6223 namespace-open, namespace-close, and innamespace.
6225 *** File local variable settings of c-file-style and c-file-offsets
6226 makes the style variables local to that buffer only.
6228 *** New indentation functions c-lineup-close-paren,
6229 c-indent-one-line-block, c-lineup-dont-change.
6231 *** Improvements (hopefully!) to the way CC Mode is loaded. You
6232 should now be able to do a (require 'cc-mode) to get the entire
6233 package loaded properly for customization in your .emacs file. A new
6234 variable c-initialize-on-load controls this and is t by default.
6236 ** Changes to hippie-expand.
6238 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-dabbrev-skip-space'. If
6239 non-nil, trailing spaces may be included in the abbreviation to search for,
6240 which then gives the same behavior as the original `dabbrev-expand'.
6242 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-dabbrev-as-symbol'. If
6243 non-nil, characters of syntax '_' is considered part of the word when
6244 expanding dynamically.
6246 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-no-restriction'. If
6247 non-nil, narrowed buffers are widened before they are searched.
6249 *** New customization variable `hippie-expand-only-buffers'. If
6250 non-empty, buffers searched are restricted to the types specified in
6251 this list. Useful for example when constructing new special-purpose
6252 expansion functions with `make-hippie-expand-function'.
6254 *** Text properties of the expansion are no longer copied.
6256 ** Changes in BibTeX mode.
6258 *** Any titleword matching a regexp in the new variable
6259 bibtex-autokey-titleword-ignore (case sensitive) is ignored during
6260 automatic key generation. This replaces variable
6261 bibtex-autokey-titleword-first-ignore, which only checked for matches
6262 against the first word in the title.
6264 *** Autokey generation now uses all words from the title, not just
6265 capitalized words. To avoid conflicts with existing customizations,
6266 bibtex-autokey-titleword-ignore is set up such that words starting with
6267 lowerkey characters will still be ignored. Thus, if you want to use
6268 lowercase words from the title, you will have to overwrite the
6269 bibtex-autokey-titleword-ignore standard setting.
6271 *** Case conversion of names and title words for automatic key
6272 generation is more flexible. Variable bibtex-autokey-preserve-case is
6273 replaced by bibtex-autokey-titleword-case-convert and
6274 bibtex-autokey-name-case-convert.
6276 ** Changes in vcursor.el.
6278 *** Support for character terminals is available: there is a new keymap
6279 and the vcursor will appear as an arrow between buffer text. A
6280 variable `vcursor-interpret-input' allows input from the vcursor to be
6281 entered exactly as if typed. Numerous functions, including
6282 `vcursor-compare-windows', have been rewritten to improve consistency
6283 in the selection of windows and corresponding keymaps.
6285 *** vcursor options can now be altered with M-x customize under the
6286 Editing group once the package is loaded.
6288 *** Loading vcursor now does not define keys by default, as this is
6289 generally a bad side effect. Use M-x customize to set
6290 vcursor-key-bindings to t to restore the old behavior.
6292 *** vcursor-auto-disable can be `copy', which turns off copying from the
6293 vcursor, but doesn't disable it, after any non-vcursor command.
6297 *** You can now spell check comments and strings in the current
6298 buffer with M-x ispell-comments-and-strings. Comments and strings
6299 are identified by syntax tables in effect.
6301 *** Generic region skipping implemented.
6302 A single buffer can be broken into a number of regions where text will
6303 and will not be checked. The definitions of the regions can be user
6304 defined. New applications and improvements made available by this
6307 o URLs are automatically skipped
6308 o EMail message checking is vastly improved.
6310 *** Ispell can highlight the erroneous word even on non-window terminals.
6312 ** Changes to RefTeX mode
6314 RefTeX has been updated in order to make it more usable with very
6315 large projects (like a several volume math book). The parser has been
6316 re-written from scratch. To get maximum speed from RefTeX, check the
6317 section `Optimizations' in the manual.
6319 *** New recursive parser.
6321 The old version of RefTeX created a single large buffer containing the
6322 entire multifile document in order to parse the document. The new
6323 recursive parser scans the individual files.
6325 *** Parsing only part of a document.
6327 Reparsing of changed document parts can now be made faster by enabling
6328 partial scans. To use this feature, read the documentation string of
6329 the variable `reftex-enable-partial-scans' and set the variable to t.
6331 (setq reftex-enable-partial-scans t)
6333 *** Storing parsing information in a file.
6335 This can improve startup times considerably. To turn it on, use
6337 (setq reftex-save-parse-info t)
6339 *** Using multiple selection buffers
6341 If the creation of label selection buffers is too slow (this happens
6342 for large documents), you can reuse these buffers by setting
6344 (setq reftex-use-multiple-selection-buffers t)
6346 *** References to external documents.
6348 The LaTeX package `xr' allows to cross-reference labels in external
6349 documents. RefTeX can provide information about the external
6350 documents as well. To use this feature, set up the \externaldocument
6351 macros required by the `xr' package and rescan the document with
6352 RefTeX. The external labels can then be accessed with the `x' key in
6353 the selection buffer provided by `reftex-reference' (bound to `C-c )').
6354 The `x' key also works in the table of contents buffer.
6356 *** Many more labeled LaTeX environments are recognized by default.
6358 The built-in command list now covers all the standard LaTeX commands,
6359 and all of the major packages included in the LaTeX distribution.
6361 Also, RefTeX now understands the \appendix macro and changes
6362 the enumeration of sections in the *toc* buffer accordingly.
6364 *** Mouse support for selection and *toc* buffers
6366 The mouse can now be used to select items in the selection and *toc*
6367 buffers. See also the new option `reftex-highlight-selection'.
6369 *** New keymaps for selection and table of contents modes.
6371 The selection processes for labels and citation keys, and the table of
6372 contents buffer now have their own keymaps: `reftex-select-label-map',
6373 `reftex-select-bib-map', `reftex-toc-map'. The selection processes
6374 have a number of new keys predefined. In particular, TAB lets you
6375 enter a label with completion. Check the on-the-fly help (press `?'
6376 at the selection prompt) or read the Info documentation to find out
6379 *** Support for the varioref package
6381 The `v' key in the label selection buffer toggles \ref versus \vref.
6385 Three new hooks can be used to redefine the way labels, references,
6386 and citations are created. These hooks are
6387 `reftex-format-label-function', `reftex-format-ref-function',
6388 `reftex-format-cite-function'.
6390 *** Citations outside LaTeX
6392 The command `reftex-citation' may also be used outside LaTeX (e.g. in
6393 a mail buffer). See the Info documentation for details.
6395 *** Short context is no longer fontified.
6397 The short context in the label menu no longer copies the
6398 fontification from the text in the buffer. If you prefer it to be
6401 (setq reftex-refontify-context t)
6403 ** file-cache-minibuffer-complete now accepts a prefix argument.
6404 With a prefix argument, it does not try to do completion of
6405 the file name within its directory; it only checks for other
6406 directories that contain the same file name.
6408 Thus, given the file name Makefile, and assuming that a file
6409 Makefile.in exists in the same directory, ordinary
6410 file-cache-minibuffer-complete will try to complete Makefile to
6411 Makefile.in and will therefore never look for other directories that
6412 have Makefile. A prefix argument tells it not to look for longer
6413 names such as Makefile.in, so that instead it will look for other
6414 directories--just as if the name were already complete in its present
6417 ** New modes and packages
6419 *** There is a new alternative major mode for Perl, Cperl mode.
6420 It has many more features than Perl mode, and some people prefer
6421 it, but some do not.
6423 *** There is a new major mode, M-x vhdl-mode, for editing files of VHDL
6426 *** M-x which-function-mode enables a minor mode that displays the
6427 current function name continuously in the mode line, as you move
6430 Which Function mode is effective in major modes which support Imenu.
6432 *** Gametree is a major mode for editing game analysis trees. The author
6433 uses it for keeping notes about his postal Chess games, but it should
6434 be helpful for other two-player games as well, as long as they have an
6435 established system of notation similar to Chess.
6437 *** The new minor mode checkdoc-minor-mode provides Emacs Lisp
6438 documentation string checking for style and spelling. The style
6439 guidelines are found in the Emacs Lisp programming manual.
6441 *** The net-utils package makes some common networking features
6442 available in Emacs. Some of these functions are wrappers around
6443 system utilities (ping, nslookup, etc); others are implementations of
6444 simple protocols (finger, whois) in Emacs Lisp. There are also
6445 functions to make simple connections to TCP/IP ports for debugging and
6448 *** highlight-changes-mode is a minor mode that uses colors to
6449 identify recently changed parts of the buffer text.
6451 *** The new package `midnight' lets you specify things to be done
6452 within Emacs at midnight--by default, kill buffers that you have not
6453 used in a considerable time. To use this feature, customize
6454 the user option `midnight-mode' to t.
6456 *** The file generic-x.el defines a number of simple major modes.
6458 apache-generic-mode: For Apache and NCSA httpd configuration files
6459 samba-generic-mode: Samba configuration files
6460 fvwm-generic-mode: For fvwm initialization files
6461 x-resource-generic-mode: For X resource files
6462 hosts-generic-mode: For hosts files (.rhosts, /etc/hosts, etc)
6463 mailagent-rules-generic-mode: For mailagent .rules files
6464 javascript-generic-mode: For JavaScript files
6465 vrml-generic-mode: For VRML files
6466 java-manifest-generic-mode: For Java MANIFEST files
6467 java-properties-generic-mode: For Java property files
6468 mailrc-generic-mode: For .mailrc files
6470 Platform-specific modes:
6472 prototype-generic-mode: For Solaris/Sys V prototype files
6473 pkginfo-generic-mode: For Solaris/Sys V pkginfo files
6474 alias-generic-mode: For C shell alias files
6475 inf-generic-mode: For MS-Windows INF files
6476 ini-generic-mode: For MS-Windows INI files
6477 reg-generic-mode: For MS-Windows Registry files
6478 bat-generic-mode: For MS-Windows BAT scripts
6479 rc-generic-mode: For MS-Windows Resource files
6480 rul-generic-mode: For InstallShield scripts
6482 * Lisp changes in Emacs 20.3 since the Emacs Lisp Manual was published
6484 ** If you want a Lisp file to be read in unibyte mode,
6485 use -*-unibyte: t;-*- on its first line.
6486 That will force Emacs to read that file in unibyte mode.
6487 Otherwise, the file will be loaded and byte-compiled in multibyte mode.
6489 Thus, each lisp file is read in a consistent way regardless of whether
6490 you started Emacs with --unibyte, so that a Lisp program gives
6491 consistent results regardless of how Emacs was started.
6493 ** The new function assoc-default is useful for searching an alist,
6494 and using a default value if the key is not found there. You can
6495 specify a comparison predicate, so this function is useful for
6496 searching comparing a string against an alist of regular expressions.
6498 ** The functions unibyte-char-to-multibyte and
6499 multibyte-char-to-unibyte convert between unibyte and multibyte
6500 character codes, in a way that is appropriate for the current language
6503 ** The functions read-event, read-char and read-char-exclusive now
6504 take two optional arguments. PROMPT, if non-nil, specifies a prompt
6505 string. SUPPRESS-INPUT-METHOD, if non-nil, says to disable the
6506 current input method for reading this one event.
6508 ** Two new variables print-escape-nonascii and print-escape-multibyte
6509 now control whether to output certain characters as
6510 backslash-sequences. print-escape-nonascii applies to single-byte
6511 non-ASCII characters; print-escape-multibyte applies to multibyte
6512 characters. Both of these variables are used only when printing
6513 in readable fashion (prin1 uses them, princ does not).
6515 * Lisp changes in Emacs 20.3 before the Emacs Lisp Manual was published
6517 ** Compiled Emacs Lisp files made with the modified "MBSK" version
6518 of Emacs 20.2 do not work in Emacs 20.3.
6520 ** Buffer positions are now measured in characters, as they were
6521 in Emacs 19 and before. This means that (forward-char 1)
6522 always increases point by 1.
6524 The function chars-in-region now just subtracts its arguments. It is
6525 considered obsolete. The function char-boundary-p has been deleted.
6527 See below for additional changes relating to multibyte characters.
6529 ** defcustom, defface and defgroup now accept the keyword `:version'.
6530 Use this to specify in which version of Emacs a certain variable's
6531 default value changed. For example,
6533 (defcustom foo-max 34 "*Maximum number of foo's allowed."
6538 (defgroup foo-group nil "The foo group."
6541 If an entire new group is added or the variables in it have the
6542 default values changed, then just add a `:version' to that group. It
6543 is recommended that new packages added to the distribution contain a
6544 `:version' in the top level group.
6546 This information is used to control the customize-changed-options command.
6548 ** It is now an error to change the value of a symbol whose name
6549 starts with a colon--if it is interned in the standard obarray.
6551 However, setting such a symbol to its proper value, which is that
6552 symbol itself, is not an error. This is for the sake of programs that
6553 support previous Emacs versions by explicitly setting these variables
6556 If you set the variable keyword-symbols-constant-flag to nil,
6557 this error is suppressed, and you can set these symbols to any
6560 ** There is a new debugger command, R.
6561 It evaluates an expression like e, but saves the result
6562 in the buffer *Debugger-record*.
6564 ** Frame-local variables.
6566 You can now make a variable local to various frames. To do this, call
6567 the function make-variable-frame-local; this enables frames to have
6568 local bindings for that variable.
6570 These frame-local bindings are actually frame parameters: you create a
6571 frame-local binding in a specific frame by calling
6572 modify-frame-parameters and specifying the variable name as the
6575 Buffer-local bindings take precedence over frame-local bindings.
6576 Thus, if the current buffer has a buffer-local binding, that binding is
6577 active; otherwise, if the selected frame has a frame-local binding,
6578 that binding is active; otherwise, the default binding is active.
6580 It would not be hard to implement window-local bindings, but it is not
6581 clear that this would be very useful; windows tend to come and go in a
6582 very transitory fashion, so that trying to produce any specific effect
6583 through a window-local binding would not be very robust.
6585 ** `sregexq' and `sregex' are two new functions for constructing
6586 "symbolic regular expressions." These are Lisp expressions that, when
6587 evaluated, yield conventional string-based regexps. The symbolic form
6588 makes it easier to construct, read, and maintain complex patterns.
6589 See the documentation in sregex.el.
6591 ** parse-partial-sexp's return value has an additional element which
6592 is used to pass information along if you pass it to another call to
6593 parse-partial-sexp, starting its scan where the first call ended.
6594 The contents of this field are not yet finalized.
6596 ** eval-region now accepts a fourth optional argument READ-FUNCTION.
6597 If it is non-nil, that function is used instead of `read'.
6599 ** unload-feature by default removes the feature's functions from
6600 known hooks to avoid trouble, but a package providing FEATURE can
6601 define a hook FEATURE-unload-hook to be run by unload-feature instead.
6603 ** read-from-minibuffer no longer returns the argument DEFAULT-VALUE
6604 when the user enters empty input. It now returns the null string, as
6605 it did in Emacs 19. The default value is made available in the
6606 history via M-n, but it is not applied here as a default.
6608 The other, more specialized minibuffer-reading functions continue to
6609 return the default value (not the null string) when the user enters
6612 ** The new variable read-buffer-function controls which routine to use
6613 for selecting buffers. For example, if you set this variable to
6614 `iswitchb-read-buffer', iswitchb will be used to read buffer names.
6615 Other functions can also be used if they accept the same arguments as
6616 `read-buffer' and return the selected buffer name as a string.
6618 ** The new function read-passwd reads a password from the terminal,
6619 echoing a period for each character typed. It takes three arguments:
6620 a prompt string, a flag which says "read it twice to make sure", and a
6621 default password to use if the user enters nothing.
6623 ** The variable fill-nobreak-predicate gives major modes a way to
6624 specify not to break a line at certain places. Its value is a
6625 function which is called with no arguments, with point located at the
6626 place where a break is being considered. If the function returns
6627 non-nil, then the line won't be broken there.
6629 ** window-end now takes an optional second argument, UPDATE.
6630 If this is non-nil, then the function always returns an accurate
6631 up-to-date value for the buffer position corresponding to the
6632 end of the window, even if this requires computation.
6634 ** other-buffer now takes an optional argument FRAME
6635 which specifies which frame's buffer list to use.
6636 If it is nil, that means use the selected frame's buffer list.
6638 ** The new variable buffer-display-time, always local in every buffer,
6639 holds the value of (current-time) as of the last time that a window
6640 was directed to display this buffer.
6642 ** It is now meaningful to compare two window-configuration objects
6643 with `equal'. Two window-configuration objects are equal if they
6644 describe equivalent arrangements of windows, in the same frame--in
6645 other words, if they would give the same results if passed to
6646 set-window-configuration.
6648 ** compare-window-configurations is a new function that compares two
6649 window configurations loosely. It ignores differences in saved buffer
6650 positions and scrolling, and considers only the structure and sizes of
6651 windows and the choice of buffers to display.
6653 ** The variable minor-mode-overriding-map-alist allows major modes to
6654 override the key bindings of a minor mode. The elements of this alist
6655 look like the elements of minor-mode-map-alist: (VARIABLE . KEYMAP).
6657 If the VARIABLE in an element of minor-mode-overriding-map-alist has a
6658 non-nil value, the paired KEYMAP is active, and totally overrides the
6659 map (if any) specified for the same variable in minor-mode-map-alist.
6661 minor-mode-overriding-map-alist is automatically local in all buffers,
6662 and it is meant to be set by major modes.
6664 ** The function match-string-no-properties is like match-string
6665 except that it discards all text properties from the result.
6667 ** The function load-average now accepts an optional argument
6668 USE-FLOATS. If it is non-nil, the load average values are returned as
6669 floating point numbers, rather than as integers to be divided by 100.
6671 ** The new variable temporary-file-directory specifies the directory
6672 to use for creating temporary files. The default value is determined
6673 in a reasonable way for your operating system; on GNU and Unix systems
6674 it is based on the TMP and TMPDIR environment variables.
6678 *** easymenu.el now uses the new menu item format and supports the
6679 keywords :visible and :filter. The existing keyword :keys is now
6682 The variable `easy-menu-precalculate-equivalent-keybindings' controls
6683 a new feature which calculates keyboard equivalents for the menu when
6684 you define the menu. The default is t. If you rarely use menus, you
6685 can set the variable to nil to disable this precalculation feature;
6686 then the calculation is done only if you use the menu bar.
6688 *** A new format for menu items is supported.
6690 In a keymap, a key binding that has the format
6691 (STRING . REAL-BINDING) or (STRING HELP-STRING . REAL-BINDING)
6692 defines a menu item. Now a menu item definition may also be a list that
6693 starts with the symbol `menu-item'.
6696 (menu-item ITEM-NAME) or
6697 (menu-item ITEM-NAME REAL-BINDING . ITEM-PROPERTY-LIST)
6698 where ITEM-NAME is an expression which evaluates to the menu item
6699 string, and ITEM-PROPERTY-LIST has the form of a property list.
6700 The supported properties include
6702 :enable FORM Evaluate FORM to determine whether the
6704 :visible FORM Evaluate FORM to determine whether the
6705 item should appear in the menu.
6707 FILTER-FN is a function of one argument,
6708 which will be REAL-BINDING.
6709 It should return a binding to use instead.
6711 DESCRIPTION is a string that describes an equivalent keyboard
6712 binding for REAL-BINDING. DESCRIPTION is expanded with
6713 `substitute-command-keys' before it is used.
6714 :key-sequence KEY-SEQUENCE
6715 KEY-SEQUENCE is a key-sequence for an equivalent
6718 This means that the command normally has no
6719 keyboard equivalent.
6720 :help HELP HELP is the extra help string (not currently used).
6721 :button (TYPE . SELECTED)
6722 TYPE is :toggle or :radio.
6723 SELECTED is a form, to be evaluated, and its
6724 value says whether this button is currently selected.
6726 Buttons are at the moment only simulated by prefixes in the menu.
6727 Eventually ordinary X-buttons may be supported.
6729 (menu-item ITEM-NAME) defines unselectable item.
6733 *** The new event type `mouse-wheel' is generated by a wheel on a
6734 mouse (such as the MS Intellimouse). The event contains a delta that
6735 corresponds to the amount and direction that the wheel is rotated,
6736 which is typically used to implement a scroll or zoom. The format is:
6738 (mouse-wheel POSITION DELTA)
6740 where POSITION is a list describing the position of the event in the
6741 same format as a mouse-click event, and DELTA is a signed number
6742 indicating the number of increments by which the wheel was rotated. A
6743 negative DELTA indicates that the wheel was rotated backwards, towards
6744 the user, and a positive DELTA indicates that the wheel was rotated
6745 forward, away from the user.
6747 As of now, this event type is generated only on MS Windows.
6749 *** The new event type `drag-n-drop' is generated when a group of
6750 files is selected in an application outside of Emacs, and then dragged
6751 and dropped onto an Emacs frame. The event contains a list of
6752 filenames that were dragged and dropped, which are then typically
6753 loaded into Emacs. The format is:
6755 (drag-n-drop POSITION FILES)
6757 where POSITION is a list describing the position of the event in the
6758 same format as a mouse-click event, and FILES is the list of filenames
6759 that were dragged and dropped.
6761 As of now, this event type is generated only on MS Windows.
6763 ** Changes relating to multibyte characters.
6765 *** The variable enable-multibyte-characters is now read-only;
6766 any attempt to set it directly signals an error. The only way
6767 to change this value in an existing buffer is with set-buffer-multibyte.
6769 *** In a string constant, `\ ' now stands for "nothing at all". You
6770 can use it to terminate a hex escape which is followed by a character
6771 that could otherwise be read as part of the hex escape.
6773 *** String indices are now measured in characters, as they were
6774 in Emacs 19 and before.
6776 The function chars-in-string has been deleted.
6777 The function concat-chars has been renamed to `string'.
6779 *** The function set-buffer-multibyte sets the flag in the current
6780 buffer that says whether the buffer uses multibyte representation or
6781 unibyte representation. If the argument is nil, it selects unibyte
6782 representation. Otherwise it selects multibyte representation.
6784 This function does not change the contents of the buffer, viewed
6785 as a sequence of bytes. However, it does change the contents
6786 viewed as characters; a sequence of two bytes which is treated as
6787 one character when the buffer uses multibyte representation
6788 will count as two characters using unibyte representation.
6790 This function sets enable-multibyte-characters to record which
6791 representation is in use. It also adjusts various data in the buffer
6792 (including its markers, overlays and text properties) so that they are
6793 consistent with the new representation.
6795 *** string-make-multibyte takes a string and converts it to multibyte
6796 representation. Most of the time, you don't need to care
6797 about the representation, because Emacs converts when necessary;
6798 however, it makes a difference when you compare strings.
6800 The conversion of non-ASCII characters works by adding the value of
6801 nonascii-insert-offset to each character, or by translating them
6802 using the table nonascii-translation-table.
6804 *** string-make-unibyte takes a string and converts it to unibyte
6805 representation. Most of the time, you don't need to care about the
6806 representation, but it makes a difference when you compare strings.
6808 The conversion from multibyte to unibyte representation
6809 loses information; the only time Emacs performs it automatically
6810 is when inserting a multibyte string into a unibyte buffer.
6812 *** string-as-multibyte takes a string, and returns another string
6813 which contains the same bytes, but treats them as multibyte.
6815 *** string-as-unibyte takes a string, and returns another string
6816 which contains the same bytes, but treats them as unibyte.
6818 *** The new function compare-strings lets you compare
6819 portions of two strings. Unibyte strings are converted to multibyte,
6820 so that a unibyte string can match a multibyte string.
6821 You can specify whether to ignore case or not.
6823 *** assoc-ignore-case now uses compare-strings so that
6824 it can treat unibyte and multibyte strings as equal.
6826 *** Regular expression operations and buffer string searches now
6827 convert the search pattern to multibyte or unibyte to accord with the
6828 buffer or string being searched.
6830 One consequence is that you cannot always use \200-\377 inside of
6831 [...] to match all non-ASCII characters. This does still work when
6832 searching or matching a unibyte buffer or string, but not when
6833 searching or matching a multibyte string. Unfortunately, there is no
6834 obvious choice of syntax to use within [...] for that job. But, what
6835 you want is just to match all non-ASCII characters, the regular
6836 expression [^\0-\177] works for it.
6838 *** Structure of coding system changed.
6840 All coding systems (including aliases and subsidiaries) are named
6841 by symbols; the symbol's `coding-system' property is a vector
6842 which defines the coding system. Aliases share the same vector
6843 as the principal name, so that altering the contents of this
6844 vector affects the principal name and its aliases. You can define
6845 your own alias name of a coding system by the function
6846 define-coding-system-alias.
6848 The coding system definition includes a property list of its own. Use
6849 the new functions `coding-system-get' and `coding-system-put' to
6850 access such coding system properties as post-read-conversion,
6851 pre-write-conversion, character-translation-table-for-decode,
6852 character-translation-table-for-encode, mime-charset, and
6853 safe-charsets. For instance, (coding-system-get 'iso-latin-1
6854 'mime-charset) gives the corresponding MIME-charset parameter
6857 Among the coding system properties listed above, safe-charsets is new.
6858 The value of this property is a list of character sets which this
6859 coding system can correctly encode and decode. For instance:
6860 (coding-system-get 'iso-latin-1 'safe-charsets) => (ascii latin-iso8859-1)
6862 Here, "correctly encode" means that the encoded character sets can
6863 also be handled safely by systems other than Emacs as far as they
6864 are capable of that coding system. Though, Emacs itself can encode
6865 the other character sets and read it back correctly.
6867 *** The new function select-safe-coding-system can be used to find a
6868 proper coding system for encoding the specified region or string.
6869 This function requires a user interaction.
6871 *** The new functions find-coding-systems-region and
6872 find-coding-systems-string are helper functions used by
6873 select-safe-coding-system. They return a list of all proper coding
6874 systems to encode a text in some region or string. If you don't want
6875 a user interaction, use one of these functions instead of
6876 select-safe-coding-system.
6878 *** The explicit encoding and decoding functions, such as
6879 decode-coding-region and encode-coding-string, now set
6880 last-coding-system-used to reflect the actual way encoding or decoding
6883 *** The new function detect-coding-with-language-environment can be
6884 used to detect a coding system of text according to priorities of
6885 coding systems used by some specific language environment.
6887 *** The functions detect-coding-region and detect-coding-string always
6888 return a list if the arg HIGHEST is nil. Thus, if only ASCII
6889 characters are found, they now return a list of single element
6890 `undecided' or its subsidiaries.
6892 *** The new functions coding-system-change-eol-conversion and
6893 coding-system-change-text-conversion can be used to get a different
6894 coding system than what specified only in how end-of-line or text is
6897 *** The new function set-selection-coding-system can be used to set a
6898 coding system for communicating with other X clients.
6900 *** The function `map-char-table' now passes as argument only valid
6901 character codes, plus generic characters that stand for entire
6902 character sets or entire subrows of a character set. In other words,
6903 each time `map-char-table' calls its FUNCTION argument, the key value
6904 either will be a valid individual character code, or will stand for a
6905 range of characters.
6907 *** The new function `char-valid-p' can be used for checking whether a
6908 Lisp object is a valid character code or not.
6910 *** The new function `charset-after' returns a charset of a character
6911 in the current buffer at position POS.
6913 *** Input methods are now implemented using the variable
6914 input-method-function. If this is non-nil, its value should be a
6915 function; then, whenever Emacs reads an input event that is a printing
6916 character with no modifier bits, it calls that function, passing the
6917 event as an argument. Often this function will read more input, first
6918 binding input-method-function to nil.
6920 The return value should be a list of the events resulting from input
6921 method processing. These events will be processed sequentially as
6922 input, before resorting to unread-command-events. Events returned by
6923 the input method function are not passed to the input method function,
6924 not even if they are printing characters with no modifier bits.
6926 The input method function is not called when reading the second and
6927 subsequent events of a key sequence.
6929 *** You can customize any language environment by using
6930 set-language-environment-hook and exit-language-environment-hook.
6932 The hook `exit-language-environment-hook' should be used to undo
6933 customizations that you made with set-language-environment-hook. For
6934 instance, if you set up a special key binding for a specific language
6935 environment by set-language-environment-hook, you should set up
6936 exit-language-environment-hook to restore the normal key binding.
6938 * Changes in Emacs 20.1
6940 ** Emacs has a new facility for customization of its many user
6941 options. It is called M-x customize. With this facility you can look
6942 at the many user options in an organized way; they are grouped into a
6945 M-x customize also knows what sorts of values are legitimate for each
6946 user option and ensures that you don't use invalid values.
6948 With M-x customize, you can set options either for the present Emacs
6949 session or permanently. (Permanent settings are stored automatically
6950 in your .emacs file.)
6952 ** Scroll bars are now on the left side of the window.
6953 You can change this with M-x customize-option scroll-bar-mode.
6955 ** The mode line no longer includes the string `Emacs'.
6956 This makes more space in the mode line for other information.
6958 ** When you select a region with the mouse, it is highlighted
6959 immediately afterward. At that time, if you type the DELETE key, it
6962 The BACKSPACE key, and the ASCII character DEL, do not do this; they
6963 delete the character before point, as usual.
6965 ** In an incremental search the whole current match is highlighted
6966 on terminals which support this. (You can disable this feature
6967 by setting search-highlight to nil.)
6969 ** In the minibuffer, in some cases, you can now use M-n to
6970 insert the default value into the minibuffer as text. In effect,
6971 the default value (if the minibuffer routines know it) is tacked
6972 onto the history "in the future". (The more normal use of the
6973 history list is to use M-p to insert minibuffer input used in the
6976 ** In Text mode, now only blank lines separate paragraphs.
6977 This makes it possible to get the full benefit of Adaptive Fill mode
6978 in Text mode, and other modes derived from it (such as Mail mode).
6979 TAB in Text mode now runs the command indent-relative; this
6980 makes a practical difference only when you use indented paragraphs.
6982 As a result, the old Indented Text mode is now identical to Text mode,
6983 and is an alias for it.
6985 If you want spaces at the beginning of a line to start a paragraph,
6986 use the new mode, Paragraph Indent Text mode.
6988 ** Scrolling changes
6990 *** Scroll commands to scroll a whole screen now preserve the screen
6991 position of the cursor, if scroll-preserve-screen-position is non-nil.
6993 In this mode, if you scroll several screens back and forth, finishing
6994 on the same screen where you started, the cursor goes back to the line
6997 *** If you set scroll-conservatively to a small number, then when you
6998 move point a short distance off the screen, Emacs will scroll the
6999 screen just far enough to bring point back on screen, provided that
7000 does not exceed `scroll-conservatively' lines.
7002 *** The new variable scroll-margin says how close point can come to the
7003 top or bottom of a window. It is a number of screen lines; if point
7004 comes within that many lines of the top or bottom of the window, Emacs
7005 recenters the window.
7007 ** International character set support (MULE)
7009 Emacs now supports a wide variety of international character sets,
7010 including European variants of the Latin alphabet, as well as Chinese,
7011 Devanagari (Hindi and Marathi), Ethiopian, Greek, IPA, Japanese,
7012 Korean, Lao, Russian, Thai, Tibetan, and Vietnamese scripts. These
7013 features have been merged from the modified version of Emacs known as
7014 MULE (for "MULti-lingual Enhancement to GNU Emacs")
7016 Users of these scripts have established many more-or-less standard
7017 coding systems for storing files. Emacs uses a single multibyte
7018 character encoding within Emacs buffers; it can translate from a wide
7019 variety of coding systems when reading a file and can translate back
7020 into any of these coding systems when saving a file.
7022 Keyboards, even in the countries where these character sets are used,
7023 generally don't have keys for all the characters in them. So Emacs
7024 supports various "input methods", typically one for each script or
7025 language, to make it possible to type them.
7027 The Emacs internal multibyte encoding represents a non-ASCII
7028 character as a sequence of bytes in the range 0200 through 0377.
7030 The new prefix key C-x RET is used for commands that pertain
7031 to multibyte characters, coding systems, and input methods.
7033 You can disable multibyte character support as follows:
7035 (setq-default enable-multibyte-characters nil)
7037 Calling the function standard-display-european turns off multibyte
7038 characters, unless you specify a non-nil value for the second
7039 argument, AUTO. This provides compatibility for people who are
7040 already using standard-display-european to continue using unibyte
7041 characters for their work until they want to change.
7045 An input method is a kind of character conversion which is designed
7046 specifically for interactive input. In Emacs, typically each language
7047 has its own input method (though sometimes several languages which use
7048 the same characters can share one input method). Some languages
7049 support several input methods.
7051 The simplest kind of input method works by mapping ASCII letters into
7052 another alphabet. This is how the Greek and Russian input methods
7055 A more powerful technique is composition: converting sequences of
7056 characters into one letter. Many European input methods use
7057 composition to produce a single non-ASCII letter from a sequence which
7058 consists of a letter followed by diacritics. For example, a' is one
7059 sequence of two characters that might be converted into a single
7062 The input methods for syllabic scripts typically use mapping followed
7063 by conversion. The input methods for Thai and Korean work this way.
7064 First, letters are mapped into symbols for particular sounds or tone
7065 marks; then, sequences of these which make up a whole syllable are
7066 mapped into one syllable sign--most often a "composite character".
7068 None of these methods works very well for Chinese and Japanese, so
7069 they are handled specially. First you input a whole word using
7070 phonetic spelling; then, after the word is in the buffer, Emacs
7071 converts it into one or more characters using a large dictionary.
7073 Since there is more than one way to represent a phonetically spelled
7074 word using Chinese characters, Emacs can only guess which one to use;
7075 typically these input methods give you a way to say "guess again" if
7076 the first guess is wrong.
7078 *** The command C-x RET m (toggle-enable-multibyte-characters)
7079 turns multibyte character support on or off for the current buffer.
7081 If multibyte character support is turned off in a buffer, then each
7082 byte is a single character, even codes 0200 through 0377--exactly as
7083 they did in Emacs 19.34. This includes the features for support for
7084 the European characters, ISO Latin-1 and ISO Latin-2.
7086 However, there is no need to turn off multibyte character support to
7087 use ISO Latin-1 or ISO Latin-2; the Emacs multibyte character set
7088 includes all the characters in these character sets, and Emacs can
7089 translate automatically to and from either one.
7091 *** Visiting a file in unibyte mode.
7093 Turning off multibyte character support in the buffer after visiting a
7094 file with multibyte code conversion will display the multibyte
7095 sequences already in the buffer, byte by byte. This is probably not
7098 If you want to edit a file of unibyte characters (Latin-1, for
7099 example), you can do it by specifying `no-conversion' as the coding
7100 system when reading the file. This coding system also turns off
7101 multibyte characters in that buffer.
7103 If you turn off multibyte character support entirely, this turns off
7104 character conversion as well.
7106 *** Displaying international characters on X Windows.
7108 A font for X typically displays just one alphabet or script.
7109 Therefore, displaying the entire range of characters Emacs supports
7110 requires using many fonts.
7112 Therefore, Emacs now supports "fontsets". Each fontset is a
7113 collection of fonts, each assigned to a range of character codes.
7115 A fontset has a name, like a font. Individual fonts are defined by
7116 the X server; fontsets are defined within Emacs itself. But once you
7117 have defined a fontset, you can use it in a face or a frame just as
7118 you would use a font.
7120 If a fontset specifies no font for a certain character, or if it
7121 specifies a font that does not exist on your system, then it cannot
7122 display that character. It will display an empty box instead.
7124 The fontset height and width are determined by the ASCII characters
7125 (that is, by the font in the fontset which is used for ASCII
7128 *** Defining fontsets.
7130 Emacs does not use any fontset by default. Its default font is still
7131 chosen as in previous versions. You can tell Emacs to use a fontset
7132 with the `-fn' option or the `Font' X resource.
7134 Emacs creates a standard fontset automatically according to the value
7135 of standard-fontset-spec. This fontset's short name is
7136 `fontset-standard'. Bold, italic, and bold-italic variants of the
7137 standard fontset are created automatically.
7139 If you specify a default ASCII font with the `Font' resource or `-fn'
7140 argument, a fontset is generated from it. This works by replacing the
7141 FOUNDARY, FAMILY, ADD_STYLE, and AVERAGE_WIDTH fields of the font name
7142 with `*' then using this to specify a fontset. This fontset's short
7143 name is `fontset-startup'.
7145 Emacs checks resources of the form Fontset-N where N is 0, 1, 2...
7146 The resource value should have this form:
7147 FONTSET-NAME, [CHARSET-NAME:FONT-NAME]...
7148 FONTSET-NAME should have the form of a standard X font name, except:
7149 * most fields should be just the wild card "*".
7150 * the CHARSET_REGISTRY field should be "fontset"
7151 * the CHARSET_ENCODING field can be any nickname of the fontset.
7152 The construct CHARSET-NAME:FONT-NAME can be repeated any number
7153 of times; each time specifies the font for one character set.
7154 CHARSET-NAME should be the name of a character set, and FONT-NAME
7155 should specify an actual font to use for that character set.
7157 Each of these fontsets has an alias which is made from the
7158 last two font name fields, CHARSET_REGISTRY and CHARSET_ENCODING.
7159 You can refer to the fontset by that alias or by its full name.
7161 For any character sets that you don't mention, Emacs tries to choose a
7162 font by substituting into FONTSET-NAME. For instance, with the
7164 Emacs*Fontset-0: -*-fixed-medium-r-normal-*-24-*-*-*-*-*-fontset-24
7165 the font for ASCII is generated as below:
7166 -*-fixed-medium-r-normal-*-24-*-ISO8859-1
7167 Here is the substitution rule:
7168 Change CHARSET_REGISTRY and CHARSET_ENCODING to that of the charset
7169 defined in the variable x-charset-registries. For instance, ASCII has
7170 the entry (ascii . "ISO8859-1") in this variable. Then, reduce
7171 sequences of wild cards -*-...-*- with a single wildcard -*-.
7172 (This is to prevent use of auto-scaled fonts.)
7174 The function which processes the fontset resource value to create the
7175 fontset is called create-fontset-from-fontset-spec. You can also call
7176 that function explicitly to create a fontset.
7178 With the X resource Emacs.Font, you can specify a fontset name just
7179 like an actual font name. But be careful not to specify a fontset
7180 name in a wildcard resource like Emacs*Font--that tries to specify the
7181 fontset for other purposes including menus, and they cannot handle
7184 *** The command M-x set-language-environment sets certain global Emacs
7185 defaults for a particular choice of language.
7187 Selecting a language environment typically specifies a default input
7188 method and which coding systems to recognize automatically when
7189 visiting files. However, it does not try to reread files you have
7190 already visited; the text in those buffers is not affected. The
7191 language environment may also specify a default choice of coding
7192 system for new files that you create.
7194 It makes no difference which buffer is current when you use
7195 set-language-environment, because these defaults apply globally to the
7196 whole Emacs session.
7198 For example, M-x set-language-environment RET Latin-1 RET
7199 chooses the Latin-1 character set. In the .emacs file, you can do this
7200 with (set-language-environment "Latin-1").
7202 *** The command C-x RET f (set-buffer-file-coding-system)
7203 specifies the file coding system for the current buffer. This
7204 specifies what sort of character code translation to do when saving
7205 the file. As an argument, you must specify the name of one of the
7206 coding systems that Emacs supports.
7208 *** The command C-x RET c (universal-coding-system-argument)
7209 lets you specify a coding system when you read or write a file.
7210 This command uses the minibuffer to read a coding system name.
7211 After you exit the minibuffer, the specified coding system
7212 is used for *the immediately following command*.
7214 So if the immediately following command is a command to read or
7215 write a file, it uses the specified coding system for that file.
7217 If the immediately following command does not use the coding system,
7218 then C-x RET c ultimately has no effect.
7220 For example, C-x RET c iso-8859-1 RET C-x C-f temp RET
7221 visits the file `temp' treating it as ISO Latin-1.
7223 *** You can specify the coding system for a file using the -*-
7224 construct. Include `coding: CODINGSYSTEM;' inside the -*-...-*-
7225 to specify use of coding system CODINGSYSTEM. You can also
7226 specify the coding system in a local variable list at the end
7229 *** The command C-x RET t (set-terminal-coding-system) specifies
7230 the coding system for terminal output. If you specify a character
7231 code for terminal output, all characters output to the terminal are
7232 translated into that character code.
7234 This feature is useful for certain character-only terminals built in
7235 various countries to support the languages of those countries.
7237 By default, output to the terminal is not translated at all.
7239 *** The command C-x RET k (set-keyboard-coding-system) specifies
7240 the coding system for keyboard input.
7242 Character code translation of keyboard input is useful for terminals
7243 with keys that send non-ASCII graphic characters--for example,
7244 some terminals designed for ISO Latin-1 or subsets of it.
7246 By default, keyboard input is not translated at all.
7248 Character code translation of keyboard input is similar to using an
7249 input method, in that both define sequences of keyboard input that
7250 translate into single characters. However, input methods are designed
7251 to be convenient for interactive use, while the code translations are
7252 designed to work with terminals.
7254 *** The command C-x RET p (set-buffer-process-coding-system)
7255 specifies the coding system for input and output to a subprocess.
7256 This command applies to the current buffer; normally, each subprocess
7257 has its own buffer, and thus you can use this command to specify
7258 translation to and from a particular subprocess by giving the command
7259 in the corresponding buffer.
7261 By default, process input and output are not translated at all.
7263 *** The variable file-name-coding-system specifies the coding system
7264 to use for encoding file names before operating on them.
7265 It is also used for decoding file names obtained from the system.
7267 *** The command C-\ (toggle-input-method) activates or deactivates
7268 an input method. If no input method has been selected before, the
7269 command prompts for you to specify the language and input method you
7272 C-u C-\ (select-input-method) lets you switch to a different input
7273 method. C-h C-\ (or C-h I) describes the current input method.
7275 *** Some input methods remap the keyboard to emulate various keyboard
7276 layouts commonly used for particular scripts. How to do this
7277 remapping properly depends on your actual keyboard layout. To specify
7278 which layout your keyboard has, use M-x quail-set-keyboard-layout.
7280 *** The command C-h C (describe-coding-system) displays
7281 the coding systems currently selected for various purposes, plus
7282 related information.
7284 *** The command C-h h (view-hello-file) displays a file called
7285 HELLO, which has examples of text in many languages, using various
7288 *** The command C-h L (describe-language-support) displays
7289 information about the support for a particular language.
7290 You specify the language as an argument.
7292 *** The mode line now contains a letter or character that identifies
7293 the coding system used in the visited file. It normally follows the
7296 A dash indicates the default state of affairs: no code conversion
7297 (except CRLF => newline if appropriate). `=' means no conversion
7298 whatsoever. The ISO 8859 coding systems are represented by digits
7299 1 through 9. Other coding systems are represented by letters:
7301 A alternativnyj (Russian)
7303 C cn-gb-2312 (Chinese)
7304 C iso-2022-cn (Chinese)
7305 D in-is13194-devanagari (Indian languages)
7306 E euc-japan (Japanese)
7307 I iso-2022-cjk or iso-2022-ss2 (Chinese, Japanese, Korean)
7308 J junet (iso-2022-7) or old-jis (iso-2022-jp-1978-irv) (Japanese)
7309 K euc-korea (Korean)
7312 S shift_jis (Japanese)
7315 V viscii or vscii (Vietnamese)
7316 i iso-2022-lock (Chinese, Japanese, Korean)
7317 k iso-2022-kr (Korean)
7321 When you are using a character-only terminal (not a window system),
7322 two additional characters appear in between the dash and the file
7323 coding system. These two characters describe the coding system for
7324 keyboard input, and the coding system for terminal output.
7326 *** The new variable rmail-file-coding-system specifies the code
7327 conversion to use for RMAIL files. The default value is nil.
7329 When you read mail with Rmail, each message is decoded automatically
7330 into Emacs' internal format. This has nothing to do with
7331 rmail-file-coding-system. That variable controls reading and writing
7332 Rmail files themselves.
7334 *** The new variable sendmail-coding-system specifies the code
7335 conversion for outgoing mail. The default value is nil.
7337 Actually, there are three different ways of specifying the coding system
7340 - If you use C-x RET f in the mail buffer, that takes priority.
7341 - Otherwise, if you set sendmail-coding-system non-nil, that specifies it.
7342 - Otherwise, the default coding system for new files is used,
7343 if that is non-nil. That comes from your language environment.
7344 - Otherwise, Latin-1 is used.
7346 *** The command C-h t (help-with-tutorial) accepts a prefix argument
7347 to specify the language for the tutorial file. Currently, English,
7348 Japanese, Korean and Thai are supported. We welcome additional
7351 ** An easy new way to visit a file with no code or format conversion
7352 of any kind: Use M-x find-file-literally. There is also a command
7353 insert-file-literally which inserts a file into the current buffer
7354 without any conversion.
7356 ** C-q's handling of octal character codes is changed.
7357 You can now specify any number of octal digits.
7358 RET terminates the digits and is discarded;
7359 any other non-digit terminates the digits and is then used as input.
7361 ** There are new commands for looking up Info documentation for
7362 functions, variables and file names used in your programs.
7364 Type M-x info-lookup-symbol to look up a symbol in the buffer at point.
7365 Type M-x info-lookup-file to look up a file in the buffer at point.
7367 Precisely which Info files are used to look it up depends on the major
7368 mode. For example, in C mode, the GNU libc manual is used.
7370 ** M-TAB in most programming language modes now runs the command
7371 complete-symbol. This command performs completion on the symbol name
7372 in the buffer before point.
7374 With a numeric argument, it performs completion based on the set of
7375 symbols documented in the Info files for the programming language that
7378 With no argument, it does completion based on the current tags tables,
7379 just like the old binding of M-TAB (complete-tag).
7381 ** File locking works with NFS now.
7383 The lock file for FILENAME is now a symbolic link named .#FILENAME,
7384 in the same directory as FILENAME.
7386 This means that collision detection between two different machines now
7387 works reasonably well; it also means that no file server or directory
7388 can become a bottleneck.
7390 The new method does have drawbacks. It means that collision detection
7391 does not operate when you edit a file in a directory where you cannot
7392 create new files. Collision detection also doesn't operate when the
7393 file server does not support symbolic links. But these conditions are
7394 rare, and the ability to have collision detection while using NFS is
7395 so useful that the change is worth while.
7397 When Emacs or a system crashes, this may leave behind lock files which
7398 are stale. So you may occasionally get warnings about spurious
7399 collisions. When you determine that the collision is spurious, just
7400 tell Emacs to go ahead anyway.
7402 ** If you wish to use Show Paren mode to display matching parentheses,
7403 it is no longer sufficient to load paren.el. Instead you must call
7406 ** If you wish to use Delete Selection mode to replace a highlighted
7407 selection when you insert new text, it is no longer sufficient to load
7408 delsel.el. Instead you must call the function delete-selection-mode.
7410 ** If you wish to use Partial Completion mode to complete partial words
7411 within symbols or filenames, it is no longer sufficient to load
7412 complete.el. Instead you must call the function partial-completion-mode.
7414 ** If you wish to use uniquify to rename buffers for you,
7415 it is no longer sufficient to load uniquify.el. You must also
7416 set uniquify-buffer-name-style to one of the non-nil legitimate values.
7418 ** Changes in View mode.
7420 *** Several new commands are available in View mode.
7421 Do H in view mode for a list of commands.
7423 *** There are two new commands for entering View mode:
7424 view-file-other-frame and view-buffer-other-frame.
7426 *** Exiting View mode does a better job of restoring windows to their
7429 *** New customization variable view-scroll-auto-exit. If non-nil,
7430 scrolling past end of buffer makes view mode exit.
7432 *** New customization variable view-exits-all-viewing-windows. If
7433 non-nil, view-mode will at exit restore all windows viewing buffer,
7434 not just the selected window.
7436 *** New customization variable view-read-only. If non-nil, visiting a
7437 read-only file automatically enters View mode, and toggle-read-only
7438 turns View mode on or off.
7440 *** New customization variable view-remove-frame-by-deleting controls
7441 how to remove a not needed frame at view mode exit. If non-nil,
7442 delete the frame, if nil make an icon of it.
7444 ** C-x v l, the command to print a file's version control log,
7445 now positions point at the entry for the file's current branch version.
7447 ** C-x v =, the command to compare a file with the last checked-in version,
7448 has a new feature. If the file is currently not locked, so that it is
7449 presumably identical to the last checked-in version, the command now asks
7450 which version to compare with.
7452 ** When using hideshow.el, incremental search can temporarily show hidden
7453 blocks if a match is inside the block.
7455 The block is hidden again if the search is continued and the next match
7456 is outside the block. By customizing the variable
7457 isearch-hide-immediately you can choose to hide all the temporarily
7458 shown blocks only when exiting from incremental search.
7460 By customizing the variable hs-isearch-open you can choose what kind
7461 of blocks to temporarily show during isearch: comment blocks, code
7462 blocks, all of them or none.
7464 ** The new command C-x 4 0 (kill-buffer-and-window) kills the
7465 current buffer and deletes the selected window. It asks for
7468 ** C-x C-w, which saves the buffer into a specified file name,
7469 now changes the major mode according to that file name.
7470 However, the mode will not be changed if
7471 (1) a local variables list or the `-*-' line specifies a major mode, or
7472 (2) the current major mode is a "special" mode,
7473 not suitable for ordinary files, or
7474 (3) the new file name does not particularly specify any mode.
7476 This applies to M-x set-visited-file-name as well.
7478 However, if you set change-major-mode-with-file-name to nil, then
7479 these commands do not change the major mode.
7481 ** M-x occur changes.
7483 *** If the argument to M-x occur contains upper case letters,
7484 it performs a case-sensitive search.
7486 *** In the *Occur* buffer made by M-x occur,
7487 if you type g or M-x revert-buffer, this repeats the search
7488 using the same regular expression and the same buffer as before.
7490 ** In Transient Mark mode, the region in any one buffer is highlighted
7491 in just one window at a time. At first, it is highlighted in the
7492 window where you set the mark. The buffer's highlighting remains in
7493 that window unless you select to another window which shows the same
7494 buffer--then the highlighting moves to that window.
7496 ** The feature to suggest key bindings when you use M-x now operates
7497 after the command finishes. The message suggesting key bindings
7498 appears temporarily in the echo area. The previous echo area contents
7499 come back after a few seconds, in case they contain useful information.
7501 ** Each frame now independently records the order for recently
7502 selected buffers, so that the default for C-x b is now based on the
7503 buffers recently selected in the selected frame.
7505 ** Outline mode changes.
7507 *** Outline mode now uses overlays (this is the former noutline.el).
7509 *** Incremental searches skip over invisible text in Outline mode.
7511 ** When a minibuffer window is active but not the selected window, if
7512 you try to use the minibuffer, you used to get a nested minibuffer.
7513 Now, this not only gives an error, it also cancels the minibuffer that
7516 The motive for this change is so that beginning users do not
7517 unknowingly move away from minibuffers, leaving them active, and then
7520 If you want to be able to have recursive minibuffers, you must
7521 set enable-recursive-minibuffers to non-nil.
7523 ** Changes in dynamic abbrevs.
7525 *** Expanding dynamic abbrevs with M-/ is now smarter about case
7526 conversion. If the expansion has mixed case not counting the first
7527 character, and the abbreviation matches the beginning of the expansion
7528 including case, then the expansion is copied verbatim.
7530 The expansion is also copied verbatim if the abbreviation itself has
7531 mixed case. And using SPC M-/ to copy an additional word always
7532 copies it verbatim except when the previous copied word is all caps.
7534 *** The values of `dabbrev-case-replace' and `dabbrev-case-fold-search'
7535 are no longer Lisp expressions. They have simply three possible
7538 `dabbrev-case-replace' has these three values: nil (don't preserve
7539 case), t (do), or `case-replace' (do like M-x query-replace).
7540 `dabbrev-case-fold-search' has these three values: nil (don't ignore
7541 case), t (do), or `case-fold-search' (do like search).
7543 ** Minibuffer history lists are truncated automatically now to a
7544 certain length. The variable history-length specifies how long they
7545 can be. The default value is 30.
7547 ** Changes in Mail mode.
7549 *** The key C-x m no longer runs the `mail' command directly.
7550 Instead, it runs the command `compose-mail', which invokes the mail
7551 composition mechanism you have selected with the variable
7552 `mail-user-agent'. The default choice of user agent is
7553 `sendmail-user-agent', which gives behavior compatible with the old
7556 C-x 4 m now runs compose-mail-other-window, and C-x 5 m runs
7557 compose-mail-other-frame.
7559 *** While composing a reply to a mail message, from Rmail, you can use
7560 the command C-c C-r to cite just the region from the message you are
7561 replying to. This copies the text which is the selected region in the
7562 buffer that shows the original message.
7564 *** The command C-c C-i inserts a file at the end of the message,
7565 with separator lines around the contents.
7567 *** The command M-x expand-mail-aliases expands all mail aliases
7568 in suitable mail headers. Emacs automatically extracts mail alias
7569 definitions from your mail alias file (e.g., ~/.mailrc). You do not
7570 need to expand mail aliases yourself before sending mail.
7572 *** New features in the mail-complete command.
7574 **** The mail-complete command now inserts the user's full name,
7575 for local users or if that is known. The variable mail-complete-style
7576 controls the style to use, and whether to do this at all.
7577 Its values are like those of mail-from-style.
7579 **** The variable mail-passwd-command lets you specify a shell command
7580 to run to fetch a set of password-entries that add to the ones in
7583 **** The variable mail-passwd-file now specifies a list of files to read
7584 to get the list of user ids. By default, one file is used:
7587 ** You can "quote" a file name to inhibit special significance of
7588 special syntax, by adding `/:' to the beginning. Thus, if you have a
7589 directory named `/foo:', you can prevent it from being treated as a
7590 reference to a remote host named `foo' by writing it as `/:/foo:'.
7592 Emacs uses this new construct automatically when necessary, such as
7593 when you start it with a working directory whose name might otherwise
7594 be taken to be magic.
7596 ** There is a new command M-x grep-find which uses find to select
7597 files to search through, and grep to scan them. The output is
7598 available in a Compile mode buffer, as with M-x grep.
7600 M-x grep now uses the -e option if the grep program supports that.
7601 (-e prevents problems if the search pattern starts with a dash.)
7603 ** In Dired, the & command now flags for deletion the files whose names
7604 suggest they are probably not needed in the long run.
7606 In Dired, * is now a prefix key for mark-related commands.
7608 new key dired.el binding old key
7609 ------- ---------------- -------
7610 * c dired-change-marks c
7612 * * dired-mark-executables * (binding deleted)
7613 * / dired-mark-directories / (binding deleted)
7614 * @ dired-mark-symlinks @ (binding deleted)
7616 * DEL dired-unmark-backward DEL
7617 * ? dired-unmark-all-files C-M-?
7618 * ! dired-unmark-all-marks
7619 * % dired-mark-files-regexp % m
7620 * C-n dired-next-marked-file M-}
7621 * C-p dired-prev-marked-file M-{
7625 *** When Rmail cannot convert your incoming mail into Babyl format, it
7626 saves the new mail in the file RMAILOSE.n, where n is an integer
7627 chosen to make a unique name. This way, Rmail will not keep crashing
7628 each time you run it.
7630 *** In Rmail, the variable rmail-summary-line-count-flag now controls
7631 whether to include the line count in the summary. Non-nil means yes.
7633 *** In Rmail summary buffers, d and C-d (the commands to delete
7634 messages) now take repeat counts as arguments. A negative argument
7635 means to move in the opposite direction.
7637 *** In Rmail, the t command now takes an optional argument which lets
7638 you specify whether to show the message headers in full or pruned.
7640 *** In Rmail, the new command w (rmail-output-body-to-file) writes
7641 just the body of the current message into a file, without the headers.
7642 It takes the file name from the message subject, by default, but you
7643 can edit that file name in the minibuffer before it is actually used
7648 *** nntp.el has been totally rewritten in an asynchronous fashion.
7650 *** Article prefetching functionality has been moved up into
7653 *** Scoring can now be performed with logical operators like
7654 `and', `or', `not', and parent redirection.
7656 *** Article washing status can be displayed in the
7659 *** gnus.el has been split into many smaller files.
7661 *** Suppression of duplicate articles based on Message-ID.
7663 (setq gnus-suppress-duplicates t)
7665 *** New variables for specifying what score and adapt files
7666 are to be considered home score and adapt files. See
7667 `gnus-home-score-file' and `gnus-home-adapt-files'.
7669 *** Groups can inherit group parameters from parent topics.
7671 *** Article editing has been revamped and is now usable.
7673 *** Signatures can be recognized in more intelligent fashions.
7674 See `gnus-signature-separator' and `gnus-signature-limit'.
7676 *** Summary pick mode has been made to look more nn-like.
7677 Line numbers are displayed and the `.' command can be
7678 used to pick articles.
7680 *** Commands for moving the .newsrc.eld from one server to
7681 another have been added.
7683 `M-x gnus-change-server'
7685 *** A way to specify that "uninteresting" fields be suppressed when
7686 generating lines in buffers.
7688 *** Several commands in the group buffer can be undone with
7691 *** Scoring can be done on words using the new score type `w'.
7693 *** Adaptive scoring can be done on a Subject word-by-word basis:
7695 (setq gnus-use-adaptive-scoring '(word))
7697 *** Scores can be decayed.
7699 (setq gnus-decay-scores t)
7701 *** Scoring can be performed using a regexp on the Date header. The
7702 Date is normalized to compact ISO 8601 format first.
7704 *** A new command has been added to remove all data on articles from
7707 `M-x gnus-group-clear-data-on-native-groups'
7709 *** A new command for reading collections of documents
7710 (nndoc with nnvirtual on top) has been added -- `C-M-d'.
7712 *** Process mark sets can be pushed and popped.
7714 *** A new mail-to-news backend makes it possible to post
7715 even when the NNTP server doesn't allow posting.
7717 *** A new backend for reading searches from Web search engines
7718 (DejaNews, Alta Vista, InReference) has been added.
7720 Use the `G w' command in the group buffer to create such
7723 *** Groups inside topics can now be sorted using the standard
7724 sorting functions, and each topic can be sorted independently.
7726 See the commands under the `T S' submap.
7728 *** Subsets of the groups can be sorted independently.
7730 See the commands under the `G P' submap.
7732 *** Cached articles can be pulled into the groups.
7734 Use the `Y c' command.
7736 *** Score files are now applied in a more reliable order.
7738 *** Reports on where mail messages end up can be generated.
7740 `M-x nnmail-split-history'
7742 *** More hooks and functions have been added to remove junk
7743 from incoming mail before saving the mail.
7745 See `nnmail-prepare-incoming-header-hook'.
7747 *** The nnml mail backend now understands compressed article files.
7749 *** To enable Gnus to read/post multi-lingual articles, you must execute
7750 the following code, for instance, in your .emacs.
7752 (add-hook 'gnus-startup-hook 'gnus-mule-initialize)
7754 Then, when you start Gnus, it will decode non-ASCII text automatically
7755 and show appropriate characters. (Note: if you are using gnus-mime
7756 from the SEMI package, formerly known as TM, you should NOT add this
7757 hook to gnus-startup-hook; gnus-mime has its own method of handling
7760 Since it is impossible to distinguish all coding systems
7761 automatically, you may need to specify a choice of coding system for a
7762 particular news group. This can be done by:
7764 (gnus-mule-add-group NEWSGROUP 'CODING-SYSTEM)
7766 Here NEWSGROUP should be a string which names a newsgroup or a tree
7767 of newsgroups. If NEWSGROUP is "XXX.YYY", all news groups under
7768 "XXX.YYY" (including "XXX.YYY.ZZZ") will use the specified coding
7769 system. CODING-SYSTEM specifies which coding system to use (for both
7770 for reading and posting).
7772 CODING-SYSTEM can also be a cons cell of the form
7773 (READ-CODING-SYSTEM . POST-CODING-SYSTEM)
7774 Then READ-CODING-SYSTEM is used when you read messages from the
7775 newsgroups, while POST-CODING-SYSTEM is used when you post messages
7778 Emacs knows the right coding systems for certain newsgroups by
7779 default. Here are some of these default settings:
7781 (gnus-mule-add-group "fj" 'iso-2022-7)
7782 (gnus-mule-add-group "alt.chinese.text" 'hz-gb-2312)
7783 (gnus-mule-add-group "alt.hk" 'hz-gb-2312)
7784 (gnus-mule-add-group "alt.chinese.text.big5" 'cn-big5)
7785 (gnus-mule-add-group "soc.culture.vietnamese" '(nil . viqr))
7787 When you reply by mail to an article, these settings are ignored;
7788 the mail is encoded according to sendmail-coding-system, as usual.
7792 *** If you edit primarily one style of C (or C++, Objective-C, Java)
7793 code, you may want to make the CC Mode style variables have global
7794 values so that you can set them directly in your .emacs file. To do
7795 this, set c-style-variables-are-local-p to nil in your .emacs file.
7796 Note that this only takes effect if you do it *before* cc-mode.el is
7799 If you typically edit more than one style of C (or C++, Objective-C,
7800 Java) code in a single Emacs session, you may want to make the CC Mode
7801 style variables have buffer local values. By default, all buffers
7802 share the same style variable settings; to make them buffer local, set
7803 c-style-variables-are-local-p to t in your .emacs file. Note that you
7804 must do this *before* CC Mode is loaded.
7806 *** The new variable c-indentation-style holds the C style name
7807 of the current buffer.
7809 *** The variable c-block-comments-indent-p has been deleted, because
7810 it is no longer necessary. C mode now handles all the supported styles
7811 of block comments, with no need to say which one you will use.
7813 *** There is a new indentation style "python", which specifies the C
7814 style that the Python developers like.
7816 *** There is a new c-cleanup-list option: brace-elseif-brace.
7817 This says to put ...} else if (...) {... on one line,
7818 just as brace-else-brace says to put ...} else {... on one line.
7822 *** In vc-retrieve-snapshot (C-x v r), if you don't specify a snapshot
7823 name, it retrieves the *latest* versions of all files in the current
7824 directory and its subdirectories (aside from files already locked).
7826 This feature is useful if your RCS directory is a link to a common
7827 master directory, and you want to pick up changes made by other
7830 You can do the same thing for an individual file by typing C-u C-x C-q
7831 RET in a buffer visiting that file.
7833 *** VC can now handle files under CVS that are being "watched" by
7834 other developers. Such files are made read-only by CVS. To get a
7835 writable copy, type C-x C-q in a buffer visiting such a file. VC then
7836 calls "cvs edit", which notifies the other developers of it.
7838 *** vc-version-diff (C-u C-x v =) now suggests reasonable defaults for
7839 version numbers, based on the current state of the file.
7841 ** Calendar changes.
7843 *** A new function, list-holidays, allows you list holidays or
7844 subclasses of holidays for ranges of years. Related menu items allow
7845 you do this for the year of the selected date, or the
7846 following/previous years.
7848 *** There is now support for the Baha'i calendar system. Use `pb' in
7849 the *Calendar* buffer to display the current Baha'i date. The Baha'i
7850 calendar, or "Badi calendar" is a system of 19 months with 19 days
7851 each, and 4 intercalary days (5 during a Gregorian leap year). The
7852 calendar begins May 23, 1844, with each of the months named after a
7853 supposed attribute of God.
7857 There are some new user variables and subgroups for customizing the page
7860 *** Headers & Footers (subgroup)
7862 Some printer systems print a header page and force the first page to
7863 be printed on the back of the header page when using duplex. If your
7864 printer system has this behavior, set variable
7865 `ps-banner-page-when-duplexing' to t.
7867 If variable `ps-banner-page-when-duplexing' is non-nil, it prints a
7868 blank page as the very first printed page. So, it behaves as if the
7869 very first character of buffer (or region) were a form feed ^L (\014).
7871 The variable `ps-spool-config' specifies who is responsible for
7872 setting duplex mode and page size. Valid values are:
7874 lpr-switches duplex and page size are configured by `ps-lpr-switches'.
7875 Don't forget to set `ps-lpr-switches' to select duplex
7876 printing for your printer.
7878 setpagedevice duplex and page size are configured by ps-print using the
7879 setpagedevice PostScript operator.
7881 nil duplex and page size are configured by ps-print *not* using
7882 the setpagedevice PostScript operator.
7884 The variable `ps-spool-tumble' specifies how the page images on
7885 opposite sides of a sheet are oriented with respect to each other. If
7886 `ps-spool-tumble' is nil, ps-print produces output suitable for
7887 bindings on the left or right. If `ps-spool-tumble' is non-nil,
7888 ps-print produces output suitable for bindings at the top or bottom.
7889 This variable takes effect only if `ps-spool-duplex' is non-nil.
7890 The default value is nil.
7892 The variable `ps-header-frame-alist' specifies a header frame
7893 properties alist. Valid frame properties are:
7895 fore-color Specify the foreground frame color.
7896 Value should be a float number between 0.0 (black
7897 color) and 1.0 (white color), or a string which is a
7898 color name, or a list of 3 float numbers which
7899 correspond to the Red Green Blue color scale, each
7900 float number between 0.0 (dark color) and 1.0 (bright
7901 color). The default is 0 ("black").
7903 back-color Specify the background frame color (similar to fore-color).
7904 The default is 0.9 ("gray90").
7906 shadow-color Specify the shadow color (similar to fore-color).
7907 The default is 0 ("black").
7909 border-color Specify the border color (similar to fore-color).
7910 The default is 0 ("black").
7912 border-width Specify the border width.
7915 Any other property is ignored.
7917 Don't change this alist directly; instead use Custom, or the
7918 `ps-value', `ps-get', `ps-put' and `ps-del' functions (see there for
7921 Ps-print can also print footers. The footer variables are:
7922 `ps-print-footer', `ps-footer-offset', `ps-print-footer-frame',
7923 `ps-footer-font-family', `ps-footer-font-size', `ps-footer-line-pad',
7924 `ps-footer-lines', `ps-left-footer', `ps-right-footer' and
7925 `ps-footer-frame-alist'. These variables are similar to those
7926 controlling headers.
7928 *** Color management (subgroup)
7930 If `ps-print-color-p' is non-nil, the buffer's text will be printed in
7933 *** Face Management (subgroup)
7935 If you need to print without worrying about face background colors,
7936 set the variable `ps-use-face-background' which specifies if face
7937 background should be used. Valid values are:
7939 t always use face background color.
7940 nil never use face background color.
7941 (face...) list of faces whose background color will be used.
7943 *** N-up printing (subgroup)
7945 The variable `ps-n-up-printing' specifies the number of pages per
7948 The variable `ps-n-up-margin' specifies the margin in points (pt)
7949 between the sheet border and the n-up printing.
7951 If variable `ps-n-up-border-p' is non-nil, a border is drawn around
7954 The variable `ps-n-up-filling' specifies how the page matrix is filled
7955 on each sheet of paper. Following are the valid values for
7956 `ps-n-up-filling' with a filling example using a 3x4 page matrix:
7958 `left-top' 1 2 3 4 `left-bottom' 9 10 11 12
7962 `right-top' 4 3 2 1 `right-bottom' 12 11 10 9
7966 `top-left' 1 4 7 10 `bottom-left' 3 6 9 12
7970 `top-right' 10 7 4 1 `bottom-right' 12 9 6 3
7974 Any other value is treated as `left-top'.
7976 *** Zebra stripes (subgroup)
7978 The variable `ps-zebra-color' controls the zebra stripes grayscale or
7981 The variable `ps-zebra-stripe-follow' specifies how zebra stripes
7982 continue on next page. Visually, valid values are (the character `+'
7983 to the right of each column indicates that a line is printed):
7985 `nil' `follow' `full' `full-follow'
7986 Current Page -------- ----------- --------- ----------------
7987 1 XXXXX + 1 XXXXXXXX + 1 XXXXXX + 1 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
7988 2 XXXXX + 2 XXXXXXXX + 2 XXXXXX + 2 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
7989 3 XXXXX + 3 XXXXXXXX + 3 XXXXXX + 3 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
7993 7 XXXXX + 7 XXXXXXXX + 7 XXXXXX + 7 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
7994 8 XXXXX + 8 XXXXXXXX + 8 XXXXXX + 8 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
7995 9 XXXXX + 9 XXXXXXXX + 9 XXXXXX + 9 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
7998 -------- ----------- --------- ----------------
7999 Next Page -------- ----------- --------- ----------------
8000 12 XXXXX + 12 + 10 XXXXXX + 10 +
8001 13 XXXXX + 13 XXXXXXXX + 11 XXXXXX + 11 +
8002 14 XXXXX + 14 XXXXXXXX + 12 XXXXXX + 12 +
8003 15 + 15 XXXXXXXX + 13 + 13 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8004 16 + 16 + 14 + 14 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8005 17 + 17 + 15 + 15 XXXXXXXXXXXXX +
8006 18 XXXXX + 18 + 16 XXXXXX + 16 +
8007 19 XXXXX + 19 XXXXXXXX + 17 XXXXXX + 17 +
8008 20 XXXXX + 20 XXXXXXXX + 18 XXXXXX + 18 +
8011 -------- ----------- --------- ----------------
8013 Any other value is treated as `nil'.
8016 *** Printer management (subgroup)
8018 The variable `ps-printer-name-option' determines the option used by
8019 some utilities to indicate the printer name; it's used only when
8020 `ps-printer-name' is a non-empty string. If you're using the lpr
8021 utility to print, for example, `ps-printer-name-option' should be set
8024 The variable `ps-manual-feed' indicates if the printer requires manual
8025 paper feeding. If it's nil, automatic feeding takes place. If it's
8026 non-nil, manual feeding takes place.
8028 The variable `ps-end-with-control-d' specifies whether C-d (\x04)
8029 should be inserted at end of the generated PostScript. Non-nil means
8032 *** Page settings (subgroup)
8034 If variable `ps-warn-paper-type' is nil, it's *not* treated as an
8035 error if the PostScript printer doesn't have a paper with the size
8036 indicated by `ps-paper-type'; the default paper size will be used
8037 instead. If `ps-warn-paper-type' is non-nil, an error is signaled if
8038 the PostScript printer doesn't support a paper with the size indicated
8039 by `ps-paper-type'. This is used when `ps-spool-config' is set to
8042 The variable `ps-print-upside-down' determines the orientation for
8043 printing pages: nil means `normal' printing, non-nil means
8044 `upside-down' printing (that is, the page is rotated by 180 degrees).
8046 The variable `ps-selected-pages' specifies which pages to print. If
8047 it's nil, all pages are printed. If it's a list, list elements may be
8048 integers specifying a single page to print, or cons cells (FROM . TO)
8049 specifying to print from page FROM to TO. Invalid list elements, that
8050 is integers smaller than one, or elements whose FROM is greater than
8051 its TO, are ignored.
8053 The variable `ps-even-or-odd-pages' specifies how to print even/odd
8054 pages. Valid values are:
8056 nil print all pages.
8058 `even-page' print only even pages.
8060 `odd-page' print only odd pages.
8062 `even-sheet' print only even sheets.
8063 That is, if `ps-n-up-printing' is 1, it behaves like
8064 `even-page', but for values greater than 1, it'll
8065 print only the even sheet of paper.
8067 `odd-sheet' print only odd sheets.
8068 That is, if `ps-n-up-printing' is 1, it behaves like
8069 `odd-page'; but for values greater than 1, it'll print
8070 only the odd sheet of paper.
8072 Any other value is treated as nil.
8074 If you set `ps-selected-pages' (see there for documentation), pages
8075 are filtered by `ps-selected-pages', and then by
8076 `ps-even-or-odd-pages'. For example, if we have:
8078 (setq ps-selected-pages '(1 4 (6 . 10) (12 . 16) 20))
8080 and we combine this with `ps-even-or-odd-pages' and
8081 `ps-n-up-printing', we get:
8083 `ps-n-up-printing' = 1:
8084 `ps-even-or-odd-pages' PAGES PRINTED
8085 nil 1, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 20
8086 even-page 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, 16, 20
8087 odd-page 1, 7, 9, 13, 15
8088 even-sheet 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, 16, 20
8089 odd-sheet 1, 7, 9, 13, 15
8091 `ps-n-up-printing' = 2:
8092 `ps-even-or-odd-pages' PAGES PRINTED
8093 nil 1/4, 6/7, 8/9, 10/12, 13/14, 15/16, 20
8094 even-page 4/6, 8/10, 12/14, 16/20
8095 odd-page 1/7, 9/13, 15
8096 even-sheet 6/7, 10/12, 15/16
8097 odd-sheet 1/4, 8/9, 13/14, 20
8099 *** Miscellany (subgroup)
8101 The variable `ps-error-handler-message' specifies where error handler
8102 messages should be sent.
8104 It is also possible to add a user-defined PostScript prologue code in
8105 front of all generated prologue code by setting the variable
8106 `ps-user-defined-prologue'.
8108 The variable `ps-line-number-font' specifies the font for line numbers.
8110 The variable `ps-line-number-font-size' specifies the font size in
8111 points for line numbers.
8113 The variable `ps-line-number-color' specifies the color for line
8114 numbers. See `ps-zebra-color' for documentation.
8116 The variable `ps-line-number-step' specifies the interval in which
8117 line numbers are printed. For example, if `ps-line-number-step' is set
8118 to 2, the printing will look like:
8130 integer an integer specifying the interval in which line numbers are
8131 printed. If it's smaller than or equal to zero, 1
8134 `zebra' specifies that only the line number of the first line in a
8135 zebra stripe is to be printed.
8137 Any other value is treated as `zebra'.
8139 The variable `ps-line-number-start' specifies the starting point in
8140 the interval given by `ps-line-number-step'. For example, if
8141 `ps-line-number-step' is set to 3, and `ps-line-number-start' is set to
8142 3, the output will look like:
8156 The variable `ps-postscript-code-directory' specifies the directory
8157 where the PostScript prologue file used by ps-print is found.
8159 The variable `ps-line-spacing' determines the line spacing in points,
8160 for ordinary text, when generating PostScript (similar to
8163 The variable `ps-paragraph-spacing' determines the paragraph spacing,
8164 in points, for ordinary text, when generating PostScript (similar to
8167 The variable `ps-paragraph-regexp' specifies the paragraph delimiter.
8169 The variable `ps-begin-cut-regexp' and `ps-end-cut-regexp' specify the
8170 start and end of a region to cut out when printing.
8172 ** hideshow changes.
8174 *** now supports hiding of blocks of single line comments (like // for
8177 *** Support for java-mode added.
8179 *** When doing `hs-hide-all' it is now possible to also hide the comments
8180 in the file if `hs-hide-comments-when-hiding-all' is set.
8182 *** The new function `hs-hide-initial-comment' hides the comments at
8183 the beginning of the files. Finally those huge RCS logs don't stay in your
8184 way! This is run by default when entering the `hs-minor-mode'.
8186 *** Now uses overlays instead of `selective-display', so is more
8187 robust and a lot faster.
8189 *** A block beginning can span multiple lines.
8191 *** The new variable `hs-show-hidden-short-form' if t, directs hideshow
8192 to show only the beginning of a block when it is hidden. See the
8193 documentation for more details.
8195 ** Changes in Enriched mode.
8197 *** When you visit a file in enriched-mode, Emacs will make sure it is
8198 filled to the current fill-column. This behavior is now independent
8199 of the size of the window. When you save the file, the fill-column in
8200 use is stored as well, so that the whole buffer need not be refilled
8201 the next time unless the fill-column is different.
8203 *** use-hard-newlines is now a minor mode. When it is enabled, Emacs
8204 distinguishes between hard and soft newlines, and treats hard newlines
8205 as paragraph boundaries. Otherwise all newlines inserted are marked
8206 as soft, and paragraph boundaries are determined solely from the text.
8212 The variables font-lock-face-attributes, font-lock-display-type and
8213 font-lock-background-mode are now obsolete; the recommended way to specify the
8214 faces to use for Font Lock mode is with M-x customize-group on the new custom
8215 group font-lock-highlighting-faces. If you set font-lock-face-attributes in
8216 your ~/.emacs file, Font Lock mode will respect its value. However, you should
8217 consider converting from setting that variable to using M-x customize.
8219 You can still use X resources to specify Font Lock face appearances.
8221 *** Maximum decoration
8223 Fontification now uses the maximum level of decoration supported by
8224 default. Previously, fontification used a mode-specific default level
8225 of decoration, which is typically the minimum level of decoration
8226 supported. You can set font-lock-maximum-decoration to nil
8227 to get the old behavior.
8231 Support is now provided for Java, Objective-C, AWK and SIMULA modes.
8233 Note that Font Lock mode can be turned on without knowing exactly what modes
8234 support Font Lock mode, via the command global-font-lock-mode.
8236 *** Configurable support
8238 Support for C, C++, Objective-C and Java can be more easily configured for
8239 additional types and classes via the new variables c-font-lock-extra-types,
8240 c++-font-lock-extra-types, objc-font-lock-extra-types and, you guessed it,
8241 java-font-lock-extra-types. These value of each of these variables should be a
8242 list of regexps matching the extra type names. For example, the default value
8243 of c-font-lock-extra-types is ("\\sw+_t") which means fontification follows the
8244 convention that C type names end in _t. This results in slower fontification.
8246 Of course, you can change the variables that specify fontification in whatever
8247 way you wish, typically by adding regexps. However, these new variables make
8248 it easier to make specific and common changes for the fontification of types.
8250 *** Adding highlighting patterns to existing support
8252 You can use the new function font-lock-add-keywords to add your own
8253 highlighting patterns, such as for project-local or user-specific constructs,
8256 For example, to highlight `FIXME:' words in C comments, put:
8258 (font-lock-add-keywords 'c-mode '(("\\<FIXME:" 0 font-lock-warning-face t)))
8264 Font Lock now defines two new faces, font-lock-builtin-face and
8265 font-lock-warning-face. These are intended to highlight builtin keywords,
8266 distinct from a language's normal keywords, and objects that should be brought
8267 to user attention, respectively. Various modes now use these new faces.
8269 *** Changes to fast-lock support mode
8271 The fast-lock package, one of the two Font Lock support modes, can now process
8272 cache files silently. You can use the new variable fast-lock-verbose, in the
8273 same way as font-lock-verbose, to control this feature.
8275 *** Changes to lazy-lock support mode
8277 The lazy-lock package, one of the two Font Lock support modes, can now fontify
8278 according to the true syntactic context relative to other lines. You can use
8279 the new variable lazy-lock-defer-contextually to control this feature. If
8280 non-nil, changes to the buffer will cause subsequent lines in the buffer to be
8281 refontified after lazy-lock-defer-time seconds of idle time. If nil, then only
8282 the modified lines will be refontified; this is the same as the previous Lazy
8283 Lock mode behaviour and the behaviour of Font Lock mode.
8285 This feature is useful in modes where strings or comments can span lines.
8286 For example, if a string or comment terminating character is deleted, then if
8287 this feature is enabled subsequent lines in the buffer will be correctly
8288 refontified to reflect their new syntactic context. Previously, only the line
8289 containing the deleted character would be refontified and you would have to use
8290 the command M-g M-g (font-lock-fontify-block) to refontify some lines.
8292 As a consequence of this new feature, two other variables have changed:
8294 Variable `lazy-lock-defer-driven' is renamed `lazy-lock-defer-on-scrolling'.
8295 Variable `lazy-lock-defer-time' can now only be a time, i.e., a number.
8296 Buffer modes for which on-the-fly deferral applies can be specified via the
8297 new variable `lazy-lock-defer-on-the-fly'.
8299 If you set these variables in your ~/.emacs, then you may have to change those
8302 ** Ada mode changes.
8304 *** There is now better support for using find-file.el with Ada mode.
8305 If you switch between spec and body, the cursor stays in the same
8306 procedure (modulo overloading). If a spec has no body file yet, but
8307 you try to switch to its body file, Ada mode now generates procedure
8310 *** There are two new commands:
8311 - `ada-make-local' : invokes gnatmake on the current buffer
8312 - `ada-check-syntax' : check syntax of current buffer.
8314 The user options `ada-compiler-make', `ada-make-options',
8315 `ada-language-version', `ada-compiler-syntax-check', and
8316 `ada-compile-options' are used within these commands.
8318 *** Ada mode can now work with Outline minor mode. The outline level
8319 is calculated from the indenting, not from syntactic constructs.
8320 Outlining does not work if your code is not correctly indented.
8322 *** The new function `ada-gnat-style' converts the buffer to the style of
8323 formatting used in GNAT. It places two blanks after a comment start,
8324 places one blank between a word end and an opening '(', and puts one
8325 space between a comma and the beginning of a word.
8327 ** Scheme mode changes.
8329 *** Scheme mode indentation now uses many of the facilities of Lisp
8330 mode; therefore, the variables to customize it are the variables used
8331 for Lisp mode which have names starting with `lisp-'. The variables
8332 with names starting with `scheme-' which used to do this no longer
8335 If you want to use different indentation for Scheme and Lisp, this is
8336 still possible, but now you must do it by adding a hook to
8337 scheme-mode-hook, which could work by setting the `lisp-' indentation
8338 variables as buffer-local variables.
8340 *** DSSSL mode is a variant of Scheme mode, for editing DSSSL scripts.
8343 ** Changes to the emacsclient program
8345 *** If a socket can't be found, and environment variables LOGNAME or
8346 USER are set, emacsclient now looks for a socket based on the UID
8347 associated with the name. That is an emacsclient running as root
8348 can connect to an Emacs server started by a non-root user.
8350 *** The emacsclient program now accepts an option --no-wait which tells
8351 it to return immediately without waiting for you to "finish" the
8354 *** The new option --alternate-editor allows to specify an editor to
8355 use if Emacs is not running. The environment variable
8356 ALTERNATE_EDITOR can be used for the same effect; the command line
8357 option takes precedence.
8359 ** M-x eldoc-mode enables a minor mode in which the echo area
8360 constantly shows the parameter list for function being called at point
8361 (in Emacs Lisp and Lisp Interaction modes only).
8363 ** C-x n d now runs the new command narrow-to-defun,
8364 which narrows the accessible parts of the buffer to just
8367 ** Emacs now handles the `--' argument in the standard way; all
8368 following arguments are treated as ordinary file names.
8370 ** On MSDOS and Windows, the bookmark file is now called _emacs.bmk,
8371 and the saved desktop file is now called _emacs.desktop (truncated if
8374 ** When you kill a buffer that visits a file,
8375 if there are any registers that save positions in the file,
8376 these register values no longer become completely useless.
8377 If you try to go to such a register with C-x j, then you are
8378 asked whether to visit the file again. If you say yes,
8379 it visits the file and then goes to the same position.
8381 ** When you visit a file that changes frequently outside Emacs--for
8382 example, a log of output from a process that continues to run--it may
8383 be useful for Emacs to revert the file without querying you whenever
8384 you visit the file afresh with C-x C-f.
8386 You can request this behavior for certain files by setting the
8387 variable revert-without-query to a list of regular expressions. If a
8388 file's name matches any of these regular expressions, find-file and
8389 revert-buffer revert the buffer without asking for permission--but
8390 only if you have not edited the buffer text yourself.
8392 ** set-default-font has been renamed to set-frame-font
8393 since it applies only to the current frame.
8395 ** In TeX mode, you can use the variable tex-main-file to specify the
8396 file for tex-file to run TeX on. (By default, tex-main-file is nil,
8397 and tex-file runs TeX on the current visited file.)
8399 This is useful when you are editing a document that consists of
8400 multiple files. In each of the included files, you can set up a local
8401 variable list which specifies the top-level file of your document for
8402 tex-main-file. Then tex-file will run TeX on the whole document
8403 instead of just the file you are editing.
8407 RefTeX mode is a new minor mode with special support for \label, \ref
8408 and \cite macros in LaTeX documents. RefTeX distinguishes labels of
8409 different environments (equation, figure, ...) and has full support for
8410 multifile documents. To use it, select a buffer with a LaTeX document and
8411 turn the mode on with M-x reftex-mode. Here are the main user commands:
8414 Creates a label semi-automatically. RefTeX is context sensitive and
8415 knows which kind of label is needed.
8417 C-c ) reftex-reference
8418 Offers in a menu all labels in the document, along with context of the
8419 label definition. The selected label is referenced as \ref{LABEL}.
8421 C-c [ reftex-citation
8422 Prompts for a regular expression and displays a list of matching BibTeX
8423 database entries. The selected entry is cited with a \cite{KEY} macro.
8425 C-c & reftex-view-crossref
8426 Views the cross reference of a \ref or \cite command near point.
8429 Shows a table of contents of the (multifile) document. From there you
8430 can quickly jump to every section.
8432 Under X, RefTeX installs a "Ref" menu in the menu bar, with additional
8433 commands. Press `?' to get help when a prompt mentions this feature.
8434 Full documentation and customization examples are in the file
8435 reftex.el. You can use the finder to view the file documentation:
8436 C-h p --> tex --> reftex.el
8438 ** Changes in BibTeX mode.
8440 *** Info documentation is now available.
8442 *** Don't allow parentheses in string constants anymore. This confused
8443 both the BibTeX program and Emacs BibTeX mode.
8445 *** Renamed variable bibtex-mode-user-optional-fields to
8446 bibtex-user-optional-fields.
8448 *** Removed variable bibtex-include-OPTannote
8449 (use bibtex-user-optional-fields instead).
8451 *** New interactive functions to copy and kill fields and complete
8452 entries to the BibTeX kill ring, from where they can be yanked back by
8453 appropriate functions.
8455 *** New interactive functions for repositioning and marking of
8456 entries. They are bound by default to C-M-l and C-M-h.
8458 *** New hook bibtex-clean-entry-hook. It is called after entry has
8461 *** New variable bibtex-field-delimiters, which replaces variables
8462 bibtex-field-{left|right}-delimiter.
8464 *** New variable bibtex-entry-delimiters to determine how entries
8467 *** Allow preinitialization of fields. See documentation of
8468 bibtex-user-optional-fields, bibtex-entry-field-alist, and
8469 bibtex-include-OPTkey for details.
8471 *** Book and InBook entries require either an author or an editor
8472 field. This is now supported by bibtex.el. Alternative fields are
8473 prefixed with `ALT'.
8475 *** New variable bibtex-entry-format, which replaces variable
8476 bibtex-clean-entry-zap-empty-opts and allows specification of many
8477 formatting options performed on cleaning an entry (see variable
8480 *** Even more control on how automatic keys are generated. See
8481 documentation of bibtex-generate-autokey for details. Transcriptions
8482 for foreign languages other than German are now handled, too.
8484 *** New boolean user option bibtex-comma-after-last-field to decide if
8485 comma should be inserted at end of last field.
8487 *** New boolean user option bibtex-align-at-equal-sign to determine if
8488 alignment should be made at left side of field contents or at equal
8489 signs. New user options to control entry layout (e.g. indentation).
8491 *** New function bibtex-fill-entry to realign entries.
8493 *** New function bibtex-reformat to reformat region or buffer.
8495 *** New function bibtex-convert-alien to convert a BibTeX database
8498 *** New function bibtex-complete-key (similar to bibtex-complete-string)
8499 to complete prefix to a key defined in buffer. Mainly useful in
8502 *** New function bibtex-count-entries to count entries in buffer or
8505 *** Added support for imenu.
8507 *** The function `bibtex-validate' now checks current region instead
8508 of buffer if mark is active. Now it shows all errors of buffer in a
8509 `compilation mode' buffer. You can use the normal commands (e.g.
8510 `next-error') for compilation modes to jump to errors.
8512 *** New variable `bibtex-string-file-path' to determine where the files
8513 from `bibtex-string-files' are searched.
8515 ** Iso Accents mode now supports Latin-3 as an alternative.
8517 ** The command next-error now opens blocks hidden by hideshow.
8519 ** The function using-unix-filesystems has been replaced by the
8520 functions add-untranslated-filesystem and remove-untranslated-filesystem.
8521 Each of these functions takes the name of a drive letter or directory
8524 When a filesystem is added as untranslated, all files on it are read
8525 and written in binary mode (no cr/lf translation is performed).
8527 ** browse-url changes
8529 *** New methods for: Grail (browse-url-generic), MMM (browse-url-mmm),
8530 Lynx in a separate xterm (browse-url-lynx-xterm) or in an Emacs window
8531 (browse-url-lynx-emacs), remote W3 (browse-url-w3-gnudoit), generic
8532 non-remote-controlled browsers (browse-url-generic) and associated
8533 customization variables.
8535 *** New commands `browse-url-of-region' and `browse-url'.
8537 *** URLs marked up with <URL:...> (RFC1738) work if broken across
8538 lines. Browsing methods can be associated with URL regexps
8539 (e.g. mailto: URLs) via `browse-url-browser-function'.
8543 *** Clicking Mouse-2 on a brief command description in Ediff control panel
8544 pops up the Info file for this command.
8546 *** There is now a variable, ediff-autostore-merges, which controls whether
8547 the result of a merge is saved in a file. By default, this is done only when
8548 merge is done from a session group (eg, when merging files in two different
8551 *** Since Emacs 19.31 (this hasn't been announced before), Ediff can compare
8552 and merge groups of files residing in different directories, or revisions of
8553 files in the same directory.
8555 *** Since Emacs 19.31, Ediff can apply multi-file patches interactively.
8556 The patches must be in the context format or GNU unified format. (The bug
8557 related to the GNU format has now been fixed.)
8561 *** The startup file is now .viper instead of .vip
8562 *** All variable/function names have been changed to start with viper-
8564 *** C-\ now simulates the meta-key in all Viper states.
8565 *** C-z in Insert state now escapes to Vi for the duration of the next
8566 Viper command. In Vi and Insert states, C-z behaves as before.
8567 *** C-c \ escapes to Vi for one command if Viper is in Insert or Emacs states.
8568 *** _ is no longer the meta-key in Vi state.
8569 *** The variable viper-insert-state-cursor-color can be used to change cursor
8570 color when Viper is in insert state.
8571 *** If search lands the cursor near the top or the bottom of the window,
8572 Viper pulls the window up or down to expose more context. The variable
8573 viper-adjust-window-after-search controls this behavior.
8577 *** In C, C++, Objective C and Java, Etags tags global variables by
8578 default. The resulting tags files are inflated by 30% on average.
8579 Use --no-globals to turn this feature off. Etags can also tag
8580 variables which are members of structure-like constructs, but it does
8581 not by default. Use --members to turn this feature on.
8583 *** C++ member functions are now recognized as tags.
8585 *** Java is tagged like C++. In addition, "extends" and "implements"
8586 constructs are tagged. Files are recognised by the extension .java.
8588 *** Etags can now handle programs written in Postscript. Files are
8589 recognised by the extensions .ps and .pdb (Postscript with C syntax).
8590 In Postscript, tags are lines that start with a slash.
8592 *** Etags now handles Objective C and Objective C++ code. The usual C and
8593 C++ tags are recognized in these languages; in addition, etags
8594 recognizes special Objective C syntax for classes, class categories,
8595 methods and protocols.
8597 *** Etags also handles Cobol. Files are recognised by the extension
8598 .cobol. The tagged lines are those containing a word that begins in
8599 column 8 and ends in a full stop, i.e. anything that could be a
8602 *** Regexps in Etags now support intervals, as in ed or grep. The syntax of
8603 an interval is \{M,N\}, and it means to match the preceding expression
8604 at least M times and as many as N times.
8606 ** The format for specifying a custom format for time-stamp to insert
8607 in files has changed slightly.
8609 With the new enhancements to the functionality of format-time-string,
8610 time-stamp-format will change to be eventually compatible with it.
8611 This conversion is being done in two steps to maintain compatibility
8612 with old time-stamp-format values.
8614 In the new scheme, alternate case is signified by the number-sign
8615 (`#') modifier, rather than changing the case of the format character.
8616 This feature is as yet incompletely implemented for compatibility
8619 In the old time-stamp-format, all numeric fields defaulted to their
8620 natural width. (With format-time-string, each format has a
8621 fixed-width default.) In this version, you can specify the colon
8622 (`:') modifier to a numeric conversion to mean "give me the historical
8623 time-stamp-format width default." Do not use colon if you are
8624 specifying an explicit width, as in "%02d".
8626 Numbers are no longer truncated to the requested width, except in the
8627 case of "%02y", which continues to give a two-digit year. Digit
8628 truncation probably wasn't being used for anything else anyway.
8630 The new formats will work with old versions of Emacs. New formats are
8631 being recommended now to allow time-stamp-format to change in the
8632 future to be compatible with format-time-string. The new forms being
8633 recommended now will continue to work then.
8635 See the documentation string for the variable time-stamp-format for
8638 ** There are some additional major modes:
8640 dcl-mode, for editing VMS DCL files.
8641 m4-mode, for editing files of m4 input.
8642 meta-mode, for editing MetaFont and MetaPost source files.
8644 ** In Shell mode, the command shell-copy-environment-variable lets you
8645 copy the value of a specified environment variable from the subshell
8648 ** New Lisp packages include:
8650 *** battery.el displays battery status for laptops.
8652 *** M-x bruce (named after Lenny Bruce) is a program that might
8653 be used for adding some indecent words to your email.
8655 *** M-x crisp-mode enables an emulation for the CRiSP editor.
8657 *** M-x dirtrack arranges for better tracking of directory changes
8660 *** The new library elint.el provides for linting of Emacs Lisp code.
8661 See the documentation for `elint-initialize', `elint-current-buffer'
8664 *** M-x expand-add-abbrevs defines a special kind of abbrev which is
8665 meant for programming constructs. These abbrevs expand like ordinary
8666 ones, when you type SPC, but only at the end of a line and not within
8667 strings or comments.
8669 These abbrevs can act as templates: you can define places within an
8670 abbrev for insertion of additional text. Once you expand the abbrev,
8671 you can then use C-x a p and C-x a n to move back and forth to these
8672 insertion points. Thus you can conveniently insert additional text
8675 *** filecache.el remembers the location of files so that you
8676 can visit them by short forms of their names.
8678 *** find-func.el lets you find the definition of the user-loaded
8679 Emacs Lisp function at point.
8681 *** M-x handwrite converts text to a "handwritten" picture.
8683 *** M-x iswitchb-buffer is a command for switching to a buffer, much like
8684 switch-buffer, but it reads the argument in a more helpful way.
8686 *** M-x landmark implements a neural network for landmark learning.
8688 *** M-x locate provides a convenient interface to the `locate' program.
8690 *** M4 mode is a new mode for editing files of m4 input.
8692 *** mantemp.el creates C++ manual template instantiations
8693 from the GCC error messages which indicate which instantiations are needed.
8695 *** mouse-copy.el provides a one-click copy and move feature.
8696 You can drag a region with M-mouse-1, and it is automatically
8697 inserted at point. M-Shift-mouse-1 deletes the text from its
8698 original place after inserting the copy.
8700 *** mouse-drag.el lets you do scrolling by dragging Mouse-2
8703 You click the mouse and move; that distance either translates into the
8704 velocity to scroll (with mouse-drag-throw) or the distance to scroll
8705 (with mouse-drag-drag). Horizontal scrolling is enabled when needed.
8707 Enable mouse-drag with:
8708 (global-set-key [down-mouse-2] 'mouse-drag-throw)
8710 (global-set-key [down-mouse-2] 'mouse-drag-drag)
8712 *** mspools.el is useful for determining which mail folders have
8713 mail waiting to be read in them. It works with procmail.
8715 *** Octave mode is a major mode for editing files of input for Octave.
8716 It comes with a facility for communicating with an Octave subprocess.
8720 The ogonek package provides functions for changing the coding of
8721 Polish diacritic characters in buffers. Codings known from various
8722 platforms are supported such as ISO8859-2, Mazovia, IBM Latin2, and
8723 TeX. For example, you can change the coding from Mazovia to
8724 ISO8859-2. Another example is a change of coding from ISO8859-2 to
8725 prefix notation (in which `/a' stands for the aogonek character, for
8726 instance) and vice versa.
8728 To use this package load it using
8729 M-x load-library [enter] ogonek
8730 Then, you may get an explanation by calling one of
8731 M-x ogonek-jak -- in Polish
8732 M-x ogonek-how -- in English
8733 The info specifies the commands and variables provided as well as the
8734 ways of customization in `.emacs'.
8736 *** Interface to ph.
8738 Emacs provides a client interface to CCSO Nameservers (ph/qi)
8740 The CCSO nameserver is used in many universities to provide directory
8741 services about people. ph.el provides a convenient Emacs interface to
8744 *** uce.el is useful for replying to unsolicited commercial email.
8746 *** vcursor.el implements a "virtual cursor" feature.
8747 You can move the virtual cursor with special commands
8748 while the real cursor does not move.
8750 *** webjump.el is a "hot list" package which you can set up
8751 for visiting your favorite web sites.
8753 *** M-x winner-mode is a minor mode which saves window configurations,
8754 so you can move back to other configurations that you have recently used.
8758 Movemail no longer needs to be installed setuid root in order for POP
8759 mail retrieval to function properly. This is because it no longer
8760 supports the RPOP (reserved-port POP) protocol; instead, it uses the
8761 user's POP password to authenticate to the mail server.
8763 This change was made earlier, but not reported in NEWS before.
8765 * Emacs 20.1 changes for MS-DOS and MS-Windows.
8767 ** Changes in handling MS-DOS/MS-Windows text files.
8769 Emacs handles three different conventions for representing
8770 end-of-line: CRLF for MSDOS, LF for Unix and GNU, and CR (used on the
8771 Macintosh). Emacs determines which convention is used in a specific
8772 file based on the contents of that file (except for certain special
8773 file names), and when it saves the file, it uses the same convention.
8775 To save the file and change the end-of-line convention, you can use
8776 C-x RET f (set-buffer-file-coding-system) to specify a different
8777 coding system for the buffer. Then, when you save the file, the newly
8778 specified coding system will take effect. For example, to save with
8779 LF, specify undecided-unix (or some other ...-unix coding system); to
8780 save with CRLF, specify undecided-dos.
8782 * Lisp Changes in Emacs 20.1
8784 ** Byte-compiled files made with Emacs 20 will, in general, work in
8785 Emacs 19 as well, as long as the source code runs in Emacs 19. And
8786 vice versa: byte-compiled files made with Emacs 19 should also run in
8787 Emacs 20, as long as the program itself works in Emacs 20.
8789 ** Windows-specific functions and variables have been renamed
8790 to start with w32- instead of win32-.
8792 In hacker language, calling something a "win" is a form of praise. We
8793 don't want to praise a non-free Microsoft system, so we don't call it
8796 ** Basic Lisp changes
8798 *** A symbol whose name starts with a colon now automatically
8799 evaluates to itself. Therefore such a symbol can be used as a constant.
8801 *** The defined purpose of `defconst' has been changed. It should now
8802 be used only for values that should not be changed whether by a program
8805 The actual behavior of defconst has not been changed.
8807 *** There are new macros `when' and `unless'
8809 (when CONDITION BODY...) is short for (if CONDITION (progn BODY...))
8810 (unless CONDITION BODY...) is short for (if CONDITION nil BODY...)
8812 *** Emacs now defines functions caar, cadr, cdar and cddr with their
8813 usual Lisp meanings. For example, caar returns the car of the car of
8816 *** equal, when comparing strings, now ignores their text properties.
8818 *** The new function `functionp' tests whether an object is a function.
8820 *** arrayp now returns t for char-tables and bool-vectors.
8822 *** Certain primitives which use characters (as integers) now get an
8823 error if the integer is not a valid character code. These primitives
8824 include insert-char, char-to-string, and the %c construct in the
8827 *** The `require' function now insists on adding a suffix, either .el
8828 or .elc, to the file name. Thus, (require 'foo) will not use a file
8829 whose name is just foo. It insists on foo.el or foo.elc.
8831 *** The `autoload' function, when the file name does not contain
8832 either a directory name or the suffix .el or .elc, insists on
8833 adding one of these suffixes.
8835 *** string-to-number now takes an optional second argument BASE
8836 which specifies the base to use when converting an integer.
8837 If BASE is omitted, base 10 is used.
8839 We have not implemented other radices for floating point numbers,
8840 because that would be much more work and does not seem useful.
8842 *** substring now handles vectors as well as strings.
8844 *** The Common Lisp function eql is no longer defined normally.
8845 You must load the `cl' library to define it.
8847 *** The new macro `with-current-buffer' lets you evaluate an expression
8848 conveniently with a different current buffer. It looks like this:
8850 (with-current-buffer BUFFER BODY-FORMS...)
8852 BUFFER is the expression that says which buffer to use.
8853 BODY-FORMS say what to do in that buffer.
8855 *** The new primitive `save-current-buffer' saves and restores the
8856 choice of current buffer, like `save-excursion', but without saving or
8857 restoring the value of point or the mark. `with-current-buffer'
8858 works using `save-current-buffer'.
8860 *** The new macro `with-temp-file' lets you do some work in a new buffer and
8861 write the output to a specified file. Like `progn', it returns the value
8864 *** The new macro `with-temp-buffer' lets you do some work in a new buffer,
8865 which is discarded after use. Like `progn', it returns the value of the
8866 last form. If you wish to return the buffer contents, use (buffer-string)
8869 *** The new function split-string takes a string, splits it at certain
8870 characters, and returns a list of the substrings in between the
8873 For example, (split-string "foo bar lose" " +") returns ("foo" "bar" "lose").
8875 *** The new macro with-output-to-string executes some Lisp expressions
8876 with standard-output set up so that all output feeds into a string.
8877 Then it returns that string.
8879 For example, if the current buffer name is `foo',
8881 (with-output-to-string
8882 (princ "The buffer is ")
8883 (princ (buffer-name)))
8885 returns "The buffer is foo".
8887 ** Non-ASCII characters are now supported, if enable-multibyte-characters
8890 These characters have character codes above 256. When inserted in the
8891 buffer or stored in a string, they are represented as multibyte
8892 characters that occupy several buffer positions each.
8894 *** When enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil, a single character in
8895 a buffer or string can be two or more bytes (as many as four).
8897 Buffers and strings are still made up of unibyte elements;
8898 character positions and string indices are always measured in bytes.
8899 Therefore, moving forward one character can increase the buffer
8900 position by 2, 3 or 4. The function forward-char moves by whole
8901 characters, and therefore is no longer equivalent to
8902 (lambda (n) (goto-char (+ (point) n))).
8904 ASCII characters (codes 0 through 127) are still single bytes, always.
8905 Sequences of byte values 128 through 255 are used to represent
8906 non-ASCII characters. These sequences are called "multibyte
8909 The first byte of a multibyte character is always in the range 128
8910 through 159 (octal 0200 through 0237). These values are called
8911 "leading codes". The second and subsequent bytes are always in the
8912 range 160 through 255 (octal 0240 through 0377). The first byte, the
8913 leading code, determines how many bytes long the sequence is.
8915 *** The function forward-char moves over characters, and therefore
8916 (forward-char 1) may increase point by more than 1 if it moves over a
8917 multibyte character. Likewise, delete-char always deletes a
8918 character, which may be more than one buffer position.
8920 This means that some Lisp programs, which assume that a character is
8921 always one buffer position, need to be changed.
8923 However, all ASCII characters are always one buffer position.
8925 *** The regexp [\200-\377] no longer matches all non-ASCII characters,
8926 because when enable-multibyte-characters is non-nil, these characters
8927 have codes that are not in the range octal 200 to octal 377. However,
8928 the regexp [^\000-\177] does match all non-ASCII characters,
8931 *** The function char-boundary-p returns non-nil if position POS is
8932 between two characters in the buffer (not in the middle of a
8935 When the value is non-nil, it says what kind of character follows POS:
8937 0 if POS is at an ASCII character or at the end of range,
8938 1 if POS is before a 2-byte length multi-byte form,
8939 2 if POS is at a head of 3-byte length multi-byte form,
8940 3 if POS is at a head of 4-byte length multi-byte form,
8941 4 if POS is at a head of multi-byte form of a composite character.
8943 *** The function char-bytes returns how many bytes the character CHAR uses.
8945 *** Strings can contain multibyte characters. The function
8946 `length' returns the string length counting bytes, which may be
8947 more than the number of characters.
8949 You can include a multibyte character in a string constant by writing
8950 it literally. You can also represent it with a hex escape,
8951 \xNNNNNNN..., using as many digits as necessary. Any character which
8952 is not a valid hex digit terminates this construct. If you want to
8953 follow it with a character that is a hex digit, write backslash and
8954 newline in between; that will terminate the hex escape.
8956 *** The function concat-chars takes arguments which are characters
8957 and returns a string containing those characters.
8959 *** The function sref access a multibyte character in a string.
8960 (sref STRING INDX) returns the character in STRING at INDEX. INDEX
8961 counts from zero. If INDEX is at a position in the middle of a
8962 character, sref signals an error.
8964 *** The function chars-in-string returns the number of characters
8965 in a string. This is less than the length of the string, if the
8966 string contains multibyte characters (the length counts bytes).
8968 *** The function chars-in-region returns the number of characters
8969 in a region from BEG to END. This is less than (- END BEG) if the
8970 region contains multibyte characters (the length counts bytes).
8972 *** The function string-to-list converts a string to a list of
8973 the characters in it. string-to-vector converts a string
8974 to a vector of the characters in it.
8976 *** The function store-substring alters part of the contents
8977 of a string. You call it as follows:
8979 (store-substring STRING IDX OBJ)
8981 This says to alter STRING, by storing OBJ starting at index IDX in
8982 STRING. OBJ may be either a character or a (smaller) string.
8983 This function really does alter the contents of STRING.
8984 Since it is impossible to change the length of an existing string,
8985 it is an error if OBJ doesn't fit within STRING's actual length.
8987 *** char-width returns the width (in columns) of the character CHAR,
8988 if it were displayed in the current buffer and the selected window.
8990 *** string-width returns the width (in columns) of the text in STRING,
8991 if it were displayed in the current buffer and the selected window.
8993 *** truncate-string-to-width shortens a string, if necessary,
8994 to fit within a certain number of columns. (Of course, it does
8995 not alter the string that you give it; it returns a new string
8996 which contains all or just part of the existing string.)
8998 (truncate-string-to-width STR END-COLUMN &optional START-COLUMN PADDING)
9000 This returns the part of STR up to column END-COLUMN.
9002 The optional argument START-COLUMN specifies the starting column.
9003 If this is non-nil, then the first START-COLUMN columns of the string
9004 are not included in the resulting value.
9006 The optional argument PADDING, if non-nil, is a padding character to be added
9007 at the beginning and end the resulting string, to extend it to exactly
9008 WIDTH columns. If PADDING is nil, that means do not pad; then, if STRING
9009 is narrower than WIDTH, the value is equal to STRING.
9011 If PADDING and START-COLUMN are both non-nil, and if there is no clean
9012 place in STRING that corresponds to START-COLUMN (because one
9013 character extends across that column), then the padding character
9014 PADDING is added one or more times at the beginning of the result
9015 string, so that its columns line up as if it really did start at
9016 column START-COLUMN.
9018 *** When the functions in the list after-change-functions are called,
9019 the third argument is the number of bytes in the pre-change text, not
9020 necessarily the number of characters. It is, in effect, the
9021 difference in buffer position between the beginning and the end of the
9022 changed text, before the change.
9024 *** The characters Emacs uses are classified in various character
9025 sets, each of which has a name which is a symbol. In general there is
9026 one character set for each script, not for each language.
9028 **** The function charsetp tests whether an object is a character set name.
9030 **** The variable charset-list holds a list of character set names.
9032 **** char-charset, given a character code, returns the name of the character
9033 set that the character belongs to. (The value is a symbol.)
9035 **** split-char, given a character code, returns a list containing the
9036 name of the character set, followed by one or two byte-values
9037 which identify the character within that character set.
9039 **** make-char, given a character set name and one or two subsequent
9040 byte-values, constructs a character code. This is roughly the
9041 opposite of split-char.
9043 **** find-charset-region returns a list of the character sets
9044 of all the characters between BEG and END.
9046 **** find-charset-string returns a list of the character sets
9047 of all the characters in a string.
9049 *** Here are the Lisp facilities for working with coding systems
9050 and specifying coding systems.
9052 **** The function coding-system-list returns a list of all coding
9053 system names (symbols). With optional argument t, it returns a list
9054 of all distinct base coding systems, not including variants.
9055 (Variant coding systems are those like latin-1-dos, latin-1-unix
9056 and latin-1-mac which specify the end-of-line conversion as well
9057 as what to do about code conversion.)
9059 **** coding-system-p tests a symbol to see if it is a coding system
9060 name. It returns t if so, nil if not.
9062 **** file-coding-system-alist specifies which coding systems to use
9063 for certain file names. It works like network-coding-system-alist,
9064 except that the PATTERN is matched against the file name.
9066 Each element has the format (PATTERN . VAL), where PATTERN determines
9067 which file names the element applies to. PATTERN should be a regexp
9068 to match against a file name.
9070 VAL is a coding system, a cons cell containing two coding systems, or
9071 a function symbol. If VAL is a coding system, it is used for both
9072 decoding what received from the network stream and encoding what sent
9073 to the network stream. If VAL is a cons cell containing two coding
9074 systems, the car specifies the coding system for decoding, and the cdr
9075 specifies the coding system for encoding.
9077 If VAL is a function symbol, the function must return a coding system
9078 or a cons cell containing two coding systems, which is used as above.
9080 **** The variable network-coding-system-alist specifies
9081 the coding system to use for network sockets.
9083 Each element has the format (PATTERN . VAL), where PATTERN determines
9084 which network sockets the element applies to. PATTERN should be
9085 either a port number or a regular expression matching some network
9088 VAL is a coding system, a cons cell containing two coding systems, or
9089 a function symbol. If VAL is a coding system, it is used for both
9090 decoding what received from the network stream and encoding what sent
9091 to the network stream. If VAL is a cons cell containing two coding
9092 systems, the car specifies the coding system for decoding, and the cdr
9093 specifies the coding system for encoding.
9095 If VAL is a function symbol, the function must return a coding system
9096 or a cons cell containing two coding systems, which is used as above.
9098 **** process-coding-system-alist specifies which coding systems to use
9099 for certain subprocess. It works like network-coding-system-alist,
9100 except that the PATTERN is matched against the program name used to
9101 start the subprocess.
9103 **** The variable default-process-coding-system specifies the coding
9104 systems to use for subprocess (and net connection) input and output,
9105 when nothing else specifies what to do. The value is a cons cell
9106 (OUTPUT-CODING . INPUT-CODING). OUTPUT-CODING applies to output
9107 to the subprocess, and INPUT-CODING applies to input from it.
9109 **** The variable coding-system-for-write, if non-nil, specifies the
9110 coding system to use for writing a file, or for output to a synchronous
9113 It also applies to any asynchronous subprocess or network connection,
9114 but in a different way: the value of coding-system-for-write when you
9115 start the subprocess or connection affects that subprocess or
9116 connection permanently or until overridden.
9118 The variable coding-system-for-write takes precedence over
9119 file-coding-system-alist, process-coding-system-alist and
9120 network-coding-system-alist, and all other methods of specifying a
9121 coding system for output. But most of the time this variable is nil.
9122 It exists so that Lisp programs can bind it to a specific coding
9123 system for one operation at a time.
9125 **** coding-system-for-read applies similarly to input from
9126 files, subprocesses or network connections.
9128 **** The function process-coding-system tells you what
9129 coding systems(s) an existing subprocess is using.
9130 The value is a cons cell,
9131 (DECODING-CODING-SYSTEM . ENCODING-CODING-SYSTEM)
9132 where DECODING-CODING-SYSTEM is used for decoding output from
9133 the subprocess, and ENCODING-CODING-SYSTEM is used for encoding
9134 input to the subprocess.
9136 **** The function set-process-coding-system can be used to
9137 change the coding systems in use for an existing subprocess.
9139 ** Emacs has a new facility to help users manage the many
9140 customization options. To make a Lisp program work with this facility,
9141 you need to use the new macros defgroup and defcustom.
9143 You use defcustom instead of defvar, for defining a user option
9144 variable. The difference is that you specify two additional pieces of
9145 information (usually): the "type" which says what values are
9146 legitimate, and the "group" which specifies the hierarchy for
9149 Thus, instead of writing
9151 (defvar foo-blurgoze nil
9152 "*Non-nil means that foo will act very blurgozely.")
9154 you would now write this:
9156 (defcustom foo-blurgoze nil
9157 "*Non-nil means that foo will act very blurgozely."
9161 The type `boolean' means that this variable has only
9162 two meaningful states: nil and non-nil. Other type values
9163 describe other possibilities; see the manual for Custom
9164 for a description of them.
9166 The "group" argument is used to specify a group which the option
9167 should belong to. You define a new group like this:
9169 (defgroup ispell nil
9170 "Spell checking using Ispell."
9173 The "group" argument in defgroup specifies the parent group. The root
9174 group is called `emacs'; it should not contain any variables itself,
9175 but only other groups. The immediate subgroups of `emacs' correspond
9176 to the keywords used by C-h p. Under these subgroups come
9177 second-level subgroups that belong to individual packages.
9179 Each Emacs package should have its own set of groups. A simple
9180 package should have just one group; a more complex package should
9181 have a hierarchy of its own groups. The sole or root group of a
9182 package should be a subgroup of one or more of the "keyword"
9183 first-level subgroups.
9185 ** New `widget' library for inserting UI components in buffers.
9187 This library, used by the new custom library, is documented in a
9188 separate manual that accompanies Emacs.
9192 The easy-mmode package provides macros and functions that make
9193 developing minor modes easier. Roughly, the programmer has to code
9194 only the functionality of the minor mode. All the rest--toggles,
9195 predicate, and documentation--can be done in one call to the macro
9196 `easy-mmode-define-minor-mode' (see the documentation). See also
9197 `easy-mmode-define-keymap'.
9199 ** Text property changes
9201 *** The `intangible' property now works on overlays as well as on a
9204 *** The new functions next-char-property-change and
9205 previous-char-property-change scan through the buffer looking for a
9206 place where either a text property or an overlay might change. The
9207 functions take two arguments, POSITION and LIMIT. POSITION is the
9208 starting position for the scan. LIMIT says where to stop the scan.
9210 If no property change is found before LIMIT, the value is LIMIT. If
9211 LIMIT is nil, scan goes to the beginning or end of the accessible part
9212 of the buffer. If no property change is found, the value is the
9213 position of the beginning or end of the buffer.
9215 *** In the `local-map' text property or overlay property, the property
9216 value can now be a symbol whose function definition is a keymap. This
9217 is an alternative to using the keymap itself.
9219 ** Changes in invisibility features
9221 *** Isearch can now temporarily show parts of the buffer which are
9222 hidden by an overlay with a invisible property, when the search match
9223 is inside that portion of the buffer. To enable this the overlay
9224 should have a isearch-open-invisible property which is a function that
9225 would be called having the overlay as an argument, the function should
9226 make the overlay visible.
9228 During incremental search the overlays are shown by modifying the
9229 invisible and intangible properties, if beside this more actions are
9230 needed the overlay should have a isearch-open-invisible-temporary
9231 which is a function. The function is called with 2 arguments: one is
9232 the overlay and the second is nil when it should show the overlay and
9233 t when it should hide it.
9235 *** add-to-invisibility-spec, remove-from-invisibility-spec
9237 Modes that use overlays to hide portions of a buffer should set the
9238 invisible property of the overlay to the mode's name (or another symbol)
9239 and modify the `buffer-invisibility-spec' to include that symbol.
9240 Use `add-to-invisibility-spec' and `remove-from-invisibility-spec' to
9241 manipulate the `buffer-invisibility-spec'.
9242 Here is an example of how to do this:
9244 ;; If we want to display an ellipsis:
9245 (add-to-invisibility-spec '(my-symbol . t))
9246 ;; If you don't want ellipsis:
9247 (add-to-invisibility-spec 'my-symbol)
9250 (overlay-put (make-overlay beginning end) 'invisible 'my-symbol)
9253 ;; When done with the overlays:
9254 (remove-from-invisibility-spec '(my-symbol . t))
9256 (remove-from-invisibility-spec 'my-symbol)
9258 ** Changes in syntax parsing.
9260 *** The syntax-directed buffer-scan functions (such as
9261 `parse-partial-sexp', `forward-word' and similar functions) can now
9262 obey syntax information specified by text properties, if the variable
9263 `parse-sexp-lookup-properties' is non-nil.
9265 If the value of `parse-sexp-lookup-properties' is nil, the behavior
9266 is as before: the syntax-table of the current buffer is always
9267 used to determine the syntax of the character at the position.
9269 When `parse-sexp-lookup-properties' is non-nil, the syntax of a
9270 character in the buffer is calculated thus:
9272 a) if the `syntax-table' text-property of that character
9273 is a cons, this cons becomes the syntax-type;
9275 Valid values of `syntax-table' text-property are: nil, a valid
9276 syntax-table, and a valid syntax-table element, i.e.,
9277 a cons cell of the form (SYNTAX-CODE . MATCHING-CHAR).
9279 b) if the character's `syntax-table' text-property
9280 is a syntax table, this syntax table is used
9281 (instead of the syntax-table of the current buffer) to
9282 determine the syntax type of the character.
9284 c) otherwise the syntax-type is determined by the syntax-table
9285 of the current buffer.
9287 *** The meaning of \s in regular expressions is also affected by the
9288 value of `parse-sexp-lookup-properties'. The details are the same as
9289 for the syntax-directed buffer-scan functions.
9291 *** There are two new syntax-codes, `!' and `|' (numeric values 14
9292 and 15). A character with a code `!' starts a comment which is ended
9293 only by another character with the same code (unless quoted). A
9294 character with a code `|' starts a string which is ended only by
9295 another character with the same code (unless quoted).
9297 These codes are mainly meant for use as values of the `syntax-table'
9300 *** The function `parse-partial-sexp' has new semantics for the sixth
9301 arg COMMENTSTOP. If it is `syntax-table', parse stops after the start
9302 of a comment or a string, or after end of a comment or a string.
9304 *** The state-list which the return value from `parse-partial-sexp'
9305 (and can also be used as an argument) now has an optional ninth
9306 element: the character address of the start of last comment or string;
9307 nil if none. The fourth and eighth elements have special values if the
9308 string/comment is started by a "!" or "|" syntax-code.
9310 *** Since new features of `parse-partial-sexp' allow a complete
9311 syntactic parsing, `font-lock' no longer supports
9312 `font-lock-comment-start-regexp'.
9314 ** Changes in face features
9316 *** The face functions are now unconditionally defined in Emacs, even
9317 if it does not support displaying on a device that supports faces.
9319 *** The function face-documentation returns the documentation string
9320 of a face (or nil if it doesn't have one).
9322 *** The function face-bold-p returns t if a face should be bold.
9323 set-face-bold-p sets that flag.
9325 *** The function face-italic-p returns t if a face should be italic.
9326 set-face-italic-p sets that flag.
9328 *** You can now specify foreground and background colors for text
9329 by adding elements of the form (foreground-color . COLOR-NAME)
9330 and (background-color . COLOR-NAME) to the list of faces in
9331 the `face' property (either the character's text property or an
9334 This means that you no longer need to create named faces to use
9335 arbitrary colors in a Lisp package.
9337 ** Changes in file-handling functions
9339 *** File-access primitive functions no longer discard an extra redundant
9340 directory name from the beginning of the file name. In other words,
9341 they no longer do anything special with // or /~. That conversion
9342 is now done only in substitute-in-file-name.
9344 This makes it possible for a Lisp program to open a file whose name
9347 *** If copy-file is unable to set the date of the output file,
9348 it now signals an error with the condition file-date-error.
9350 *** The inode number returned by file-attributes may be an integer (if
9351 the number fits in a Lisp integer) or a list of integers.
9353 *** insert-file-contents can now read from a special file,
9354 as long as the arguments VISIT and REPLACE are nil.
9356 *** The RAWFILE arg to find-file-noselect, if non-nil, now suppresses
9357 character code conversion as well as other things.
9359 Meanwhile, this feature does work with remote file names
9360 (formerly it did not).
9362 *** Lisp packages which create temporary files should use the TMPDIR
9363 environment variable to decide which directory to put them in.
9365 *** interpreter-mode-alist elements now specify regexps
9366 instead of constant strings.
9368 *** expand-file-name no longer treats `//' or `/~' specially. It used
9369 to delete all the text of a file name up through the first slash of
9370 any `//' or `/~' sequence. Now it passes them straight through.
9372 substitute-in-file-name continues to treat those sequences specially,
9373 in the same way as before.
9375 *** The variable `format-alist' is more general now.
9376 The FROM-FN and TO-FN in a format definition can now be strings
9377 which specify shell commands to use as filters to perform conversion.
9379 *** The new function access-file tries to open a file, and signals an
9380 error if that fails. If the open succeeds, access-file does nothing
9381 else, and returns nil.
9383 *** The function insert-directory now signals an error if the specified
9384 directory cannot be listed.
9386 ** Changes in minibuffer input
9388 *** The functions read-buffer, read-variable, read-command, read-string
9389 read-file-name, read-from-minibuffer and completing-read now take an
9390 additional argument which specifies the default value. If this
9391 argument is non-nil, it should be a string; that string is used in two
9394 It is returned if the user enters empty input.
9395 It is available through the history command M-n.
9397 *** The functions read-string, read-from-minibuffer,
9398 read-no-blanks-input and completing-read now take an additional
9399 argument INHERIT-INPUT-METHOD. If this is non-nil, then the
9400 minibuffer inherits the current input method and the setting of
9401 enable-multibyte-characters from the previously current buffer.
9403 In an interactive spec, you can use M instead of s to read an
9404 argument in this way.
9406 *** All minibuffer input functions discard text properties
9407 from the text you enter in the minibuffer, unless the variable
9408 minibuffer-allow-text-properties is non-nil.
9410 ** Echo area features
9412 *** Clearing the echo area now runs the normal hook
9413 echo-area-clear-hook. Note that the echo area can be used while the
9414 minibuffer is active; in that case, the minibuffer is still active
9415 after the echo area is cleared.
9417 *** The function current-message returns the message currently displayed
9418 in the echo area, or nil if there is none.
9420 ** Keyboard input features
9422 *** tty-erase-char is a new variable that reports which character was
9423 set up as the terminal's erase character when time Emacs was started.
9425 *** num-nonmacro-input-events is the total number of input events
9426 received so far from the terminal. It does not count those generated
9429 ** Frame-related changes
9431 *** make-frame runs the normal hook before-make-frame-hook just before
9432 creating a frame, and just after creating a frame it runs the abnormal
9433 hook after-make-frame-functions with the new frame as arg.
9435 *** The new hook window-configuration-change-hook is now run every time
9436 the window configuration has changed. The frame whose configuration
9437 has changed is the selected frame when the hook is run.
9439 *** Each frame now independently records the order for recently
9440 selected buffers, in its buffer-list frame parameter, so that the
9441 value of other-buffer is now based on the buffers recently displayed
9442 in the selected frame.
9444 *** The value of the frame parameter vertical-scroll-bars
9445 is now `left', `right' or nil. A non-nil value specifies
9446 which side of the window to put the scroll bars on.
9448 ** X Windows features
9450 *** You can examine X resources for other applications by binding
9451 x-resource-class around a call to x-get-resource. The usual value of
9452 x-resource-class is "Emacs", which is the correct value for Emacs.
9454 *** In menus, checkboxes and radio buttons now actually work.
9455 The menu displays the current status of the box or button.
9457 *** The function x-list-fonts now takes an optional fourth argument
9458 MAXIMUM which sets a limit on how many matching fonts to return.
9459 A smaller value of MAXIMUM makes the function faster.
9461 If the only question is whether *any* font matches the pattern,
9462 it is good to supply 1 for this argument.
9464 ** Subprocess features
9466 *** A reminder: it is no longer necessary for subprocess filter
9467 functions and sentinels to do save-match-data, because Emacs does this
9470 *** The new function shell-command-to-string executes a shell command
9471 and returns the output from the command as a string.
9473 *** The new function process-contact returns t for a child process,
9474 and (HOSTNAME SERVICE) for a net connection.
9476 ** An error in running pre-command-hook or post-command-hook
9477 does clear the variable to nil. The documentation was wrong before.
9479 ** In define-key-after, if AFTER is t, the new binding now always goes
9480 at the end of the keymap. If the keymap is a menu, this means it
9481 goes after the other menu items.
9483 ** If you have a program that makes several changes in the same area
9484 of the buffer, you can use the macro combine-after-change-calls
9485 around that Lisp code to make it faster when after-change hooks
9488 The macro arranges to call the after-change functions just once for a
9489 series of several changes--if that seems safe.
9491 Don't alter the variables after-change-functions and
9492 after-change-function within the body of a combine-after-change-calls
9495 ** If you define an abbrev (with define-abbrev) whose EXPANSION
9496 is not a string, then the abbrev does not expand in the usual sense,
9497 but its hook is still run.
9499 ** Normally, the Lisp debugger is not used (even if you have enabled it)
9500 for errors that are handled by condition-case.
9502 If you set debug-on-signal to a non-nil value, then the debugger is called
9503 regardless of whether there is a handler for the condition. This is
9504 useful for debugging problems that happen inside of a condition-case.
9506 This mode of operation seems to be unreliable in other ways. Errors that
9507 are normal and ought to be handled, perhaps in timers or process
9508 filters, will instead invoke the debugger. So don't say you weren't
9511 ** The new variable ring-bell-function lets you specify your own
9512 way for Emacs to "ring the bell".
9514 ** If run-at-time's TIME argument is t, the action is repeated at
9515 integral multiples of REPEAT from the epoch; this is useful for
9516 functions like display-time.
9518 ** You can use the function locate-library to find the precise file
9519 name of a Lisp library. This isn't new, but wasn't documented before.
9521 ** Commands for entering view mode have new optional arguments that
9522 can be used from Lisp. Low-level entrance to and exit from view mode
9523 is done by functions view-mode-enter and view-mode-exit.
9525 ** batch-byte-compile-file now makes Emacs return a nonzero status code
9526 if there is an error in compilation.
9528 ** pop-to-buffer, switch-to-buffer-other-window and
9529 switch-to-buffer-other-frame now accept an additional optional
9530 argument NORECORD, much like switch-to-buffer. If it is non-nil,
9531 they don't put the buffer at the front of the buffer list.
9533 ** If your .emacs file leaves the *scratch* buffer non-empty,
9534 Emacs does not display the startup message, so as to avoid changing
9535 the *scratch* buffer.
9537 ** The new function regexp-opt returns an efficient regexp to match a string.
9538 The arguments are STRINGS and (optionally) PAREN. This function can be used
9539 where regexp matching or searching is intensively used and speed is important,
9540 e.g., in Font Lock mode.
9542 ** The variable buffer-display-count is local to each buffer,
9543 and is incremented each time the buffer is displayed in a window.
9544 It starts at 0 when the buffer is created.
9546 ** The new function compose-mail starts composing a mail message
9547 using the user's chosen mail composition agent (specified with the
9548 variable mail-user-agent). It has variants compose-mail-other-window
9549 and compose-mail-other-frame.
9551 ** The `user-full-name' function now takes an optional parameter which
9552 can either be a number (the UID) or a string (the login name). The
9553 full name of the specified user will be returned.
9555 ** Lisp packages that load files of customizations, or any other sort
9556 of user profile, should obey the variable init-file-user in deciding
9557 where to find it. They should load the profile of the user name found
9558 in that variable. If init-file-user is nil, meaning that the -q
9559 option was used, then Lisp packages should not load the customization
9562 ** format-time-string now allows you to specify the field width
9563 and type of padding. This works as in printf: you write the field
9564 width as digits in the middle of a %-construct. If you start
9565 the field width with 0, it means to pad with zeros.
9567 For example, %S normally specifies the number of seconds since the
9568 minute; %03S means to pad this with zeros to 3 positions, %_3S to pad
9569 with spaces to 3 positions. Plain %3S pads with zeros, because that
9570 is how %S normally pads to two positions.
9572 ** thing-at-point now supports a new kind of "thing": url.
9574 ** imenu.el changes.
9576 You can now specify a function to be run when selecting an
9577 item from menu created by imenu.
9579 An example of using this feature: if we define imenu items for the
9580 #include directives in a C file, we can open the included file when we
9581 select one of those items.
9583 * For older news, see the file ONEWS
9585 ----------------------------------------------------------------------
9586 Copyright information:
9588 Copyright (C) 1999, 2000, 2001 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
9590 Permission is granted to anyone to make or distribute verbatim copies
9591 of this document as received, in any medium, provided that the
9592 copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved,
9593 thus giving the recipient permission to redistribute in turn.
9595 Permission is granted to distribute modified versions
9596 of this document, or of portions of it,
9597 under the above conditions, provided also that they
9598 carry prominent notices stating who last changed them.
9602 paragraph-separate: "[
\f]*$"