3 If you are ready to start working on any of these TODO items, we
4 appreciate your help; please write to emacs-devel@gnu.org so we can be
5 aware that the problem is being addressed, and talk with you how to do
6 it best. Since Emacs is an FSF-copyrighted package, please be
7 prepared to sign legal papers to transfer the copyright on your work
10 * Small but important fixes needed in existing features:
12 ** revert-buffer should eliminate overlays and the mark.
14 ** erase-buffer should perhaps disregard read-only properties of text.
16 ** Make occur correctly handle matches that span more than one line,
17 as well as overlapping matches.
19 ** Fix the kill/yank treatment of invisible text. At the moment,
20 invisible text is placed in the kill-ring, so that the contents of
21 the ring may not correspond to the text as displayed to the user.
22 It ought to be possible to omit text which is invisible (due to a
23 text-property, overlay, or selective display) from the kill-ring.
25 ** Change the way define-minor-mode handles autoloading.
26 It should not generate :require. Or :require in defcustom
27 should not be recorded in the user's custom-set-variables call.
29 ** The buttons at the top of a custom buffer should not omit
30 variables whose values are currently hidden.
32 ** Clean up the variables in browse-url. Perhaps use a shell command string to
33 specify the browser instead of the mushrooming set of functions.
34 See also ESR's proposal for a BROWSER environment variable
35 <URL:http://www.catb.org/~esr/BROWSER/browse-url.patch>.
37 ** Enhance scroll-bar to handle tall line (similar to line-move).
39 ** Make occur handle multi-line matches cleanly with context.
41 ** In Custom buffers, put the option that turns a mode on or off first,
42 using a heuristic of some kind?
44 ** Define recompute-arg and recompute-arg-if for fix_command to use.
45 See rms message of 11 Dec 05.
47 ** Height returned by frame-parameter ... and height given to
48 make-frame does not mean the same thing. The former includes menu and
49 tool bar lines, the latter don't. frame-parameter should return height
50 without menu and tool bar lines.
52 ** In Emacs Info, examples of using Customize should be clickable
53 and they should create Custom buffers.
57 ** Provide user-friendly ways to list all available font families,
58 list fonts, display a font as a sample, etc. [fx looked at
59 multilingual font selection for Unicode-based Emacs 23.]
61 ** Rewrite the face code to be simpler, clearer and faster.
63 ** Program Enriched mode to read and save in RTF. [Is there actually a
64 decent single definition of RTF? Maybe see info at
65 http://latex2rtf.sourceforge.net/.] This task seems to be addressed
66 by http://savannah.nongnu.org/projects/emacs-rtf/, which is still in
69 ** Implement something better than the current Refill mode. This
70 probably needs some primitive support.
72 ** Add a command to make a "Local Variables" section in the current buffer
73 and/or add a variable to the list.
75 ** Implement primitive and higher-level functions to allow filling
76 properly with variable-pitch faces.
78 ** Implement a smoother vertical scroll facility, one that allows
79 C-v to scroll through a tall image. The primitive operations
80 posn-at-point and posn-at-x-y should now make it doable in elisp.
82 ** Implement intelligent search/replace, going beyond query-replace
83 (see http://graphics.csail.mit.edu/~rcm/chi04.pdf).
85 ** Implement other text formatting properties.
86 *** Footnotes that can appear either in place or at the end of the page.
87 *** text property that says "don't break line in middle of this".
88 Don't break the line between two characters that have the
89 same value of this property.
90 *** Discretionary hyphens that are not visible when they are at end of line.
92 ** Make movemail work with IMAP.
93 movemail from GNU mailutils does that, so switching to it will solve
96 ** Internationalize Emacs's messages.
98 ** Install mmc@maruska.dyndns.org's no-flicker change.
100 ** Add a "current vertical pixel level" value that goes with point,
101 so that motion commands can also move through tall images.
102 This value would be to point as window-vscroll is to window-start.
104 ** Address internationalization of symbols names essentially
105 as documentation, e.g. in command names and Custom.
107 ** Make the Lucid menu widget display multilingual text. [This
108 probably needs to be done from actual Emacs buffers, either directly
109 in the menu or by rendering in an unmapped window and copying the
110 pixels. The current code assumes a specific locale; that isn't good
111 enough even if X can render the arbitrary text] [The gtk
112 port now displays multilingual text in menus, but only insofar as
113 Emacs can encode it as utf-8 and gtk can display the result.]
114 Maybe making Lucid menus work like Gtk's (i.e. just force utf-8) is good
115 enough now that Emacs can encode most chars into utf-8.
117 ** Remove the limitation that window and frame widths and heights can
118 be only full columns/lines.
120 * Other features we would like:
122 ** Create a category of errors called `process-error'
123 for some or all errors associated with using subprocesses.
125 ** Maybe reinterpret `parse-error' as a category of errors
126 and put some other errors under it.
128 ** A function to tell you the argument pattern of functions.
129 See `function-arity' in http://www.loveshack.ukfsn.org/emacs/fx-misc.el.
131 ** Make byte-compile warn when a doc string is too wide.
133 ** A function to check for customizable options that have been
134 set but not saved, and ask the user whether to save them.
135 This could go in kill-emacs-query-functions, to remind people
136 to save their changes. If the user says yes, show them
137 in a Custom buffer using customize-customized.
139 ** Emacs Lisp mode could put an overlay on the defun for every
140 function that has advice. The overlay could have `after-text' like "
141 [Function has advice]". It might look like
142 (defun foo [Function has advice] (x y)
143 The overlay could also be a button that you could use to view the advice.
147 This is hard to make work because sftp doesn't print status
150 *** Use MLS for ange-ftp-insert-directory if a list of files is specified.
152 ** Ability to map a key, including all modified-combinations.
153 E.g map mouse-4 to wheel-up as well as M-mouse-4 -> M-wheel-up
154 M-C-mouse-4 -> M-C-wheel-up, H-S-C-M-s-double-mouse-4 ->
155 H-S-C-M-s-double-wheel-up, ...
157 ** Beefed-up syntax-tables.
158 *** recognize multi-character syntactic entities like `begin' and `end'.
159 *** nested string-delimiters (for Postscript's (foo(bar)baz) strings).
160 *** support for infix operators (with precedence).
161 *** support for the $ (paired delimiter) in parse-partial-sexp.
162 *** support for hook-chars whose effect on the parsing-state is specified
163 by elisp code. Thus a char could both close a string and open a comment
164 at the same time and do it in a context-sensitive way.
165 *** ability to add mode-specific data to the partial-parse-state.
167 ** Add a way to convert a keyboard macro to equivalent Lisp code.
169 ** Have a command suggestion help system that recognizes patterns
170 of commands which could be replaced with a simpler common command.
171 It should not make more than one suggestion per 10 minutes.
173 ** Add a way to define input methods by computing them (when first used)
174 from other input methods. Then redefine C-x 8 to use a
175 user-selected input method, with the default being the union of
176 latin-1-prefix and latin-1-postfix.
178 ** Implement a clean way to use different major modes for
179 different parts of a buffer. This could be useful in editing
180 Bison input files, for instance, or other kinds of text
181 where one language is embedded in another language. See
182 http://www.loveshack.ukfsn.org/emacs/multi-mode.el and also
183 mmm-mode, as reference for approaches took by others.
185 ** Arrange a way for an input method to return the first character
186 immediately, then replace it later. So that C-s a with
187 input method latin-1-postfix would immediately search for an a.
189 ** Give start-process the ability to direct standard-error
190 output to a different filter.
192 ** Make desktop.el save the "frame configuration" of Emacs (in some
195 ** Give desktop.el a feature to switch between different named
198 ** Replace finder.el with something that generates an Info file
199 which gives the same information through a menu structure. [Dave
200 Love started on this.]
202 ** Add a cpio mode, more or less like tar mode.
204 ** Implement a variant of uncompress.el or jka-compr.el that works with
205 GNU Privacy Guard for encryption. [Code exists but isn't assigned.
206 See the Gnus development sources for assigned code concerning GPG
207 use with mail, which is probably a good start.] See also
208 http://www.loveshack.ukfsn.org/emacs/auto-crypt.tgz.
210 ** Save undo information in special temporary files, and reload it
211 when needed for undoing. This could extend undo capacity.
213 ** Change the Windows NT menu code
214 so that it handles the deep_p argument and avoids
215 regenerating the whole menu bar menu tree except
216 when the user tries to use the menubar.
218 This requires the RIT to forward the WM_INITMENU message to
219 the main thread, and not return from that message until the main
220 thread has processed the MENU_BAR_ACTIVATE_EVENT and regenerated
221 the whole menu bar. In the mean time, it should process other messages.
223 ** Get some major packages installed: W3 (development version needs
224 significant work), PSGML. Check the assignments file for other
225 packages which might go in and have been missed.
227 ** Make keymaps a first-class Lisp object (this means a rewrite of
228 keymap.c). What should it do apart from being opaque ?
229 multiple inheritance ? faster where-is ? no more fix_submap_inheritance ?
232 ** Provide real menus on ttys. The MS-DOS implementation can serve as
233 an example how to do part of this.
235 ** Implement popular parts of the rest of the CL functions as compiler
238 ** Make compiler warnings about functions that might be undefined at run time
239 smarter, so that they know which files are required by the file being
240 compiled and don't warn about functions defined in them.
242 ** Highlight rectangles (`mouse-track-rectangle-p' in XEmacs). Already in CUA,
243 but it's a valuable feature worth making more general.
245 ** Support simultaneous tty and X frames. [For a partial
246 implementation, see tla branch
247 lorentey@elte.hu--2004/emacs--multi-tty--0 at
248 http://lorentey.hu/arch/2004]
250 ** Provide MIME support for Rmail using the Gnus MIME library. [Maybe
251 not now feasible, given Gnus maintenance decisions. fx looked at
252 this and can say where some of the problems are.]
254 ** Eliminate the storm of warnings concerning char/unsigned char
255 mismatches that we get with GCC 4.x and proprietary compilers on
256 various systems. They make it difficult to spot the important
259 ** Fix anything necessary to use `long long' EMACS_INTs with GCC.
261 ** Split out parts of lisp.h and generate Makefile dependencies
266 ** Allow auto-compression-mode to use zlib calls if zlib is available.
267 [It's required for PNG, so may be linked anyhow.]
269 ** Add a --pristine startup flag which does -q --no-site-file plus
270 ignoring X resources (Doze equivalents?) and most of the
271 environment. What should not be ignored needs consideration.
273 ** Enhance locale handling: handle language, territory and charset
274 orthogonally and de-emphasize language environments. Use the locale
275 to set up more things, such as fontsets, the default Ispell
276 dictionary, diary format, calendar holidays and display, quoting
277 characters and phrase boundaries, sentence endings, collation for
278 sorting (at least for unicodes), HTTP Accept-language, patterns for
279 directory listings and compilation messages, yes-or-no replies,
280 common menu items when the toolkit supports it ... `locale-info'
281 needs extending for LC_COLLATE &c. [fx started on this.]
283 ** Improve the GC (generational, incremental). (We may be able to use
284 the Boehm collector.) [See the Boehm-GC branch in CVS for work on
287 ** Check what hooks would help Emacspeak -- see the defadvising in W3.
289 ** Add horizontal scroll bars.
291 ** Provide an optional feature which computes a scroll bar slider's
292 size and its position from lines instead of characters.
294 ** Add support for SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) rendering to
297 ** Allow unknown image types to be rendered via an external program
298 converting them to, say, PBM (in the same way as PostScript?).
300 ** Allow displaying an X window from an external program in a buffer,
301 e.g. to render graphics from Java applets. [gerd and/or wmperry
302 thought this was feasible.]
304 ** Allow images (not just text) in the margin to be mouse-sensitive.
305 (Requires recursing through display properties). Provide some way
306 to simulate mouse-clicks on marginal text without a mouse.
308 ** Implement Lisp functions to determine properly whether a character
309 is displayable (particularly needed in XFree 4, sigh). Use it to
310 define useful glyphs that may be displayed as images or unicodes
311 (with ASCIIfied fallback via latin1-disp). Examples include
312 box-drawing graphics in Custom buffers, W3 rules and tables, and
313 tree displays generally, mode-line mail indicator. [See work done
314 already for Emacs 22 and consult fx.]
316 ** Do something to make rms happy with fx's dynamic loading, and use it
317 to implement things like auto-loaded buffer parsers and database
318 access in cases which need more than Lisp.
320 ** Extend ps-print to deal with multiple font sizes, images, and extra
323 ** Provide portable undumping using mmap (per gerd design).
325 ** Make byte-compile avoid binding an expanded defsubst's args
326 when the body only calls primitives.
328 ** Use the XIE X extension, if available, for image display.
330 ** Make monochrome images display using the foreground and background
331 colors of the applicable faces.
335 ** Optionally make the cursor a little thinner at the end of a line
336 or the end of the buffer.
338 ** Add support for rendering antialiased text, probably using
341 ** Port the conservative stack marking code of Emacs' garbage collector
342 to more systems, so that we can completely get rid of GCPROs. Note
343 that Boehm garbage collector provides this.
345 ** Reorder defcustom's in each package so that the more important
346 options come first in the Customize buffers. This could be done by
347 either rearranging the file (since options are shown in the order
348 they appear in the *.el files), or by adding a few :set-after
351 ** Maybe document the features of libraries missing from the manual (or
352 ancillary manuals, including the Lisp manual in some cases).
353 This is not worth doing for all of these packages and we need not
354 aim for completeness, but some may be worth documenting.
356 Here's a list which is probably not complete/correct: align, allout,
357 artist, ansi-color, array, battery, calculator, cdl, cmuscheme,
358 completion, cua, delim-col, dirtrack, double, echistory, elide-head,
359 easymenu, expand, flow-ctrl, format [format-alist],
360 generic/generic-x [various modes], kermit, log-edit, ledit
361 [obsolete?], makesum, midnight [other than in Kill Buffer node],
362 mouse-copy [?], mouse-drag, mouse-sel, net-utils, rcompile,
363 snmp-mode [?], soundex [should be interactive?], strokes [start from
364 the web page], talk, thingatpt [interactive functions?], type-break,
365 vcursor, xscheme, zone-mode [?], mlconvert [?], iso-cvt, iso-swed,
366 swedish, feedmail [?], uce, bruce, gametree, meese, page-ext,
367 refbib, refer, scribe, sgml-mode, spell, texinfo, underline,
368 cmacexp, hideif, mantemp [obsolete?], pcomplete, assoc, xml,
369 cvs-status (should be described in PCL-CVS manual); other progmodes,
370 probably in separate manual.
372 ** Convert the XPM bitmaps to PPM, replace the PBMs with them and scrap
373 the XPMs so that the colour versions work generally. (Requires care
374 with the colour used for the transparent regions.)
376 ** Convenient access to the `values' variable. It would be nice to have an
377 interface that would show you the printed reps of the elements of the
378 list in a menu, let you select one of the values, and put it into some
379 other variable, without changing the value of `values'.
381 ** (Controlled by a flag) make open and close syntax match exactly,
382 i.e. `(' doesn't match `]'.
384 ** Specify parameter ID-FORMAT in all calls to `file-attributes' and
385 `directory-files-and-attributes' where attributes UID or GID are used.
386 Whenever possible, use value 'string.
387 When done, change meaning of default value from 'integer to 'string.
388 If value 'integer is used nowhere, remove the parameter ID-FORMAT from
389 the definition of `file-attributes' and `directory-files-and-attributes'
392 ** Make language-info-alist customizable. Currently a user can customize
393 only the variable `current-language-environment'.
395 ** Improve language environment handling so that Emacs can fit
396 better to a users locale. Currently Emacs uses utf-8 language
397 environment for all utf-8 locales, thus a user in ja_JP.UTF-8 locale
398 are also put in utf-8 lang. env. In such a case, it is
399 better to use Japanese lang. env. but prefer utf-8 coding system.
401 ** Eliminate the current restriction on header printing by ps-print.
402 Currently, a header can contain only single 1-byte charset in
405 ** In ps-print, provide an user friendly interface to specify fonts.
407 ** OpenType font support for various complex scripts (e.g. Devanagari).
408 As X protocal doesn't provide a way to access OpenType Layout Tables
409 in a OpenType font of a server side, we need a way to utilize local
410 fonts (perhaps by directly using the Freetype library or indirectly
413 ** Enhance word boundary detection for such a script that doesn't use
414 space at word boundary (e.g. Thai).
416 ** Implement interface programs with major Japanese conversion server
417 in lib-src so that they can be used from the input method
418 "japanese". Currently, most Japanese users are using external
419 packages (e.g. tamago, anthy) or an input method via XIM.
421 ** Provide the toolbar on ttys. This could map a bit like tmm-menubar
422 for the menubar and buttons could look a bit like those used by customize.
426 ** Replace gmalloc.c with the modified Doug Lea code from the current
427 GNU libc so that the special mmapping of buffers can be removed --
428 that apparently loses under Solaris, at least. [fx has mostly done
431 ** Rewrite make-docfile to be clean and maintainable.
433 ** Add an inferior-comint-minor-mode to capture the common set of operations
434 offered by major modes that offer an associated inferior
435 comint-derived mode. I.e. basically make cmuscheme.el/inf-lisp.el generic.
436 For use by sml-mode, python-mode, tex-mode, scheme-mode, lisp-mode,
437 haskell-mode, tuareg-mode, ...
441 ** a two-char comment-starter whose two chars are symbol constituents will
442 not be noticed if it appears within a word.
444 ** Fix unexelf.c to handle the .data.rel and .data.rel.local
445 sections made by GCC 3.4 on IRIX.
447 ;;; arch-tag: b0a3e40b-726a-457d-9999-ba848321b036