New make target for Windows platform: make dist (bug#6602)
[bpt/emacs.git] / etc / NEWS
CommitLineData
29b7722a 1GNU Emacs NEWS -- history of user-visible changes.
5b87ad55 2
eb199145 3Copyright (C) 2010 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
5b87ad55 4See the end of the file for license conditions.
a933dad1 5
893db5bc 6Please send Emacs bug reports to bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org.
9a21d88b
KS
7If possible, use M-x report-emacs-bug.
8
eb199145 9This file is about changes in Emacs version 24.
9a21d88b 10
eb199145
GM
11See files NEWS.23, NEWS.22, NEWS.21, NEWS.20, NEWS.19, NEWS.18,
12and NEWS.1-17 for changes in older Emacs versions.
9a21d88b
KS
13
14You can narrow news to a specific version by calling `view-emacs-news'
15with a prefix argument or by typing C-u C-h C-n.
3f7194ed 16
adce950d
CY
17
18Temporary note:
19 +++ indicates that the appropriate manual has already been updated.
20 --- means no change in the manuals is called for.
21When you add a new item, please add it without either +++ or ---
22so we will look at it and add it to the manual.
23
24\f
eb199145 25* Installation Changes in Emacs 24.1
09e18d03 26
338648ad
GM
27** Configure links against libselinux if it is found.
28You can disable this by using --without-selinux.
29
30---
31** By default, the installed Info and man pages are compressed.
32You can disable this by configuring --without-compress-info.
33
aded53ff
GM
34---
35** There are new configure options:
36--with-mmdf, --with-mail-unlink, --with-mailhost.
37These provide no new functionality, they just remove the need to edit
38lib-src/Makefile by hand in order to use the associated features.
39
1ddac986
GM
40---
41** There is a new configure option --with-crt-dir.
42This is only useful if your crt*.o files are in a non-standard location.
43
e547b051 44---
30c4d8dc 45** Emacs can be compiled against Gtk+ 3.0 if you pass --with-x-toolkit=gtk3
e547b051
J
46to configure. Note that other libraries used by Emacs, RSVG and GConf,
47also depend on Gtk+. You can disable them with --without-rsvg and
48--without-gconf.
49
d9170db5
DN
50** There is a new configure option --enable-use-lisp-union-type.
51This is only useful for Emacs developers to debug certain types of bugs.
52These is not a new feature; only the configure flag is new.
53
0bfd685e 54\f
eb199145 55* Startup Changes in Emacs 24.1
4a263588 56
0bfd685e 57\f
eb199145 58* Changes in Emacs 24.1
7841339b 59
0191e222
CY
60** New emacsclient argument --parent-id ID can be used to open a
61client frame in parent X window ID, via XEmbed. This works like the
62--parent-id argument to Emacs.
63
902a6d8d
SM
64** Completion can cycle, depending on completion-cycle-threshold.
65
2372f278
SM
66** auto-mode-case-fold is now enabled by default.
67
f4b6ba46
EZ
68+++
69** Emacs now supports display and editing of bidirectional text.
f4b6ba46
EZ
70
71See the node "Bidirectional Editing" in the Emacs Manual for some
72initial documentation.
73
74To turn this on in any given buffer, set the buffer-local variable
75`bidi-display-reordering' to a non-nil value. The default is nil.
76
77The buffer-local variable `bidi-paragraph-direction', if non-nil,
78forces each paragraph in the buffer to have its base direction
79according to the value of this variable. Possible values are
80`right-to-left' and `left-to-right'. If the value is nil (the
81default), Emacs determines the base direction of each paragraph from
82its text, as specified by the Unicode Bidirectional Algorithm.
83
d20e1419
EZ
84The function `current-bidi-paragraph-direction' returns the actual
85value of paragraph base direction at point.
86
f4b6ba46
EZ
87Reordering of bidirectional text for display in Emacs is a "Full
88bidirectionality" class implementation of the Unicode Bidirectional
89Algorithm.
90
46759717
EZ
91Note that some advanced display features, such as overlay strings and
92`display' text properties, do not yet work correctly when
93bidirectional text is reordered for display.
94
303500aa 95** GTK scroll-bars are now placed on the right by default.
52834b6b
CY
96Use `set-scroll-bar-mode' to change this.
97
20fe03ad 98** GTK tool bars can have just text, just images or images and text.
d8004abe 99Customize `tool-bar-style' to choose style. On a Gnome desktop, the default
20fe03ad
JD
100is taken from the desktop settings.
101
1ecb2d3f
JD
102** Lucid menus and dialogs can display antialiased fonts if Emacs is built
103with Xft.
99852628 104
b7d65a5f
GM
105** Basic SELinux support has been added.
106This requires Emacs to be linked with libselinux at build time.
107
d8004abe
GM
108*** Emacs preserves the SELinux file context when backing up, and
109optionally when copying files. To this end, copy-file has an extra
110optional argument, and backup-buffer and friends include the SELinux
111context in their return values.
b7d65a5f
GM
112
113*** The new functions file-selinux-context and set-file-selinux-context
114get and set the SELinux context of a file.
115
a5bee597
MA
116*** Tramp offers handlers for file-selinux-context and set-file-selinux-context
117for remote machines which support SELinux.
118
79ce172a 119** New scrolling commands `scroll-up-command' and `scroll-down-command'
7b05466f
JL
120(bound to C-v/[next] and M-v/[prior]) does not signal errors at top/bottom
121of buffer at first key-press (instead moves to top/bottom of buffer)
122when a new variable `scroll-error-top-bottom' is non-nil.
79ce172a 123
5a97d2da
JL
124** New scrolling commands `scroll-up-line' and `scroll-down-line'
125scroll a line instead of full screen.
126
a4b000fb
JL
127** New property `scroll-command' should be set on a command's symbol to
128define it as a scroll command affected by `scroll-preserve-screen-position.
9013a7f8 129
f1a5d776
CY
130** Trash changes
131
132*** `delete-by-moving-to-trash' now only affects commands that specify
133trashing. This avoids inadvertently trashing temporary files.
134
135*** Calling `delete-file' or `delete-directory' with a prefix argument
136now forces true deletion, regardless of `delete-by-moving-to-trash'.
137
f0bf7c8e
JL
138** New option `list-colors-sort' defines the color sort order
139for `list-colors-display'.
140
44198b6e
CY
141** An Emacs Lisp package manager is now included.
142This is a convenient way to download and install additional packages,
143from elpa.gnu.org. `M-x package-list-packages' shows a list of
144packages, which can be selected for installation.
145
146*** By default, all installed packages are loaded and activated
147automatically when Emacs starts up. To disable this, set
148`package-enable-at-startup' to nil. To change which packages are
149loaded, customize `package-load-list'.
150
0bfd685e 151\f
eb199145 152* Editing Changes in Emacs 24.1
b350bdf2 153
a982c7ec
CY
154** completion-at-point is now an alias for complete-symbol.
155
53967e09 156** mouse-region-delete-keys has been deleted.
b9229673
CY
157
158** Deletion changes
159
160*** New option `delete-active-region'.
161If non-nil, C-d, [delete], and DEL delete the region if it is active
162and no prefix argument is given. If set to `kill', these commands
163kill instead.
164
165*** New command `delete-forward-char', bound to C-d and [delete].
166This is meant for interactive use, and obeys `delete-active-region';
167delete-char, meant for Lisp, does not obey `delete-active-region'.
168
169*** `delete-backward-char' is now a Lisp function.
170Apart from obeying `delete-active-region', its behavior is unchanged.
171However, the byte compiler now warns if it is called from Lisp; you
172should use delete-char with a negative argument instead.
173
174*** The option `mouse-region-delete-keys' has been deleted.
175
f9d71b42
CY
176** Selection changes.
177
178The way Emacs interacts with the clipboard and primary selection, by
179default, is now similar to other X applications. In particular, kill
180and yank use the clipboard, in addition to the primary selection.
181
182*** `select-active-regions' now defaults to t.
183
184*** `x-select-enable-clipboard' now defaults to t.
185
2490cbbc
CY
186*** `x-select-enable-primary' now defaults to nil.
187
f9d71b42
CY
188*** `mouse-drag-copy-region' now defaults to nil.
189
190*** `mouse-2' is now bound to `mouse-yank-primary'.
191
9bae34bf 192\f
eb199145 193* Changes in Specialized Modes and Packages in Emacs 24.1
efeb796b 194
b3671a51
JL
195** Archive Mode has basic support to browse 7z archives.
196
27d3cd56
CY
197** In ido-mode, C-v is no longer bound to ido-toggle-vc.
198The reason is that this interferes with cua-mode.
199
c1e25821 200** partial-completion-mode is now obsolete.
79ccd68f
SM
201You can get a comparable behavior with:
202(setq completion-styles '(partial-completion initials))
203(setq completion-pcm-complete-word-inserts-delimiters t)
c1e25821 204
18c812bd 205** mpc.el: Can use pseudo tags of the form tag1|tag2 as a union of two tags.
52834b6b
CY
206** Customize
207
208*** Customize buffers now contain a search field.
209The search is performed using `customize-apropos'.
210To turn off the search field, set custom-search-field to nil .
211
212*** Custom options now start out hidden if at their default values.
213Use the arrow to the left of the option name to toggle visibility.
214
215*** custom-buffer-sort-alphabetically now defaults to t.
216
217*** The color widget now has a "Choose" button, which allows you to
218choose a color via list-colors-display.
219
f5d6548a
JL
220** Dired-x
221
222*** dired-jump and dired-jump-other-window called with a prefix argument
223read a file name from the minibuffer instead of using buffer-file-name.
224
855a2294
DN
225** VC and related modes
226
e97a42c1 227*** New VC commands: vc-log-incoming, vc-log-outgoing, vc-find-conflicted-file.
31527c56 228
6941ffec
DN
229**** vc-log-incoming for Git runs "git fetch" so that the necessary
230data is available locally.
231
eccdfe5f
DN
232**** vc-log-incoming and vc-log-outgoing for Git require version 1.7 (or newer).
233
54d3626e
DN
234*** New key bindings: C-x v I and C-x v O bound to vc-log-incoming and
235vc-log-outgoing, respectively.
236
855a2294
DN
237*** vc-dir for Bzr supports viewing shelve contents and shelving snapshots.
238
09158997 239*** Special markup can be added to log-edit buffers.
e97a42c1
SM
240The log-edit buffers are expected to have a format similar to email messages
241with headers of the form:
242 Author: <author of this change>
243 Summary: <one line summary of this change>
244 Fixes: <reference to the bug fixed by this change>
245Some backends handle some of those headers specially, but any unknown header
246is just left as is in the message, so it is not lost.
09158997 247
fab43c76
DN
248**** vc-git handles Author: and Date:
249**** vc-hg handles Author: and Date:
250**** vc-bzr handles Author:, Date: and Fixes:
251**** vc-mtn handles Author: and Date:
252
8117868f
DN
253** Directory local variables can apply to file-less buffers.
254For example, adding "(diff-mode . ((mode . whitespace)))" to your
d8004abe 255.dir-locals.el file, will turn on `whitespace-mode' for *vc-diff* buffers.
8117868f 256
7492acc9
MM
257** SQL Mode enhancements.
258
30c4d8dc
MM
259*** Several variables have been marked as safe local variables. The
260variables `sql-product', `sql-user', `sql-server', `sql-database' and
261`sql-port' can now be safely used as local variables.
7492acc9
MM
262
263*** Added ability to login with a port on MySQL.
264The custom variable `sql-port' can be specified for connection to
265MySQL servers.
266
267*** Custom variables control prompting for login parameters.
268Each supported product has a custom variable `sql-*-login-params'
269which is a list of the parameters to be prompted for before a
270connection is established.
271
5474c40f
MM
272By default, the value of the parameter is simply prompted for. For
273`server' and `database', they can be specified in a list as shown
274below:
275
276 (server :file ARG)
277 (database :file ARG)
278 (server :completion ARG)
279 (database :completion ARG)
280
281The ARG when :file is specified is a regexp that will match valid file
282names (without the directory portion). Generally these strings will
283be of the form ".+\.SUF" where SUF is the desired file suffix.
284
285When :completion is specified, the ARG corresponds to the PREDICATE
286argument to the `completing-read' function.
287
30c4d8dc
MM
288*** Added `sql-connection-alist' to record login parameter values.
289An alist for recording different username, database and server
290values. If there are multiple databases that you connect to the
291parameters needed can be stored in this alist.
292
293For example, the following might be set in the user's init.el:
294
295 (setq sql-connection-alist
296 '((dev (sql-product 'sqlite)
297 (sql-database "/home/mmaug/dev.db"))
298 (prd (sql-product 'oracle)
299 (sql-user "mmaug")
300 (sql-database "iprd2a"))))
301
302This defines two connections named "dev" and "prd".
303
304*** Added `sql-connect' to use predefined connections.
305Sets the login parameters based on the values in the
306`sql-connection-alist' and start a SQL interactive session. Any
307values specified in the connection will not be prompted for.
308
309In the example above, if the user were to invoke M-x sql-connect, they
310would be prompted for the connection. The user can respond with
311either "dev" or "prd". The "dev" connection would connect to the
312SQLite database without prompting; the "prd" connection would prompt
313for the users password and then connect to the Oracle database.
314
d26b0ea9
MM
315**** Added SQL->Start... submenu when connections are defined.
316When connections have been defined, There is a submenu available that
317allows the user to select one to start a SQLi session. The "Start
318SQLi Session" item moves to the "Start..." submenu when cnnections
319have been defined.
320
321**** Added "Save Connection" menu item in SQLi buffers.
322When a SQLi session is not started by a connection then
323`sql-save-connection' will gather the login params specified for the
324session and save them as a new connection.
325
7492acc9
MM
326*** Added option `sql-send-terminator'.
327When set makes sure that each command sent with `sql-send-*' commands
328are properly terminated and submitted to the SQL processor.
329
330*** Added option `sql-oracle-scan-on'.
331When set commands sent to Oracle's SQL*Plus are scanned for strings
30c4d8dc
MM
332starting with an ampersand and the user is asked for replacement text.
333In general, the SQL*Plus option SCAN should always be set OFF under
334SQL interactive mode and this option used in its place.
7492acc9
MM
335
336*** SQL interactive mode will replace tabs with spaces.
337This prevents the comand interpretter for MySQL and Postgres from
338listing object name completions when being sent text via
339`sql-send-*' functions.
340
341*** An API for manipulating SQL product definitions has been added.
342
5e418f17
JL
343** s-region.el is now declared obsolete, superceded by shift-select-mode
344enabled by default in 23.1.
345
691cf4a0
NR
346** gdb-mi
347
348*** GDB User Interface migrated to GDB Machine Interface and now
349supports multithread non-stop debugging and debugging of several
350threads simultaneously.
351
eb199145
GM
352\f
353* New Modes and Packages in Emacs 24.1
d445b3f8 354
5ad4bef5
SM
355** smie.el is a package providing a simple generic indentation engine.
356
7725ebb7
MA
357** secrets.el is an implementation of the Secret Service API, an
358interface to password managers like GNOME Keyring or KDE Wallet. The
065f2743
MA
359Secret Service API requires D-Bus for communication. The command
360`secrets-show-secrets' offers a buffer with a visualization of the
361secrets.
7725ebb7 362
f9e78150
MA
363** notifications.el provides an implementation of the Desktop
364Notifications API. It requires D-Bus for communication.
365
eb199145
GM
366\f
367* Incompatible Lisp Changes in Emacs 24.1
6dfcbe31 368
288cf4e9
SM
369** A backquote not followed by a space is now always treated as new-style.
370
fd5c9dfa 371** Test for special mode-class was moved from view-file to view-buffer.
288cf4e9
SM
372FIXME: This only says what was changed, but not what are the
373programmer-visible consequences.
fd5c9dfa 374
3b7e1d5f
SM
375** Passing a nil argument to a minor mode function now turns the mode
376 ON unconditionally.
6431f2e6
CY
377
378** During startup, Emacs no longer adds entries for `menu-bar-lines'
379and `tool-bar-lines' to `default-frame-alist' and
380`initial-frame-alist'. With these alist entries omitted, `make-frame'
381checks the value of the variable `menu-bar-mode'/`tool-bar-mode' to
382determine whether to create a menu-bar or tool-bar, respectively.
383If the alist entries are added, they override the value of
384`menu-bar-mode'/`tool-bar-mode'.
385
fe0aa820
CY
386** Regions created by mouse dragging are now normal active regions,
387similar to the ones created by shift-selection. In previous Emacs
388versions, these regions were delineated by `mouse-drag-overlay', which
389has now been removed.
d6d8ee7a 390
eb199145
GM
391\f
392* Lisp changes in Emacs 24.1
9097e8af 393
4e2db1fe 394** frame-local variables cannot be let-bound any more.
10dcc561 395** prog-mode is a new major-mode meant to be the parent of programming mode.
f44379e7
SM
396** define-minor-mode accepts a new keyword :variable.
397
f1a5d776
CY
398** `delete-file' and `delete-directory now accept optional arg TRASH.
399Trashing is performed if TRASH and `delete-by-moving-to-trash' are
400both non-nil. Interactively, TRASH defaults to t, unless a prefix
401argument is supplied (see Trash changes, above).
53967e09 402
8f92b8ad
SM
403** buffer-substring-filters is obsoleted by filter-buffer-substring-functions.
404
00278747
SM
405** New completion style `substring'.
406
00fe2df1
JL
407** Image API
408
409*** When the image type is one of listed in `image-animated-types'
1546c559 410and the number of sub-images in the image is more than one, then the
00fe2df1
JL
411new function `create-animated-image' creates an animated image where
412sub-images are displayed successively with the duration defined by
413`image-animate-max-time' and the delay between sub-images defined
414by the Graphic Control Extension of the image.
415
1546c559
JL
416*** `image-extension-data' is renamed to `image-metadata'.
417
a6020335
MH
418** Isearch
419
420*** New hook `isearch-update-post-hook' that runs in `isearch-update'.
421
9326ba26
CY
422** Progress reporters can now "spin".
423The MIN-VALUE and MAX-VALUE arguments of `make-progress-reporter' can
424now be nil, or omitted. This makes a "non-numeric" reporter. Each
425time you call `progress-reporter-update' on that progress reporter,
426with a nil or omitted VALUE argument, the reporter message is
427displayed with a "spinning bar".
428
eb199145
GM
429\f
430* Changes in Emacs 24.1 on non-free operating systems
d53a60a6 431
04779484
JB
432** New configure.bat option --enable-checking builds emacs with extra
433runtime checks.
434
e3aef5c6
CS
435** New configure.bat option --distfiles to specify files to be
436 included in binary distribution
437
438** New make target `dist' to create binary disttribution for Windows
439 platform
440
05197f40 441\f
a933dad1 442----------------------------------------------------------------------
5b87ad55 443This file is part of GNU Emacs.
a933dad1 444
ab73e885 445GNU Emacs is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
5b87ad55 446it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
ab73e885
GM
447the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
448(at your option) any later version.
5b87ad55
GM
449
450GNU Emacs is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
451but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
452MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
453GNU General Public License for more details.
a933dad1 454
5b87ad55 455You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
ab73e885 456along with GNU Emacs. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
a933dad1 457
05197f40 458\f
a933dad1
DL
459Local variables:
460mode: outline
461paragraph-separate: "[ \f]*$"
462end: