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1 GNU Emacs NEWS -- history of user-visible changes.
2
3 Copyright (C) 2010-2012 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
4 See the end of the file for license conditions.
5
6 Please send Emacs bug reports to bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org.
7 If possible, use M-x report-emacs-bug.
8
9 This file is about changes in Emacs version 24.
10
11 See files NEWS.23, NEWS.22, NEWS.21, NEWS.20, NEWS.19, NEWS.18,
12 and NEWS.1-17 for changes in older Emacs versions.
13
14 You can narrow news to a specific version by calling `view-emacs-news'
15 with a prefix argument or by typing C-u C-h C-n.
16
17 \f
18 * Installation Changes in Emacs 24.1
19
20 ** Emacs can be compiled with Gtk+ 3.0 if you pass --with-x-toolkit=gtk3
21 to configure. Note that other libraries used by Emacs, RSVG and GConf,
22 also depend on Gtk+. You can disable them with --without-rsvg and
23 --without-gconf.
24
25 ** Emacs can be compiled with GnuTLS support.
26 This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
27 found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
28 `--without-gnutls'. See below for GnuTLS features.
29
30 ** Emacs can be compiled with SELinux support.
31 This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
32 found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
33 `--without-selinux'. See below for SELinux features.
34
35 ** Emacs can be compiled with ImageMagick support.
36 This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
37 found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
38 `--without-imagemagick'. See below for ImageMagick features.
39 This feature is not available for the Nextstep or MS ports.
40
41 ** Emacs can be compiled with libxml2 support.
42 This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
43 found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
44 `--without-xml2'. See below for libxml2 features.
45
46 ** By default, the installed Info and man pages are compressed.
47 You can disable this by configuring --without-compress-info.
48
49 ** New configure option --with-wide-int.
50 With it, Emacs integers typically have 62 bits, even on 32-bit machines.
51 On 32-bit hosts, this raises the limit on buffer sizes from about 512 MiB
52 to about 2 GiB.
53
54 ** New configure options: --with-mmdf, --with-mail-unlink, --with-mailhost.
55 These provide no new functionality, they just remove the need to edit
56 lib-src/Makefile by hand in order to use the associated features.
57
58 ** New configure option --enable-use-lisp-union-type.
59 This is only useful for Emacs developers to debug certain types of bugs.
60 This is not a new feature; only the configure flag is new.
61
62 ** The standalone programs digest-doc and sorted-doc are removed.
63 Emacs now uses Lisp commands `doc-file-to-man' and `doc-file-to-info'.
64
65 ** The standalone program `fakemail' is removed.
66 If you need it, feedmail.el provides a superset of the functionality.
67
68 \f
69 * Startup Changes in Emacs 24.1
70
71 ** The --unibyte, --multibyte, --no-multibyte, and --no-unibyte
72 command line arguments, and the EMACS_UNIBYTE environment variable, no
73 longer have any effect. (They were declared obsolete in Emacs 23.)
74
75 ** New command line option `--no-site-lisp' removes site-lisp directories
76 from load-path. -Q now implies this. This option does not affect the
77 EMACSLOADPATH environment variable (and hence has no effect for
78 Nextstep builds).
79
80 \f
81 * Changes in Emacs 24.1
82
83 ** Completion
84
85 *** Many packages now use the `completion-at-point' command,
86 rather than implementing separate completion commands.
87
88 *** `completion-at-point' now handles tags and semantic completion.
89
90 *** Completion in a non-minibuffer now tries to detect the end of completion
91 and pops down the *Completions* buffer accordingly.
92
93 *** New option `completion-cycle-threshold' allows completion cycling.
94
95 *** New option `completion-category-overrides' for overriding the
96 default completion style in certain circumstances.
97
98 *** New completion style `substring'.
99
100 *** Completion of buffer names uses `substring' completion by default.
101
102 *** The option `widget-complete-field' has been removed.
103
104 ** Mail changes
105
106 *** The first time you try sending mail, Emacs asks for a mail method.
107 This is implemented by a new default for `send-mail-function', which
108 is `sendmail-query-once'. This offers to use the smtpmail package, or
109 to use the old defaults relying on external mail facilities
110 (`sendmail-send-it' on GNU/Linux and other Unix-like systems, and
111 `mailclient-send-it' on Windows).
112
113 *** Typing C-c m in the buffer made by M-x report-emacs-bug transfers
114 the report to your desktop's preferred mail client, if there is one.
115 This uses either the "xdg-email" utility, or Mac OS's "open" command.
116
117 *** See Changes in Specialized Modes and Packages for SMTPmail changes
118 and Mail mode changes
119
120 ** Emacs server and client changes
121
122 *** New option `server-port' specifies the port for TCP Emacs servers.
123
124 *** New emacsclient argument -q/--quiet suppresses some status messages.
125
126 *** New emacsclient argument --frame-parameters specifies the frame
127 parameters of any newly-created graphical frame.
128
129 *** If emacsclient shuts down due to Emacs signaling an error,
130 its exit status is 1.
131
132 *** New emacsclient argument --parent-id ID.
133 This opens a client frame in parent X window ID, via XEmbed, similar
134 to the --parent-id argument to Emacs.
135
136 ** Internationalization changes
137
138 *** Emacs now supports display and editing of bidirectional text.
139 Right-to-left (RTL) scripts, such as Arabic, Farsi, and Hebrew, are
140 displayed in the correct visual order as expected by users of those
141 scripts. The display reordering is a "full bidirectionality" class
142 implementation of the Unicode Bidirectional Algorithm (UBA). Buffers
143 with no RTL text should look exactly the same as before.
144
145 **** New buffer-local variable `bidi-display-reordering'.
146 To disable display reordering in a buffer, change this to nil.
147
148 **** New buffer-local variable `bidi-paragraph-direction'.
149 If nil (the default), Emacs determines the base direction of each
150 paragraph from its text, as specified by the UBA. Setting the value
151 to `right-to-left' or `left-to-right' forces a base direction on each
152 paragraph.
153
154 Paragraphs with right-to-left base direction are displayed starting at
155 the right window edge.
156
157 *** Enhanced support for characters with no glyphs in available fonts,
158 or, on text terminals, characters that cannot be encoded by the
159 terminal coding system. The new option `glyphless-char-display-control'
160 specifies how to display them: as a hexadecimal code in a box, a thin
161 1-pixel space, an empty box, etc.
162
163 *** New input methods: farsi, farsi-translit, bulgarian-alt-phonetic.
164
165 *** `nobreak-char-display' now also highlights Unicode hyphen chars
166 (U+2010 and U+2011).
167
168 *** New Hebrew translation of the Emacs Tutorial.
169 Type `C-u C-h t' to choose it in case your language setup doesn't
170 automatically select it.
171
172 ** An Emacs Lisp package manager is now included.
173 This is a convenient way to download and install additional packages,
174 from a package repository at http://elpa.gnu.org.
175
176 *** M-x list-packages shows a list of packages, which can be
177 selected for installation.
178
179 *** New command `describe-package', bound to `C-h P'.
180
181 *** By default, all installed packages are loaded automatically when
182 Emacs starts up. To disable this, set `package-enable-at-startup' to
183 nil. To specify the packages to load, customize `package-load-list'.
184
185 ** Custom theme changes
186
187 *** New command `M-x customize-themes', which provides a convenient
188 interface for enabling and disabling Custom themes.
189
190 *** New option `custom-theme-load-path' is the load path for themes.
191 Emacs no longer looks for Custom themes in `load-path'. The default
192 value of `custom-theme-load-path' says to look for themes in
193 `custom-theme-directory', followed by a subdirectory of
194 `data-directory' named "themes/", which contains a small selection of
195 built-in Custom themes.
196
197 *** New option `custom-safe-themes' records known-safe theme files.
198 If a theme is not in this list, Emacs queries before loading it, and
199 offers to save the theme to `custom-safe-themes' automatically. By
200 default, all themes included in Emacs are treated as safe.
201
202 ** Improved GTK integration
203
204 *** GTK scroll-bars are now placed on the right by default.
205 The function `set-scroll-bar-mode' can change this.
206
207 *** GTK tool bars can have just text, just images or images and text.
208 Customize `tool-bar-style' to choose the style. On a Gnome desktop,
209 the default is taken from desktop settings.
210
211 *** GTK tool bars can be placed on any edge of the frame.
212 The frame-parameter tool-bar-position controls this. It takes the
213 values top, left, right or bottom. The Options => Show/Hide menu has
214 entries for this.
215
216 *** The default colors for selected text (the `region' face) are taken
217 from the GTK theme when Emacs is built with GTK.
218
219 *** Emacs uses GTK tooltips by default if built with GTK.
220 You can disable this by changing `x-gtk-use-system-tooltips' to nil.
221
222 ** Graphical interface changes
223
224 *** On graphical displays, the mode-line no longer ends in dashes.
225 Also, the first dash (which does not indicate anything) is just
226 displayed as a space.
227
228 *** `menu-bar-select-buffer-function' lets you choose another operation
229 instead of `switch-to-buffer' when selecting an item in the Buffers menu.
230
231 *** Lucid menus and dialogs can display antialiased fonts if Emacs is
232 built with Xft. These fonts can be set via X resources, for example:
233 Emacs.pane.menubar.font: Courier-12
234
235 ** Exiting changes
236
237 *** Emacs now calls `kill-emacs' if it receives SIGTERM or SIGHUP,
238 or if it receives a SIGINT signal in batch mode.
239
240 *** `kill-emacs-hook' is now also run in batch mode.
241 Third-party code which adds to `kill-emacs-hook' should check if they
242 do the right thing in batch mode.
243
244 ** Scrolling changes
245
246 *** New scrolling commands `scroll-up-command' and `scroll-down-command'
247 (bound to C-v/[next] and M-v/[prior]) do not signal errors at top/bottom
248 of buffer at first key-press (instead they move to top/bottom of buffer)
249 when `scroll-error-top-bottom' is non-nil.
250
251 *** New option `scroll-error-top-bottom' (see above).
252
253 *** New scrolling commands `scroll-up-line' and `scroll-down-line'
254 scroll a line instead of full screen.
255
256 *** New property `scroll-command' should be set on a command's symbol to
257 define it as a scroll command affected by `scroll-preserve-screen-position'.
258
259 *** If you customize `scroll-conservatively' to a value greater than 100,
260 Emacs will never recenter point in the window when it scrolls due to
261 cursor motion commands or commands that move point (e.f., `M-g M-g').
262 Previously, you needed to use `most-positive-fixnum' as the value of
263 `scroll-conservatively' to achieve the same effect.
264
265 *** "Aggressive" scrolling now honors the scroll margins.
266 If you customize `scroll-up-aggressively' or
267 `scroll-down-aggressively' and move point off the window, Emacs now
268 scrolls the window so as to avoid positioning point inside the scroll
269 margin.
270
271 ** Basic SELinux support has been added.
272 This requires Emacs to be linked with libselinux at build time.
273
274 *** Emacs preserves the SELinux file context when backing up.
275 Also, the function `copy-file' has an extra optional argument for
276 preserving SELinux context, and the return value of `backup-buffer'
277 now includes the SELinux context.
278
279 *** New functions `file-selinux-context' and `set-file-selinux-context'
280 get and set the SELinux context of a file.
281
282 ** Trash changes
283
284 *** `delete-by-moving-to-trash' now only affects commands that specify
285 trashing. This avoids inadvertently trashing temporary files.
286
287 *** Calling `delete-file' or `delete-directory' with a prefix argument
288 now forces true deletion, regardless of `delete-by-moving-to-trash'.
289
290 ** File- and directory-local variable changes
291
292 *** You can stop directory local vars from applying to subdirectories.
293 Add an element (subdirs . nil) to the alist portion of any variables
294 settings to indicate that the section should not apply to
295 subdirectories.
296
297 *** Directory local variables can apply to some file-less buffers.
298 Affected modes include dired, vc-dir, and log-edit. For example,
299 adding "(diff-mode . ((mode . whitespace)))" to .dir-locals.el will
300 turn on `whitespace-mode' for *vc-diff* buffers. Modes should call
301 `hack-dir-local-variables-non-file-buffer' to support this.
302
303 *** Using "mode: MINOR-MODE" to enable a minor mode is deprecated.
304 Instead, use "eval: (minor-mode 1)".
305
306 *** The variable `inhibit-first-line-modes-regexps' has been renamed
307 to `inhibit-local-variables-regexps'. As the name suggests, it now
308 applies to ALL file local variables, not just -*- lines. The
309 associated `inhibit-first-line-modes-suffixes' has been renamed in the
310 corresponding way.
311
312 ** Window changes
313
314 *** The `quit-window' command now restores the last buffer displayed
315 in the quitted window.
316
317 *** Resizing an Emacs frame now preserves proportional window sizes,
318 modulo restrictions like window minimum sizes and fixed-size windows.
319
320 *** The behavior of `display-buffer' is now customizable in detail.
321
322 **** New option `display-buffer-base-action' specifies a list of
323 user-determined display "actions" (functions and optional arguments
324 for choosing the displaying window).
325
326 This takes precedence over the default display action, which is
327 specified by `display-buffer-fallback-action'.
328
329 **** New option `display-buffer-alist' maps buffer name regexps to
330 display actions, taking precedence over `display-buffer-base-action'.
331
332 *** New option `window-combination-limit'.
333 The new option `window-combination-limit' allows to return the space
334 obtained for resizing or creating a window more reliably to the window
335 from which such space was obtained.
336
337 *** New option `window-combination-resize'.
338 The new option `window-combination-resize' allows to split a window that
339 otherwise cannot be split because it's too small by stealing space from
340 other windows in the same combination. Subsequent resizing or deletion
341 of the window will resize all windows in the same combination as well.
342
343 *** New option `frame-auto-hide-function' lets you choose between
344 iconifying or deleting a frame when burying a buffer in a dedicated
345 frame, or quitting a window showing a buffer in a frame of its own.
346
347 *** New commands `maximize-window' and `minimize-window'.
348 These maximize and minimize the size of a window within its frame.
349
350 *** New commands `switch-to-prev-buffer' and `switch-to-next-buffer'.
351 These functions allow to navigate through the live buffers that have
352 been shown in a specific window.
353
354 ** Minibuffer changes
355
356 *** The inactive minibuffer has its own major mode `minibuffer-inactive-mode'.
357 This is handy for minibuffer-only frames, and is also used for the feature
358 where mouse-1 pops up *Messages*"', which can now easily be changed.
359
360 *** Minibuffers set `truncate-lines' to nil.
361 If you want to change the value to something else, you could use
362 for example `minibuffer-setup-hook'.
363
364 ** `auto-mode-case-fold' is now enabled by default.
365
366 ** `backup-by-copying-when-mismatch' now defaults to t.
367
368 ** New basic faces `error', `warning', `success'.
369 These are used to highlight text indicating failure, caution or
370 successful operation.
371
372 ** New option `list-colors-sort' defines the color sort order
373 for `list-colors-display'.
374
375 ** The variable `focus-follows-mouse' now always defaults to nil.
376
377 \f
378 * Editing Changes in Emacs 24.1
379
380 ** Search changes
381
382 *** C-y in Isearch is now bound to `isearch-yank-kill', instead of
383 `isearch-yank-line'.
384
385 *** M-y in Isearch is now bound to `isearch-yank-pop', instead of
386 `isearch-yank-kill'.
387
388 *** M-s C-e in Isearch is now bound to `isearch-yank-line'.
389
390 ** New commands `count-words-region' and `count-words'.
391
392 *** M-= is bound to `count-words-region', not `count-lines-region'.
393 The `count-words-region' command, when called interactively, reports
394 the number of lines, words, and characters in the region. It is a
395 superset of the old `count-lines-region', which is now an obsolete
396 alias for it.
397
398 ** The command `just-one-space' (M-SPC), if given a negative argument,
399 also deletes newlines around point.
400
401 ** Deletion changes
402
403 *** New option `delete-active-region'.
404 If non-nil, [delete] and DEL delete the region if it is active and no
405 prefix argument is given. If set to `kill', those commands kill
406 instead.
407
408 *** New command `delete-forward-char', bound to [delete].
409 This is meant for interactive use, and obeys `delete-active-region'.
410 The command `delete-char' does not obey `delete-active-region'.
411
412 *** `delete-backward-char' is now a Lisp function.
413 Apart from obeying `delete-active-region', its behavior is unchanged.
414 However, the byte compiler now warns if it is called from Lisp; Lisp
415 callers should use delete-char with a negative argument instead.
416
417 *** The option `mouse-region-delete-keys' has been deleted.
418
419 ** Selection changes.
420
421 The default handling of clipboard and primary selections has been
422 changed to conform with modern X applications. In short, most
423 commands for killing and yanking text now use the clipboard, while
424 mouse commands use the primary selection.
425
426 In the following, we provide a list of these changes, followed by a
427 list of steps to get the old behavior back if you prefer that.
428
429 *** `select-active-regions' now defaults to t.
430 Merely selecting text (e.g. with drag-mouse-1) no longer puts it in
431 the kill ring. The selected text is put in the primary selection, if
432 the system possesses a separate primary selection facility (e.g. X).
433
434 **** `select-active-regions' also accepts a new value, `only'.
435 This means to only set the primary selection for temporarily active
436 regions (usually made by mouse-dragging or shift-selection);
437 "ordinary" active regions, such as those made with C-SPC followed by
438 point motion, do not alter the primary selection.
439
440 **** `mouse-drag-copy-region' now defaults to nil.
441
442 *** mouse-2 is now bound to `mouse-yank-primary'.
443 This pastes from the primary selection, ignoring the kill-ring.
444 Previously, mouse-2 was bound to `mouse-yank-at-click'.
445
446 *** `x-select-enable-clipboard' now defaults to t on all platforms.
447
448 *** `x-select-enable-primary' now defaults to nil.
449 Thus, commands that kill text or copy it to the kill-ring (such as
450 M-w, C-w, and C-k) also use the clipboard---not the primary selection.
451
452 **** The "Copy", "Cut", and "Paste" items in the "Edit" menu are now
453 exactly equivalent to M-w, C-w, and C-y respectively.
454
455 **** Note that on MS-Windows, `x-select-enable-clipboard' was already
456 non-nil by default, as Windows does not support the primary selection
457 between applications.
458
459 *** To return to the previous behavior, do the following:
460
461 **** Change `select-active-regions' to nil.
462 **** Change `mouse-drag-copy-region' to t.
463 **** Change `x-select-enable-primary' to t (on X only).
464 **** Change `x-select-enable-clipboard' to nil.
465 **** Bind `mouse-yank-at-click' to mouse-2.
466
467 *** Support for X cut buffers has been removed.
468
469 *** X clipboard managers are now supported.
470 To inhibit this, change `x-select-enable-clipboard-manager' to nil.
471
472 ** New command `C-x r N' (`rectangle-number-lines') numbers the lines
473 in the current rectangle. With a prefix argument, this prompts for a
474 number to count from and for a format string.
475
476 ** `redisplay-dont-pause' now defaults to t.
477 This makes Emacs feel more responsive to editing commands that arrive
478 at high rate, e.g. if you lean on some key, because stopping redisplay
479 in the middle (when this variable is nil) forces more expensive
480 updates later on, and Emacs appears to be unable to keep up.
481
482 ** The behavior of <TAB> for active regions in Text mode has changed.
483 In Text and related modes, typing <TAB> (`indent-for-tab-command')
484 when the region is active causes Emacs to indent all the lines in the
485 region, aligning them with the line previous to the first line in the
486 region (or with the left margin if there is no previous line).
487
488 ** When `occur' is called with a prefix argument, matching strings are
489 collected into the `*Occur*' buffer without line numbers. If there
490 are parenthesized subexpressions in the specified regexp, `occur'
491 reads replacement text that may contain \\& and \\N whose convention
492 follows `replace-match'.
493
494 \f
495 * Changes in Specialized Modes and Packages in Emacs 24.1
496
497 ** Archive Mode has basic support for browsing and updating 7z archives.
498
499 ** BibTeX mode
500
501 *** BibTeX mode now supports biblatex.
502 Use the variable `bibtex-dialect' to select different BibTeX dialects.
503 `bibtex-entry-field-alist' is now an obsolete alias for
504 `bibtex-BibTeX-entry-alist'.
505
506 *** New command `bibtex-search-entries', bound to C-c C-a.
507
508 *** New `bibtex-entry-format' option `sort-fields', disabled by default.
509
510 *** New variable `bibtex-search-entry-globally'.
511
512 ** Browse-url
513
514 *** New option `browse-url-mailto-function' specifies how to handle "mailto:"s.
515
516 *** The default browser used by the package is now the "xdg-open" program,
517 on platforms that support it. This calls your desktop's preferred browser.
518
519 ** Calendar, Diary, and Appt
520
521 *** Diary entries can contain non-printing "comments".
522 See the variable `diary-comment-start'.
523
524 *** Appointments can specify their individual warning times.
525 See the variable `appt-warning-time-regexp'.
526
527 *** The function specified by `appt-disp-window-function' may be passed
528 lists of arguments if multiple appointments are due at similar times.
529 If you are using a custom function for this, you should update it.
530
531 *** New function `diary-hebrew-birthday'.
532
533 *** Elements of `calendar-day-abbrev-array' and `calendar-month-abbrev-array'
534 may no longer be nil, but must all be strings.
535
536 *** The obsolete (since Emacs 22.1) method of enabling the appt
537 package by adding `appt-make-list' to `diary-hook' has been removed.
538 Use `appt-activate' instead.
539
540 *** Some appt variables (obsolete since Emacs 22.1) have been removed:
541 appt-issue-message (use the function appt-activate)
542 appt-visible/appt-msg-window (use the variable appt-display-format)
543
544 *** Some diary function aliases (obsolete since Emacs 22.1) have been removed:
545 view-diary-entries, list-diary-entries, show-all-diary-entries
546
547 ** CC Mode
548
549 *** New feature to "guess" the style in an existing buffer.
550 The main entry point is M-x c-guess.
551
552 *** Java Mode now supports Java 5.0 (Tiger) and 6 (Mustang).
553
554 *** `c-beginning-of-defun' and `c-end-of-defun' now respect nested scopes.
555 Thus C-M-a will, by default, go to the beginning of the immediate function,
556 not the top level.
557
558 *** "Macros with semicolons" can be registered for correct indentation.
559 Where such a macro ends a line (no semicolon) the next statement is no longer
560 parsed as a statement continuation.
561
562 ** Comint and modes derived from it use the standard completion code.
563
564 ** Compilation mode
565
566 *** Compilation mode can be used without Font Lock mode.
567 `compilation-parse-errors-function' is now obsolete.
568
569 *** New variable `compilation-filter-start', which is bound while
570 `compilation-filter-hook' runs. It records the start position of the
571 text inserted by `compilation-filter'.
572
573 *** `compilation-error-screen-columns' and `compilation-first-column'
574 are obeyed in the editing buffer. So programming language modes can
575 set them, whereas previously only the value in the *Compilation*
576 buffer was used.
577
578 ** Customize
579
580 *** Customize buffers now contain a search field.
581 The search is performed using `customize-apropos'.
582 To turn off the search field, set `custom-search-field' to nil.
583
584 *** Custom options now start out hidden if at their default values.
585 Use the arrow to the left of the option name to toggle visibility.
586
587 *** custom-buffer-sort-alphabetically now defaults to t.
588
589 *** The color widget now has a "Choose" button, which allows you to
590 choose a color via `list-colors-display'.
591
592 ** D-Bus
593
594 *** It is now possible to access buses other than the default system
595 or session bus.
596
597 *** The `dbus-register-method' and `dbus-register-property' functions
598 optionally do not register names.
599
600 *** The new function `dbus-register-service' registers a known service
601 name on a D-Bus without also registering a property or a method.
602
603 ** Dired-x
604
605 *** C-x C-j (`dired-jump') and C-x 4 C-j (`dired-jump-other-window'),
606 if called with a prefix argument, read a file name from the minibuffer
607 instead of using the current buffer.
608
609 *** The "dired local variables" feature of Dired-x is obsolete.
610 The standard directory local variables feature replaces it.
611
612 ** ERC changes
613
614 *** New options `erc-autojoin-timing' and `erc-autojoin-delay',
615 controlling attempts to autojoin a channel.
616
617 *** New variable `erc-coding-system-precedence': If we use `undecided'
618 as the server coding system, this variable will then be consulted.
619 The default is to decode strings that can be decoded as utf-8 as
620 utf-8, and do the normal `undecided' decoding for the rest.
621
622 ** Eshell changes
623
624 *** The default value of `eshell-directory-name' has changed
625 to be an "eshell" directory in `user-emacs-directory'.
626 The old "~/.eshell/" directory is still used if it exists, though.
627
628 ** gdb-mi
629
630 *** The M-x gdb command now uses the GDB Machine Interface protocol.
631 It now supports multithread non-stop debugging and simultaneous
632 debugging of several threads.
633
634 ** Image mode
635
636 *** RET (`image-toggle-animation') toggles animation, if applicable.
637 Animation plays once, unless the option `image-animate-loop' is non-nil.
638
639 ** Info
640
641 *** New command M-x info-display-manual displays a named Info manual.
642 If that manual is already visited in some Info buffer, it displays
643 that buffer. (This is handy if you have many manuals in many *info*
644 buffers, and don't remember the name of the buffer visiting the manual
645 you want to consult.) Otherwise, it loads and displays the manual.
646
647 *** `e' is now bound to `end-of-buffer' rather than to `Info-edit'.
648 This is for compatibility with the stand-alone Info reader program,
649 and also because `Info-edit' is a rarely used command that is disabled
650 by default.
651
652 ** Mail mode changes (not Message mode)
653
654 *** New command M-x mail-add-attachment for adding MIME attachments
655
656 *** The command M-x mail-attach-file was renamed to M-x mail-insert-file.
657 (Its name is misleading, since it has nothing to do with MIME
658 attachments.) The old name is now an obsolete alias to the new name.
659
660 ** MH-E has been upgraded to MH-E version 8.3.1.
661 See MH-E-NEWS for details.
662
663 ** Modula-2 mode provides auto-indentation.
664
665 ** mpc.el: Can use pseudo tags of the form tag1|tag2 as a union of two tags.
666
667 ** nXML mode no longer binds C-RET to `nxml-complete'.
668 Completion is now performed via `completion-at-point', bound to C-M-i
669 or M-TAB. If `nxml-bind-meta-tab-to-complete-flag' is non-nil (the
670 default), this performs tag completion.
671
672 ** Prolog mode has been completely revamped, with lots of additional
673 functionality such as more intelligent indentation, electricity,
674 support for more variants, including Mercury, and a lot more.
675
676 ** Rmail
677
678 *** The command `rmail-epa-decrypt' decrypts OpenPGP data
679 in the Rmail incoming message.
680
681 *** The variable `rmail-message-filter' no longer has any effect.
682 This change was made in Emacs 23.1 but was not advertised at the time.
683 Try using `rmail-show-message-hook' instead.
684
685 ** Shell mode
686
687 *** M-x shell prompts for the shell path name if the default directory
688 is a remote file name and neither the environment variable $ESHELL nor
689 the variable `explicit-shell-file-name' is set.
690
691 *** TAB is now bound to the standard `completion-at-point' command,
692 which now implements the pcomplete rules for shell command completion.
693
694 ** SMTPmail
695
696 *** SMTPmail now uses encrypted connections (via STARTTLS) by default
697 if the mail server supports them. This uses either built-in GnuTLS
698 support, or the starttls.el library. Customize `smtpmail-stream-type'
699 to change this.
700
701 *** The variable `smtpmail-auth-credentials' has been removed.
702 By default, the information is now stored in the file ~/.authinfo.
703 This was the default value of smtpmail-auth-credentials. If you had
704 customized smtpmail-auth-credentials to a list of user names and
705 passwords, those settings are not used. During your first connection
706 to the smtp server, Emacs will prompt for the user name and password,
707 and offer to save them to ~/.authinfo. Or you can manually copy the
708 credentials to ~/.authinfo. For example, if you had
709
710 (setq smtpmail-auth-credentials
711 '(("mail.example.org" 25 "jim" "s!cret")))
712
713 then the equivalent line in ~/.authinfo would be
714
715 machine mail.example.org port 25 login jim password s!cret
716
717 See the auth-source manual for more information, e.g. on encrypting
718 the credentials file.
719
720 *** The variable `smtpmail-starttls-credentials' has been removed.
721 If you had that set, you need to put
722
723 machine smtp.whatever.foo port 25 key "~/.my_smtp_tls.key" cert "~/.my_smtp_tls.cert"
724
725 in your ~/.authinfo file instead.
726
727 ** SQL mode
728
729 *** New options `sql-port', `sql-connection-alist', `sql-send-terminator',
730 and `sql-oracle-scan-on'.
731
732 *** New options controlling prompting for login parameters.
733 Each supported product has a custom variable `sql-*-login-params',
734 which is a list of the parameters to be prompted for before a
735 connection is established.
736
737 *** The command `sql-product-interactive' now takes a prefix argument,
738 which causes it to prompt for an SQL product.
739
740 *** Product-specific SQL interactive commands now take prefix arguments.
741 These commands (`sql-sqlite', `sql-postgres', `sql-mysql', etc.),
742 given a prefix argument, prompt for a name for the SQL interactive
743 buffer. This reduces the need for calling `sql-rename-buffer'.
744
745 *** SQL interactive modes suppress command continuation prompts, and
746 replace tabs with spaces. The first change impacts multiple line SQL
747 statements entered with C-j between each line, statements yanked into
748 the buffer and statements sent with `sql-send-*' functions. The
749 second prevents the MySQL and Postgres interpreters from listing
750 object name completions when sent text via `sql-send-*' functions.
751
752 *** New command `sql-connect' starts a predefined SQLi session,
753 using the login parameters from `sql-connection-alist'.
754
755 *** New "Save Connection" menu item in SQLi buffers.
756 This gathers the login params specified for the SQLi session, if it
757 was not started by a connection, and saves them as a new connection.
758
759 *** New commands for listing database objects and details:
760 sql-list-all and sql-list-table.
761
762 *** An API for manipulating SQL product definitions has been added.
763
764 ** TeX modes
765
766 *** latex-electric-env-pair-mode keeps \begin..\end matched on the fly.
767
768 ** Tramp
769
770 *** New inline access method "ksu" (kerberized su).
771
772 *** The following access methods are discontinued: "ssh1_old",
773 "ssh2_old", "scp1_old", "scp2_old", "imap", "imaps" and "fish".
774
775 *** The user option `remote-file-name-inhibit-cache' controls whether
776 remote file attributes are cached for better performance.
777
778 *** The option `ange-ftp-binary-file-name-regexp' has changed its
779 default value to "".
780
781 *** Handlers for `file-selinux-context' and `set-file-selinux-context'
782 for remote machines which support SELinux.
783
784 ** New function `url-queue-retrieve', which behaves like url-retrieve,
785 but with limits (`url-queue-parallel-processes', `url-queue-timeout') on
786 the degree of parallelism.
787
788 ** VC and related modes
789
790 *** Support for pulling on distributed version control systems.
791 The command C-x v + (`vc-pull') runs a "pull" operation, if it is
792 supported (currently with Bzr, Git, and Mercurial), to update the
793 current branch and working tree. A prefix argument means to prompt
794 the user for specifics, e.g. a pull location.
795
796 *** `vc-update' is now an alias for `vc-pull'.
797
798 *** Support for merging on distributed version control systems.
799 The command C-x v m (`vc-merge') now runs a "merge" operation, if it
800 is supported (currently with Bzr, Git, and Mercurial), to merge
801 changes from another branch into the current one. It prompts for
802 specifics, e.g. a merge source.
803
804 *** New option `vc-revert-show-diff' controls whether `vc-revert'
805 shows a diff while querying the user. It defaults to t.
806
807 *** Log entries in some Log View buffers can be toggled to display a
808 longer description by typing RET (log-view-toggle-entry-display).
809 This is currently supported for Bzr, Git, and Mercurial (to support
810 another backend, define a `log-view-expanded-log-entry-function').
811 In the Log View buffers made by C-x v L (`vc-print-root-log'), you can
812 use this to display the full log entry for the revision at point.
813
814 *** New command `vc-ediff' allows visual comparison of two revisions
815 of a file similar to `vc-diff', but using ediff backend.
816
817 *** The option `vc-initial-comment' was removed in Emacs 23.2, but
818 this was not advertised at the time.
819
820 *** `vc-toggle-read-only' is an obsolete alias for `toggle-read-only'.
821 Since Emacs 23, it has done the same thing as `toggle-read-only', but
822 this was not advertised at the time.
823
824 ** Obsolete modes
825
826 *** abbrevlist.el
827
828 *** erc-hecomplete.el (use erc-pcomplete.el instead)
829
830 *** partial-completion-mode (complete.el) is obsolete.
831 You can get a comparable behavior with:
832 (setq completion-styles '(partial-completion initials))
833 (setq completion-pcm-complete-word-inserts-delimiters t)
834
835 *** pc-mode.el is obsolete (CUA mode is much more comprehensive).
836
837 *** pgg is obsolete (use EasyPG instead).
838
839 *** sregex.el is obsolete, since rx.el is a strict superset.
840
841 *** s-region.el and pc-select.el are obsolete.
842 They are superseded by shift-select-mode, enabled by default since 23.1.
843
844 *** vc-mcvs.el is obsolete (for lack of a maintainer).
845
846 ** Miscellaneous
847
848 *** The Landmark game is now invoked with `landmark', not `lm'.
849 Its functions and variables have been similarly renamed.
850
851 *** In `ido-file-completion-map', C-v is no longer bound to `ido-toggle-vc'.
852 (This interfered with cua-mode.)
853
854 *** f90.el has some support for Fortran 2008 syntax.
855
856 *** `copyright-fix-years' can optionally convert consecutive years to ranges.
857
858 *** New command `nato-region' converts text to NATO phonetic alphabet.
859
860 \f
861 * New Modes and Packages in Emacs 24.1
862
863 ** Occur Edit mode applies edits made in *Occur* buffers to the
864 original buffers. It is bound to "e" in Occur mode.
865
866 ** New global minor mode electric-pair-mode.
867 When enabled, typing an open parenthesis automatically inserts the
868 matching closing one.
869
870 ** New global minor mode electric-indent-mode.
871 When enabled, typing certain characters triggers reindentation.
872 Major modes wishing to use this can set electric-indent-chars or
873 electric-indent-functions.
874
875 ** New global minor mode electric-layout-mode.
876 When enabled, typing certain characters automatically inserts newlines.
877 Major modes wishing to use this can set electric-layout-rules.
878
879 ** tabulated-list.el provides a generic major mode for tabulated data,
880 from which other modes can be derived.
881
882 ** pcase.el provides the ML-style pattern matching macro `pcase'.
883
884 ** secrets.el is an implementation of the Secret Service API, an
885 interface to password managers like GNOME Keyring or KDE Wallet. The
886 Secret Service API requires D-Bus for communication. The command
887 `secrets-show-secrets' offers a buffer with a visualization of the
888 secrets.
889
890 ** notifications.el provides an implementation of the Desktop
891 Notifications API. It requires D-Bus for communication.
892
893 ** soap-client.el supports access to SOAP web services from Emacs.
894 soap-inspect.el is an interactive inspector for SOAP WSDL structures.
895
896 ** New generic mode, xmodmap-generic-mode, for xmodmap files.
897
898 ** New emacs-lock.el package.
899 The previous version has been moved to obsolete/old-emacs-lock.el.
900 Now, there is a proper minor mode `emacs-lock-mode'. Protection
901 against exiting Emacs and killing the buffer can be set separately.
902 The mechanism for automatically turning off protection for buffers
903 with dead inferior processes has been generalized.
904
905 \f
906 * Incompatible Lisp Changes in Emacs 24.1
907
908 ** Passing a nil argument to a minor mode function call now ENABLES
909 the minor mode unconditionally. This is so that you can write e.g.
910
911 (add-hook 'text-mode-hook 'foo-mode)
912
913 to enable foo-mode in Text mode buffers, removing the need for
914 `turn-on-foo-mode' style functions. This affects all mode commands
915 defined by `define-minor-mode'. If called interactively, the mode
916 command still toggles the minor mode.
917
918 ** The return value of `backup-buffer' has changed.
919 It is now a list of three elements, where the second element is a list
920 describing the original file's SELinux context. If Emacs or the
921 system lacks SELinux support, the context list is (nil nil nil nil).
922 See "Basic SELinux support" above, under "Changes in Emacs 24.1".
923
924 ** `char-direction-table' and the `char-direction' function were deleted.
925 They were buggy and inferior to the new support of bidirectional
926 editing introduced in Emacs 24. If you need the bidirectional
927 properties of a character, use `get-char-code-property' with the last
928 argument `bidi-class'.
929
930 ** `copy-directory' now copies the source directory as a subdirectory
931 of the target directory, if the latter is an existing directory. The
932 new optional arg COPY-CONTENTS, if non-nil, makes the function copy
933 the contents directly into a pre-existing target directory.
934
935 ** For mouse click input events in the text area, the Y pixel
936 coordinate in the POSITION list now counts from the top of the text
937 area, excluding any header line. Previously, it counted from the top
938 of the header line.
939
940 ** Support for "old-style" backquotes, obsolete for 10+ years, has
941 been further reduced. Now a backquote not followed by a space is
942 always treated as a "new-style" backquote. Please remove all
943 "old-style" backquotes from your code. If your code uses backquotes
944 as documented in the Elisp manual, and compiles without warning, then
945 you have nothing to do in this regard. Code not following the
946 appropriate conventions may fail to compile.
947
948 The most common cause of trouble seems to be an old-style backquote
949 followed by a newline. Another cause of trouble is vector notation
950 for key sequence notation: instead of [(control ,)] and [(control ')],
951 you should write [(control ?,)] and [(control ?')], which will work in
952 older Emacsen too.
953
954 ** The macro `eval-at-startup' was removed in Emacs 23.2, but this
955 was not advertised at the time. The function `custom-initialize-delay'
956 replaced all known uses.
957
958 ** `view-buffer' now treats special mode-class in the same way that
959 `view-file' has since Emacs 22 (i.e. it won't enable View mode if the
960 major mode is special).
961
962 ** Menu and tool bar changes
963
964 *** During startup, Emacs no longer adds entries for `menu-bar-lines'
965 and `tool-bar-lines' to `default-frame-alist' and `initial-frame-alist'.
966 With these alist entries omitted, `make-frame' checks the value of the
967 variable `menu-bar-mode'/`tool-bar-mode' to determine whether to create
968 a menu-bar or tool-bar, respectively. If the alist entries are added,
969 they override the value of `menu-bar-mode'/`tool-bar-mode'.
970
971 *** The menu bar bindings's caches are not used any more.
972 Use (where-is-internal <def> nil t) instead.
973
974 ** Regions created by mouse dragging are now normal active regions,
975 similar to those created by shift-selection (see Selection changes
976 above). In previous Emacs versions, these regions were delineated by
977 `mouse-drag-overlay'; that variable has been removed.
978
979 ** The fourth argument of `filter-buffer-substring' has been removed.
980 If you want to remove text properties from the final result, simply
981 pass the result through substring-no-properties.
982
983 ** cl.el no longer provides `cl-19'.
984
985 ** The following obsolete functions and aliases have been removed
986 (the appropriate new function is given in parentheses; "not needed"
987 means you can just remove all calls to the function in question):
988
989 *** `comint-kill-output' (`comint-delete-output')
990 *** `decompose-composite-char' (`char-to-string')
991 *** `outline-visible' (`outline-invisible-p')
992 *** `internal-find-face' (`facep')
993 *** `internal-get-face' (`facep and check-face')
994 *** `frame-update-faces' (not needed)
995 *** `frame-update-face-colors' (`frame-set-background-mode')
996 *** `x-frob-font-weight' and `x-frob-font-slant' (`make-face-*' functions)
997 *** `x-make-font-bold and x-make-font-demibold (`make-face-bold')
998 *** `x-make-font-italic' and `x-make-font-oblique' (`make-face-italic')
999 *** `x-make-font-bold-italic' (`make-face-bold-italic')
1000 *** `x-make-font-unbold' (`make-face-unbold')
1001 *** `x-make-font-unitalic' (`make-face-unitalic')
1002 *** `mldrag-drag-mode-line' (`mouse-drag-mode-line')
1003 *** `mldrag-drag-vertical-line' (`mouse-drag-vertical-line')
1004 *** `iswitchb-default-keybindings' (`iswitchb-mode')
1005 *** `char-bytes' (== 1)
1006 *** `isearch-return-char' (`isearch-printing-char')
1007 *** `make-local-hook' (not needed)
1008 *** `set-screen-height' (`set-frame-height')
1009 *** `set-screen-width' (`set-frame-width')
1010
1011 ** The following obsolete variables and varaliases have been removed
1012 (the appropriate new variable is given in parentheses):
1013
1014 *** `checkdoc-minor-keymap' (`checkdoc-minor-mode-map')
1015 *** `vc-header-alist' (`vc-BACKEND-header')
1016 *** `directory-sep-char' (== ?/)
1017 *** `font-lock-defaults-alist' (`font-lock-defaults')
1018 *** `e' (`float-e').
1019
1020 ** The following obsolete files were removed:
1021 sc.el, x-menu.el, rnews.el, rnewspost.el
1022
1023 ** The format of the finder-inf.el file has changed, since the Finder
1024 mechanism is now based on the package system. The variable
1025 `finder-package-info' is replaced by `package--builtins' and
1026 `finder-keywords-hash'.
1027
1028 ** When generating autoloads, `update-directory-autoloads' no longer
1029 assumes every inspected file is in your `load-path'. It instead
1030 generates relative names according to the current `load-path'.
1031
1032 \f
1033 * Lisp changes in Emacs 24.1
1034
1035 ** Code can now use lexical scoping by default instead of dynamic scoping.
1036 The `lexical-binding' variable enables lexical scoping for local
1037 variables. It is typically set via a file-local variable in the first
1038 line of the file, in which case it applies to all the code in that
1039 file.
1040
1041 *** `eval' takes a new optional argument `lexical' to choose the new lexical
1042 binding instead of the old dynamic binding mode.
1043
1044 *** Lexically scoped interpreted functions are represented with a new form
1045 of function value which looks like (closure ENV ARGS &rest BODY).
1046
1047 *** New macro `letrec' to define recursive local functions.
1048
1049 *** `defvar' and `defconst' now mark the variable as special (dynamic).
1050 So do `defcustom' and other forms that call `defvar' as a subroutine.
1051
1052 *** New function `special-variable-p' to check whether a variable is
1053 declared as dynamically bound.
1054
1055 *** The form ((lambda ...) ...) is deprecated.
1056
1057 ** An Emacs Lisp testing tool is now included.
1058 Emacs Lisp developers can use this tool to write automated tests for
1059 their code. See the ERT info manual for details.
1060
1061 ** Changes for bidirectional display and editing
1062
1063 *** New function `current-bidi-paragraph-direction'.
1064 This returns the base direction of the paragraph at point.
1065
1066 *** New function `bidi-string-mark-left-to-right'.
1067 Given a string containing characters from right-to-left scripts, this
1068 function returns another string which can be safely inserted into a
1069 buffer, such that any following text will be always displayed to the
1070 right of that string. (This works by appending an invisible Unicode
1071 "LEFT-TO-RIGHT MARK" character if the argument string might need it.)
1072
1073 This is useful when the buffer has overall left-to-right paragraph
1074 direction and you need to insert a string whose contents are not known
1075 in advance, without disrupting the layout of the line.
1076
1077 ** Window changes
1078
1079 *** Window tree functions are accessible in Elisp.
1080 Functions are provided to return the parent, siblings or child windows
1081 of any window including internal windows (windows not associated with a
1082 buffer) in the window tree.
1083
1084 **** New function `window-valid-p' gives non-nil for live and internal
1085 windows.
1086
1087 **** Window manipulation can deal with internal windows.
1088 Many window handling functions like `split-window', `delete-window', or
1089 `delete-other-windows' as well as the window resizing functions can now
1090 act on any window including internal ones.
1091
1092 *** window-total-height/-width vs window-body-height/-width.
1093 The function `window-height' has been renamed to `window-total-height'
1094 and `window-width' has been renamed to `window-body-width'. The old
1095 names are provided as aliases. Two new functions `window-total-width'
1096 and `window-body-height' are provided.
1097
1098 *** Window parameters specific to window handling functions.
1099 For each window you can specify a parameter to override the default
1100 behavior of a number of functions like `split-window', `delete-window'
1101 and `delete-other-windows'. The variable `ignore-window-parameters'
1102 allows to ignore processing such parameters.
1103
1104 *** New semantics of third argument of `split-window'.
1105 The third argument of `split-window' has been renamed to SIDE and can be
1106 set to any of the values 'below, 'right, 'above, or 'left to make the
1107 new window appear on the corresponding side of the window that shall be
1108 split. Any other value of SIDE will cause `split-window' to split the
1109 window into two side-by-side windows as before.
1110
1111 *** Window resizing functions.
1112 A new standard function for resizing windows called `window-resize' has
1113 been introduced. This and all other functions for resizing windows no
1114 longer delete any windows when they become too small.
1115
1116 *** Deleting the selected window now selects the most recently selected
1117 live window on that frame instead.
1118
1119 *** `adjust-window-trailing-edge' adjustments.
1120 `adjust-window-trailing-edge' can now deal with fixed-size windows and
1121 is able to resize other windows if a window adjacent to the trailing
1122 edge cannot be shrunk any more. This makes its behavior more similar to
1123 that of Emacs 21 without compromising, however, its inability to delete
1124 windows which was introduced in Emacs 22.
1125
1126 *** Window-local buffer lists.
1127 Windows now have local buffer lists. This means that removing a buffer
1128 from display in a window will preferably show the buffer previously
1129 shown in that window with its previous window-start and window-point
1130 positions. This also means that the same buffer may be automatically
1131 shown twice even if it already appears in another window.
1132
1133 *** `switch-to-buffer' has a new optional argument FORCE-SAME-WINDOW,
1134 which if non-nil requires the buffer to be displayed in the currently
1135 selected window, signaling an error otherwise. If nil, another window
1136 can be used, e.g. if the selected one is strongly dedicated.
1137
1138 *** `split-window-vertically' and `split-window-horizontally' renamed
1139 to `split-window-below' and `split-window-right' respectively.
1140 The old names are kept as aliases.
1141
1142 *** Display actions
1143
1144 **** The second arg to `display-buffer' and `pop-to-buffer' is now
1145 named ACTION, and takes a display action of the same form as
1146 `display-buffer-base-action' (see Changes, above). A non-nil,
1147 non-list value is treated specially, as the old meaning.
1148
1149 **** New variable `display-buffer-overriding-action'.
1150
1151 **** The procedure of `display-buffer' etc. to choose a window is
1152 determined by combining `display-buffer-overriding-action',
1153 `display-buffer-alist', the ACTION arg, `display-buffer-base-action',
1154 and `display-buffer-fallback-action'. The second and fourth of these
1155 are user-customizable variables.
1156
1157 See the docstring of `display-buffer' for details.
1158
1159 *** New functions `window-state-get' and `window-state-put'.
1160 These functions allow to save and restore the state of an arbitrary
1161 frame or window as an Elisp object.
1162
1163 ** Completion
1164
1165 *** New variable `completion-extra-properties' used to specify extra
1166 properties of the current completion:
1167 - :annotate-function, same as the old completion-annotate-function.
1168 - :exit-function, function to call after completion took place.
1169
1170 *** Functions on `completion-at-point-functions' can return any of the
1171 properties valid for `completion-extra-properties'.
1172
1173 *** `completion-annotate-function' is obsolete.
1174
1175 *** New `metadata' method for completion tables. The metadata thus returned
1176 can specify various details of the data returned by `all-completions':
1177 - `category' is the kind of objects returned (e.g., `buffer', `file', ...),
1178 used to select a style in completion-category-overrides.
1179 - `annotation-function' to add annotations in *Completions*.
1180 - `display-sort-function' to specify how to sort entries in *Completions*.
1181 - `cycle-sort-function' to specify how to sort entries when cycling.
1182
1183 *** `minibuffer-local-filename-must-match-map' is not used any more.
1184 Instead, the bindings in `minibuffer-local-filename-completion-map'
1185 are combined with `minibuffer-local-must-match-map'.
1186
1187 *** New variable `completing-read-function' allows overriding the
1188 behavior of `completing-read'.
1189
1190 ** `glyphless-char-display' can now distinguish between graphical and
1191 text terminal display, via a char-table entry that is a cons cell.
1192
1193 ** `pre-command-hook'/`post-command-hook' are not reset to nil on error.
1194 Instead, the offending function is removed.
1195
1196 ** New hook types
1197
1198 *** New function `run-hook-wrapped' for running an abnormal hook by
1199 passing the hook functions as arguments to a "wrapping" function.
1200 Like `run-hook-with-args-until-success', it stops at the first
1201 non-nil return value.
1202
1203 *** New macro `with-wrapper-hook' for running an abnormal hook as a
1204 set of "wrapping" filters, similar to around advice.
1205 (A version of this macro was actually added in Emacs 23.2 but was not
1206 advertised at the time.)
1207
1208 ** Debugger changes
1209
1210 *** New macro `condition-case-unless-debug' (this was actually added in
1211 Emacs 23.1 as condition-case-no-debug, but not advertised)
1212
1213 *** The macro `with-demoted-errors' was added in Emacs 23.1, but not advertised.
1214
1215 *** Variable `stack-trace-on-error' removed.
1216
1217 *** The debugger can now "continue" from an error, which means it will
1218 jump to the error handler as if the debugger had not been invoked
1219 instead of jumping all the way to the top-level.
1220
1221 *** Set `debug-on-event' to enter the debugger on events like SIGUSR1.
1222 This can be useful when `inhibit-quit' is set.
1223
1224 ** The new function `server-eval-at' allows evaluation of Lisp forms on
1225 named Emacs server instances.
1226
1227 ** `call-process' and `call-process-region' allow a `(:file "file")' spec
1228 to redirect STDOUT to a file.
1229
1230 ** The function `format-time-string' now supports the %N directive,
1231 for higher-resolution time stamps.
1232
1233 ** New input reading functions
1234
1235 *** New function `read-char-choice' reads a restricted set of
1236 characters, discarding any inputs not inside the set.
1237
1238 *** The command `read-color' now requires a match for a color name
1239 or RGB triplet, instead of signaling an error if the user provides
1240 invalid input.
1241
1242 **** `facemenu-read-color' is now an alias for `read-color'.
1243
1244 ** `image-library-alist' is renamed to `dynamic-library-alist'.
1245 The variable is now used to load all kind of supported dynamic libraries,
1246 not just image libraries. The previous name is still available as an
1247 obsolete alias.
1248
1249 ** Syntax parsing changes
1250
1251 *** New variable `syntax-propertize-function'.
1252 This replaces `font-lock-syntactic-keywords' which is now obsolete.
1253 This allows syntax-table properties to be set independently from font-lock:
1254 just call syntax-propertize to make sure the text is propertized.
1255 Together with this new variable come a new hook
1256 syntax-propertize-extend-region-functions, as well as two helper functions:
1257 syntax-propertize-via-font-lock to reuse old font-lock-syntactic-keywords
1258 as-is; and syntax-propertize-rules which provides a new way to specify
1259 syntactic rules.
1260
1261 *** Syntax tables support a new "comment style c" additionally to style b.
1262
1263 ** New hook `post-self-insert-hook', run after `self-insert-command'.
1264
1265 ** frame-local variables cannot be let-bound any more.
1266
1267 ** Major and minor mode changes
1268
1269 *** `set-auto-mode' now respects mode: local variables at the end of files,
1270 as well as those in the -*- line.
1271
1272 *** `prog-mode' is a new major mode from which programming modes
1273 should be derived.
1274
1275 **** `prog-mode-hook' can be used to enable features for programming
1276 modes, e.g. (add-hook 'prog-mode-hook 'flyspell-prog-mode) to enable
1277 on-the-fly spell checking for comments and strings.
1278
1279 *** New hook `change-major-mode-after-body-hook', run by
1280 `run-mode-hooks' just before any other mode hooks.
1281
1282 *** Enabled globalized minor modes can be disabled in specific major modes.
1283 If the global mode is global-FOO-mode, then run (FOO-mode -1) in the
1284 major mode's hook, where FOO-mode toggles the mode on a per-buffer basis.
1285
1286 *** `define-minor-mode' accepts new keywords :variable, :after-hook.
1287
1288 ** File-handling changes
1289
1290 *** `delete-file' and `delete-directory' now accept optional arg TRASH.
1291 Trashing is performed if TRASH and `delete-by-moving-to-trash' are
1292 both non-nil. Interactively, TRASH defaults to t, unless a prefix
1293 argument is supplied (see Trash changes, above).
1294
1295 *** New file predicates: `file-equal-p', `file-in-directory-p'.
1296
1297 ** Tool-bars can display separators.
1298 Tool-bar separators are handled like menu separators in menu-bar maps,
1299 i.e. via menu entries of the form `(menu-item "--")'.
1300
1301 ** Image API
1302
1303 *** Animated images support (currently animated gifs only).
1304
1305 **** `image-animated-p' returns non-nil if an image can be animated.
1306
1307 **** `image-animate' animates a supplied image spec.
1308
1309 **** `image-animate-timer' returns the timer object for an image that
1310 is being animated.
1311
1312 *** `image-extension-data' has been renamed to `image-metadata'.
1313 The old name is an obsolete alias to the new one.
1314
1315 *** Image mode can view any image type that ImageMagick supports.
1316 This requires Emacs to be built with ImageMagick support.
1317
1318 **** New function `imagemagick-types', defined if ImageMagick support
1319 is enabled, returns a list of image file extensions that your
1320 ImageMagick installation supports.
1321
1322 **** New function `imagemagick-register-types' enables ImageMagick
1323 image types in Image mode and in `create-image' and other helper
1324 functions.
1325
1326 **** New option `imagemagick-types-inhibit' excludes certain
1327 ImageMagick image types from `imagemagick-register-types'.
1328
1329 **** With ImageMagick support, there are extra Image mode commands to
1330 resize and rotate images: `image-transform-fit-to-height',
1331 `image-transform-fit-to-width', `image-transform-set-rotation', and
1332 `image-transform-set-scale'.
1333
1334 ** `compose-mail' now accepts an optional 8th arg, RETURN-ACTION, and
1335 passes it to the mail user agent function. This argument specifies an
1336 action for returning to the caller after finishing with the mail. For
1337 example, this is used by Rmail to optionally delete a mail window.
1338
1339 ** XML and HTML parsing
1340 If Emacs is compiled with libxml2 support, there are two new
1341 functions: `libxml-parse-html-region' (which parses "real world" HTML)
1342 and `libxml-parse-xml-region' (which parses XML). Both return an
1343 Emacs Lisp parse tree.
1344
1345 ** Networking and encryption changes
1346
1347 *** `open-network-stream' can now be used to open an encrypted stream.
1348 It now accepts an optional `:type' parameter for initiating a TLS
1349 connection, directly or via STARTTLS. To do STARTTLS, additional
1350 parameters (`:end-of-command', `:success', `:capabilities-command')
1351 must also be supplied.
1352
1353 *** New library gnutls.el.
1354 The new function `gnutls-available-p' returns non-nil if Emacs is
1355 built with GnuTLS support. The main entry points are
1356 `open-gnutls-stream' and `gnutls-negotiate'. It's easiest to use
1357 these functions through `open-network-stream', because that can
1358 upgrade connections through STARTTLS opportunistically or use plain
1359 SSL, depending on your needs. For debugging, set `gnutls-log-level'
1360 greater than 0.
1361
1362 *** New primitive `secure-hash' that supports many secure hash algorithms:
1363 md5, sha1, sha2, sha224, sha256, sha384, and sha512. The lisp library
1364 sha1.el has been removed. The `sha1' feature is provided by default.
1365
1366 ** Isearch
1367
1368 *** New hook `isearch-update-post-hook' that runs in `isearch-update'.
1369
1370 ** Progress reporters can now "spin".
1371 The MIN-VALUE and MAX-VALUE arguments of `make-progress-reporter' can
1372 now be nil, or omitted. This makes a "non-numeric" reporter. Each
1373 time you call `progress-reporter-update' on that progress reporter,
1374 with a nil or omitted VALUE argument, the reporter message is
1375 displayed with a "spinning bar".
1376
1377 ** New variable `revert-buffer-in-progress-p' is true while a buffer is
1378 being reverted, even if the buffer has a local `revert-buffer-function'.
1379
1380 ** New variables `delayed-warnings-list' and `delayed-warnings-hook'.
1381 If delayed-warnings-list is non-nil, the command loop calls
1382 `delayed-warnings-hook' after `post-command-hook'. At present, this
1383 is only used by Emacs on some platforms to display warnings during
1384 startup, which might otherwise not be noticed. This uses the
1385 functions `display-delayed-warnings' and `collapse-delayed-warnings'.
1386
1387 ** rx.el has a new `group-n' construct for explicitly numbered groups.
1388
1389 ** New function `make-composed-keymap' that constructs a new keymap
1390 from multiple input maps. You can use this to make a keymap that
1391 inherits from multiple maps, eg:
1392 (set-keymap-parent newmap (make-composed-keymap othermap parent))
1393
1394 ** New function `string-prefix-p'.
1395 (This was actually added in Emacs 23.2 but was not advertised at the time.)
1396
1397 ** New reader macro ## that stands for the empty symbol.
1398 This means that the empty symbol can now be read back. Also, #: by itself
1399 (when not immediately followed by a possible symbol character) stands for
1400 an empty uninterned symbol.
1401
1402 ** New math functions `isnan', `copysign', `frexp', `ldexp'.
1403
1404 ** The following functions and variables are obsolete:
1405
1406 *** `tooltip-use-echo-area' is obsolete.
1407 Rather than setting this to t, disable Tooltip mode instead.
1408
1409 *** buffer-substring-filters is obsolete.
1410 Use `filter-buffer-substring-functions' instead.
1411
1412 *** `byte-compile-disable-print-circle' is obsolete.
1413
1414 *** `deferred-action-list' and `deferred-action-function' are obsolete.
1415 Use `post-command-hook' instead.
1416
1417 *** `font-lock-maximum-size' is obsolete.
1418
1419 \f
1420 * Changes in Emacs 24.1 on non-free operating systems
1421
1422 ** On MS Windows, Emacs warns when using the obsolete init file _emacs,
1423 and also when HOME is set to C:\ by default.
1424
1425 ** New configure.bat options
1426
1427 *** --enable-checking builds Emacs with extra runtime checks.
1428
1429 *** --distfiles specifies files to be included in binary distribution.
1430
1431 *** --without-gnutls disables automatic GnuTLS detection.
1432
1433 *** --lib for general library linkage, works with the USER_LIBS build variable.
1434
1435 ** New make target `dist' to create binary distribution for MS Windows.
1436
1437 ** The Lisp function `w32-default-color-map' is now obsolete.
1438 (It is only used internally in the Emacs C code.)
1439
1440 ** Customize ns-auto-hide-menu-bar to have the menu-bar hidden, but
1441 reappear on mouse-over. (Requires OS X 10.6 or later.)
1442
1443 ** On Mac OS X, dragging a file into Emacs visits the file, like on
1444 other platforms, rather than inserting its contents into the buffer.
1445
1446 \f
1447 ----------------------------------------------------------------------
1448 This file is part of GNU Emacs.
1449
1450 GNU Emacs is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
1451 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
1452 the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
1453 (at your option) any later version.
1454
1455 GNU Emacs is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
1456 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
1457 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
1458 GNU General Public License for more details.
1459
1460 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
1461 along with GNU Emacs. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
1462
1463 \f
1464 Local variables:
1465 mode: outline
1466 paragraph-separate: "[ \f]*$"
1467 end: