* etc/NEWS: Minor edit
[bpt/emacs.git] / etc / NEWS
1 GNU Emacs NEWS -- history of user-visible changes.
2
3 Copyright (C) 2010-2014 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 Temporary note:
18 +++ indicates that all necessary documentation updates are complete.
19 (This means all relevant manuals in doc/ AND lisp doc-strings.)
20 --- means no change in the manuals is needed.
21 When you add a new item, use the appropriate mark if you are sure it applies,
22 otherwise leave it unmarked.
23
24 \f
25 * Installation Changes in Emacs 24.4
26
27 ---
28 ** Emacs can now be compiled with ACL support.
29 This happens by default if a suitable support library is found at
30 build time, like libacl on GNU/Linux. To prevent this, use the
31 configure option `--disable-acl'. See below for related features.
32
33 ---
34 ** Emacs can now be compiled with file notification support.
35 This happens by default if a suitable system library is found at
36 build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
37 `--without-file-notification'. See below for file-notify features.
38 This feature is not available for the Nextstep port.
39
40 ---
41 ** Emacs can now be compiled with zlib support.
42 This happens by default if zlib is present, which it normally is.
43 To prevent this, use the configure option `--without-zlib'.
44 This provides the function `zlib-decompress-region'; see below for details.
45
46 ---
47 ** The configure option `--without-compress-info' has been generalized,
48 and renamed to `--without-compress-install'. It now prevents compression
49 of _any_ files during installation.
50
51 ---
52 ** The configure option `--with-crt-dir' has been removed.
53 It is no longer needed, as the crt*.o files are no longer linked specially.
54
55 ---
56 ** Directories passed to configure option `--enable-locallisppath' are
57 no longer created during installation.
58
59 ---
60 ** Emacs for NS (Mac OS X, GNUstep) can be built with ImageMagick support.
61 This requires pkg-config to be available at build time.
62
63 \f
64 * Startup Changes in Emacs 24.4
65
66 +++
67 ** When initializing `load-path', an empty element in the EMACSLOADPATH
68 environment variable (either leading, e.g., ":/foo"; trailing, e.g.,
69 "/foo:"; or embedded, e.g., "/foo::/bar") is replaced with the default
70 load-path (the one that would have been used if EMACSLOADPATH was unset).
71 This makes it easier to _extend_ the load-path via EMACSLOADPATH
72 (previously, EMACSLOADPATH had to specify the complete load-path,
73 including the defaults). (In older versions of Emacs, an empty element
74 was replaced by ".", so use an explicit "." now if that is what you want.)
75
76 +++
77 ** The -L option, which normally prepends its argument to load-path,
78 will instead append, if the argument begins with `:' (or `;' on MS Windows;
79 i.e., `path-separator').
80
81 +++
82 ** If you use either site-load.el or site-init.el to customize the dumped
83 Emacs executable, any changes to `load-path' that these files make
84 will no longer be present after dumping. To affect a permanent change
85 to `load-path', use the `--enable-locallisppath' option of `configure'.
86
87 +++
88 ** The user option `initial-buffer-choice' can now specify a function
89 to set up the initial buffer.
90
91 \f
92 * Changes in Emacs 24.4
93
94 +++
95 ** New function `zlib-decompress-region', which decompresses gzip- and
96 zlib-format compressed data using built-in zlib support, if available.
97
98 +++
99 ** New option `gnutls-verify-error', if non-nil, means that Emacs
100 should reject SSL/TLS certificates that GnuTLS determines as invalid.
101 (This option defaults to nil at present, but this is expected to change
102 in a future release.)
103
104 +++
105 ** Emacs now supports menus on text-mode terminals.
106 If the terminal supports a mouse, clicking on the menu bar, or on
107 sensitive portions of the mode line or header line, will drop down the
108 menu defined at that position. Likewise, clicking C-mouse-2 or
109 C-mouse-2 or C-mouse-3 on the text area will pop up the menus defined
110 for those locations.
111
112 If the text terminal does not support a mouse, you can activate the
113 first menu-bar menu by typing F10, which invokes `menu-bar-open'.
114
115 If you want the previous behavior, whereby F10 invoked `tmm-menubar',
116 customize the option `tty-menu-open-use-tmm' to a non-nil value.
117 (Typing M-` always invokes `tmm-menubar', even if `tty-menu-open-use-tmm'
118 is nil.)
119
120 +++
121 ** The *Messages* buffer is created in `messages-buffer-mode',
122 a new major mode, with read-only status. Any code that might create
123 the *Messages* buffer should call the function `messages-buffer' to do
124 so and set up the mode.
125
126 +++
127 ** Emacs can now support ACLs (access control lists).
128 This requires a suitable support library to be found at build time.
129 On GNU/Linux, the POSIX ACL interface is used via libacl.
130 On MS-Windows, the NT Security APIs are used to emulate the POSIX interface.
131
132 +++
133 *** Emacs preserves the ACL entries of files when backing up.
134 +++
135 *** New functions `file-acl' and `set-file-acl' get and set the ACL
136 entries of a file.
137
138 ** Multi-monitor support has been added.
139
140 +++
141 *** New functions `display-monitor-attributes-list' and
142 `frame-monitor-attributes' can be used to obtain information about
143 each physical monitor on multi-monitor setups.
144
145 +++
146 *** The functions `display-pixel-width' and `display-pixel-height' now
147 behave consistently among the platforms: they return the pixel width
148 or height for all physical monitors associated with the given display
149 as if they were on X. To get information for each physical
150 monitor, use the new functions above. Similar notes also apply to
151 `x-display-pixel-width', `x-display-pixel-height', `display-mm-width',
152 `display-mm-height', `x-display-mm-width', and `x-display-mm-height'.
153
154 +++
155 ** The cursor stops blinking after 10 blinks (by default) on X and NS.
156 You can change the default by customizing `blink-cursor-blinks'.
157
158 +++
159 ** In keymaps where SPC scrolls forward, S-SPC now scrolls backward.
160 This affects View mode, etc.
161
162 ** Help changes
163
164 +++
165 *** The command `apropos-variable' is renamed to `apropos-user-option'.
166 `apropos-user-option' shows all user options while `apropos-variable'
167 shows all variables. When called with a universal prefix argument,
168 the two commands swap their behaviors. When `apropos-do-all' is
169 non-nil, they output the same results.
170
171 +++
172 *** The key `?' now describes prefix bindings, like `C-h'.
173
174 ---
175 *** The command `describe-function' has been extended for EIEIO.
176 Running it on constructors will show a full description of the
177 generated class. For generic functions, it will show all
178 implementations together with links to the source. The old commands
179 `describe-class', `describe-constructor' and `describe-generic' were
180 removed.
181
182 ---
183 *** The function `quail-help' is no longer an interactive command.
184 Use `C-h C-\' (`describe-input-method') instead.
185
186 ** ImageMagick
187
188 +++
189 *** ImageMagick images now support the :max-width and :max-height keywords.
190
191 +++
192 *** When using `create-image' with image data, you can pass a :format
193 attribute (via the property-list argument) in order to help
194 ImageMagick detect the image type. The value should be a MIME
195 content-type that is found in the new variable `image-format-suffixes'.
196
197 ** Frame and window changes
198
199 +++
200 *** New commands `toggle-frame-fullscreen' and `toggle-frame-maximized',
201 bound to <f11> and M-<f10>, respectively.
202
203 +++
204 *** New hooks `focus-in-hook', `focus-out-hook'.
205 These are normal hooks run when an Emacs frame gains or loses input focus.
206
207 *** Emacs can now change frame sizes in units of pixels, rather than
208 text rows or columns. When maximizing a frame or making it fullscreen,
209 remaining extra pixels are no longer given to the minibuffer, the rightmost
210 fringe, or other unusable space, but are distributed among the text
211 areas of the frame's windows. If the new option `frame-resize-pixelwise'
212 is non-nil, all frame size changes happen pixelwise and set the
213 corresponding size hints for the window manager.
214
215 *** Emacs can now change window sizes in units of pixels.
216 Mouse-dragging a mode line or window divider now changes the size of
217 adjacent windows pixelwise. If the new option `window-resize-pixelwise'
218 is non-nil, functions like `balance-windows-area' and `fit-window-to-buffer'
219 resize windows pixelwise. Most functions for changing or accessing
220 window sizes now have an additional argument that allows changes to apply,
221 or values to be returned, in pixels instead of lines/columns.
222
223 *** Emacs can now draw dividers between adjacent windows. To put
224 dividers between side-by-side/vertically stacked windows customize the
225 frame parameters `right-divider-width' and `bottom-divider-width' to
226 some positive integer. You can drag dividers with the mouse (they show
227 a corresponding cursor when the mouse hovers over them). You can change
228 the appearance of dividers by customizing the faces `window-divider',
229 `window-divider-first-pixel', and `window-divider-last-pixel'. The last
230 two are useful to provide a 3D effect, or to better distinguish dividers
231 from surrounding display objects.
232
233 *** New functions are provided to return the pixel sizes of window
234 components, namely `window-scroll-bar-width', `window-mode-line-height'
235 `window-header-line-height', `window-right-divider-width' and
236 `window-bottom-divider-width'.
237
238 *** The new function `window-text-pixel-size' returns the size of the
239 text of a window's buffer in pixels. This allows functions like
240 `fit-frame-to-buffer' and `fit-window-to-buffer' to accurately fit a
241 window to its buffer as it will be displayed.
242
243 *** `fit-window-to-buffer' can now resize windows horizontally.
244 This behavior is controlled by the new option
245 `fit-window-to-buffer-horizontally'.
246
247 *** `fit-frame-to-buffer' can now fit frames in both directions.
248 This behavior is controlled by the option `fit-frame-to-buffer' which
249 tells in which direction(s) the frame shall be fit. The new options
250 `fit-frame-to-buffer-margins' and `fit-frame-to-buffer-sizes' allow to
251 control the size of the frame and its position on screen.
252
253 *** Temp Buffer Resize Mode can now adjust height and width of windows
254 and frames. `temp-buffer-resize-mode' is now able to adjust the height
255 and the width of a window displaying a temporary buffer. The new option
256 `temp-buffer-max-width' allows to control the width of temporary buffer
257 windows. Moreover, if the new option `fit-frame-to-buffer' is non-nil
258 and the buffer appears in the root window of a frame, Temp Buffer Resize
259 Mode will try to adjust width and/or height of the frame.
260
261 ---
262 *** `split-window' is now a non-interactive function, not a command.
263 As a command, it was a special case of `C-x 2' (`split-window-below'),
264 and as such superfluous. After being reimplemented in Lisp, its
265 interactive form was mistakenly retained.
266
267 +++
268 *** The functions `window-size' and `window-total-size' now have an
269 optional argument to return a rounded size value.
270
271 +++
272 *** `window-state-put' now allows to put a window state into internal
273 windows too.
274
275 +++
276 *** New option `scroll-bar-adjust-thumb-portion'.
277 Available only on X, this option allows to control over-scrolling
278 using the scroll bar (i.e. dragging the thumb down even when the end
279 of the buffer is visible).
280
281 +++
282 *** New basic action function `display-buffer-in-previous-window' has
283 `display-buffer' display a buffer in a window previously showing that
284 buffer.
285
286 +++
287 *** New basic action function `display-buffer-at-bottom' has
288 `display-buffer' choose or make a window at the bottom of the selected
289 frame.
290
291 *** New display action function `display-buffer-no-window' to not
292 display the buffer in a window.
293
294 *** New display action alist entry `allow-no-window' to indicate the
295 caller of `display-buffer' is ready to handle the case of not
296 displaying the buffer in a window.
297
298 ** Lisp evaluation changes
299 +++
300 *** `eval-defun' on an already defined defcustom calls the :set function,
301 if there is one.
302
303 +++
304 *** The commands `eval-expression' (`M-:'), `eval-last-sexp' (`C-x C-e'),
305 and `eval-print-last-sexp' (`C-j' in Lisp Interaction mode) can take a
306 zero prefix argument. This disables truncation of lists in the output,
307 equivalent to setting `(eval-expression-)print-length' and
308 `(eval-expression-)print-level' to nil. Additionally, it causes integers
309 to be printed in other formats (octal, hexadecimal, and character).
310
311 ---
312 *** New hook `eval-expression-minibuffer-setup-hook' run by
313 `eval-expression' on entering the minibuffer.
314
315 ---
316 ** `write-region-inhibit-fsync' now defaults to t in batch mode.
317
318 +++
319 ** `cache-long-line-scans' is now non-nil, and renamed to `cache-long-scans',
320 because it affects caching of paragraph scanning results as well.
321 There is no reason to set this to nil except for debugging purposes.
322
323 ---
324 ** The option `set-mark-default-inactive' has been deleted.
325 This unfinished feature was introduced by accident in Emacs 23.1;
326 simply disabling Transient Mark mode does the same thing.
327
328 ---
329 ** The default value of `comment-use-global-state' is now t,
330 and this variable has been marked obsolete.
331
332 ---
333 ** `emacs-bzr-version' has been renamed to `emacs-repository-version',
334 and works for git too, if you fetch the repository notes.
335
336 +++
337 ** New option `load-prefer-newer' affects how the `load' function chooses
338 the file to load. If this is non-nil, then when both .el and .elc
339 versions of a file exist, and the caller did not explicitly specify
340 which one to load, then the newer file is loaded. The default, nil,
341 means to always load the .elc file.
342
343 \f
344 * Editing Changes in Emacs 24.4
345
346 ** Indentation changes
347
348 +++
349 *** The behavior of `C-x TAB' (`indent-rigidly') has changed.
350 When invoked without a prefix argument, it now activates a transient
351 mode in which typing <left>, <right>, <S-left>, and <S-right> adjusts
352 the text indentation in the region. Typing any other key resumes
353 normal editing behavior.
354
355 *** `electric-indent-mode' is enabled by default.
356
357 +++
358 *** `tab-stop-list' is now implicitly extended to infinity by repeating
359 the last step. Its default value is changed to nil, which means a tab
360 stop every `tab-width' columns.
361
362 +++
363 ** New command `cycle-spacing' acts like a smarter `just-one-space'.
364 When called in succession, it cycles between spacing conventions:
365 one space, no spaces, original spacing.
366
367 +++
368 ** The new function `fill-single-char-nobreak-p' can stop fill from breaking
369 a line after a one-letter word, which is an error in some typographical
370 conventions. To use it, add it to the `fill-nobreak-predicate' hook.
371
372 +++
373 ** Uniquify is enabled by default, with `post-forward-angle-brackets' style.
374
375 +++
376 ** New command `C-x SPC' (`rectangle-mark-mode') makes a rectangular region.
377 Most commands are still unaware of it, but kill/yank do work on the rectangle.
378
379 +++
380 ** New option `visual-order-cursor-movement'.
381 If this is non-nil, cursor motion with arrow keys will follow the
382 visual order of characters on the screen: <left> always moves to the
383 left, <right> always moves to the right, disregarding the surrounding
384 bidirectional context.
385
386 ** Register changes
387
388 +++
389 *** All interactive commands that read a register (`copy-to-register', etc.)
390 now display a temporary window after `register-preview-delay' seconds
391 that summarizes existing registers. To disable this, set that option to nil.
392 Interactive commands that read registers and want to make use of this
393 should use `register-read-with-preview' to read register names.
394
395 +++
396 *** New command `frameset-to-register' bound to `C-x r f', replacing
397 `frame-configuration-to-register'. It offers similar functionality,
398 plus enhancements like the ability to restore deleted frames.
399 (`frame-configuration-to-register' still exists, but no longer has a
400 key binding.)
401
402 +++
403 *** New command `C-x C-k x' (`kmacro-to-register') stores keyboard
404 macros in registers.
405
406 +++
407 ** New command `delete-duplicate-lines'.
408 This searches the region for identical lines, and removes all but one
409 copy of each repeated line. The lines need not be sorted.
410
411 \f
412 * Changes in Specialized Modes and Packages in Emacs 24.4
413
414 +++
415 ** More packages look for ~/.emacs.d/<foo> additionally to ~/.<foo>.
416 Affected files:
417 ~/.emacs.d/timelog replaces ~/.timelog
418 ~/.emacs.d/vip replaces ~/.vip
419 ~/.emacs.d/viper replaces ~/.viper
420 ~/.emacs.d/ido.last replaces ~/.ido.last
421 ~/.emacs.d/kkcrc replaces ~/.kkcrc
422 ~/.emacs.d/quickurls replaces ~/.quickurls
423 ~/.emacs.d/idlwave/ replaces ~/.idlwave/
424 ~/.emacs.d/bdfcache.el replaces ~/.bdfcache.el
425 ~/.emacs.d/places replaces ~/.emacs-places
426 ~/.emacs.d/shadows replaces ~/.shadows
427 ~/.emacs.d/shadow_todo replaces ~/.shadow_todo
428 ~/.emacs.d/strokes replaces ~/.strokes
429 ~/.emacs.d/notes replaces ~/.notes
430 ~/.emacs.d/type-break replaces ~/.type-break
431 Also the following files used by the now obsolete otodo-mode.el:
432 ~/.emacs.d/todo-do replaces ~/.todo-do
433 ~/.emacs.d/todo-done replaces ~/.todo-done
434 ~/.emacs.d/todo-top replaces ~/.todo-top
435
436 ** Backtrace and debugger
437
438 +++
439 *** New Lisp debugger command `v' (`debugger-toggle-locals') toggles the
440 display of local variables of the current stack frame.
441
442 +++
443 *** The Lisp debugger's `e' command (`debugger-eval-expression') now includes
444 the lexical environment when evaluating the code in the context at point
445 (and so allows you to access lexical variables).
446
447 ---
448 *** New minor mode `jit-lock-debug-mode' helps you debug code run via JIT Lock.
449
450 ---
451 ** Battery information can now be retrieved from BSD's `apm' utility.
452
453 ---
454 ** In the Buffer Menu, `M-s a C-o' shows matches for a regexp in marked buffers.
455
456 ** Calendar and Diary
457
458 ---
459 *** New faces `calendar-weekday-header', `calendar-weekend-header',
460 and `calendar-month-header'.
461
462 +++
463 *** New option `calendar-day-header-array'.
464
465 +++
466 *** New variable `diary-from-outlook-function', used by the command
467 `diary-from-outlook'.
468
469 ---
470 *** The variable `calendar-font-lock-keywords' is obsolete.
471
472 ** Calc
473
474 +++
475 *** Calc by default now uses the Gregorian calendar for all dates, and
476 uses January 1, 1 AD as its day number 1. Previously Calc used the
477 Julian calendar for dates before September 14, 1752, and it used
478 December 31, 1 BC as its day number 1; the new scheme is more
479 consistent with Calendar's calendrical system and day numbering.
480
481 +++
482 *** The new option `calc-gregorian-switch' lets you configure if
483 (and when) Calc switches from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar.
484
485 +++
486 *** Support for ISO 8601 dates.
487
488 ** CEDET
489
490 *** EDE
491
492 **** The cpp-root project now supports executing a compile command.
493 It can be set through the new :compile-command slot or the
494 buffer-local variable `compile-command'.
495
496 **** Better selection of include directories for the 'linux' project.
497 Include directories now support out-of-tree build directories and
498 target architecture auto-detection.
499
500 *** Semantic
501
502 **** Improved detection of used namespaces in current scope in C++.
503
504 **** Parsing of default values for variables and function arguments in C/C++.
505 They are also displayed by the summarize feature in the mode line.
506
507 **** Improved parsing of function pointers in C/C++.
508 This also includes parsing of function pointers as function arguments.
509
510 **** Parsing of C/C++ preprocessor macros that open new scope.
511 For example, this enables parsing of macros that open new namespaces.
512
513 **** Support for 'this' pointer in inline member functions in C++.
514
515 ** cl-lib
516
517 +++
518 *** New macro `cl-tagbody'.
519 This executes statements while allowing for control transfer to labels.
520
521 +++
522 *** letf is now just an alias for cl-letf.
523
524 ** CUA mode
525
526 +++
527 *** CUA mode now uses `delete-selection-mode' and `shift-select-mode'.
528 Hence, you can now enable it independently from those modes, and from
529 `transient-mark-mode'.
530
531 ---
532 *** `cua-highlight-region-shift-only' is now obsolete.
533 You can disable `transient-mark-mode' to get the same result.
534
535 +++
536 *** CUA's rectangles can now be used without CUA by calling the command
537 `cua-rectangle-mark-mode'.
538
539 ** CFEngine mode
540
541 ---
542 *** Support for completion, ElDoc, and Flycheck has been added.
543
544 ---
545 *** The current CFEngine syntax is parsed from "cf-promises -s json".
546 There is a fallback syntax available if you don't have cf-promises or
547 if your version doesn't support that option. See option `cfengine-cf-promises'.
548
549 ---
550 ** Delete Selection mode can now be used without Transient Mark mode.
551
552 ** Desktop
553
554 +++
555 *** `desktop-save-mode' by default now auto-saves an existing desktop file
556 after `desktop-auto-save-timeout'. To disable this, customize that option
557 to nil (or zero).
558
559 +++
560 *** `desktop-restore-frames', enabled by default, allows saving and
561 restoring the frame/window configuration (frameset). Additional options
562 `desktop-restore-in-current-display', `desktop-restore-reuses-frames'
563 and `desktop-restore-forces-onscreen' offer further customization.
564
565 +++
566 ** New Dired minor mode `dired-hide-details-mode' toggles whether details,
567 such as file ownership or permissions, are visible.
568
569 ---
570 ** You can enable ElDoc inside the `eval-expression' minibuffer with:
571 (add-hook 'eval-expression-minibuffer-setup-hook 'eldoc-mode)
572 The results display in the mode line.
573
574 ** Electric Pair mode
575
576 +++
577 *** New option `electric-pair-preserve-balance', enabled by default.
578 If non-nil, pairing/skipping only kicks in when that help the balance
579 of parentheses and quotes, i.e. the buffer should end up at least as
580 balanced as before.
581
582 You can further control this behavior by adjusting the predicates
583 stored in `electric-pair-inhibit-predicate' and `electric-pair-skip-self'.
584
585 +++
586 *** New option `electric-pair-delete-adjacent-pairs', enabled by default.
587 In `electric-pair-mode', the commands `backward-delete-char' and
588 `backward-delete-char-untabify' are now bound to electric variants
589 that delete the closer when invoked between adjacent pairs.
590
591 +++
592 *** New option `electric-pair-open-newline-between-pairs', enabled by default.
593 In `electric-pair-mode', inserting a newline between adjacent pairs
594 opens an extra newline after point, which is indented if
595 `electric-indent-mode' is also set.
596
597 +++
598 *** New option `electric-pair-skip-whitespace', enabled by default.
599 This controls if skipping over closing delimiters should jump over any
600 whitespace slack. Setting it to `chomp' makes it delete this
601 whitespace. See also the variable `electric-pair-skip-whitespace-chars'.
602
603 ---
604 *** New variables control the pairing in strings and comments.
605 You can customize `electric-pair-text-pairs' and
606 `electric-pair-text-syntax-table' to tweak pairing behavior inside
607 strings and comments.
608
609 +++
610 ** New EPA option `epa-mail-aliases'.
611 You can set this to a list of email address aliases that `epa-mail-encrypt'
612 should use to find keys.
613
614 ---
615 ** New ERC option `erc-accidental-paste-threshold-seconds'.
616 If set to a number, this can be used to avoid accidentally pasting large
617 amounts of data into the ERC input.
618
619 +++
620 ** New ERT macro `skip-unless' allows skipping ERT tests.
621 See the ERT manual for details.
622
623 ** Eshell
624
625 +++
626 *** `eshell' now supports visual subcommands and options.
627 Eshell has been able to handle "visual" commands (interactive,
628 non-line oriented commands such as top that require display
629 capabilities not provided by eshell) by running them in an Emacs
630 terminal emulator. See `eshell-visual-commands'.
631
632 This feature has been extended to subcommands and options that make a
633 usually line-oriented command a visual command. Typical examples are
634 "git log" and "git <command> --help", which display their output in a
635 pager by default. See `eshell-visual-subcommands' and
636 `eshell-visual-options'.
637
638 ---
639 *** New Eshell-Tramp module.
640 External su and sudo commands are now the default; the internal,
641 Tramp-using variants can still be used by enabling the eshell-tramp
642 module.
643
644 ---
645 ** New F90 mode option `f90-smart-end-names'.
646
647 ** Icomplete
648 Icomplete is now more similar to Ido.
649
650 ---
651 *** Icomplete by default now applies to all forms of minibuffer completion.
652 The variable `icomplete-with-completion-tables' (now a user option)
653 controls this. To restore the old behavior, set it back to
654 '(internal-complete-buffer).
655
656 +++
657 *** You can navigate through and select completions using the keys
658 from `icomplete-minibuffer-map'.
659
660 ---
661 *** The string that separates potential completions is now a customizable
662 option (`icomplete-separator'). The default is " | " rather than ",".
663
664 ---
665 *** New face `icomplete-first-match'; and new options
666 `icomplete-hide-common-prefix' and `icomplete-show-matches-on-no-input'.
667
668 ---
669 *** The option `icomplete-show-key-bindings' has been removed.
670
671 ** Ido
672
673 +++
674 *** An Ido user manual is now included.
675
676 ---
677 *** The option `ido-use-virtual-buffers' can now take the value `auto'.
678 This means to use virtual buffers if the current ido input does not match
679 an existing buffer.
680
681 ---
682 *** The variable `ido-decorations' can optionally have two new elements,
683 which are the brackets to use around the sole remaining completion.
684
685 ** Image mode
686
687 +++
688 *** New commands `n' (`image-next-file') and `p' (`image-previous-file')
689 visit the next image file and the previous image file in the same
690 directory, respectively.
691
692 +++
693 *** New commands to show specific frames of multi-frame images.
694 `f' (`image-next-frame') and `b' (`image-previous-frame') visit the
695 next or previous frame. `F' (`image-goto-frame') shows a specific frame.
696
697 +++
698 *** New commands to speed up, slow down, or reverse animation.
699 `a +' (`image-increase-speed') and `a -' (`image-decrease-speed') to
700 speed up and slow down the animation. `a r' (`image-reverse-speed')
701 to reverse it and `a 0' (`image-reset-speed') to reset it.
702
703 ---
704 *** The command `image-mode-fit-frame' deletes other windows.
705 When toggling, it restores the frame's previous window configuration.
706 It also has an optional frame argument, which can be used by Lisp
707 callers to fit the image to a frame other than the selected frame.
708
709 ** Hi-Lock
710
711 +++
712 *** New global command `M-s h .' (`highlight-symbol-at-point') highlights
713 the symbol found near point.
714
715 +++
716 *** New option `hi-lock-auto-select-face'. When non-nil, hi-lock commands
717 will cycle through faces in `hi-lock-face-defaults' without prompting.
718
719 ---
720 ** New Imenu option `imenu-generic-skip-comments-and-strings'.
721
722 ** Info
723
724 ---
725 *** New Info face `info-index-match', used to highlight matches in index
726 entries displayed by `Info-index-next', `Info-virtual-index' and
727 `info-apropos'.
728
729 ---
730 *** The Info-edit command is obsolete. Editing Info nodes by hand
731 has not been relevant for some time.
732
733 ** JS Mode
734
735 ---
736 *** New option `js-switch-indent-offset'.
737
738 ---
739 *** Better indentation of multiple-variable declarations.
740 If a declaration spans several lines, variables on the following lines
741 are lined up to the first one.
742
743 ---
744 *** Recognition and better indentation of continuations in array comprehensions.
745
746 +++
747 ** MH-E has been updated to version 8.5 - see separate MH-E-NEWS file.
748
749 +++
750 ** Octave mode
751
752 *** Font locking for Texinfo comments and new keywords.
753
754 *** Completion in Octave file buffers.
755
756 *** ElDoc support.
757
758 *** Jump to definition.
759
760 *** Documentation lookup/search.
761
762 +++
763 ** OPascal mode is the new name for Delphi mode
764
765 ---
766 *** All delphi-* variables and functions have been renamed to opascal-*.
767 Obsolete aliases exist for those likely to have been used externally.
768
769 ---
770 *** The option `delphi-newline-always-indents' has been removed.
771 Use `electric-indent-mode' instead.
772
773 ---
774 *** The TAB key runs the standard `indent-for-tab-command', not `delphi-tab'.
775
776 ** Package
777
778 +++
779 *** In the `list-packages' buffer, you can use `f' (`package-menu-filter')
780 to filter the list of packages by a keyword.
781
782 +++
783 *** In the `describe-package' buffer, there are now buttons listing the
784 keywords related to the package. Click on a button to see other packages
785 related to that keyword.
786
787 ---
788 *** The format of `archive-contents' files, generated by package
789 repositories, has changed to allow a new (fifth) element in the data
790 vectors, containing an associative list with extra properties.
791 (For example, `describe-package' uses the `:url' extra property to
792 display a "Homepage" header.)
793
794 ---
795 ** In Prolog mode, `prolog-use-smie' has been removed,
796 along with the non-SMIE indentation code.
797
798 ** Remember
799
800 +++
801 *** The new command `remember-notes' creates a buffer that is saved on exit.
802 You can use it as a more permanent *scratch* buffer.
803
804 +++
805 *** Remember can now store notes in separate files.
806 To use this, add `remember-store-in-files' to the `remember-handler-functions'
807 option. The files are saved in `remember-data-directory' using
808 names specified by `remember-directory-file-name-format'.
809
810 ** Rmail
811
812 +++
813 *** Customize `rmail-mbox-format' to influence some minor aspects of
814 how Rmail displays non-MIME messages.
815
816 ---
817 *** The `unrmail' command now converts from BABYL to mboxrd format,
818 rather than mboxo. Customize `unrmail-mbox-format' to change this.
819
820 ** Ruby mode
821
822 ---
823 *** Improved syntax highlighting and indentation.
824
825 ---
826 *** New `electric-indent-mode' integration.
827
828 ---
829 *** New option `ruby-encoding-magic-comment-style'.
830
831 ---
832 *** New option `ruby-custom-encoding-magic-comment-template'.
833
834 ---
835 *** New option `ruby-align-to-stmt-keywords'.
836
837 ---
838 *** New option `ruby-align-chained-calls'.
839
840 ---
841 *** More Ruby file types have been added to `auto-mode-alist'.
842
843 ** Search and Replace
844
845 +++
846 *** New global command `M-s .' (`isearch-forward-symbol-at-point')
847 starts a symbol (identifier) incremental search forward with the
848 symbol found near point added to the search string initially.
849
850 +++
851 *** `C-x 8 RET' in Isearch mode reads a character by its Unicode name
852 and adds it to the search string.
853
854 +++
855 *** `M-s i' in Isearch mode toggles whether search matches invisible text.
856
857 +++
858 *** `query-replace' skips invisible text when `search-invisible' is nil,
859 and opens overlays with hidden text when `search-invisible' is `open'.
860
861 +++
862 *** A negative prefix arg of replacement commands replaces backward.
863 `M-- M-%' replaces a string backward, `M-- C-M-%' replaces a regexp
864 backward, `M-s w words M-- M-%' replaces a sequence of words backward.
865
866 +++
867 *** By default, prefix arguments do not now terminate Isearch mode.
868 Set `isearch-allow-prefix' to nil to restore old behavior.
869
870 +++
871 *** More Isearch commands accept prefix arguments, namely
872 `isearch-printing-char', `isearch-quote-char', `isearch-yank-word',
873 `isearch-yank-line'.
874
875 +++
876 *** Word search now matches whitespace at the beginning/end
877 of the search string if it contains leading/trailing whitespace.
878 In an incremental word search or when using a non-nil LAX argument
879 of `word-search-regexp', the lax matching can also match part of
880 the first word (in addition to the lax matching of the last word).
881 The same rules are now applied to the symbol search with the difference
882 that it matches symbols, and non-symbol characters between symbols.
883
884 +++
885 ** New SES command `ses-rename-cell' allows assignment of names to SES cells.
886
887 ---
888 ** The shell.el option `explicit-bash-args' includes --noediting by default.
889 All non-ancient Bash versions support this option.
890
891 ** Shell Script mode
892
893 ---
894 *** The SMIE indentation engine is now used by default - see `sh-use-smie'.
895
896 ---
897 *** `sh-mode' now has its own setting for `add-log-current-defun-function'.
898
899 ** SMIE indentation can be customized via `smie-config'.
900 Emacs can learn the appropriate indentation settings if you provide it
901 with an indented sample file.
902
903 ---
904 ** SQL mode
905
906 *** Improved login monitoring and appropriate response to login failures.
907 New variable `sql-login-delay' defines maximum wait time for a connection.
908
909 *** Oracle support.
910 SQL*Plus script placeholders are properly highlighted and identified
911 in `sql-placeholders-filter'. When starting SQL*Plus, `sql-oracle-options'
912 are passed before the logon parameter, as required. The default now
913 includes `-L', to limit the number of logon attempts per invocation.
914
915 ---
916 ** New Term mode option `term-suppress-hard-newline'.
917
918 +++
919 ** Todo mode has been rewritten and enhanced.
920 The Todo mode user manual describes all commands and most user
921 options. To support some of these features, a new file format is
922 used, which is incompatible with the old format; however, you can
923 convert old todo and done item files to the new format on initializing
924 the first new todo file, or at any later time with the provided
925 conversion command. The previous version of todo-mode.el has been
926 renamed to otodo-mode.el and is now obsolete. New features include:
927
928 *** Support for multiple todo files and archive files of done items.
929
930 *** Renaming, reordering, moving, merging, and deleting categories.
931
932 *** Sortable tabular summaries of categories and the item types they contain.
933
934 *** Cross-category lists of items filtered by specific criteria.
935
936 *** More fine-grained interaction with the Emacs diary, by being able to
937 decide for each todo item whether it appears in the Fancy Diary display.
938
939 *** Highly flexible new item insertion and item editing.
940
941 *** Moving items between categories, storing done items in their category
942 or in archive files, undoing or unarchiving done items.
943
944 *** Reprioritizing items by inputting a numerical priority.
945
946 *** Extensive customizability of operation and display, including many faces.
947
948 ** Trace
949
950 ---
951 *** `trace-function' and `trace-function-background' no longer prompt for
952 the output buffer. Unless you use a prefix argument, they output to
953 `trace-buffer'.
954
955 ---
956 *** With a prefix argument, `trace-function' and `trace-function-background'
957 will prompt for a "context". This is a Lisp expression, whose value at the
958 time the function is entered/exited is printed along with the function's
959 name and arguments.
960
961 ** Tramp
962
963 +++
964 *** The experimental url syntax for remote file names has been removed.
965
966 +++
967 *** New connection method "adb", which allows to access Android
968 devices by the Android Debug Bridge. The variable `tramp-adb-program'
969 can be used to adapt the path of the "adb" program, if needed.
970
971 +++
972 *** The connection methods "plink1", "ssh1", "ssh2", "scp1", "scp2",
973 "scpc" and "rsyncc" are discontinued. The ssh option
974 "ControlMaster=auto" is set automatically in all ssh-based methods,
975 when possible. See `tramp-use-ssh-controlmaster-options'.
976
977 +++
978 *** Handlers for `file-acl' and `set-file-acl' for remote machines
979 which support POSIX ACLs.
980
981 +++
982 *** Handlers for `file-notify-add-watch' and `file-notify-rm-watch'
983 for remote machines which support filesystem notifications.
984
985 +++
986 ** New URL command `url-cookie-list' displays the current cookies,
987 and allows you to interactively remove cookies.
988
989 ** VC and related modes
990
991 +++
992 *** In VC directory mode, `D' displays diffs between VC-controlled
993 whole tree revisions.
994
995 +++
996 *** In VC directory mode, `L' lists the change log for the current VC
997 controlled tree in a window.
998
999 +++
1000 *** In VC directory mode, `I' shows a log of changes that will be
1001 received with a pull operation.
1002
1003 +++
1004 *** `C-x v G' (globally) and `G' (in VC directory mode) ignores a file
1005 under current version control system. When called with a prefix
1006 argument, you can remove a file from the ignored file list.
1007
1008 ** VHDL mode
1009
1010 ---
1011 *** New options: `vhdl-actual-generic-name', `vhdl-beautify-options'.
1012
1013 ---
1014 *** New commands: `vhdl-fix-statement-region', `vhdl-fix-statement-buffer'.
1015
1016 ---
1017 ** The Woman commands `woman-default-faces' and `woman-monochrome-faces'
1018 are obsolete. Customize the `woman-*' faces instead.
1019
1020 ** Obsolete packages
1021
1022 +++
1023 *** iswitchb.el; use icomplete-mode.
1024
1025 ---
1026 *** longlines.el; use visual-line-mode.
1027
1028 ---
1029 *** meese.el.
1030
1031 +++
1032 *** sup-mouse.el.
1033
1034 ---
1035 *** terminal.el; use term.el instead.
1036
1037 ---
1038 *** the old version of todo-mode.el (renamed to otodo-mode.el).
1039
1040 ---
1041 *** xesam.el (owing to the cancellation of the XESAM project).
1042
1043 +++
1044 *** yow.el; use fortune.el or cookie1.el instead.
1045
1046 \f
1047 * New Modes and Packages in Emacs 24.4
1048
1049 +++
1050 ** New package `eww' is a built-in web browser.
1051 It is only available if Emacs is compiled with libxml2 support.
1052
1053 +++
1054 ** New minor mode `superword-mode'.
1055 This overrides the default word motion commands to treat "symbol_words"
1056 as a single word, similar to what `subword-mode' does.
1057
1058 +++
1059 ** New package nadvice.el offers lighter-weight advice facilities.
1060 It is layered as:
1061
1062 *** add-function/remove-function, which can be used to add/remove code on any
1063 function-carrying place, such as process-filters or `<foo>-function' hooks.
1064
1065 *** advice-add/advice-remove to add/remove a piece of advice on a named
1066 function, much like `defadvice' does.
1067
1068 ** New package frameset.el.
1069 It provides a set of operations to save a frameset (the state of all
1070 or a subset of the existing frames and windows, somewhat similar to a
1071 frame configuration), both in-session and persistently, and restore it
1072 at some point in the future.
1073
1074 +++
1075 ** New package filenotify.el provides an interface for file system
1076 notifications. It requires that Emacs be compiled with one of the
1077 low-level libraries gfilenotify.c, inotify.c or w32notify.c.
1078
1079 \f
1080 * Incompatible Lisp Changes in Emacs 24.4
1081
1082 ---
1083 ** `kill-region' has lost its `yank-handler' optional argument.
1084
1085 +++
1086 ** `(input-pending-p)' no longer runs other timers that are ready to run.
1087 The new optional CHECK-TIMERS parameter allows for the prior behavior.
1088
1089 +++
1090 ** `defvar' and `defcustom' in a let-binding affect the "external" default.
1091
1092 ---
1093 ** The syntax of ?» and ?« is now punctuation instead of matched parens.
1094 Some languages match those as »...«, and others as «...», so it is
1095 better for Emacs to stay neutral by default.
1096
1097 ---
1098 ** In compiled Lisp files, the header no longer includes a timestamp.
1099
1100 +++
1101 ** The default file coding for Emacs Lisp files is now utf-8.
1102 (See `file-coding-system-alist'.) In most cases, this change is
1103 transparent, but files that contain unusual characters without
1104 specifying an explicit coding system may fail to load with obscure
1105 errors. You should either convert them to utf-8 or add an explicit
1106 `coding:' cookie.
1107
1108 +++
1109 ** `overriding-terminal-local-map' no longer replaces the local keymaps.
1110 It used to disable the minor mode, major mode, and text-property keymaps,
1111 whereas now it simply has higher precedence.
1112
1113 +++
1114 ** Default process filters and sentinels are not nil any more.
1115 Instead they default to a function that does what the nil value used to do.
1116
1117 +++
1118 ** `read-event' does not return decoded chars in ttys any more.
1119 As was the case in Emacs 22 and before, the decoding of terminal
1120 input, according to `keyboard-coding-system', is not performed in
1121 `read-event' any more. But unlike in Emacs 22, this decoding is still
1122 done before input-decode-map, function-key-map, etc.
1123
1124 ---
1125 ** The option `inhibit-local-menu-bar-menus' has been removed.
1126
1127 ---
1128 ** Frame-local variables that affect redisplay do not work any more.
1129 More specifically, redisplay does not bother to check for a frame-local
1130 value when looking up variables.
1131
1132 +++
1133 ** nil and "unbound" are indistinguishable in `symbol-function'.
1134 `symbol-function' does not signal a `void-function' error any more.
1135 To determine if a symbol's function definition is void, use `fboundp'.
1136
1137 +++
1138 ** `defadvice' does not honor the `freeze' flag and cannot advise
1139 special-forms any more.
1140
1141 ---
1142 ** `dolist' no longer binds VAR while evaluating the RESULT form,
1143 when lexical binding is enabled. Previously, VAR was bound to nil,
1144 which often led to spurious unused-variable warnings.
1145
1146 +++
1147 ** The return value of `backup-buffer' has changed.
1148 The second argument is no longer an SELinux context, instead it is an
1149 alist of extended attributes as returned by the new function
1150 `file-extended-attributes'. The attributes can be applied to another
1151 file using `set-file-extended-attributes'.
1152
1153 +++
1154 ** By default `copy-file' no longer copies file permission bits to an
1155 existing destination; and it sets the file permission bits of a newly
1156 created destination to those of the source, masked by the default file
1157 permissions. To copy the file permission bits, pass t as the
1158 PRESERVE-PERMISSIONS argument of `copy-file'.
1159
1160 +++
1161 ** `visited-file-modtime' now returns -1 for nonexistent files.
1162 Formerly it returned a list (-1 LOW USEC PSEC), but this was ambiguous
1163 in the presence of files with negative time stamps.
1164
1165 +++
1166 ** The cars of the elements in `interpreter-mode-alist' are now
1167 treated as regexps rather than literal strings.
1168
1169 \f
1170 * Lisp Changes in Emacs 24.4
1171
1172 +++
1173 ** The second argument of `eval' can now specify a lexical environment.
1174
1175 +++
1176 ** New functions `special-form-p' and `macrop'.
1177
1178 +++
1179 ** New macro `define-alternatives' can be used to define generic commands.
1180 Generic commands are interactive functions whose implementation can be
1181 selected among several alternatives, as a matter of user preference.
1182
1183 +++
1184 ** If you give a symbol a `defalias-fset-function' property, `defalias'
1185 on that symbol will use the associated value as a function to call
1186 in place of `fset'.
1187
1188 +++
1189 ** New variable `enable-dir-local-variables'.
1190 Directory-local variables are ignored if this is nil. This may be
1191 useful for modes that want to ignore directory-locals while still
1192 respecting file-local variables.
1193
1194 +++
1195 ** New function `get-pos-property'.
1196
1197 +++
1198 ** `read-regexp' now uses the new variable `read-regexp-defaults-function'
1199 as a function to call to provide default values.
1200
1201 ** Completion changes
1202
1203 ---
1204 *** The separator used by `completing-read-multiple' is now a regexp.
1205 The default `crm-separator' has been changed to allow surrounding spaces
1206 around the comma.
1207
1208 +++
1209 *** The `common-substring' argument of `display-completion-list',
1210 which has been documented as obsolete since Emacs 23.1, is now _really_
1211 obsolete, and no longer advertised. Instead either call
1212 `completion-hilit-commonality' to add the highlighting; or use
1213 `completion-all-completions', which returns highlighted strings.
1214
1215 +++
1216 *** New function `completion-table-with-cache' is a wrapper for
1217 `completion-table-dynamic' that caches the result of the last lookup.
1218
1219 +++
1220 *** New function `completion-table-merge' to combine several
1221 completion tables by merging their completions.
1222
1223 +++
1224 ** New minor modes `prettify-symbols-mode' and `global-prettify-symbols-mode'
1225 display specified symbols as composed characters. E.g., in Emacs Lisp mode,
1226 this replaces the string "lambda" with the Greek lambda character.
1227
1228 ** Terminal changes
1229
1230 +++
1231 *** Functions to pop up menus and dialogs now work on all terminals,
1232 including TTYs. This includes `x-popup-menu', `x-popup-dialog',
1233 `message-box', `yes-or-no-p', etc.
1234
1235 The function `display-popup-menus-p' will now return non-nil for a
1236 display or frame whenever a mouse is supported on that display or
1237 frame.
1238
1239 +++
1240 *** New hook `tty-setup-hook', run at the end of initializing a text terminal.
1241
1242 +++
1243 *** The hook `term-setup-hook' is obsolete. It is entirely equivalent
1244 to `emacs-startup-hook'. See also the new `tty-setup-hook'.
1245
1246 +++
1247 ** New hook `pre-redisplay-function'.
1248
1249 +++
1250 ** New bool-vector set operation functions
1251 *** `bool-vector-exclusive-or'
1252 *** `bool-vector-union'
1253 *** `bool-vector-intersection'
1254 *** `bool-vector-set-difference'
1255 *** `bool-vector-not'
1256 *** `bool-vector-subsetp'
1257 *** `bool-vector-count-consecutive'
1258 *** `bool-vector-count-population'
1259
1260 +++
1261 ** Comparison functions =, <, >, <=, >= can now take many arguments.
1262
1263 ** Error-handling changes
1264
1265 +++
1266 *** New function `define-error'.
1267
1268 +++
1269 *** `with-demoted-errors' takes an additional argument `format'.
1270
1271 +++
1272 ** New macro `with-eval-after-load'.
1273 This is like the old `eval-after-load', but better behaved.
1274
1275 ---
1276 ** New library subr-x.el with miscellaneous small utility functions
1277 *** `hash-table-keys'
1278 *** `hash-table-values'
1279 *** `string-blank-p'
1280 *** `string-empty-p'
1281 *** `string-join'
1282 *** `string-reverse'
1283 *** `string-trim-left'
1284 *** `string-trim-right'
1285 *** `string-trim'
1286 *** `string-remove-prefix'
1287 *** `string-remove-suffix'
1288
1289 +++
1290 ** Obsoleted functions
1291 *** `log10'
1292 *** `dont-compile'
1293 *** `lisp-complete-symbol'
1294 *** `field-complete'
1295 *** `minibuffer-completion-contents'
1296 *** `isearch-nonincremental-exit-minibuffer'
1297 *** `isearch-filter-visible'
1298 *** `generic-make-keywords-list'
1299 *** `get-upcase-table' (use `case-table-get-table' instead).
1300
1301 +++
1302 ** `with-wrapper-hook' is obsoleted by `add-function'.
1303 The few hooks that used with-wrapper-hook are replaced as follows:
1304 *** `abbrev-expand-function' obsoletes `abbrev-expand-functions'.
1305 *** `completion-in-region-function' obsoletes `completion-in-region-functions'.
1306 *** `filter-buffer-substring-function' obsoletes `filter-buffer-substring-functions'.
1307
1308 +++
1309 ** `byte-compile-interactive-only-functions' is now obsolete.
1310 To specify that a command should only be called interactively, give it
1311 a non-nil `interactive-only' property.
1312
1313 +++
1314 ** `split-string' now takes an optional argument TRIM.
1315 The value, if non-nil, is a regexp that specifies what to trim from
1316 the start and end of each substring.
1317
1318 +++
1319 ** New function `string-suffix-p'.
1320
1321 ** File-handling changes
1322
1323 +++
1324 *** Support for filesystem notifications.
1325 Emacs now supports notifications of filesystem changes, such as
1326 creation, modification, and deletion of files. This requires the
1327 `glib' API, or the 'inotify' API (on GNU/Linux systems only). On
1328 MS-Windows systems, this is supported for Windows XP and newer
1329 versions.
1330
1331 +++
1332 *** The 9th element returned by `file-attributes' is now unspecified.
1333 Formerly, it was t if the file's gid would change if file were deleted
1334 and recreated. This value has been inaccurate for years on many
1335 platforms, and nobody seems to have noticed or cared.
1336
1337 +++
1338 *** The 6th argument to `copy-file' has been renamed to
1339 PRESERVE-PERMISSIONS as it now handles ACL entries and the traditional
1340 Unix file permission bits as well as SELinux context.
1341
1342 +++
1343 *** The function `file-ownership-preserved-p' now has an optional
1344 argument GROUP which causes it check for file group too. This can be
1345 used in place of the 9th element of `file-attributes'.
1346
1347 ---
1348 *** The function `set-visited-file-modtime' now accepts a 0 or -1
1349 argument, with the same interpretation as the returned value of
1350 `visited-file-modtime'.
1351
1352 ** Autorevert changes
1353
1354 ---
1355 *** If Emacs is compiled with file notification support, notifications
1356 are used instead of checking the time stamp of the files. You can
1357 disable this by setting the user option `auto-revert-use-notify' to
1358 nil. Alternatively, a regular expression of directories to be
1359 excluded from file notifications can be specified by
1360 `auto-revert-notify-exclude-dir-regexp'.
1361
1362 ---
1363 *** The new user option `auto-revert-remote-files' enables reversion
1364 of remote files when set to non-nil.
1365
1366 ** Face changes
1367
1368 +++
1369 *** The function `face-spec-set' is now like `setq' for face specs.
1370 Its third arg now accepts values specifying a face spec type (defface,
1371 custom, or override spec), and the relevant spec is set accordingly.
1372
1373 +++
1374 *** New function `add-face-text-property', which can be used to
1375 conveniently prepend/append new face properties.
1376
1377 ---
1378 *** Face specs set via Custom themes now replace the `defface' spec
1379 rather than inheriting from it. In other words, setting a face via a
1380 theme now behaves like setting it via Customize.
1381
1382 ---
1383 *** New face characteristic (supports :underline (:style wave))
1384 specifies whether or not the terminal can display a wavy line.
1385
1386 +++
1387 *** New face spec attribute :distant-foreground
1388 specifies foreground to use if background color is near the foreground
1389 color that would otherwise have been used.
1390
1391 ** Image API
1392
1393 +++
1394 *** `image-animated-p' is now `image-multi-frame-p'.
1395 It returns non-nil for any image that contains multiple frames,
1396 whether or not it specifies a frame delay.
1397
1398 +++
1399 *** New variable `image-default-frame-delay' gives the frame delay for
1400 animated images which do not specify a frame delay.
1401
1402 +++
1403 *** New functions `image-current-frame' and `image-show-frame' for getting
1404 and setting the current frame of a multi-frame image.
1405
1406 ** EIEIO
1407
1408 +++
1409 *** Namespace cleanup by obsolete-aliasing functions to use `eieio-' prefix.
1410 **** object-name -> eieio-object-name
1411 **** object-class -> eieio-object-class
1412 **** object-class-fast -> eieio--object-class
1413 **** object-class-name -> eieio-object-class-name
1414 **** object-name-string -> eieio-object-name-string
1415 **** object-num-slots -> eieio--object-num-slots
1416 **** object-set-name-string -> eieio-object-set-name-string
1417 **** class-of -> eieio-object-class
1418 **** class-name -> eieio-class-name
1419 **** class-parent -> eieio-class-parent
1420 **** class-parents -> eieio-class-parents
1421 **** class-parents-fast -> eieio-class-parents-fast
1422 **** class-children -> eieio-class-children
1423 **** class-num-slots -> eieio--class-num-slots
1424 **** class-precedence-list -> eieio-class-precedence-list
1425 **** class-direct-subclasses -> eieio-class-children
1426 **** class-direct-superclasses -> eieio-class-parents
1427
1428 ** Changes in encoding and decoding of text
1429
1430 ---
1431 *** New coding-system `prefer-utf-8'.
1432 This is like `undecided' but prefers UTF-8 on decoding if the text to
1433 be decoded does not contain any invalid UTF-8 sequences. On encoding,
1434 any non-ASCII characters are automatically encoded as UTF-8.
1435
1436 ---
1437 *** New attributes of coding-systems whose type is `undecided'.
1438 Two new attributes, `:inhibit-null-byte-detection' and
1439 `:inhibit-iso-escape-detection', determine how to detect encoding of
1440 text that includes null bytes and ISO-2022 escape sequences,
1441 respectively. Each of these attributes can be either nil, zero, or
1442 t. If it is t, decoding text ignores null bytes and, respectively,
1443 ISO-2022 sequences. If it is nil, null bytes cause text to be decoded
1444 with no-conversion and ISO-2022 sequences cause Emacs to assume the
1445 text is encoded in one of the ISO-2022 encodings, such as
1446 iso-2022-7bit. If the value is zero, Emacs consults the variables
1447 inhibit-null-byte-detection and inhibit-iso-escape-detection, which
1448 see.
1449 The new attribute `:prefer-utf-8', if non-nil, causes Emacs to prefer
1450 UTF-8 encoding and decoding, whenever possible.
1451
1452 These attributes are only meaningful for coding-systems of type
1453 `undecided'. (The type of a coding-system is determined by its
1454 `:coding-type' attribute and can be accessed by calling the
1455 `coding-system-type' function.)
1456
1457 ---
1458 ** The `time-to-seconds' alias to `float-time' is no longer marked obsolete.
1459
1460 +++
1461 ** New functions `group-gid' and `group-real-gid'.
1462
1463 ---
1464 ** The spelling of the rx.el category `chinese-two-byte' has been
1465 corrected (the first 'e' was missing).
1466
1467 ---
1468 ** Minor internal changes to the details of lock files.
1469 The lock for DIR/FILE is now _always_ DIR/.#FILE.
1470 If DIR/.#FILE already exists and is not an Emacs lock file,
1471 Emacs makes no attempt to lock DIR/FILE. (Previously, it fell back to
1472 numbered lock files DIR/.#FILE.0...).
1473 On file systems that do not support symbolic links, the lock is now a
1474 regular file with contents being what would have been in the symlink.
1475
1476 ** Changes to the Emacs Lisp Coding Conventions in Emacs 24.4
1477
1478 +++
1479 *** The package descriptor and name of global variables, constants,
1480 and functions should be separated by two hyphens if the symbol is not
1481 meant to be used by other packages.
1482
1483 \f
1484 * Changes in Emacs 24.4 on Non-Free Operating Systems
1485
1486 ---
1487 ** The procedure for building Emacs on MS-Windows has changed.
1488 It is now built by running the same configure script as on all other
1489 platforms. This requires the MSYS environment and MinGW development
1490 tools. See the updated instructions in nt/INSTALL for details.
1491
1492 Using the Posix configure script and Makefile's also means a change in
1493 the directory structure of the Emacs installation on Windows. It is
1494 now the same as on GNU and Unix systems. In particular, the auxiliary
1495 programs, such as cmdproxy.exe and hexl.exe, are in
1496 libexec/emacs/VERSION/i686-pc-mingw32 (where VERSION is the Emacs
1497 version), version-independent site-lisp is in share/emacs/site-lisp,
1498 version-specific Lisp files are in share/emacs/VERSION/lisp and in
1499 share/emacs/VERSION/site-lisp, Info docs are in share/info, and data
1500 files are in share/emacs/VERSION/etc. (Emacs knows about all these
1501 directories and will find the files in there automatically; there's no
1502 need to set any variables due to this change.)
1503
1504 +++
1505 ** Emacs on Windows 2000 and later can now access files and directories
1506 whose names cannot be encoded in the current system codepage.
1507
1508 The new variable `w32-unicode-filenames' controls this feature: if it
1509 is t, Emacs uses Unicode APIs to pass file names to system calls,
1510 which lifts the limitation of file names to the current locale.
1511
1512 +++
1513 ** The "generate a backtrace on fatal error" feature now works on MS Windows.
1514 The backtrace is written to the 'emacs_backtrace.txt' file in the
1515 directory where Emacs was running.
1516
1517 +++
1518 ** The variable `buffer-file-type' is no longer supported.
1519 Setting it has no effect, and %t in the mode-line format is ignored.
1520 Likewise, `file-name-buffer-file-type-alist' is now obsolete, and
1521 modifying it has no effect.
1522
1523 ---
1524 ** Lock files now work on MS-Windows.
1525 This helps to prevent losing your edits if the same file is being
1526 edited in another Emacs session or by another user. See the node
1527 "Interlocking" in the Emacs User Manual for the details. To disable
1528 file locking, customize `create-lockfiles' to nil.
1529
1530 ** New Core Text based font backend for Mac OS X 10.5 and newer.
1531 GNUstep and Mac OS X 10.4 use the old font backend.
1532 To use the old backend by default, do on the command line:
1533 % defaults write org.gnu.Emacs FontBackend ns
1534
1535 ** Improved fullscreen support on Mac OS X.
1536 Emacs supports both native (Mac OS X 10.7 and newer) and "old style" fullscreen.
1537 Customize `ns-use-native-fullscreen' to change the style.
1538 For Mac OS X 10.7 and newer, native is the default.
1539
1540 ** On Mac OS X 10.7 and newer, Emacs uses sRGB colorspace by default.
1541 Customize `ns-use-srgb-colorspace' to disable this. Note that this
1542 does not apply to images.
1543
1544 \f
1545 * Installation Changes in Emacs 24.3
1546
1547 ** The default X toolkit is now Gtk+ version 3.
1548 If you don't pass `--with-x-toolkit' to configure, or if you use
1549 `--with-x-toolkit=gtk' or `--with-x-toolkit=yes', configure will try
1550 to build with Gtk+ version 3, and if that fails, try Gtk+ version 2.
1551 You can explicitly require a specific version by passing
1552 `--with-x-toolkit=gtk2' or `--with-x-toolkit=gtk3' to configure.
1553
1554 ** New configure option `--enable-link-time-optimization', to utilize
1555 an appropriate feature provided by GCC since version 4.5.0.
1556
1557 ** New configure option `--without-all' to disable most of the optional
1558 features (image support, etc.) that are normally enabled by default.
1559
1560 ** New configure option `--enable-gcc-warnings' (for developing/debugging
1561 Emacs). If building with GCC, this enables compile-time checks that
1562 warn/give errors about possibly-questionable C code. On a recent GNU
1563 system there should be no warnings; on older and on non-GNU systems
1564 the results may be useful to developers.
1565
1566 ** The configure option `--enable-use-lisp-union-type' has been
1567 renamed to `--enable-check-lisp-object-type', as the resulting
1568 Lisp_Object type no longer uses a union to implement the compile time
1569 check that this option enables.
1570
1571 ** The configure option `--disable-maintainer-mode' has been removed,
1572 as it was confusingly-named and rarely useful.
1573
1574 ** The configure options `--program-prefix', `--program-suffix', and
1575 `--program-transform-name' apply to more than just the installed
1576 binaries. Now they also affect the man pages, icons, and the
1577 etc/emacs.desktop file; but not the info pages, since this would break
1578 links between the various manuals.
1579
1580 ** You can use `NO_BIN_LINK=t make install' to prevent the installation
1581 overwriting "emacs" in the installation bin/ directory with a link
1582 to "emacs-VERSION".
1583
1584 ** Emacs uses libtinfo in preference to libncurses, if available.
1585
1586 ** On FreeBSD and NetBSD, configure no longer adds /usr/local/lib and
1587 /usr/pkg/lib to the linker search path. You must add them yourself if
1588 you want them.
1589
1590 ** The standalone scripts `rcs-checkin' and `vcdiff' have been removed
1591 (from the bin and libexec directories, respectively). The former is
1592 no longer relevant, the latter is replaced by lisp (in vc-sccs.el).
1593
1594 \f
1595 * Startup Changes in Emacs 24.3
1596
1597 ** Emacs no longer searches for `leim-list.el' files beneath the standard
1598 lisp/ directory. There should not be any there anyway. If you have
1599 been adding them there, put them somewhere else; e.g., site-lisp.
1600
1601 ** The `--no-site-lisp' command line option now works for Nextstep builds.
1602
1603 \f
1604 * Changes in Emacs 24.3
1605
1606 ** Help
1607
1608 *** `C-h f' (`describe-function') can now perform autoloading.
1609 When this command is called for an autoloaded function whose docstring
1610 contains a key substitution construct, that function's library is
1611 automatically loaded, so that the documentation can be shown
1612 correctly. To disable this, set `help-enable-auto-load' to nil.
1613
1614 *** `C-h f' now reports previously-autoloaded functions as "autoloaded",
1615 even after their associated libraries have been loaded (and the
1616 autoloads have been redefined as functions).
1617
1618 ** ImageMagick
1619
1620 *** Images displayed via ImageMagick now support transparency and the
1621 :background image specification property.
1622
1623 *** When available, ImageMagick support is automatically enabled.
1624 It is no longer necessary to call `imagemagick-register-types'
1625 explicitly to install ImageMagick image types; that function is called
1626 automatically at startup, or when customizing an imagemagick- option.
1627
1628 *** Setting `imagemagick-types-inhibit' to t now disables the use of
1629 ImageMagick to view images. (You must call `imagemagick-register-types'
1630 afterwards if you do not use customize to change this.)
1631
1632 *** The new variable `imagemagick-enabled-types' also affects which
1633 ImageMagick types are treated as images. The function
1634 `imagemagick-filter-types' returns the list of types that will be
1635 treated as images.
1636
1637 ** Minibuffer
1638
1639 *** In minibuffer filename prompts, `C-M-f' and `C-M-b' now move to the
1640 next and previous path separator, respectively.
1641
1642 *** `minibuffer-electric-default-mode' can shorten "(default ...)" to "[...]"
1643 in minibuffer prompts. Just set `minibuffer-eldef-shorten-default'
1644 non-nil before enabling the mode.
1645
1646 ** Mode line
1647
1648 *** New option `mode-line-default-help-echo' specifies the help text
1649 (shown in a tooltip or in the echo area) for any part of the mode line
1650 that does not have its own specialized help text.
1651
1652 *** You can now click mouse-3 in the coding system indicator to invoke
1653 `set-buffer-file-coding-system'.
1654
1655 ** Server and client
1656
1657 *** emacsclient now obeys string values for `initial-buffer-choice',
1658 if it is told to open a new frame without specifying any file to visit
1659 or expression to evaluate.
1660
1661 *** New option `server-auth-key' specifies a shared server key.
1662
1663 ** Emacs now generates backtraces on fatal errors.
1664 On encountering a fatal error, Emacs now outputs a textual description
1665 of the fatal signal, and a short backtrace on platforms like glibc
1666 that support backtraces.
1667
1668 ** `C-x C-q' is now bound to the new minor mode `read-only-mode'.
1669 This minor mode replaces `toggle-read-only', which is now obsolete.
1670
1671 ** Most `y-or-n' prompts now allow you to scroll the selected window.
1672 Typing `C-v' or `M-v' at a y-or-n prompt scrolls forward or backward
1673 respectively, without exiting from the prompt.
1674
1675 ** In the Package Menu, newly-available packages are listed as "new",
1676 and sorted above the other "available" packages by default.
1677
1678 ** If your Emacs was built from a repository checkout, the new variable
1679 `emacs-bzr-version' contains information about the bzr revision used.
1680
1681 ** New option `create-lockfiles' specifies usage of lockfiles.
1682 It defaults to t. Changing it to nil inhibits the creation of lock
1683 files (use this with caution).
1684
1685 ** New option `enable-remote-dir-locals', if non-nil, allows directory-local
1686 variables on remote hosts.
1687
1688 ** The entry for PCL-CVS has been removed from the Tools menu.
1689 The PCL-CVS commands are still available via the keyboard.
1690
1691 ** Using "unibyte: t" in Lisp source files is obsolete.
1692 Use "coding: raw-text" instead.
1693
1694 ** In the buffer made by `M-x report-emacs-bug', the `C-c m' binding
1695 has been changed to `C-c M-i' (`report-emacs-bug-insert-to-mailer').
1696 The previous binding, introduced in Emacs 24.1, was a mistake, because
1697 `C-c LETTER' bindings are reserved for user customizations.
1698
1699 ** Internationalization
1700
1701 *** New language environment: Persian.
1702
1703 *** New input method `vietnamese-vni'.
1704
1705 ** Nextstep (GNUstep / Mac OS X) port
1706
1707 *** Support for fullscreen and the frame parameter fullscreen.
1708
1709 *** A file dialog is used for open/save operations initiated from the
1710 menu/toolbar.
1711
1712 \f
1713 * Editing Changes in Emacs 24.3
1714
1715 ** Search and Replace
1716
1717 *** Non-regexp Isearch now performs "lax" space matching.
1718 Each sequence of spaces in the supplied search string may match any
1719 sequence of one or more whitespace characters, as specified by the
1720 variable `search-whitespace-regexp'. (This variable is also used by a
1721 similar existing feature for regexp Isearch.)
1722
1723 *** New Isearch command `M-s SPC' toggles lax space matching.
1724 This applies to both ordinary and regexp Isearch.
1725
1726 *** New option `replace-lax-whitespace'.
1727 If non-nil, `query-replace' uses flexible whitespace matching too.
1728 The default is nil.
1729
1730 *** Global `M-s _' starts a symbol (identifier) incremental search,
1731 and `M-s _' in Isearch toggles symbol search mode.
1732 `M-s c' in Isearch toggles search case-sensitivity.
1733
1734 ** Navigation commands
1735
1736 *** New binding `M-g c' for `goto-char'.
1737
1738 *** New binding `M-g TAB' for `move-to-column'.
1739
1740 *** `M-g TAB' (`move-to-column') prompts for a column number if called
1741 interactively with no prefix arg. Previously, it moved to column 1.
1742
1743 ** New option `yank-handled-properties' allows processing of text
1744 properties on yanked text, in ways that are more general than just
1745 removing them (as is done by `yank-excluded-properties').
1746
1747 ** New option `delete-trailing-lines' specifies whether
1748 M-x delete-trailing-whitespace should delete trailing lines at the end
1749 of the buffer. It defaults to t.
1750
1751 ** `C-u M-=' now counts lines/words/characters in the entire buffer.
1752
1753 ** `C-x 8 RET' is now bound to `insert-char', which is now a command.
1754 `ucs-insert' is now an obsolete alias for `insert-char'.
1755
1756 ** The `z' key no longer has a binding in most special modes.
1757 It used to be bound to `kill-this-buffer', but `z' is too easy to
1758 accidentally type.
1759
1760 ** New command `C-x r M-w' (`copy-rectangle-as-kill').
1761 It copies the region-rectangle as the last rectangle kill.
1762
1763 ** Registers
1764
1765 *** `C-x r +' is now overloaded to invoke `append-to-register'.
1766
1767 *** New option `register-separator' specifies the register containing
1768 the text to put between collected texts for use with
1769 M-x append-to-register and M-x prepend-to-register.
1770
1771 \f
1772 * Changes in Specialized Modes and Packages in Emacs 24.3
1773
1774 ** Common Lisp emulation (CL)
1775
1776 *** CL's main entry is now (require 'cl-lib).
1777 `cl-lib' is like the old `cl' except that it uses the namespace cleanly;
1778 i.e., all its definitions have the "cl-" prefix (and internal definitions
1779 use the "cl--" prefix).
1780
1781 If `cl' provided a feature under the name `foo', then `cl-lib'
1782 provides it under the name `cl-foo' instead; with the exceptions of the
1783 few `cl' definitions that had to use `foo*' to avoid conflicts with
1784 pre-existing Elisp entities. These have been renamed to `cl-foo'
1785 rather than `cl-foo*'.
1786
1787 The old `cl' is now deprecated and is mainly just a bunch of aliases that
1788 provide the old, non-prefixed names. Some exceptions are listed below:
1789
1790 *** `cl-flet' is not like `flet' (which is deprecated).
1791 Instead it obeys the behavior of Common-Lisp's `flet'.
1792 In particular, in cl-flet function definitions are lexically scoped,
1793 whereas in flet the scoping is dynamic.
1794
1795 *** `cl-labels' is slightly different from `labels'.
1796 The difference is that it relies on the `lexical-binding' machinery
1797 (as opposed to the `lexical-let' machinery used previously) to capture
1798 definitions in closures, so such closures will only work if `lexical-binding'
1799 is in use.
1800
1801 *** `cl-letf' is not exactly like `letf'.
1802 The only difference is in details that relate to some deprecated usage
1803 of `symbol-function' in place forms.
1804
1805 *** `progv' was rewritten to use the `let' machinery.
1806 A side effect is that variables without corresponding values are bound
1807 to nil rather than being made unbound.
1808
1809 *** The following methods of extending `setf' are obsolete
1810 (use features from gv.el instead):
1811 `define-modify-macro' (use `gv-letplace')
1812 `defsetf' (use `gv-define-simple-setter' or `gv-define-setter')
1813 `define-setf-expander' (use `gv-define-setter' or `gv-define-expander')
1814 `get-setf-method' no longer exists (see "Incompatible Lisp Changes")
1815
1816 ** Diff mode
1817
1818 *** Changes are now highlighted using the same color scheme as in
1819 modern VCSes. Deletions are displayed in red (new faces
1820 `diff-refine-removed' and `smerge-refined-removed', and new definition
1821 of `diff-removed'), insertions in green (new faces `diff-refine-added'
1822 and `smerge-refined-added', and new definition of `diff-added').
1823
1824 *** The variable `diff-use-changed-face' defines whether to use the
1825 face `diff-changed', or `diff-removed' and `diff-added' to highlight
1826 changes in context diffs.
1827
1828 *** The new command `diff-delete-trailing-whitespace' removes trailing
1829 whitespace introduced by a diff.
1830
1831 ** Ediff now uses the same color scheme as Diff mode.
1832
1833 ** Python mode
1834
1835 A new version of python.el, which provides several new features, including:
1836 per-buffer shells, better indentation, Python 3 support, and improved
1837 shell-interaction compatible with iPython (and virtually any other
1838 text based shell).
1839
1840 *** Some user options have been replaced/renamed, including (old -> new):
1841 **** python-indent -> python-indent-offset
1842 **** python-guess-indent -> python-indent-guess-indent-offset
1843 **** python-pdbtrack-do-tracking-p -> python-pdbtrack-activate
1844 **** python-use-skeletons -> python-skeleton-autoinsert
1845
1846 *** Some user options have been removed, including:
1847
1848 **** `python-indent-string-contents': Strings are never indented.
1849
1850 **** `python-honour-comment-indentation':
1851 Comments are always considered as indentation markers.
1852
1853 **** `python-continuation-offset': Indentation is automatically
1854 calculated in a pep8 compliant way depending on the context.
1855
1856 **** `python-shell-prompt-alist', `python-shell-continuation-prompt-alist':
1857 Have no direct mapping as the shell interaction is completely different.
1858
1859 **** `python-python-command', `python-jython-command':
1860 Replaced by `python-shell-interpreter'.
1861
1862 **** `inferior-python-filter-regexp', `python-remove-cwd-from-path',
1863 `python-pdbtrack-minor-mode-string', `python-source-modes':
1864 No longer relevant.
1865
1866 *** Some commands have been replaced (old -> new):
1867 **** python-insert-class -> python-skeleton-class
1868 **** python-insert-def -> python-skeleton-def
1869 **** python-insert-for -> python-skeleton-for
1870 **** python-insert-if -> python-skeleton-if
1871 **** python-insert-try/except -> python-skeleton-try
1872 **** python-insert-try/finally -> python-skeleton-try
1873 **** python-insert-while -> python-skeleton-while
1874 **** python-find-function -> python-nav-jump-to-defun
1875 **** python-next-statement -> python-nav-forward-sentence
1876 **** python-previous-statement -> python-nav-backward-sentence
1877 **** python-beginning-of-defun-function -> python-nav-beginning-of-defun
1878 **** python-end-of-defun-function -> python-nav-end-of-defun
1879 **** python-send-buffer -> python-shell-send-buffer
1880 **** python-send-defun -> python-shell-send-defun
1881 **** python-send-region -> python-shell-send-region
1882 **** python-send-region-and-go -> emulate with python-shell-send-region
1883 and python-shell-switch-to-shell
1884 **** python-send-string -> python-shell-send-string
1885 **** python-switch-to-python -> python-shell-switch-to-shell
1886 **** python-describe-symbol -> python-eldoc-at-point
1887
1888 ** D-Bus
1889
1890 *** New variables `dbus-compiled-version' and `dbus-runtime-version'.
1891
1892 *** The D-Bus object manager interface is implemented.
1893
1894 *** Variables of type :(u)int32 and :(u)int64 accept floating points,
1895 if their value does not fit into Emacs's integer range.
1896
1897 *** The function `dbus-call-method' is now non-blocking.
1898 It can be interrupted by `C-g'. `dbus-call-method-non-blocking' is obsolete.
1899
1900 *** Signals can also be sent as unicast messages.
1901
1902 *** The argument list of `dbus-register-signal' has been extended,
1903 according to the new match rule types of D-Bus.
1904
1905 *** `dbus-init-bus' supports private connections.
1906
1907 *** There is a new function `dbus-setenv'.
1908
1909 ** `desktop-path' no longer includes the "." directory.
1910 Desktop files are now located in ~/.emacs.d by default.
1911
1912 ** Dired
1913
1914 *** `dired-do-async-shell-command' executes each file sequentially
1915 if the command ends in `;' (when operating on multiple files).
1916 Otherwise, it executes the command on each file in parallel.
1917
1918 *** Typing `M-n' in the minibuffer of `dired-do-chmod', `dired-do-chgrp',
1919 `dired-do-chown', and `dired-do-touch' yanks the attributes of the
1920 file at point.
1921
1922 *** When the region is active, `m' (`dired-mark'), `u' (`dired-unmark'),
1923 `DEL' (`dired-unmark-backward'), and `d' (`dired-flag-file-deletion')
1924 mark/unmark/flag all files in the active region.
1925
1926 *** The minibuffer default for `=' (`dired-diff') has changed.
1927 It is now the backup file for the file at point, if one exists.
1928 In Transient Mark mode the default is the file at the active mark.
1929
1930 *** `M-=' is no longer bound to `dired-backup-diff' in Dired buffers.
1931 The global binding for `M-=', `count-words-region' is in effect.
1932
1933 ** ERC
1934
1935 *** New module "notifications", which can send a notification when you
1936 receive a private message or your nickname is mentioned.
1937
1938 *** ERC will look up server/channel names via auth-source and use any
1939 channel keys found.
1940
1941 *** New option `erc-lurker-hide-list', similar to `erc-hide-list', but
1942 only applies to messages sent by lurkers.
1943
1944 ** reStructuredText mode
1945
1946 *** Keybindings (see `C-c C-h'), TAB indentation, filling and auto-filling,
1947 fontification, comment handling, and customization have all been revised
1948 and improved.
1949
1950 *** Support for `imenu' and `which-function-mode'.
1951
1952 *** The reStructuredText syntax is more closely covered.
1953 Sphinx support has been improved.
1954
1955 *** `rst-insert-list' inserts new list or continues existing lists.
1956
1957 *** A negative prefix argument always works for `rst-adjust'.
1958
1959 *** The window configuration is reset after displaying a TOC.
1960
1961 *** The constant `rst-version' describes the rst.el package version.
1962
1963 ** Ruby mode
1964
1965 *** Support for percent literals and recognition of regular expressions
1966 in method calls without parentheses with more methods, including Cucumber
1967 steps definitions.
1968
1969 *** Improved syntax highlighting and indentation.
1970
1971 *** New command `ruby-toggle-block', bound to `C-c {'.
1972
1973 *** Some non-standard keybindings/commands have been removed:
1974
1975 **** `ruby-electric-brace'; use `electric-indent-mode' instead.
1976
1977 **** `ruby-mark-defun'; use `mark-defun'.
1978
1979 **** `ruby-beginning-of-defun' and `ruby-end-of-defun' are replaced by
1980 appropriate settings for the variables `beginning-of-defun-function'
1981 and `end-of-defun-function'.
1982
1983 **** Non-standard keybindings for `backward-kill-word', `comment-region',
1984 `reindent-then-newline-and-indent' and `newline' have been removed.
1985
1986 ** Shell Script mode
1987
1988 *** Pairing of parens/quotes uses `electric-pair-mode' instead of skeleton-pair.
1989
1990 *** `sh-electric-here-document-mode' now controls auto-insertion of here-docs.
1991
1992 *** `sh-use-smie' lets you choose a new indentation and navigation code.
1993
1994 ** VHDL mode
1995
1996 *** The free software compiler GHDL is supported (and now the default).
1997
1998 *** Support for the VHDL-AMS packages has been added/updated.
1999
2000 *** Updated to the 2002 revision of the VHDL standard.
2001
2002 *** Accepts \r and \f as whitespace.
2003
2004 ** Apropos
2005
2006 *** The faces used by Apropos are now directly customizable.
2007 These faces are named `apropos-symbol', `apropos-keybinding', and so on;
2008 see the `apropos' Custom group for details.
2009
2010 *** The old options whose values specified faces to use have been removed
2011 (i.e. `apropos-symbol-face', `apropos-keybinding-face', `apropos-label-face',
2012 `apropos-match-face' and `apropos-property-face'.).
2013
2014 ** Buffer Menu
2015
2016 *** This package has been rewritten to use Tabulated List mode.
2017
2018 *** Option `Buffer-menu-buffer+size-width' is now obsolete.
2019 Use `Buffer-menu-name-width' and `Buffer-menu-size-width' instead.
2020
2021 ** Calc
2022
2023 *** Algebraic simplification mode is now the default.
2024 To restrict to the limited simplifications given by the former
2025 default simplification mode, use `m I'.
2026
2027 ** Calendar
2028
2029 *** You can customize the header text that appears above each calendar month.
2030 See the variable `calendar-month-header'.
2031
2032 *** New LaTeX calendar style, produced by `cal-tex-cursor-week2-summary'.
2033
2034 *** The calendars produced by cal-html include holidays.
2035 Customize `cal-html-holidays' to change this.
2036
2037 ** CEDET
2038
2039 *** The major modes from the parser generators "Bovine" and "Wisent"
2040 are now properly integrated in Emacs. The file suffixes ".by" and ".wy"
2041 are in `auto-mode-alist', and the corresponding manuals are included.
2042
2043 *** EDE
2044
2045 **** Menu support for the "Configuration" feature. This allows users to
2046 choose the active configuration (such as debug or install) from the menu.
2047
2048 **** New command `ede-set' to interactively set project-local variables.
2049
2050 **** Support for compiling, debugging, and running in "generic" projects.
2051
2052 **** Autoconf editing support for M4 macros with complex arguments.
2053
2054 **** Compilation support for the "linux" project type.
2055
2056 **** "simple" projects have been removed; use "generic" projects instead.
2057
2058 *** Semantic
2059
2060 **** Support for parsing #include statements inside a namespace in C/C++.
2061
2062 **** Improved support for 'extern "C"' declarations in C/C++.
2063
2064 **** The ability to ignore more common special C/C++ preprocessor symbols,
2065 such as '__nonnull' and '__asm'. Add '__cplusplus' macro when parsing C++.
2066 If available, include cdefs.h as an additional source of preprocessor symbols.
2067
2068 **** Improved C/C++ function pointer parsing.
2069
2070 **** In Python, support for converting imports to include file names.
2071
2072 **** Ability to dynamically determine the Python load path.
2073
2074 **** Support for the Python 'WITH' and 'AT' keywords.
2075
2076 **** Improved tooltip completion.
2077
2078 *** SRecode
2079
2080 **** The SRecode manual is now included.
2081
2082 **** Tag generation supports constructor/destructor settings and system
2083 include differentiation.
2084
2085 **** Addition of 'Framework' support: Frameworks are specified when a
2086 particular kind of library (such as Android) is needed in a common language
2087 mode (like Java).
2088
2089 **** Support for nested templates and let variables override based on priority.
2090
2091 **** Support for merging tables from multiple related modes, such as
2092 default -> c++ -> arduino.
2093
2094 ** Compile has a new option `compilation-always-kill'.
2095
2096 ** Customize
2097
2098 *** `custom-reset-button-menu' now defaults to t.
2099
2100 *** Non-option variables are never matched in `customize-apropos' and
2101 `customize-apropos-options' (i.e., the prefix argument does nothing for
2102 these commands now).
2103
2104 ** Term
2105
2106 *** The variables `term-default-fg-color' and `term-default-bg-color'
2107 are now deprecated in favor of the customizable face `term'.
2108
2109 *** You can customize how to display ANSI terminal colors and styles
2110 by customizing the corresponding `term-color-<COLOR>',
2111 `term-color-underline' and `term-color-bold' faces.
2112
2113 ** Tramp
2114
2115 *** The syntax has been extended in order to allow ad-hoc proxy definitions.
2116
2117 *** Remote processes are now also supported on remote MS-Windows hosts.
2118
2119 ** URL
2120
2121 *** Structs made by `url-generic-parse-url' have nil `attributes' slot.
2122 Previously, this slot stored semicolon-separated attribute-value pairs
2123 appended to some imap URLs, but this is not compatible with RFC 3986.
2124 So now the `filename' slot stores the entire path and query components,
2125 and the `attributes' slot is always nil.
2126
2127 *** New function `url-encode-url' for encoding a URI string.
2128 The `url-retrieve' function now uses this to encode its URL argument,
2129 in case that is not properly encoded.
2130
2131 ** notifications.el supports now version 1.2 of the Notifications API.
2132 The function `notifications-get-capabilities' returns the supported
2133 server properties.
2134
2135 ** Flymake uses fringe bitmaps to indicate errors and warnings.
2136 See `flymake-fringe-indicator-position', `flymake-error-bitmap' and
2137 `flymake-warning-bitmap'.
2138
2139 ** The FFAP option `ffap-url-unwrap-remote' can now be a list of strings,
2140 specifying URL types that should be converted to remote file names at
2141 the FFAP prompt. The default is now '("ftp").
2142
2143 ** New Ibuffer `derived-mode' filter, bound to `/ M'.
2144 The old binding for `/ M' (filter by used-mode) is now bound to `/ m'.
2145
2146 ** New option `mouse-avoidance-banish-position' specifies where the
2147 `banish' mouse avoidance setting moves the mouse.
2148
2149 ** In Perl mode, new option `perl-indent-parens-as-block' causes non-block
2150 closing brackets to be aligned with the line of the opening bracket.
2151
2152 ** In Proced mode, new command `proced-renice' renices marked processes.
2153
2154 ** New option `async-shell-command-buffer' specifies the buffer to use
2155 for a new asynchronous `shell-command' when the default output buffer
2156 `*Async Shell Command*' is already in use.
2157
2158 ** SQL mode has a new option `sql-db2-escape-newlines'.
2159 If non-nil, newlines sent to the command interpreter will be escaped
2160 by a backslash. The default does not escape the newlines and assumes
2161 that the sql statement will be terminated by a semicolon.
2162
2163 ** New command `tabulated-list-sort', bound to `S' in Tabulated List mode
2164 (and modes that derive from it), sorts the column at point, or the Nth
2165 column if a numeric prefix argument is given.
2166
2167 ** `which-func-modes' now defaults to t, so Which Function mode, when
2168 enabled, applies to all applicable major modes.
2169
2170 ** `winner-mode-hook' now runs when the mode is disabled, as well as when
2171 it is enabled.
2172
2173 ** Follow mode no longer works by using advice.
2174 The option `follow-intercept-processes' has been removed.
2175
2176 ** `javascript-generic-mode' is now an obsolete alias for `js-mode'.
2177
2178 ** Hooks renamed to avoid obsolete "-hooks" suffix:
2179 *** semantic-lex-reset-hooks -> semantic-lex-reset-functions
2180 *** semantic-change-hooks -> semantic-change-functions
2181 *** semantic-edits-new-change-hooks -> semantic-edits-new-change-functions
2182 *** semantic-edits-delete-change-hooks -> semantic-edits-delete-change-functions
2183 *** semantic-edits-reparse-change-hooks -> semantic-edits-reparse-change-functions
2184 *** semanticdb-save-database-hooks -> semanticdb-save-database-functions
2185 *** c-prepare-bug-report-hooks -> c-prepare-bug-report-hook
2186 *** rcirc-sentinel-hooks -> rcirc-sentinel-functions
2187 *** rcirc-receive-message-hooks -> rcirc-receive-message-functions
2188 *** rcirc-activity-hooks -> rcirc-activity-functions
2189 *** rcirc-print-hooks -> rcirc-print-functions
2190 *** dbus-event-error-hooks -> dbus-event-error-functions
2191 *** eieio-pre-method-execution-hooks -> eieio-pre-method-execution-functions
2192 *** checkdoc-style-hooks -> checkdoc-style-functions
2193 *** checkdoc-comment-style-hooks -> checkdoc-comment-style-functions
2194 *** archive-extract-hooks -> archive-extract-hook
2195 *** filesets-cache-fill-content-hooks -> filesets-cache-fill-content-hook
2196 *** hfy-post-html-hooks -> hfy-post-html-hook
2197 *** nndiary-request-create-group-hooks -> nndiary-request-create-group-functions
2198 *** nndiary-request-update-info-hooks -> nndiary-request-update-info-functions
2199 *** nndiary-request-accept-article-hooks -> nndiary-request-accept-article-functions
2200 *** gnus-subscribe-newsgroup-hooks -> gnus-subscribe-newsgroup-functions
2201
2202 ** Obsolete packages
2203
2204 *** assoc.el
2205 In most cases, assoc+member+push+delq work just as well.
2206 And in any case it's just a terrible package: ugly semantics, terrible
2207 inefficiency, and not namespace-clean.
2208 *** bruce.el
2209 *** cust-print.el
2210 *** ledit.el
2211 *** mailpost.el
2212 *** mouse-sel.el
2213 *** patcomp.el
2214
2215 \f
2216 * Incompatible Lisp Changes in Emacs 24.3
2217
2218 ** Docstrings starting with `*' no longer indicate user options.
2219 Only variables defined using `defcustom' are considered user options.
2220 The function `user-variable-p' is now an obsolete alias for
2221 `custom-variable-p'.
2222
2223 ** The return values of `defalias', `defun' and `defmacro' have changed,
2224 and are now undefined. For backwards compatibility, `defun' and
2225 `defmacro' currently return the name of the newly defined
2226 function/macro, but this should not be relied upon.
2227
2228 ** `random' by default now returns a different random sequence in
2229 every Emacs run. Use `(random S)', where S is a string, to set the
2230 random seed to a value based on S, in order to get a repeatable
2231 sequence in later calls.
2232
2233 ** If the NEWTEXT arg to `replace-match' contains a substring "\?",
2234 that substring is inserted literally even if the LITERAL arg is
2235 non-nil, instead of causing an error to be signaled.
2236
2237 ** `select-window' now always makes the window's buffer current.
2238 It does so even if the window was selected before.
2239
2240 ** The function `x-select-font' can return a font spec, instead of a
2241 font name as a string. Whether it returns a font spec or a font name
2242 depends on the graphical library.
2243
2244 ** `face-spec-set' no longer sets frame-specific attributes when the
2245 third argument is a frame (that usage was obsolete since Emacs 22.2).
2246
2247 ** `set-buffer-multibyte' now signals an error in narrowed buffers.
2248
2249 ** The CL package's `get-setf-method' function no longer exists.
2250 Generalized variables are now part of core Emacs Lisp, and implemented
2251 differently to the way cl.el used to do it. It is not possible to
2252 define a compatible replacement for `get-setf-method'. See the file
2253 gv.el for internal details of the new implementation.
2254
2255 ** The arguments of `dbus-register-signal' are no longer just strings,
2256 but keywords or keyword-string pairs. The old argument list will
2257 still be supported for Emacs 24.x.
2258
2259 ** Miscellaneous name changes
2260 Some Lisp symbols have been renamed to correct their spelling,
2261 or to be more consistent with standard Emacs terminology.
2262
2263 *** Renamed functions
2264 **** hangul-input-method-inactivate -> hangul-input-method-deactivate
2265 **** inactivate-input-method -> deactivate-input-method
2266 **** quail-inactivate -> quail-deactivate
2267 **** robin-inactivate -> robin-deactivate
2268 **** viper-inactivate-input-method -> viper-deactivate-input-method
2269 **** viper-inactivate-input-method-action ->
2270 viper-deactivate-input-method-action
2271 **** ucs-input-inactivate -> ucs-input-deactivate
2272
2273 *** Renamed hooks
2274 The old hooks are still supported for backward compatibility, but they
2275 are deprecated and will be removed eventually.
2276 **** input-method-inactivate-hook -> input-method-deactivate-hook
2277 **** robin-inactivate-hook -> robin-deactivate-hook
2278 **** quail-inactivate-hook -> quail-deactivate-hook
2279
2280 *** Renamed variables
2281 **** follow-deactive-menu -> follow-inactive-menu
2282 **** inactivate-current-input-method-function ->
2283 deactivate-current-input-method-function
2284
2285 ** Some obsolete functions, variables, and faces have been removed:
2286 *** `last-input-char', `last-command-char', `unread-command-char'
2287 *** `facemenu-unlisted-faces'
2288 *** `rmail-decode-mime-charset'
2289 *** `iswitchb-read-buffer'
2290 *** `sc-version', `sc-submit-bug-report'
2291 *** `set-char-table-default'
2292 *** `string-to-sequence' (use `string-to-list' or `string-to-vector')
2293 *** `compile-internal'
2294 *** `modeline'
2295 *** `mode-line-inverse-video'
2296 *** `follow-mode-off-hook'
2297 *** `cvs-commit-buffer-require-final-newline'
2298 (use `log-edit-require-final-newline' instead)
2299 *** `cvs-changelog-full-paragraphs'
2300 (use `log-edit-changelog-full-paragraphs' instead)
2301 *** `cvs-diff-ignore-marks', `cvs-diff-buffer-name'
2302 *** `vc-ignore-vc-files' (use `vc-handled-backends' instead)
2303 *** `vc-master-templates' (use `vc-handled-backends' instead)
2304 *** `vc-checkout-carefully'
2305
2306 \f
2307 * Lisp Changes in Emacs 24.3
2308
2309 ** CL-style generalized variables are now in core Elisp.
2310 `setf' is autoloaded; `push' and `pop' accept generalized variables.
2311 You can define your own generalized variables using `gv-define-simple-setter',
2312 `gv-define-setter', etc.
2313
2314 ** Emacs tries to macroexpand interpreted (non-compiled) files during load.
2315 This can significantly speed up execution of non-byte-compiled code,
2316 but can also bump into previously unnoticed cyclic dependencies.
2317 These are generally harmless: they will simply cause the macro calls
2318 to be left for later expansion (as before), but will result in a
2319 warning ("Eager macro-expansion skipped due to cycle") describing the cycle.
2320 You may wish to restructure your code so this does not happen.
2321
2322 ** New sampling-based Elisp profiler.
2323 Try M-x profiler-start, do some work, and then call M-x profiler-report.
2324 When finished, use M-x profiler-stop. The sampling rate can be based on
2325 CPU time or memory allocations.
2326
2327 ** `defun' also accepts a (declare DECLS) form, like `defmacro'.
2328 The interpretation of the DECLS is determined by `defun-declarations-alist'.
2329
2330 ** New macros `setq-local' and `defvar-local'.
2331
2332 ** Face underlining can now use a wave.
2333
2334 ** `read-regexp' has a new argument HISTORY; the first argument PROMPT
2335 of `read-regexp' accepts a string ending with a colon and space, and its
2336 second argument DEFAULTS can be a list of strings accessible via `M-n'
2337 in the minibuffer ahead of other hard-coded useful regexp-related values.
2338 More commands use `read-regexp' now to read their regexp arguments.
2339
2340 ** Completion
2341
2342 *** New function `completion-table-with-quoting' to handle completion
2343 in the presence of quoting, such as file completion in shell buffers.
2344
2345 *** New function `completion-table-subvert' to use an existing completion
2346 table, but with a different prefix.
2347
2348 ** Debugger
2349
2350 *** New error type and new function `user-error'.
2351 These do not trigger the debugger.
2352
2353 *** New option `debugger-bury-or-kill', saying what to do with the
2354 debugger buffer when exiting debug.
2355
2356 *** Set `debug-on-message' to enter the debugger when a certain
2357 message is displayed in the echo area. This can be useful when trying
2358 to work out which code is doing something.
2359
2360 *** New var `inhibit-debugger', automatically set to prevent accidental
2361 recursive invocations.
2362
2363 ** Window handling
2364
2365 *** New command `fit-frame-to-buffer' adjusts the frame height to
2366 fit the contents.
2367
2368 *** The command `fit-window-to-buffer' can adjust the frame height
2369 if the new option `fit-frame-to-buffer' is non-nil.
2370
2371 *** New macro `with-temp-buffer-window', similar to
2372 `with-output-to-temp-buffer'.
2373
2374 *** `temp-buffer-resize-mode' no longer resizes windows that have been
2375 reused.
2376
2377 *** New option `switch-to-buffer-preserve-window-point' to restore a
2378 window's point when switching buffers.
2379
2380 *** New display action alist entries `window-height' and `window-width'
2381 specify the size of new windows created by `display-buffer'.
2382
2383 *** New display action alist entry `pop-up-frame-parameters', if
2384 non-nil, specifies frame parameters to give any newly-created frame.
2385
2386 *** New display action alist entry `inhibit-switch-frame', if non-nil,
2387 tells display action functions to avoid changing which frame is
2388 selected.
2389
2390 *** New display action alist entry `previous-window', if non-nil,
2391 specifies window to reuse in `display-buffer-in-previous-window'.
2392
2393 *** New display action functions `display-buffer-below-selected',
2394 and `display-buffer-in-previous-window'.
2395
2396 *** The functions `get-lru-window', `get-mru-window' and `get-largest-window'
2397 now accept a third argument to avoid choosing the selected window.
2398
2399 *** Additional values recognized for option `window-combination-limit'.
2400
2401 *** The following variables are obsolete, as they can be replaced by
2402 appropriate entries in the `display-buffer-alist' function introduced
2403 in Emacs 24.1:
2404 **** `dired-shrink-to-fit'
2405 **** `display-buffer-reuse-frames'
2406 **** `display-buffer-function'
2407 **** `special-display-buffer-names'
2408 **** `special-display-frame-alist'
2409 **** `special-display-function'
2410 **** `special-display-regexps'
2411
2412 ** Time
2413
2414 *** `current-time-string' no longer requires that its argument's year
2415 must be in the range 1000..9999. It now works with any year supported
2416 by the underlying C implementation.
2417
2418 *** `current-time' now returns extended-format time stamps
2419 (HIGH LOW USEC PSEC), where the new PSEC slot specifies picoseconds.
2420 PSEC is typically a multiple of 1000 on current machines. Other
2421 functions that use this format, such as `file-attributes' and
2422 `format-time-string', have been changed accordingly. Old-format time
2423 stamps are still accepted.
2424
2425 *** The format of timers in `timer-list' and `timer-idle-list' is now
2426 [TRIGGERED-P HI-SECS LO-SECS USECS REPEAT-DELAY FUNCTION ARGS IDLE-DELAY PSECS].
2427 The PSECS slot is new, and uses picosecond resolution. It can be
2428 accessed via the new `timer--psecs' accessor.
2429
2430 *** Last-modified time stamps in undo lists now are of the form
2431 (t HI-SECS LO-SECS USECS PSECS) instead of (t HI-SECS . LO-SECS).
2432
2433 ** EIEIO
2434
2435 *** Improved security when handling persistent objects:
2436
2437 **** `eieio-persistent-read' now features optional arguments for specifying
2438 the class to load, as well as a flag stating whether subclasses are allowed;
2439 if provided, other classes will be rejected by the reader. For
2440 compatibility with existing code, if the class is omitted only a
2441 warning is issued.
2442
2443 **** New specialized reader for pulling in classes and signaling errors
2444 without evaluation of suspicious code.
2445
2446 **** All slots that contain objects must have a :type. Slots with lists
2447 of objects must use a new type predicate for a list of an object type.
2448
2449 *** Support for `find-function' and similar utilities, through the addition
2450 of filename support to generated symbols.
2451
2452 ** Floating point functions now always return special values like NaN,
2453 instead of signaling errors, if given invalid args; e.g., (log -1.0).
2454 Previously, they returned NaNs on some platforms but signaled errors
2455 on others. The affected functions are acos, asin, tan, exp, expt,
2456 log, log10, sqrt, and mod.
2457
2458 ** New fringe bitmap `exclamation-mark'.
2459
2460 ** Miscellaneous changes to special forms and macros
2461
2462 *** `defun' and `defmacro' are now macros rather than special forms.
2463
2464 *** `kbd' is now a function rather than a macro.
2465
2466 ** Miscellaneous new functions
2467
2468 *** `set-temporary-overlay-map' sets up a temporary keymap that
2469 takes precedence over most other maps for a short while (normally one key).
2470
2471 *** `autoloadp' tests if its argument is an autoloaded object.
2472
2473 *** `autoload-do-load' performs the autoloading operation.
2474
2475 *** `buffer-narrowed-p' tests if the buffer is narrowed.
2476
2477 *** `file-name-base' returns a file name sans directory and extension.
2478
2479 *** `function-get' fetches a function property, following aliases.
2480
2481 *** `posnp' tests if an object is a `posn'.
2482
2483 *** `system-users' returns the user names on the system.
2484
2485 *** `system-groups' returns the group names on the system.
2486
2487 *** `tty-top-frame' returns the topmost frame of a text terminal.
2488
2489 ** The following functions and variables are obsolete:
2490 *** `automount-dir-prefix' (use `directory-abbrev-alist')
2491 *** `buffer-has-markers-at'
2492 *** `macro-declaration-function' (use `macro-declarations-alist')
2493 *** `window-system-version' (provides no useful information)
2494 *** `dired-pop-to-buffer' (use `dired-mark-pop-up')
2495 *** `query-replace-interactive'
2496 *** `font-list-limit' (has had no effect since Emacs < 23)
2497
2498 \f
2499 * Changes in Emacs 24.3 on Non-Free Operating Systems
2500
2501 ** Cygwin builds can use the native MS Windows user interface.
2502 Pass `--with-w32' to configure. The default remains the X11 interface.
2503
2504 ** Two new functions are available in Cygwin builds:
2505 `cygwin-convert-file-name-from-windows' and
2506 `cygwin-convert-file-name-to-windows'. These functions allow Lisp
2507 code to access the Cygwin file-name mapping machinery to convert
2508 between Cygwin and Windows-native file and directory names.
2509
2510 ** When invoked with the -nw switch to run on the Windows text-mode terminal,
2511 Emacs now supports `mouse-highlight', help-echo (in the echo area), and
2512 `mouse-autoselect-window'.
2513
2514 ** On MS Windows Vista and later Emacs now supports symbolic links.
2515
2516 ** On MS Windows, you can pass `--without-libxml2' to configure.bat to omit
2517 support for libxml2, even if its presence is detected.
2518
2519 ** On Mac OS X, the Nextstep port requires OS X 10.4 or later.
2520
2521 ** On Mac OS X, configure no longer automatically adds the Fink "/sw"
2522 directories to the search path. You must add them yourself if you want them.
2523
2524 \f
2525 * Changes in Emacs 24.2
2526
2527 ** This is mainly a bug-fix release.
2528
2529 \f
2530 * Installation Changes in Emacs 24.1
2531
2532 ** Emacs can be compiled with Gtk+ 3.0 if you pass --with-x-toolkit=gtk3
2533 to configure. Note that other libraries used by Emacs, RSVG and GConf,
2534 also depend on Gtk+. You can disable them with --without-rsvg and
2535 --without-gconf.
2536
2537 ** Emacs can be compiled with GnuTLS support.
2538 This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
2539 found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
2540 `--without-gnutls'. See below for GnuTLS features.
2541
2542 ** Emacs can be compiled with SELinux support.
2543 This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
2544 found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
2545 `--without-selinux'. See below for SELinux features.
2546
2547 ** Emacs can be compiled with ImageMagick support.
2548 This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
2549 found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
2550 `--without-imagemagick'. See below for ImageMagick features.
2551 This feature is not available for the Nextstep or MS ports.
2552
2553 ** Emacs can be compiled with libxml2 support.
2554 This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
2555 found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
2556 `--without-xml2'. See below for libxml2 features.
2557
2558 ** By default, the installed Info and man pages are compressed.
2559 You can disable this by configuring --without-compress-info.
2560
2561 ** New configure option --with-wide-int.
2562 With it, Emacs integers typically have 62 bits, even on 32-bit machines.
2563 On 32-bit hosts, this raises the limit on buffer sizes from about 512 MiB
2564 to about 2 GiB.
2565
2566 ** New configure options: --with-mmdf, --with-mail-unlink, --with-mailhost.
2567 These provide no new functionality, they just remove the need to edit
2568 lib-src/Makefile by hand in order to use the associated features.
2569
2570 ** New configure option --enable-use-lisp-union-type.
2571 This is only useful for Emacs developers to debug certain types of bugs.
2572 This is not a new feature; only the configure flag is new.
2573
2574 ** The standalone programs digest-doc and sorted-doc are removed.
2575 Emacs now uses Lisp commands `doc-file-to-man' and `doc-file-to-info'.
2576
2577 ** The standalone program `fakemail' is removed.
2578 If you need it, feedmail.el provides a superset of the functionality.
2579
2580 \f
2581 * Startup Changes in Emacs 24.1
2582
2583 ** The --unibyte, --multibyte, --no-multibyte, and --no-unibyte
2584 command line arguments, and the EMACS_UNIBYTE environment variable, no
2585 longer have any effect. (They were declared obsolete in Emacs 23.)
2586
2587 ** New command line option `--no-site-lisp' removes site-lisp directories
2588 from load-path. -Q now implies this. This option does not affect the
2589 EMACSLOADPATH environment variable (and hence has no effect for
2590 Nextstep builds).
2591
2592 \f
2593 * Changes in Emacs 24.1
2594
2595 ** Completion
2596
2597 *** Many packages now use the `completion-at-point' command,
2598 rather than implementing separate completion commands.
2599
2600 *** `completion-at-point' now handles tags and semantic completion.
2601
2602 *** Completion in a non-minibuffer now tries to detect the end of completion
2603 and pops down the *Completions* buffer accordingly.
2604
2605 *** New option `completion-cycle-threshold' allows completion cycling.
2606
2607 *** New option `completion-category-overrides' for overriding the
2608 default completion style in certain circumstances.
2609
2610 *** New completion style `substring'.
2611
2612 *** Completion of buffer names uses `substring' completion by default.
2613
2614 *** The option `widget-complete-field' has been removed.
2615
2616 ** Mail changes
2617
2618 *** The first time you try sending mail, Emacs asks for a mail method.
2619 This is implemented by a new default for `send-mail-function', which
2620 is `sendmail-query-once'. This offers to use the smtpmail package, or
2621 to use the old defaults relying on external mail facilities
2622 (`sendmail-send-it' on GNU/Linux and other Unix-like systems, and
2623 `mailclient-send-it' on Windows).
2624
2625 *** Typing `C-c m' in the buffer made by `M-x report-emacs-bug'
2626 transfers the report to your desktop's preferred mail client, if there
2627 is one. This uses either the "xdg-email" utility, or Mac OS's "open"
2628 command.
2629
2630 *** See Changes in Specialized Modes and Packages for SMTPmail changes
2631 and Mail mode changes
2632
2633 ** Emacs server and client changes
2634
2635 *** New option `server-port' specifies the port for TCP Emacs servers.
2636
2637 *** New emacsclient argument -q/--quiet suppresses some status messages.
2638
2639 *** New emacsclient argument --frame-parameters specifies the frame
2640 parameters of any newly-created graphical frame.
2641
2642 *** If emacsclient shuts down due to Emacs signaling an error,
2643 its exit status is 1.
2644
2645 *** New emacsclient argument --parent-id ID.
2646 This opens a client frame in parent X window ID, via XEmbed, similar
2647 to the --parent-id argument to Emacs.
2648
2649 ** Internationalization changes
2650
2651 *** Emacs now supports display and editing of bidirectional text.
2652 Right-to-left (RTL) scripts, such as Arabic, Farsi, and Hebrew, are
2653 displayed in the correct visual order as expected by users of those
2654 scripts. The display reordering is a "full bidirectionality" class
2655 implementation of the Unicode Bidirectional Algorithm (UBA). Buffers
2656 with no RTL text should look exactly the same as before.
2657
2658 **** New buffer-local variable `bidi-display-reordering'.
2659 To disable display reordering in a buffer, change this to nil.
2660
2661 **** New buffer-local variable `bidi-paragraph-direction'.
2662 If nil (the default), Emacs determines the base direction of each
2663 paragraph from its text, as specified by the UBA. Setting the value
2664 to `right-to-left' or `left-to-right' forces a base direction on each
2665 paragraph.
2666
2667 Paragraphs with right-to-left base direction are displayed starting at
2668 the right window edge.
2669
2670 *** Enhanced support for characters with no glyphs in available fonts,
2671 or, on text terminals, characters that cannot be encoded by the
2672 terminal coding system. The new option `glyphless-char-display-control'
2673 specifies how to display them: as a hexadecimal code in a box, a thin
2674 1-pixel space, an empty box, etc.
2675
2676 *** New input methods for Farsi and Bulgarian
2677 (farsi-isiri-9147, farsi-transliterate-banan, bulgarian-alt-phonetic).
2678
2679 *** `nobreak-char-display' now also highlights Unicode hyphen chars
2680 (U+2010 and U+2011).
2681
2682 *** New Hebrew translation of the Emacs Tutorial.
2683 Type `C-u C-h t' to choose it in case your language setup doesn't
2684 automatically select it.
2685
2686 ** An Emacs Lisp package manager is now included.
2687 This is a convenient way to download and install additional packages,
2688 from a package repository at http://elpa.gnu.org.
2689
2690 *** M-x list-packages shows a list of packages, which can be
2691 selected for installation.
2692
2693 *** New command `describe-package', bound to `C-h P'.
2694
2695 *** By default, all installed packages are loaded automatically when
2696 Emacs starts up. To disable this, set `package-enable-at-startup' to
2697 nil. To specify the packages to load, customize `package-load-list'.
2698
2699 ** Custom theme changes
2700
2701 *** New command `M-x customize-themes', which provides a convenient
2702 interface for enabling and disabling Custom themes.
2703
2704 *** New option `custom-theme-load-path' is the load path for themes.
2705 Emacs no longer looks for Custom themes in `load-path'. The default
2706 value of `custom-theme-load-path' says to look for themes in
2707 `custom-theme-directory', followed by a subdirectory of
2708 `data-directory' named "themes/", which contains a small selection of
2709 built-in Custom themes.
2710
2711 *** New option `custom-safe-themes' records known-safe theme files.
2712 If a theme is not in this list, Emacs queries before loading it, and
2713 offers to save the theme to `custom-safe-themes' automatically. By
2714 default, all themes included in Emacs are treated as safe.
2715
2716 ** Improved GTK integration
2717
2718 *** GTK scroll-bars are now placed on the right by default.
2719 The function `set-scroll-bar-mode' can change this.
2720
2721 *** GTK tool bars can have just text, just images or images and text.
2722 Customize `tool-bar-style' to choose the style. On a Gnome desktop,
2723 the default is taken from desktop settings.
2724
2725 *** GTK tool bars can be placed on any edge of the frame.
2726 The frame-parameter tool-bar-position controls this. It takes the
2727 values top, left, right or bottom. The Options => Show/Hide menu has
2728 entries for this.
2729
2730 *** The default colors for selected text (the `region' face) are taken
2731 from the GTK theme when Emacs is built with GTK.
2732
2733 *** Emacs uses GTK tooltips by default if built with GTK.
2734 You can disable this by changing `x-gtk-use-system-tooltips' to nil.
2735
2736 ** Graphical interface changes
2737
2738 *** On graphical displays, the mode-line no longer ends in dashes.
2739 Also, the first dash (which does not indicate anything) is just
2740 displayed as a space.
2741
2742 *** `menu-bar-select-buffer-function' lets you choose another operation
2743 instead of `switch-to-buffer' when selecting an item in the Buffers menu.
2744
2745 *** Lucid menus and dialogs can display antialiased fonts if Emacs is
2746 built with Xft. These fonts can be set via X resources, for example:
2747 Emacs.pane.menubar.font: Courier-12
2748
2749 ** Exiting changes
2750
2751 *** Emacs now calls `kill-emacs' if it receives SIGTERM or SIGHUP,
2752 or if it receives a SIGINT signal in batch mode.
2753
2754 *** `kill-emacs-hook' is now also run in batch mode.
2755 Third-party code which adds to `kill-emacs-hook' should check if they
2756 do the right thing in batch mode.
2757
2758 ** Scrolling changes
2759
2760 *** New scrolling commands `scroll-up-command' and `scroll-down-command'
2761 (bound to C-v/[next] and M-v/[prior]) do not signal errors at top/bottom
2762 of buffer at first key-press (instead they move to top/bottom of buffer)
2763 when `scroll-error-top-bottom' is non-nil.
2764
2765 *** New option `scroll-error-top-bottom' (see above).
2766
2767 *** New scrolling commands `scroll-up-line' and `scroll-down-line'
2768 scroll a line instead of full screen.
2769
2770 *** New property `scroll-command' should be set on a command's symbol to
2771 define it as a scroll command affected by `scroll-preserve-screen-position'.
2772
2773 *** If you customize `scroll-conservatively' to a value greater than 100,
2774 Emacs will never recenter point in the window when it scrolls due to
2775 cursor motion commands or commands that move point (e.f., `M-g M-g').
2776 Previously, you needed to use `most-positive-fixnum' as the value of
2777 `scroll-conservatively' to achieve the same effect.
2778
2779 *** "Aggressive" scrolling now honors the scroll margins.
2780 If you customize `scroll-up-aggressively' or
2781 `scroll-down-aggressively' and move point off the window, Emacs now
2782 scrolls the window so as to avoid positioning point inside the scroll
2783 margin.
2784
2785 ** Basic SELinux support has been added.
2786 This requires Emacs to be linked with libselinux at build time.
2787
2788 *** Emacs preserves the SELinux file context when backing up.
2789 Also, the function `copy-file' has an extra optional argument for
2790 preserving SELinux context, and the return value of `backup-buffer'
2791 now includes the SELinux context.
2792
2793 *** New functions `file-selinux-context' and `set-file-selinux-context'
2794 get and set the SELinux context of a file.
2795
2796 ** Trash changes
2797
2798 *** `delete-by-moving-to-trash' now only affects commands that specify
2799 trashing. This avoids inadvertently trashing temporary files.
2800
2801 *** Calling `delete-file' or `delete-directory' with a prefix argument
2802 now forces true deletion, regardless of `delete-by-moving-to-trash'.
2803
2804 ** File- and directory-local variable changes
2805
2806 *** You can stop directory local vars from applying to subdirectories.
2807 Add an element (subdirs . nil) to the alist portion of any variables
2808 settings to indicate that the section should not apply to
2809 subdirectories.
2810
2811 *** Directory local variables can apply to some file-less buffers.
2812 Affected modes include dired, vc-dir, and log-edit. For example,
2813 adding "(diff-mode . ((mode . whitespace)))" to .dir-locals.el will
2814 turn on `whitespace-mode' for *vc-diff* buffers. Modes should call
2815 `hack-dir-local-variables-non-file-buffer' to support this.
2816
2817 *** Using "mode: MINOR-MODE" to enable a minor mode is deprecated.
2818 Instead, use "eval: (minor-mode 1)".
2819
2820 *** The variable `inhibit-first-line-modes-regexps' has been renamed
2821 to `inhibit-local-variables-regexps'. As the name suggests, it now
2822 applies to ALL file local variables, not just -*- lines. The
2823 associated `inhibit-first-line-modes-suffixes' has been renamed in the
2824 corresponding way.
2825
2826 ** Window changes
2827
2828 *** The `quit-window' command now restores the last buffer displayed
2829 in the quitted window.
2830
2831 *** Resizing an Emacs frame now preserves proportional window sizes,
2832 modulo restrictions like window minimum sizes and fixed-size windows.
2833
2834 *** The behavior of `display-buffer' is now customizable in detail.
2835
2836 **** New option `display-buffer-base-action' specifies a list of
2837 user-determined display "actions" (functions and optional arguments
2838 for choosing the displaying window).
2839
2840 This takes precedence over the default display action, which is
2841 specified by `display-buffer-fallback-action'.
2842
2843 **** New option `display-buffer-alist' maps buffer name regexps to
2844 display actions, taking precedence over `display-buffer-base-action'.
2845
2846 *** New option `window-combination-limit'.
2847 The new option `window-combination-limit' allows to return the space
2848 obtained for resizing or creating a window more reliably to the window
2849 from which such space was obtained.
2850
2851 *** New option `window-combination-resize'.
2852 The new option `window-combination-resize' allows to split a window that
2853 otherwise cannot be split because it's too small by stealing space from
2854 other windows in the same combination. Subsequent resizing or deletion
2855 of the window will resize all windows in the same combination as well.
2856
2857 *** New option `frame-auto-hide-function' lets you choose between
2858 iconifying or deleting a frame when burying a buffer in a dedicated
2859 frame, or quitting a window showing a buffer in a frame of its own.
2860
2861 *** New commands `maximize-window' and `minimize-window'.
2862 These maximize and minimize the size of a window within its frame.
2863
2864 *** New commands `switch-to-prev-buffer' and `switch-to-next-buffer'.
2865 These functions allow to navigate through the live buffers that have
2866 been shown in a specific window.
2867
2868 ** Minibuffer changes
2869
2870 *** The inactive minibuffer has its own major mode `minibuffer-inactive-mode'.
2871 This is handy for minibuffer-only frames, and is also used for the feature
2872 where mouse-1 pops up *Messages*"', which can now easily be changed.
2873
2874 *** Minibuffers set `truncate-lines' to nil.
2875 If you want to change the value to something else, you could use
2876 for example `minibuffer-setup-hook'.
2877
2878 ** `auto-mode-case-fold' is now enabled by default.
2879
2880 ** `backup-by-copying-when-mismatch' now defaults to t.
2881
2882 ** New basic faces `error', `warning', `success'.
2883 These are used to highlight text indicating failure, caution or
2884 successful operation.
2885
2886 ** New option `list-colors-sort' defines the color sort order
2887 for `list-colors-display'.
2888
2889 ** The variable `focus-follows-mouse' now always defaults to nil.
2890
2891 \f
2892 * Editing Changes in Emacs 24.1
2893
2894 ** Search changes
2895
2896 *** C-y in Isearch is now bound to `isearch-yank-kill', instead of
2897 `isearch-yank-line'.
2898
2899 *** M-y in Isearch is now bound to `isearch-yank-pop', instead of
2900 `isearch-yank-kill'.
2901
2902 *** M-s C-e in Isearch is now bound to `isearch-yank-line'.
2903
2904 ** New commands `count-words-region' and `count-words'.
2905
2906 *** M-= is bound to `count-words-region', not `count-lines-region'.
2907 The `count-words-region' command, when called interactively, reports
2908 the number of lines, words, and characters in the region. It is a
2909 superset of the old `count-lines-region', which is now an obsolete
2910 alias for it.
2911
2912 ** The command `just-one-space' (M-SPC), if given a negative argument,
2913 also deletes newlines around point.
2914
2915 ** Deletion changes
2916
2917 *** New option `delete-active-region'.
2918 If non-nil, [delete] and DEL delete the region if it is active and no
2919 prefix argument is given. If set to `kill', those commands kill
2920 instead.
2921
2922 *** New command `delete-forward-char', bound to [delete].
2923 This is meant for interactive use, and obeys `delete-active-region'.
2924 The command `delete-char' does not obey `delete-active-region'.
2925
2926 *** `delete-backward-char' is now a Lisp function.
2927 Apart from obeying `delete-active-region', its behavior is unchanged.
2928 However, the byte compiler now warns if it is called from Lisp; Lisp
2929 callers should use delete-char with a negative argument instead.
2930
2931 *** The option `mouse-region-delete-keys' has been deleted.
2932
2933 ** Selection changes.
2934
2935 The default handling of clipboard and primary selections has been
2936 changed to conform with modern X applications. In short, most
2937 commands for killing and yanking text now use the clipboard, while
2938 mouse commands use the primary selection.
2939
2940 In the following, we provide a list of these changes, followed by a
2941 list of steps to get the old behavior back if you prefer that.
2942
2943 *** `select-active-regions' now defaults to t.
2944 Merely selecting text (e.g. with drag-mouse-1) no longer puts it in
2945 the kill ring. The selected text is put in the primary selection, if
2946 the system possesses a separate primary selection facility (e.g. X).
2947
2948 **** `select-active-regions' also accepts a new value, `only'.
2949 This means to only set the primary selection for temporarily active
2950 regions (usually made by mouse-dragging or shift-selection);
2951 "ordinary" active regions, such as those made with C-SPC followed by
2952 point motion, do not alter the primary selection.
2953
2954 **** `mouse-drag-copy-region' now defaults to nil.
2955
2956 *** mouse-2 is now bound to `mouse-yank-primary'.
2957 This pastes from the primary selection, ignoring the kill-ring.
2958 Previously, mouse-2 was bound to `mouse-yank-at-click'.
2959
2960 *** `x-select-enable-clipboard' now defaults to t on all platforms.
2961
2962 *** `x-select-enable-primary' now defaults to nil.
2963 Thus, commands that kill text or copy it to the kill-ring (such as
2964 M-w, C-w, and C-k) also use the clipboard---not the primary selection.
2965
2966 **** The "Copy", "Cut", and "Paste" items in the "Edit" menu are now
2967 exactly equivalent to M-w, C-w, and C-y respectively.
2968
2969 **** Note that on MS-Windows, `x-select-enable-clipboard' was already
2970 non-nil by default, as Windows does not support the primary selection
2971 between applications.
2972
2973 *** To return to the previous behavior, do the following:
2974
2975 **** Change `select-active-regions' to nil.
2976 **** Change `mouse-drag-copy-region' to t.
2977 **** Change `x-select-enable-primary' to t (on X only).
2978 **** Change `x-select-enable-clipboard' to nil.
2979 **** Bind `mouse-yank-at-click' to mouse-2.
2980
2981 *** Support for X cut buffers has been removed.
2982
2983 *** X clipboard managers are now supported.
2984 To inhibit this, change `x-select-enable-clipboard-manager' to nil.
2985
2986 ** New command `C-x r N' (`rectangle-number-lines') numbers the lines
2987 in the current rectangle. With a prefix argument, this prompts for a
2988 number to count from and for a format string.
2989
2990 ** `redisplay-dont-pause' now defaults to t.
2991 This makes Emacs feel more responsive to editing commands that arrive
2992 at high rate, e.g. if you lean on some key, because stopping redisplay
2993 in the middle (when this variable is nil) forces more expensive
2994 updates later on, and Emacs appears to be unable to keep up.
2995
2996 ** The behavior of <TAB> for active regions in Text mode has changed.
2997 In Text and related modes, typing <TAB> (`indent-for-tab-command')
2998 when the region is active causes Emacs to indent all the lines in the
2999 region, aligning them with the line previous to the first line in the
3000 region (or with the left margin if there is no previous line).
3001
3002 ** When `occur' is called with a prefix argument, matching strings are
3003 collected into the `*Occur*' buffer without line numbers. If there
3004 are parenthesized subexpressions in the specified regexp, `occur'
3005 reads replacement text that may contain \\& and \\N whose convention
3006 follows `replace-match'.
3007
3008 \f
3009 * Changes in Specialized Modes and Packages in Emacs 24.1
3010
3011 ** Archive Mode has basic support for browsing and updating 7z archives.
3012
3013 ** BibTeX mode
3014
3015 *** BibTeX mode now supports biblatex.
3016 Use the variable `bibtex-dialect' to select different BibTeX dialects.
3017 `bibtex-entry-field-alist' is now an obsolete alias for
3018 `bibtex-BibTeX-entry-alist'.
3019
3020 *** New command `bibtex-search-entries', bound to C-c C-a.
3021
3022 *** New `bibtex-entry-format' option `sort-fields', disabled by default.
3023
3024 *** New variable `bibtex-search-entry-globally'.
3025
3026 ** Browse-url
3027
3028 *** New option `browse-url-mailto-function' specifies how to handle "mailto:"s.
3029
3030 *** The default browser used by the package is now the "xdg-open" program,
3031 on platforms that support it. This calls your desktop's preferred browser.
3032
3033 ** Calc
3034
3035 *** Support for musical notes.
3036
3037 *** Support for logarithmic units.
3038
3039 *** No longer uses the tex prefix for TeX specific unit names when
3040 using TeX or LaTeX mode.
3041
3042 *** New option to highlight selections using faces.
3043
3044 *** `calc-histogram' has the option of using a vector to determine the bins.
3045
3046 *** New "O" option prefix.
3047
3048 *** Use the "O" prefix to "d r" (`calc-radix') to turn on twos-complement mode.
3049
3050 ** Calendar, Diary, and Appt
3051
3052 *** Diary entries can contain non-printing "comments".
3053 See the variable `diary-comment-start'.
3054
3055 *** Appointments can specify their individual warning times.
3056 See the variable `appt-warning-time-regexp'.
3057
3058 *** The function specified by `appt-disp-window-function' may be passed
3059 lists of arguments if multiple appointments are due at similar times.
3060 If you are using a custom function for this, you should update it.
3061
3062 *** New function `diary-hebrew-birthday'.
3063
3064 *** Elements of `calendar-day-abbrev-array' and `calendar-month-abbrev-array'
3065 may no longer be nil, but must all be strings.
3066
3067 *** The obsolete (since Emacs 22.1) method of enabling the appt
3068 package by adding `appt-make-list' to `diary-hook' has been removed.
3069 Use `appt-activate' instead.
3070
3071 *** Some appt variables (obsolete since Emacs 22.1) have been removed:
3072 appt-issue-message (use the function appt-activate)
3073 appt-visible/appt-msg-window (use the variable appt-display-format)
3074
3075 *** Some diary function aliases (obsolete since Emacs 22.1) have been removed:
3076 view-diary-entries, list-diary-entries, show-all-diary-entries
3077
3078 ** CC Mode
3079
3080 *** New feature to "guess" the style in an existing buffer.
3081 The main entry point is M-x c-guess.
3082
3083 *** Java Mode now supports Java 5.0 (Tiger) and 6 (Mustang).
3084
3085 *** `c-beginning-of-defun' and `c-end-of-defun' now respect nested scopes.
3086 Thus C-M-a will, by default, go to the beginning of the immediate function,
3087 not the top level.
3088
3089 *** "Macros with semicolons" can be registered for correct indentation.
3090 Where such a macro ends a line (no semicolon) the next statement is no longer
3091 parsed as a statement continuation.
3092
3093 ** Comint and modes derived from it use the standard completion code.
3094
3095 ** Compilation mode
3096
3097 *** Compilation mode can be used without Font Lock mode.
3098 `compilation-parse-errors-function' is now obsolete.
3099
3100 *** New variable `compilation-filter-start', which is bound while
3101 `compilation-filter-hook' runs. It records the start position of the
3102 text inserted by `compilation-filter'.
3103
3104 *** `compilation-error-screen-columns' and `compilation-first-column'
3105 are obeyed in the editing buffer. So programming language modes can
3106 set them, whereas previously only the value in the *Compilation*
3107 buffer was used.
3108
3109 ** Customize
3110
3111 *** Customize buffers now contain a search field.
3112 The search is performed using `customize-apropos'.
3113 To turn off the search field, set `custom-search-field' to nil.
3114
3115 *** Options in customize group buffers start out hidden if not customized.
3116 Use the arrow to the left of the option name to toggle visibility.
3117
3118 *** custom-buffer-sort-alphabetically now defaults to t.
3119
3120 *** The color widget now has a "Choose" button, which allows you to
3121 choose a color via `list-colors-display'.
3122
3123 ** D-Bus
3124
3125 *** It is now possible to access buses other than the default system
3126 or session bus.
3127
3128 *** The `dbus-register-method' and `dbus-register-property' functions
3129 optionally do not register names.
3130
3131 *** The new function `dbus-register-service' registers a known service
3132 name on a D-Bus without also registering a property or a method.
3133
3134 ** Dired-x
3135
3136 *** C-x C-j (`dired-jump') and C-x 4 C-j (`dired-jump-other-window'),
3137 if called with a prefix argument, read a file name from the minibuffer
3138 instead of using the current buffer.
3139
3140 *** The "dired local variables" feature of Dired-x is obsolete.
3141 The standard directory local variables feature replaces it.
3142
3143 ** ERC changes
3144
3145 *** New options `erc-autojoin-timing' and `erc-autojoin-delay',
3146 controlling attempts to autojoin a channel.
3147
3148 *** New variable `erc-coding-system-precedence': If we use `undecided'
3149 as the server coding system, this variable will then be consulted.
3150 The default is to decode strings that can be decoded as utf-8 as
3151 utf-8, and do the normal `undecided' decoding for the rest.
3152
3153 ** Eshell changes
3154
3155 *** The default value of `eshell-directory-name' has changed
3156 to be an "eshell" directory in `user-emacs-directory'.
3157 The old "~/.eshell/" directory is still used if it exists, though.
3158
3159 ** gdb-mi
3160
3161 *** The M-x gdb command now uses the GDB Machine Interface protocol.
3162 It now supports multithread non-stop debugging and simultaneous
3163 debugging of several threads.
3164
3165 ** Image mode
3166
3167 *** RET (`image-toggle-animation') toggles animation, if applicable.
3168 Animation plays once, unless the option `image-animate-loop' is non-nil.
3169
3170 ** Info
3171
3172 *** New command M-x info-display-manual displays a named Info manual.
3173 If that manual is already visited in some Info buffer, it displays
3174 that buffer. (This is handy if you have many manuals in many *info*
3175 buffers, and don't remember the name of the buffer visiting the manual
3176 you want to consult.) Otherwise, it loads and displays the manual.
3177
3178 *** `e' is now bound to `end-of-buffer' rather than to `Info-edit'.
3179 This is for compatibility with the stand-alone Info reader program,
3180 and also because `Info-edit' is a rarely used command that is disabled
3181 by default.
3182
3183 ** Mail mode changes (not Message mode)
3184
3185 *** New command M-x mail-add-attachment for adding MIME attachments
3186
3187 *** The command M-x mail-attach-file was renamed to M-x mail-insert-file.
3188 (Its name is misleading, since it has nothing to do with MIME
3189 attachments.) The old name is now an obsolete alias to the new name.
3190
3191 ** MH-E has been updated to MH-E version 8.3.1.
3192 See MH-E-NEWS for details.
3193
3194 ** Modula-2 mode provides auto-indentation.
3195
3196 ** mpc.el: Can use pseudo tags of the form tag1|tag2 as a union of two tags.
3197
3198 ** nXML mode no longer binds C-RET to `nxml-complete'.
3199 Completion is now performed via `completion-at-point', bound to C-M-i
3200 or M-TAB. If `nxml-bind-meta-tab-to-complete-flag' is non-nil (the
3201 default), this performs tag completion.
3202
3203 ** Org mode has been updated to version 7.8.09.
3204 See ORG-NEWS for details.
3205
3206 ** Prolog mode has been completely revamped, with lots of additional
3207 functionality such as more intelligent indentation, electricity,
3208 support for more variants, including Mercury, and a lot more.
3209
3210 ** Rmail
3211
3212 *** The command `rmail-epa-decrypt' decrypts OpenPGP data
3213 in the Rmail incoming message.
3214
3215 *** The variable `rmail-message-filter' no longer has any effect.
3216 This change was made in Emacs 23.1 but was not advertised at the time.
3217 Try using `rmail-show-message-hook' instead.
3218
3219 ** Shell mode
3220
3221 *** M-x shell prompts for the shell path name if the default directory
3222 is a remote file name and neither the environment variable $ESHELL nor
3223 the variable `explicit-shell-file-name' is set.
3224
3225 *** TAB is now bound to the standard `completion-at-point' command,
3226 which now implements the pcomplete rules for shell command completion.
3227
3228 ** SMTPmail
3229
3230 *** SMTPmail now uses encrypted connections (via STARTTLS) by default
3231 if the mail server supports them. This uses either built-in GnuTLS
3232 support, or the starttls.el library. Customize `smtpmail-stream-type'
3233 to change this.
3234
3235 *** The variable `smtpmail-auth-credentials' has been removed.
3236 By default, the information is now stored in the file ~/.authinfo.
3237 This was the default value of smtpmail-auth-credentials. If you had
3238 customized smtpmail-auth-credentials to a list of user names and
3239 passwords, those settings are not used. During your first connection
3240 to the smtp server, Emacs will prompt for the user name and password,
3241 and offer to save them to ~/.authinfo. Or you can manually copy the
3242 credentials to ~/.authinfo. For example, if you had
3243
3244 (setq smtpmail-auth-credentials
3245 '(("mail.example.org" 25 "jim" "s!cret")))
3246
3247 then the equivalent line in ~/.authinfo would be
3248
3249 machine mail.example.org port 25 login jim password s!cret
3250
3251 See the auth-source manual for more information, e.g. on encrypting
3252 the credentials file.
3253
3254 *** The variable `smtpmail-starttls-credentials' has been removed.
3255 If you had that set, you need to put
3256
3257 machine smtp.whatever.foo port 25 key "~/.my_smtp_tls.key" cert "~/.my_smtp_tls.cert"
3258
3259 in your ~/.authinfo file instead.
3260
3261 *** SMTPmail defaults to using the address in the From: header as the
3262 SMTP MAIL FROM envelope. To override this, set `mail-envelope-from'
3263 to the address you wish to use instead.
3264
3265 ** SQL mode
3266
3267 *** New options `sql-port', `sql-connection-alist', `sql-send-terminator',
3268 and `sql-oracle-scan-on'.
3269
3270 *** New options controlling prompting for login parameters.
3271 Each supported product has a custom variable `sql-*-login-params',
3272 which is a list of the parameters to be prompted for before a
3273 connection is established.
3274
3275 *** The command `sql-product-interactive' now takes a prefix argument,
3276 which causes it to prompt for an SQL product.
3277
3278 *** Product-specific SQL interactive commands now take prefix arguments.
3279 These commands (`sql-sqlite', `sql-postgres', `sql-mysql', etc.),
3280 given a prefix argument, prompt for a name for the SQL interactive
3281 buffer. This reduces the need for calling `sql-rename-buffer'.
3282
3283 *** SQL interactive modes suppress command continuation prompts, and
3284 replace tabs with spaces. The first change impacts multiple line SQL
3285 statements entered with C-j between each line, statements yanked into
3286 the buffer and statements sent with `sql-send-*' functions. The
3287 second prevents the MySQL and Postgres interpreters from listing
3288 object name completions when sent text via `sql-send-*' functions.
3289
3290 *** New command `sql-connect' starts a predefined SQLi session,
3291 using the login parameters from `sql-connection-alist'.
3292
3293 *** New "Save Connection" menu item in SQLi buffers.
3294 This gathers the login params specified for the SQLi session, if it
3295 was not started by a connection, and saves them as a new connection.
3296
3297 *** New commands for listing database objects and details:
3298 sql-list-all and sql-list-table.
3299
3300 *** An API for manipulating SQL product definitions has been added.
3301
3302 ** TeX modes
3303
3304 *** latex-electric-env-pair-mode keeps \begin..\end matched on the fly.
3305
3306 ** Tramp
3307
3308 *** New inline access method "ksu" (kerberized su).
3309
3310 *** The following access methods are discontinued: "ssh1_old",
3311 "ssh2_old", "scp1_old", "scp2_old", "imap", "imaps" and "fish".
3312
3313 *** The user option `remote-file-name-inhibit-cache' controls whether
3314 remote file attributes are cached for better performance.
3315
3316 *** The option `ange-ftp-binary-file-name-regexp' has changed its
3317 default value to "".
3318
3319 *** Handlers for `file-selinux-context' and `set-file-selinux-context'
3320 for remote machines which support SELinux.
3321
3322 ** New function `url-queue-retrieve', which behaves like url-retrieve,
3323 but with limits (`url-queue-parallel-processes', `url-queue-timeout') on
3324 the degree of parallelism.
3325
3326 ** VC and related modes
3327
3328 *** Support for pulling on distributed version control systems.
3329 The command C-x v + (`vc-pull') runs a "pull" operation, if it is
3330 supported (currently with Bzr, Git, and Mercurial), to update the
3331 current branch and working tree. A prefix argument means to prompt
3332 the user for specifics, e.g. a pull location.
3333
3334 *** `vc-update' is now an alias for `vc-pull'.
3335
3336 *** Support for merging on distributed version control systems.
3337 The command C-x v m (`vc-merge') now runs a "merge" operation, if it
3338 is supported (currently with Bzr, Git, and Mercurial), to merge
3339 changes from another branch into the current one. It prompts for
3340 specifics, e.g. a merge source.
3341
3342 *** New option `vc-revert-show-diff' controls whether `vc-revert'
3343 shows a diff while querying the user. It defaults to t.
3344
3345 *** Log entries in some Log View buffers can be toggled to display a
3346 longer description by typing RET (log-view-toggle-entry-display).
3347 This is currently supported for Bzr, Git, and Mercurial (to support
3348 another backend, define a `log-view-expanded-log-entry-function').
3349 In the Log View buffers made by C-x v L (`vc-print-root-log'), you can
3350 use this to display the full log entry for the revision at point.
3351
3352 *** New command `vc-ediff' allows visual comparison of two revisions
3353 of a file similar to `vc-diff', but using ediff backend.
3354
3355 *** The option `vc-initial-comment' was removed in Emacs 23.2, but
3356 this was not advertised at the time.
3357
3358 *** `vc-toggle-read-only' is an obsolete alias for `toggle-read-only'.
3359 Since Emacs 23, it has done the same thing as `toggle-read-only', but
3360 this was not advertised at the time.
3361
3362 ** Obsolete modes
3363
3364 *** abbrevlist.el
3365
3366 *** erc-hecomplete.el (use erc-pcomplete.el instead)
3367
3368 *** partial-completion-mode (complete.el) is obsolete.
3369 You can get a comparable behavior with:
3370 (setq completion-styles '(partial-completion initials))
3371 (setq completion-pcm-complete-word-inserts-delimiters t)
3372
3373 *** pc-mode.el is obsolete (CUA mode is much more comprehensive).
3374
3375 *** pgg is obsolete (use EasyPG instead).
3376
3377 *** sregex.el is obsolete, since rx.el is a strict superset.
3378
3379 *** s-region.el and pc-select.el are obsolete.
3380 They are superseded by shift-select-mode, enabled by default since 23.1.
3381
3382 *** vc-mcvs.el is obsolete (for lack of a maintainer).
3383
3384 ** Miscellaneous
3385
3386 *** The Landmark game is now invoked with `landmark', not `lm'.
3387 Its functions and variables have been similarly renamed.
3388
3389 *** In `ido-file-completion-map', C-v is no longer bound to `ido-toggle-vc'.
3390 (This interfered with cua-mode.)
3391
3392 *** f90.el has some support for Fortran 2008 syntax.
3393
3394 *** `copyright-fix-years' can optionally convert consecutive years to ranges.
3395
3396 *** New command `nato-region' converts text to NATO phonetic alphabet.
3397
3398 \f
3399 * New Modes and Packages in Emacs 24.1
3400
3401 ** Occur Edit mode applies edits made in *Occur* buffers to the
3402 original buffers. It is bound to "e" in Occur mode.
3403
3404 ** New global minor mode electric-pair-mode.
3405 When enabled, typing an open parenthesis automatically inserts the
3406 matching closing one.
3407
3408 ** New global minor mode electric-indent-mode.
3409 When enabled, typing certain characters triggers reindentation.
3410 Major modes wishing to use this can set electric-indent-chars or
3411 electric-indent-functions.
3412
3413 ** New global minor mode electric-layout-mode.
3414 When enabled, typing certain characters automatically inserts newlines.
3415 Major modes wishing to use this can set electric-layout-rules.
3416
3417 ** tabulated-list.el provides a generic major mode for tabulated data,
3418 from which other modes can be derived.
3419
3420 ** pcase.el provides the ML-style pattern matching macro `pcase'.
3421
3422 ** secrets.el is an implementation of the Secret Service API, an
3423 interface to password managers like GNOME Keyring or KDE Wallet. The
3424 Secret Service API requires D-Bus for communication. The command
3425 `secrets-show-secrets' offers a buffer with a visualization of the
3426 secrets.
3427
3428 ** notifications.el provides an implementation of the Desktop
3429 Notifications API. It requires D-Bus for communication.
3430
3431 ** soap-client.el supports access to SOAP web services from Emacs.
3432 soap-inspect.el is an interactive inspector for SOAP WSDL structures.
3433
3434 ** New generic mode, xmodmap-generic-mode, for xmodmap files.
3435
3436 ** New emacs-lock.el package.
3437 The previous version has been moved to obsolete/old-emacs-lock.el.
3438 Now, there is a proper minor mode `emacs-lock-mode'. Protection
3439 against exiting Emacs and killing the buffer can be set separately.
3440 The mechanism for automatically turning off protection for buffers
3441 with dead inferior processes has been generalized.
3442
3443 \f
3444 * Incompatible Lisp Changes in Emacs 24.1
3445
3446 ** Passing a nil argument to a minor mode function call now ENABLES
3447 the minor mode unconditionally. This is so that you can write e.g.
3448
3449 (add-hook 'text-mode-hook 'foo-mode)
3450
3451 to enable foo-mode in Text mode buffers, removing the need for
3452 `turn-on-foo-mode' style functions. This affects all mode commands
3453 defined by `define-minor-mode'. If called interactively, the mode
3454 command still toggles the minor mode.
3455
3456 ** The return value of `backup-buffer' has changed.
3457 It is now a list of three elements, where the second element is a list
3458 describing the original file's SELinux context. If Emacs or the
3459 system lacks SELinux support, the context list is (nil nil nil nil).
3460 See "Basic SELinux support" above, under "Changes in Emacs 24.1".
3461
3462 ** `char-direction-table' and the `char-direction' function were deleted.
3463 They were buggy and inferior to the new support of bidirectional
3464 editing introduced in Emacs 24. If you need the bidirectional
3465 properties of a character, use `get-char-code-property' with the last
3466 argument `bidi-class'.
3467
3468 ** `copy-directory' now copies the source directory as a subdirectory
3469 of the target directory, if the latter is an existing directory. The
3470 new optional arg COPY-CONTENTS, if non-nil, makes the function copy
3471 the contents directly into a pre-existing target directory.
3472
3473 ** For mouse click input events in the text area, the Y pixel
3474 coordinate in the POSITION list now counts from the top of the text
3475 area, excluding any header line. Previously, it counted from the top
3476 of the header line.
3477
3478 ** Support for "old-style" backquotes, obsolete for 10+ years, has
3479 been further reduced. Now a backquote not followed by a space is
3480 always treated as a "new-style" backquote. Please remove all
3481 "old-style" backquotes from your code. If your code uses backquotes
3482 as documented in the Elisp manual, and compiles without warning, then
3483 you have nothing to do in this regard. Code not following the
3484 appropriate conventions may fail to compile.
3485
3486 The most common cause of trouble seems to be an old-style backquote
3487 followed by a newline. Another cause of trouble is vector notation
3488 for key sequence notation: instead of [(control ,)] and [(control ')],
3489 you should write [(control ?,)] and [(control ?')], which will work in
3490 older Emacsen too.
3491
3492 ** The macro `eval-at-startup' was removed in Emacs 23.2, but this
3493 was not advertised at the time. The function `custom-initialize-delay'
3494 replaced all known uses.
3495
3496 ** `view-buffer' now treats special mode-class in the same way that
3497 `view-file' has since Emacs 22 (i.e. it won't enable View mode if the
3498 major mode is special).
3499
3500 ** Menu and tool bar changes
3501
3502 *** During startup, Emacs no longer adds entries for `menu-bar-lines'
3503 and `tool-bar-lines' to `default-frame-alist' and `initial-frame-alist'.
3504 With these alist entries omitted, `make-frame' checks the value of the
3505 variable `menu-bar-mode'/`tool-bar-mode' to determine whether to create
3506 a menu-bar or tool-bar, respectively. If the alist entries are added,
3507 they override the value of `menu-bar-mode'/`tool-bar-mode'.
3508
3509 *** The menu bar bindings's caches are not used any more.
3510 Use (where-is-internal <def> nil t) instead.
3511
3512 ** Regions created by mouse dragging are now normal active regions,
3513 similar to those created by shift-selection (see Selection changes
3514 above). In previous Emacs versions, these regions were delineated by
3515 `mouse-drag-overlay'; that variable has been removed.
3516
3517 ** The fourth argument of `filter-buffer-substring' has been removed.
3518 If you want to remove text properties from the final result, simply
3519 pass the result through substring-no-properties.
3520
3521 ** cl.el no longer provides `cl-19'.
3522
3523 ** The following obsolete functions and aliases have been removed
3524 (the appropriate new function is given in parentheses; "not needed"
3525 means you can just remove all calls to the function in question):
3526
3527 *** `comint-kill-output' (`comint-delete-output')
3528 *** `decompose-composite-char' (`char-to-string')
3529 *** `outline-visible' (`outline-invisible-p')
3530 *** `internal-find-face' (`facep')
3531 *** `internal-get-face' (`facep and check-face')
3532 *** `frame-update-faces' (not needed)
3533 *** `frame-update-face-colors' (`frame-set-background-mode')
3534 *** `x-frob-font-weight' and `x-frob-font-slant' (`make-face-*' functions)
3535 *** `x-make-font-bold' and `x-make-font-demibold' (`make-face-bold')
3536 *** `x-make-font-italic' and `x-make-font-oblique' (`make-face-italic')
3537 *** `x-make-font-bold-italic' (`make-face-bold-italic')
3538 *** `x-make-font-unbold' (`make-face-unbold')
3539 *** `x-make-font-unitalic' (`make-face-unitalic')
3540 *** `mldrag-drag-mode-line' (`mouse-drag-mode-line')
3541 *** `mldrag-drag-vertical-line' (`mouse-drag-vertical-line')
3542 *** `iswitchb-default-keybindings' (`iswitchb-mode')
3543 *** `char-bytes' (== 1)
3544 *** `isearch-return-char' (`isearch-printing-char')
3545 *** `make-local-hook' (not needed)
3546 *** `set-screen-height' (`set-frame-height')
3547 *** `set-screen-width' (`set-frame-width')
3548
3549 ** The following obsolete variables and varaliases have been removed
3550 (the appropriate new variable is given in parentheses):
3551
3552 *** `checkdoc-minor-keymap' (`checkdoc-minor-mode-map')
3553 *** `vc-header-alist' (`vc-BACKEND-header')
3554 *** `directory-sep-char' (== ?/)
3555 *** `font-lock-defaults-alist' (`font-lock-defaults')
3556 *** `e' (`float-e').
3557
3558 ** The following obsolete files were removed:
3559 sc.el, x-menu.el, rnews.el, rnewspost.el
3560
3561 ** The format of the finder-inf.el file has changed, since the Finder
3562 mechanism is now based on the package system. The variable
3563 `finder-package-info' is replaced by `package--builtins' and
3564 `finder-keywords-hash'.
3565
3566 ** When generating autoloads, `update-directory-autoloads' no longer
3567 assumes every inspected file is in your `load-path'. It instead
3568 generates relative names according to the current `load-path'.
3569
3570 \f
3571 * Lisp Changes in Emacs 24.1
3572
3573 ** Code can now use lexical scoping by default instead of dynamic scoping.
3574 The `lexical-binding' variable enables lexical scoping for local
3575 variables. It is typically set via a file-local variable in the first
3576 line of the file, in which case it applies to all the code in that
3577 file.
3578
3579 *** `eval' takes a new optional argument `lexical' to choose the new lexical
3580 binding instead of the old dynamic binding mode.
3581
3582 *** Lexically scoped interpreted functions are represented with a new form
3583 of function value which looks like (closure ENV ARGS &rest BODY).
3584
3585 *** New macro `letrec' to define recursive local functions.
3586
3587 *** `defvar' and `defconst' now mark the variable as special (dynamic).
3588 So do `defcustom' and other forms that call `defvar' as a subroutine.
3589
3590 *** New function `special-variable-p' to check whether a variable is
3591 declared as dynamically bound.
3592
3593 *** The form ((lambda ...) ...) is deprecated.
3594
3595 ** An Emacs Lisp testing tool is now included.
3596 Emacs Lisp developers can use this tool to write automated tests for
3597 their code. See the ERT info manual for details.
3598
3599 ** Changes for bidirectional display and editing
3600
3601 *** New function `current-bidi-paragraph-direction'.
3602 This returns the base direction of the paragraph at point.
3603
3604 *** New function `bidi-string-mark-left-to-right'.
3605 Given a string containing characters from right-to-left scripts, this
3606 function returns another string which can be safely inserted into a
3607 buffer, such that any following text will be always displayed to the
3608 right of that string. (This works by appending an invisible Unicode
3609 "LEFT-TO-RIGHT MARK" character if the argument string might need it.)
3610
3611 This is useful when the buffer has overall left-to-right paragraph
3612 direction and you need to insert a string whose contents are not known
3613 in advance, without disrupting the layout of the line.
3614
3615 ** Window changes
3616
3617 *** Window tree functions are accessible in Elisp.
3618 Functions are provided to return the parent, siblings or child windows
3619 of any window including internal windows (windows not associated with a
3620 buffer) in the window tree.
3621
3622 **** New function `window-valid-p' gives non-nil for live and internal
3623 windows.
3624
3625 **** Window manipulation can deal with internal windows.
3626 Many window handling functions like `split-window', `delete-window', or
3627 `delete-other-windows' as well as the window resizing functions can now
3628 act on any window including internal ones.
3629
3630 *** window-total-height/-width vs window-body-height/-width.
3631 The function `window-height' has been renamed to `window-total-height'
3632 and `window-width' has been renamed to `window-body-width'. The old
3633 names are provided as aliases. Two new functions `window-total-width'
3634 and `window-body-height' are provided.
3635
3636 *** Window parameters specific to window handling functions.
3637 For each window you can specify a parameter to override the default
3638 behavior of a number of functions like `split-window', `delete-window'
3639 and `delete-other-windows'. The variable `ignore-window-parameters'
3640 allows to ignore processing such parameters.
3641
3642 *** New semantics of third argument of `split-window'.
3643 The third argument of `split-window' has been renamed to SIDE and can be
3644 set to any of the values 'below, 'right, 'above, or 'left to make the
3645 new window appear on the corresponding side of the window that shall be
3646 split. Any other value of SIDE will cause `split-window' to split the
3647 window into two side-by-side windows as before.
3648
3649 *** Window resizing functions.
3650 A new standard function for resizing windows called `window-resize' has
3651 been introduced. This and all other functions for resizing windows no
3652 longer delete any windows when they become too small.
3653
3654 *** Deleting the selected window now selects the most recently selected
3655 live window on that frame instead.
3656
3657 *** `adjust-window-trailing-edge' adjustments.
3658 `adjust-window-trailing-edge' can now deal with fixed-size windows and
3659 is able to resize other windows if a window adjacent to the trailing
3660 edge cannot be shrunk any more. This makes its behavior more similar to
3661 that of Emacs 21 without compromising, however, its inability to delete
3662 windows which was introduced in Emacs 22.
3663
3664 *** Window-local buffer lists.
3665 Windows now have local buffer lists. This means that removing a buffer
3666 from display in a window will preferably show the buffer previously
3667 shown in that window with its previous window-start and window-point
3668 positions. This also means that the same buffer may be automatically
3669 shown twice even if it already appears in another window.
3670
3671 *** `switch-to-buffer' has a new optional argument FORCE-SAME-WINDOW,
3672 which if non-nil requires the buffer to be displayed in the currently
3673 selected window, signaling an error otherwise. If nil, another window
3674 can be used, e.g. if the selected one is strongly dedicated.
3675
3676 *** `split-window-vertically' and `split-window-horizontally' renamed
3677 to `split-window-below' and `split-window-right' respectively.
3678 The old names are kept as aliases.
3679
3680 *** Display actions
3681
3682 **** The second arg to `display-buffer' and `pop-to-buffer' is now
3683 named ACTION, and takes a display action of the same form as
3684 `display-buffer-base-action' (see Changes, above). A non-nil,
3685 non-list value is treated specially, as the old meaning.
3686
3687 **** New variable `display-buffer-overriding-action'.
3688
3689 **** The procedure of `display-buffer' etc. to choose a window is
3690 determined by combining `display-buffer-overriding-action',
3691 `display-buffer-alist', the ACTION arg, `display-buffer-base-action',
3692 and `display-buffer-fallback-action'. The second and fourth of these
3693 are user-customizable variables.
3694
3695 See the docstring of `display-buffer' for details.
3696
3697 *** New functions `window-state-get' and `window-state-put'.
3698 These functions allow to save and restore the state of an arbitrary
3699 frame or window as an Elisp object.
3700
3701 ** Completion
3702
3703 *** New variable `completion-extra-properties' used to specify extra
3704 properties of the current completion:
3705 - :annotate-function, same as the old completion-annotate-function.
3706 - :exit-function, function to call after completion took place.
3707
3708 *** Functions on `completion-at-point-functions' can return any of the
3709 properties valid for `completion-extra-properties'.
3710
3711 *** `completion-annotate-function' is obsolete.
3712
3713 *** New `metadata' method for completion tables. The metadata thus returned
3714 can specify various details of the data returned by `all-completions':
3715 - `category' is the kind of objects returned (e.g., `buffer', `file', ...),
3716 used to select a style in completion-category-overrides.
3717 - `annotation-function' to add annotations in *Completions*.
3718 - `display-sort-function' to specify how to sort entries in *Completions*.
3719 - `cycle-sort-function' to specify how to sort entries when cycling.
3720
3721 *** `minibuffer-local-filename-must-match-map' is not used any more.
3722 Instead, the bindings in `minibuffer-local-filename-completion-map'
3723 are combined with `minibuffer-local-must-match-map'.
3724
3725 *** New variable `completing-read-function' allows overriding the
3726 behavior of `completing-read'.
3727
3728 ** `glyphless-char-display' can now distinguish between graphical and
3729 text terminal display, via a char-table entry that is a cons cell.
3730
3731 ** `pre-command-hook'/`post-command-hook' are not reset to nil on error.
3732 Instead, the offending function is removed.
3733
3734 ** New hook types
3735
3736 *** New function `run-hook-wrapped' for running an abnormal hook by
3737 passing the hook functions as arguments to a "wrapping" function.
3738 Like `run-hook-with-args-until-success', it stops at the first
3739 non-nil return value.
3740
3741 *** New macro `with-wrapper-hook' for running an abnormal hook as a
3742 set of "wrapping" filters, similar to around advice.
3743 (A version of this macro was actually added in Emacs 23.2 but was not
3744 advertised at the time.)
3745
3746 ** Debugger changes
3747
3748 *** New macro `condition-case-unless-debug' (this was actually added in
3749 Emacs 23.1 as condition-case-no-debug, but not advertised)
3750
3751 *** The macro `with-demoted-errors' was added in Emacs 23.1, but not advertised.
3752
3753 *** Variable `stack-trace-on-error' removed.
3754
3755 *** The debugger can now "continue" from an error, which means it will
3756 jump to the error handler as if the debugger had not been invoked
3757 instead of jumping all the way to the top-level.
3758
3759 *** Set `debug-on-event' to enter the debugger on events like SIGUSR1.
3760 This can be useful when `inhibit-quit' is set.
3761
3762 ** The new function `server-eval-at' allows evaluation of Lisp forms on
3763 named Emacs server instances.
3764
3765 ** `call-process' and `call-process-region' allow a `(:file "file")' spec
3766 to redirect STDOUT to a file.
3767
3768 ** The function `format-time-string' now supports the %N directive,
3769 for higher-resolution time stamps.
3770
3771 ** New input reading functions
3772
3773 *** New function `read-char-choice' reads a restricted set of
3774 characters, discarding any inputs not inside the set.
3775
3776 *** The command `read-color' now requires a match for a color name
3777 or RGB triplet, instead of signaling an error if the user provides
3778 invalid input.
3779
3780 **** `facemenu-read-color' is now an alias for `read-color'.
3781
3782 ** `image-library-alist' is renamed to `dynamic-library-alist'.
3783 The variable is now used to load all kind of supported dynamic libraries,
3784 not just image libraries. The previous name is still available as an
3785 obsolete alias.
3786
3787 ** Syntax parsing changes
3788
3789 *** New variable `syntax-propertize-function'.
3790 This replaces `font-lock-syntactic-keywords' which is now obsolete.
3791 This allows syntax-table properties to be set independently from font-lock:
3792 just call syntax-propertize to make sure the text is propertized.
3793 Together with this new variable come a new hook
3794 syntax-propertize-extend-region-functions, as well as two helper functions:
3795 syntax-propertize-via-font-lock to reuse old font-lock-syntactic-keywords
3796 as-is; and syntax-propertize-rules which provides a new way to specify
3797 syntactic rules.
3798
3799 *** Syntax tables support a new "comment style c" additionally to style b.
3800
3801 ** New hook `post-self-insert-hook', run after `self-insert-command'.
3802
3803 ** frame-local variables cannot be let-bound any more.
3804
3805 ** Major and minor mode changes
3806
3807 *** `set-auto-mode' now respects mode: local variables at the end of files,
3808 as well as those in the -*- line.
3809
3810 *** `prog-mode' is a new major mode from which programming modes
3811 should be derived.
3812
3813 **** `prog-mode-hook' can be used to enable features for programming
3814 modes, e.g. (add-hook 'prog-mode-hook 'flyspell-prog-mode) to enable
3815 on-the-fly spell checking for comments and strings.
3816
3817 *** New hook `change-major-mode-after-body-hook', run by
3818 `run-mode-hooks' just before any other mode hooks.
3819
3820 *** Enabled globalized minor modes can be disabled in specific major modes.
3821 If the global mode is global-FOO-mode, then run (FOO-mode -1) in the
3822 major mode's hook, where FOO-mode toggles the mode on a per-buffer basis.
3823
3824 *** `define-minor-mode' accepts new keywords :variable, :after-hook.
3825
3826 ** File-handling changes
3827
3828 *** `delete-file' and `delete-directory' now accept optional arg TRASH.
3829 Trashing is performed if TRASH and `delete-by-moving-to-trash' are
3830 both non-nil. Interactively, TRASH defaults to t, unless a prefix
3831 argument is supplied (see Trash changes, above).
3832
3833 *** New file predicates: `file-equal-p', `file-in-directory-p'.
3834
3835 ** Tool-bars can display separators.
3836 Tool-bar separators are handled like menu separators in menu-bar maps,
3837 i.e. via menu entries of the form `(menu-item "--")'.
3838
3839 ** Image API
3840
3841 *** Animated images support (currently animated gifs only).
3842
3843 **** `image-animated-p' returns non-nil if an image can be animated.
3844
3845 **** `image-animate' animates a supplied image spec.
3846
3847 **** `image-animate-timer' returns the timer object for an image that
3848 is being animated.
3849
3850 *** `image-extension-data' has been renamed to `image-metadata'.
3851 The old name is an obsolete alias to the new one.
3852
3853 *** Image mode can view any image type that ImageMagick supports.
3854 This requires Emacs to be built with ImageMagick support.
3855
3856 **** New function `imagemagick-types', defined if ImageMagick support
3857 is enabled, returns a list of image file extensions that your
3858 ImageMagick installation supports.
3859
3860 **** New function `imagemagick-register-types' enables ImageMagick
3861 image types in Image mode and in `create-image' and other helper
3862 functions.
3863
3864 **** New option `imagemagick-types-inhibit' excludes certain
3865 ImageMagick image types from `imagemagick-register-types'.
3866
3867 **** With ImageMagick support, there are extra Image mode commands to
3868 resize and rotate images: `image-transform-fit-to-height',
3869 `image-transform-fit-to-width', `image-transform-set-rotation', and
3870 `image-transform-set-scale'.
3871
3872 ** `compose-mail' now accepts an optional 8th arg, RETURN-ACTION, and
3873 passes it to the mail user agent function. This argument specifies an
3874 action for returning to the caller after finishing with the mail. For
3875 example, this is used by Rmail to optionally delete a mail window.
3876
3877 ** XML and HTML parsing
3878 If Emacs is compiled with libxml2 support, there are two new
3879 functions: `libxml-parse-html-region' (which parses "real world" HTML)
3880 and `libxml-parse-xml-region' (which parses XML). Both return an
3881 Emacs Lisp parse tree.
3882
3883 ** Networking and encryption changes
3884
3885 *** `open-network-stream' can now be used to open an encrypted stream.
3886 It now accepts an optional `:type' parameter for initiating a TLS
3887 connection, directly or via STARTTLS. To do STARTTLS, additional
3888 parameters (`:end-of-command', `:success', `:capabilities-command')
3889 must also be supplied.
3890
3891 *** New library gnutls.el.
3892 The new function `gnutls-available-p' returns non-nil if Emacs is
3893 built with GnuTLS support. The main entry points are
3894 `open-gnutls-stream' and `gnutls-negotiate'. It's easiest to use
3895 these functions through `open-network-stream', because that can
3896 upgrade connections through STARTTLS opportunistically or use plain
3897 SSL, depending on your needs. For debugging, set `gnutls-log-level'
3898 greater than 0.
3899
3900 *** New primitive `secure-hash' that supports many secure hash algorithms:
3901 md5, sha1, sha2, sha224, sha256, sha384, and sha512. The lisp library
3902 sha1.el has been removed. The `sha1' feature is provided by default.
3903
3904 ** Isearch
3905
3906 *** New hook `isearch-update-post-hook' that runs in `isearch-update'.
3907
3908 ** Progress reporters can now "spin".
3909 The MIN-VALUE and MAX-VALUE arguments of `make-progress-reporter' can
3910 now be nil, or omitted. This makes a "non-numeric" reporter. Each
3911 time you call `progress-reporter-update' on that progress reporter,
3912 with a nil or omitted VALUE argument, the reporter message is
3913 displayed with a "spinning bar".
3914
3915 ** New variable `revert-buffer-in-progress-p' is true while a buffer is
3916 being reverted, even if the buffer has a local `revert-buffer-function'.
3917
3918 ** New variables `delayed-warnings-list' and `delayed-warnings-hook'.
3919 If delayed-warnings-list is non-nil, the command loop calls
3920 `delayed-warnings-hook' after `post-command-hook'. At present, this
3921 is only used by Emacs on some platforms to display warnings during
3922 startup, which might otherwise not be noticed. This uses the
3923 functions `display-delayed-warnings' and `collapse-delayed-warnings'.
3924
3925 ** rx.el has a new `group-n' construct for explicitly numbered groups.
3926
3927 ** New function `make-composed-keymap' that constructs a new keymap
3928 from multiple input maps. You can use this to make a keymap that
3929 inherits from multiple maps, eg:
3930 (set-keymap-parent newmap (make-composed-keymap othermap parent))
3931
3932 ** New function `string-prefix-p'.
3933 (This was actually added in Emacs 23.2 but was not advertised at the time.)
3934
3935 ** New reader macro ## that stands for the empty symbol.
3936 This means that the empty symbol can now be read back. Also, #: by itself
3937 (when not immediately followed by a possible symbol character) stands for
3938 an empty uninterned symbol.
3939
3940 ** New math functions `isnan', `copysign', `frexp', `ldexp'.
3941
3942 ** The following functions and variables are obsolete:
3943
3944 *** `tooltip-use-echo-area' is obsolete.
3945 Rather than setting this to t, disable Tooltip mode instead.
3946
3947 *** buffer-substring-filters is obsolete.
3948 Use `filter-buffer-substring-functions' instead.
3949
3950 *** `byte-compile-disable-print-circle' is obsolete.
3951
3952 *** `deferred-action-list' and `deferred-action-function' are obsolete.
3953 Use `post-command-hook' instead.
3954
3955 *** `font-lock-maximum-size' is obsolete.
3956
3957 \f
3958 * Changes in Emacs 24.1 on Non-Free Operating Systems
3959
3960 ** On MS Windows, Emacs warns when using the obsolete init file _emacs,
3961 and also when HOME is set to C:\ by default.
3962
3963 ** New configure.bat options
3964
3965 *** --enable-checking builds Emacs with extra runtime checks.
3966
3967 *** --distfiles specifies files to be included in binary distribution.
3968
3969 *** --without-gnutls disables automatic GnuTLS detection.
3970
3971 *** --lib for general library linkage, works with the USER_LIBS build variable.
3972
3973 ** New make target `dist' to create binary distribution for MS Windows.
3974
3975 ** The Lisp function `w32-default-color-map' is now obsolete.
3976 (It is only used internally in the Emacs C code.)
3977
3978 ** Customize ns-auto-hide-menu-bar to have the menu-bar hidden, but
3979 reappear on mouse-over. (Requires OS X 10.6 or later.)
3980
3981 ** On Mac OS X, dragging a file into Emacs visits the file, like on
3982 other platforms, rather than inserting its contents into the buffer.
3983
3984 \f
3985 ----------------------------------------------------------------------
3986 This file is part of GNU Emacs.
3987
3988 GNU Emacs is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
3989 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
3990 the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
3991 (at your option) any later version.
3992
3993 GNU Emacs is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
3994 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
3995 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
3996 GNU General Public License for more details.
3997
3998 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
3999 along with GNU Emacs. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
4000
4001 \f
4002 Local variables:
4003 mode: outline
4004 paragraph-separate: "[ \f]*$"
4005 end: