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1 GNU Emacs NEWS -- history of user-visible changes.
2
3 Copyright (C) 2010-2012 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
4 See the end of the file for license conditions.
5
6 Please send Emacs bug reports to bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org.
7 If possible, use M-x report-emacs-bug.
8
9 This file is about changes in Emacs version 24.
10
11 See files NEWS.23, NEWS.22, NEWS.21, NEWS.20, NEWS.19, NEWS.18,
12 and NEWS.1-17 for changes in older Emacs versions.
13
14 You can narrow news to a specific version by calling `view-emacs-news'
15 with a prefix argument or by typing C-u C-h C-n.
16
17 \f
18 * Installation Changes in Emacs 24.1
19
20 ** Emacs can be compiled with Gtk+ 3.0 if you pass --with-x-toolkit=gtk3
21 to configure. Note that other libraries used by Emacs, RSVG and GConf,
22 also depend on Gtk+. You can disable them with --without-rsvg and
23 --without-gconf.
24
25 ** Emacs can be compiled with GnuTLS support.
26 This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
27 found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
28 `--without-gnutls'. See below for GnuTLS features.
29
30 ** Emacs can be compiled with SELinux support.
31 This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
32 found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
33 `--without-selinux'. See below for SELinux features.
34
35 ** Emacs can be compiled with ImageMagick support.
36 This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
37 found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
38 `--without-imagemagick'. See below for ImageMagick features.
39 This feature is not available for the Nextstep or MS ports.
40
41 ** Emacs can be compiled with libxml2 support.
42 This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
43 found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
44 `--without-xml2'. See below for libxml2 features.
45
46 ** By default, the installed Info and man pages are compressed.
47 You can disable this by configuring --without-compress-info.
48
49 ** New configure option --with-wide-int.
50 With it, Emacs integers typically have 62 bits, even on 32-bit machines.
51 On 32-bit hosts, this raises the limit on buffer sizes from about 512 MiB
52 to about 2 GiB.
53
54 ** New configure options: --with-mmdf, --with-mail-unlink, --with-mailhost.
55 These provide no new functionality, they just remove the need to edit
56 lib-src/Makefile by hand in order to use the associated features.
57
58 ** New configure option --enable-use-lisp-union-type.
59 This is only useful for Emacs developers to debug certain types of bugs.
60 This is not a new feature; only the configure flag is new.
61
62 ** The standalone programs digest-doc and sorted-doc are removed.
63 Emacs now uses Lisp commands `doc-file-to-man' and `doc-file-to-info'.
64
65 ** The standalone program `fakemail' is removed.
66 If you need it, feedmail.el provides a superset of the functionality.
67
68 \f
69 * Startup Changes in Emacs 24.1
70
71 ** The --unibyte, --multibyte, --no-multibyte, and --no-unibyte
72 command line arguments, and the EMACS_UNIBYTE environment variable, no
73 longer have any effect. (They were declared obsolete in Emacs 23.)
74
75 ** New command line option `--no-site-lisp' removes site-lisp directories
76 from load-path. -Q now implies this. This option does not affect the
77 EMACSLOADPATH environment variable (and hence has no effect for
78 Nextstep builds).
79
80 \f
81 * Changes in Emacs 24.1
82
83 ** Completion
84
85 *** Shell mode uses pcomplete rules, with the standard completion UI.
86
87 *** Many packages now use the `completion-at-point' command,
88 rather than implementing separate completion commands.
89
90 *** `completion-at-point' now handles tags and semantic completion.
91
92 *** Completion in a non-minibuffer now tries to detect the end of completion
93 and pops down the *Completions* buffer accordingly.
94
95 *** New option `completion-cycle-threshold' allows completion cycling.
96
97 *** New option `completion-category-overrides' for overriding the
98 default completion style in certain circumstances.
99
100 *** New completion style `substring'.
101
102 *** Completion of buffer names uses `substring' completion by default.
103
104 *** The option `widget-complete-field' has been removed.
105
106 ** Mail changes
107
108 *** The first time you try sending mail, Emacs asks for a mail method.
109 This is implemented by a new default for `send-mail-function', which
110 is `sendmail-query-once'. This offers to use the smtpmail package, or
111 to use the old defaults relying on external mail facilities
112 (`sendmail-send-it' on GNU/Linux and other Unix-like systems, and
113 `mailclient-send-it' on Windows).
114
115 *** Typing C-c m in the buffer made by M-x report-emacs-bug transfers
116 the report to your desktop's preferred mail client, if there is one.
117 This uses either the "xdg-email" utility, or Mac OS's "open" command.
118
119 *** See Changes in Specialized Modes and Packages for SMTPmail changes
120 and Mail mode changes
121
122 ** Emacs server and client changes
123
124 *** New option `server-port' specifies the port for TCP Emacs servers.
125
126 *** New emacsclient argument -q/--quiet suppresses some status messages.
127
128 *** New emacsclient argument --frame-parameters specifies the frame
129 parameters of any newly-created graphical frame.
130
131 *** If emacsclient shuts down due to Emacs signaling an error,
132 its exit status is 1.
133
134 *** New emacsclient argument --parent-id ID.
135 This opens a client frame in parent X window ID, via XEmbed, similar
136 to the --parent-id argument to Emacs.
137
138 ** Internationalization changes
139
140 *** Emacs now supports display and editing of bidirectional text.
141 Right-to-left (RTL) scripts, such as Arabic, Farsi, and Hebrew, are
142 displayed in the correct visual order as expected by users of those
143 scripts. The display reordering is a "full bidirectionality" class
144 implementation of the Unicode Bidirectional Algorithm (UBA). Buffers
145 with no RTL text should look exactly the same as before.
146
147 **** New buffer-local variable `bidi-display-reordering'.
148 To disable display reordering in a buffer, change this to nil.
149
150 **** New buffer-local variable `bidi-paragraph-direction'.
151 If nil (the default), Emacs determines the base direction of each
152 paragraph from its text, as specified by the UBA. Setting the value
153 to `right-to-left' or `left-to-right' forces a base direction on each
154 paragraph.
155
156 Paragraphs with right-to-left base direction are displayed starting at
157 the right window edge.
158
159 *** Enhanced support for characters with no glyphs in available fonts,
160 or, on text terminals, characters that cannot be encoded by the
161 terminal coding system. The new option `glyphless-char-display-control'
162 specifies how to display them: as a hexadecimal code in a box, a thin
163 1-pixel space, an empty box, etc.
164
165 *** New input methods: farsi, farsi-translit, bulgarian-alt-phonetic.
166
167 *** `nobreak-char-display' now also highlights Unicode hyphen chars
168 (U+2010 and U+2011).
169
170 *** New Hebrew translation of the Emacs Tutorial.
171 Type `C-u C-h t' to choose it in case your language setup doesn't
172 automatically select it.
173
174 ** An Emacs Lisp package manager is now included.
175 This is a convenient way to download and install additional packages,
176 from a package repository at http://elpa.gnu.org.
177
178 *** M-x list-packages shows a list of packages, which can be
179 selected for installation.
180
181 *** New command `describe-package', bound to `C-h P'.
182
183 *** By default, all installed packages are loaded automatically when
184 Emacs starts up. To disable this, set `package-enable-at-startup' to
185 nil. To specify the packages to load, customize `package-load-list'.
186
187 ** Custom theme changes
188
189 *** New command `M-x customize-themes', which provides a convenient
190 interface for enabling and disabling Custom themes.
191
192 *** New option `custom-theme-load-path' is the load path for themes.
193 Emacs no longer looks for Custom themes in `load-path'. The default
194 value of `custom-theme-load-path' says to look for themes in
195 `custom-theme-directory', followed by a subdirectory of
196 `data-directory' named "themes/", which contains a small selection of
197 built-in Custom themes.
198
199 *** New option `custom-safe-themes' records known-safe theme files.
200 If a theme is not in this list, Emacs queries before loading it, and
201 offers to save the theme to `custom-safe-themes' automatically. By
202 default, all themes included in Emacs are treated as safe.
203
204 ** Improved GTK integration
205
206 *** GTK scroll-bars are now placed on the right by default.
207 The function `set-scroll-bar-mode' can change this.
208
209 *** GTK tool bars can have just text, just images or images and text.
210 Customize `tool-bar-style' to choose the style. On a Gnome desktop,
211 the default is taken from desktop settings.
212
213 *** GTK tool bars can be placed on any edge of the frame.
214 The frame-parameter tool-bar-position controls this. It takes the
215 values top, left, right or bottom. The Options => Show/Hide menu has
216 entries for this.
217
218 *** The default colors for selected text (the `region' face) are taken
219 from the GTK theme when Emacs is built with GTK.
220
221 *** Emacs uses GTK tooltips by default if built with GTK.
222 You can disable this by changing `x-gtk-use-system-tooltips' to nil.
223
224 ** Graphical interface changes
225
226 *** On graphical displays, the mode-line no longer ends in dashes.
227 Also, the first dash (which does not indicate anything) is just
228 displayed as a space.
229
230 *** `menu-bar-select-buffer-function' lets you choose another operation
231 instead of `switch-to-buffer' when selecting an item in the Buffers menu.
232
233 *** Lucid menus and dialogs can display antialiased fonts if Emacs is
234 built with Xft. These fonts can be set via X resources, for example:
235 Emacs.pane.menubar.font: Courier-12
236
237 ** Exiting changes
238
239 *** Emacs now calls `kill-emacs' if it receives SIGTERM or SIGHUP,
240 or if it receives a SIGINT signal in batch mode.
241
242 *** `kill-emacs-hook' is now also run in batch mode.
243 Third-party code which adds to `kill-emacs-hook' should check if they
244 do the right thing in batch mode.
245
246 ** Scrolling changes
247
248 *** New scrolling commands `scroll-up-command' and `scroll-down-command'
249 (bound to C-v/[next] and M-v/[prior]) do not signal errors at top/bottom
250 of buffer at first key-press (instead they move to top/bottom of buffer)
251 when `scroll-error-top-bottom' is non-nil.
252
253 *** New option `scroll-error-top-bottom' (see above).
254
255 *** New scrolling commands `scroll-up-line' and `scroll-down-line'
256 scroll a line instead of full screen.
257
258 *** New property `scroll-command' should be set on a command's symbol to
259 define it as a scroll command affected by `scroll-preserve-screen-position'.
260
261 *** If you customize `scroll-conservatively' to a value greater than 100,
262 Emacs will never recenter point in the window when it scrolls due to
263 cursor motion commands or commands that move point (e.f., `M-g M-g').
264 Previously, you needed to use `most-positive-fixnum' as the value of
265 `scroll-conservatively' to achieve the same effect.
266
267 *** "Aggressive" scrolling now honors the scroll margins.
268 If you customize `scroll-up-aggressively' or
269 `scroll-down-aggressively' and move point off the window, Emacs now
270 scrolls the window so as to avoid positioning point inside the scroll
271 margin.
272
273 ** Basic SELinux support has been added.
274 This requires Emacs to be linked with libselinux at build time.
275
276 *** Emacs preserves the SELinux file context when backing up.
277 Also, the function `copy-file' has an extra optional argument for
278 preserving SELinux context, and the return value of `backup-buffer'
279 now includes the SELinux context.
280
281 *** New functions `file-selinux-context' and `set-file-selinux-context'
282 get and set the SELinux context of a file.
283
284 ** Trash changes
285
286 *** `delete-by-moving-to-trash' now only affects commands that specify
287 trashing. This avoids inadvertently trashing temporary files.
288
289 *** Calling `delete-file' or `delete-directory' with a prefix argument
290 now forces true deletion, regardless of `delete-by-moving-to-trash'.
291
292 ** File- and directory-local variable changes
293
294 *** You can stop directory local vars from applying to subdirectories.
295 Add an element (subdirs . nil) to the alist portion of any variables
296 settings to indicate that the section should not apply to
297 subdirectories.
298
299 *** Directory local variables can apply to some file-less buffers.
300 Affected modes include dired, vc-dir, and log-edit. For example,
301 adding "(diff-mode . ((mode . whitespace)))" to .dir-locals.el will
302 turn on `whitespace-mode' for *vc-diff* buffers. Modes should call
303 `hack-dir-local-variables-non-file-buffer' to support this.
304
305 *** Using "mode: MINOR-MODE" to enable a minor mode is deprecated.
306 Instead, use "eval: (minor-mode 1)".
307
308 *** The variable `inhibit-first-line-modes-regexps' has been renamed
309 to `inhibit-local-variables-regexps'. As the name suggests, it now
310 applies to ALL file local variables, not just -*- lines. The
311 associated `inhibit-first-line-modes-suffixes' has been renamed in the
312 corresponding way.
313
314 ** Window changes
315
316 *** Resizing an Emacs frame now preserves proportional window sizes,
317 modulo restrictions like window minimum sizes and fixed-size windows.
318
319 *** The behavior of `display-buffer' is now customizable in detail.
320
321 **** New option `display-buffer-base-action' specifies a list of
322 user-determined display "actions" (functions and optional arguments
323 for choosing the displaying window).
324
325 This takes precedence over the default display action, which is
326 specified by `display-buffer-fallback-action'.
327
328 **** New option `display-buffer-alist' maps buffer name regexps to
329 display actions, taking precedence over `display-buffer-base-action'.
330
331 *** New option `window-combination-limit'.
332 The new option `window-combination-limit' allows to return the space
333 obtained for resizing or creating a window more reliably to the window
334 from which such space was obtained.
335
336 *** New option `window-combination-resize'.
337 The new option `window-combination-resize' allows to split a window that
338 otherwise cannot be split because it's too small by stealing space from
339 other windows in the same combination. Subsequent resizing or deletion
340 of the window will resize all windows in the same combination as well.
341
342 *** New commands `maximize-window' and `minimize-window'.
343 These maximize and minimize the size of a window within its frame.
344
345 *** New commands `switch-to-prev-buffer' and `switch-to-next-buffer'.
346 These functions allow to navigate through the live buffers that have
347 been shown in a specific window.
348
349 ** Minibuffer changes
350
351 *** The inactive minibuffer has its own major mode `minibuffer-inactive-mode'.
352 This is handy for minibuffer-only frames, and is also used for the feature
353 where mouse-1 pops up *Messages*"', which can now easily be changed.
354
355 *** Minibuffers set `truncate-lines' to nil.
356 If you want to change the value to something else, you could use
357 for example `minibuffer-setup-hook'.
358
359 ** `auto-mode-case-fold' is now enabled by default.
360
361 ** `backup-by-copying-when-mismatch' now defaults to t.
362
363 ** New basic faces `error', `warning', `success'.
364 These are used to highlight text indicating failure, caution or
365 successful operation.
366
367 ** New option `list-colors-sort' defines the color sort order
368 for `list-colors-display'.
369
370 ** The variable `focus-follows-mouse' now always defaults to nil.
371
372 \f
373 * Editing Changes in Emacs 24.1
374
375 ** Search changes
376
377 *** C-y in Isearch is now bound to `isearch-yank-kill', instead of
378 `isearch-yank-line'.
379
380 *** M-y in Isearch is now bound to `isearch-yank-pop', instead of
381 `isearch-yank-kill'.
382
383 *** M-s C-e in Isearch is now bound to `isearch-yank-line'.
384
385 ** New commands `count-words-region' and `count-words'.
386
387 *** M-= is bound to `count-words-region', not `count-lines-region'.
388 The `count-words-region' command, when called interactively, reports
389 the number of lines, words, and characters in the region. It is a
390 superset of the old `count-lines-region', which is now an obsolete
391 alias for it.
392
393 ** The command `just-one-space' (M-SPC), if given a negative argument,
394 also deletes newlines around point.
395
396 ** Deletion changes
397
398 *** New option `delete-active-region'.
399 If non-nil, [delete] and DEL delete the region if it is active and no
400 prefix argument is given. If set to `kill', those commands kill
401 instead.
402
403 *** New command `delete-forward-char', bound to [delete].
404 This is meant for interactive use, and obeys `delete-active-region'.
405 The command `delete-char' does not obey `delete-active-region'.
406
407 *** `delete-backward-char' is now a Lisp function.
408 Apart from obeying `delete-active-region', its behavior is unchanged.
409 However, the byte compiler now warns if it is called from Lisp; Lisp
410 callers should use delete-char with a negative argument instead.
411
412 *** The option `mouse-region-delete-keys' has been deleted.
413
414 ** Selection changes.
415
416 The default handling of clipboard and primary selections has been
417 changed to conform with modern X applications. In short, most
418 commands for killing and yanking text now use the clipboard, while
419 mouse commands use the primary selection.
420
421 In the following, we provide a list of these changes, followed by a
422 list of steps to get the old behavior back if you prefer that.
423
424 *** `select-active-regions' now defaults to t.
425 Merely selecting text (e.g. with drag-mouse-1) no longer puts it in
426 the kill ring. The selected text is put in the primary selection, if
427 the system possesses a separate primary selection facility (e.g. X).
428
429 **** `select-active-regions' also accepts a new value, `only'.
430 This means to only set the primary selection for temporarily active
431 regions (usually made by mouse-dragging or shift-selection);
432 "ordinary" active regions, such as those made with C-SPC followed by
433 point motion, do not alter the primary selection.
434
435 **** `mouse-drag-copy-region' now defaults to nil.
436
437 *** mouse-2 is now bound to `mouse-yank-primary'.
438 This pastes from the primary selection, ignoring the kill-ring.
439 Previously, mouse-2 was bound to `mouse-yank-at-click'.
440
441 *** `x-select-enable-clipboard' now defaults to t on all platforms.
442
443 *** `x-select-enable-primary' now defaults to nil.
444 Thus, commands that kill text or copy it to the kill-ring (such as
445 M-w, C-w, and C-k) also use the clipboard---not the primary selection.
446
447 **** The "Copy", "Cut", and "Paste" items in the "Edit" menu are now
448 exactly equivalent to M-w, C-w, and C-y respectively.
449
450 **** Note that on MS-Windows, `x-select-enable-clipboard' was already
451 non-nil by default, as Windows does not support the primary selection
452 between applications.
453
454 *** To return to the previous behavior, do the following:
455
456 **** Change `select-active-regions' to nil.
457 **** Change `mouse-drag-copy-region' to t.
458 **** Change `x-select-enable-primary' to t (on X only).
459 **** Change `x-select-enable-clipboard' to nil.
460 **** Bind `mouse-yank-at-click' to mouse-2.
461
462 *** Support for X cut buffers has been removed.
463
464 *** X clipboard managers are now supported.
465 To inhibit this, change `x-select-enable-clipboard-manager' to nil.
466
467 ** New command `C-x r N' (`rectangle-number-lines') numbers the lines
468 in the current rectangle. With a prefix argument, this prompts for a
469 number to count from and for a format string.
470
471 ** `redisplay-dont-pause' now defaults to t.
472 This makes Emacs feel more responsive to editing commands that arrive
473 at high rate, e.g. if you lean on some key, because stopping redisplay
474 in the middle (when this variable is nil) forces more expensive
475 updates later on, and Emacs appears to be unable to keep up.
476
477 ** The behavior of <TAB> for active regions in Text mode has changed.
478 In Text and related modes, typing <TAB> (`indent-for-tab-command')
479 when the region is active causes Emacs to indent all the lines in the
480 region, aligning them with the line previous to the first line in the
481 region (or with the left margin if there is no previous line).
482
483 ** When `occur' is called with a prefix argument, matching strings are
484 collected into the `*Occur*' buffer without line numbers. If there
485 are parenthesized subexpressions in the specified regexp, `occur'
486 reads replacement text that may contain \\& and \\N whose convention
487 follows `replace-match'.
488
489 \f
490 * Changes in Specialized Modes and Packages in Emacs 24.1
491
492 ** Archive Mode has basic support for browsing and updating 7z archives.
493
494 ** BibTeX mode
495
496 *** BibTeX mode now supports biblatex.
497 Use the variable `bibtex-dialect' to select different BibTeX dialects.
498 `bibtex-entry-field-alist' is now an obsolete alias for
499 `bibtex-BibTeX-entry-alist'.
500
501 *** New command `bibtex-search-entries', bound to C-c C-a.
502
503 *** New `bibtex-entry-format' option `sort-fields', disabled by default.
504
505 *** New variable `bibtex-search-entry-globally'.
506
507 ** Browse-url
508
509 *** New option `browse-url-mailto-function' specifies how to handle "mailto:"s.
510
511 *** The default browser used by the package is now the "xdg-open" program,
512 on platforms that support it. This calls your desktop's preferred browser.
513
514 ** Calendar, Diary, and Appt
515
516 *** Diary entries can contain non-printing "comments".
517 See the variable `diary-comment-start'.
518
519 *** Appointments can specify their individual warning times.
520 See the variable `appt-warning-time-regexp'.
521
522 *** The function specified by `appt-disp-window-function' may be passed
523 lists of arguments if multiple appointments are due at similar times.
524 If you are using a custom function for this, you should update it.
525
526 *** New function `diary-hebrew-birthday'.
527
528 *** Elements of `calendar-day-abbrev-array' and `calendar-month-abbrev-array'
529 may no longer be nil, but must all be strings.
530
531 *** The obsolete (since Emacs 22.1) method of enabling the appt
532 package by adding `appt-make-list' to `diary-hook' has been removed.
533 Use `appt-activate' instead.
534
535 *** Some appt variables (obsolete since Emacs 22.1) have been removed:
536 appt-issue-message (use the function appt-activate)
537 appt-visible/appt-msg-window (use the variable appt-display-format)
538
539 *** Some diary function aliases (obsolete since Emacs 22.1) have been removed:
540 view-diary-entries, list-diary-entries, show-all-diary-entries
541
542 ** CC Mode
543
544 *** New feature to "guess" the style in an existing buffer.
545 The main entry point is M-x c-guess.
546
547 *** Java Mode now supports Java 5.0 (Tiger) and 6 (Mustang).
548
549 *** `c-beginning-of-defun' and `c-end-of-defun' now respect nested scopes.
550 Thus C-M-a will, by default, go to the beginning of the immediate function,
551 not the top level.
552
553 *** "Macros with semicolons" can be registered for correct indentation.
554 Where such a macro ends a line (no semicolon) the next statement is no longer
555 parsed as a statement continuation.
556
557 ** Comint and modes derived from it use the standard completion code.
558
559 ** Compilation mode
560
561 *** Compilation mode can be used without Font Lock mode.
562 `compilation-parse-errors-function' is now obsolete.
563
564 *** New variable `compilation-filter-start', which is bound while
565 `compilation-filter-hook' runs. It records the start position of the
566 text inserted by `compilation-filter'.
567
568 *** `compilation-error-screen-columns' and `compilation-first-column'
569 are obeyed in the editing buffer. So programming language modes can
570 set them, whereas previously only the value in the *Compilation*
571 buffer was used.
572
573 ** Customize
574
575 *** Customize buffers now contain a search field.
576 The search is performed using `customize-apropos'.
577 To turn off the search field, set `custom-search-field' to nil.
578
579 *** Custom options now start out hidden if at their default values.
580 Use the arrow to the left of the option name to toggle visibility.
581
582 *** custom-buffer-sort-alphabetically now defaults to t.
583
584 *** The color widget now has a "Choose" button, which allows you to
585 choose a color via `list-colors-display'.
586
587 ** D-Bus
588
589 *** It is now possible to access buses other than the default system
590 or session bus.
591
592 *** The `dbus-register-method' and `dbus-register-property' functions
593 optionally do not register names.
594
595 *** The new function `dbus-register-service' registers a known service
596 name on a D-Bus without also registering a property or a method.
597
598 ** Dired-x
599
600 *** C-x C-j (`dired-jump') and C-x 4 C-j (`dired-jump-other-window'),
601 if called with a prefix argument, read a file name from the minibuffer
602 instead of using the current buffer.
603
604 *** The "dired local variables" feature of Dired-x is obsolete.
605 The standard directory local variables feature replaces it.
606
607 ** ERC changes
608
609 *** New options `erc-autojoin-timing' and `erc-autojoin-delay',
610 controlling attempts to autojoin a channel.
611
612 *** New variable `erc-coding-system-precedence': If we use `undecided'
613 as the server coding system, this variable will then be consulted.
614 The default is to decode strings that can be decoded as utf-8 as
615 utf-8, and do the normal `undecided' decoding for the rest.
616
617 ** Eshell changes
618
619 *** The default value of `eshell-directory-name' has changed
620 to be an "eshell" directory in `user-emacs-directory'.
621 The old "~/.eshell/" directory is still used if it exists, though.
622
623 ** gdb-mi
624
625 *** The M-x gdb command now uses the GDB Machine Interface protocol.
626 It now supports multithread non-stop debugging and simultaneous
627 debugging of several threads.
628
629 ** Image mode
630
631 *** RET (`image-toggle-animation') toggles animation, if applicable.
632 Animation plays once, unless the option `image-animate-loop' is non-nil.
633
634 ** Info
635
636 *** New command M-x info-display-manual displays a named Info manual.
637 If that manual is already visited in some Info buffer, it displays
638 that buffer. (This is handy if you have many manuals in many *info*
639 buffers, and don't remember the name of the buffer visiting the manual
640 you want to consult.) Otherwise, it loads and displays the manual.
641
642 *** `e' is now bound to `end-of-buffer' rather than to `Info-edit'.
643 This is for compatibility with the stand-alone Info reader program,
644 and also because `Info-edit' is a rarely used command that is disabled
645 by default.
646
647 ** Mail mode changes (not Message mode)
648
649 *** New command M-x mail-add-attachment for adding MIME attachments
650
651 *** The command M-x mail-attach-file was renamed to M-x mail-insert-file.
652 (Its name is misleading, since it has nothing to do with MIME
653 attachments.) The old name is now an obsolete alias to the new name.
654
655 ** MH-E has been upgraded to MH-E version 8.3.1.
656 See MH-E-NEWS for details.
657
658 ** Modula-2 mode provides auto-indentation.
659
660 ** mpc.el: Can use pseudo tags of the form tag1|tag2 as a union of two tags.
661
662 ** nXML mode no longer binds C-RET to `nxml-complete'.
663 Completion is now performed via `completion-at-point', bound to C-M-i
664 or M-TAB. If `nxml-bind-meta-tab-to-complete-flag' is non-nil (the
665 default), this performs tag completion.
666
667 ** Prolog mode has been completely revamped, with lots of additional
668 functionality such as more intelligent indentation, electricity,
669 support for more variants, including Mercury, and a lot more.
670
671 ** Rmail
672
673 *** The command `rmail-epa-decrypt' decrypts OpenPGP data
674 in the Rmail incoming message.
675
676 *** The variable `rmail-message-filter' no longer has any effect.
677 This change was made in Emacs 23.1 but was not advertised at the time.
678 Try using `rmail-show-message-hook' instead.
679
680 ** Shell mode
681
682 *** M-x shell prompts for the shell path name if the default directory
683 is a remote file name and neither the environment variable $ESHELL nor
684 the variable `explicit-shell-file-name' is set.
685
686 *** TAB is now bound to the standard `completion-at-point' command,
687 which now implements the pcomplete rules for shell command completion.
688
689 ** SMTPmail
690
691 *** SMTPmail now uses encrypted connections (via STARTTLS) by default
692 if the mail server supports them. This uses either built-in GnuTLS
693 support, or the starttls.el library. Customize `smtpmail-stream-type'
694 to change this.
695
696 *** The variable `smtpmail-auth-credentials' has been removed.
697 By default, the information is now stored in the file ~/.authinfo.
698 This was the default value of smtpmail-auth-credentials. If you had
699 customized smtpmail-auth-credentials to a list of user names and
700 passwords, those settings are not used. During your first connection
701 to the smtp server, Emacs will prompt for the user name and password,
702 and offer to save them to ~/.authinfo. Or you can manually copy the
703 credentials to ~/.authinfo. For example, if you had
704
705 (setq smtpmail-auth-credentials
706 '(("mail.example.org" 25 "jim" "s!cret")))
707
708 then the equivalent line in ~/.authinfo would be
709
710 machine mail.example.org port 25 login jim password s!cret
711
712 See the auth-source manual for more information, e.g. on encrypting
713 the credentials file.
714
715 *** The variable `smtpmail-starttls-credentials' has been removed.
716 If you had that set, you need to put
717
718 machine smtp.whatever.foo port 25 key "~/.my_smtp_tls.key" cert "~/.my_smtp_tls.cert"
719
720 in your ~/.authinfo file instead.
721
722 ** SQL mode
723
724 *** New options `sql-port', `sql-connection-alist', `sql-send-terminator',
725 and `sql-oracle-scan-on'.
726
727 *** New options controlling prompting for login parameters.
728 Each supported product has a custom variable `sql-*-login-params',
729 which is a list of the parameters to be prompted for before a
730 connection is established.
731
732 *** The command `sql-product-interactive' now takes a prefix argument,
733 which causes it to prompt for an SQL product.
734
735 *** Product-specific SQL interactive commands now take prefix arguments.
736 These commands (`sql-sqlite', `sql-postgres', `sql-mysql', etc.),
737 given a prefix argument, prompt for a name for the SQL interactive
738 buffer. This reduces the need for calling `sql-rename-buffer'.
739
740 *** SQL interactive modes suppress command continuation prompts, and
741 replace tabs with spaces. The first change impacts multiple line SQL
742 statements entered with C-j between each line, statements yanked into
743 the buffer and statements sent with `sql-send-*' functions. The
744 second prevents the MySQL and Postgres interpreters from listing
745 object name completions when sent text via `sql-send-*' functions.
746
747 *** New command `sql-connect' starts a predefined SQLi session,
748 using the login parameters from `sql-connection-alist'.
749
750 *** New "Save Connection" menu item in SQLi buffers.
751 This gathers the login params specified for the SQLi session, if it
752 was not started by a connection, and saves them as a new connection.
753
754 *** New commands for listing database objects and details:
755 sql-list-all and sql-list-table.
756
757 *** An API for manipulating SQL product definitions has been added.
758
759 ** TeX modes
760
761 *** latex-electric-env-pair-mode keeps \begin..\end matched on the fly.
762
763 ** Tramp
764
765 *** New inline access method "ksu" (kerberized su).
766
767 *** The following access methods are discontinued: "ssh1_old",
768 "ssh2_old", "scp1_old", "scp2_old", "imap", "imaps" and "fish".
769
770 *** The user option `remote-file-name-inhibit-cache' controls whether
771 remote file attributes are cached for better performance.
772
773 *** The option `ange-ftp-binary-file-name-regexp' has changed its
774 default value to "".
775
776 *** Handlers for `file-selinux-context' and `set-file-selinux-context'
777 for remote machines which support SELinux.
778
779 ** New function `url-queue-retrieve', which behaves like url-retrieve,
780 but with limits (`url-queue-parallel-processes', `url-queue-timeout') on
781 the degree of parallelism.
782
783 ** VC and related modes
784
785 *** Support for pulling on distributed version control systems.
786 The command C-x v + (`vc-pull') runs a "pull" operation, if it is
787 supported (currently with Bzr, Git, and Mercurial), to update the
788 current branch and working tree. A prefix argument means to prompt
789 the user for specifics, e.g. a pull location.
790
791 *** `vc-update' is now an alias for `vc-pull'.
792
793 *** Support for merging on distributed version control systems.
794 The command C-x v m (`vc-merge') now runs a "merge" operation, if it
795 is supported (currently with Bzr, Git, and Mercurial), to merge
796 changes from another branch into the current one. It prompts for
797 specifics, e.g. a merge source.
798
799 *** New option `vc-revert-show-diff' controls whether `vc-revert'
800 shows a diff while querying the user. It defaults to t.
801
802 *** Log entries in some Log View buffers can be toggled to display a
803 longer description by typing RET (log-view-toggle-entry-display).
804 This is currently supported for Bzr, Git, and Mercurial (to support
805 another backend, define a `log-view-expanded-log-entry-function').
806 In the Log View buffers made by C-x v L (`vc-print-root-log'), you can
807 use this to display the full log entry for the revision at point.
808
809 *** New command `vc-ediff' allows visual comparison of two revisions
810 of a file similar to `vc-diff', but using ediff backend.
811
812 *** The option `vc-initial-comment' was removed in Emacs 23.2, but
813 this was not advertised at the time.
814
815 *** `vc-toggle-read-only' is an obsolete alias for `toggle-read-only'.
816 Since Emacs 23, it has done the same thing as `toggle-read-only', but
817 this was not advertised at the time.
818
819 ** Obsolete modes
820
821 *** abbrevlist.el
822
823 *** erc-hecomplete.el (use erc-pcomplete.el instead)
824
825 *** partial-completion-mode (complete.el) is obsolete.
826 You can get a comparable behavior with:
827 (setq completion-styles '(partial-completion initials))
828 (setq completion-pcm-complete-word-inserts-delimiters t)
829
830 *** pc-mode.el is obsolete (CUA mode is much more comprehensive).
831
832 *** pgg is obsolete (use EasyPG instead).
833
834 *** sregex.el is obsolete, since rx.el is a strict superset.
835
836 *** s-region.el and pc-select.el are obsolete.
837 They are superseded by shift-select-mode, enabled by default since 23.1.
838
839 *** vc-mcvs.el is obsolete (for lack of a maintainer).
840
841 ** Miscellaneous
842
843 *** The Landmark game is now invoked with `landmark', not `lm'.
844 Its functions and variables have been similarly renamed.
845
846 *** In `ido-file-completion-map', C-v is no longer bound to `ido-toggle-vc'.
847 (This interfered with cua-mode.)
848
849 *** f90.el has some support for Fortran 2008 syntax.
850
851 *** `copyright-fix-years' can optionally convert consecutive years to ranges.
852
853 *** New command `nato-region' converts text to NATO phonetic alphabet.
854
855 \f
856 * New Modes and Packages in Emacs 24.1
857
858 ** Occur Edit mode applies edits made in *Occur* buffers to the
859 original buffers. It is bound to "e" in Occur mode.
860
861 ** New global minor mode electric-pair-mode.
862 When enabled, typing an open parenthesis automatically inserts the
863 matching closing one.
864
865 ** New global minor mode electric-indent-mode.
866 When enabled, typing certain characters triggers reindentation.
867 Major modes wishing to use this can set electric-indent-chars or
868 electric-indent-functions.
869
870 ** New global minor mode electric-layout-mode.
871 When enabled, typing certain characters automatically inserts newlines.
872 Major modes wishing to use this can set electric-layout-rules.
873
874 ** tabulated-list.el provides a generic major mode for tabulated data,
875 from which other modes can be derived.
876
877 ** pcase.el provides the ML-style pattern matching macro `pcase'.
878
879 ** secrets.el is an implementation of the Secret Service API, an
880 interface to password managers like GNOME Keyring or KDE Wallet. The
881 Secret Service API requires D-Bus for communication. The command
882 `secrets-show-secrets' offers a buffer with a visualization of the
883 secrets.
884
885 ** notifications.el provides an implementation of the Desktop
886 Notifications API. It requires D-Bus for communication.
887
888 ** soap-client.el supports access to SOAP web services from Emacs.
889 soap-inspect.el is an interactive inspector for SOAP WSDL structures.
890
891 ** New generic mode, xmodmap-generic-mode, for xmodmap files.
892
893 ** New emacs-lock.el package.
894 The previous version has been moved to obsolete/old-emacs-lock.el.
895 Now, there is a proper minor mode `emacs-lock-mode'. Protection
896 against exiting Emacs and killing the buffer can be set separately.
897 The mechanism for automatically turning off protection for buffers
898 with dead inferior processes has been generalized.
899
900 \f
901 * Incompatible Lisp Changes in Emacs 24.1
902
903 ** Passing a nil argument to a minor mode function call now ENABLES
904 the minor mode unconditionally. This is so that you can write e.g.
905
906 (add-hook 'text-mode-hook 'foo-mode)
907
908 to enable foo-mode in Text mode buffers, removing the need for
909 `turn-on-foo-mode' style functions. This affects all mode commands
910 defined by `define-minor-mode'. If called interactively, the mode
911 command still toggles the minor mode.
912
913 ** The return value of `backup-buffer' has changed.
914 It is now a list of three elements, where the second element is a list
915 describing the original file's SELinux context. If Emacs or the
916 system lacks SELinux support, the context list is (nil nil nil nil).
917 See "Basic SELinux support" above, under "Changes in Emacs 24.1".
918
919 ** `char-direction-table' and the `char-direction' function were deleted.
920 They were buggy and inferior to the new support of bidirectional
921 editing introduced in Emacs 24. If you need the bidirectional
922 properties of a character, use `get-char-code-property' with the last
923 argument `bidi-class'.
924
925 ** `copy-directory' now copies the source directory as a subdirectory
926 of the target directory, if the latter is an existing directory. The
927 new optional arg COPY-CONTENTS, if non-nil, makes the function copy
928 the contents directly into a pre-existing target directory.
929
930 ** For mouse click input events in the text area, the Y pixel
931 coordinate in the POSITION list now counts from the top of the text
932 area, excluding any header line. Previously, it counted from the top
933 of the header line.
934
935 ** Support for "old-style" backquotes, obsolete for 10+ years, has
936 been further reduced. Now a backquote not followed by a space is
937 always treated as a "new-style" backquote. Please remove all
938 "old-style" backquotes from your code. If your code uses backquotes
939 as documented in the Elisp manual, and compiles without warning, then
940 you have nothing to do in this regard. Code not following the
941 appropriate conventions may fail to compile.
942
943 The most common cause of trouble seems to be an old-style backquote
944 followed by a newline. Another cause of trouble is vector notation
945 for key sequence notation: instead of [(control ,)] and [(control ')],
946 you should write [(control ?,)] and [(control ?')], which will work in
947 older Emacsen too.
948
949 ** The macro `eval-at-startup' was removed in Emacs 23.2, but this
950 was not advertised at the time. The function `custom-initialize-delay'
951 replaced all known uses.
952
953 ** `view-buffer' now treats special mode-class in the same way that
954 `view-file' has since Emacs 22 (i.e. it won't enable View mode if the
955 major mode is special).
956
957 ** Menu and tool bar changes
958
959 *** During startup, Emacs no longer adds entries for `menu-bar-lines'
960 and `tool-bar-lines' to `default-frame-alist' and `initial-frame-alist'.
961 With these alist entries omitted, `make-frame' checks the value of the
962 variable `menu-bar-mode'/`tool-bar-mode' to determine whether to create
963 a menu-bar or tool-bar, respectively. If the alist entries are added,
964 they override the value of `menu-bar-mode'/`tool-bar-mode'.
965
966 *** The menu bar bindings's caches are not used any more.
967 Use (where-is-internal <def> nil t) instead.
968
969 ** Regions created by mouse dragging are now normal active regions,
970 similar to those created by shift-selection (see Selection changes
971 above). In previous Emacs versions, these regions were delineated by
972 `mouse-drag-overlay'; that variable has been removed.
973
974 ** The fourth argument of `filter-buffer-substring' has been removed.
975 If you want to remove text properties from the final result, simply
976 pass the result through substring-no-properties.
977
978 ** cl.el no longer provides `cl-19'.
979
980 ** The following obsolete functions and aliases have been removed
981 (the appropriate new function is given in parentheses; "not needed"
982 means you can just remove all calls to the function in question):
983
984 *** `comint-kill-output' (`comint-delete-output')
985 *** `decompose-composite-char' (`char-to-string')
986 *** `outline-visible' (`outline-invisible-p')
987 *** `internal-find-face' (`facep')
988 *** `internal-get-face' (`facep and check-face')
989 *** `frame-update-faces' (not needed)
990 *** `frame-update-face-colors' (`frame-set-background-mode')
991 *** `x-frob-font-weight' and `x-frob-font-slant' (`make-face-*' functions)
992 *** `x-make-font-bold and x-make-font-demibold (`make-face-bold')
993 *** `x-make-font-italic' and `x-make-font-oblique' (`make-face-italic')
994 *** `x-make-font-bold-italic' (`make-face-bold-italic')
995 *** `x-make-font-unbold' (`make-face-unbold')
996 *** `x-make-font-unitalic' (`make-face-unitalic')
997 *** `mldrag-drag-mode-line' (`mouse-drag-mode-line')
998 *** `mldrag-drag-vertical-line' (`mouse-drag-vertical-line')
999 *** `iswitchb-default-keybindings' (`iswitchb-mode')
1000 *** `char-bytes' (== 1)
1001 *** `isearch-return-char' (`isearch-printing-char')
1002 *** `make-local-hook' (not needed)
1003 *** `set-screen-height' (`set-frame-height')
1004 *** `set-screen-width' (`set-frame-width')
1005
1006 ** The following obsolete variables and varaliases have been removed
1007 (the appropriate new variable is given in parentheses):
1008
1009 *** `checkdoc-minor-keymap' (`checkdoc-minor-mode-map')
1010 *** `vc-header-alist' (`vc-BACKEND-header')
1011 *** `directory-sep-char' (== ?/)
1012 *** `font-lock-defaults-alist' (`font-lock-defaults')
1013 *** `e' (`float-e').
1014
1015 ** The following obsolete files were removed:
1016 sc.el, x-menu.el, rnews.el, rnewspost.el
1017
1018 ** The format of the finder-inf.el file has changed, since the Finder
1019 mechanism is now based on the package system. The variable
1020 `finder-package-info' is replaced by `package--builtins' and
1021 `finder-keywords-hash'.
1022
1023 ** When generating autoloads, `update-directory-autoloads' no longer
1024 assumes every inspected file is in your `load-path'. It instead
1025 generates relative names according to the current `load-path'.
1026
1027 \f
1028 * Lisp changes in Emacs 24.1
1029
1030 ** Code can now use lexical scoping by default instead of dynamic scoping.
1031 The `lexical-binding' variable enables lexical scoping for local
1032 variables. It is typically set via a file-local variable in the first
1033 line of the file, in which case it applies to all the code in that
1034 file.
1035
1036 *** `eval' takes a new optional argument `lexical' to choose the new lexical
1037 binding instead of the old dynamic binding mode.
1038
1039 *** Lexically scoped interpreted functions are represented with a new form
1040 of function value which looks like (closure ENV ARGS &rest BODY).
1041
1042 *** New macro `letrec' to define recursive local functions.
1043
1044 *** `defvar' and `defconst' now mark the variable as special (dynamic).
1045 So do `defcustom' and other forms that call `defvar' as a subroutine.
1046
1047 *** New function `special-variable-p' to check whether a variable is
1048 declared as dynamically bound.
1049
1050 ** An Emacs Lisp testing tool is now included.
1051 Emacs Lisp developers can use this tool to write automated tests for
1052 their code. See the ERT info manual for details.
1053
1054 ** Changes for bidirectional display and editing
1055
1056 *** New function `current-bidi-paragraph-direction'.
1057 This returns the base direction of the paragraph at point.
1058
1059 *** New function `bidi-string-mark-left-to-right'.
1060 Given a string containing characters from right-to-left scripts, this
1061 function returns another string which can be safely inserted into a
1062 buffer, such that any following text will be always displayed to the
1063 right of that string. (This works by appending an invisible Unicode
1064 "LEFT-TO-RIGHT MARK" character if the argument string might need it.)
1065
1066 This is useful when the buffer has overall left-to-right paragraph
1067 direction and you need to insert a string whose contents are not known
1068 in advance, without disrupting the layout of the line.
1069
1070 ** Window changes
1071
1072 *** Window tree functions are accessible in Elisp.
1073 Functions are provided to return the parent, siblings or child windows
1074 of any window including internal windows (windows not associated with a
1075 buffer) in the window tree.
1076
1077 **** New function `window-valid-p' gives non-nil for live and internal
1078 windows.
1079
1080 **** Window manipulation can deal with internal windows.
1081 Many window handling functions like `split-window', `delete-window', or
1082 `delete-other-windows' as well as the window resizing functions can now
1083 act on any window including internal ones.
1084
1085 *** window-total-height/-width vs window-body-height/-width.
1086 The function `window-height' has been renamed to `window-total-height'
1087 and `window-width' has been renamed to `window-body-width'. The old
1088 names are provided as aliases. Two new functions `window-total-width'
1089 and `window-body-height' are provided.
1090
1091 *** Window parameters specific to window handling functions.
1092 For each window you can specify a parameter to override the default
1093 behavior of a number of functions like `split-window', `delete-window'
1094 and `delete-other-windows'. The variable `ignore-window-parameters'
1095 allows to ignore processing such parameters.
1096
1097 *** New semantics of third argument of `split-window'.
1098 The third argument of `split-window' has been renamed to SIDE and can be
1099 set to any of the values 'below, 'right, 'above, or 'left to make the
1100 new window appear on the corresponding side of the window that shall be
1101 split. Any other value of SIDE will cause `split-window' to split the
1102 window into two side-by-side windows as before.
1103
1104 *** Window resizing functions.
1105 A new standard function for resizing windows called `window-resize' has
1106 been introduced. This and all other functions for resizing windows no
1107 longer delete any windows when they become too small.
1108
1109 *** Deleting the selected window now selects the most recently selected
1110 live window on that frame instead.
1111
1112 *** `adjust-window-trailing-edge' adjustments.
1113 `adjust-window-trailing-edge' can now deal with fixed-size windows and
1114 is able to resize other windows if a window adjacent to the trailing
1115 edge cannot be shrunk any more. This makes its behavior more similar to
1116 that of Emacs 21 without compromising, however, its inability to delete
1117 windows which was introduced in Emacs 22.
1118
1119 *** Window-local buffer lists.
1120 Windows now have local buffer lists. This means that removing a buffer
1121 from display in a window will preferably show the buffer previously
1122 shown in that window with its previous window-start and window-point
1123 positions. This also means that the same buffer may be automatically
1124 shown twice even if it already appears in another window.
1125
1126 *** `switch-to-buffer' has a new optional argument FORCE-SAME-WINDOW,
1127 which if non-nil requires the buffer to be displayed in the currently
1128 selected window, signaling an error otherwise. If nil, another window
1129 can be used, e.g. if the selected one is strongly dedicated.
1130
1131 *** `split-window-vertically' and `split-window-horizontally' renamed
1132 to `split-window-below' and `split-window-right' respectively.
1133 The old names are kept as aliases.
1134
1135 *** Display actions
1136
1137 **** The second arg to `display-buffer' and `pop-to-buffer' is now
1138 named ACTION, and takes a display action of the same form as
1139 `display-buffer-base-action' (see Changes, above). A non-nil,
1140 non-list value is treated specially, as the old meaning.
1141
1142 **** New variable `display-buffer-overriding-action'.
1143
1144 **** The procedure of `display-buffer' etc. to choose a window is
1145 determined by combining `display-buffer-overriding-action',
1146 `display-buffer-alist', the ACTION arg, `display-buffer-base-action',
1147 and `display-buffer-fallback-action'. The second and fourth of these
1148 are user-customizable variables.
1149
1150 See the docstring of `display-buffer' for details.
1151
1152 *** New behavior of `quit-window'.
1153 The behavior of `quit-window' has been changed in order to restore the
1154 state before the last buffer display operation in that window.
1155
1156 *** The new option `frame-auto-hide-function' lets you choose between
1157 iconifying or deleting a frame when burying a buffer shown in a dedicated
1158 frame or quitting a window showing a buffer in a frame of its own.
1159
1160 *** New functions `window-state-get' and `window-state-put'.
1161 These functions allow to save and restore the state of an arbitrary
1162 frame or window as an Elisp object.
1163
1164 ** Completion
1165
1166 *** New variable `completion-extra-properties' used to specify extra
1167 properties of the current completion:
1168 - :annotate-function, same as the old completion-annotate-function.
1169 - :exit-function, function to call after completion took place.
1170
1171 *** Functions on `completion-at-point-functions' can return any of the
1172 properties valid for `completion-extra-properties'.
1173
1174 *** `completion-annotate-function' is obsolete.
1175
1176 *** New `metadata' method for completion tables. The metadata thus returned
1177 can specify various details of the data returned by `all-completions':
1178 - `category' is the kind of objects returned (e.g., `buffer', `file', ...),
1179 used to select a style in completion-category-overrides.
1180 - `annotation-function' to add annotations in *Completions*.
1181 - `display-sort-function' to specify how to sort entries in *Completions*.
1182 - `cycle-sort-function' to specify how to sort entries when cycling.
1183
1184 *** `minibuffer-local-filename-must-match-map' is not used any more.
1185 Instead, the bindings in `minibuffer-local-filename-completion-map'
1186 are combined with `minibuffer-local-must-match-map'.
1187
1188 *** New variable `completing-read-function' allows overriding the
1189 behavior of `completing-read'.
1190
1191 ** `glyphless-char-display' can now distinguish between graphical and
1192 text terminal display, via a char-table entry that is a cons cell.
1193
1194 ** `pre-command-hook'/`post-command-hook' are not reset to nil on error.
1195 Instead, the offending function is removed.
1196
1197 ** New hook types
1198
1199 *** New function `run-hook-wrapped' for running an abnormal hook by
1200 passing the hook functions as arguments to a "wrapping" function.
1201 Like `run-hook-with-args-until-success', it stops at the first
1202 non-nil return value.
1203
1204 *** New macro `with-wrapper-hook' for running an abnormal hook as a
1205 set of "wrapping" filters, similar to around advice.
1206 (A version of this macro was actually added in Emacs 23.2 but was not
1207 advertised at the time.)
1208
1209 ** Debugger changes
1210
1211 *** New macro `condition-case-unless-debug' (this was actually added in
1212 Emacs 23.1 as condition-case-no-debug, but not advertised)
1213
1214 *** The macro `with-demoted-errors' was added in Emacs 23.1, but not advertised.
1215
1216 *** Variable `stack-trace-on-error' removed.
1217
1218 *** The debugger can now "continue" from an error, which means it will
1219 jump to the error handler as if the debugger had not been invoked
1220 instead of jumping all the way to the top-level.
1221
1222 *** Set `debug-on-event' to enter the debugger on events like SIGUSR1.
1223 This can be useful when `inhibit-quit' is set.
1224
1225 ** The new function `server-eval-at' allows evaluation of Lisp forms on
1226 named Emacs server instances.
1227
1228 ** `call-process' and `call-process-region' allow a `(:file "file")' spec
1229 to redirect STDOUT to a file.
1230
1231 ** The function `format-time-string' now supports the %N directive,
1232 for higher-resolution time stamps.
1233
1234 ** New input reading functions
1235
1236 *** New function `read-char-choice' reads a restricted set of
1237 characters, discarding any inputs not inside the set.
1238
1239 *** The command `read-color' now requires a match for a color name
1240 or RGB triplet, instead of signaling an error if the user provides
1241 invalid input.
1242
1243 **** `facemenu-read-color' is now an alias for `read-color'.
1244
1245 ** `image-library-alist' is renamed to `dynamic-library-alist'.
1246 The variable is now used to load all kind of supported dynamic libraries,
1247 not just image libraries. The previous name is still available as an
1248 obsolete alias.
1249
1250 ** Syntax parsing changes
1251
1252 *** New variable `syntax-propertize-function'.
1253 This replaces `font-lock-syntactic-keywords' which is now obsolete.
1254 This allows syntax-table properties to be set independently from font-lock:
1255 just call syntax-propertize to make sure the text is propertized.
1256 Together with this new variable come a new hook
1257 syntax-propertize-extend-region-functions, as well as two helper functions:
1258 syntax-propertize-via-font-lock to reuse old font-lock-syntactic-keywords
1259 as-is; and syntax-propertize-rules which provides a new way to specify
1260 syntactic rules.
1261
1262 *** Syntax tables support a new "comment style c" additionally to style b.
1263
1264 ** New hook `post-self-insert-hook', run after `self-insert-command'.
1265
1266 ** frame-local variables cannot be let-bound any more.
1267
1268 ** Major and minor mode changes
1269
1270 *** `set-auto-mode' now respects mode: local variables at the end of files,
1271 as well as those in the -*- line.
1272
1273 *** `prog-mode' is a new major mode from which programming modes
1274 should be derived.
1275
1276 **** `prog-mode-hook' can be used to enable features for programming
1277 modes, e.g. (add-hook 'prog-mode-hook 'flyspell-prog-mode) to enable
1278 on-the-fly spell checking for comments and strings.
1279
1280 *** New hook `change-major-mode-after-body-hook', run by
1281 `run-mode-hooks' just before any other mode hooks.
1282
1283 *** Enabled globalized minor modes can be disabled in specific major modes.
1284 If the global mode is global-FOO-mode, then run (FOO-mode -1) in the
1285 major mode's hook, where FOO-mode toggles the mode on a per-buffer basis.
1286
1287 *** `define-minor-mode' accepts new keywords :variable, :after-hook.
1288
1289 ** File-handling changes
1290
1291 *** `delete-file' and `delete-directory' now accept optional arg TRASH.
1292 Trashing is performed if TRASH and `delete-by-moving-to-trash' are
1293 both non-nil. Interactively, TRASH defaults to t, unless a prefix
1294 argument is supplied (see Trash changes, above).
1295
1296 *** New file predicates: `file-equal-p', `file-in-directory-p'.
1297
1298 ** Tool-bars can display separators.
1299 Tool-bar separators are handled like menu separators in menu-bar maps,
1300 i.e. via menu entries of the form `(menu-item "--")'.
1301
1302 ** Image API
1303
1304 *** Animated images support (currently animated gifs only).
1305
1306 **** `image-animated-p' returns non-nil if an image can be animated.
1307
1308 **** `image-animate' animates a supplied image spec.
1309
1310 **** `image-animate-timer' returns the timer object for an image that
1311 is being animated.
1312
1313 *** `image-extension-data' has been renamed to `image-metadata'.
1314 The old name is an obsolete alias to the new one.
1315
1316 *** Image mode can view any image type that ImageMagick supports.
1317 This requires Emacs to be built with ImageMagick support.
1318
1319 **** New function `imagemagick-types', defined if ImageMagick support
1320 is enabled, returns a list of image file extensions that your
1321 ImageMagick installation supports.
1322
1323 **** New function `imagemagick-register-types' enables ImageMagick
1324 image types in Image mode and in `create-image' and other helper
1325 functions.
1326
1327 **** New option `imagemagick-types-inhibit' excludes certain
1328 ImageMagick image types from `imagemagick-register-types'.
1329
1330 **** With ImageMagick support, there are extra Image mode commands to
1331 resize and rotate images: `image-transform-fit-to-height',
1332 `image-transform-fit-to-width', `image-transform-set-rotation', and
1333 `image-transform-set-scale'.
1334
1335 ** `compose-mail' now accepts an optional 8th arg, RETURN-ACTION, and
1336 passes it to the mail user agent function. This argument specifies an
1337 action for returning to the caller after finishing with the mail. For
1338 example, this is used by Rmail to optionally delete a mail window.
1339
1340 ** XML and HTML parsing
1341 If Emacs is compiled with libxml2 support, there are two new
1342 functions: `libxml-parse-html-region' (which parses "real world" HTML)
1343 and `libxml-parse-xml-region' (which parses XML). Both return an
1344 Emacs Lisp parse tree.
1345
1346 ** Networking and encryption changes
1347
1348 *** `open-network-stream' can now be used to open an encrypted stream.
1349 It now accepts an optional `:type' parameter for initiating a TLS
1350 connection, directly or via STARTTLS. To do STARTTLS, additional
1351 parameters (`:end-of-command', `:success', `:capabilities-command')
1352 must also be supplied.
1353
1354 *** New library gnutls.el.
1355 The new function `gnutls-available-p' returns non-nil if Emacs is
1356 built with GnuTLS support. The main entry points are
1357 `open-gnutls-stream' and `gnutls-negotiate'. It's easiest to use
1358 these functions through `open-network-stream', because that can
1359 upgrade connections through STARTTLS opportunistically or use plain
1360 SSL, depending on your needs. For debugging, set `gnutls-log-level'
1361 greater than 0.
1362
1363 *** New primitive `secure-hash' that supports many secure hash algorithms:
1364 md5, sha1, sha2, sha224, sha256, sha384, and sha512. The lisp library
1365 sha1.el has been removed. The `sha1' feature is provided by default.
1366
1367 ** Isearch
1368
1369 *** New hook `isearch-update-post-hook' that runs in `isearch-update'.
1370
1371 ** Progress reporters can now "spin".
1372 The MIN-VALUE and MAX-VALUE arguments of `make-progress-reporter' can
1373 now be nil, or omitted. This makes a "non-numeric" reporter. Each
1374 time you call `progress-reporter-update' on that progress reporter,
1375 with a nil or omitted VALUE argument, the reporter message is
1376 displayed with a "spinning bar".
1377
1378 ** New variable `revert-buffer-in-progress-p' is true while a buffer is
1379 being reverted, even if the buffer has a local `revert-buffer-function'.
1380
1381 ** New variables `delayed-warnings-list' and `delayed-warnings-hook'.
1382 If delayed-warnings-list is non-nil, the command loop calls
1383 `delayed-warnings-hook' after `post-command-hook'. At present, this
1384 is only used by Emacs on some platforms to display warnings during
1385 startup, which might otherwise not be noticed. This uses the
1386 functions `display-delayed-warnings' and `collapse-delayed-warnings'.
1387
1388 ** rx.el has a new `group-n' construct for explicitly numbered groups.
1389
1390 ** New function `make-composed-keymap' that constructs a new keymap
1391 from multiple input maps. You can use this to make a keymap that
1392 inherits from multiple maps, eg:
1393 (set-keymap-parent newmap (make-composed-keymap othermap parent))
1394
1395 ** New function `string-prefix-p'.
1396 (This was actually added in Emacs 23.2 but was not advertised at the time.)
1397
1398 ** New reader macro ## that stands for the empty symbol.
1399 This means that the empty symbol can now be read back. Also, #: by itself
1400 (when not immediately followed by a possible symbol character) stands for
1401 an empty uninterned symbol.
1402
1403 ** New math functions `isnan', `copysign', `frexp', `ldexp'.
1404
1405 ** The following functions and variables are obsolete:
1406
1407 *** `tooltip-use-echo-area' is obsolete.
1408 Rather than setting this to t, disable Tooltip mode instead.
1409
1410 *** buffer-substring-filters is obsolete.
1411 Use `filter-buffer-substring-functions' instead.
1412
1413 *** `byte-compile-disable-print-circle' is obsolete.
1414
1415 *** `deferred-action-list' and `deferred-action-function' are obsolete.
1416 Use `post-command-hook' instead.
1417
1418 *** `font-lock-maximum-size' is obsolete.
1419
1420 \f
1421 * Changes in Emacs 24.1 on non-free operating systems
1422
1423 ** On MS Windows, Emacs warns when using the obsolete init file _emacs,
1424 and also when HOME is set to C:\ by default.
1425
1426 ** New configure.bat options
1427
1428 *** --enable-checking builds Emacs with extra runtime checks.
1429
1430 *** --distfiles specifies files to be included in binary distribution.
1431
1432 *** --without-gnutls disables automatic GnuTLS detection.
1433
1434 *** --lib for general library linkage, works with the USER_LIBS build variable.
1435
1436 ** New make target `dist' to create binary distribution for MS Windows.
1437
1438 ** The Lisp function `w32-default-color-map' is now obsolete.
1439 (It is only used internally in the Emacs C code.)
1440
1441 ** Customize ns-auto-hide-menu-bar to have the menu-bar hidden, but
1442 reappear on mouse-over. (Requires OS X 10.6 or later.)
1443
1444 ** On Mac OS X, dragging a file into Emacs visits the file, like on
1445 other platforms, rather than inserting its contents into the buffer.
1446
1447 \f
1448 ----------------------------------------------------------------------
1449 This file is part of GNU Emacs.
1450
1451 GNU Emacs is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
1452 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
1453 the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
1454 (at your option) any later version.
1455
1456 GNU Emacs is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
1457 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
1458 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
1459 GNU General Public License for more details.
1460
1461 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
1462 along with GNU Emacs. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
1463
1464 \f
1465 Local variables:
1466 mode: outline
1467 paragraph-separate: "[ \f]*$"
1468 end: