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GNU Emacs NEWS — history of user-visible changes.

Copyright © 2010-2012 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
See the end of the file for license conditions.

Please send Emacs bug reports to [email protected].
If possible, use M-x report-emacs-bug.

This file is about changes in Emacs version 24.

See files NEWS.23, NEWS.22, NEWS.21, NEWS.20, NEWS.19, NEWS.18,
and NEWS.1-17 for changes in older Emacs versions.

You can narrow news to a specific version by calling `view-emacs-news’
with a prefix argument or by typing C-u C-h C-n.

  • Installation Changes in Emacs 24.1
  • Emacs can be compiled with Gtk+ 3.0 if you pass —with-x-toolkit=gtk3
    to configure. Note that other libraries used by Emacs, RSVG and GConf,
    also depend on Gtk+. You can disable them with —without-rsvg and
    —without-gconf.
  • Emacs can be compiled with GnuTLS support.
    This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
    found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
    `—without-gnutls’. See below for GnuTLS features.
  • Emacs can be compiled with SELinux support.
    This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
    found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
    `—without-selinux’. See below for SELinux features.
  • Emacs can be compiled with ImageMagick support.
    This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
    found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
    `—without-imagemagick’. See below for ImageMagick features.
    This feature is not available for the Nextstep or MS ports.
  • Emacs can be compiled with libxml2 support.
    This happens by default if a suitably recent version of the library is
    found at build time. To prevent this, use the configure option
    `—without-xml2’. See below for libxml2 features.
  • By default, the installed Info and man pages are compressed.
    You can disable this by configuring —without-compress-info.
  • New configure option —with-wide-int.
    With it, Emacs integers typically have 62 bits, even on 32-bit machines.
    On 32-bit hosts, this raises the limit on buffer sizes from about 512 MiB
    to about 2 GiB.
  • New configure options: —with-mmdf, —with-mail-unlink, —with-mailhost.
    These provide no new functionality, they just remove the need to edit
    lib-src/Makefile by hand in order to use the associated features.
  • New configure option —enable-use-lisp-union-type.
    This is only useful for Emacs developers to debug certain types of bugs.
    This is not a new feature; only the configure flag is new.
  • The standalone programs digest-doc and sorted-doc are removed.
    Emacs now uses Lisp commands `doc-file-to-man’ and `doc-file-to-info’.
  • The standalone program `fakemail’ is removed.
    If you need it, feedmail.el provides a superset of the functionality.

  • Startup Changes in Emacs 24.1
  • The —unibyte, —multibyte, —no-multibyte, and —no-unibyte
    command line arguments, and the EMACS_UNIBYTE environment variable, no
    longer have any effect. (They were declared obsolete in Emacs 23.)
  • New command line option `—no-site-lisp’ removes site-lisp directories
    from load-path. -Q now implies this. This option does not affect the
    EMACSLOADPATH environment variable (and hence has no effect for
    Nextstep builds).

  • Changes in Emacs 24.1
  • Completion
  • Many packages now use the `completion-at-point’ command,
    rather than implementing separate completion commands.
  • `completion-at-point’ now handles tags and semantic completion.
  • Completion in a non-minibuffer now tries to detect the end of completion
    and pops down the Completions buffer accordingly.
  • New option `completion-cycle-threshold’ allows completion cycling.
  • New option `completion-category-overrides’ for overriding the
    default completion style in certain circumstances.
  • New completion style `substring’.
  • Completion of buffer names uses `substring’ completion by default.
  • The option `widget-complete-field’ has been removed.
  • Mail changes
  • The first time you try sending mail, Emacs asks for a mail method.
    This is implemented by a new default for `send-mail-function’, which
    is `sendmail-query-once’. This offers to use the smtpmail package, or
    to use the old defaults relying on external mail facilities
    (`sendmail-send-it’ on GNU/Linux and other Unix-like systems, and
    `mailclient-send-it’ on Windows).
  • Typing C-c m in the buffer made by M-x report-emacs-bug transfers
    the report to your desktop’s preferred mail client, if there is one.
    This uses either the “xdg-email” utility, or Mac OS’s “open” command.
  • See Changes in Specialized Modes and Packages for SMTPmail changes
    and Mail mode changes
  • Emacs server and client changes
  • New option `server-port’ specifies the port for TCP Emacs servers.
  • New emacsclient argument q/-quiet suppresses some status messages.
  • New emacsclient argument —frame-parameters specifies the frame
    parameters of any newly-created graphical frame.
  • If emacsclient shuts down due to Emacs signaling an error,
    its exit status is 1.
  • New emacsclient argument —parent-id ID.
    This opens a client frame in parent X window ID, via XEmbed, similar
    to the —parent-id argument to Emacs.
  • Internationalization changes
  • Emacs now supports display and editing of bidirectional text.
    Right-to-left (RTL) scripts, such as Arabic, Farsi, and Hebrew, are
    displayed in the correct visual order as expected by users of those
    scripts. The display reordering is a “full bidirectionality” class
    implementation of the Unicode Bidirectional Algorithm (UBA). Buffers
    with no RTL text should look exactly the same as before.
  • New buffer-local variable `bidi-display-reordering’.
    To disable display reordering in a buffer, change this to nil.
  • New buffer-local variable `bidi-paragraph-direction’.
    If nil (the default), Emacs determines the base direction of each
    paragraph from its text, as specified by the UBA. Setting the value
    to `right-to-left’ or `left-to-right’ forces a base direction on each
    paragraph.

Paragraphs with right-to-left base direction are displayed starting at
the right window edge.

  • Enhanced support for characters with no glyphs in available fonts,
    or, on text terminals, characters that cannot be encoded by the
    terminal coding system. The new option `glyphless-char-display-control’
    specifies how to display them: as a hexadecimal code in a box, a thin
    1-pixel space, an empty box, etc.
  • New input methods: farsi, farsi-translit, bulgarian-alt-phonetic.
  • `nobreak-char-display’ now also highlights Unicode hyphen chars
    (U+2010 and U+2011).
  • New Hebrew translation of the Emacs Tutorial.
    Type `C-u C-h t’ to choose it in case your language setup doesn’t
    automatically select it.
  • An Emacs Lisp package manager is now included.
    This is a convenient way to download and install additional packages,
    from a package repository at http://elpa.gnu.org.
  • M-x list-packages shows a list of packages, which can be
    selected for installation.
  • New command `describe-package’, bound to `C-h P’.
  • By default, all installed packages are loaded automatically when
    Emacs starts up. To disable this, set `package-enable-at-startup’ to
    nil. To specify the packages to load, customize `package-load-list’.
  • Custom theme changes
  • New command `M-x customize-themes’, which provides a convenient
    interface for enabling and disabling Custom themes.
  • New option `custom-theme-load-path’ is the load path for themes.
    Emacs no longer looks for Custom themes in `load-path’. The default
    value of `custom-theme-load-path’ says to look for themes in
    `custom-theme-directory’, followed by a subdirectory of
    `data-directory’ named “themes/”, which contains a small selection of
    built-in Custom themes.
  • New option `custom-safe-themes’ records known-safe theme files.
    If a theme is not in this list, Emacs queries before loading it, and
    offers to save the theme to `custom-safe-themes’ automatically. By
    default, all themes included in Emacs are treated as safe.
  • Improved GTK integration
  • GTK scroll-bars are now placed on the right by default.
    The function `set-scroll-bar-mode’ can change this.
  • GTK tool bars can have just text, just images or images and text.
    Customize `tool-bar-style’ to choose the style. On a Gnome desktop,
    the default is taken from desktop settings.
  • GTK tool bars can be placed on any edge of the frame.
    The frame-parameter tool-bar-position controls this. It takes the
    values top, left, right or bottom. The Options => Show/Hide menu has
    entries for this.
  • The default colors for selected text (the `region’ face) are taken
    from the GTK theme when Emacs is built with GTK.
  • Emacs uses GTK tooltips by default if built with GTK.
    You can disable this by changing `x-gtk-use-system-tooltips’ to nil.
  • Graphical interface changes
  • On graphical displays, the mode-line no longer ends in dashes.
    Also, the first dash (which does not indicate anything) is just
    displayed as a space.
  • `menu-bar-select-buffer-function’ lets you choose another operation
    instead of `switch-to-buffer’ when selecting an item in the Buffers menu.
  • Lucid menus and dialogs can display antialiased fonts if Emacs is
    built with Xft. These fonts can be set via X resources, for example:
    Emacs.pane.menubar.font: Courier-12
  • Exiting changes
  • Emacs now calls `kill-emacs’ if it receives SIGTERM or SIGHUP,
    or if it receives a SIGINT signal in batch mode.
  • `kill-emacs-hook’ is now also run in batch mode.
    Third-party code which adds to `kill-emacs-hook’ should check if they
    do the right thing in batch mode.
  • Scrolling changes
  • New scrolling commands `scroll-up-command’ and `scroll-down-command’
    (bound to C-v/[next] and M-v/[prior]) do not signal errors at top/bottom
    of buffer at first key-press (instead they move to top/bottom of buffer)
    when `scroll-error-top-bottom’ is non-nil.
  • New option `scroll-error-top-bottom’ (see above).
  • New scrolling commands `scroll-up-line’ and `scroll-down-line’
    scroll a line instead of full screen.
  • New property `scroll-command’ should be set on a command’s symbol to
    define it as a scroll command affected by `scroll-preserve-screen-position’.
  • If you customize `scroll-conservatively’ to a value greater than 100,
    Emacs will never recenter point in the window when it scrolls due to
    cursor motion commands or commands that move point (e.f., `M-g M-g’).
    Previously, you needed to use `most-positive-fixnum’ as the value of
    `scroll-conservatively’ to achieve the same effect.
  • “Aggressive” scrolling now honors the scroll margins.
    If you customize `scroll-up-aggressively’ or
    `scroll-down-aggressively’ and move point off the window, Emacs now
    scrolls the window so as to avoid positioning point inside the scroll
    margin.
  • Basic SELinux support has been added.
    This requires Emacs to be linked with libselinux at build time.
  • Emacs preserves the SELinux file context when backing up.
    Also, the function `copy-file’ has an extra optional argument for
    preserving SELinux context, and the return value of `backup-buffer’
    now includes the SELinux context.
  • New functions `file-selinux-context’ and `set-file-selinux-context’
    get and set the SELinux context of a file.
  • Trash changes
  • `delete-by-moving-to-trash’ now only affects commands that specify
    trashing. This avoids inadvertently trashing temporary files.
  • Calling `delete-file’ or `delete-directory’ with a prefix argument
    now forces true deletion, regardless of `delete-by-moving-to-trash’.
  • File- and directory-local variable changes
  • You can stop directory local vars from applying to subdirectories.
    Add an element (subdirs . nil) to the alist portion of any variables
    settings to indicate that the section should not apply to
    subdirectories.
  • Directory local variables can apply to some file-less buffers.
    Affected modes include dired, vc-dir, and log-edit. For example,
    adding “(diff-mode . ((mode . whitespace)))” to .dir-locals.el will
    turn on `whitespace-mode’ for vc-diff buffers. Modes should call
    `hack-dir-local-variables-non-file-buffer’ to support this.
  • Using “mode: MINOR-MODE” to enable a minor mode is deprecated.
    Instead, use “eval: (minor-mode 1)”.
  • The variable `inhibit-first-line-modes-regexps’ has been renamed
    to `inhibit-local-variables-regexps’. As the name suggests, it now
    applies to ALL file local variables, not just * lines. The
    associated `inhibit-first-line-modes-suffixes’ has been renamed in the
    corresponding way.
  • Window changes
  • The `quit-window’ command now restores the last buffer displayed
    in the quitted window.
  • Resizing an Emacs frame now preserves proportional window sizes,
    modulo restrictions like window minimum sizes and fixed-size windows.
  • The behavior of `display-buffer’ is now customizable in detail.
  • New option `display-buffer-base-action’ specifies a list of
    user-determined display “actions” (functions and optional arguments
    for choosing the displaying window).

This takes precedence over the default display action, which is
specified by `display-buffer-fallback-action’.

  • New option `display-buffer-alist’ maps buffer name regexps to
    display actions, taking precedence over `display-buffer-base-action’.
  • New option `window-combination-limit’.
    The new option `window-combination-limit’ allows to return the space
    obtained for resizing or creating a window more reliably to the window
    from which such space was obtained.
  • New option `window-combination-resize’.
    The new option `window-combination-resize’ allows to split a window that
    otherwise cannot be split because it’s too small by stealing space from
    other windows in the same combination. Subsequent resizing or deletion
    of the window will resize all windows in the same combination as well.
  • New option `frame-auto-hide-function’ lets you choose between
    iconifying or deleting a frame when burying a buffer in a dedicated
    frame, or quitting a window showing a buffer in a frame of its own.
  • New commands `maximize-window’ and `minimize-window’.
    These maximize and minimize the size of a window within its frame.
  • New commands `switch-to-prev-buffer’ and `switch-to-next-buffer’.
    These functions allow to navigate through the live buffers that have
    been shown in a specific window.
  • Minibuffer changes
  • The inactive minibuffer has its own major mode `minibuffer-inactive-mode’.
    This is handy for minibuffer-only frames, and is also used for the feature
    where mouse-1 pops up *Messages*"’, which can now easily be changed.
  • Minibuffers set `truncate-lines’ to nil.
    If you want to change the value to something else, you could use
    for example `minibuffer-setup-hook’.
  • `auto-mode-case-fold’ is now enabled by default.
  • `backup-by-copying-when-mismatch’ now defaults to t.
  • New basic faces `error’, `warning’, `success’.
    These are used to highlight text indicating failure, caution or
    successful operation.
  • New option `list-colors-sort’ defines the color sort order
    for `list-colors-display’.
  • The variable `focus-follows-mouse’ now always defaults to nil.

  • Editing Changes in Emacs 24.1
  • Search changes
  • C-y in Isearch is now bound to `isearch-yank-kill’, instead of
    `isearch-yank-line’.
  • M-y in Isearch is now bound to `isearch-yank-pop’, instead of
    `isearch-yank-kill’.
  • M-s C-e in Isearch is now bound to `isearch-yank-line’.
  • New commands `count-words-region’ and `count-words’.
  • M-= is bound to `count-words-region’, not `count-lines-region’.
    The `count-words-region’ command, when called interactively, reports
    the number of lines, words, and characters in the region. It is a
    superset of the old `count-lines-region’, which is now an obsolete
    alias for it.
  • The command `just-one-space’ (M-SPC), if given a negative argument,
    also deletes newlines around point.
  • Deletion changes
  • New option `delete-active-region’.
    If non-nil, [delete] and DEL delete the region if it is active and no
    prefix argument is given. If set to `kill’, those commands kill
    instead.
  • New command `delete-forward-char’, bound to [delete].
    This is meant for interactive use, and obeys `delete-active-region’.
    The command `delete-char’ does not obey `delete-active-region’.
  • `delete-backward-char’ is now a Lisp function.
    Apart from obeying `delete-active-region’, its behavior is unchanged.
    However, the byte compiler now warns if it is called from Lisp; Lisp
    callers should use delete-char with a negative argument instead.
  • The option `mouse-region-delete-keys’ has been deleted.
  • Selection changes.

The default handling of clipboard and primary selections has been
changed to conform with modern X applications. In short, most
commands for killing and yanking text now use the clipboard, while
mouse commands use the primary selection.

In the following, we provide a list of these changes, followed by a
list of steps to get the old behavior back if you prefer that.

  • `select-active-regions’ now defaults to t.
    Merely selecting text (e.g. with drag-mouse-1) no longer puts it in
    the kill ring. The selected text is put in the primary selection, if
    the system possesses a separate primary selection facility (e.g. X).
  • `select-active-regions’ also accepts a new value, `only’.
    This means to only set the primary selection for temporarily active
    regions (usually made by mouse-dragging or shift-selection);
    “ordinary” active regions, such as those made with C-SPC followed by
    point motion, do not alter the primary selection.
  • `mouse-drag-copy-region’ now defaults to nil.
  • mouse-2 is now bound to `mouse-yank-primary’.
    This pastes from the primary selection, ignoring the kill-ring.
    Previously, mouse-2 was bound to `mouse-yank-at-click’.
  • `x-select-enable-clipboard’ now defaults to t on all platforms.
  • `x-select-enable-primary’ now defaults to nil.
    Thus, commands that kill text or copy it to the kill-ring (such as
    M-w, C-w, and C-k) also use the clipboard—-not the primary selection.
  • The “Copy”, “Cut”, and “Paste” items in the “Edit” menu are now
    exactly equivalent to M-w, C-w, and C-y respectively.
  • Note that on MS-Windows, `x-select-enable-clipboard’ was already
    non-nil by default, as Windows does not support the primary selection
    between applications.
  • To return to the previous behavior, do the following:
  • Change `select-active-regions’ to nil.
  • Change `mouse-drag-copy-region’ to t.
  • Change `x-select-enable-primary’ to t (on X only).
  • Change `x-select-enable-clipboard’ to nil.
  • Bind `mouse-yank-at-click’ to mouse-2.
  • Support for X cut buffers has been removed.
  • X clipboard managers are now supported.
    To inhibit this, change `x-select-enable-clipboard-manager’ to nil.
  • New command `C-x r N’ (`rectangle-number-lines’) numbers the lines
    in the current rectangle. With a prefix argument, this prompts for a
    number to count from and for a format string.
  • `redisplay-dont-pause’ now defaults to t.
    This makes Emacs feel more responsive to editing commands that arrive
    at high rate, e.g. if you lean on some key, because stopping redisplay
    in the middle (when this variable is nil) forces more expensive
    updates later on, and Emacs appears to be unable to keep up.
  • The behavior of for active regions in Text mode has changed.
    In Text and related modes, typing (`indent-for-tab-command’)
    when the region is active causes Emacs to indent all the lines in the
    region, aligning them with the line previous to the first line in the
    region (or with the left margin if there is no previous line).
  • When `occur’ is called with a prefix argument, matching strings are
    collected into the `*Occur*’ buffer without line numbers. If there
    are parenthesized subexpressions in the specified regexp, `occur’
    reads replacement text that may contain \\& and \\N whose convention
    follows `replace-match’.

  • Changes in Specialized Modes and Packages in Emacs 24.1
  • Archive Mode has basic support for browsing and updating 7z archives.
  • BibTeX mode
  • BibTeX mode now supports biblatex.
    Use the variable `bibtex-dialect’ to select different BibTeX dialects.
    `bibtex-entry-field-alist’ is now an obsolete alias for
    `bibtex-BibTeX-entry-alist’.
  • New command `bibtex-search-entries’, bound to C-c C-a.
  • New `bibtex-entry-format’ option `sort-fields’, disabled by default.
  • New variable `bibtex-search-entry-globally’.
  • Browse-url
  • New option `browse-url-mailto-function’ specifies how to handle “mailto:”s.
  • The default browser used by the package is now the “xdg-open” program,
    on platforms that support it. This calls your desktop’s preferred browser.
  • Calendar, Diary, and Appt
  • Diary entries can contain non-printing “comments”.
    See the variable `diary-comment-start’.
  • Appointments can specify their individual warning times.
    See the variable `appt-warning-time-regexp’.
  • The function specified by `appt-disp-window-function’ may be passed
    lists of arguments if multiple appointments are due at similar times.
    If you are using a custom function for this, you should update it.
  • New function `diary-hebrew-birthday’.
  • Elements of `calendar-day-abbrev-array’ and `calendar-month-abbrev-array’
    may no longer be nil, but must all be strings.
  • The obsolete (since Emacs 22.1) method of enabling the appt
    package by adding `appt-make-list’ to `diary-hook’ has been removed.
    Use `appt-activate’ instead.
  • Some appt variables (obsolete since Emacs 22.1) have been removed:
    appt-issue-message (use the function appt-activate)
    appt-visible/appt-msg-window (use the variable appt-display-format)
  • Some diary function aliases (obsolete since Emacs 22.1) have been removed:
    view-diary-entries, list-diary-entries, show-all-diary-entries
  • CC Mode
  • New feature to “guess” the style in an existing buffer.
    The main entry point is M-x c-guess.
  • Java Mode now supports Java 5.0 (Tiger) and 6 (Mustang).
  • `c-beginning-of-defun’ and `c-end-of-defun’ now respect nested scopes.
    Thus C-M-a will, by default, go to the beginning of the immediate function,
    not the top level.
  • “Macros with semicolons” can be registered for correct indentation.
    Where such a macro ends a line (no semicolon) the next statement is no longer
    parsed as a statement continuation.
  • Comint and modes derived from it use the standard completion code.
  • Compilation mode
  • Compilation mode can be used without Font Lock mode.
    `compilation-parse-errors-function’ is now obsolete.
  • New variable `compilation-filter-start’, which is bound while
    `compilation-filter-hook’ runs. It records the start position of the
    text inserted by `compilation-filter’.
  • `compilation-error-screen-columns’ and `compilation-first-column’
    are obeyed in the editing buffer. So programming language modes can
    set them, whereas previously only the value in the Compilation
    buffer was used.
  • Customize
  • Customize buffers now contain a search field.
    The search is performed using `customize-apropos’.
    To turn off the search field, set `custom-search-field’ to nil.
  • Custom options now start out hidden if at their default values.
    Use the arrow to the left of the option name to toggle visibility.
  • custom-buffer-sort-alphabetically now defaults to t.
  • The color widget now has a “Choose” button, which allows you to
    choose a color via `list-colors-display’.
  • D-Bus
  • It is now possible to access buses other than the default system
    or session bus.
  • The `dbus-register-method’ and `dbus-register-property’ functions
    optionally do not register names.
  • The new function `dbus-register-service’ registers a known service
    name on a D-Bus without also registering a property or a method.
  • Dired-x
  • C-x C-j (`dired-jump’) and C-x 4 C-j (`dired-jump-other-window’),
    if called with a prefix argument, read a file name from the minibuffer
    instead of using the current buffer.
  • The “dired local variables” feature of Dired-x is obsolete.
    The standard directory local variables feature replaces it.
  • ERC changes
  • New options `erc-autojoin-timing’ and `erc-autojoin-delay’,
    controlling attempts to autojoin a channel.
  • New variable `erc-coding-system-precedence’: If we use `undecided’
    as the server coding system, this variable will then be consulted.
    The default is to decode strings that can be decoded as utf-8 as
    utf-8, and do the normal `undecided’ decoding for the rest.
  • Eshell changes
  • The default value of `eshell-directory-name’ has changed
    to be an “eshell” directory in `user-emacs-directory’.
    The old “~/.eshell/” directory is still used if it exists, though.
  • gdb-mi
  • The M-x gdb command now uses the GDB Machine Interface protocol.
    It now supports multithread non-stop debugging and simultaneous
    debugging of several threads.
  • Image mode
  • RET (`image-toggle-animation’) toggles animation, if applicable.
    Animation plays once, unless the option `image-animate-loop’ is non-nil.
  • Info
  • New command M-x info-display-manual displays a named Info manual.
    If that manual is already visited in some Info buffer, it displays
    that buffer. (This is handy if you have many manuals in many info
    buffers, and don’t remember the name of the buffer visiting the manual
    you want to consult.) Otherwise, it loads and displays the manual.
  • `e’ is now bound to `end-of-buffer’ rather than to `Info-edit’.
    This is for compatibility with the stand-alone Info reader program,
    and also because `Info-edit’ is a rarely used command that is disabled
    by default.
  • Mail mode changes (not Message mode)
  • New command M-x mail-add-attachment for adding MIME attachments
  • The command M-x mail-attach-file was renamed to M-x mail-insert-file.
    (Its name is misleading, since it has nothing to do with MIME
    attachments.) The old name is now an obsolete alias to the new name.
  • MH-E has been updated to MH-E version 8.3.1.
    See MH-E-NEWS for details.
  • Modula-2 mode provides auto-indentation.
  • mpc.el: Can use pseudo tags of the form tag1|tag2 as a union of two tags.
  • nXML mode no longer binds C-RET to `nxml-complete’.
    Completion is now performed via `completion-at-point’, bound to C-M-i
    or M-TAB. If `nxml-bind-meta-tab-to-complete-flag’ is non-nil (the
    default), this performs tag completion.
  • Org mode has been updated to version 7.8.09.
    See ORG-NEWS for details.
  • Prolog mode has been completely revamped, with lots of additional
    functionality such as more intelligent indentation, electricity,
    support for more variants, including Mercury, and a lot more.
  • Rmail
  • The command `rmail-epa-decrypt’ decrypts OpenPGP data
    in the Rmail incoming message.
  • The variable `rmail-message-filter’ no longer has any effect.
    This change was made in Emacs 23.1 but was not advertised at the time.
    Try using `rmail-show-message-hook’ instead.
  • Shell mode
  • M-x shell prompts for the shell path name if the default directory
    is a remote file name and neither the environment variable $ESHELL nor
    the variable `explicit-shell-file-name’ is set.
  • TAB is now bound to the standard `completion-at-point’ command,
    which now implements the pcomplete rules for shell command completion.
  • SMTPmail
  • SMTPmail now uses encrypted connections (via STARTTLS) by default
    if the mail server supports them. This uses either built-in GnuTLS
    support, or the starttls.el library. Customize `smtpmail-stream-type’
    to change this.
  • The variable `smtpmail-auth-credentials’ has been removed.
    By default, the information is now stored in the file ~/.authinfo.
    This was the default value of smtpmail-auth-credentials. If you had
    customized smtpmail-auth-credentials to a list of user names and
    passwords, those settings are not used. During your first connection
    to the smtp server, Emacs will prompt for the user name and password,
    and offer to save them to ~/.authinfo. Or you can manually copy the
    credentials to ~/.authinfo. For example, if you had
(setq smtpmail-auth-credentials ’((“mail.example.org” 25 “jim” “s!cret”)))

then the equivalent line in ~/.authinfo would be

machine mail.example.org port 25 login jim password s!cret

See the auth-source manual for more information, e.g. on encrypting
the credentials file.

  • The variable `smtpmail-starttls-credentials’ has been removed.
    If you had that set, you need to put
machine smtp.whatever.foo port 25 key “~/.my_smtp_tls.key” cert “~/.my_smtp_tls.cert”

in your ~/.authinfo file instead.

  • SQL mode
  • New options `sql-port’, `sql-connection-alist’, `sql-send-terminator’,
    and `sql-oracle-scan-on’.
  • New options controlling prompting for login parameters.
    Each supported product has a custom variable `sql-*-login-params’,
    which is a list of the parameters to be prompted for before a
    connection is established.
  • The command `sql-product-interactive’ now takes a prefix argument,
    which causes it to prompt for an SQL product.
  • Product-specific SQL interactive commands now take prefix arguments.
    These commands (`sql-sqlite’, `sql-postgres’, `sql-mysql’, etc.),
    given a prefix argument, prompt for a name for the SQL interactive
    buffer. This reduces the need for calling `sql-rename-buffer’.
  • SQL interactive modes suppress command continuation prompts, and
    replace tabs with spaces. The first change impacts multiple line SQL
    statements entered with C-j between each line, statements yanked into
    the buffer and statements sent with `sql-send-’ functions. The
    second prevents the MySQL and Postgres interpreters from listing
    object name completions when sent text via `sql-send-
    ’ functions.
  • New command `sql-connect’ starts a predefined SQLi session,
    using the login parameters from `sql-connection-alist’.
  • New “Save Connection” menu item in SQLi buffers.
    This gathers the login params specified for the SQLi session, if it
    was not started by a connection, and saves them as a new connection.
  • New commands for listing database objects and details:
    sql-list-all and sql-list-table.
  • An API for manipulating SQL product definitions has been added.
  • TeX modes
  • latex-electric-env-pair-mode keeps \begin..\end matched on the fly.
  • Tramp
  • New inline access method “ksu” (kerberized su).
  • The following access methods are discontinued: “ssh1_old”,
    “ssh2_old”, “scp1_old”, “scp2_old”, “imap”, “imaps” and “fish”.
  • The user option `remote-file-name-inhibit-cache’ controls whether
    remote file attributes are cached for better performance.
  • The option `ange-ftp-binary-file-name-regexp’ has changed its
    default value to "".
  • Handlers for `file-selinux-context’ and `set-file-selinux-context’
    for remote machines which support SELinux.
  • New function `url-queue-retrieve’, which behaves like url-retrieve,
    but with limits (`url-queue-parallel-processes’, `url-queue-timeout’) on
    the degree of parallelism.
  • VC and related modes
  • Support for pulling on distributed version control systems.
    The command C-x v + (`vc-pull’) runs a “pull” operation, if it is
    supported (currently with Bzr, Git, and Mercurial), to update the
    current branch and working tree. A prefix argument means to prompt
    the user for specifics, e.g. a pull location.
  • `vc-update’ is now an alias for `vc-pull’.
  • Support for merging on distributed version control systems.
    The command C-x v m (`vc-merge’) now runs a “merge” operation, if it
    is supported (currently with Bzr, Git, and Mercurial), to merge
    changes from another branch into the current one. It prompts for
    specifics, e.g. a merge source.
  • New option `vc-revert-show-diff’ controls whether `vc-revert’
    shows a diff while querying the user. It defaults to t.
  • Log entries in some Log View buffers can be toggled to display a
    longer description by typing RET (log-view-toggle-entry-display).
    This is currently supported for Bzr, Git, and Mercurial (to support
    another backend, define a `log-view-expanded-log-entry-function’).
    In the Log View buffers made by C-x v L (`vc-print-root-log’), you can
    use this to display the full log entry for the revision at point.
  • New command `vc-ediff’ allows visual comparison of two revisions
    of a file similar to `vc-diff’, but using ediff backend.
  • The option `vc-initial-comment’ was removed in Emacs 23.2, but
    this was not advertised at the time.
  • `vc-toggle-read-only’ is an obsolete alias for `toggle-read-only’.
    Since Emacs 23, it has done the same thing as `toggle-read-only’, but
    this was not advertised at the time.
  • Obsolete modes
  • abbrevlist.el
  • erc-hecomplete.el (use erc-pcomplete.el instead)
  • partial-completion-mode (complete.el) is obsolete.
    You can get a comparable behavior with:
    (setq completion-styles ’(partial-completion initials))
    (setq completion-pcm-complete-word-inserts-delimiters t)
  • pc-mode.el is obsolete (CUA mode is much more comprehensive).
  • pgg is obsolete (use EasyPG instead).
  • sregex.el is obsolete, since rx.el is a strict superset.
  • s-region.el and pc-select.el are obsolete.
    They are superseded by shift-select-mode, enabled by default since 23.1.
  • vc-mcvs.el is obsolete (for lack of a maintainer).
  • Miscellaneous
  • The Landmark game is now invoked with `landmark’, not `lm’.
    Its functions and variables have been similarly renamed.
  • In `ido-file-completion-map’, C-v is no longer bound to `ido-toggle-vc’.
    (This interfered with cua-mode.)
  • f90.el has some support for Fortran 2008 syntax.
  • `copyright-fix-years’ can optionally convert consecutive years to ranges.
  • New command `nato-region’ converts text to NATO phonetic alphabet.

  • New Modes and Packages in Emacs 24.1
  • Occur Edit mode applies edits made in Occur buffers to the
    original buffers. It is bound to “e” in Occur mode.
  • New global minor mode electric-pair-mode.
    When enabled, typing an open parenthesis automatically inserts the
    matching closing one.
  • New global minor mode electric-indent-mode.
    When enabled, typing certain characters triggers reindentation.
    Major modes wishing to use this can set electric-indent-chars or
    electric-indent-functions.
  • New global minor mode electric-layout-mode.
    When enabled, typing certain characters automatically inserts newlines.
    Major modes wishing to use this can set electric-layout-rules.
  • tabulated-list.el provides a generic major mode for tabulated data,
    from which other modes can be derived.
  • pcase.el provides the ML-style pattern matching macro `pcase’.
  • secrets.el is an implementation of the Secret Service API, an
    interface to password managers like GNOME Keyring or KDE Wallet. The
    Secret Service API requires D-Bus for communication. The command
    `secrets-show-secrets’ offers a buffer with a visualization of the
    secrets.
  • notifications.el provides an implementation of the Desktop
    Notifications API. It requires D-Bus for communication.
  • soap-client.el supports access to SOAP web services from Emacs.
    soap-inspect.el is an interactive inspector for SOAP WSDL structures.
  • New generic mode, xmodmap-generic-mode, for xmodmap files.
  • New emacs-lock.el package.
    The previous version has been moved to obsolete/old-emacs-lock.el.
    Now, there is a proper minor mode `emacs-lock-mode’. Protection
    against exiting Emacs and killing the buffer can be set separately.
    The mechanism for automatically turning off protection for buffers
    with dead inferior processes has been generalized.

  • Incompatible Lisp Changes in Emacs 24.1
  • Passing a nil argument to a minor mode function call now ENABLES
    the minor mode unconditionally. This is so that you can write e.g.
(add-hook ’text-mode-hook ’foo-mode)

to enable foo-mode in Text mode buffers, removing the need for
`turn-on-foo-mode’ style functions. This affects all mode commands
defined by `define-minor-mode’. If called interactively, the mode
command still toggles the minor mode.

  • The return value of `backup-buffer’ has changed.
    It is now a list of three elements, where the second element is a list
    describing the original file’s SELinux context. If Emacs or the
    system lacks SELinux support, the context list is (nil nil nil nil).
    See “Basic SELinux support” above, under “Changes in Emacs 24.1”.
  • `char-direction-table’ and the `char-direction’ function were deleted.
    They were buggy and inferior to the new support of bidirectional
    editing introduced in Emacs 24. If you need the bidirectional
    properties of a character, use `get-char-code-property’ with the last
    argument `bidi-class’.
  • `copy-directory’ now copies the source directory as a subdirectory
    of the target directory, if the latter is an existing directory. The
    new optional arg COPY-CONTENTS, if non-nil, makes the function copy
    the contents directly into a pre-existing target directory.
  • For mouse click input events in the text area, the Y pixel
    coordinate in the POSITION list now counts from the top of the text
    area, excluding any header line. Previously, it counted from the top
    of the header line.
  • Support for “old-style” backquotes, obsolete for 10+ years, has
    been further reduced. Now a backquote not followed by a space is
    always treated as a “new-style” backquote. Please remove all
    “old-style” backquotes from your code. If your code uses backquotes
    as documented in the Elisp manual, and compiles without warning, then
    you have nothing to do in this regard. Code not following the
    appropriate conventions may fail to compile.

The most common cause of trouble seems to be an old-style backquote
followed by a newline. Another cause of trouble is vector notation
for key sequence notation: instead of [(control ,)] and [(control ‘)],
you should write [(control ?,)] and [(control ?’)], which will work in
older Emacsen too.

  • The macro `eval-at-startup’ was removed in Emacs 23.2, but this
    was not advertised at the time. The function `custom-initialize-delay’
    replaced all known uses.
  • `view-buffer’ now treats special mode-class in the same way that
    `view-file’ has since Emacs 22 (i.e. it won’t enable View mode if the
    major mode is special).
  • Menu and tool bar changes
  • During startup, Emacs no longer adds entries for `menu-bar-lines’
    and `tool-bar-lines’ to `default-frame-alist’ and `initial-frame-alist’.
    With these alist entries omitted, `make-frame’ checks the value of the
    variable `menu-bar-mode’/`tool-bar-mode’ to determine whether to create
    a menu-bar or tool-bar, respectively. If the alist entries are added,
    they override the value of `menu-bar-mode’/`tool-bar-mode’.
  • The menu bar bindings’s caches are not used any more.
    Use (where-is-internal nil t) instead.
  • Regions created by mouse dragging are now normal active regions,
    similar to those created by shift-selection (see Selection changes
    above). In previous Emacs versions, these regions were delineated by
    `mouse-drag-overlay’; that variable has been removed.
  • The fourth argument of `filter-buffer-substring’ has been removed.
    If you want to remove text properties from the final result, simply
    pass the result through substring-no-properties.
  • cl.el no longer provides `cl-19’.
  • The following obsolete functions and aliases have been removed
    (the appropriate new function is given in parentheses; “not needed”
    means you can just remove all calls to the function in question):
  • `comint-kill-output’ (`comint-delete-output’)
  • `decompose-composite-char’ (`char-to-string’)
  • `outline-visible’ (`outline-invisible-p’)
  • `internal-find-face’ (`facep’)
  • `internal-get-face’ (`facep and check-face’)
  • `frame-update-faces’ (not needed)
  • `frame-update-face-colors’ (`frame-set-background-mode’)
  • `x-frob-font-weight’ and `x-frob-font-slant’ (`make-face-*’ functions)
  • `x-make-font-bold and x-make-font-demibold (`make-face-bold’)
  • `x-make-font-italic’ and `x-make-font-oblique’ (`make-face-italic’)
  • `x-make-font-bold-italic’ (`make-face-bold-italic’)
  • `x-make-font-unbold’ (`make-face-unbold’)
  • `x-make-font-unitalic’ (`make-face-unitalic’)
  • `mldrag-drag-mode-line’ (`mouse-drag-mode-line’)
  • `mldrag-drag-vertical-line’ (`mouse-drag-vertical-line’)
  • `iswitchb-default-keybindings’ (`iswitchb-mode’)
  • `char-bytes’ (== 1)
  • `isearch-return-char’ (`isearch-printing-char’)
  • `make-local-hook’ (not needed)
  • `set-screen-height’ (`set-frame-height’)
  • `set-screen-width’ (`set-frame-width’)
  • The following obsolete variables and varaliases have been removed
    (the appropriate new variable is given in parentheses):
  • `checkdoc-minor-keymap’ (`checkdoc-minor-mode-map’)
  • `vc-header-alist’ (`vc-BACKEND-header’)
  • `directory-sep-char’ (== ?/)
  • `font-lock-defaults-alist’ (`font-lock-defaults’)
  • `e’ (`float-e’).
  • The following obsolete files were removed:
    sc.el, x-menu.el, rnews.el, rnewspost.el
  • The format of the finder-inf.el file has changed, since the Finder
    mechanism is now based on the package system. The variable
    `finder-package-info’ is replaced by `package—builtins’ and
    `finder-keywords-hash’.
  • When generating autoloads, `update-directory-autoloads’ no longer
    assumes every inspected file is in your `load-path’. It instead
    generates relative names according to the current `load-path’.

  • Lisp changes in Emacs 24.1
  • Code can now use lexical scoping by default instead of dynamic scoping.
    The `lexical-binding’ variable enables lexical scoping for local
    variables. It is typically set via a file-local variable in the first
    line of the file, in which case it applies to all the code in that
    file.
  • `eval’ takes a new optional argument `lexical’ to choose the new lexical
    binding instead of the old dynamic binding mode.
  • Lexically scoped interpreted functions are represented with a new form
    of function value which looks like (closure ENV ARGS &rest BODY).
  • New macro `letrec’ to define recursive local functions.
  • `defvar’ and `defconst’ now mark the variable as special (dynamic).
    So do `defcustom’ and other forms that call `defvar’ as a subroutine.
  • New function `special-variable-p’ to check whether a variable is
    declared as dynamically bound.
  • The form ((lambda …) …) is deprecated.
  • An Emacs Lisp testing tool is now included.
    Emacs Lisp developers can use this tool to write automated tests for
    their code. See the ERT info manual for details.
  • Changes for bidirectional display and editing
  • New function `current-bidi-paragraph-direction’.
    This returns the base direction of the paragraph at point.
  • New function `bidi-string-mark-left-to-right’.
    Given a string containing characters from right-to-left scripts, this
    function returns another string which can be safely inserted into a
    buffer, such that any following text will be always displayed to the
    right of that string. (This works by appending an invisible Unicode
    LEFT-TO-RIGHT MARK” character if the argument string might need it.)

This is useful when the buffer has overall left-to-right paragraph
direction and you need to insert a string whose contents are not known
in advance, without disrupting the layout of the line.

  • Window changes
  • Window tree functions are accessible in Elisp.
    Functions are provided to return the parent, siblings or child windows
    of any window including internal windows (windows not associated with a
    buffer) in the window tree.
  • New function `window-valid-p’ gives non-nil for live and internal
    windows.
  • Window manipulation can deal with internal windows.
    Many window handling functions like `split-window’, `delete-window’, or
    `delete-other-windows’ as well as the window resizing functions can now
    act on any window including internal ones.
  • window-total-height/-width vs window-body-height/-width.
    The function `window-height’ has been renamed to `window-total-height’
    and `window-width’ has been renamed to `window-body-width’. The old
    names are provided as aliases. Two new functions `window-total-width’
    and `window-body-height’ are provided.
  • Window parameters specific to window handling functions.
    For each window you can specify a parameter to override the default
    behavior of a number of functions like `split-window’, `delete-window’
    and `delete-other-windows’. The variable `ignore-window-parameters’
    allows to ignore processing such parameters.
  • New semantics of third argument of `split-window’.
    The third argument of `split-window’ has been renamed to SIDE and can be
    set to any of the values ‘below, ’right, ’above, or ’left to make the
    new window appear on the corresponding side of the window that shall be
    split. Any other value of SIDE will cause `split-window’ to split the
    window into two side-by-side windows as before.
  • Window resizing functions.
    A new standard function for resizing windows called `window-resize’ has
    been introduced. This and all other functions for resizing windows no
    longer delete any windows when they become too small.
  • Deleting the selected window now selects the most recently selected
    live window on that frame instead.
  • `adjust-window-trailing-edge’ adjustments.
    `adjust-window-trailing-edge’ can now deal with fixed-size windows and
    is able to resize other windows if a window adjacent to the trailing
    edge cannot be shrunk any more. This makes its behavior more similar to
    that of Emacs 21 without compromising, however, its inability to delete
    windows which was introduced in Emacs 22.
  • Window-local buffer lists.
    Windows now have local buffer lists. This means that removing a buffer
    from display in a window will preferably show the buffer previously
    shown in that window with its previous window-start and window-point
    positions. This also means that the same buffer may be automatically
    shown twice even if it already appears in another window.
  • `switch-to-buffer’ has a new optional argument FORCE-SAME-WINDOW,
    which if non-nil requires the buffer to be displayed in the currently
    selected window, signaling an error otherwise. If nil, another window
    can be used, e.g. if the selected one is strongly dedicated.
  • `split-window-vertically’ and `split-window-horizontally’ renamed
    to `split-window-below’ and `split-window-right’ respectively.
    The old names are kept as aliases.
  • Display actions
  • The second arg to `display-buffer’ and `pop-to-buffer’ is now
    named ACTION, and takes a display action of the same form as
    `display-buffer-base-action’ (see Changes, above). A non-nil,
    non-list value is treated specially, as the old meaning.
  • New variable `display-buffer-overriding-action’.
  • The procedure of `display-buffer’ etc. to choose a window is
    determined by combining `display-buffer-overriding-action’,
    `display-buffer-alist’, the ACTION arg, `display-buffer-base-action’,
    and `display-buffer-fallback-action’. The second and fourth of these
    are user-customizable variables.

See the docstring of `display-buffer’ for details.

  • New functions `window-state-get’ and `window-state-put’.
    These functions allow to save and restore the state of an arbitrary
    frame or window as an Elisp object.
  • Completion
  • New variable `completion-extra-properties’ used to specify extra
    properties of the current completion:
    - :annotate-function, same as the old completion-annotate-function.
    - :exit-function, function to call after completion took place.
  • Functions on `completion-at-point-functions’ can return any of the
    properties valid for `completion-extra-properties’.
  • `completion-annotate-function’ is obsolete.
  • New `metadata’ method for completion tables. The metadata thus returned
    can specify various details of the data returned by `all-completions’:
    - `category’ is the kind of objects returned (e.g., `buffer’, `file’, …),
    used to select a style in completion-category-overrides.
    - `annotation-function’ to add annotations in Completions.
    - `display-sort-function’ to specify how to sort entries in Completions.
    - `cycle-sort-function’ to specify how to sort entries when cycling.
  • `minibuffer-local-filename-must-match-map’ is not used any more.
    Instead, the bindings in `minibuffer-local-filename-completion-map’
    are combined with `minibuffer-local-must-match-map’.
  • New variable `completing-read-function’ allows overriding the
    behavior of `completing-read’.
  • `glyphless-char-display’ can now distinguish between graphical and
    text terminal display, via a char-table entry that is a cons cell.
  • `pre-command-hook’/`post-command-hook’ are not reset to nil on error.
    Instead, the offending function is removed.
  • New hook types
  • New function `run-hook-wrapped’ for running an abnormal hook by
    passing the hook functions as arguments to a “wrapping” function.
    Like `run-hook-with-args-until-success’, it stops at the first
    non-nil return value.
  • New macro `with-wrapper-hook’ for running an abnormal hook as a
    set of “wrapping” filters, similar to around advice.
    (A version of this macro was actually added in Emacs 23.2 but was not
    advertised at the time.)
  • Debugger changes
  • New macro `condition-case-unless-debug’ (this was actually added in
    Emacs 23.1 as condition-case-no-debug, but not advertised)
  • The macro `with-demoted-errors’ was added in Emacs 23.1, but not advertised.
  • Variable `stack-trace-on-error’ removed.
  • The debugger can now “continue” from an error, which means it will
    jump to the error handler as if the debugger had not been invoked
    instead of jumping all the way to the top-level.
  • Set `debug-on-event’ to enter the debugger on events like SIGUSR1.
    This can be useful when `inhibit-quit’ is set.
  • The new function `server-eval-at’ allows evaluation of Lisp forms on
    named Emacs server instances.
  • `call-process’ and `call-process-region’ allow a `(:file “file”)’ spec
    to redirect STDOUT to a file.
  • The function `format-time-string’ now supports the %N directive,
    for higher-resolution time stamps.
  • New input reading functions
  • New function `read-char-choice’ reads a restricted set of
    characters, discarding any inputs not inside the set.
  • The command `read-color’ now requires a match for a color name
    or RGB triplet, instead of signaling an error if the user provides
    invalid input.
  • `facemenu-read-color’ is now an alias for `read-color’.
  • `image-library-alist’ is renamed to `dynamic-library-alist’.
    The variable is now used to load all kind of supported dynamic libraries,
    not just image libraries. The previous name is still available as an
    obsolete alias.
  • Syntax parsing changes
  • New variable `syntax-propertize-function’.
    This replaces `font-lock-syntactic-keywords’ which is now obsolete.
    This allows syntax-table properties to be set independently from font-lock:
    just call syntax-propertize to make sure the text is propertized.
    Together with this new variable come a new hook
    syntax-propertize-extend-region-functions, as well as two helper functions:
    syntax-propertize-via-font-lock to reuse old font-lock-syntactic-keywords
    as-is; and syntax-propertize-rules which provides a new way to specify
    syntactic rules.
  • Syntax tables support a new “comment style c” additionally to style b.
  • New hook `post-self-insert-hook’, run after `self-insert-command’.
  • frame-local variables cannot be let-bound any more.
  • Major and minor mode changes
  • `set-auto-mode’ now respects mode: local variables at the end of files,
    as well as those in the * line.
  • `prog-mode’ is a new major mode from which programming modes
    should be derived.
  • `prog-mode-hook’ can be used to enable features for programming
    modes, e.g. (add-hook ’prog-mode-hook ’flyspell-prog-mode) to enable
    on-the-fly spell checking for comments and strings.
  • New hook `change-major-mode-after-body-hook’, run by
    `run-mode-hooks’ just before any other mode hooks.
  • Enabled globalized minor modes can be disabled in specific major modes.
    If the global mode is global-FOO-mode, then run (FOO-mode -1) in the
    major mode’s hook, where FOO-mode toggles the mode on a per-buffer basis.
  • `define-minor-mode’ accepts new keywords :variable, :after-hook.
  • File-handling changes
  • `delete-file’ and `delete-directory’ now accept optional arg TRASH.
    Trashing is performed if TRASH and `delete-by-moving-to-trash’ are
    both non-nil. Interactively, TRASH defaults to t, unless a prefix
    argument is supplied (see Trash changes, above).
  • New file predicates: `file-equal-p’, `file-in-directory-p’.
  • Tool-bars can display separators.
    Tool-bar separators are handled like menu separators in menu-bar maps,
    i.e. via menu entries of the form `(menu-item “—”)’.
  • Image API
  • Animated images support (currently animated gifs only).
  • `image-animated-p’ returns non-nil if an image can be animated.
  • `image-animate’ animates a supplied image spec.
  • `image-animate-timer’ returns the timer object for an image that
    is being animated.
  • `image-extension-data’ has been renamed to `image-metadata’.
    The old name is an obsolete alias to the new one.
  • Image mode can view any image type that ImageMagick supports.
    This requires Emacs to be built with ImageMagick support.
  • New function `imagemagick-types’, defined if ImageMagick support
    is enabled, returns a list of image file extensions that your
    ImageMagick installation supports.
  • New function `imagemagick-register-types’ enables ImageMagick
    image types in Image mode and in `create-image’ and other helper
    functions.
  • New option `imagemagick-types-inhibit’ excludes certain
    ImageMagick image types from `imagemagick-register-types’.
  • With ImageMagick support, there are extra Image mode commands to
    resize and rotate images: `image-transform-fit-to-height’,
    `image-transform-fit-to-width’, `image-transform-set-rotation’, and
    `image-transform-set-scale’.
  • `compose-mail’ now accepts an optional 8th arg, RETURN-ACTION, and
    passes it to the mail user agent function. This argument specifies an
    action for returning to the caller after finishing with the mail. For
    example, this is used by Rmail to optionally delete a mail window.
  • XML and HTML parsing
    If Emacs is compiled with libxml2 support, there are two new
    functions: `libxml-parse-html-region’ (which parses “real world” HTML)
    and `libxml-parse-xml-region’ (which parses XML). Both return an
    Emacs Lisp parse tree.
  • Networking and encryption changes
  • `open-network-stream’ can now be used to open an encrypted stream.
    It now accepts an optional `:type’ parameter for initiating a TLS
    connection, directly or via STARTTLS. To do STARTTLS, additional
    parameters (`:end-of-command’, `:success’, `:capabilities-command’)
    must also be supplied.
  • New library gnutls.el.
    The new function `gnutls-available-p’ returns non-nil if Emacs is
    built with GnuTLS support. The main entry points are
    `open-gnutls-stream’ and `gnutls-negotiate’. It’s easiest to use
    these functions through `open-network-stream’, because that can
    upgrade connections through STARTTLS opportunistically or use plain
    SSL, depending on your needs. For debugging, set `gnutls-log-level’
    greater than 0.
  • New primitive `secure-hash’ that supports many secure hash algorithms:
    md5, sha1, sha2, sha224, sha256, sha384, and sha512. The lisp library
    sha1.el has been removed. The `sha1’ feature is provided by default.
  • Isearch
  • New hook `isearch-update-post-hook’ that runs in `isearch-update’.
  • Progress reporters can now “spin”.
    The MIN-VALUE and MAX-VALUE arguments of `make-progress-reporter’ can
    now be nil, or omitted. This makes a “non-numeric” reporter. Each
    time you call `progress-reporter-update’ on that progress reporter,
    with a nil or omitted VALUE argument, the reporter message is
    displayed with a “spinning bar”.
  • New variable `revert-buffer-in-progress-p’ is true while a buffer is
    being reverted, even if the buffer has a local `revert-buffer-function’.
  • New variables `delayed-warnings-list’ and `delayed-warnings-hook’.
    If delayed-warnings-list is non-nil, the command loop calls
    `delayed-warnings-hook’ after `post-command-hook’. At present, this
    is only used by Emacs on some platforms to display warnings during
    startup, which might otherwise not be noticed. This uses the
    functions `display-delayed-warnings’ and `collapse-delayed-warnings’.
  • rx.el has a new `group-n’ construct for explicitly numbered groups.
  • New function `make-composed-keymap’ that constructs a new keymap
    from multiple input maps. You can use this to make a keymap that
    inherits from multiple maps, eg:
    (set-keymap-parent newmap (make-composed-keymap othermap parent))
  • New function `string-prefix-p’.
    (This was actually added in Emacs 23.2 but was not advertised at the time.)
  • New reader macro ## that stands for the empty symbol.
    This means that the empty symbol can now be read back. Also, #: by itself
    (when not immediately followed by a possible symbol character) stands for
    an empty uninterned symbol.
  • New math functions `isnan’, `copysign’, `frexp’, `ldexp’.
  • The following functions and variables are obsolete:
  • `tooltip-use-echo-area’ is obsolete.
    Rather than setting this to t, disable Tooltip mode instead.
  • buffer-substring-filters is obsolete.
    Use `filter-buffer-substring-functions’ instead.
  • `byte-compile-disable-print-circle’ is obsolete.
  • `deferred-action-list’ and `deferred-action-function’ are obsolete.
    Use `post-command-hook’ instead.
  • `font-lock-maximum-size’ is obsolete.

  • Changes in Emacs 24.1 on non-free operating systems
  • On MS Windows, Emacs warns when using the obsolete init file _emacs,
    and also when HOME is set to C:\ by default.
  • New configure.bat options
  • —enable-checking builds Emacs with extra runtime checks.
  • —distfiles specifies files to be included in binary distribution.
  • —without-gnutls disables automatic GnuTLS detection.
  • —lib for general library linkage, works with the USER_LIBS build variable.
  • New make target `dist’ to create binary distribution for MS Windows.
  • The Lisp function `w32-default-color-map’ is now obsolete.
    (It is only used internally in the Emacs C code.)
  • Customize ns-auto-hide-menu-bar to have the menu-bar hidden, but
    reappear on mouse-over. (Requires OS X 10.6 or later.)
  • On Mac OS X, dragging a file into Emacs visits the file, like on
    other platforms, rather than inserting its contents into the buffer.

-—————————————————————————————————-
This file is part of GNU Emacs.

GNU Emacs is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
(at your option) any later version.

GNU Emacs is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
GNU General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
along with GNU Emacs. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.

Local variables:
mode: outline
paragraph-separate: "[ ]*$"
end:

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