Technitribe » Emacs

Zone out completely

tbielawa — Sat, 27 Mar 2010 01:00:48 +0000

While searching for modes which would help me edit bind9 configuration files I came across this mailing list post. It mentions zone-mode which ended up being great for editing the actual zone files A+. It also tipped me off to another emacs Easter Egg, M-x zone. Described thus:

zone is an interactive compiled Lisp function.
It is bound to    .
(zone)
Zone out, completely.

It’s basically an emacs screensaver/psychedelic ascii mode using your focused buffer for content. It obfuscates the buffer in ways which involves wrapping your code around the screen or swapping characters around, and even just turning it all into curly braces and wiggling. Press a key to undo it all. Might be a neat trick to play on a friend, but I see no other usage for this mode.

Macports updates their Erlang version, update your load-path’s

tbielawa — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 05:08:37 +0000

I’ve been working on my XMPP server pet project recently, and the need for a good Erlang XML parser has finally struck. I decided to go with Erlsom. It’s in MacPorts, so from there I installed it. Now, since I don’t update my port tree frequently I get delightful surprises from time to time. This time installing Erlsom triggered an update of Erlang, to the latest version!

Short story shorter, the update changes the path to the erlang-mode.el file so before you can M-x erlang-mode again you’ll have you fix your Emacs load-path to register the new location. (See my older post on how to initially set up Erlang and Emacs from MacPorts from scratch)

The new load commands should be:

(setq load-path (cons  "/opt/local/lib/erlang/lib/tools-2.6.5/emacs/" load-path))
(setq erlang-root-dir "/opt/local/lib/erlang")
(setq exec-path (cons "/opt/local/bin" exec-path))
(require 'erlang-start)

It just requires changing the tools-x.x.x to 2.6.5.

p.s. about erlang-mode

Syndication

tbielawa — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 23:24:46 +0000

Emacs related posts are now being syndicated on Planet Emacsen!

Emacs Hacking, reverse other buffer

tbielawa — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 22:39:51 +0000

I started reading Writing GNU Emacs Extensions by Bob Glickstein. The first real meaty example you work through in it is making an ‘other-buffer’ like key command that works in reverse. So here I present to the internet, my version of previous-window.

(defun previous-window ()
  "As other-buffer, except in the other-direction"
  (interactive)
  (other-window -1))
 
(global-set-key "\C-c\o" 'previous-window)

Put in your .emacs file and activate with C-c o when you have multiple frames open at once.

Enabling automatic slash completion in nXML-Mode

tbielawa — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 21:38:46 +0000

I do a lot of DocBook XML editing, either at my job or at home. Because of that I’ve built up a pretty customized .emacs file. Every so often I meet another person whose also found themselves having to edit a bunch of XML. The most fantastic thing about nXML mode I think is the automatic slash completion feature. It works like this: If I have an open element, say I’ve started an , you can configure nXML mode such that upon typing the closing

Enter nxml-mode
M-x customize-apropos
nxml-slash
Press Toggle on
Optionally: select “Save for future sessions”

For even more fun, use the C-c C-f macro which will auto complete your current block, regardless of your position inside of it. For additional references, I invite you to check out the docs NM Tech has posted on nXML-Mode.