bug#3344: eshell environment does not override TERM

bug#3344: eshell environment does not override TERM

[Bruno Haible]

Please write in English if possible, because the Emacs maintainers
usually do not have translators to read other languages for them.

Your bug report will be posted to the bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org mailing list,
and to the gnu.emacs.bug news group.

Please describe exactly what actions triggered the bug
and the precise symptoms of the bug:

When I invoke M-x eshell, subprocesses see the same TERM
environment variable as the one from which emacs was launched.
For example, when I launch emacs from an xterm, which has
TERM=xterm set, then processes run from within eshell will
see TERM=xterm as well and emit ANSI control codes for bold
or colored output. But eshell does not interpret these control
codes, and shows weird-looking ASCII characters instead.

Example:
M-x eshell
echo $TERM
wget http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/libsigsegv/libsigsegv-2.6.tar.gz
tar xfz libsigsegv-2.6.tar.gz
cd libsigsegv-2.6
./configure

shows:
^[[1mBuild Tools:^[[m

Likewise with packages that use automake's new 'color-tests'
option.



If Emacs crashed, and you have the Emacs process in the gdb debugger,
please include the output from the following gdb commands:
    `bt full' and `xbacktrace'.
If you would like to further debug the crash, please read the file
/usr/share/emacs/22.2/etc/DEBUG for instructions.


In GNU Emacs 22.2.1 (x86_64-suse-linux-gnu, X toolkit, Xaw3d scroll bars)
 of 2008-09-12 on hammer22
Windowing system distributor `The X.Org Foundation', version 11.0.10400090
configured using `configure  '--with-gcc' '--with-pop' '--without-hesiod' '--with-kerberos' '--with-kerberos5' '--with-leim' '--with-xim' '--with-system-malloc' '--prefix=/usr' '--infodir=/usr/share/info' '--mandir=/usr/share/man' '--localstatedir=/var' '--sharedstatedir=/var/lib' '--libexecdir=/usr/lib' '--with-x' '--with-sound' '--with-xpm' '--with-jpeg' '--with-tiff' '--with-gif' '--with-png' '--with-x-toolkit=lucid' '--x-includes=/usr/include' '--x-libraries=/usr/lib64:/usr/share/X11' '--build=x86_64-suse-linux-gnu' 'build_alias=x86_64-suse-linux-gnu' 'CC=gcc' 'CFLAGS=-O2 -fmessage-length=0 -Wall -D_FORTIFY_SOURCE=2 -fstack-protector -g -D_GNU_SOURCE -std=gnu89 -pipe -fno-strict-aliasing -Wno-pointer-sign -Wno-unused-variable -Wno-unused-label -Wno-unprototyped-calls -DSYSTEM_PURESIZE_
 EXTRA=55000 	 -DSITELOAD_PURESIZE_EXTRA=10000 ' 'LDFLAGS=''

Important settings:
  value of $LC_ALL: nil
  value of $LC_COLLATE: nil
  value of $LC_CTYPE: nil
  value of $LC_MESSAGES: nil
  value of $LC_MONETARY: nil
  value of $LC_NUMERIC: nil
  value of $LC_TIME: nil
  value of $LANG: de_DE.UTF-8
  locale-coding-system: utf-8
  default-enable-multibyte-characters: t

Major mode: Lisp Interaction

Minor modes in effect:
  show-paren-mode: t
  tooltip-mode: t
  tool-bar-mode: t
  mouse-wheel-mode: t
  menu-bar-mode: t
  file-name-shadow-mode: t
  global-font-lock-mode: t
  font-lock-mode: t
  blink-cursor-mode: t
  unify-8859-on-encoding-mode: t
  utf-translate-cjk-mode: t
  auto-compression-mode: t
  line-number-mode: t
  transient-mark-mode: t

Recent input:
<help-echo> <help-echo> <help-echo> <help-echo> <help-echo> 
<help-echo> <help-echo> <help-echo> <help-echo> <help-echo> 
<help-echo> <help-echo> <help-echo> <help-echo> <help-echo> 
<help-echo> <help-echo> <help-echo> M-x n <backspace> 
b u g <tab> <tab> <backspace> <backspace> <backspace> 
e m <tab> a <tab> <backspace> <backspace> <backspace> 
<backspace> <backspace> r <backspace> e <backspace> 
<backspace> r e p <tab> o <tab> r <tab> <return>

Recent messages:
Loading paren...done
Loading cl-indent...done
Loading derived...done
For information about GNU Emacs and the GNU system, type C-h C-a.
Making completion list...
Loading help-mode...done
Making completion list... [2 times]
Loading emacsbug...
Loading regexp-opt...done
Loading emacsbug...done

bug#3345: eshell environment does not override TERM

[John Wiegley]

On May 21, 2009, at 2:02 PM, Bruno Haible wrote:

> When I invoke M-x eshell, subprocesses see the same TERM
> environment variable as the one from which emacs was launched.
> For example, when I launch emacs from an xterm, which has
> TERM=xterm set, then processes run from within eshell will
> see TERM=xterm as well and emit ANSI control codes for bold
> or colored output. But eshell does not interpret these control
> codes, and shows weird-looking ASCII characters instead.

This has been fixed in Emacs CVS.  Eshell now interprets many ANSI  
control codes by default.

John

bug#3344: eshell environment does not override TERM

[Stefan Monnier]

> When I invoke M-x eshell, subprocesses see the same TERM
> environment variable as the one from which emacs was launched.

In Emacs-23, the $TERM value with which Emacs was started is fairly
quickly thrown away so that no subprocess will inherit it (after all,
Emacs has no way to run a process and give it access to the tty in which
Emacs is running).

Can you try again with the Emacs-23 pretest to confirm that the bug
is fixed?


        Stefan

bug#3344: eshell environment does not override TERM

[Bruno Haible]

Stefan Monnier wrote:
> Can you try again with the Emacs-23 pretest to confirm that the bug
> is fixed?

Yes, I confirm. In emacs-23.0.91, after M-x eshell,

  - TERM is set to 'dumb' by default. This has the effect that programs
    won't try to use bold writing or colours.

  - If I set TERM=eterm, programs which use the ANSI escape sequences for
    bold writing and colours produce good output. However, programs which
    use the escape sequences from the terminfo database entry for 'eterm'
    (such as 'msgcat') produce suboptimal output (some escape sequences
    are apparently being ignored). Test case:
      $ wget http://translationproject.org/PO-files/de/gettext-runtime-0.17.de.po
      $ msgcat --color=always gettext-runtime-0.17.de.po

Maybe 'eterm' is not the right value for TERM in M-x eshell?

Bruno