bug#11138: 23.3; on Windows, message-box does not display line breaks in the message

bug#11138: 23.3; on Windows, message-box does not display line breaks in the message

[Dino Chiesa]

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When I run this code: 

  (message-box (concat "First line in a long-ish message.\n"
                     "This is line number 2 in the message."))

The message gets displayed in one very wide dialog box. 
I would expect it to break at the \n.  Line breaks work, apparently,
on Linux, so I am told. But I have confirmed with others that they
see this anomalous message-box behavior on Windows . 




In GNU Emacs 23.3.1 (i386-mingw-nt6.1.7601)
of 2011-03-10 on 3249CTO
Windowing system distributor `Microsoft Corp.', version 6.1.7601
configured using `configure --with-gcc (4.5) --no-opt --cflags -Ic:/imagesupport/include'

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: ENU
  value of $XMODIFIERS: nil
  locale-coding-system: cp1252
  default enable-multibyte-characters: t

Major mode: Dired by ext

Minor modes in effect:
  show-paren-mode: t
  recentf-mode: t
  shell-dirtrack-mode: t
  yas/global-mode: t
  yas/minor-mode: t
  global-hl-line-mode: t
  hl-line-mode: t
  tooltip-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
  auto-encryption-mode: t
  auto-compression-mode: t
  line-number-mode: t
  transient-mark-mode: t

Recent input:
<C-left> u i - l i g h t n e s s <escape> d <C-left> 
<C-left> <left> <escape> SPC <C-left> <left> C-w C-y 
C-y <escape> b s t a r t <escape> d C-b C-b C-b C-b 
C-b C-b <escape> SPC <escape> b C-b C-w C-y C-t C-x 
u <escape> SPC <escape> C-b C-w C-y C-y <escape> b 
h u m a n i t y <escape> d C-n C-n C-n C-n C-x C-s 
<up> <up> <up> <up> <C-right> <C-right> <down> <C-right> 
<C-right> <C-right> <C-right> <C-right> <C-right> <C-right> 
<C-right> <C-right> <C-right> <C-right> <C-right> <C-right> 
<C-right> <C-left> <left> <backspace> 1 <down> <down> 
<down> $ 0 C-x C-s <help-echo> <up> <up> <up> <up> 
<up> <up> <up> <up> <up> <up> C-e <down> <C-right> 
<C-right> <C-right> <right> u i . <escape> b <backspace> 
- C-x C-s C-x C-f <backspace> <return> g s C-p C-p 
C-p C-n C-n C-n u C-p C-p <help-echo> <down> f C-e 
<down> <down> <down> <down> <down> <down> <down> <up> 
C-e <down> C-e <up> C-e <left> <C-left> <C-left> <C-left> 
<left> <backspace> <backspace> <down> C-x C-s <left> 
<down> C-d <up> <up> <up> <up> <up> C-e <left> <left> 
<down> <down> <down> <down> <down> C-x C-s C-x C-f 
<backspace> <return> C-p C-p C-p C-p C-p C-p f C-n 
C-n C-n C-n C-e C-b C-b C-d C-n C-x C-s C-x k <return> 
C-n f C-n C-n C-e C-n C-n C-p C-p C-p C-n C-n C-n C-n 
C-n C-x k <return> C-n C-n C-n C-n C-n C-n C-n C-p 
C-p C-x b t h e <tab> C-g C-x C-f <escape> <backspace> 
<escape> <backspace> <escape> <backspace> t h e s <tab> 
e l <tab> <return> <escape> SPC <escape> > C-w C-y 
C-x k <return> y e s <return> <help-echo> <help-echo> 
<help-echo> <help-echo> <help-echo> <escape> x r e 
p o r t - e m <tab> <return>

Recent messages:
Directory has changed on disk; type g to update Dired
Saving file c:/Users/Dino/elisp/snippets/html-mode/script-jquery-ui...
Wrote c:/Users/Dino/elisp/snippets/html-mode/script-jquery-ui
Saving file c:/Users/Dino/elisp/snippets/html-mode/script-jquery-ui...
Wrote c:/Users/Dino/elisp/snippets/html-mode/script-jquery-ui
Saving file c:/Users/Dino/elisp/snippets/html-mode/link...
Wrote c:/Users/Dino/elisp/snippets/html-mode/link
Quit
Mark set [2 times]
Auto-saving...

Load-path shadows:
/users/dino/elisp/refill hides c:/emacs/lisp/textmodes/refill

Features:
(shadow sort mail-extr message ecomplete rfc822 mml mml-sec
password-cache mm-decode mm-bodies mm-encode mailabbrev nnheader
gnus-util netrc gmm-utils mailheader canlock sha1 hex-util hashcash
emacsbug sgml-mode holidays hol-loaddefs cal-menu calendar cal-loaddefs
ebnf2ps ps-print ps-def lpr epg-config ansi-color goto-addr nxml-uchnm
rng-xsd xsd-regexp rng-cmpct rng-nxml rng-valid rng-loc rng-uri
rng-parse nxml-parse rng-match rng-dt rng-util rng-pttrn nxml-ns
nxml-mode nxml-outln nxml-rap nxml-util nxml-glyph nxml-enc xmltok
vbs-mode browse-url mail-utils info find-func dabbrev smart-op
flymake-for-jslint-for-wsh autopair js json etags imenu dired-aux tabify
compare-w rfringe paren csharp-mode cc-langs cc-mode cc-fonts cc-menus
cc-cmds align mule-util pp grep time-stamp multi-isearch conf-mode
newcomment cl-specs edebug url-cache format-spec url-http tls mail-parse
rfc2231 rfc2047 rfc2045 qp ietf-drums time-date url-gw url-auth url
url-proxy url-privacy url-expand url-methods url-history url-cookie
url-util url-parse url-vars mm-util mail-prsvr mailcap autorevert server
thesaurus recentf tree-widget flyphpcs flymake-cursor byte-opt warnings
bytecomp byte-compile flymake compile synonyms-autoloads package
cperl-mode jsshell-bundle jsshell shell comint ring hideshow cc-styles
cc-align cc-engine cc-vars cc-defs dired regexp-opt defaultcontent
thingatpt yasnippet dropdown-list derived easy-mmode help-mode view
assoc cl cl-19 tfs skeleton edmacro kmacro httpget hl-line advice
help-fns advice-preload cus-edit easymenu cus-start cus-load wid-edit
tooltip ediff-hook vc-hooks lisp-float-type mwheel dos-w32 disp-table
ls-lisp w32-win w32-vars tool-bar dnd fontset image fringe lisp-mode
register page menu-bar rfn-eshadow timer select scroll-bar mldrag mouse
jit-lock font-lock syntax facemenu font-core frame cham georgian
utf-8-lang misc-lang vietnamese tibetan thai tai-viet lao korean
japanese hebrew greek romanian slovak czech european ethiopic indian
cyrillic chinese case-table epa-hook jka-cmpr-hook help simple abbrev
loaddefs button minibuffer faces cus-face files text-properties overlay
md5 base64 format env code-pages mule custom widget
hashtable-print-readable backquote make-network-process multi-tty emacs)

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bug#11138: 23.3; on Windows, message-box does not display line breaks in the message

[Drew Adams]

> (message-box (concat "First line in a long-ish message.\n"
>                      "This is line number 2 in the message."))
>
> The message gets displayed in one very wide dialog box. 
> I would expect it to break at the \n.  Line breaks work, apparently,
> on Linux, so I am told. But I have confirmed with others that they
> see this anomalous message-box behavior on Windows . 

Yes, I can confirm that this is broken on MS Windows, and has been so back
through at least Emacs 20.  The newline char is displayed (in emacs -Q, at
least) as an empty box.

bug#11138: 23.3; on Windows, message-box does not display line breaks in the message

[Eli Zaretskii]

severity 11138 wishlist
stop

> From: "Drew Adams" <drew.adams@oracle.com>
> Date: Sat, 31 Mar 2012 08:26:50 -0700
> 
> > (message-box (concat "First line in a long-ish message.\n"
> >                      "This is line number 2 in the message."))
> >
> > The message gets displayed in one very wide dialog box. 
> > I would expect it to break at the \n.  Line breaks work, apparently,
> > on Linux, so I am told. But I have confirmed with others that they
> > see this anomalous message-box behavior on Windows . 
> 
> Yes, I can confirm that this is broken on MS Windows, and has been so back
> through at least Emacs 20.  The newline char is displayed (in emacs -Q, at
> least) as an empty box.

The Windows port doesn't really have an implementation of a message
box, it just pops up a menu.  And in a menu, each item is one line.

Patches to implement a true message box are welcome.

bug#11138: 23.3; on Windows, message-box does not display line breaks in the message

[Drew Adams]

> The Windows port doesn't really have an implementation of a message
> box, it just pops up a menu.  And in a menu, each item is one line.
> Patches to implement a true message box are welcome.

I see.  I don't have a true message-box implementation, but wouldn't it be
possible to just use multiple menu lines for this?  The current menu line is not
selectable anyway, AFAICT.

bug#11138: 23.3; on Windows, message-box does not display line breaks in the message

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: "Drew Adams" <drew.adams@oracle.com>
> Cc: <dpchiesa@hotmail.com>, <11138@debbugs.gnu.org>
> Date: Sat, 31 Mar 2012 11:14:34 -0700
> 
> > The Windows port doesn't really have an implementation of a message
> > box, it just pops up a menu.  And in a menu, each item is one line.
> > Patches to implement a true message box are welcome.
> 
> I see.  I don't have a true message-box implementation, but wouldn't it be
> possible to just use multiple menu lines for this?

Not if we reuse the normal menu-creation code, I would think.  But the
truth is that I simply don't know enough about this to say something
intelligent.  Again, if this is possible, patches are welcome.

bug#11138: 23.3; on Windows, message-box does not display line breaks in the message

[Drew Adams]

> > I see.  I don't have a true message-box implementation, but 
> > wouldn't it be possible to just use multiple menu lines for this?
> 
> Not if we reuse the normal menu-creation code, I would think.  But the
> truth is that I simply don't know enough about this to say something
> intelligent.  Again, if this is possible, patches are welcome.

It certainly would be possible (trivial) in Lisp: just split the string at each
\n and create a separate (non-selectable) menu item for each.

But this code is in C for some reason, so I'm afraid someone else will need to
come up with the requisite patch.

bug#11138: 23.3; on Windows, message-box does not display line breaks in the message

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: "Drew Adams" <drew.adams@oracle.com>
> Cc: <dpchiesa@hotmail.com>, <11138@debbugs.gnu.org>
> Date: Sat, 31 Mar 2012 11:37:35 -0700
> 
> > > I see.  I don't have a true message-box implementation, but 
> > > wouldn't it be possible to just use multiple menu lines for this?
> > 
> > Not if we reuse the normal menu-creation code, I would think.  But the
> > truth is that I simply don't know enough about this to say something
> > intelligent.  Again, if this is possible, patches are welcome.
> 
> It certainly would be possible (trivial) in Lisp: just split the string at each
> \n and create a separate (non-selectable) menu item for each.

But the same code is used for a real menu, where we don't want to
create two separate menu items for a line with embedded newline.

bug#11138: 23.3; on Windows, message-box does not display line breaks in the message

[Stefan Monnier]

Maybe the window-box could be re-implemented as a kind of tooltip-frame.


        Stefan

bug#11138: 23.3; on Windows, message-box does not display line breaks in the message

[Drew Adams]

> > > > wouldn't it be possible to just use multiple menu lines...
> > > 
> > > Not if we reuse the normal menu-creation code...
> > 
> > It certainly would be possible (trivial) in Lisp: just 
> > split the string at each \n and create a separate
> > (non-selectable) menu item for each.
> 
> But the same code is used for a real menu, where we don't want to
> create two separate menu items for a line with embedded newline.

Sorry, I don't follow you - don't know what you mean.

What I'm saying is that (in Lisp, at least) it would be possible to create a
menu here that had one non-selectable menu item (line) for each line of the
multiline input (as split by \n), plus a selectable final line for the `OK'
action.

Not sure what you intend by a "real" menu, but it is certainly possible (in Lisp
at least) to create a menu with N non-selectable menu items followed by one
selectable item.  Such a menu is as real as any other I've come across. 

bug#11138: 23.3; on Windows, message-box does not display line breaks in the message

[Drew Adams]

> Maybe the window-box could be re-implemented as a kind of 
> tooltip-frame.

That sounds good too.

bug#11138: 23.3; on Windows, message-box does not display line breaks in the message

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: "Drew Adams" <drew.adams@oracle.com>
> Cc: <dpchiesa@hotmail.com>, <11138@debbugs.gnu.org>
> Date: Sat, 31 Mar 2012 12:19:03 -0700
> 
> > > > > wouldn't it be possible to just use multiple menu lines...
> > > > 
> > > > Not if we reuse the normal menu-creation code...
> > > 
> > > It certainly would be possible (trivial) in Lisp: just 
> > > split the string at each \n and create a separate
> > > (non-selectable) menu item for each.
> > 
> > But the same code is used for a real menu, where we don't want to
> > create two separate menu items for a line with embedded newline.
> 
> Sorry, I don't follow you - don't know what you mean.

What I mean is that message-box on Windows eventually calls
x-popup-menu.  So whatever you do for multi-line messages inside
x-popup-menu will also affect x-popup-menu calls that want to display
menus as well.

bug#11138: 23.3; on Windows, message-box does not display line breaks in the message

[Drew Adams]

> What I mean is that message-box on Windows eventually calls
> x-popup-menu.  So whatever you do for multi-line messages inside
> x-popup-menu will also affect x-popup-menu calls that want to display
> menus as well.

I would not suggest changing `x-popup-menu'.  My suggestion was to have
`message-box' call `x-popup-menu' (or other code to create the menu) passing
multiple menu lines, all of which, except the last one ("OK"), are
non-selectable.

The multiple lines come from splitting, at each \n, the result of applying
FORMAT-STRING to ARGS.

(BTW, I do not have the Emacs 24 C code, but in Emacs 23.3 it looks like
`message-box' calls `x-popup-dialog', not `x-popup-menu'.  Same idea, anyway.)

bug#11138: 23.3; on Windows, message-box does not display line breaks in the message

[Juanma Barranquero]

On Sat, Mar 31, 2012 at 20:06, Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org> wrote:

> The Windows port doesn't really have an implementation of a message
> box, it just pops up a menu.  And in a menu, each item is one line.

And some checking for excessive length is missing, BTW:

emacs -Q
M-: (message-box (make-string (/ most-positive-fixnum 2) ?a) "") <RETURN>

Program received signal SIGSEGV, Segmentation fault.
0x754f8dd2 in strcat () from C:\Windows\syswow64\msvcrt.dll
(gdb) bt
#0  0x754f8dd2 in strcat () from C:\Windows\syswow64\msvcrt.dll
#1  0x64c9000c in ?? ()
#2  0x012b68f4 in fill_in_menu (menu=0x37640627, wv=0x9f1740) at w32menu.c:1564
#3  0x012b5673 in w32_menu_show (f=0x3a22e00, x=340, y=304,
for_click=0, keymaps=0, title=55546785, error=0x88f290) at
w32menu.c:867
#4  0x0129e565 in Fx_popup_menu (position=59320198, menu=59320214) at
menu.c:1323
#5  0x012b3782 in Fx_popup_dialog (position=54708274,
contents=59320166, header=54708274) at w32menu.c:206
#6  0x011061d6 in Fmessage_box (nargs=2, args=0x88f3a0) at editfns.c:3420
#7  0x01034c46 in eval_sub (form=59319710) at eval.c:2322
#8  0x01034572 in Feval (form=59319710, lexical=54708250) at eval.c:2204
#9  0x01036ce9 in Ffuncall (nargs=3, args=0x88f570) at eval.c:3005
#10 0x010dec96 in exec_byte_code (bytestr=20473265, vector=20473381,
maxdepth=20, args_template=54708250, nargs=0, args=0x0) at
bytecode.c:785
#11 0x01037b9c in funcall_lambda (fun=20473213, nargs=2,
arg_vector=0x342c81a) at eval.c:3233
#12 0x01037082 in Ffuncall (nargs=3, args=0x88f870) at eval.c:3051
#13 0x01035c57 in Fapply (nargs=2, args=0x88f904) at eval.c:2507
#14 0x010361a4 in apply1 (fn=55149410, arg=59320094) at eval.c:2745
#15 0x010e1a41 in Fcall_interactively (function=55149410,
record_flag=54708250, keys=54729477) at callint.c:377
#16 0x01036d57 in Ffuncall (nargs=4, args=0x88fb40) at eval.c:3009
#17 0x01036273 in call3 (fn=54828442, arg1=55149410, arg2=54708250,
arg3=54708250) at eval.c:2802
#18 0x0101f9f4 in Fcommand_execute (cmd=55149410,
record_flag=54708250, keys=54708250, special=54708250) at
keyboard.c:10330
#19 0x0100658f in command_loop_1 () at keyboard.c:1572
#20 0x01032c4f in internal_condition_case (bfun=0x100569b
<command_loop_1>, handlers=54766026, hfun=0x1004eba <cmd_error>) at
eval.c:1515
#21 0x010052f7 in command_loop_2 (ignore=54708250) at keyboard.c:1160
#22 0x01032672 in internal_catch (tag=54764026, func=0x10052d3
<command_loop_2>, arg=54708250) at eval.c:1272
#23 0x010052b3 in command_loop () at keyboard.c:1139
#24 0x0100488f in recursive_edit_1 () at keyboard.c:759
#25 0x01004baa in Frecursive_edit () at keyboard.c:823
#26 0x010028b5 in main (argc=2, argv=0xbe15f8) at emacs.c:1715

Lisp Backtrace:
"message-box" (0x88f3a0)
"eval" (0x88f574)
"eval-expression" (0x88f874)
"call-interactively" (0x88fb44)
(gdb)

    Juanma

bug#11138: 23.3; on Windows, message-box does not display line breaks in the message

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: "Drew Adams" <drew.adams@oracle.com>
> Cc: <dpchiesa@hotmail.com>, <11138@debbugs.gnu.org>
> Date: Sat, 31 Mar 2012 14:29:31 -0700
> 
> (BTW, I do not have the Emacs 24 C code, but in Emacs 23.3 it looks like
> `message-box' calls `x-popup-dialog', not `x-popup-menu'.  Same idea, anyway.)

If you look at the sources, you will see that x-popup-dialog calls
x-popup-menu internally.

bug#11138: 23.3; on Windows, message-box does not display line breaks in the message

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Juanma Barranquero <lekktu@gmail.com>
> Date: Sat, 31 Mar 2012 23:36:01 +0200
> Cc: Drew Adams <drew.adams@oracle.com>, 11138@debbugs.gnu.org, dpchiesa@hotmail.com
> 
> On Sat, Mar 31, 2012 at 20:06, Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org> wrote:
> 
> > The Windows port doesn't really have an implementation of a message
> > box, it just pops up a menu.  And in a menu, each item is one line.
> 
> And some checking for excessive length is missing, BTW:
> 
> emacs -Q
> M-: (message-box (make-string (/ most-positive-fixnum 2) ?a) "") <RETURN>
> 
> Program received signal SIGSEGV, Segmentation fault.
> 0x754f8dd2 in strcat () from C:\Windows\syswow64\msvcrt.dll
> (gdb) bt
> #0  0x754f8dd2 in strcat () from C:\Windows\syswow64\msvcrt.dll
> #1  0x64c9000c in ?? ()
> #2  0x012b68f4 in fill_in_menu (menu=0x37640627, wv=0x9f1740) at w32menu.c:1564

This crash should be fixed in trunk revision 107723.  Now even your
crazy test case doesn't crash, just says that it ran out of memory
after a while (kids, don't try that at home).

Btw, it looks like MS-Windows menus cannot have strings longer than
64K, although I cannot find this documented anywhere.