bug#31626: Emacs window resizes when entering dired mode

bug#31626: Emacs window resizes when entering dired mode

[Alain Knaff]

Hi,

Whenever I enter dired mode, the emacs window resizes itself. This is
undesirable, as windows that jump around interrupt the flow of work.

It happens with Gnu Emacs 25.2.2 as included on Ubuntu 18.04

It did not happen with the version included with Ubuntu 16.04

Thanks for fixing this,

-- 
Alain Knaff
Ingénieur Informaticien

LE GOUVERNEMENT DU GRAND-DUCHÉ DE LUXEMBOURG
Ministère du Développement durable et des Infrastructures
Administration de l’environnement

1, avenue du Rock'n'Roll . L-4361 Esch-sur-Alzette
Tél. (+352) 40 56 56-309
E-Mail: Alain.Knaff@aev.etat.lu
www.gouvernement.lu . www.luxembourg.lu

bug#31626: Emacs window resizes when entering dired mode

[Alain Knaff]

On 2018-05-28 15:02, Alain Knaff wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> Whenever I enter dired mode, the emacs window resizes itself. This is
> undesirable, as windows that jump around interrupt the flow of work.
> 
> It happens with Gnu Emacs 25.2.2 as included on Ubuntu 18.04
> 
> It did not happen with the version included with Ubuntu 16.04
> 
> Thanks for fixing this,>

I noticed that when this happens, the following is printed to stdout:
gtk_distribute_natural_allocation: assertion 'extra_space >= 0' failed

The same is also printed when manually making the window narrower again,
or changing its width in any way while it is narrower than the width
dired wants.

-- 
Alain Knaff
Ingénieur Informaticien

LE GOUVERNEMENT DU GRAND-DUCHÉ DE LUXEMBOURG
Ministère du Développement durable et des Infrastructures
Administration de l’environnement

1, avenue du Rock'n'Roll . L-4361 Esch-sur-Alzette
Tél. (+352) 40 56 56-309
E-Mail: Alain.Knaff@aev.etat.lu
www.gouvernement.lu . www.luxembourg.lu

bug#31626: Emacs window resizes when entering dired mode

[Robert Pluim]

Alain Knaff <Alain.Knaff@aev.etat.lu> writes:

> On 2018-05-28 15:02, Alain Knaff wrote:
>> Hi,
>> 
>> Whenever I enter dired mode, the emacs window resizes itself. This is
>> undesirable, as windows that jump around interrupt the flow of work.
>> 
>> It happens with Gnu Emacs 25.2.2 as included on Ubuntu 18.04
>> 
>> It did not happen with the version included with Ubuntu 16.04
>> 
>> Thanks for fixing this,>
>
> I noticed that when this happens, the following is printed to stdout:
> gtk_distribute_natural_allocation: assertion 'extra_space >= 0' failed
>
> The same is also printed when manually making the window narrower again,
> or changing its width in any way while it is narrower than the width
> dired wants.

My crystal ball says youʼre using a HiDpi display, and you have menus
enabled. Setting the environment variable GDK_SCALE to 1 before
running emacs might help.

There have been some scaling related fixes in the just-released
emacs-26, would it be possible for you to try that version?

Regards

Robert

bug#31626: Emacs window resizes when entering dired mode

[Alain Knaff]

On 2018-05-28 17:54, Robert Pluim wrote:
[...]
> My crystal ball says youʼre using a HiDpi display, and you have menus
> enabled. Setting the environment variable GDK_SCALE to 1 before
> running emacs might help.

Nope, doesn't help, unfortunately :-(

> 
> There have been some scaling related fixes in the just-released
> emacs-26, would it be possible for you to try that version?

Is there a repository where I can easily get that version from into
Ubuntu? Or else, is there a way to disable this "scaling" in dired mode?
Apparently it seems that this is something specific that dired "does",
for whatever reason, as it happens in no other circumstance.

> 
> Regards
> 
> Robert
> 

Thanks,

-- 
Alain Knaff
Ingénieur Informaticien

LE GOUVERNEMENT DU GRAND-DUCHÉ DE LUXEMBOURG
Ministère du Développement durable et des Infrastructures
Administration de l’environnement

1, avenue du Rock'n'Roll . L-4361 Esch-sur-Alzette
Tél. (+352) 40 56 56-309
E-Mail: Alain.Knaff@aev.etat.lu
www.gouvernement.lu . www.luxembourg.lu

bug#31626: Emacs window resizes when entering dired mode

[Robert Pluim]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 759 bytes --]

Alain Knaff <Alain.Knaff@aev.etat.lu> writes:

>> There have been some scaling related fixes in the just-released
>> emacs-26, would it be possible for you to try that version?
>
> Is there a repository where I can easily get that version from into
> Ubuntu? Or else, is there a way to disable this "scaling" in dired mode?
> Apparently it seems that this is something specific that dired "does",
> for whatever reason, as it happens in no other circumstance.

The scaling is not dired-specific, itʼs inside GTK, so thereʼs nothing
you can do to dired to change it.

Emacs-26 was released about 2 hours ago, so I doubt anyone's packaged it yet.
Iʼve attached the announcement, perhaps you can build emacs from source?

Regards

Robert


[-- Attachment #2: Type: text/plain, Size: 1986 bytes --]

Date: Mon, 28 May 2018 16:14:22 +0200
Date: 1 hour, 56 minutes, 48 seconds ago
From: Nicolas Petton <nicolas@petton.fr>
To: Emacs Devel <emacs-devel@gnu.org>
Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.announce
Subject: [ANNOUNCE] Emacs 26.1 released
Keywords: emacs-announce

[[PGP Signed Part:Undecided]]
[1. text/plain]
Hi!

Version 26.1 of the Emacs text editor is now available.

For more information on Emacs, see:
  http://www.gnu.org/software/emacs

You can retrieve the source from your nearest GNU mirror by using one
of the following links:
  http://ftpmirror.gnu.org/emacs/emacs-26.1.tar.xz
  http://ftpmirror.gnu.org/emacs/emacs-26.1.tar.gz

You can get the PGP signatures at
  http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/emacs/emacs-26.1.tar.xz.sig
  http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/emacs/emacs-26.1.tar.gz.sig

You can choose a mirror explicitly from the list at:
  http://www.gnu.org/prep/ftp.html

Mirrors may take some time to update; the main GNU ftp server is at:
  http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/emacs/

Highlights of this release include:

  - Limited form of concurrency with Lisp threads
  
  - Support for optional display of line numbers in the buffer
  
  - Emacs now uses double buffering to reduce flicker on the X Window
    System
  
  - Flymake has been completely redesigned
  
  - TRAMP has a new connection method for Google Drive
  
  - New single-line horizontal scrolling mode
  
  - A systemd user unit file is provided
  
  - Support for 24-bit colors on capable text terminals

There are many more changes; for a summary see the etc/NEWS file,
which you can view from Emacs with `C-h n'.

For the complete list of changes and the people who made them, see the
various ChangeLog files in the source distribution.  For a summary
of all the people who have contributed to Emacs, see the etc/AUTHORS
file.

Printed copies of the Emacs manual are available for purchase from the
Free Software Foundation's online store at:
http://shop.fsf.org/product/emacs-manual/

Regards,
Nico

[[End of PGP Signed Part]]

bug#31626: Emacs window resizes when entering dired mode

[Alain Knaff]

On 2018-05-28 18:11, Robert Pluim wrote:
[...]
> The scaling is not dired-specific, itʼs inside GTK, so thereʼs nothing
> you can do to dired to change it.

If it's inside GTK, then why are only dired buffers affected? For
instance, a buffer containing a Java file or something else is not affected.

So I guess emacs is calling a certain gtk function when a dired buffer
is active, that it does not call for other buffers. Which call could
that be? Initiative *must* come from somewhere inside emacs, or else
emacs-specific actions such as pressing C-x o would not be able to
trigger it.


Possibly also this is a call that emacs did not invoke on older
versions? (but here, it is just as well possible that Ubuntu 18.04's GTK
performs that call differently than Ubuntu 16.04's GTK)

> 
> Emacs-26 was released about 2 hours ago, so I doubt anyone's packaged it yet.

ok :-)

> Iʼve attached the announcement, perhaps you can build emacs from source?

... or I'll just wait until the distributors pick it up :-)

> 
> Regards
> 
> Robert
> 

Regards,

-- 
Alain Knaff
Ingénieur Informaticien

LE GOUVERNEMENT DU GRAND-DUCHÉ DE LUXEMBOURG
Ministère du Développement durable et des Infrastructures
Administration de l’environnement

1, avenue du Rock'n'Roll . L-4361 Esch-sur-Alzette
Tél. (+352) 40 56 56-309
E-Mail: Alain.Knaff@aev.etat.lu
www.gouvernement.lu . www.luxembourg.lu

bug#31626: Emacs window resizes when entering dired mode

[Robert Pluim]

Alain Knaff <Alain.Knaff@aev.etat.lu> writes:

> On 2018-05-28 18:11, Robert Pluim wrote:
> [...]
>> The scaling is not dired-specific, itʼs inside GTK, so thereʼs nothing
>> you can do to dired to change it.
>
> If it's inside GTK, then why are only dired buffers affected? For
> instance, a buffer containing a Java file or something else is not affected.

The error message you quoted happens when creating menus, and those
menus are mode-specific, so different for java and dired.

> So I guess emacs is calling a certain gtk function when a dired buffer
> is active, that it does not call for other buffers. Which call could
> that be? Initiative *must* come from somewhere inside emacs, or else
> emacs-specific actions such as pressing C-x o would not be able to
> trigger it.
>

Yes, but unfortunately itʼs not that simple, else we would have fixed
it already :-)

>
> Possibly also this is a call that emacs did not invoke on older
> versions? (but here, it is just as well possible that Ubuntu 18.04's GTK
> performs that call differently than Ubuntu 16.04's GTK)
>
>> 
>> Emacs-26 was released about 2 hours ago, so I doubt anyone's packaged it yet.
>
> ok :-)
>
>> Iʼve attached the announcement, perhaps you can build emacs from source?
>
> ... or I'll just wait until the distributors pick it up :-)
>

OK. Please let us know how it goes.

Regards

Robert

bug#31626: Emacs window resizes when entering dired mode

[Alain Knaff]

On 2018-05-28 18:39, Robert Pluim wrote:
> Alain Knaff <Alain.Knaff@aev.etat.lu> writes:
[...]
>> If it's inside GTK, then why are only dired buffers affected? For
>> instance, a buffer containing a Java file or something else is not affected.
> 
> The error message you quoted happens when creating menus, and those
> menus are mode-specific, so different for java and dired.

A yes, now indeed I see it... dired has more items in its main menu, and
it tries to fit them all into one line...

... maybe then one workaround would be to use a smaller font for the
menu. But how does one do that? I tried putting the following into my
~/.Xdefaults, but it did nothing :-(

Emacs*menubar*Font: 		-*-*-bold-r-*-*-*-80-*-*-*-*-iso8859-*


> 
>> So I guess emacs is calling a certain gtk function when a dired buffer
>> is active, that it does not call for other buffers. Which call could
>> that be? Initiative *must* come from somewhere inside emacs, or else
>> emacs-specific actions such as pressing C-x o would not be able to
>> trigger it.
>>
> 
> Yes, but unfortunately itʼs not that simple, else we would have fixed
> it already :-)

Yeah, that's also why I was so puzzled how it could even make it into a
released version :-)

[...]
> OK. Please let us know how it goes.

No problem :-)


-- 
Alain Knaff
Ingénieur Informaticien

LE GOUVERNEMENT DU GRAND-DUCHÉ DE LUXEMBOURG
Ministère du Développement durable et des Infrastructures
Administration de l’environnement

1, avenue du Rock'n'Roll . L-4361 Esch-sur-Alzette
Tél. (+352) 40 56 56-309
E-Mail: Alain.Knaff@aev.etat.lu
www.gouvernement.lu . www.luxembourg.lu

bug#31626: Emacs window resizes when entering dired mode

[Alain Knaff]

On 2018-05-28 18:59, Alain Knaff wrote:
[...]
> A yes, now indeed I see it... dired has more items in its main menu, and
> it tries to fit them all into one line...

... and indeed, if I disable the menu bar with (menu-bar-mode -1), the
issue disappears :-)




-- 
Alain Knaff
Ingénieur Informaticien

LE GOUVERNEMENT DU GRAND-DUCHÉ DE LUXEMBOURG
Ministère du Développement durable et des Infrastructures
Administration de l’environnement

1, avenue du Rock'n'Roll . L-4361 Esch-sur-Alzette
Tél. (+352) 40 56 56-309
E-Mail: Alain.Knaff@aev.etat.lu
www.gouvernement.lu . www.luxembourg.lu

bug#31626: Emacs window resizes when entering dired mode

[David Engster]

merge 15700 22000 22898 31626
thanks

Alain Knaff writes:
> On 2018-05-28 18:59, Alain Knaff wrote:
> [...]
>> A yes, now indeed I see it... dired has more items in its main menu, and
>> it tries to fit them all into one line...
>
> ... and indeed, if I disable the menu bar with (menu-bar-mode -1), the
> issue disappears :-)

Alternatively, you can build Emacs with the Lucid toolkit, which does
not suffer from this problem.

(This is a duplicate of bug 15700, 22000 and 22898)

-David

bug#31626: Emacs window resizes when entering dired mode

[Robert Pluim]

Alain Knaff <Alain.Knaff@aev.etat.lu> writes:

> On 2018-05-28 18:39, Robert Pluim wrote:
>> Alain Knaff <Alain.Knaff@aev.etat.lu> writes:
> [...]
>>> If it's inside GTK, then why are only dired buffers affected? For
>>> instance, a buffer containing a Java file or something else is not affected.
>> 
>> The error message you quoted happens when creating menus, and those
>> menus are mode-specific, so different for java and dired.
>
> A yes, now indeed I see it... dired has more items in its main menu, and
> it tries to fit them all into one line...
>
> ... maybe then one workaround would be to use a smaller font for the
> menu. But how does one do that? I tried putting the following into my
> ~/.Xdefaults, but it did nothing :-(
>
> Emacs*menubar*Font: 		-*-*-bold-r-*-*-*-80-*-*-*-*-iso8859-*

If your emacs is compiled to use GTK, then it uses GTK resources to
specify the appearance of the menus. The info node 'GTK resources'
in the emacs user manual describes how they're used.

Regards

Robert

bug#31626: Emacs window resizes when entering dired mode

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Alain Knaff <Alain.Knaff@aev.etat.lu>
> Date: Mon, 28 May 2018 13:02:32 +0000
> 
> Whenever I enter dired mode, the emacs window resizes itself. This is
> undesirable, as windows that jump around interrupt the flow of work.
> 
> It happens with Gnu Emacs 25.2.2 as included on Ubuntu 18.04

I cannot reproduce this.  Do you see that in "emacs-Q"?

Thanks.

bug#31626: Emacs window resizes when entering dired mode

[Alain Knaff]

On 2018-05-28 17:25, Eli Zaretskii wrote:
>> From: Alain Knaff <Alain.Knaff@aev.etat.lu>
>> Date: Mon, 28 May 2018 13:02:32 +0000
>>
>> Whenever I enter dired mode, the emacs window resizes itself. This is
>> undesirable, as windows that jump around interrupt the flow of work.
>>
>> It happens with Gnu Emacs 25.2.2 as included on Ubuntu 18.04
> 
> I cannot reproduce this.  Do you see that in "emacs-Q"?

I do. Even though the "jump" is less pronounced.

> 
> Thanks.
> 



-- 
Alain Knaff
Ingénieur Informaticien

LE GOUVERNEMENT DU GRAND-DUCHÉ DE LUXEMBOURG
Ministère du Développement durable et des Infrastructures
Administration de l’environnement

1, avenue du Rock'n'Roll . L-4361 Esch-sur-Alzette
Tél. (+352) 40 56 56-309
E-Mail: Alain.Knaff@aev.etat.lu
www.gouvernement.lu . www.luxembourg.lu

bug#31626: Emacs window resizes when entering dired mode

[Alain Knaff]

On 2018-05-28 17:32, Alain Knaff wrote:
> 
> 
> On 2018-05-28 17:25, Eli Zaretskii wrote:
>>> From: Alain Knaff <Alain.Knaff@aev.etat.lu>
>>> Date: Mon, 28 May 2018 13:02:32 +0000
>>>
>>> Whenever I enter dired mode, the emacs window resizes itself. This is
>>> undesirable, as windows that jump around interrupt the flow of work.
>>>
>>> It happens with Gnu Emacs 25.2.2 as included on Ubuntu 18.04
>>
>> I cannot reproduce this.  Do you see that in "emacs-Q"?
> 
> I do. Even though the "jump" is less pronounced.

... and actually, it seems to happen not only for new dired buffers but
also when:

1. C-x b'ing back to a dired buffer
2. Just clicking or C-o'ing into the dired buffer (in split window mode)
3. Leaving the mini-buffer while the dired buffer is active (either by
completing the command, or by C-g'ing it)

Also, when dired has the focus and the frame is currently narrower or
equal than what dired wants, set-frame-width with a width smaller than
95 is ineffective.

When dired does have the focus, and the frame is currently wider or
equal than what dired wants, set-frame-width with a width smaller than
95 performs as if 95 had been given.

> 
>>
>> Thanks.
>>
> 
> 
> 

-- 
Alain Knaff
Ingénieur Informaticien

LE GOUVERNEMENT DU GRAND-DUCHÉ DE LUXEMBOURG
Ministère du Développement durable et des Infrastructures
Administration de l’environnement

1, avenue du Rock'n'Roll . L-4361 Esch-sur-Alzette
Tél. (+352) 40 56 56-309
E-Mail: Alain.Knaff@aev.etat.lu
www.gouvernement.lu . www.luxembourg.lu

bug#31626: Emacs window resizes when entering dired mode

[martin rudalics]

 > Whenever I enter dired mode, the emacs window resizes itself. This is
 > undesirable, as windows that jump around interrupt the flow of work.

This is

*** Emacs built with GTK+ toolkit can unexpectedly widen frames

described in etc/PROBLEMS.  Sorry, no remedy in sight.

martin