commenting lines

commenting lines

[Gareth Walker]

Hi all -- I know it is possible to comment out text in Emacs with 
`comment-region', but is it possible to specify what goes at the 
beginning of each line?  I would like to `label' regions of my text 
files with different things.

best wishes

Gareth

RE: commenting lines

[Arnaldo Mandel]

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Gareth Walker wrote (on Jul 2, 2002):
 > Hi all -- I know it is possible to comment out text in Emacs with 
 > `comment-region', but is it possible to specify what goes at the 
 > beginning of each line?  I would like to `label' regions of my text 
 > files with different things.

This oldie is quite reliable, useful enough to deserve a key-binding.

;; Christopher North-Keys, 1989
(defun prefix-region (start end string)
  "Insert STRING, default '> ', at the start of each line
in or intersecting region while preserving indentation.
Called from a program, takes three arguments, START, END and STRING."
  (interactive "r\nsString:  ")
  (if (or (equal string "") (equal string nil))
      (setq string "> "))
  ;; Adjust start and end to extremes of
  ;; lines so lines don't get broken.
  (goto-char end)
  (end-of-line)
  (setq end (point))
  (goto-char start)
  (beginning-of-line)
  (setq start (point))
  ;; There is another command, replace-regexp, that did not work well.
  ;; If you narrowed as one would expect, you could not widen to the
  ;; previous narrow.  Saving the old narrow extremes failed, as this
  ;; routine expands the region.  Sadmaking.
  (let (line)
    (setq lines (count-lines start end))
    (while (> lines 0)
      (insert string)
      (search-forward "\n")
      (setq lines (- lines 1))
      )))

Enjoy,

am

-- 
Arnaldo Mandel                        
Departamento de Ciência da Computação - Computer Science Department
Universidade de São Paulo, Bra[sz]il	  
am@ime.usp.br

Re: commenting lines

[Greg Hill]

Gareth,

I have the following in my .emacs, which I use for that sort of 
thing.  Just set mark at the beginning of the first line you want to 
comment out, move point to the beginning of the last line, invoke the 
command, and type in the string you want to use as a comment.

(global-set-key [?\C-\A-\M-s] (lambda (string start end)
                                               (interactive "sString: \nr")
                                               (string-rectangle start 
end string)))

I use the following for removing those comments.  Set mark at the 
beginning of the first line you want to uncomment, move point to the 
last line just after the last character of the comment, and invoke 
the command.

(global-set-key [?\C-\A-\M-d] (lambda (start end)
                                                            (interactive "r")
 
(delete-rectangle start end)))

--Greg

At 12:59 PM +0100 7/2/02, Gareth Walker wrote:
>Hi all -- I know it is possible to comment out text in Emacs with 
>`comment-region', but is it possible to specify what goes at the 
>beginning of each line?  I would like to `label' regions of my text 
>files with different things.
>
>best wishes
>
>Gareth
>
>
>
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