Cocoa Emacs 23 and Tramp problem

Cocoa Emacs 23 and Tramp problem

[Lars Wessman]

I'm using the nightly build of cocoa emacs 23 (the latest one) with an
up-to-date copy of OS X Leopard and when I try to use tramp I get the
following message:

sh: ssh: command not found
exit

Process *tramp/ssh2 lwessman@7up.dreamhost.com* exited abnormally with
code 127

Something is wrong in the configuration of something, and I've
rummaged around in the documentation of Tramp, but I can't seem to
find how to get tramp to find ssh on my machine (as it seems that the
problem is that tramp can't find ssh).

Any ideas?

Re: Cocoa Emacs 23 and Tramp problem

[dericbytes]

On Mar 6, 6:35 pm, Lars Wessman <lars.wess...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I'm using the nightly build of cocoa emacs 23 (the latest one) with an
> up-to-date copy of OS X Leopard and when I try to use tramp I get the
> following message:
>
> sh: ssh: command not found
> exit
>
> Process *tramp/ssh2 lwess...@7up.dreamhost.com* exited abnormally with
> code 127
>
> Something is wrong in the configuration of something, and I've
> rummaged around in the documentation of Tramp, but I can't seem to
> find how to get tramp to find ssh on my machine (as it seems that the
> problem is that tramp can't find ssh).
>
> Any ideas?

(setq exec-path (cons "C:/path/to/ssh/dir" exec-path))

Re: Cocoa Emacs 23 and Tramp problem

[Lars Wessman]

On Mar 6, 8:46 pm, "dericby...@gmail.com" <dericby...@gmail.com>
wrote:
> On Mar 6, 6:35 pm, Lars Wessman <lars.wess...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> (setq exec-path (cons "C:/path/to/ssh/dir" exec-path))

No dice, unfortunately.

Re: Cocoa Emacs 23 and Tramp problem

[Ted Zlatanov]

On Fri, 6 Mar 2009 13:08:53 -0800 (PST) Lars Wessman <lars.wessman@gmail.com> wrote: 

LW> On Mar 6, 8:46 pm, "dericby...@gmail.com" <dericby...@gmail.com>
LW> wrote:
>> On Mar 6, 6:35 pm, Lars Wessman <lars.wess...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>> (setq exec-path (cons "C:/path/to/ssh/dir" exec-path))

LW> No dice, unfortunately.

Do you have SSH installed?  Where?  Use that path, not c:/... as the
example suggested.  If you need to install it, use Mac Ports.

If it still doesn't work, post the result of

M-: (executable-find "ssh") RET

For me, it says "/usr/bin/ssh" but on MacOS X it may be elsewhere.

Ted

Re: Cocoa Emacs 23 and Tramp problem

[Lars Wessman]

On Mar 6, 10:15 pm, Ted Zlatanov <t...@lifelogs.com> wrote:
> On Fri, 6 Mar 2009 13:08:53 -0800 (PST) Lars Wessman <lars.wess...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> LW> On Mar 6, 8:46 pm, "dericby...@gmail.com" <dericby...@gmail.com>
>
> LW> wrote:
> >> On Mar 6, 6:35 pm, Lars Wessman <lars.wess...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >> (setq exec-path (cons "C:/path/to/ssh/dir" exec-path))
>
> LW> No dice, unfortunately.
>
> Do you have SSH installed?  Where?  Use that path, not c:/... as the
> example suggested.  If you need to install it, use Mac Ports.
>
> If it still doesn't work, post the result of
>
> M-: (executable-find "ssh") RET
>
> For me, it says "/usr/bin/ssh" but on MacOS X it may be elsewhere.
>
> Ted

Yes, that is where ssh is located in OS X. The solution you suggested
turned out to be on the right track though. I solved the problem by
fishing some functions out of Aquamacs, a distribution which I knew
had a functioning Tramp, for setting the path. Dave Reitter, the
distribution's maintainer, explains in the comments that getting
environment variables from the shell is not straightforward. Here is
the code that did the trick, which I loaded from a separate file
from .emacs:


;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;

(defvar environment-temp-file nil)

;; (setq shell-file-name "/bin/bash")
;; (let ((debug-on-error)) (mac-read-environment-vars-from-shell))

;; Reading the environment variables is complex, primarily due to
;; bugs in OS X.  On some systems, starting the login shell and
;; printing all variables takes an hour, so we need to have a
;; timeout.  However, starting the process asynchronuously using
;; `start-process' fails as well on some other systems.  Hence the
;; need to run it with `call-process' and "&", storing the output in
;; a temporary file.
;; dr. 07/2008

(defun mac-read-environment-vars-from-shell ()
  "Import the environment from the system's default login shell
specified in `shell-file-name'."

  (setq environment-temp-file (make-temp-file "envvar-"))
  ;; running the shell with -l (to load the environment)
  (setq default-directory "~/")	; ensure it can be executed

  (message "Shell: %s" shell-file-name)

  (let* ((shell (or shell-file-name "/bin/bash"))   ;; can shell-file-
name be nil?
	 (command (format "printenv >%s.tmp; mv %s.tmp %s"
			  environment-temp-file
			  environment-temp-file
			  environment-temp-file)))

    (if (string-match ".*/\\(ba\\|z\\)sh" shell)
	(call-process shell nil
		      0 nil
		      "-l" "-c" command)
      (if (or (string-match ".*/\\tcsh" shell)
	      (string-match ".*/ksh" shell))
	  (call-process shell nil
			0 nil
			;; we can't start tcsh as a login shell
			;; because it doesn't accept -l in combination
			;; with a command.
			;; call-process-region wouldn't work because it's
			;; not interactive.
			"-c" command)
	(message "Could not retrieve login shell environment with login
shell: %s" shell)
	;; won't work for csh, because it doesn't take -l -c ...
	))))
;; we call the process asynchronuously
;; using start-process does not work for unknown reasons:
;; sometimes it doesn't get the environment.

;; (mac-read-environment-vars-from-shell)
;; (sit-for 1)
;; (mac-read-environment-vars-from-shell-2)

(defun mac-read-environment-vars-from-shell-2 ()
  "Reads temporary file if it exists."
  (if (file-readable-p environment-temp-file)
      (prog1
	  (with-temp-buffer
	    (condition-case nil
		(progn
		  (insert-file-contents-literally environment-temp-file nil)
		  (delete-file environment-temp-file))
	      (error nil))
	    (let ((num 0))
	     (if (eq (buffer-size) 0)
		 (message "Warning: Login shell did not return environment.")
	       (goto-char (point-min))
	       (while (re-search-forward "^[A-Za-z_0-9]+=()\s*[^\x]*?
\s*}\s*$" nil t)
		 (replace-match "..." nil nil))
	       (goto-char (point-min))
	       (while (search-forward-regexp "^\\([A-Za-z_0-9]+\\)=\\(.*\\)$"
nil t)
		 (setq num (1+ num))
		 (setenv
		  (match-string 1)
		  (if (equal (match-string 1) "PATH")
		      (concat (match-string 2) ":" (getenv "PATH"))
		    (match-string 2)))))
	  (message "%d environment variables imported from login shell
(%s)."
		   num shell-file-name)
	  (mac-post-environment-vars-function)
	  num)))
    nil))


(defun mac-post-environment-vars-function ()

  (mac-add-path-to-exec-path)
  (mac-add-local-directory-to-exec-path) ;; needed for CocoAspell

  ;; inferior workaround, until mac.c is fixed not to set INFOPATH any
longer
  (if (equal (concat (mac-resources-path)
		       "info")
	     (getenv "INFOPATH"))
      (setenv "INFOPATH"))

;; when INFOPATH is set from outside, it will only load INFOPATH

  (let ((extra-dirs (list
		     "~/Library/Application Support/Emacs/info"
		     "/Library/Application Support/Emacs/info"
		     (concat (mac-resources-path)
			     "site-lisp/edit-modes/info")
		     (concat (mac-resources-path)
			     "info"))))

    (setq Info-default-directory-list (append extra-dirs
				       Info-default-directory-list
				       ))
    (when (getenv "INFOPATH")
      (setenv "INFOPATH" (apply 'concat (getenv "INFOPATH")
				(mapcar (lambda (x) (concat ":" x))
					extra-dirs))))))


(defun mac-add-path-to-exec-path ()
  "Add elements from environment variable `PATH' to `exec-path'."
  (let ((l (split-string (getenv "PATH") ":")))
  (mapc
   (lambda (p)
     (unless (member p l)
       (nconc l (list p))))
   exec-path)
  (setq exec-path l)))

(defun mac-add-local-directory-to-exec-path ()
  "Add /usr/locaL/bin to `exec-path'"
  (add-to-list 'exec-path "/usr/local/bin"))

;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;

And then I added this to my .emacs:

(Mac-read-environment-vars-from-shell)
(sit-for 1)
(mac-read-environment-vars-from-shell-2)

Three cheers for open source!

Re: Cocoa Emacs 23 and Tramp problem

[Lars Wessman]

On Mar 6, 10:15 pm, Ted Zlatanov <t...@lifelogs.com> wrote:
> On Fri, 6 Mar 2009 13:08:53 -0800 (PST) Lars Wessman <lars.wess...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> LW> On Mar 6, 8:46 pm, "dericby...@gmail.com" <dericby...@gmail.com>
>
> LW> wrote:
> >> On Mar 6, 6:35 pm, Lars Wessman <lars.wess...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >> (setq exec-path (cons "C:/path/to/ssh/dir" exec-path))
>
> LW> No dice, unfortunately.
>
> Do you have SSH installed?  Where?  Use that path, not c:/... as the
> example suggested.  If you need to install it, use Mac Ports.
>
> If it still doesn't work, post the result of
>
> M-: (executable-find "ssh") RET
>
> For me, it says "/usr/bin/ssh" but on MacOS X it may be elsewhere.
>
> Ted

Thanks for your help, by the way.

Lars

Re: Cocoa Emacs 23 and Tramp problem

[Peter Dyballa]

Am 06.03.2009 um 19:35 schrieb Lars Wessman:

> sh: ssh: command not found


Obviously Emacs.app has not received the proper "process-environment"  
– a variable you can examine. Besides launching Emacs.app from the  
command line with a corrected PATH setting you have some more  
options: you can use ~/.MacOSX/environment.plist to supply all  
applications with the necessary PATH value. On a command line, for  
example in Emacs.app's *shell* buffer, you can invoke:

	defaults write ~/.MacOSX/environment PATH <your correct choice>

(Documented here: http://developer.apple.com/qa/qa2001/qa1067.html,  
it's also possible to use other environment variables via ~/.MacOSX/ 
environment.plist.) Logging out and in are necessary. The second  
option is to adjust the variable exec-path for Emacs:

	(add-to-list 'exec-path "<the path to ssh>")

This will allow Emacs to find ssh.

--
Greetings

   Pete

The human animal differs from the lesser primates in his passion for  
lists of "Ten Best."
				– H. Allen Smith

Re: Cocoa Emacs 23 and Tramp problem

[Lars Wessman]

On Mar 6, 2009, at 11:17 PM, Peter Dyballa wrote:

>
> Am 06.03.2009 um 19:35 schrieb Lars Wessman:
>
>> sh: ssh: command not found
>
>
> Obviously Emacs.app has not received the proper "process- 
> environment" – a variable you can examine. Besides launching  
> Emacs.app from the command line with a corrected PATH setting you  
> have some more options: you can use ~/.MacOSX/environment.plist to  
> supply all applications with the necessary PATH value. On a command  
> line, for example in Emacs.app's *shell* buffer, you can invoke:
>
> 	defaults write ~/.MacOSX/environment PATH <your correct choice>
>
> (Documented here: http://developer.apple.com/qa/qa2001/qa1067.html,  
> it's also possible to use other environment variables via ~/.MacOSX/ 
> environment.plist.) Logging out and in are necessary. The second  
> option is to adjust the variable exec-path for Emacs:
>
> 	(add-to-list 'exec-path "<the path to ssh>")
>
> This will allow Emacs to find ssh.
>
> --
> Greetings
>
>  Pete
>
> The human animal differs from the lesser primates in his passion for  
> lists of "Ten Best."
> 				– H. Allen Smith

Thanks Peter, reading this I now remember vaguely coming across this  
information before when trying so sort out a similar problem.

I think this (~/.MacOSX/environment.plist) is a superior solution to  
the one I posted, since one wants as much as possible to avoid loading  
elisp code on startup as much as one can.

I'll try this out tomorrow, and then maybe I'll look to see if this  
info is in the emacs wiki and, if not, add it in an appropriate place.

Thanks Again

Lars

Re: Cocoa Emacs 23 and Tramp problem

[Peter Dyballa]

Am 07.03.2009 um 00:59 schrieb Lars Wessman:

> I'll try this out tomorrow, and then maybe I'll look to see if this  
> info is in the emacs wiki and, if not, add it in an appropriate place.


If you do so, you could also mention that with ~/.MacOSX/ 
environment.plist you have one "single point of failure:" you don't  
need to mess with PATH or path settings in different (login) shell RC  
files. Whenever you need a particular environment variable globally,  
you can put it there. Since the process environment does not  
automatically change when ~/.MacOSX/environment.plist is changed, and  
it could happen that you log in to your or some other Mac from  
remote, you can also use ~/.MacOSX/environment.plist as the single  
source for quite up-to-date environment settings in shell by using in  
~/.bashrc or such:

	export PATH=$(defaults read "${HOME}/.MacOSX/environment" PATH)

or in ~/.(t)cshrc or such:

	set path=(`defaults read ~/.MacOSX/environment PATH | tr ':' ' '`)

I.e.: instead of editing half a dozen files every time you care for  
just a single one.

--
Greetings

   Pete

I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by.
				– Douglas Adams

Re: Cocoa Emacs 23 and Tramp problem

[Lars Wessman]

On Mar 7, 2009, at 12:24 AM, Peter Dyballa wrote:

>
> Am 07.03.2009 um 00:59 schrieb Lars Wessman:
>
>> I'll try this out tomorrow, and then maybe I'll look to see if this  
>> info is in the emacs wiki and, if not, add it in an appropriate  
>> place.
>
>
> If you do so, you could also mention that with ~/.MacOSX/ 
> environment.plist you have one "single point of failure:" you don't  
> need to mess with PATH or path settings in different (login) shell  
> RC files. Whenever you need a particular environment variable  
> globally, you can put it there. Since the process environment does  
> not automatically change when ~/.MacOSX/environment.plist is  
> changed, and it could happen that you log in to your or some other  
> Mac from remote, you can also use ~/.MacOSX/environment.plist as the  
> single source for quite up-to-date environment settings in shell by  
> using in ~/.bashrc or such:
>
> 	export PATH=$(defaults read "${HOME}/.MacOSX/environment" PATH)
>
> or in ~/.(t)cshrc or such:
>
> 	set path=(`defaults read ~/.MacOSX/environment PATH | tr ':' ' '`)
>
> I.e.: instead of editing half a dozen files every time you care for  
> just a single one.
>
> --
> Greetings
>
>  Pete
>
> I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by.
> 				– Douglas Adams

I just checked this out. It seems that my ~/.macosx/environment.plist  
has been there with the PATH variable in it all the time. For some  
reason it is not being picked up. I tested this again by commenting  
out the code I got from Aquamacs, and the contents of the  
environment.plist file was not being loaded again. I seems that this  
is problem.

After some googling, I cross a little package ( http://edward.oconnor.cx/elisp/osx-plist.el 
  ) for parsing plists that also happens to have the code for loading  
~/.macosx/environment.plist as sample code. I just tested it and it  
works like a charm.

So there are two choices, the code I took from Aquamacs, or osx- 
plist.el. osx-plist.el is probably the preferred method, since .emacs  
loads twice as fast using osx-plist.el than it does when using the  
Aquamacs code. This is likely due to the fact that the process of  
lifting the data directly from the shell is a bit slow, as Dave  
Reitter says in the comments to the code.

Cheers

Lars

Re: Cocoa Emacs 23 and Tramp problem

[Peter Dyballa]

Am 07.03.2009 um 11:36 schrieb Lars Wessman:

> It seems that my ~/.macosx/environment.plist has been there with  
> the PATH variable in it all the time


The case of letters can play a role.

Some shell RC files can set a different environment that this PLIST.

You might also check with ps (ps -lwwwxe) from some command line and  
with process-environment and exec-path from inside Emacs.app the  
actual process environments. And please do it with Emacs.app launched  
with -Q – it's better to leave all your potential mistakes in init  
files out.

--
Greetings

   Pete

Clovis' Consideration of an Atmospheric Anomaly:
         The perversity of nature is nowhere better demonstrated
         than by the fact that, when exposed to the same atmosphere,
         bread becomes hard while crackers become soft.

Re: Cocoa Emacs 23 and Tramp problem

[Lars Wessman]

On Mar 7, 2009, at 12:17 PM, Peter Dyballa wrote:

>
> Am 07.03.2009 um 11:36 schrieb Lars Wessman:
>
>> It seems that my ~/.macosx/environment.plist has been there with  
>> the PATH variable in it all the time
>
>
> The case of letters can play a role.
>
> Some shell RC files can set a different environment that this PLIST.
>
> You might also check with ps (ps -lwwwxe) from some command line and  
> with process-environment and exec-path from inside Emacs.app the  
> actual process environments. And please do it with Emacs.app  
> launched with -Q – it's better to leave all your potential mistakes  
> in init files out.
>
> --
> Greetings
>
>  Pete
>
> Clovis' Consideration of an Atmospheric Anomaly:
>        The perversity of nature is nowhere better demonstrated
>        than by the fact that, when exposed to the same atmosphere,
>        bread becomes hard while crackers become soft.

The problem was in the .emacs file, as you were hinting. There was a  
line break in the middle of the following s-exp:

(setenv "PATH" "/opt/local/bin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/local/sbin:$HOME/ 
bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin")

line break -> .../usr/b\nin/:..

Ironically, ssh is located in /usr/bin

This was preventing the proper information from being set. The line  
break was near the edge of the frame, so I didn't notice it, although  
I had looked at that line many times while trying to figure this out.

This line was simply breaking the PATH variable and it is also why  
when I reloaded the PATH information using code further down in the  
file, the problem would disappear.

SIgh...

Thanks again

Lars

Re: Cocoa Emacs 23 and Tramp problem

[Peter Dyballa]

Am 07.03.2009 um 15:14 schrieb Lars Wessman:

> (setenv "PATH" "/opt/local/bin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/local/sbin:$HOME/ 
> bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin")


Why does it still exist?

--
Greetings

   Pete

Be careful of reading health books, you might die of a misprint.
				– Mark Twain

Re: Cocoa Emacs 23 and Tramp problem

[Lars Wessman]

On Mar 7, 2009, at 4:01 PM, Peter Dyballa wrote:

>
> Am 07.03.2009 um 15:14 schrieb Lars Wessman:
>
>> (setenv "PATH" "/opt/local/bin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/local/sbin:$HOME/ 
>> bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin")
>
>
> Why does it still exist?
>
> --
> Greetings
>
>  Pete
>
> Be careful of reading health books, you might die of a misprint.
> 				– Mark Twain


It doesn't.

I don't remember now exactly why I had that line in there; it was the  
fossil of some fooling around I did a while ago. In any case, I had  
removed it when cleaning up the .emacs after puttig in the osx- 
plist.el workaround this morning. So I removed the bad code, not  
knowing it was the bad code, and kept the workaround until I read your  
reply where you were suspecting a problem in the .emacs.

I ran the code without the workaround and was surprised that things  
still worked. So I pulled a 4 day-old version of the file out of Time  
Machine, diffed it with the current one, and found the culprit.

Knowing what the problem was and that it had been removed, I removed  
the workaround as well.

Cheers

Lars