Emacs 23.0.60 on Mac OS X

Emacs 23.0.60 on Mac OS X

[Patrick Mahan]

Not sure if this is a bug or merely my misunderstanding of the
documentation.

I've cvs'd the lastes emacs sources and built Emacs by following
the instructions in 'nextstep/INSTALL'.  Emacs starts up fine,
but it no longer pays attention to some of the values in
'~/Library/Preferences/org.gnu.Emacs.plist'.  Particularly, the
X resource "style" values.  For example, I have the following
in my 'org.gnu.Emacs':

Patrick@widowmaker-~/Emacs 467 > defaults read org.gnu.Emacs
{
     ApplicationCrashedAfterRelaunch = 0;
     "Emacs.background" = black;
     "Emacs.cursorColor" = yellow;
     "Emacs.foreground" = mediumspringgreen;
     "Emacs.pointerColor" = blue;
     NSColorPanelMode = 6;
     NSColorPanelVisibleSwatchRows = 1;
     NSFontPanelAttributes = "1, 0";
     NSFontPanelPreviewHeight = 0;
     "NSWindow Frame NSColorPanel" = "491 373 201 309 0 0 1440 938 ";
     "NSWindow Frame NSFontPanel" = "929 77 445 270 0 0 1440 938 ";
}

However, it is ignoring the background, cursorColor, foreground, etc.

I have a 23.0.50 version I got built a while ago by patching up some of the
files to allow it to run that does set the background, cursorColor, etc
correctly.

Has this changed with the merger of the Coca/GNUstep code?

System Info: PPC G4, 512 MB memory, Mac OS X 10.4.11
              built with gcc v4.0.0 (provided as part of Xcode developer stuff)

Thanks,

Patrick

Re: Emacs 23.0.60 on Mac OS X

[Peter Dyballa]

Am 16.08.2008 um 05:36 schrieb Patrick Mahan:

> ~/Library/Preferences/org.gnu.Emacs.plist


The file is now ~/Library/Preferences/Emacs.plist. The name has  
changed some time ago when the Release Candidate 3 of Emacs.app was  
released.

--
Greetings

   Pete

A child of five could understand this!  Fetch me a child of five.

Re: Emacs 23.0.60 on Mac OS X

[Patrick Mahan]

Thanks,

I did -

    defaults write Emacs Emacs.background black
    defaults write Emacs Emacs.foreground mediumspringgreen
    defaults write Emacs Emacs.cursorColor yellow

But launching Emacs.app does not seem to pick it up.  I can
specify these colors from the command line using the "-bg",
"-fg" and "-cr" options.

I see in the Message buffer the following:

   'Unable to load color "darkblue"'

This message shows up even if I start it with '--no-init-file'.

Any suggestions?  Is there anything short of rebuilding with
some debugging enabled to diagnose this?

Note: the Emacs manual include with the release still references
the older file under the "Mac OS" section.

Thanks,

Patrick

Peter Dyballa presented these words - circa 8/15/08 11:46 PM->
> 
> Am 16.08.2008 um 05:36 schrieb Patrick Mahan:
> 
>> ~/Library/Preferences/org.gnu.Emacs.plist
> 
> 
> The file is now ~/Library/Preferences/Emacs.plist. The name has changed 
> some time ago when the Release Candidate 3 of Emacs.app was released.
> 
> -- 
> Greetings
> 
>   Pete
> 
> A child of five could understand this!  Fetch me a child of five.
> 
> 
> 

Re: Emacs 23.0.60 on Mac OS X

[Peter Dyballa]

Am 16.08.2008 um 18:05 schrieb Patrick Mahan:

> I did -
>
>    defaults write Emacs Emacs.background black
>    defaults write Emacs Emacs.foreground mediumspringgreen
>    defaults write Emacs Emacs.cursorColor yellow

Presumingly wrong symbols. I am using different ones:

     Background = CMYK3c6b3f25;
     Foreground = MidnightBlue;
     "border.attributeBackground" = turquoise1;
     "calendar-today.attributeBackground" = LightSkyBlue1;
     "comint-highlight-prompt.attributeBackground" = FloralWhite;
     "comint-highlight-prompt.attributeForeground" = DarkViolet;

And I was wrong when I told you that the preferences file is  
Emacs.plist. It's indeed the name you mentioned, org.gnu.Emacs.plist.  
I use default-frame-alist and initial-frame-alist in ~/.emacs while  
the preferences list is kind of a toy (at least necessary to re-set  
the "modifier" keys). But when launching

	/Applications/Emacs.app/Contents/MacOS/Emacs -q &

I can see the preferences in action.

The *Help* description on the *-frame-alists might be a bit confusing  
when referencing the term "X resources." The actual X resource is for  
example just the word "background" or "cursorColor." The prefix  
"Emacs" is useful in an environment where X resources for more than  
one application are loaded into the X server resource database  
utility xrdb. Then one needs to make a difference between a setting  
for application A and one for application B. This is done by the  
prefix. (Or, in X, by using X resources files with different names,  
names that equal the applications' names.)

To achieve a real dark and unergonomic background you can also use  
the --reverse-video or -r or -rv option on the command line ...

>
> I see in the Message buffer the following:
>
>   'Unable to load color "darkblue"'

The file Emacs.clr contains two writings for this colour: "DarkBlue"  
and "dark blue" – maybe here's the reason for the complaint. You know  
that you can select colours from the Mac OS X colour chooser?

>
> This message shows up even if I start it with '--no-init-file'.

So it's in the preferences list.

>
> Is there anything short of rebuilding with some debugging enabled  
> to diagnose this?

I don't know! What's possible is to rename the preferences list and  
then launch Emacs.app as

	/Applications/Emacs.app/Contents/MacOS/Emacs -Q -l ~/.emacs-init- 
test.el &

where ~/.emacs-init-test.el is a file with some settings as in  
~/.emacs. While you are editing this file in one Emacs.app you can  
launch a second one to test the settings. To make debugging a bit  
easier you can insert a few ELisp statements like this

	(message "line #... in ~/.emacs-init-test.el")

>
> Note: the Emacs manual include with the release still references
> the older file under the "Mac OS" section.


*I* made the mistake of telling you the wrong file name!

--
Greetings

   Pete

"Debugging? Klingons do not debug! Our software does not coddle the  
weak."

Re: Emacs 23.0.60 on Mac OS X

[Patrick Mahan]

Peter Dyballa presented these words - circa 8/16/08 2:36 PM->
> 
> Am 16.08.2008 um 18:05 schrieb Patrick Mahan:
> 
>> I did -
>>
>>    defaults write Emacs Emacs.background black
>>    defaults write Emacs Emacs.foreground mediumspringgreen
>>    defaults write Emacs Emacs.cursorColor yellow
> 
> Presumingly wrong symbols. I am using different ones:
> 
>     Background = CMYK3c6b3f25;
>     Foreground = MidnightBlue;
>     "border.attributeBackground" = turquoise1;
>     "calendar-today.attributeBackground" = LightSkyBlue1;
>     "comint-highlight-prompt.attributeBackground" = FloralWhite;
>     "comint-highlight-prompt.attributeForeground" = DarkViolet;
> 

These were based upon the entries under the 'Mac OS' entry in the
Emacs manual.  There it shows you use "Emacs.<resource>".

> And I was wrong when I told you that the preferences file is 
> Emacs.plist. It's indeed the name you mentioned, org.gnu.Emacs.plist. I 
> use default-frame-alist and initial-frame-alist in ~/.emacs while the 
> preferences list is kind of a toy (at least necessary to re-set the 
> "modifier" keys). But when launching
> 
>     /Applications/Emacs.app/Contents/MacOS/Emacs -q &
> 
> I can see the preferences in action.
>

I've got it to work.  The difference is the capitalization.  In X11
'background' is different from 'Background'.  The first is the
instance name while the second is the class name.  Normally in X Windows
you use the instance name as opposed to its class name.  Using the
class name works for the current version (23.0.60).

> The *Help* description on the *-frame-alists might be a bit confusing 
> when referencing the term "X resources." The actual X resource is for 
> example just the word "background" or "cursorColor." The prefix "Emacs" 
> is useful in an environment where X resources for more than one 
> application are loaded into the X server resource database utility xrdb. 
> Then one needs to make a difference between a setting for application A 
> and one for application B. This is done by the prefix. (Or, in X, by 
> using X resources files with different names, names that equal the 
> applications' names.)
>

Understood.  Again, I was going with what the documentation was presenting.

> To achieve a real dark and unergonomic background you can also use the 
> --reverse-video or -r or -rv option on the command line ...
> 
>>
>> I see in the Message buffer the following:
>>
>>   'Unable to load color "darkblue"'
> 
> The file Emacs.clr contains two writings for this colour: "DarkBlue" and 
> "dark blue" – maybe here's the reason for the complaint. You know that 
> you can select colours from the Mac OS X colour chooser?
> 
>>
>> This message shows up even if I start it with '--no-init-file'.
> 
> So it's in the preferences list.
> 
>>
>> Is there anything short of rebuilding with some debugging enabled to 
>> diagnose this?
> 
> I don't know! What's possible is to rename the preferences list and then 
> launch Emacs.app as
> 
>     /Applications/Emacs.app/Contents/MacOS/Emacs -Q -l 
> ~/.emacs-init-test.el &
> 
> where ~/.emacs-init-test.el is a file with some settings as in ~/.emacs. 
> While you are editing this file in one Emacs.app you can launch a second 
> one to test the settings. To make debugging a bit easier you can insert 
> a few ELisp statements like this
> 
>     (message "line #... in ~/.emacs-init-test.el")
> 
>>
>> Note: the Emacs manual include with the release still references
>> the older file under the "Mac OS" section.
> 
> 
> *I* made the mistake of telling you the wrong file name!
> 

Granted by the source in doc/macos.texi should be upgraded to correctly reflect
this changed behavior.

I will post a doc bug against for the Mac OS.

Thanks,

Patrick