Re: Non file buffers and default-directory

[Tim Landscheidt <tim@tim-landscheidt.de>]

Tomas Hlavaty <tom@logand.com> wrote:

>> Side note: I would love a well-maintained example of an
>> "asynchronous" user interface in Emacs.

> This is easy if you are writing it from scratch.
> It is not easy if you are talking about existing code.

Great, I'm looking for the "easy" one :-).  Any pointers?

>> I have a bunch of shell/Perl/Python scripts that I'd like to
>> convert to Emacs Lisp for a consistent UI that can also be
>> used over SSH.

>> For example, I have a script that plays a podcast's audio
>> file and afterwards asks me if the associated database entry
>> selected from a list of suggestions should be marked as
>> heard (and the file archived).  I also use this as part of
>> sequences, i. e. "$script file1.mp3 && $script file2.mp3".

>> Now in Emacs, I obviously would want to continue to work on
>> something else while the audio is playing in the background.
>> I also don't want that other work to be interrupted in the
>> sense of a blocking minibuffer prompt when the playback has
>> finished.  And I also don't want to accidentally quit Emacs
>> without me being reminded, "hey, that playback has finished,
>> should it be marked as heard?"  And I want that "bit" to be
>> usable as part of a sequence, i. e. after answering the
>> question, the next statement should be executed.

> Why not simply start a separate Emacs process and play the podcasts
> there?

Because then I wouldn't have one Emacs instance, but two (or
more) that I would have to switch between either in Screen
or with a window manager.  I want to have one unified Emacs
"control center" that I don't have to leave and where I can
integrate all aspects of Emacs "life" together, e. g., start
some workflow on an article's body when I read it in Gnus,
queue some other processes when the first one is finished,
feed the output to some other workflow/org-mode task/Gnus
mail, etc.

Tim