How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Kro Ly]

Hi, i'm using emacs in the terminal and I'd like to know how to copy and paste something from firefox to emacs for instance ?
Thanks.

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Quanyang Liu]

On Sat, Aug 16 2014 at 19:09:27 +0800, David Hume wrote:
> Kro Ly <mnmnmnmna@gmail.com> writes:
>
>> Hi, i'm using emacs in the terminal and I'd like to know how to copy
>> and paste something from firefox to emacs for instance ?
>> Thanks.
>
> That depends on the terminal I think. If it is xterm you can press the
> middle mouse button to paste.
Maybe you can try to use xsel. The way I use is below:

;; use xsel to copy/paste in emacs-nox
(unless window-system
  (when (getenv "DISPLAY")
	(defun xsel-cut-function (text &optional push)
	  (with-temp-buffer
		(insert text)
		(call-process-region (point-min) (point-max) "xsel" nil 0 nil "--clipboard" "--input")))
	(defun xsel-paste-function()
	  (let ((xsel-output (shell-command-to-string "xsel --clipboard --output")))
		(unless (string= (car kill-ring) xsel-output)
		  xsel-output )))
	(setq interprogram-cut-function 'xsel-cut-function)
	(setq interprogram-paste-function 'xsel-paste-function)
	))
    
-- 
Quanyang Liu （刘全阳）
Undergraduate
Department of Computer Science and Engineering
Shanghai Jiao Tong University

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Grant Rettke]

Untested:

http://blog.binchen.org/posts/paste-string-from-clipboard-into-minibuffer-in-emacs.html
Grant Rettke | ACM, ASA, FSF, IEEE, SIAM
gcr@wisdomandwonder.com | http://www.wisdomandwonder.com/
“Wisdom begins in wonder.” --Socrates
((λ (x) (x x)) (λ (x) (x x)))
“Life has become immeasurably better since I have been forced to stop
taking it seriously.” --Thompson


On Sat, Aug 16, 2014 at 6:29 AM, Quanyang Liu <lqymgt@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Sat, Aug 16 2014 at 19:09:27 +0800, David Hume wrote:
>> Kro Ly <mnmnmnmna@gmail.com> writes:
>>
>>> Hi, i'm using emacs in the terminal and I'd like to know how to copy
>>> and paste something from firefox to emacs for instance ?
>>> Thanks.
>>
>> That depends on the terminal I think. If it is xterm you can press the
>> middle mouse button to paste.
> Maybe you can try to use xsel. The way I use is below:
>
> ;; use xsel to copy/paste in emacs-nox
> (unless window-system
>   (when (getenv "DISPLAY")
>         (defun xsel-cut-function (text &optional push)
>           (with-temp-buffer
>                 (insert text)
>                 (call-process-region (point-min) (point-max) "xsel" nil 0 nil "--clipboard" "--input")))
>         (defun xsel-paste-function()
>           (let ((xsel-output (shell-command-to-string "xsel --clipboard --output")))
>                 (unless (string= (car kill-ring) xsel-output)
>                   xsel-output )))
>         (setq interprogram-cut-function 'xsel-cut-function)
>         (setq interprogram-paste-function 'xsel-paste-function)
>         ))
>
> --
> Quanyang Liu （刘全阳）
> Undergraduate
> Department of Computer Science and Engineering
> Shanghai Jiao Tong University
>

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Emanuel Berg]

Quanyang Liu <lqymgt@gmail.com> writes:

> Maybe you can try to use xsel. The way I use is below:
>
> ;; use xsel to copy/paste in emacs-nox
> (unless window-system
>   (when (getenv "DISPLAY")
> 	(defun xsel-cut-function (text &optional push)
> 	  (with-temp-buffer
> 		(insert text)
> 		(call-process-region (point-min) (point-max) "xsel" nil 0 nil "--clipboar=
> d" "--input")))
> 	(defun xsel-paste-function()
> 	  (let ((xsel-output (shell-command-to-string "xsel --clipboard --output")=
> ))
> 		(unless (string=3D (car kill-ring) xsel-output)
> 		  xsel-output )))
> 	(setq interprogram-cut-function 'xsel-cut-function)
> 	(setq interprogram-paste-function 'xsel-paste-function)
> 	))

Amazing! I have almost the same, also based on xsel. I
made it into a package [1], but then I learned another
guy had submitted a package to ELPA, only based on
xclip (which I first used, but dropped for some reason
in favor of xsel).

So I never submitted it, but perhaps I still will.

Both xsel and xclip are in the repositories for Debian
and surely for Ubuntu as well (if you are using Unity,
I mean).

Also, if you are using tmux, I wrote some code [2] so
that you can insert what you kill in tmux into an Emacs
buffer. The Emacs kill-yank keys are at work by default
in tmux, I think, but tmux requires a little love [3]
to write the killed region to a file, which is then
inserted from Emacs.

Good luck!

[1] http://user.it.uu.se/~embe8573/conf/emacs-init/xsel.el
[2] http://user.it.uu.se/~embe8573/conf/emacs-init/linux-shell.el
[3] http://user.it.uu.se/~embe8573/conf/.tmux.conf

-- 
underground experts united

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Quanyang Liu]

On Sun, Aug 17 2014 at 05:45:31 +0800, Emanuel Berg wrote:
> Amazing! I have almost the same, also based on xsel. I
> made it into a package [1], but then I learned another
> guy had submitted a package to ELPA, only based on
> xclip (which I first used, but dropped for some reason
> in favor of xsel).
>

Well... I got the solution from the Internet, in fact.

-- 
Quanyang Liu （刘全阳）
Undergraduate
Department of Computer Science and Engineering
Shanghai Jiao Tong University

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Emanuel Berg]

Quanyang Liu <lqymgt@gmail.com> writes:

>> Amazing! I have almost the same, also based on xsel.
>> I made it into a package [1], but then I learned
>> another guy had submitted a package to ELPA, only
>> based on xclip (which I first used, but dropped for
>> some reason in favor of xsel).
>
> Well... I got the solution from the Internet, in
> fact.

It doesn't matter. Code doesn't belong to the person
who wrote it, but the person who needs it.

-- 
underground experts united

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Kro Ly]

Thanks everyone but xsel doesn't seem to work and I have found no solution. It say "xsel: can't open display: (null): success. I'm on ubuntu 12.04 using the first console (ctrl + alt + f1).

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Yuri Khan]

On Mon, Aug 18, 2014 at 10:22 PM, Kro Ly <mnmnmnmna@gmail.com> wrote:
> Thanks everyone but xsel doesn't seem to work and I have found no solution. It say "xsel: can't open display: (null): success. I'm on ubuntu 12.04 using the first console (ctrl + alt + f1).

Before running xclip or xsel, you might want to set the DISPLAY
environment to indicate the X display whose selection or clipboard you
want to access, e.g.:

$ DISPLAY=:0 xsel -o

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Kro Ly]

Le lundi 18 août 2014 17:37:50 UTC+2, Yuri Khan a écrit :
> On Mon, Aug 18, 2014 at 10:22 PM, Kro Ly <mnmnmnmna@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> > Thanks everyone but xsel doesn't seem to work and I have found no solution. It say "xsel: can't open display: (null): success. I'm on ubuntu 12.04 using the first console (ctrl + alt + f1).
> 
> 
> 
> Before running xclip or xsel, you might want to set the DISPLAY
> 
> environment to indicate the X display whose selection or clipboard you
> 
> want to access, e.g.:
> 
> 
> 
> $ DISPLAY=:0 xsel -o

this worked perfectly :
$ export DISPLAY=:0
$ xsel -b
;; return what I copied in the GUI.

the quanyang's script works fine on emacs now, I'm happy :)

thanks to everyone for having tried to help me.
for those who are curious about why I'm using emacs in the terminal, it just reminds me my childhood :)

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Yuri Khan]

On Tue, Aug 19, 2014 at 3:12 AM, Kro Ly <mnmnmnmna@gmail.com> wrote:

> thanks to everyone for having tried to help me.
> for those who are curious about why I'm using emacs in the terminal, it just reminds me my childhood :)

Have a look at the cool-old-term project. It works in X and might
remind one’s childhood even more :)

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Bob Proulx]

Yuri Khan wrote:
> Have a look at the cool-old-term project. It works in X and might
> remind one’s childhood even more :)

  https://github.com/Swordifish90/cool-old-term

That is	quite a nice retro look to the terminal.  I like it!  :-)

However I see you using the unicode "’" (U+2019) in your reply
instead of the traditional typewriter "'" (0x27).  :-)  How can you be
a traditionalist with behavior like that?  Ha ha!

Bob

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Emanuel Berg]

Bob Proulx <bob@proulx.com> writes:

> Yuri Khan wrote:
>
>> Have a look at the cool-old-term project. It works
>> in X and might remind one’s childhood even more :)
>
>   https://github.com/Swordifish90/cool-old-term
>
> That is quite a nice retro look to the terminal. I
> like it! :-)

Yeah, me too!

But I suppose it is not "real" but rather they used
high tech to make it look that way. Like the MAME and
zsnes and all those emulators to play Neo-Geo and SNES.
But actually those run the original ROMs. This is just
a shell that looks that way. Also, they are "exposed"
as running it in a GUI window. But I'm impressed by the
effort and result.

Though I prefer the real deal. Here, no fake records:

http://user.it.uu.se/~embe8573/pics/console_cols.png

This is the console with tmux and zsh. Showing Debian,
Sun, colored prompt strings, colored output, color by
extension, and some ASCII art from the BBS era.
Speaking of the 90s, to quote SEGA: "Beat us. If you
can."

By the way, "Swordfish" is also the name of a hacker
movie that really sucked, but at least included some
nice looking wenches.

Also, there is a very colorful shell being developed
today, the fish shell. You can get such colors for zsh
as well, which I tried, but I got stressed out by the
words changing colors as I typed.

> However I see you using the unicode "’" (U+2019) in
> your reply instead of the traditional typewriter "'"
> (0x27). :-) How can you be a traditionalist with
> behavior like that? Ha ha!

I and Mr. Khan already had a holy war on that which
included some 10-20 posts, some of which were very
long. Next time, I'll put him down that mercilessly as
you just did and be done with it.

:)

-- 
underground experts united

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Yuri Khan]

On Thu, Aug 21, 2014 at 12:28 AM, Emanuel Berg <embe8573@student.uu.se> wrote:
>
>> However I see you using the unicode "’" (U+2019) in
>> your reply instead of the traditional typewriter "'"
>> (0x27). :-) How can you be a traditionalist with
>> behavior like that? Ha ha!
>
> I and Mr. Khan already had a holy war on that which
> included some 10-20 posts, some of which were very
> long. Next time, I'll put him down that mercilessly as
> you just did and be done with it.

Oh, now that you two have blown my cover, I have to confess. I am from
an alternate reality where technical limitations and bad design
decisions are recognized, deprecated and obsoleted at the earliest
opportunity. So, Unicode everywhere (including FTP and ZIP), keyboard
rows are not staggered, and HTML has been superseded with XHTML which
has to be valid to at least 1.0 Strict before any existing browser
displays even a bit of it.

But even in that alternate reality, now and then, people still miss a
bit of a technical limitation which was in effect at the time of their
childhood. Some develop a CRT-like terminal emulator, some listen to
music on vinyl discs.

> :)

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Emanuel Berg]

Yuri Khan <yuri.v.khan@gmail.com> writes:

> Oh, now that you two have blown my cover, I have to
> confess. I am from an alternate reality where
> technical limitations and bad design decisions are
> recognized, deprecated and obsoleted at the earliest
> opportunity. So, Unicode everywhere (including FTP
> and ZIP), keyboard rows are not staggered, and HTML
> has been superseded with XHTML which has to be valid
> to at least 1.0 Strict before any existing browser
> displays even a bit of it.

What?

> But even in that alternate reality, now and then,
> people still miss a bit of a technical limitation
> which was in effect at the time of their childhood.
> Some develop a CRT-like terminal emulator, some
> listen to music on vinyl discs.

Perhaps to you it is nostalgia. My first computer was a
Mac Plus - well, of course it wasn't mine, it was the
first I used, I mean.

The OS - perhaps what we would now would call a desktop
or window manager - was Finder. I remember upgrading
(or switching) to 6.0.7.

Finder was the smash hit of the GUIs. And there were
some great games like Dark Castle,
Beyond Dark Castle, Shadowgate and Prince of Persia.

There were also some crossovers from the PC world (like
King's Quest, Space Quest etc. from Sierra On-line)
which were horrible. (On-line back then was the
computer world, as opposed to the paper world.)

But I didn't think about the UI at all back then, as a
kid. Anyway, somewhere along the way I started using
PCs, Windows 95 and XP are the OSs I remember. (I
didn't do much DOS at all.) I did VB 5.0 and either C
or C++, I don't remember. I did BASIC on the TI
calculator and amazingly on the PlayStation 2 as well.
I'm actually much more a newcomer to the CLI world than
to programming.

No, I discovered the CLI and all with the SunOS and
later Debian. It took my quite some time to be GNOME-,
X-, and mouse-free. So for me it is absolutely not
about nostalgia. The moment I saw the terminal I
realized it was 100 times better, and I wanted nothing
else, but at that time I couldn't do everything I
wanted so I had to use X for certain things. RMAIL,
then Gnus, and Emacs-w3m were the last nails in the
coffin for me. Now I'm not that angry at GUIs, the
mouse, and all, anymore, because I don't use them.

It is like the police. When you feel they might arrest
you or ride into the street rally, you don't like them.
But when you are safe and sound you don't think about
them or waste any energy being negativistic and angry.

-- 
underground experts united

RE: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Subhan Michael Tindall]

I'm stuck in Windows-land these days, but when I was using terminal emacs a lot on my Ubuntu machine (gnome terminal I think, but I believe this is common: )
A) Highlight URL or whatever in firefox, chrome, etc.
B) copy or kill using C-c or C-x
C) paste into term at cursor: Shift-C-v

Hope this helps!




> -----Original Message-----
> From: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+subhant=familycareinc.org@gnu.org
> [mailto:help-gnu-emacs-bounces+subhant=familycareinc.org@gnu.org] On
> Behalf Of David Hume
> Sent: Monday, August 18, 2014 9:16 AM
> To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal
> version ?
> 
> Kro Ly <mnmnmnmna@gmail.com> writes:
> 
> > Thanks everyone but xsel doesn't seem to work and I have found no
> > solution. It say "xsel: can't open display: (null): success. I'm on
> > ubuntu 12.04 using the first console (ctrl + alt + f1).
> 
> aaaaaaaah, you are using the console! Well, you could perhaps run emacs in
> xterm instead. :)
> 
> emacs -nw


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Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Bob Proulx]

Subhan Michael Tindall wrote:
> I'm stuck in Windows-land these days, but when I was using terminal
> emacs a lot on my Ubuntu machine (gnome terminal I think, but I
> believe this is common: )
> A) Highlight URL or whatever in firefox, chrome, etc.
> B) copy or kill using C-c or C-x
> C) paste into term at cursor: Shift-C-v

Or in xterm and other places it is Shift-Insert.

The traditional X controls are to highlight using the left mouse
button.  Then paste using the middle mouse button.  Shift-Insert is
also available as a paste control.

Unfortunately (for me anyway) the Microsoft C-c, C-x, C-v controls are
permeating and the traditional methods are becoming broken.  Therefore
your experience may be different depending upon configuration.

Bob

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Stefan Monnier]

> The traditional X controls are to highlight using the left mouse
> button.  Then paste using the middle mouse button.  Shift-Insert is
> also available as a paste control.

Indeed, this is the traditional bindings to control the PRIMARY selection.

> Unfortunately (for me anyway) the Microsoft C-c, C-x, C-v controls are
> permeating and the traditional methods are becoming broken.  Therefore
> your experience may be different depending upon configuration.

I haven't seen much real breakage in that area.  But these key bindings
typically control the CLIPBOARD selection instead, so if you're not
aware of the distinction between PRIMARY and CLIPBOARD selection
(and/or if you don't know or aren't sure which is used by your program
and/or by the key sequence you used), then indeed, sometimes it looks
like it's just broken.


        Stefan

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Bob Proulx]

Stefan Monnier wrote:
> Bob Proulx wrote:
> > The traditional X controls are to highlight using the left mouse
> > button.  Then paste using the middle mouse button.  Shift-Insert is
> > also available as a paste control.
> 
> Indeed, this is the traditional bindings to control the PRIMARY selection.
> 
> > Unfortunately (for me anyway) the Microsoft C-c, C-x, C-v controls are
> > permeating and the traditional methods are becoming broken.  Therefore
> > your experience may be different depending upon configuration.
> 
> I haven't seen much real breakage in that area.  But these key bindings
> typically control the CLIPBOARD selection instead, so if you're not
> aware of the distinction between PRIMARY and CLIPBOARD selection
> (and/or if you don't know or aren't sure which is used by your program
> and/or by the key sequence you used), then indeed, sometimes it looks
> like it's just broken.

I am familiar with the differences between the primary selection and
the clipboard.  However the resulting behavior of cutting text and
pasting text shouldn't matter whether you are using one or the other.
Except that it does.

In the end anything that prevents being able to highlight text with a
click and drag of the left mouse button and then being able to paste
that text with the middle button appears as breakage whether it is
actually the clipboard or the primary selection executing the details.

Bob

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Stefan Monnier]

> I am familiar with the differences between the primary selection and
> the clipboard.  However the resulting behavior of cutting text and
> pasting text shouldn't matter whether you are using one or the other.

Of course it does: if you select text in an application which puts it in
PRIMARY and then paste it in an application which looks for it in
CLIPBOARD you won't get what you're asking for.

> In the end anything that prevents being able to highlight text with a
> click and drag of the left mouse button and then being able to paste
> that text with the middle button appears as breakage whether it is
> actually the clipboard or the primary selection executing the details.

Right.  The convention is not followed correctly by all applications,
plus some applications are trying to be helpful (i.e. to try and
accommodate the fact that other applications don't follow the convention
correctly) and end up breaking the convention yet again.

It's kind of messy because this convention was introduced "late" in the
life of X11.


        Stefan

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Emanuel Berg]

David Hume <David.Hume@example.com> writes:

> aaaaaaaah, you are using the console! Well, you could
> perhaps run emacs in xterm instead. :)
>
> emacs -nw

There are many differences between using Emacs with -nw
in xterm and using it in a Linux VT/tty/"the console".

For example, xterm requires you to use X. Most of the
time that isn't a problem, but sometimes your system
may be in a compromised state, and you don't have X
access. Of coures, that never happens to me (cough)

The biggest differences are how you configure the keys
and the fonts and the colors. In the console, that is
completely in the console. In X, some of it is in X (by
way of xterm), some of it is Emacs.

It is not really that one is better than the other.
Rather, if you started with one, you probably have a
better understanding and your mind is quicker to
execute whatever you want to do. So at that point,
probably you should stick to the one you like and know
the best.

Fonts, colors, and keys, mostly in the console but some
X stuff as well:

http://user.it.uu.se/~embe8573/cols/www/
http://user.it.uu.se/~embe8573/zsh.html

-- 
underground experts united

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Emanuel Berg]

Emanuel Berg <embe8573@student.uu.se> writes:

> Fonts, colors, and keys ...

Clarification: With "keys" I mean not everyday keys but
exotic keys and combinations that Emacs without
workarounds won't make use of as you intended. For
example, to rebind CAPS or to make C-m work. Those kind
of things are dealt with differently in the console and
in X. Regular keybindings to functions are just the
same. Colors and fonts also behave somewhat like that.
What can be setup in an Emacs init file should in 99%
do for both the console and X. But sometimes what you
setup like that relates to something you setup
somewhere else, and sometimes the fix is entirely
outside of Emacs. So bring a flashlight!

-- 
underground experts united

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Emanuel Berg]

David Hume <David.Hume@example.com> writes:

>> may be in a compromised state, and you don't have X
>
> If he has firefox, he has X.

(Misunderstanding: read again what I wrote.)

>> execute whatever you want to do. So at that point,
>> probably you should stick to the one you like and
>> know the best.
>
> The strong point of human beings is adaptability. You
> shouldn't stick with what you like and know the best,
> you should adapt to something better if it is
> available. Otherwise we would be wandering around
> looking for woolly Mammoths and feeling rather
> hungry.

One of the strong points of human beings is
adaptability. Another strong point is perfecting what
is known to be good.

In the streets of Karakorum a guy that has been
fiddling with thousands of different weapons all his
life is but a war-nerd. The other guy who spent his
life perfecting archery will put an arrow through the
war-nerds head, using exactly the same method he has
employed all his fighting life.

-- 
underground experts united

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Emanuel Berg]

David Hume <David.Hume@example.com> writes:

> ... you seem to be talking about a hypothetical
> situation. If X is broken, or if you have set up
> colours.

It doesn't have to be X that is broken just because you
can't use it.

Hypothetical and hypothetical... it is a fact that
using Emacs in the console isn't in all aspects
identical to using it in xterm with -nw. If those
differences will ever matter to the OP at some level
that is worth bringing up, I cant' say, of course. I
always said the Delhi oracle was more talented than
I...

-- 
underground experts united

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Emanuel Berg]

Emanuel Berg <embe8573@student.uu.se> writes:

> I always said the Delhi oracle was more talented than
> I...

*Delphi :)

There is also the matter of speed, the "interactive
feel" someone mentioned. When I started with Linux I
used gnome-terminal which was (is?) very slow. I could
sense this because I had used the terminal on SunOS
5.10, which was invoked from Gnome just under the
black-screen icon named "Terminal", so I don't know
what it was. Anyway, I looked around and found rxvt
which was much faster (that acronym is really telling,
if you don't know it). I then switched to urxvt (or
"rxvt-unicode") probably for Unicode support, and that
was as fast as rxvt. Then I switched to the console
which I experienced as as fast, perhaps marginally
faster still. But the best thing was that it was
distraction-free or almost so without that much
configuration, and the configuration that remained come
easy... well, relatively speaking. Now I use xterm in X
which I also consider fast. If you are very sensitive
to distractions this can actually be a way of getting
super-focus, but only if you get rid of the
distractions. If you can't, it is very bad. The console
can be a quick and easy way. It all depends what you
want and how sensitive you are (or "perceptive" if you
prefer a word that rings positively).

-- 
underground experts united

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Emanuel Berg]

Kro Ly <mnmnmnmna@gmail.com> writes:

> Hi, i'm using emacs in the terminal and I'd like to
> know how to copy and paste something from firefox to
> emacs for instance ? Thanks.

In addition to my other post on xsel, I'd like to
mention that a copy-and-paste interface from Emacs to
the outside world is, while useful, still a very
limited interface - and one that isn't programmable.

Emacs is all about automatization. Two things in
sequence that you make into one.

So the best answer is actually: Don't do it! Instead,
use an Emacs based browser, for example w3m - hit the
repositories for 'w3m-el-snapshot'.

Not only will that in an instant solve the clipboard
problem - it will actually solve it in a much better
way, as the Emacs kill ring is much more advanced than
the X clipboard - but the main advantage is that
instead of a mere copy-and-paste interface, you will
have a completely integrated browser. If you are fond
of Lisp, the sky's the limit. [1]

By the way, I just thought of one thing. Unity on
Ubuntu is still on X, or did they switch to Mir yet? In
that case, I don't know if xclip and xsel works. I've
heard of XMir that would bridge the gap, but I've not
seen any of this live. Perhaps you are even using
Kubuntu that would stick with X and switch (?) to
Wayland eventually. It would be nice if you could tell
us a thing or two.

[1] http://user.it.uu.se/~embe8573/conf/emacs-init/w3m/

-- 
underground experts united

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Quanyang Liu]

On Sun, Aug 17 2014 at 07:18:29 +0800, Emanuel Berg wrote:
> So the best answer is actually: Don't do it! Instead,
> use an Emacs based browser, for example w3m - hit the
> repositories for 'w3m-el-snapshot'.

I don't think a text-base browser can always satisfy requirements...
By the way, since he uses firefox, why not directly use Emacs for GUI.
-- 
Quanyang Liu （刘全阳）
Undergraduate
Department of Computer Science and Engineering
Shanghai Jiao Tong University

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Emanuel Berg]

Quanyang Liu <lqymgt@gmail.com> writes:

>> So the best answer is actually: Don't do it!
>> Instead, use an Emacs based browser, for example w3m
>> - hit the repositories for 'w3m-el-snapshot'.
>
> I don't think a text-base browser can always satisfy
> requirements...

There is only one case where w3m fails me, and that is
http://www.sj.se, to se when the trains come and go.
Everything else I can do with text-only. I think it is
JavaScript that is lacking, a technology I don't
respect anyway. (Other people may have other needs, of
course.)

Even accursed YouTube I don't have to use that way.
First w3m to get the URL, then youtube-dl to get the
movie file. Browser GUI, YouTube GUI, dependence on the
Internet, all bypassed.

But, I think nowadays there actually are Emacs browsers
that can show pictures. (If anyone passes the sj.se
test, I'd give it a try.)

> By the way, since he uses firefox, why not directly
> use Emacs for GUI.

One more time?

-- 
underground experts united

how to determine if to reply by CC as well (was: Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?)

[Emanuel Berg]

David Hume <David.Hume@example.com> writes:

> This is odd ... the OP asked how to past /from/
> firefox /to/ emacs, and that works fine for me just
> by selecting copy from the firefox menu, and then
> pressing the middle mouse key in emacs.

Perhaps the OP is a real programmer, and those don't
use either menus or the mouse.

:)

> But then we will probably never know what terminal
> the OP was using.

Yes, many posters do that. Most often I think they just
don't know it is helpful/appreciated to hear back from
them.

In some cases I suspect the old trap door which is the
newsgroup/listbot hybrid. Unless a poster ask for a CC,
I never include it.

Again: Is there any way to deduct from the post if the
poster isn't on Usenet, and isn't part of the list, in
what case a CC makes sense? (By "the post" I mean what
I see, or can see, as a Gnus newsgroup follower, in the
header fields.)

-- 
underground experts united

Re: how to determine if to reply by CC as well

[Emanuel Berg]

David Hume <David.Hume@example.com> writes:

>> Perhaps the OP is a real programmer, and those don't
>> use either menus or the mouse. ...
>
> Firefox without a mouse.

You can use Firefox without a mouse. There is
"search-for-links-only" key and then just type away.
Likewise shortcuts to show the bookmarks, mark the URL
field, iterate the tabs, and so on. But it is an uphill
battle. They don't expect people to do that so it is
far from as refined as it could be. Second it is not
programmable in the sense w3m is on Emacs, with just
reevaluating a defun to get the new (hopefully desired)
behavior. But there is a plugin system which
perhaps (?) can be used in that sense.

But the biggest problem isn't in the client software.
It can be, and is, great. The problem is those webpages
with zero structure and literally thousands of links
everywhere. They just expect people to not be bothered
with that as they use huge monitors with fonts so tiny
they are difficult to even make out.

And they use different fonts (and sizes), and the
location on the screen to express purpose (in a bad
way, but still). When this is rendered in a text-based
browser, or when some guy tries to use it without a
mouse and scrollwheel, it stinks even more.

So there is only so much the end software can do about
that. People will have to upgrade their taste as well
as their clients... and stay out of those websites.

> What fun!

Maybe not like taking Ecstacy and going to the circus.
But it is possible. But even so I recommend using Emacs
for plain-text and/or keyboard-only browsing. That way
it'll just be all in your hands if you want to change
and extend the user interface, which is likely...

>> Again: Is there any way to deduct from the post if
>> the poster isn't on Usenet, and isn't part of the
>> list, in what case a CC makes sense? (By "the post"
>> I mean what I see, or can see, as a Gnus newsgroup
>> follower, in the header fields.)
>
> Looking at the headers in the OP article, it says
> received by SMTP, so I guess it was an email.

Yes, but is he on the list or not? If he is, he doesn't
need a CC. If he isn't, he might be unaware there were
people trying to help him.

-- 
underground experts united

Re: how to determine if to reply by CC as well

[Quanyang Liu]

On Mon, Aug 18 2014 at 05:53:05 +0800, Emanuel Berg wrote:
>> Looking at the headers in the OP article, it says
>> received by SMTP, so I guess it was an email.
>
> Yes, but is he on the list or not? If he is, he doesn't
> need a CC. If he isn't, he might be unaware there were
> people trying to help him.

Sorry, I am just new here. But I am curious why you all know the OP will
never see the replies? If one is not on the list, does he can post here?
-- 
Quanyang Liu （刘全阳）
Undergraduate
Department of Computer Science and Engineering
Shanghai Jiao Tong University

Re: how to determine if to reply by CC as well

[Bob Proulx]

I am going to reply to several different messages in this thread all
at once.  Making this an extra long message.

Emanuel Berg wrote:
> Again: Is there any way to deduct from the post if the
> poster isn't on Usenet, and isn't part of the list, in
> what case a CC makes sense? (By "the post" I mean what
> I see, or can see, as a Gnus newsgroup follower, in the
> header fields.)

When you say USENET I assume you mean nntp news.  For that people read
it when they feel like it.  It is up to the reader.  Therefore there
is never a way to tell if they will actually get a response.  Since
many people post once and walk away never to be seen again.

However the original poster was seen twice.  The second had no quoted
text.  From that and the headers I would conclude that they are
posting to the Google Groups side of things.

I looked in the admin interface and the original poster is not
subscribed but because their header shows they posted through news and
because they responded to a later message we can be safe assuming they
are reading the news feed from the gateway.  I would not send them a
specific CC in that case.  They are reading the news feed and will
read all of the responses there.

On the mailing list side of things it is complicated by the history.
On mailing lists we rather expect people to be subscribed.  That is
policy on many mailing lists.  (Such as the Debian mailing lists for
example.  No CC's there please.)  But on the GNU lists specifically
the bug-* bug reporting lists we don't expect people to be subscribed
to post a bug report.  That would be too much.  Google requires people
to be signed up to Google to post bug reports for example which
includes knowing your phone number.  That is exceptionally too much!

Emanuel Berg wrote:
> David Hume wrote:
> > Looking at the headers in the OP article, it says received by SMTP, so
> > I guess it was an email.

You are probably subscribed to the mailing list.  The SMTP headers you
are seeing are probably from the mail side of things.  It looks to me
that it entered the system as a news submission.

> Yes, but is he on the list or not? If he is, he doesn't
> need a CC. If he isn't, he might be unaware there were
> people trying to help him.

Yes.  That is exactly the problem.  And one without a solution from
looking at one email message.  Sometimes you can tell by looking over
several messages.  For example if the poster has previously responded
to a message that went only to the mailing list then you can safely
assume that they are reading the mail list messages.  Or if they have
set a Mail-Followup-To: header.  But otherwise there just isn't any
way to know.

It starts with the bug reporting mailing lists.  On the bug-* lists we
don't expect a bug reporter to be subscribed.  There isn't any written
down policy either way so on the bug-* lists we usually do a reply-all
and send the original poster a direct copy assuming that they are not
subscribed.

That unwritten policy follows through to other mailing lists too such
as help-gnu-emacs.  Should a new poster not seen before get a CC?  It
is a problem.  There is no right answer.

At one time in the far past before spammers existed it was common to
keep the list of subscribers public.  You could ask the mailing list
robot to send you the list with the "who" command.  But now we have
spammers.  People object if their mail address is made public on
archive sites.  Therefore the who command is restricted to list admins
only now.  I as a list admin can cheat and look at the subscriber list
and see if a poster is subscribed but a normal user cannot.

I rather wish there were a mailing list feature to make it so that
non-subscribers would automatically receive a reply to their message
if someone posts a reply in the thread that they start.  That would
solve this problem nicely.  I am not aware of any mailing list that
does this.

> In some cases I suspect the old trap door which is the
> newsgroup/listbot hybrid. Unless a poster ask for a CC,
> I never include it.

Generally I think that is the safe procedure.  I don't like getting
extra CC's myself.  I generally do as you do and do a list-reply to
most postings.  That is the way discussion lists work.  However if I
am on a bug-* bug reporting list and I don't recognize the bug
reporter then I do a reply-all and send a CC to the bug reporter
directly.  (If it is a well known name, say you or me or one of the
other denizens that often post then we just know that they don't need
a direct CC of the message.)

If I am responding to a sub-message in the thread then I never do a
reply-all.  (I do manually drag in the original poster address if
needed.)  The person I am responding to must be subscribed.  Or must
be reading an archive such as Gmane.  Because they were able to read
and respond to the mailing list message therefore they must be reading
the messages and therefore will not need a direct reply.  So that
works for messages in the thread.  But not for the original message.

Another feature that would be nice would be if the mailing list
software would note in the header automatically if the poster were
subscribed.  That is what the Mail-Followup-To: header could be used
to supply automatically.  I always set it on my messages.  But it
never made it through the standards and so is only an ad-hoc
standard.  And one that the mailing list software is not coded to deal
with.  At least not yet.

As to your specific question about the newsgroup mailing list gateway
that can be told by looking at the headers.  The original poster had
this header:

  Path: usenet.stanford.edu!r2no737342igi.0!news-out.google.com!j6ni1320qas.0!nntp.google.com!i13no278061qae.1!postnews.google.com!glegroupsg2000goo.googlegroups.com!not-for-mail
  Newsgroups: gnu.emacs.help

Your messages alway have this header:

  Path: usenet.stanford.edu!news.kjsl.com!feeder.erje.net!eu.feeder.erje.net!news.ecp.fr!aioe.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail
  Newsgroups: gnu.emacs.help

And so it is easy to tell that the OP posted through Google Groups and
you are posting through news.

Note how old the protocol is in the above?  It uses UUCP addressing.
And then hoping not to confuse it with a uucp email address it says
not-for-mail.  :-)

The news mailing list gateway is what somewhat breaks threading.  Your
messages from the news gateway always appear to come from the parent
and not the message to which you are actually responding.  I think it
preserves the In-Reply-To header and does not update it.  Or something
like that.  I think that is because news software cares about the
References header instead.  And the gateway doesn't correct for this.
I think.  I haven't researched it to root cause.  But that seems a
plausible explanation of the broken behavior.  It is one of the
reasons I don't like the gateway and wish it did not exist.

Quanyang Liu wrote:
> Sorry, I am just new here. But I am curious why you all know the OP will
> never see the replies? If one is not on the list, does he can post here?

The GNU mailing lists are all open lists.  Because of them mostly
starting off as a bug reporting address and we wouldn't require
someone to be subscribed before posting a bug.  And more or less the
same when writing for help.  If someone is writing for help they may
not be knowledgeable about mailing lists and are starting from the
beginning and asking for help.  Therefore the mailing lists are open
and it is not necessary to be subscribe to post.

And so people often write to report a bug or write to ask for help and
are not subscribed.  If they don't say anything then we don't know if
they know enough to be subscribe or not.  If they are not (no way for
most people to know) then a list-reply only will not ever be seen by
them.

Bob

Re: how to determine if to reply by CC as well

[Quanyang Liu]

On Tue, Aug 19 2014 at 01:46:37 +0800, Bob Proulx wrote:
> Quanyang Liu wrote:
>> Sorry, I am just new here. But I am curious why you all know the OP will
>> never see the replies? If one is not on the list, does he can post here?
>
> The GNU mailing lists are all open lists.  Because of them mostly
> starting off as a bug reporting address and we wouldn't require
> someone to be subscribed before posting a bug.  And more or less the
> same when writing for help.  If someone is writing for help they may
> not be knowledgeable about mailing lists and are starting from the
> beginning and asking for help.  Therefore the mailing lists are open
> and it is not necessary to be subscribe to post.
>
> And so people often write to report a bug or write to ask for help and
> are not subscribed.  If they don't say anything then we don't know if
> they know enough to be subscribe or not.  If they are not (no way for
> most people to know) then a list-reply only will not ever be seen by
> them.

Thanks for answering.

-- 
Quanyang Liu （刘全阳）
Undergraduate
Department of Computer Science and Engineering
Shanghai Jiao Tong University

Re: how to determine if to reply by CC as well

[Emanuel Berg]

Bob Proulx <bob@proulx.com> writes:

>> Yes, but is he on the list or not? If he is, he
>> doesn't need a CC. If he isn't, he might be unaware
>> there were people trying to help him.
>
> Yes. That is exactly the problem. And one without a
> solution from looking at one email message. Sometimes
> you can tell by looking over several messages. For
> example if the poster has previously responded to a
> message that went only to the mailing list then you
> can safely assume that they are reading the mail list
> messages. Or if they have set a Mail-Followup-To:
> header. But otherwise there just isn't any way to
> know.

Perhaps an auto-reply could be sent to those who are
not on the list, with a suggestion to join the list,
and a note saying what ways there are to still read the
replies (if joining the list isn't attractive for some
reason).

But in a way I don't like that because every time I get
automatic mails they say stuff I don't care for and/or
already know.

But wait: When people aren't on the list, and they are
not on Usenet, how do they learn of the list/group in
the first place?

At those places, perhaps the equivalent message can be
showed? Then it is a matter of not having too much
other text on that page, so that not the future poster
will be tempted to skip it and remain uninformed.

-- 
underground experts united

Re: how to determine if to reply by CC as well

[Bob Proulx]

Emanuel Berg wrote:
> Perhaps an auto-reply could be sent to those who are
> not on the list, with a suggestion to join the list,
> and a note saying what ways there are to still read the
> replies (if joining the list isn't attractive for some
> reason).

That could be an interesting feature.  It doesn't currently exist.
But if it were coded up into a Mailman 2.x maintenance release (Ha!)
then it might propagate to the FSF servers.

One must be careful about auto-replies.  Otherwise it can generate
backscatter spam and get the list server onto a DNSBL.  This has
happened at various times and it is annoying.

At the present time most of the mailing lists do not auto-respond to
messages and we try hard to prevent backscatter spam from occuring
from the lists.  Some lists (thankfully only a few) do have odd
configurations and some do autorespond.

> But in a way I don't like that because every time I get
> automatic mails they say stuff I don't care for and/or
> already know.

Yes.

> But wait: When people aren't on the list, and they are
> not on Usenet, how do they learn of the list/group in
> the first place?

It is posted on the web page.

  http://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/

  Support

  To ask for help with GNU Emacs, use the mailing list
  help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org or the newsgroup gnu.emacs.help.  The mailing
  list and newsgroup are linked: messages posted on one appear on the
  other as well.

> At those places, perhaps the equivalent message can be
> showed? Then it is a matter of not having too much
> other text on that page, so that not the future poster
> will be tempted to skip it and remain uninformed.

Updating the text on the web page is easily done.  Would you like to
suggest an improvement to the web page that would help to improve
things?

Bob

Re: how to determine if to reply by CC as well

[Emanuel Berg]

Bob Proulx <bob@proulx.com> writes:

> It is posted on the web page.
>
>   http://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/
>
>   Support
>
>   To ask for help with GNU Emacs, use the mailing list
> help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org or the newsgroup gnu.emacs.help.
> The mailing list and newsgroup are linked: messages
> posted on one appear on the other as well.

OK! I see, there is also this page with more details:

https://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/help-gnu-emacs

This problem doesn't seem to be mentioned, though.

Now, this is a delicate situation - by mentioning it,
maybe *more* people will start posting without joining?

But, in the spirit of the FSF, perhaps it should be all
spelled out? Like,

"We recommend you to either use the newsgroup, or to
join the mailing list. However, you can also get help
simply by sending questions to help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org.
If you choose to do that, we ask you to mention that
you are not on the list. That way, we can send replies
to your mail as well as to the members of the list."

Excursion: Why do people don't want to join? Probably
because they think their inboxes will be flooded with
stuff they (as beginners) won't understand. I use Gnus
so I don't know, but even for gmail and such, aren't
there ways to split the mail logically into folders,
where 1000 mails are just a non-disturbing one-liner
"help-gnu-emacs(1000)"? Perhaps a link to a guide that
helps you do it for the more common (non-hacker)
clients and web-solutions would help.

Also: "We appreciate if you tell us if we were able to
help you or not. If you didn't get it to work, please
include as much details as possible as to in what ways
your problem remains."

And, this:

    Please don't send bug reports here, or to the
    comp.emacs newsgroup; mail them to
    bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org instead.

I would add: "If you are unsure, but suspect you have
encountered a bug, you are encouraged to report it just
the same."

If you use any of this, of course rephrase as much as
you like.

-- 
underground experts united

Re: how to determine if to reply by CC as well

[Will Parsons]

Emanuel Berg wrote:
> Bob Proulx <bob@proulx.com> writes:
>
>> It is posted on the web page.
>>
>>   http://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/
>>
>>   Support
>>
>>   To ask for help with GNU Emacs, use the mailing list
>> help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org or the newsgroup gnu.emacs.help.
>> The mailing list and newsgroup are linked: messages
>> posted on one appear on the other as well.
>
> OK! I see, there is also this page with more details:
>
> https://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/help-gnu-emacs
>
> This problem doesn't seem to be mentioned, though.
>
> Now, this is a delicate situation - by mentioning it,
> maybe *more* people will start posting without joining?

You seem to think that not using the mailing list is undesirable - I
disagree.

> But, in the spirit of the FSF, perhaps it should be all
> spelled out? Like,
>
> "We recommend you to either use the newsgroup, or to
> join the mailing list. However, you can also get help
> simply by sending questions to help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org.
> If you choose to do that, we ask you to mention that
> you are not on the list. That way, we can send replies
> to your mail as well as to the members of the list."
>
> Excursion: Why do people don't want to join? Probably
> because they think their inboxes will be flooded with
> stuff they (as beginners) won't understand. I use Gnus
> so I don't know, but even for gmail and such, aren't
> there ways to split the mail logically into folders,
> where 1000 mails are just a non-disturbing one-liner
> "help-gnu-emacs(1000)"? Perhaps a link to a guide that
> helps you do it for the more common (non-hacker)
> clients and web-solutions would help.

I am one of those who prefer to follow the newsgroup, and not sign up
for a mailing list.  Yes, I don't want my mailbox to fill up with a
lot a mail that I'll have do deal with (if only to delete it), and as
I have more that 30 years experience as a professional programmer, I
hardly think I classify as a "beginner".  NNTP is much easier to deal
with IMO than mailing lists, and I generally prefer to use Gmane
rather than signing up for mailing lists if I possibly can.

The fact that I follow gnu.emacs.help rather than a mailing list is a
*good* thing.

-- 
Will

Re: how to determine if to reply by CC as well

[Quanyang Liu]

On Tue, Aug 19 2014 at 22:25:30 +0800, Will Parsons wrote:
> I am one of those who prefer to follow the newsgroup, and not sign up
> for a mailing list.  Yes, I don't want my mailbox to fill up with a
> lot a mail that I'll have do deal with (if only to delete it), and as
> I have more that 30 years experience as a professional programmer, I
> hardly think I classify as a "beginner".  NNTP is much easier to deal
> with IMO than mailing lists, and I generally prefer to use Gmane
> rather than signing up for mailing lists if I possibly can.

For me, using Gmane is much faster than using mailing lists through gmail....
-- 
Quanyang Liu （刘全阳）
Undergraduate
Department of Computer Science and Engineering
Shanghai Jiao Tong University

Re: how to determine if to reply by CC as well

[Emanuel Berg]

Will Parsons <varro@nodomain.invalid> writes:

> You seem to think that not using the mailing list is
> undesirable - I disagree.

I think it is undesirable to ask questions by way of
mail and at the same time not be on the list. That way
those who answer the question will have to look out for
notes they should manually include a CC to reach the
poster, as we just learned that cannot be deducted. Not
mentioning it is brainless activity that is boring and
easy to forget. People should never hesitate - OK,
here as question; I know the answer, BAM! I just send
the OP my reply and feel good about it.

> I am one of those who prefer to follow the newsgroup

Yes, I use Gnus for both mails and news, when I can
favor one, I pick news. This is not a news vs. mail
discussion.

> and not sign up for a mailing list. Yes, I don't want
> my mailbox to fill up with a lot a mail that I'll
> have do deal with (if only to delete it)

Gnus has a feature called mail splitting. With that,
mail can act exactly like news. After setting it up,
which is easy, after 5 seconds you don't care what is
news and what is mail. Same interface, looks the same,
everything is the same.

> NNTP is much easier to deal with IMO than mailing
> lists, and I generally prefer to use Gmane rather
> than signing up for mailing lists if I possibly can.
>
> The fact that I follow gnu.emacs.help rather than a
> mailing list is a *good* thing.

Yeah, the discussion is not about mail vs. news.

-- 
underground experts united

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Robert Thorpe]

Kro Ly <mnmnmnmna@gmail.com> writes:

> Hi, i'm using emacs in the terminal and I'd like to know how to copy and paste something from firefox to emacs for instance ?
> Thanks.

This question keeps being asked recently.  Lots of people have posted
code using xsel and xclip.  Some of which doesn't work properly
(http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/help-gnu-emacs/2014-05/msg00100.html
), but I think the ones posted in this thread are ok.

What's the point of running the terminal version of Emacs in X?  If you
want windowing then why not run the X version?  If you don't want
windowing, then why both run X at all?

BR,
Robert Thorpe

Re: How to copy and paste from unity to emacs in the terminal version ?

[Stefan Monnier]

> Hi, i'm using emacs in the terminal and I'd like to know how to copy and
> paste something from firefox to Emacs for instance ?

Depends on the terminal you use, but other than that it should "just
work".  What have you tried and what result did you get?


        Stefan