Re: multiple inserts within skeletons

[Oliver Scholz <alkibiades@gmx.de>]

[Note: skeletons are not Lisp, but a special purpose language. The
various parts of a skeleton program are called “elements”. Elements
may be strings, sexpr (which are either sub-skeletons or Lisp
expressions) or special skeleton commands like >, _, @, \n, | or
&. Have a look at `C-h f skeleton-insert RET' or at the “Autotype”
info manual.]

Harry Putnam <hgp@sbcglobal.net> writes:

> Oliver Scholz <alkibiades@gmx.de> writes:
[define-skeleton]

> This is close to something I've tried to do a few times.  Maybe you
> can coach me a little here.
>
> I'd like to produce and insert that looks like:
>
> # Keywords: Some Key words
> # More commentary
> # yet more comentary
> # CURRENT_DATE
> # &&
>
> Trying to rework your example like this comes sort of close.:
>
> (define-skeleton my-comment
>   "Keywords formatted input"
>   nil
>   "# Keywords: " 
>   ("Type descriptive comments: " "# " str & \n | -15)
>   "END NONSENSE")
>
> # Keywords: # some key words
> # more commentary
> # yet more commentary
> # CURRENT_DATE
> # &&
>
> NOTE:  Current Date and closing ampersands added by hand but I'd like
> the skeleton to do that for me.

By “current date” do you mean the current date or the literal text
“CURRENT_DATE”? If the former: skeletons may contain abitrary Lisp
expressions as elements, which are then evaluated and the return value
is inserted into the buffer. You could use this feature together with
the function `current-time-string'. for example:

(define-skeleton my-test-skel
  "Insert the current time and date."
  nil
  "Date: " (current-time-string) ".")

If you mean just the literal “CURRENT_DATE”: just add a string to the
skeleton language.

> 1) How can I make the octothorpe begin to appear only after the
>    keywords line, so it doesn't appear after `Keywords'.

I don't know what an “octothorpe” is; it's not im my Webster's. I
assume that you mean the “#”?

If so, I believe, you want something like this:

(define-skeleton my-comment
  "Insert keywords formatted input."
  "Keywords: "
  "# Keywords: " str \n
  ("Comment: " "# " str "\n"))

Basically the difference is, that this uses the combination of
PROMPT + “str” two times in two different ways: "Keywords: " and the
first occurence of “str” in the top-skeleton; "Comment: " and the
second “str” in the sub-skeleton.

[The “str & \n | -15” stuff that I recommended earlier is pointless,
as I realize now: sub-skeletons are inserted *only*, if the user has
entered something at the prompt.]

> 2) Can I arrange the skeleton so that when I press C-g to break out,
>    it inserts the CURRENT_DATE followed by `# &&' on a separate line?
>    Or in some other way cause those last two items to be inserted
>    automatically 

Well, for one you could simply hit RET, when prompted for a
“descriptive comment”. The skeleton program then leaves the
sub-skeleton loop and resumes the top skeleton. But if you have (like
me) the bad habit to type `C-g' all the time to get out of the
minibuffer, you can use the `resume:' keyword to specify a place where
the skeleton should resume execution after the user hit `C-g'. For
example.

(define-skeleton my-repeat-ad-nauseam
  ""
  nil
  ("Type something, please: " str "\n")
  & "Allright, we finished in a normal way."
  | resume: & "Aha, you lost temper and hit `C-g'.")

I hope this sets you on the track. :-)

    Oliver
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