Re: Question regarding COLUMNS setting...

[Kevin Rodgers <ihs_4664@yahoo.com>]

Larry D. Weiner wrote:
 > I have just built emacs 21.3 on HP-UX. When I try to
 > do a compile from various frames, I find that the
 > compilation mode has set the environment variable
 > COLUMNS, which the compiler then uses to format it's
 > output. The COLUMNS is set from the frame that I issue
 > the compile-command. However, I have compilation set
 > in my special-display-buffer-names variable, so the
 > column-width is completely irrelevant for any other
 > frame. The upshot is that this interferes with the
 > interpretation of compile errors. Is there a way to
 > suppress COLUMNS from being set?

Heres' where COLUMNS is set by compile-internal in compile.el:

  	    (let* ((process-environment
		    (append
		     (if (and (boundp 'system-uses-terminfo)
			      system-uses-terminfo)
			 (list "TERM=dumb" "TERMCAP="
			       (format "COLUMNS=%d" (window-width)))
		       (list "TERM=emacs"
			     (format "TERMCAP=emacs:co#%d:tc=unknown:"
				     (window-width))))
		     ;; Set the EMACS variable, but
		     ;; don't override users' setting of $EMACS.
		     (if (getenv "EMACS")
			 process-environment
		       (cons "EMACS=t" process-environment))))
		   (proc (start-process-shell-command (downcase mode-name)
						      outbuf
						      command)))

So you could try something like

(defadvice compile-internal (around suppress-columns activate)
   (let ((system-uses-terminfo nil))
     ad-do-it))

but then the TERMCAP environment variable would include the erroneous
number -- but perhaps your compiler will ignore that.

-- 
Kevin Rodgers