From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail From: Eli Zaretskii Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.help Subject: Re: How to use display text property with after-string? Date: Fri, 21 Oct 2016 23:04:32 +0300 Message-ID: <83vawlqxin.fsf@gnu.org> References: <87funqtegs.fsf@mbork.pl> <83lgxirw7k.fsf@gnu.org> <874m45trq6.fsf@mbork.pl> NNTP-Posting-Host: blaine.gmane.org X-Trace: blaine.gmane.org 1477080982 7709 195.159.176.226 (21 Oct 2016 20:16:22 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@blaine.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 21 Oct 2016 20:16:22 +0000 (UTC) To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org Original-X-From: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Fri Oct 21 22:16:18 2016 Return-path: Envelope-to: geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([208.118.235.17]) by blaine.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.84_2) (envelope-from ) id 1bxgEP-0007G6-Aa for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Fri, 21 Oct 2016 22:15:57 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:34287 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1bxgER-0007Ew-Eo for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Fri, 21 Oct 2016 16:15:59 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:4830:134:3::10]:34452) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1bxg3Y-00076Z-Nb for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Fri, 21 Oct 2016 16:04:45 -0400 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1bxg3V-0008QT-K4 for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Fri, 21 Oct 2016 16:04:44 -0400 Original-Received: from fencepost.gnu.org ([2001:4830:134:3::e]:55737) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1bxg3V-0008QK-Gp for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Fri, 21 Oct 2016 16:04:41 -0400 Original-Received: from 84.94.185.246.cable.012.net.il ([84.94.185.246]:4255 helo=home-c4e4a596f7) by fencepost.gnu.org with esmtpsa (TLS1.2:RSA_AES_128_CBC_SHA1:128) (Exim 4.82) (envelope-from ) id 1bxg3U-0000kX-RB for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Fri, 21 Oct 2016 16:04:41 -0400 In-reply-to: <874m45trq6.fsf@mbork.pl> (message from Marcin Borkowski on Fri, 21 Oct 2016 21:41:21 +0200) X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 2.2.x-3.x [generic] X-Received-From: 2001:4830:134:3::e X-BeenThere: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.21 Precedence: list List-Id: Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: "help-gnu-emacs" Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.help:111587 Archived-At: > From: Marcin Borkowski > Cc: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org > Date: Fri, 21 Oct 2016 21:41:21 +0200 > > > The 'display' property doesn't support after-string, only the overlay > > properties do. > > I see. I was a bit afraid that is the case. > > Is there any other way to put some nonexistent text in the buffer? What's wrong with 'display' text property? Just make its value be a string, not '(after-string "something"). > Overlays are not very good that, since I hear many overlays in a buffer > may slow things down. My use case is as follows: I want to write > a function which will find all the dates in the US format (M/D/Y) in the > buffer and put a date in a sane format (maybe together with something > like "3 days ago" or "tomorrow") next to them. (That would be very > useful for me, since I sometimes get emails from Americans, and dealing > with dates in M/D/Y format is a huge cognitive load for me;-).) The 'display' text property whose value is a string causes that string be displayed _instead_ of the text covered by the text property. Which sounds exactly what you want. One caveat: you cannot move cursor through the display string (the same is true for after-strings).