getting gnu emacs to run in gui mode

getting gnu emacs to run in gui mode

[Kevin Patrick Barry]

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Dear List,

I apologise in advance if there is an established solution to this problem
out there; an hour or so with manuals/google hasn't turned anything up.

I have installed gnu emacs 23.4 on my linux system (Lubuntu), and I can run
it just fine from my terminal, but I can't get it to load in gui mode.
Emacs has appeared in my desktop menus but clicking it does nothing (no
error messages, nothing at all, even though the command is fine if I do it
manually in the terminal).  Clicking 'run' and typing Emacs also gets
nothing.  I scoured the manual for an option to force gui mode but there
doesn't appear to be one, just an opposite for forcing terminal mode (-nw).

Perhaps this has something to do with the LXDE desktop environment?
(Googling various combinations of this and Lubuntu didn't turn anything
up.)  Or perhaps I installed it from the wrong file?  I used the file
`emacs-23.4.tar.gz' from http://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/emacs/.

I'm sure it would work if I installed it from the package manager, but I'm
doing this as something of an educational exercise in installing
applications manually.  Therefore it isn't urgent, but any help would be
much appreciated.

Regards,
Kevin Barry
University of Dublin
Trinity College

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Re: getting gnu emacs to run in gui mode

[Alberto Luaces]

Kevin Patrick Barry writes:

> Dear List,
>
> I apologise in advance if there is an established solution to this
> problem out there; an hour or so with manuals/google hasn't turned
> anything up.
>
> I have installed gnu emacs 23.4 on my linux system (Lubuntu), and I
> can run it just fine from my terminal, but I can't get it to load in
> gui mode.  Emacs has appeared in my desktop menus but clicking it
> does nothing (no error messages, nothing at all, even though the
> command is fine if I do it manually in the terminal).  Clicking 'run'
> and typing Emacs also gets nothing.  I scoured the manual for an
> option
> to force gui mode but there doesn't appear to be one, just an opposite
> for forcing terminal mode (-nw).
>
> Perhaps this has something to do with the LXDE desktop environment? 
> (Googling various combinations of this and Lubuntu didn't turn
> anything up.)  Or perhaps I installed it from the wrong file?  I used
> the
> file `emacs-23.4.tar.gz' from http://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/emacs/.
>
> I'm sure it would work if I installed it from the package manager, but
> I'm doing this as something of an educational exercise in installing
> applications manually.  Therefore it isn't urgent, but any help
> would be much appreciated.

Look at the configuration stage when you compiled emacs. Maybe you had
not installed the graphics toolkit development packages (i.e. gtk) and
therefore emacs was built in terminal mode only.

-- 
Alberto

Re: getting gnu emacs to run in gui mode

[Peter Dyballa]

Am 21.3.2012 um 13:45 schrieb Kevin Patrick Barry:

> I have installed gnu emacs 23.4 on my linux system (Lubuntu), and I can run
> it just fine from my terminal, but I can't get it to load in gui mode.

You need to install a lot of dev packages. Compiling GNU Emacs is kind of "development", not just using the system. Since you still have the sources on your system, run './configure --help' and then decide which components of X11, font handling and display, etc. you want and then install the corresponding dev packages.

In GNU Emacs you can perform the task of configuration and compilation (+ installation). From the top level directory of the sources, i.e., emacs-23.4, invoke M-x compile RET, then remove the text appearing in echo area/mini-buffer and type: ./configure <possible options> RET. And you can see in colour which software components and particles are found and which not. At the end of the *compilation* buffer you'll see which kind of Emacs will be built. You can save the whole buffer – and close it! (Or it will be overwritten by next compilation.) If you are satisfied, you can M-x compile RET and press RET again if the text says 'make -k' or use cursor-up to fetch back that 'make -k'. RET will start the build.
If you're not satisfied with the configuration step you can install more dev packages and/or use some configure options.

--
Greetings

  Pete

Don't force it; get a larger hammer. 
				– Anthony's Law of Force

Re: getting gnu emacs to run in gui mode

[Ian Barton]

On 21/03/12 12:45, Kevin Patrick Barry wrote:
> Dear List,
>
> I apologise in advance if there is an established solution to this
> problem out there; an hour or so with manuals/google hasn't turned
> anything up.
>
> I have installed gnu emacs 23.4 on my linux system (Lubuntu), and I can
> run it just fine from my terminal, but I can't get it to load in gui
> mode.  Emacs has appeared in my desktop menus but clicking it does
> nothing (no error messages, nothing at all, even though the command is
> fine if I do it manually in the terminal).  Clicking 'run' and typing
> Emacs also gets nothing.  I scoured the manual for an option to force
> gui mode but there doesn't appear to be one, just an opposite for
> forcing terminal mode (-nw).
>
> Perhaps this has something to do with the LXDE desktop environment?
> (Googling various combinations of this and Lubuntu didn't turn anything
> up.)  Or perhaps I installed it from the wrong file?  I used the file
> `emacs-23.4.tar.gz' from http://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/emacs/.
>
> I'm sure it would work if I installed it from the package manager, but
> I'm doing this as something of an educational exercise in installing
> applications manually.  Therefore it isn't urgent, but any help would be
> much appreciated.
>

Assuming you have all the required packages installed (try apt-get 
build-dep emacs) try the following:

make distclean
./configure --prefix=/usr/local --sysconfdir=/etc --libexecdir=/usr/lib 
\ --with-x-toolkit=gtk --with-xft

make
make install

I haven't built emacs on Ubuntu for a while, but this used to work for 
me (I am still using the same on Arch).

Ian.

Re: getting gnu emacs to run in gui mode

[suvayu ali]

On Wed, Mar 21, 2012 at 13:45, Kevin Patrick Barry <barryk2@tcd.ie> wrote:
> I have installed gnu emacs 23.4 on my linux system (Lubuntu), and I can run
> it just fine from my terminal, but I can't get it to load in gui mode.
> Emacs has appeared in my desktop menus but clicking it does nothing (no
> error messages, nothing at all, even though the command is fine if I do it
> manually in the terminal).  Clicking 'run' and typing Emacs also gets
> nothing.  I scoured the manual for an option to force gui mode but there
> doesn't appear to be one, just an opposite for forcing terminal mode (-nw).
>

You don't say the exact emacs package names you installed (I'm
assuming you did not compile it yourself as you didn't say so), but I
have a hunch you only have the emacs-nox package installed. Try
installing the full feature emacs pacakge (its probably named simply
emacs or emacs23)[1].

So something like this should work:

$ sudo apt-get install emacs23

[1] <http://packages.ubuntu.com/precise/emacs>

-- 
Suvayu

Open source is the future. It sets us free.

Re: getting gnu emacs to run in gui mode

[suvayu ali]

On Wed, Mar 21, 2012 at 20:40, suvayu ali <fatkasuvayu+linux@gmail.com> wrote:
> You don't say the exact emacs package names you installed (I'm
> assuming you did not compile it yourself as you didn't say so), but I
> have a hunch you only have the emacs-nox package installed. Try
> installing the full feature emacs pacakge (its probably named simply
> emacs or emacs23)[1].
>
> So something like this should work:
>
> $ sudo apt-get install emacs23
>
> [1] <http://packages.ubuntu.com/precise/emacs>

Ah sorry you mentioned you compiled it yourself, in that case you need
the X development libraries.

-- 
Suvayu

Open source is the future. It sets us free.

Re: getting gnu emacs to run in gui mode

[suvayu ali]

On Wed, Mar 21, 2012 at 20:41, suvayu ali <fatkasuvayu+linux@gmail.com> wrote:
> Ah sorry you mentioned you compiled it yourself, in that case you need
> the X development libraries.

Here is a list of dependencies:

zlib-devel
xorg-x11-proto-devel
texinfo
python3-devel
python-devel
ncurses-devel
m17n-lib-devel
libtiff-devel
librsvg2-devel
libpng-devel
libotf-devel
libjpeg-turbo-devel
libXt-devel
libXrender-devel
libXpm-devel
libXdmcp-devel
libXau-devel
libX11-devel
gzip
gtk2-devel
glibc-devel
giflib-devel
freetype-devel
fontconfig-devel
desktop-file-utils
dbus-devel
cairo-devel
cairo
bzip
automake
autoconf
atk-devel
alsa-lib-devel
GConf2-devel

-- 
Suvayu

Open source is the future. It sets us free.