How to make emacs *not* add a newline at the end of the file?

How to make emacs *not* add a newline at the end of the file?

[Juha Nieminen]

  From some version forward emacs has been automatically adding a
newline at the end of the file if there wasn't one when saving the file.

  I don't need this feature, and in a few cases it actually hinders me
(ie. in the few cases where I *really* don't want that newline as the
last character of the file). I have always liked emacs because it
doesn't add any extraneous characters which I haven't specifically told
it to add, like so many other text editors do, which gives me much more
precise control over the contents of the file. This new feature is
consequently a bit annoying.

  How can the feature be turned off?

  Another related question: Is there an easy way of making emacs
visually show the end of the file? (Some other text editors have such a
feature, eg. by showing a special symbol after the last character in the
file, and it would be useful.)

Re: How to make emacs *not* add a newline at the end of the file?

[Charles Sebold]

On 31 Dec 2008, Juha Nieminen wrote:

> I don't need this feature, and in a few cases it actually hinders me
> (ie. in the few cases where I *really* don't want that newline as the
> last character of the file). I have always liked emacs because it
> doesn't add any extraneous characters which I haven't specifically
> told it to add, like so many other text editors do, which gives me
> much more precise control over the contents of the file. This new
> feature is consequently a bit annoying.
>
> How can the feature be turned off?

M-x customize-variable RET require-final-newline RET

Also see the value of the variable mode-require-final-newline.

(info "(emacs)Customize Save") has the scoop.

C-h i < m emacs RET m customize save RET

> Another related question: Is there an easy way of making emacs
> visually show the end of the file? (Some other text editors have such
> a feature, eg. by showing a special symbol after the last character in
> the file, and it would be useful.)

This I don't know off the top of my head.
-- 
Charles Sebold                                    31st of December, 2008
GNU Emacs 22.3.1 (i386-mingw-nt5.1.2600) | Gnus v5.11 | org-mode 6.16trans
 

Re: How to make emacs *not* add a newline at the end of the file?

[Allan Gottlieb]

At Wed, 31 Dec 2008 13:14:01 -0600 Charles Sebold <csebold@gmail.com> wrote:

> On 31 Dec 2008, Juha Nieminen wrote:
>
>> Another related question: Is there an easy way of making emacs
>> visually show the end of the file? (Some other text editors have such
>> a feature, eg. by showing a special symbol after the last character in
>> the file, and it would be useful.)
>
> This I don't know off the top of my head.

It already does when running under X windows.  See the "fringes" info
node in the emacs manual.

allan

Re: How to make emacs *not* add a newline at the end of the file?

[Juha Nieminen]

Charles Sebold wrote:
> Also see the value of the variable mode-require-final-newline.

  That did what I wanted. Thanks.

Re: How to make emacs *not* add a newline at the end of the file?

[Kevin Rodgers]

Juha Nieminen wrote:
> Charles Sebold wrote:
>> Also see the value of the variable mode-require-final-newline.
> 
>   That did what I wanted. Thanks.

Just curious: What modes set require-final-newline, and how does that
hinder you?

-- 
Kevin Rodgers
Denver, Colorado, USA

Re: How to make emacs *not* add a newline at the end of the file?

[Juha Nieminen]

Kevin Rodgers wrote:
> Juha Nieminen wrote:
>> Charles Sebold wrote:
>>> Also see the value of the variable mode-require-final-newline.
>>
>>   That did what I wanted. Thanks.
> 
> Just curious: What modes set require-final-newline, and how does that
> hinder you?

  From what I tested, at least editing .txt, .c and .cc files did that.

  It hinders me in the few cases where I really *don't* want that
newline at the end. I have always liked emacs exactly because it doesn't
add (or remove) *anything* I don't explicitly instruct it to, no matter
which file I edit. This seems to be more an exception than a rule with
text editors (especially in Windows). I don't need the text editor to
"think for me" in this case.

Re: How to make emacs *not* add a newline at the end of the file?

[Teemu Likonen]

Juha Nieminen (2008-12-31 17:56 +0000) wrote:

>   Another related question: Is there an easy way of making emacs
> visually show the end of the file? (Some other text editors have such
> a feature, eg. by showing a special symbol after the last character in
> the file, and it would be useful.)

There is an option for showing the first and the last line:

    M-x customize-option RET indicate-buffer-boundaries RET

But I don't know about showing the last character. I guess
whitespace-mode would be too noisy for that.