Re: Q on using shell mode remotely

[Kevin Rodgers <ihs_4664@yahoo.com>]

Drew Adams wrote:
> When I use M-x telnet, I get a prompt that looks like this:
> 
>    > 8:34am
> 
> I have some Emacs-Lisp code that recognizes the shell prompt, in order to
> let you complete and cycle among past shell inputs. I use
> `comint-prompt-regexp' to recognize the prompt; I subtract the prompt from
> an input line to get the actual command used.
> 
> In plain (local) shell mode on Windows, this works fine; there, the prompt I
> see is this: "> ". In telnet mode, however, the time of day interferes. It
> is not actually part of the prompt as understood by Emacs (comint mode) -
> that is, it doesn't match the default value of `comint-prompt-regexp'. For
> both shell and telnet modes, this is the value of `comint-prompt-regexp':
> 
>    "^[^#$%>\n]*[#$%>] *"
> 
> On the remote machine, I do have a right-side prompt variable ($rprompt) set
> to add the time at the *right* side of the screen. I use csh as the
> remote-machine shell, and this is my $prompt:
> 
>    "%B%.01%b %h:"
> 
> This is my $rprompt (it is this that prints the time of day at the right):
> 
>    "%@"
> 
> Through telnet, the time appears next to the left prompt (i.e. at the
> left) - I guess there is no notion of right-side prompt, but it still picks
> up $rprompt and concatenates it to $prompt. Naturally, it is not picked up
> by `comint-prompt-regexp' (which can't know by itself that $rprompt is being
> used and its value is a time-of-day pattern).
> 
> Any ideas on how to deal with this? Either 1) how to recognize the presence
> of the added time (appearing at the left) and treat it as part of the
> prompt, or 2) (not as good, because it won't help others who use my code)
> how to tell telnet not to use the time part of the prompt? Is there some
> variable similar to `comint-prompt-regexp' that will pick up $rprompt (or
> the concatenation of $prompt and $rprompt)?

Why can't you just add a time pattern to telnet-prompt-pattern, which is
used to set the buffer-local value of comint-prompt-pattern:

(eval-after-load "telnet"
   '(setq telnet-prompt-pattern
       (concat telnet-prompt-pattern "\\([12]?[0-9]:[0-5][0-9][ap]m\\)?")))

-- 
Kevin