142 lines
6.1 KiB
HTML
142 lines
6.1 KiB
HTML
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//IETF//DTD HTML//EN">
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<HTML> <HEAD>
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<TITLE>Two Useful Emacs Extensions</TITLE>
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<BODY BGCOLOR="#ffefd5" TEXT="#483d8b">
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<CENTER><H1>VM and Html-Helper-Mode for Emacs</H1></CENTER>
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<CENTER> by <B>Larry Ayers</B></CENTER><BR>
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<CENTER><A HREF="mailto:
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layers@vax2.rain.gen.mo.us"><layers@vax2.rain.gen.mo.us></A></CENTER><BR>
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<CENTER>Copyright (c) 1996</CENTER><BR>
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<CENTER> <H5>Published in Issue 8 of the Linux Gazette</H5></CENTER>
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<HR>
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<CENTER><H3>Introduction</H3></CENTER>
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Aside from the tremendous versatility and configurability of the editor
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itself, a major reason for the enduring popularity of Emacs is the wide
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variety of add-on lisp modules which are available.<P>
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Lately I've been excited about two of these in particular:<P>
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<UL>
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<LI><A HREF="#vm">The VM Mail Interface, with the Win-VM Extension</A>
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<LI><A HREF="#html">Html-Helper-Mode</A>
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</UL>
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<CENTER><IMG SRC="./gx/ayers/featherline.gif" ></CENTER><P>
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<A NAME="vm"></A>
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<CENTER><H3>The VM Mail System</H3></CENTER>
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If you use Emacs at all for editing, it can be convenient to use it as an
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e-mail client as well, thus retaining familiar keystrokes and Emacs' powerful
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editing capabilities. I have found the Emacs mail composing facility to be
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efficient as well as easy to configure and use. (I'm using Gnu Emacs 19.31.)
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Emacs seems to work well with either sendmail or smail.<P>
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The built-in mail-reader, Rmail, I found less useful. Rmail uses a proprietary
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format which is not readable by other mail-programs; when you read mail with
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Rmail, you have effectively decided to use nothing but Rmail.<P>
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<A HREF="mailto:kyle@uunet.uu.net">Kyle E. Jones</A> wrote a replacement for
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Rmail called VM (View Mail) which seems to have gathered quite a following,
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judging by usenet postings regarding it. This lisp package makes Emacs a
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full-featured mail-reader, with support for multiple folders and a useful
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header-index window. When used in conjunction with
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<A HREF="mailto:psmith@wellfleet.com">Paul D. Smith's</A> win-vm.el, your
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mail-reading session will be opened in another frame and give mouse support in
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the header window, as well as new menubar items for VM.<P>
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Rather than configuring VM with lisp code in the ~/.emacs file, a separate
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file called ~/.vm can be created, containing entries customizing any of the
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plentiful VM variables.<P>
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As an example, the following entries will cause VM to open with a header-index
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view, with the cursor kept to the center of the display:<PRE>
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(setq vm-startup-with-summary t)
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(setq vm-follow-summary-at-cursor t)
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(setq vm-auto-center-summary t)</PRE>
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<P>
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VM offers many other features, such as virtual folders, which I haven't
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explored yet, but a new user can benefit from the basic default setup.<P>
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I usually use Pine to quickly scan new mail and delete obvious junk, as well
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as for typing a quick reply or two. Later when I've started emacs I'll load VM,
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which moves new mail into its own Inbox file, then displays the first unread
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message. (If configured as in the example above, the header index is shown
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first.) <P>
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It's really a quite useful and pleasant-to-use system; if you're an Emacs user
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I recommend that you give it a try! Both packages can be obtained via ftp
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from <A HREF="ftp://ftp.uu.net/networking/mail/vm">ftp.uu.net</A>, as well as
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its mirror sites.<P>
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<CENTER><IMG SRC="./gx/ayers/featherline.gif" ></CENTER><P>
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<A NAME="html"></A>
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<CENTER><H3>Nelson Minar's Html-Helper-Mode</H3></CENTER>
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<A HREF=MAILTO:NELSON@SANTAFE.EDU>Nelson Minar</A> , at the Santa Fe Institute
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in New Mexico, has over the past couple of years created a feature-rich and
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easy-to-learn HTML-editing mode for Emacs.<P>
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It's called html-helper-mode.el, and it was originally inspired by an early
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HTML mode for Emacs written by Marc Andreessen of Netscape fame.<P>
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Html-helper-mode started out as simply a set of key-bindings for basic HTML
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tags, but as other Emacs users began to use the mode various useful add-ons
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for it began to appear. These now include an excellent font-lock mode, a mode
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for passing a file to a browser, and support for Netscape extensions.<P>
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The current beta version of html-helper (which is very stable, and only called
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a beta because the docs haven't been updated yet), is available from
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<A HREF="http://www.santafe.edu/~nelson/tools/">Nelson's website</A>.
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Get this version if you can, because this one adds an HTML menu to the
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menu-bar. This is very helpful for learning the keybindings; as with many
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emacs add-ons, the key-bindings are rather long and not completely intuitive.
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The menu serves as a quick reference and a way to use the more obscure tags
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which don't really need to be memorized.<P>
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The above web-site also has links to all of the extensions which others have
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contributed, plus the documentation which can be browsed online.<P>
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Html-helper also has a linux-questions-only@ssc.completion feature; typing <EM>esc-tab</EM> will
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complete a partially typed tag. I had a little trouble surrounding selected
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text with a tag, but eventually found that typing <EM>cntrl-u</EM> will cause
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the subsequent linux-questions-only@ssc.command to do this properly.<P>
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When a new *.html file is created a basic template is inserted in the file,
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complete with an automatic timestamp at the end. Here is a screenshot showing
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the default layout with font-lock enabled:<P>
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<CENTER><A HREF="./gx/ayers/helper.gif">Html-Helper Sample</A></CENTER><P>
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The mode is enabled by adding lisp code to your ~/.emacs file. As is true
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with other emacs modes, the mode is only loaded into memory when a file with
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the *.html extension is loaded or created. VM mode (discussed in the first
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section) works the same way. This is a great advantage to the emacs user,
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giving access to a variety of specialized editing modes without burdening your
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system with multiple user interfaces.
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<CENTER><IMG SRC="./gx/ayers/featherline.gif" ></CENTER><P>
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<CENTER><ADDRESS><A HREF="mailto:layers@vax2.rain.gen.mo.us">Larry
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Ayers<http://vax2.rain.gen.mo.us/~layers/></A></ADDRESS></CENTER><P>
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<CENTER><A HREF="./gazette_toc.html">Back up to Linux Gazette
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T.O.C</A></CENTER>
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<P>
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<!-- HHMTS START -->
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Last modified: Sun Jun 2 16:10:51 CDT 1996
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<!-- HHMTS END -->
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</BODY>
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</HTML>
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