3 This file describes various problems that have been encountered
4 in compiling, installing and running XEmacs. It has been updated for
7 This file is rather large, but we have tried to sort the entries by
8 their respective relevance for XEmacs, but may have not succeeded
9 completely in that task. The file is divided into four parts:
11 - Problems with building XEmacs
12 - Problems with running XEmacs
13 - Compatibility problems
16 Use `C-c C-f' to move to the next equal level of outline, and
17 `C-c C-b' to move to previous equal level. `C-h m' will give more
18 info about the Outline mode.
20 Also, Try finding the things you need using one of the search commands
21 XEmacs provides (e.g. `C-s').
24 WATCH OUT for .emacs file! ~/.emacs is your Emacs init file. If
25 you observe strange problems, invoke XEmacs with the `-q' option
26 and see if you can repeat the problem.
29 * Problems with building XEmacs
30 ===============================
33 *** Don't use -O2 with gcc 2.8.1 and egcs 1.0 under SPARC architectures
34 without also using `-fno-schedule-insns'.
36 gcc will generate incorrect code otherwise, typically resulting in
37 crashes in the function skip-syntax-backward.
41 There have been reports of egcs-1.1 not compiling XEmacs correctly on
42 Alpha Linux. There have also been reports that egcs-1.0.3a is O.K.
44 *** Don't use -O2 with gcc 2.7.2 under Intel/XXX without also using
45 `-fno-strength-reduce'.
47 gcc will generate incorrect code otherwise. This bug is present in at
48 least 2.6.x and 2.7.[0-2]. This bug has been fixed in GCC 2.7.2.1 and
49 later. This bug is O/S independent, but is limited to x86 architectures.
51 This problem is known to be fixed in egcs (or pgcc) 1.0 or later.
53 *** Don't use -O2 with gcc 2.7.2 under Intel architectures without also
54 using `-fno-caller-saves'.
56 gcc will generate incorrect code otherwise. This bug is still
57 present in gcc 2.7.2.3. There have been no reports to indicate the
58 bug is present in egcs 1.0 (or pgcc 1.0) or later. This bug is O/S
59 independent, but limited to x86 architectures.
61 This problem is known to be fixed in egcs (or pgcc) 1.0 or later.
63 *** When using gcc, you get the error message "undefined symbol __fixunsdfsi".
64 When using gcc, you get the error message "undefined symbol __main".
66 This means that you need to link with the gcc library. It may be called
67 "gcc-gnulib" or "libgcc.a"; figure out where it is, and define LIB_GCC in
68 config.h to point to it.
70 It may also work to use the GCC version of `ld' instead of the standard one.
72 *** Excessive optimization with pgcc can break XEmacs
74 It has been reported on some systems that compiling with -O6 can lead
75 to XEmacs failures. The workaround is to use a lower optimization
76 level. -O2 and -O4 have been tested extensively.
78 All of this depends heavily on the version of pgcc and the version
79 of libc. Snapshots near the release of pgcc-1.0 have been tested
80 extensively and no sign of breakage has been seen on systems using
83 *** src/Makefile and lib-src/Makefile are truncated--most of the file missing.
85 This can happen if configure uses GNU sed version 2.03. That version
86 had a bug. GNU sed version 2.05 works properly.
88 *** When compiling with X11, you get "undefined symbol _XtStrings".
90 This means that you are trying to link emacs against the X11r4 version of
91 libXt.a, but you have compiled either Emacs or the code in the lwlib
92 subdirectory with the X11r5 header files. That doesn't work.
94 Remember, you can't compile lwlib for r4 and emacs for r5, or vice versa.
97 *** test-distrib says that the distribution has been clobbered
98 or, temacs prints "Command key out of range 0-127"
99 or, temacs runs and dumps xemacs, but xemacs totally fails to work.
100 or, temacs gets errors dumping xemacs
102 This can be because the .elc files have been garbled. Do not be
103 fooled by the fact that most of a .elc file is text: these are binary
104 files and can contain all 256 byte values.
106 In particular `shar' cannot be used for transmitting GNU Emacs. It
107 typically truncates "lines". (this does not apply to GNU shar, which
108 uses uuencode to encode binary files.)
110 If you have a copy of Emacs that has been damaged in its nonprinting
111 characters, you can fix them by running:
115 This will rebuild all the needed .elc files.
117 *** `compress' and `uncompress' not found and XFree86
119 XFree86 installs a very old version of libz.a by default ahead of where
120 more modern version of libz might be installed. This will cause problems
121 when attempting to link against libMagick. The fix is to remove the old
122 libz.a in the X11 binary directory.
126 *** On AIX 4.3, you must specify --with-dialogs=athena with configure
128 *** The libXt shipped with AIX 4.3 is broken. This causes xemacs -nw
129 to fail in various ways. The solution is to build against stock
132 *** On AIX, you get this compiler error message:
134 Processing include file ./XMenuInt.h
135 1501-106: (S) Include file X11/Xlib.h not found.
137 This means your system was installed with only the X11 runtime i.d
138 libraries. You have to find your sipo (bootable tape) and install
141 *** On AIX 4.1.2, linker error messages such as
142 ld: 0711-212 SEVERE ERROR: Symbol .__quous, found in the global symbol table
143 of archive /usr/lib/libIM.a, was not defined in archive member shr.o.
145 This is a problem in libIM.a. You can work around it by executing
146 these shell commands in the src subdirectory of the directory where
149 cp /usr/lib/libIM.a .
153 Then change -lIM to ./libIM.a in the command to link temacs (in
156 *** Excessive optimization on AIX 4.2 can lead to compiler failure.
158 Valdis.Kletnieks@vt.edu writes:
159 At least at the b34 level, and the latest-and-greatest IBM xlc
160 (3.1.4.4), there are problems with -O3. I haven't investigated
165 *** Link failure when using acc on a Sun.
167 To use acc, you need additional options just before the libraries, such as
169 /usr/lang/SC2.0.1/values-Xt.o -L/usr/lang/SC2.0.1/cg87 -L/usr/lang/SC2.0.1
171 and you need to add -lansi just before -lc.
173 The precise file names depend on the compiler version, so we
174 cannot easily arrange to supply them.
176 *** Problems finding X11 libraries on Solaris with Openwindows
178 Some users have reported problems in this area. The reported solution
179 is to define the environment variable OPENWINHOME, even if you must set
180 it to `/usr/openwin'.
182 *** Sed problems on Solaris 2.5
184 There have been reports of Sun sed truncating very lines in the
185 Makefile during configuration. The workaround is to use GNU sed or,
186 even better, think of a better way to generate Makefile, and send us a
189 *** On Solaris 2 I get undefined symbols from libcurses.a.
191 You probably have /usr/ucblib/ on your LD_LIBRARY_PATH. Do the link with
192 LD_LIBRARY_PATH unset. Generally, avoid using any ucb* stuff when
195 *** On Solaris 2 I cannot make alloc.o, glyphs.o or process.o.
197 The SparcWorks C compiler may have difficulty building those modules
198 with optimization level -xO4. Try using only "-fast" optimization
199 for just those modules. (Or use gcc).
201 *** Solaris 2.3 /bin/sh coredumps during configuration.
203 This only occurs if you have LANG != C. This is a known bug with
204 /bin/sh fixed by installing Patch-ID# 101613-01. Or, you can use
205 bash, as a workaround.
207 *** On SunOS, you get linker errors
209 _get_wmShellWidgetClass
210 _get_applicationShellWidgetClass
212 The fix to this is to install patch 100573 for OpenWindows 3.0
213 or link libXmu statically.
215 *** On Sunos 4, you get the error ld: Undefined symbol __lib_version.
217 This is the result of using cc or gcc with the shared library meant
218 for acc (the Sunpro compiler). Check your LD_LIBRARY_PATH and delete
219 /usr/lang/SC2.0.1 or some similar directory.
221 *** Undefined symbols when linking on Sunos 4.1.
223 If you get the undefined symbols _atowc _wcslen, _iswprint, _iswspace,
224 _iswcntrl, _wcscpy, and _wcsncpy, then you need to add -lXwchar after
225 -lXaw in the command that links temacs.
227 This problem seems to arise only when the international language
228 extensions to X11R5 are installed.
230 *** On a Sun running SunOS 4.1.1, you get this error message from GNU ld:
232 /lib/libc.a(_Q_sub.o): Undefined symbol __Q_get_rp_rd referenced from text segment
234 The problem is in the Sun shared C library, not in GNU ld.
236 The solution is to install Patch-ID# 100267-03 from Sun.
238 *** SunOS 4.1.2: undefined symbol _get_wmShellWidgetClass
240 Apparently the version of libXmu.so.a that Sun ships is hosed: it's missing
241 some stuff that is in libXmu.a (the static version). Sun has a patch for
242 this, but a workaround is to use the static version of libXmu, by changing
243 the link command from "-lXmu" to "-Bstatic -lXmu -Bdynamic". If you have
244 OpenWindows 3.0, ask Sun for these patches:
245 100512-02 4.1.x OpenWindows 3.0 libXt Jumbo patch
246 100573-03 4.1.x OpenWindows 3.0 undefined symbols with shared libXmu
248 *** Random other SunOS 4.1.[12] link errors.
250 The X headers and libraries that Sun ships in /usr/{include,lib}/X11 are
251 broken. Use the ones in /usr/openwin/{include,lib} instead.
254 *** Under Linux, you get "too many arguments to function `getpgrp'".
256 You have probably installed LessTiff under `/usr/local' and `libXm.so'
257 could not be found when linking `getpgrp()' test program, making XEmacs
258 think that `getpgrp()' takes an argument. Try adding `/usr/local/lib'
259 in `/etc/ld.so.conf' and run `ldconfig'. Then run XEmacs's `configure'
260 again. As with all problems of this type, reading the config.log file
261 generated from configure and seeing the log of how the test failed can
264 *** `Error: No ExtNode to pop!' on Linux systems with Lesstif.
266 This error message has been observed with lesstif-0.75a. It does not
267 appear to cause any harm.
269 *** xemacs: can't resolve symbol '__malloc_hook'
271 This is a Linux problem where you've compiled the XEmacs binary on a libc
272 5.4 with version higher than 5.4.19 and attempted to run the binary against
273 an earlier version. The solution is to upgrade your old library.
276 *** Linking with -rpath on IRIX.
278 Darrell Kindred <dkindred@cmu.edu> writes:
279 There are a couple of problems [with use of -rpath with Irix ld], though:
281 1. The ld in IRIX 5.3 ignores all but the last -rpath
282 spec, so the patched configure spits out a warning
283 if --x-libraries or --site-runtime-libraries are
284 specified under irix 5.x, and it only adds -rpath
285 entries for the --site-runtime-libraries. This bug was
286 fixed sometime between 5.3 and 6.2.
288 2. IRIX gcc 2.7.2 doesn't accept -rpath directly, so
289 it would have to be prefixed by -Xlinker or "-Wl,".
290 This would be fine, except that configure compiles with
291 ${CC-cc} $CFLAGS $LDFLAGS ...
292 rather than quoting $LDFLAGS with prefix-args, like
293 src/Makefile does. So if you specify --x-libraries
294 or --site-runtime-libraries, you must use --use-gcc=no,
295 or configure will fail.
297 *** On Irix 6.3, the SGI ld quits with segmentation fault when linking temacs
299 This occurs if you use the SGI linker version 7.1. Installing the
300 patch SG0001872 fixes this problem.
302 *** On Irix 6.0, make tries (and fails) to build a program named unexelfsgi
304 A compiler bug inserts spaces into the string "unexelfsgi . o"
305 in src/Makefile. Edit src/Makefile, after configure is run,
306 find that string, and take out the spaces.
308 Compiler fixes in Irix 6.0.1 should eliminate this problem.
310 *** On Irix 5.2, unexelfsgi.c can't find cmplrs/stsupport.h.
312 The file cmplrs/stsupport.h was included in the wrong file set in the
313 Irix 5.2 distribution. You can find it in the optional fileset
314 compiler_dev, or copy it from some other Irix 5.2 system. A kludgy
315 workaround is to change unexelfsgi.c to include sym.h instead of
318 *** Coredumping in Irix 6.2
320 Pete Forman <gsez020@compo.bedford.waii.com> writes:
321 A problem noted by myself and others (I've lost the references) was
322 that XEmacs coredumped when the cut or copy toolbar buttons were
323 pressed. This has been fixed by loading the SGI patchset (Feb 98)
324 without having to recompile XEmacs.
326 My versions are XEmacs 20.3 (problem first noted in 19.15) and IRIX
327 6.2, compiled using -n32. I'd guess that the relevant individual
328 patch was "SG0002580: multiple fixes for X libraries". SGI recommends
329 that the complete patch set be installed rather than parts of it.
331 ** Digital UNIX/OSF/VMS
332 *** On Digital UNIX, the DEC C compiler might have a problem compiling
335 In particular, src/extents.c and src/faces.c might cause the DEC C
336 compiler to abort. When this happens: cd src, compile the files by
337 hand, cd .., and redo the "make" command. When recompiling the files by
338 hand, use the old C compiler for the following versions of Digital UNIX:
339 - V3.n: Remove "-migrate" from the compile command.
340 - V4.n: Add "-oldc" to the compile command.
342 A related compiler bug has been fixed by the DEC compiler team. The
343 new versions of the compiler should run fine.
345 *** Under some versions of OSF XEmacs runs fine if built without
346 optimization but will crash randomly if built with optimization.
348 Using 'cc -g' is not sufficient to eliminate all optimization. Try
351 *** Compilation errors on VMS.
353 Sorry, XEmacs does not work under VMS. You might consider working on
354 the port if you really want to have XEmacs work under VMS.
357 *** On HPUX, the HP C compiler might have a problem compiling some files
360 Richard Cognot <cognot@ensg.u-nancy.fr> writes:
362 Had to drop once again to level 2 optimization, at least to
363 compile lstream.c. Otherwise, I get a "variable is void: \if"
364 problem while dumping (this is a problem I already reported
365 with vanilla hpux 10.01 and 9.07, which went away after
366 applying patches for the C compiler). Trouble is I still
367 haven't found the same patch for hpux 10.10, and I don't
368 remember the patch numbers. I think potential XEmacs builders
369 on HP should be warned about this.
371 *** I don't have `xmkmf' and `imake' on my HP.
373 You can get these standard X tools by anonymous FTP to
374 hpcvaaz.cv.hp.com. Essentially all X programs need these.
376 *** On HP-UX, problems with make
378 Marcus Thiessel <marcus_thiessel@hp.com>
380 Some releases of XEmacs (e.g. 20.4) require GNU make to build
381 successfully. You don't need GNU make when building 21.x.
383 *** On HP-UX 9.05 XEmacs won't compile or coredump during the build.
385 Marcus Thiessel <marcus_thiessel@hp.com>
387 This might be a sed problem. For your own safety make sure to use
388 GNU sed while dumping XEmacs.
390 *** On HP-UX 11.0 XEmacs causes excessive X11 errors when running.
392 Marcus Thiessel <marcus_thiessel@hp.com>
394 Unfortunately, XEmacs releases <21.0 don't work with Motif2.1. It
395 will compile but you will get excessive X11 errors like
397 xemacs: X Error of failed request: BadGC (invalid GC parameter)
399 and finally XEmacs gets killed. A workaround is to use the
400 Motif1.2_R6 libraries. You can the following line to your call to
403 --x-libraries="/usr/lib/Motif1.2_R6 -L/usr/lib/X11R6"
405 Make sure /usr/lib/Motif1.2_R6/libXm.sl is a link to
406 /usr/lib/Motif1.2_R6/libXm.3.
409 *** Native cc on SCO OpenServer 5 is now OK. Icc may still throw you
410 a curve. Here is what Robert Lipe <robertl@arnet.com> says:
412 Unlike XEmacs 19.13, building with the native cc on SCO OpenServer 5
413 now produces a functional binary. I will typically build this
414 configuration for COFF with:
416 /path_to_xemacs_source/configure --with-gcc=no \
417 --site-includes=/usr/local/include --site-libraries=/usr/local/lib \
418 --with-xpm --with-xface --with-sound=nas
420 This version now supports ELF builds. I highly recommend this to
421 reduce the in-core footprint of XEmacs. This is now how I compile
422 all my test releases. Build it like this:
424 /path_to_XEmacs_source/configure --with-gcc=no \
425 --site-includes=/usr/local/include --site-libraries=/usr/local/lib \
426 --with-xpm --with-xface --with-sound=nas --dynamic
428 The compiler known as icc [ supplied with the OpenServer 5 Development
429 System ] generates a working binary, but it takes forever to generate
430 XEmacs. ICC also whines more about the code than /bin/cc does. I do
431 believe all its whining is legitimate, however. Note that you do
432 have to 'cd src ; make LD=icc' to avoid linker errors.
434 The way I handle the build procedure is:
436 /path_to_XEmacs_source/configure --with-gcc=no \
437 --site-includes=/usr/local/include --site-libraries=/usr/local/lib \
438 --with-xpm --with-xface --with-sound=nas --dynamic --compiler="icc"
440 NOTE I have the xpm, xface, and audio libraries and includes in
441 /usr/local/lib, /usr/local/include. If you don't have these,
442 don't include the "--with-*" arguments in any of my examples.
444 In previous versions of XEmacs, you had to override the defaults while
445 compiling font-lock.o and extents.o when building with icc. This seems
446 to no longer be true, but I'm including this old information in case it
447 resurfaces. The process I used was:
450 [ procure pizza, beer, repeat ]
452 make CC="icc -W0,-mP1COPT_max_tree_size=3000" font-lock.o extents.o
455 If you want sound support, get the tls566 supplement from
456 ftp.sco.com:/TLS or any of its mirrors. It works just groovy
459 The M-x manual-entry is known not to work. If you know Lisp and would
460 like help in making it work, e-mail me at <robertl@dgii.com>.
461 (UNCHECKED for 19.15 -- it might work).
463 In earlier releases, gnuserv/gnuclient/gnudoit would open a frame
464 just fine, but the client would lock up and the server would
465 terminate when you used C-x # to close the frame. This is now
468 In etc/ there are two files of note. emacskeys.sco and emacsstrs.sco.
469 The comments at the top of emacskeys.sco describe its function, and
470 the emacstrs.sco is a suitable candidate for /usr/lib/keyboard/strings
471 to take advantage of the keyboard map in emacskeys.sco.
473 Note: Much of the above entry is probably not valid for XEmacs 21.0
477 *** In general use etc/check_cygwin_setup.sh to trap environment problems.
479 The script etc/check_cygwin_setup.sh will attempt to detect whether
480 you have a suitable environment for building. This script may not work
481 correctly if you are using ash instead of bash (see below).
483 *** X11 not detected.
485 This is usually because xmkmf is not in your path or because you are
486 using the default cygwin shell. The default cygwin shell (/bin/sh.exe)
487 is ash which appears to work in most circumstances but has some wierd
488 failure modes. I recommend replacing sh.exe with bash.exe, this will
489 mean configure is slower but more reliable.
491 *** Subprocesses do not work.
493 You do not have "tty" in your CYGWIN32 (for b19) or CYGWIN (for b20)
494 environment variable. This must be set in your autoexec.bat (win95) or
495 the system properties (winnt) as it must be read before the cygwin dll
498 *** ^G does not work on hung subprocesses.
500 This is a known problem. It can be remedied with cygwin b20 or greater
501 by defining BROKEN_SIGIO in src/s/cygwin32.h, however this currently
502 leads to instability in XEmacs.
504 *** The XEmacs executable crashes at startup.
506 This can be caused by many things.
508 If you are running with X11 you need to have cygwin b19 or cygwin
509 b20.1 or greater, cygwin b20 will not work.
511 If you are running with cygwin b19 make sure you are using egcs 1.0.2
512 rather than vanilla gcc. XEmacs builds by default with -O3 which does
513 not work with the gcc that ships with b19. Alternatively use -O2.
515 *** The info files will not build.
517 makeinfo that ships with cygwin (all versions) is a noop. You need to
518 obtain makeinfo from somewhere or build it yourself.
520 *** I have no graphics.
522 You need to obtain the various graphics libraries. Pre-built versions
523 of these and the X libraries are located on the XEmacs website in
524 ftp://ftp.xemacs.org/pub/aux/cygwin*.
526 *** There are no images in the toolbar buttons.
528 You need version 4.71 of commctrl.dll which does not ship with windows
529 95. You can get this by installing IE 4.0 or downloading it from the
533 * Problems with running XEmacs
534 ==============================
536 *** C-z just refreshes the screen instead of suspending Emacs.
538 You are probably using a shell that doesn't support job control, even
539 though the system itself is capable of it. Try using a different
542 *** You type Control-H (Backspace) expecting to delete characters.
544 Emacs has traditionally used Control-H for help; unfortunately this
545 interferes with its use as Backspace on TTY's. One way to solve this
546 problem is to put this in your .emacs:
548 (when (eq tty-erase-char ?\C-h)
549 (keyboard-translate ?\C-h ?\C-?)
550 (global-set-key "\M-?" 'help-command))
552 This checks whether the TTY erase char is C-h, and if it is, makes
553 Control-H (Backspace) work sensibly, and moves help to Meta-? (ESC ?).
555 Note that you can probably also access help using F1.
557 *** Mail agents (VM, Gnus, rmail) cannot get new mail
559 rmail and VM get new mail from /usr/spool/mail/$USER using a program
560 called `movemail'. This program interlocks with /bin/mail using the
561 protocol defined by /bin/mail.
563 There are two different protocols in general use. One of them uses
564 the `flock' system call. The other involves creating a lock file;
565 `movemail' must be able to write in /usr/spool/mail in order to do
566 this. You control which one is used by defining, or not defining, the
567 macro MAIL_USE_FLOCK in config.h or the m- or s- file it includes. IF
568 YOU DON'T USE THE FORM OF INTERLOCKING THAT IS NORMAL ON YOUR SYSTEM,
571 If your system uses the lock file protocol, and fascist restrictions
572 prevent ordinary users from writing the lock files in /usr/spool/mail,
573 you may need to make `movemail' setgid to a suitable group such as
574 `mail'. To do this, use the following commands (as root) after doing
580 Installation normally copies movemail from the build directory to an
581 installation directory which is usually under /usr/local/lib. The
582 installed copy of movemail is usually in the directory
583 /usr/local/lib/emacs/VERSION/TARGET. You must change the group and
584 mode of the installed copy; changing the group and mode of the build
585 directory copy is ineffective.
587 *** VM appears to hang in large folders.
589 This is normal (trust us) when upgrading to VM-6.22 from earlier
590 versions. Let VM finish what it is doing and all will be well.
592 *** Changes made to .el files do not take effect.
594 You may have forgotten to recompile them into .elc files. Then the
595 old .elc files will be loaded, and your changes will not be seen. To
596 fix this, do `M-x byte-recompile-directory' and specify the directory
597 that contains the Lisp files.
599 Note that you will get a warning when loading a .elc file that is
600 older than the corresponding .el file.
602 *** Things which should be bold or italic (such as the initial
603 copyright notice) are not.
605 The fonts of the "bold" and "italic" faces are generated from the font
606 of the "default" face; in this way, your bold and italic fonts will
607 have the appropriate size and family. However, emacs can only be
608 clever in this way if you have specified the default font using the
609 XLFD (X Logical Font Description) format, which looks like
611 *-courier-medium-r-*-*-*-120-*-*-*-*-*-*
613 if you use any of the other, less strict font name formats, some of
616 lucidasanstypewriter-12
620 then emacs won't be able to guess the names of the "bold" and "italic"
621 versions. All X fonts can be referred to via XLFD-style names, so you
622 should use those forms. See the man pages for X(1), xlsfonts(1), and
625 *** The dumped Emacs crashes when run, trying to write pure data.
627 Two causes have been seen for such problems.
629 1) On a system where getpagesize is not a system call, it is defined
630 as a macro. If the definition (in both unexec.c and malloc.c) is wrong,
631 it can cause problems like this. You might be able to find the correct
632 value in the man page for a.out (5).
634 2) Some systems allocate variables declared static among the
635 initialized variables. Emacs makes all initialized variables in most
636 of its files pure after dumping, but the variables declared static and
637 not initialized are not supposed to be pure. On these systems you
638 may need to add "#define static" to the m- or the s- file.
640 *** Reading and writing files is very very slow.
642 Try evaluating the form (setq lock-directory nil) and see if that helps.
643 There is a problem with file-locking on some systems (possibly related
644 to NFS) that I don't understand. Please send mail to the address
645 xemacs@xemacs.org if you figure this one out.
647 *** When emacs starts up, I get lots of warnings about unknown keysyms.
649 If you are running the prebuilt binaries, the Motif library expects to find
650 certain thing in the XKeysymDB file. This file is normally in /usr/lib/X11/
651 or in /usr/openwin/lib/. If you keep yours in a different place, set the
652 environment variable $XKEYSYMDB to point to it before starting emacs. If
653 you still have the problem after doing that, perhaps your version of X is
654 too old. There is a copy of the MIT X11R5 XKeysymDB file in the emacs `etc'
655 directory. Try using that one.
657 *** My X resources used to work, and now some of them are being ignored.
659 Check the resources in .../etc/Emacs.ad (which is the same as the file
660 sample.Xdefaults). Perhaps some of the default resources built in to
661 emacs are now overriding your existing resources. Copy and edit the
662 resources in Emacs.ad as necessary.
664 *** I have focus problems when I use `M-o' to switch to another screen
665 without using the mouse.
667 The focus issues with a program like XEmacs, which has multiple
668 homogeneous top-level windows, are very complicated, and as a result,
669 most window managers don't implement them correctly.
671 The R4/R5 version of twm (and all of its descendants) had buggy focus
672 handling. Sufficiently recent versions of tvtwm have been fixed. In
673 addition, if you're using twm, make sure you have not specified
674 "NoTitleFocus" in your .tvtwmrc file. The very nature of this option
675 makes twm do some illegal focus tricks, even with the patch.
677 It is known that olwm and olvwm are buggy, and in different ways. If
678 you're using click-to-type mode, try using point-to-type, or vice
681 In older versions of NCDwm, one could not even type at XEmacs windows.
682 This has been fixed in newer versions (2.4.3, and possibly earlier).
684 (Many people suggest that XEmacs should warp the mouse when focusing
685 on another screen in point-to-type mode. This is not ICCCM-compliant
686 behavior. Implementing such policy is the responsibility of the
687 window manager itself, it is not legal for a client to do this.)
689 *** Emacs spontaneously displays "I-search: " at the bottom of the screen.
691 This means that Control-S/Control-Q (XON/XOFF) "flow control" is being
692 used. C-s/C-q flow control is bad for Emacs editors because it takes
693 away C-s and C-q as user commands. Since editors do not output long
694 streams of text without user commands, there is no need for a
695 user-issuable "stop output" command in an editor; therefore, a
696 properly designed flow control mechanism would transmit all possible
697 input characters without interference. Designing such a mechanism is
698 easy, for a person with at least half a brain.
700 There are three possible reasons why flow control could be taking place:
702 1) Terminal has not been told to disable flow control
703 2) Insufficient padding for the terminal in use
704 3) Some sort of terminal concentrator or line switch is responsible
706 First of all, many terminals have a set-up mode which controls whether
707 they generate XON/XOFF flow control characters. This must be set to
708 "no XON/XOFF" in order for Emacs to work. Sometimes there is an
709 escape sequence that the computer can send to turn flow control off
710 and on. If so, perhaps the termcap `ti' string should turn flow
711 control off, and the `te' string should turn it on.
713 Once the terminal has been told "no flow control", you may find it
714 needs more padding. The amount of padding Emacs sends is controlled
715 by the termcap entry for the terminal in use, and by the output baud
716 rate as known by the kernel. The shell command `stty' will print
717 your output baud rate; `stty' with suitable arguments will set it if
718 it is wrong. Setting to a higher speed causes increased padding. If
719 the results are wrong for the correct speed, there is probably a
720 problem in the termcap entry. You must speak to a local Unix wizard
721 to fix this. Perhaps you are just using the wrong terminal type.
723 For terminals that lack a "no flow control" mode, sometimes just
724 giving lots of padding will prevent actual generation of flow control
725 codes. You might as well try it.
727 If you are really unlucky, your terminal is connected to the computer
728 through a concentrator which sends XON/XOFF flow control to the
729 computer, or it insists on sending flow control itself no matter how
730 much padding you give it. Unless you can figure out how to turn flow
731 control off on this concentrator (again, refer to your local wizard),
732 you are screwed! You should have the terminal or concentrator
733 replaced with a properly designed one. In the mean time, some drastic
734 measures can make Emacs semi-work.
736 You can make Emacs ignore C-s and C-q and let the operating system
737 handle them. To do this on a per-session basis, just type M-x
738 enable-flow-control RET. You will see a message that C-\ and C-^ are
739 now translated to C-s and C-q. (Use the same command M-x
740 enable-flow-control to turn *off* this special mode. It toggles flow
743 If C-\ and C-^ are inconvenient for you (for example, if one of them
744 is the escape character of your terminal concentrator), you can choose
745 other characters by setting the variables flow-control-c-s-replacement
746 and flow-control-c-q-replacement. But choose carefully, since all
747 other control characters are already used by emacs.
749 IMPORTANT: if you type C-s by accident while flow control is enabled,
750 Emacs output will freeze, and you will have to remember to type C-q in
753 If you work in an environment where a majority of terminals of a
754 certain type are flow control hobbled, you can use the function
755 `enable-flow-control-on' to turn on this flow control avoidance scheme
756 automatically. Here is an example:
758 (enable-flow-control-on "vt200" "vt300" "vt101" "vt131")
760 If this isn't quite correct (e.g. you have a mixture of flow-control hobbled
761 and good vt200 terminals), you can still run enable-flow-control
764 I have no intention of ever redesigning the Emacs command set for the
765 assumption that terminals use C-s/C-q flow control. XON/XOFF flow
766 control technique is a bad design, and terminals that need it are bad
767 merchandise and should not be purchased. Now that X is becoming
768 widespread, XON/XOFF seems to be on the way out. If you can get some
769 use out of GNU Emacs on inferior terminals, more power to you, but I
770 will not make Emacs worse for properly designed systems for the sake
773 *** Control-S and Control-Q commands are ignored completely.
775 For some reason, your system is using brain-damaged C-s/C-q flow
776 control despite Emacs's attempts to turn it off. Perhaps your
777 terminal is connected to the computer through a concentrator
778 that wants to use flow control.
780 You should first try to tell the concentrator not to use flow control.
781 If you succeed in this, try making the terminal work without
782 flow control, as described in the preceding section.
784 If that line of approach is not successful, map some other characters
785 into C-s and C-q using keyboard-translate-table. The example above
786 shows how to do this with C-^ and C-\.
788 *** Control-S and Control-Q commands are ignored completely on a net
791 Some versions of rlogin (and possibly telnet) do not pass flow
792 control characters to the remote system to which they connect.
793 On such systems, emacs on the remote system cannot disable flow
794 control on the local system.
796 One way to cure this is to disable flow control on the local host
797 (the one running rlogin, not the one running rlogind) using the
798 stty command, before starting the rlogin process. On many systems,
799 `stty start u stop u' will do this.
801 Some versions of tcsh will prevent even this from working. One way
802 around this is to start another shell before starting rlogin, and
803 issue the stty command to disable flow control from that shell.
805 If none of these methods work, the best solution is to type
806 `M-x enable-flow-control' at the beginning of your emacs session, or
807 if you expect the problem to continue, add a line such as the
808 following to your .emacs (on the host running rlogind):
810 (enable-flow-control-on "vt200" "vt300" "vt101" "vt131")
812 See the entry about spontaneous display of I-search (above) for more
815 *** TTY redisplay is slow.
817 XEmacs has fairly new TTY redisplay support (beginning from 19.12),
818 which doesn't include some basic TTY optimizations -- like using
819 scrolling regions to move around blocks of text. This is why
820 redisplay on the traditional terminals, or over slow lines can be very
823 If you are interested in fixing this, please let us know at
826 *** Screen is updated wrong, but only on one kind of terminal.
828 This could mean that the termcap entry you are using for that terminal
829 is wrong, or it could mean that Emacs has a bug handing the
830 combination of features specified for that terminal.
832 The first step in tracking this down is to record what characters
833 Emacs is sending to the terminal. Execute the Lisp expression
834 (open-termscript "./emacs-script") to make Emacs write all terminal
835 output into the file ~/emacs-script as well; then do what makes the
836 screen update wrong, and look at the file and decode the characters
837 using the manual for the terminal. There are several possibilities:
839 1) The characters sent are correct, according to the terminal manual.
841 In this case, there is no obvious bug in Emacs, and most likely you
842 need more padding, or possibly the terminal manual is wrong.
844 2) The characters sent are incorrect, due to an obscure aspect of the
845 terminal behavior not described in an obvious way by termcap.
847 This case is hard. It will be necessary to think of a way for Emacs
848 to distinguish between terminals with this kind of behavior and other
849 terminals that behave subtly differently but are classified the same
850 by termcap; or else find an algorithm for Emacs to use that avoids the
851 difference. Such changes must be tested on many kinds of terminals.
853 3) The termcap entry is wrong.
855 See the file etc/TERMS for information on changes that are known to be
856 needed in commonly used termcap entries for certain terminals.
858 4) The characters sent are incorrect, and clearly cannot be right for
859 any terminal with the termcap entry you were using.
861 This is unambiguously an Emacs bug, and can probably be fixed in
862 termcap.c, terminfo.c, tparam.c, cm.c, redisplay-tty.c,
863 redisplay-output.c, or redisplay.c.
865 *** My buffers are full of \000 characters or otherwise corrupt.
867 Some compilers have trouble with gmalloc.c and ralloc.c; try recompiling
868 without optimization. If that doesn't work, try recompiling with
869 SYSTEM_MALLOC defined, and/or with REL_ALLOC undefined.
871 *** A position you specified in .Xdefaults is ignored, using twm.
873 twm normally ignores "program-specified" positions.
874 You can tell it to obey them with this command in your `.twmrc' file:
876 UsePPosition "on" #allow clents to request a position
878 *** With M-x enable-flow-control, you need to type C-\ twice to do
879 incremental search--a single C-\ gets no response.
881 This has been traced to communicating with your machine via kermit,
882 with C-\ as the kermit escape character. One solution is to use
883 another escape character in kermit. One user did
885 set escape-character 17
887 in his .kermrc file, to make C-q the kermit escape character.
889 *** The Motif version of Emacs paints the screen a solid color.
891 This has been observed to result from the following X resource:
893 Emacs*default.attributeFont: -*-courier-medium-r-*-*-*-140-*-*-*-*-iso8859-*
895 That the resource has this effect indicates a bug in something, but we
896 do not yet know what. If it is an Emacs bug, we hope someone can
897 explain what the bug is so we can fix it. In the mean time, removing
898 the resource prevents the problem.
900 *** After running emacs once, subsequent invocations crash.
902 Some versions of SVR4 have a serious bug in the implementation of the
903 mmap () system call in the kernel; this causes emacs to run correctly
904 the first time, and then crash when run a second time.
906 Contact your vendor and ask for the mmap bug fix; in the mean time,
907 you may be able to work around the problem by adding a line to your
908 operating system description file (whose name is reported by the
909 configure script) that reads:
910 #define SYSTEM_MALLOC
911 This makes Emacs use memory less efficiently, but seems to work around
914 *** Inability to send an Alt-modified key, when Emacs is communicating
915 directly with an X server.
917 If you have tried to bind an Alt-modified key as a command, and it
918 does not work to type the command, the first thing you should check is
919 whether the key is getting through to Emacs. To do this, type C-h c
920 followed by the Alt-modified key. C-h c should say what kind of event
921 it read. If it says it read an Alt-modified key, then make sure you
922 have made the key binding correctly.
924 If C-h c reports an event that doesn't have the Alt modifier, it may
925 be because your X server has no key for the Alt modifier. The X
926 server that comes from MIT does not set up the Alt modifier by
929 If your keyboard has keys named Alt, you can enable them as follows:
931 xmodmap -e 'add mod2 = Alt_L'
932 xmodmap -e 'add mod2 = Alt_R'
934 If the keyboard has just one key named Alt, then only one of those
935 commands is needed. The modifier `mod2' is a reasonable choice if you
936 are using an unmodified MIT version of X. Otherwise, choose any
937 modifier bit not otherwise used.
939 If your keyboard does not have keys named Alt, you can use some other
940 keys. Use the keysym command in xmodmap to turn a function key (or
941 some other 'spare' key) into Alt_L or into Alt_R, and then use the
942 commands show above to make them modifier keys.
944 Note that if you have Alt keys but no Meta keys, Emacs translates Alt
945 into Meta. This is because of the great importance of Meta in Emacs.
947 *** In Shell mode, you get a ^M at the end of every line.
949 This happens to people who use tcsh, because it is trying to be too
950 smart. It sees that the Shell uses terminal type `unknown' and turns
951 on the flag to output ^M at the end of each line. You can fix the
952 problem by adding this to your .cshrc file:
955 if ($EMACS == "t") then
957 stty -icrnl -onlcr -echo susp ^Z
961 *** An error message such as `X protocol error: BadMatch (invalid
962 parameter attributes) on protocol request 93'.
964 This comes from having an invalid X resource, such as
966 (which is invalid because it specifies a color name for something
969 The fix is to correct your X resources.
971 *** Once you pull down a menu from the menubar, it won't go away.
973 It has been claimed that this is caused by a bug in certain very old
974 (1990?) versions of the twm window manager. It doesn't happen with
975 recent vintages, or with other window managers.
977 *** Emacs ignores the "help" key when running OLWM.
979 OLWM grabs the help key, and retransmits it to the appropriate client
980 using XSendEvent. Allowing emacs to react to synthetic events is a
981 security hole, so this is turned off by default. You can enable it by
982 setting the variable x-allow-sendevents to t. You can also cause fix
983 this by telling OLWM to not grab the help key, with the null binding
984 "OpenWindows.KeyboardCommand.Help:".
986 *** Programs running under terminal emulator do not recognize `emacs'
989 The cause of this is a shell startup file that sets the TERMCAP
990 environment variable. The terminal emulator uses that variable to
991 provide the information on the special terminal type that Emacs
994 Rewrite your shell startup file so that it does not change TERMCAP
995 in such a case. You could use the following conditional which sets
996 it only if it is undefined.
998 if ( ! ${?TERMCAP} ) setenv TERMCAP ~/my-termcap-file
1000 Or you could set TERMCAP only when you set TERM--which should not
1001 happen in a non-login shell.
1003 *** The popup menu appears at the buttom/right of my screen.
1005 You probably have something like the following in your ~/.Xdefaults
1007 Emacs.geometry: 81x56--9--1
1009 Use the following instead
1011 Emacs*EmacsFrame.geometry: 81x56--9--1
1015 *** Your Delete key sends a Backspace to the terminal, using an AIXterm.
1017 The solution is to include in your .Xdefaults the lines:
1019 *aixterm.Translations: #override <Key>BackSpace: string(0x7f)
1020 aixterm*ttyModes: erase ^?
1022 This makes your Backspace key send DEL (ASCII 127).
1024 *** On AIX 4, some programs fail when run in a Shell buffer
1025 with an error message like No terminfo entry for "unknown".
1027 On AIX, many terminal type definitions are not installed by default.
1028 `unknown' is one of them. Install the "Special Generic Terminal
1029 Definitions" to make them defined.
1031 *** On AIX, you get this message when running Emacs:
1033 Could not load program emacs
1034 Symbol smtcheckinit in csh is undefined
1035 Error was: Exec format error
1039 Could not load program .emacs
1040 Symbol _system_con in csh is undefined
1041 Symbol _fp_trapsta in csh is undefined
1042 Error was: Exec format error
1044 These can happen when you try to run on AIX 3.2.5 a program that was
1045 compiled with 3.2.4. The fix is to recompile.
1047 *** Trouble using ptys on AIX.
1049 People often install the pty devices on AIX incorrectly.
1050 Use `smit pty' to reinstall them properly.
1054 *** The Emacs window disappears when you type M-q.
1056 Some versions of the Open Look window manager interpret M-q as a quit
1057 command for whatever window you are typing at. If you want to use
1058 Emacs with that window manager, you should try to configure the window
1059 manager to use some other command. You can disable the
1060 shortcut keys entirely by adding this line to ~/.OWdefaults:
1062 OpenWindows.WindowMenuAccelerators: False
1064 *** When Emacs tries to ring the bell, you get an error like
1066 audio: sst_open: SETQSIZE" Invalid argument
1067 audio: sst_close: SETREG MMR2, Invalid argument
1069 you have probably compiled using an ANSI C compiler, but with non-ANSI
1070 include files. In particular, on Suns, the file
1071 /usr/include/sun/audioio.h uses the _IOW macro to define the constant
1072 AUDIOSETQSIZE. _IOW in turn uses a K&R preprocessor feature that is
1073 now explicitly forbidden in ANSI preprocessors, namely substitution
1074 inside character constants. All ANSI C compilers must provide a
1075 workaround for this problem. Lucid's C compiler is shipped with a new
1076 set of system include files. If you are using GCC, there is a script
1077 called fixincludes that creates new versions of some system include
1078 files that use this obsolete feature.
1080 *** On Solaris 2.6, XEmacs dumps core when exiting.
1082 This happens if you're XEmacs is running on the same machine as the X
1083 server, and the optimized memory transport has been turned on by
1084 setting the environment variable XSUNTRANSPORT. The crash occurs
1085 during the call to XCloseDisplay.
1087 If this describes your situation, you need to undefine the
1088 XSUNTRANSPORT environment variable.
1090 *** On Solaris, C-x doesn't get through to Emacs when you use the console.
1092 This is a Solaris feature (at least on Intel x86 cpus). Type C-r
1093 C-r C-t, to toggle whether C-x gets through to Emacs.
1095 *** On Solaris 2.4, Dired hangs and C-g does not work. Or Emacs hangs
1096 forever waiting for termination of a subprocess that is a zombie.
1098 casper@fwi.uva.nl says the problem is in X11R6. Rebuild libX11.so
1099 after changing the file xc/config/cf/sunLib.tmpl. Change the lines
1102 #define SharedX11Reqs -lthread
1107 #if OSMinorVersion < 4
1109 #define SharedX11Reqs -lthread
1113 Be sure also to edit x/config/cf/sun.cf so that OSMinorVersion is 4
1114 (as it should be for Solaris 2.4). The file has three definitions for
1115 OSMinorVersion: the first is for x86, the second for SPARC under
1116 Solaris, and the third for SunOS 4. Make sure to update the
1117 definition for your type of machine and system.
1119 Then do `make Everything' in the top directory of X11R6, to rebuild
1120 the makefiles and rebuild X. The X built this way work only on
1121 Solaris 2.4, not on 2.3.
1123 For multithreaded X to work it necessary to install patch
1124 101925-02 to fix problems in header files [2.4]. You need
1125 to reinstall gcc or re-run just-fixinc after installing that
1128 However, Frank Rust <frust@iti.cs.tu-bs.de> used a simpler solution:
1130 #define ThreadedX YES
1132 #define ThreadedX NO
1133 in sun.cf and did `make World' to rebuild X11R6. Removing all
1134 `-DXTHREAD*' flags and `-lthread' entries from lib/X11/Makefile and
1135 typing 'make install' in that directory also seemed to work.
1137 *** On SunOS 4.1.3, Emacs unpredictably crashes in _yp_dobind_soft.
1139 This happens if you configure Emacs specifying just `sparc-sun-sunos4'
1140 on a system that is version 4.1.3. You must specify the precise
1141 version number (or let configure figure out the configuration, which
1142 it can do perfectly well for SunOS).
1144 *** Mail is lost when sent to local aliases.
1146 Many emacs mail user agents (VM and rmail, for instance) use the
1147 sendmail.el library. This library can arrange for mail to be
1148 delivered by passing messages to the /usr/lib/sendmail (usually)
1149 program . In doing so, it passes the '-t' flag to sendmail, which
1150 means that the name of the recipient of the message is not on the
1151 command line and, therefore, that sendmail must parse the message to
1152 obtain the destination address.
1154 There is a bug in the SunOS4.1.1 and SunOS4.1.3 versions of sendmail.
1155 In short, when given the -t flag, the SunOS sendmail won't recognize
1156 non-local (i.e. NIS) aliases. It has been reported that the Solaris
1157 2.x versions of sendmail do not have this bug. For those using SunOS
1158 4.1, the best fix is to install sendmail V8 or IDA sendmail (which
1159 have other advantages over the regular sendmail as well). At the time
1160 of this writing, these official versions are available:
1162 Sendmail V8 on ftp.cs.berkeley.edu in /ucb/sendmail:
1163 sendmail.8.6.9.base.tar.Z (the base system source & documentation)
1164 sendmail.8.6.9.cf.tar.Z (configuration files)
1165 sendmail.8.6.9.misc.tar.Z (miscellaneous support programs)
1166 sendmail.8.6.9.xdoc.tar.Z (extended documentation, with postscript)
1168 IDA sendmail on vixen.cso.uiuc.edu in /pub:
1169 sendmail-5.67b+IDA-1.5.tar.gz
1171 *** Emacs fails to understand most Internet host names, even though
1172 the names work properly with other programs on the same system.
1173 Emacs won't work with X-windows if the value of DISPLAY is HOSTNAME:0.
1174 Gnus can't make contact with the specified host for nntp.
1176 This typically happens on Suns and other systems that use shared
1177 libraries. The cause is that the site has installed a version of the
1178 shared library which uses a name server--but has not installed a
1179 similar version of the unshared library which Emacs uses.
1181 The result is that most programs, using the shared library, work with
1182 the nameserver, but Emacs does not.
1184 The fix is to install an unshared library that corresponds to what you
1185 installed in the shared library, and then relink Emacs.
1187 On SunOS 4.1, simply define HAVE_RES_INIT.
1189 If you have already installed the name resolver in the file libresolv.a,
1190 then you need to compile Emacs to use that library. The easiest way to
1191 do this is to add to config.h a definition of LIBS_SYSTEM, LIBS_MACHINE
1192 or LIB_STANDARD which uses -lresolv. Watch out! If you redefine a macro
1193 that is already in use in your configuration to supply some other libraries,
1194 be careful not to lose the others.
1196 Thus, you could start by adding this to config.h:
1198 #define LIBS_SYSTEM -lresolv
1200 Then if this gives you an error for redefining a macro, and you see that
1201 the s- file defines LIBS_SYSTEM as -lfoo -lbar, you could change config.h
1204 #define LIBS_SYSTEM -lresolv -lfoo -lbar
1206 *** With process-connection-type set to t, each line of subprocess
1207 output is terminated with a ^M, making ange-ftp and GNUS not work.
1209 On SunOS systems, this problem has been seen to be a result of an
1210 incomplete installation of gcc 2.2 which allowed some non-ANSI
1211 compatible include files into the compilation. In particular this
1212 affected virtually all ioctl() calls.
1216 *** You get crashes in a non-C locale with Linux GNU Libc 2.0.
1218 Internationalization was not the top priority for GNU Libc 2.0.
1219 As of this writing (1998-12-28) you may get crashes while running
1220 XEmacs in a non-C locale. For example, `LC_ALL=en_US xemacs' crashes
1221 while `LC_ALL=C xemacs' runs fine. This happens for example with GNU
1222 libc 2.0.7. Installing libintl.a and libintl.h built from gettext
1223 0.10.35 and re-building XEmacs solves the crashes. Presumably soon
1224 everyone will upgrade to GNU Libc 2.1 and this problem will go away.
1226 *** `C-z', or `M-x suspend-emacs' hangs instead of suspending.
1228 If you build with `gpm' support on Linux, you cannot suspend XEmacs
1229 because gpm installs a buggy SIGTSTP handler. Either compile with
1230 `--with-gpm=no', or don't suspend XEmacs on the Linux console until
1233 *** With certain fonts, when the cursor appears on a character, the
1234 character doesn't appear--you get a solid box instead.
1236 One user on a Linux system reported that this problem went away with
1237 installation of a new X server. The failing server was XFree86 3.1.1.
1238 XFree86 3.1.2 works.
1240 *** Slow startup on Linux.
1242 People using systems based on the Linux kernel sometimes report that
1243 startup takes 10 to 15 seconds longer than `usual'.
1245 This is because Emacs looks up the host name when it starts.
1246 Normally, this takes negligible time; the extra delay is due to
1247 improper system configuration. This problem can occur for both
1248 networked and non-networked machines.
1250 Here is how to fix the configuration. It requires being root.
1254 First, make sure the files `/etc/hosts' and `/etc/host.conf' both
1255 exist. The first line in the `/etc/hosts' file should look like this
1256 (replace HOSTNAME with your host name):
1258 127.0.0.1 localhost HOSTNAME
1260 Also make sure that the `/etc/host.conf' files contains the following
1266 Any changes, permanent and temporary, to the host name should be
1267 indicated in the `/etc/hosts' file, since it acts a limited local
1268 database of addresses and names (e.g., some SLIP connections
1269 dynamically allocate ip addresses).
1271 **** Non-Networked Case
1273 The solution described in the networked case applies here as well.
1274 However, if you never intend to network your machine, you can use a
1275 simpler solution: create an empty `/etc/host.conf' file. The command
1276 `touch /etc/host.conf' suffices to create the file. The `/etc/hosts'
1277 file is not necessary with this approach.
1281 *** On Irix, I don't see the toolbar icons and I'm getting lots of
1282 entries in the warnings buffer.
1284 SGI ships a really old Xpm library in /usr/lib which does not work at
1285 all well with XEmacs. The solution is to install your own copy of the
1286 latest version of Xpm somewhere and then use the --site-includes and
1287 --site-libraries flags to tell configure where to find it.
1289 *** Trouble using ptys on IRIX, or running out of ptys.
1291 The program mkpts (which may be in `/usr/adm' or `/usr/sbin') needs to
1292 be set-UID to root, or non-root programs like Emacs will not be able
1293 to allocate ptys reliably.
1295 *** Motif dialog boxes lose on Irix.
1297 Larry Auton <lda@control.att.com> writes:
1298 Beware of not specifying
1300 --with-dialogs=athena
1302 if it builds with the motif dialogs [boom!] you're a dead man.
1304 *** Beware of the default image & graphics library on Irix
1306 Richard Cognot <cognot@ensg.u-nancy.fr> writes:
1308 You *have* to compile your own jpeg lib. The one delivered with SGI
1309 systems is a C++ lib, which apparently XEmacs cannot cope with.
1312 ** Digital UNIX/OSF/VMS/Ultrix
1313 *** XEmacs crashes on Digital Unix within font-lock, or when dealing
1314 with large compilation buffers.
1316 The default stack size under Digital Unix is rather small (2M as
1317 opposed to Solaris 8M), hosing the regexp code, which uses alloca()
1318 extensively, overflowing the stack when complex regexps are used.
1321 1) Increase your stack size, using `ulimit -s 8192' or a (t)csh
1324 2) Recompile regex.c with REGEX_MALLOC defined.
1326 *** The `Alt' key doesn't behave as `Meta' when running DECwindows.
1328 The default DEC keyboard mapping has the Alt keys set up to generate the
1329 keysym `Multi_key', which has a meaning to xemacs which is distinct from that
1330 of the `Meta_L' and `Meta-R' keysyms. A second problem is that certain keys
1331 have the Mod2 modifier attached to them for no adequately explored reason.
1332 The correct fix is to pass this file to xmodmap upon starting X:
1335 keysym Multi_key = Alt_L
1339 *** The Compose key on a DEC keyboard does not work as Meta key.
1341 This shell command should fix it:
1343 xmodmap -e 'keycode 0xb1 = Meta_L'
1345 *** `expand-file-name' fails to work on any but the machine you dumped
1348 On Ultrix, if you use any of the functions which look up information
1349 in the passwd database before dumping Emacs (say, by using
1350 expand-file-name in site-init.el), then those functions will not work
1351 in the dumped Emacs on any host but the one Emacs was dumped on.
1353 The solution? Don't use expand-file-name in site-init.el, or in
1354 anything it loads. Yuck - some solution.
1356 I'm not sure why this happens; if you can find out exactly what is
1357 going on, and perhaps find a fix or a workaround, please let us know.
1358 Perhaps the YP functions cache some information, the cache is included
1359 in the dumped Emacs, and is then inaccurate on any other host.
1363 *** I get complaints about the mapping of my HP keyboard at startup,
1364 but I haven't changed anything.
1366 The default HP keymap is set up to have Mod1 assigned to two different keys:
1367 Meta_L and Mode_switch (even though there is not actually a Mode_switch key on
1368 the keyboard -- it uses an "imaginary" keycode.) There actually is a reason
1369 for this, but it's not a good one. The correct fix is to execute this command
1372 xmodmap -e 'remove mod1 = Mode_switch'
1374 *** On HP-UX, you get "poll: Interrupted system call" message in the
1375 window where XEmacs was launched.
1377 Richard Cognot <cognot@ensg.u-nancy.fr> writes:
1379 I get a very strange problem when linking libc.a dynamically: every
1380 event (mouse, keyboard, expose...) results in a "poll: Interrupted
1381 system call" message in the window where XEmacs was
1382 launched. Forcing a static link of libc.a alone by adding
1383 /usr/lib/libc.a at the end of the link line solves this. Note that
1384 my 9.07 build of 19.14b17 and my (old) build of 19.13 both exhibit
1385 the same behaviour. I've tried various hpux patches to no avail. If
1386 this problem cannot be solved before the release date, binary kits
1387 for HP *must* be linked statically against libc, otherwise this
1388 problem will show up. (This is directed at whoever will volunteer
1389 for this kit, as I won't be available to do it, unless 19.14 gets
1390 delayed until mid-june ;-). I think this problem will be an FAQ soon
1391 after the release otherwise.
1393 Note: The above entry is probably not valid for XEmacs 21.0 and
1396 *** The right Alt key works wrong on German HP keyboards (and perhaps
1397 other non-English HP keyboards too).
1399 This is because HP-UX defines the modifiers wrong in X. Here is a
1400 shell script to fix the problem; be sure that it is run after VUE
1401 configures the X server.
1403 xmodmap 2> /dev/null - << EOF
1404 keysym Alt_L = Meta_L
1405 keysym Alt_R = Meta_R
1410 keysym Mode_switch = NoSymbol
1412 keysym Meta_R = Mode_switch
1413 add mod2 = Mode_switch
1416 *** `Pid xxx killed due to text modification or page I/O error'
1418 On HP-UX, you can get that error when the Emacs executable is on an NFS
1419 file system. HP-UX responds this way if it tries to swap in a page and
1420 does not get a response from the server within a timeout whose default
1421 value is just ten seconds.
1423 If this happens to you, extend the timeout period.
1425 *** Shell mode on HP-UX gives the message, "`tty`: Ambiguous".
1427 christos@theory.tn.cornell.edu says:
1429 The problem is that in your .cshrc you have something that tries to
1430 execute `tty`. If you are not running the shell on a real tty then tty
1431 will print "not a tty". Csh expects one word in some places, but tty
1432 is giving it back 3.
1434 The solution is to add a pair of quotes around `tty` to make it a
1437 if (`tty` == "/dev/console")
1439 should be changed to:
1441 if ("`tty`" == "/dev/console")
1443 Even better, move things that set up terminal sections out of .cshrc
1448 *** Regular expressions matching bugs on SCO systems.
1450 On SCO, there are problems in regexp matching when Emacs is compiled
1451 with the system compiler. The compiler version is "Microsoft C
1452 version 6", SCO 4.2.0h Dev Sys Maintenance Supplement 01/06/93; Quick
1453 C Compiler Version 1.00.46 (Beta). The solution is to compile with
1458 *** Emacs exits with "X protocol error" when run with an X server for
1461 A certain X server for Windows had a bug which caused this.
1462 Supposedly the newer 32-bit version of this server doesn't have the
1467 * Compatibility problems (with Emacs 18, GNU Emacs, or previous XEmacs/lemacs)
1468 ==============================================================================
1470 *** "Symbol's value as variable is void: unread-command-char".
1471 "Wrong type argument: arrayp, #<keymap 143 entries>"
1472 "Wrong type argument: stringp, [#<keypress-event return>]"
1474 There are a few incompatible changes in XEmacs, and these are the
1475 symptoms. Some of the emacs-lisp code you are running needs to be
1476 updated to be compatible with XEmacs.
1478 The code should not treat keymaps as arrays (use `define-key', etc.),
1479 should not use obsolete variables like `unread-command-char' (use
1480 `unread-command-events'). Many (most) of the new ways of doing things
1481 are compatible in GNU Emacs and XEmacs.
1483 Modern Emacs packages (Gnus, VM, W3, efs, etc) are written to support
1484 GNU Emacs and XEmacs. We have provided modified versions of several
1485 popular emacs packages (dired, etc) which are compatible with this
1486 version of emacs. Check to make sure you have not set your load-path
1487 so that your private copies of these packages are being found before
1488 the versions in the lisp directory.
1490 Make sure that your load-path and your $EMACSLOADPATH environment
1491 variable are not pointing at an Emacs18 lisp directory. This will
1494 ** Some packages that worked before now cause the error
1495 Wrong type argument: arrayp, #<face ... >
1497 Code which uses the `face' accessor functions must be recompiled with
1498 xemacs 19.9 or later. The functions whose callers must be recompiled
1499 are: face-font, face-foreground, face-background,
1500 face-background-pixmap, and face-underline-p. The .elc files
1501 generated by version 19.9 will work in 19.6 and 19.8, but older .elc
1502 files which contain calls to these functions will not work in 19.9.
1504 ** Signaling: (error "Byte code stack underflow (byte compiler bug), pc 38")
1506 This error is given when XEmacs 20 is compiled without MULE support
1507 but is attempting to load a .elc which requires MULE support. The fix
1508 is to rebytecompile the offending file.
1510 ** Signaling: (wrong-type-argument ...) when loading mail-abbrevs
1512 The is seen when installing the Insidious Big Brother Data Base (bbdb)
1513 which includes an outdated copy of mail-abbrevs.el. Remove the copy
1514 that comes with bbdb and use the one that comes with XEmacs.
1520 ** A reminder: XEmacs/Mule work does not currently receive *any*
1521 funding, and all work is done by volunteers. If you think you can
1522 help, please contact the XEmacs maintainers.
1524 ** XEmacs/Mule doesn't support TTY's satisfactorily.
1526 This is a major problem, which we plan to address in a future release
1527 of XEmacs. Basically, XEmacs should have primitives to be told
1528 whether the terminal can handle international output, and which
1529 locale. Also, it should be able to do approximations of characters to
1530 the nearest supported by the locale.
1532 ** Internationalized (Asian) Isearch doesn't work.
1534 Currently, Isearch doesn't directly support any of the input methods
1535 that are not XIM based (like egg, canna and quail) (and there are
1536 potential problems with XIM version too...). If you're using egg
1537 there is a workaround. Hitting <RET> right after C-s to invoke
1538 Isearch will put Isearch in string mode, where a complete string can
1539 be typed into the minibuffer and then processed by Isearch afterwards.
1540 Since egg is now supported in the minibuffer using string mode you can
1541 now use egg to input your Japanese, Korean or Chinese string, then hit
1542 return to send that to Isearch and then use standard Isearch commands
1545 ** Using egg and mousing around while in 'fence' mode screws up my
1548 Don't do this. The fence modes of egg and canna are currently very
1549 modal, and messing with where they expect point to be and what they
1550 think is the current buffer is just asking for trouble. If you're
1551 lucky they will realize that something is awry, and simply delete the
1552 fence, but worst case can trash other buffers too. We've tried to
1553 protect against this where we can, but there still are many ways to
1554 shoot yourself in the foot. So just finish what you are typing into
1555 the fence before reaching for the mouse.
1557 ** Not all languages in Quail are supported like Devanagari and Indian
1558 languages, Lao and Tibetan.
1560 Quail requires more work and testing. Although it has been ported to
1561 XEmacs, it works really well for Japanese and for the European
1564 ** Right-to-left mode is not yet implemented, so languages like
1565 Arabic, Hebrew and Thai don't work.
1567 Getting this right requires more work. It may be implemented in a
1568 future XEmacs version, but don't hold your breath. If you know
1569 someone who is ready to implement this, please let us know.
1571 ** We need more developers and native language testers. It's extremely
1572 difficult (and not particularly productive) to address languages that
1573 nobody is using and testing.
1575 ** The kWnn and cWnn support for Chinese and Korean needs developers
1576 and testers. It probably doesn't work.
1578 ** There are no `native XEmacs' TUTORIALs for any Asian languages,
1579 including Japanese. FSF Emacs and XEmacs tutorials are quite similar,
1580 so it should be sufficient to skim through the differences and apply
1581 them to the Japanese version.
1583 ** We only have localized menus translated for Japanese, and the
1584 Japanese menus are developing bitrot (the Mule menu appears in
1587 ** XIM is untested for any language other than Japanese.