1 .TH XEMACS 1 "1998 January 13"
4 xemacs \- Emacs: The Next Generation
8 .I command-line switches
17 compatible with and containing many improvements over
20 written by Richard Stallman of the Free Software Foundation. It was
21 originally based on an early release of
24 and has tracked subsequent releases of
26 as they have become available.
28 The primary documentation of
33 which you can read on-line using Info, a subsystem of
35 Please look there for complete and up-to-date documentation.
36 Complete documentation on using Emacs Lisp is available on-line
38 .I XEmacs Lisp Programmer's
40 Both manuals also can be printed out nicely using the
44 The user functionality of
46 encompasses everything other
48 editors do, and it is easily extensible since its
49 editing commands are written in Lisp.
52 has an extensive interactive help facility,
53 but the facility assumes that you know how to manipulate
56 CTRL-h enters the Help facility. Help Tutorial (CTRL-h t)
57 requests an interactive tutorial which can teach beginners the fundamentals
61 Help Apropos (CTRL-h a) helps you
62 find a command given its functionality, Help Key Binding (CTRL-h k)
63 describes a given key sequence's effect, and Help Function (CTRL-h f)
64 describes a given Lisp function specified by name. You can also
65 look up key sequences in the
66 .I XEmacs Reference Manual
67 using Lookup Key Binding (CTRL-h CTRL-k),
68 and look up Lisp functions in the
69 .I XEmacs Lisp Programmer's Manual
70 using Lookup Function (CTRL-h CTRL-f). All of these help functions,
71 and more, are available on the Help menu if you are using a window
75 has extensive GUI (graphical user interface) support when running under
76 a window system such as
78 including multiple frames (top-level windows), a menubar, a toolbar,
79 horizontal and vertical scrollbars, dialog boxes, and extensive mouse
83 has full support for multiple fonts and colors, variable-width fonts,
84 and variable-height lines, and allows for pixmaps to be inserted into
85 a buffer. (This is used in the W3 web-browsing package and in some
86 of the debugger and outlining interfaces, among other things.)
89 Undo can undo several steps of modification to your buffers, so it is
90 easy to recover from editing mistakes.
93 many special packages handle mail reading (VM, MH-E and RMail) and
94 sending (Mail), Usenet news reading and posting (GNUS), World Wide Web
95 browsing (W3), specialized modes for editing source code in all common
96 programming languages, syntax highlighting for many languages
97 (Font-Lock), compiling (Compile), running subshells within
99 windows (Shell), outline editing (Outline), running a Lisp read-eval-print
100 loop (Lisp-Interaction-Mode), and automated psychotherapy (Doctor).
102 There is an extensive reference manual, but users of other Emacsen
103 should have little trouble adapting even without a copy. Users new to
104 Emacs will be able to use basic features fairly rapidly by studying
105 the tutorial and using the self-documentation features.
109 XEmacs accepts all standard X Toolkit command line options when run in
110 an X Windows environment. In addition, the following options are accepted
111 (when options imply a sequence of actions to perform, they are
112 performed in the order encountered):
117 as the terminal instead of using stdin/stdout. This implies
121 Edit in batch mode. The editor will send messages to stdout. You
127 options to specify files to execute and functions to call.
130 Inhibit the use of any window-system-specific display code: use the
134 Enter the debugger if an error occurs loading the init file.
137 Do not map the initial frame.
140 Do not load the site-specific init file (site-start.el).
142 .B \-q, \-no\-init\-file
143 Do not load an init file.
145 .B \-no-early-packages
146 Do not process the early packages.
149 Load no extra files at startup. Equivalent to the combination of
157 .BI \-u " user, " \-user " user"
167 Go to the line specified by
169 (do not insert a space between the "+" sign and the number).
172 Print a help message and exit.
175 Print the version number and exit.
177 .BI \-f " function, " \-funcall " function"
178 Execute the lisp function
181 .BI \-l " file, " \-load " file"
182 Load the Lisp code in the file
186 Evaluate the Lisp form
189 .BI \-i " file, " \-insert " file"
192 into the current buffer.
200 .SM Using XEmacs with X
203 has been tailored to work well with the X window system.
206 from under X windows, it will create its own X window to
207 display in. You will probably want to start the editor
208 as a background process
209 so that you can continue using your original window.
212 can be started with the following standard X options:
214 .BI \-visual " <visualname><bitdepth>"
215 Select the visual that XEmacs will attempt to use.
217 should be one of the strings "StaticColor", "TrueColor", "GrayScale",
218 "PseudoColor" or "DirectColor", and
220 should be the number of bits per pixel (example, "-visual TrueColor24"
221 for a 24bit TrueColor visual) See
223 for more information.
226 Require XEmacs to create and use a private colormap for display. This will keep
227 XEmacs from taking colors from the default colormap and keeping them from other
230 .BI \-geometry " ##x##+##+##"
231 Specify the geometry of the initial window. The ##'s represent a number;
232 the four numbers are width (characters), height (characters), X offset
233 (pixels), and Y offset (pixels), respectively. Partial specifications of
238 are also allowed. (The geometry
239 specification is in the standard X format; see
241 for more information.)
244 Specifies that the initial window should initially appear iconified.
247 Specifies the program name which should be used when looking up
248 defaults in the user's X resources.
250 .BI \-title " title, " \-T " title, " \-wn " title"
251 Specifies the title which should be assigned to the
255 .BI \-d " displayname, " \-display " displayname"
258 window on the display specified by
260 Must be the first option specified in the command line.
262 .BI \-font " font, " \-fn " font"
265 window's font to that specified by
267 You will find the various
270 .I /usr/lib/X11/fonts
273 works with either fixed- or variable-width fonts, but will probably
274 look better with a fixed-width font.
276 .BI \-scrollbar\-width " pixels"
277 Specify the width of the vertical scrollbars.
279 .BI \-scrollbar\-height " pixels"
280 Specify the height of the horizontal scrollbars.
282 .BI \-bw " pixels, " \-borderwidth " pixels"
285 window's border width to the number of pixels specified by
287 Defaults to one pixel on each side of the window.
289 .BI \-ib " pixels, " \-internal\-border\-width " pixels"
290 Specify the width between a frame's border and its text, in pixels.
291 Defaults to one pixel on each side of the window.
293 .BI \-fg " color, " \-foreground " color"
294 Sets the color of the text.
297 .I /usr/lib/X11/rgb.txt
301 .BI \-bg " color, " \-background " color"
302 Sets the color of the window's background.
304 .BI \-bd " color, " \-bordercolor " color"
305 Sets the color of the window's border.
308 Sets the color of the mouse pointer.
311 Sets the color of the text cursor.
314 Reverses the foreground and background colors (reverse video). Consider
315 explicitly setting the foreground and background colors instead of using
318 .BI \-xrm " argument"
319 This allows you to set an arbitrary resource on the command line.
321 should be a resource specification, as might as in your
327 You can also set resources, i.e.
329 default values, for your
337 Use the following format:
343 Emacs*EmacsFrame.keyword:value
347 specifies the default value of
349 (Some resources need the former format; some the latter.)
351 You can also set resources for a particular frame by using the
354 Emacs*framename.keyword:value
358 is the resource name assigned to that particular frame.
359 (Certain packages, such as VM, give their frames unique resource
360 names, in this case "VM".)
363 lets you set default values for the following keywords:
365 .B default.attributeFont (\fPclass\fB Face.AttributeFont)
366 Sets the window's text font.
368 .B default.attributeForeground (\fPclass\fB Face.AttributeForeground)
369 Sets the window's text color.
371 .B default.attributeBackground (\fPclass\fB Face.AttributeBackground)
372 Sets the window's background color.
374 .B \fIface\fB.attributeFont (\fPclass\fB Face.AttributeFont)
377 which should be the name of a face. Common face names are
379 .in +\w'right-margin'u+12n
380 .ta \w'right-margin'u+4n
381 .ti -\w'right-margin'u+4n
384 .ti -\w'right-margin'u+4n
387 .ti -\w'right-margin'u+4n
390 .ti -\w'right-margin'u+4n
391 italic Italicized text.
393 .ti -\w'right-margin'u+4n
394 bold-italic Bold and italicized text.
396 .ti -\w'right-margin'u+4n
397 modeline Modeline text.
399 .ti -\w'right-margin'u+4n
400 zmacs-region Text selected with the mouse.
402 .ti -\w'right-margin'u+4n
403 highlight Text highlighted when the mouse passes over.
405 .ti -\w'right-margin'u+4n
406 left-margin Text in the left margin.
408 .ti -\w'right-margin'u+4n
409 right-margin Text in the right margin.
411 .ti -\w'right-margin'u+4n
412 isearch Text highlighted during incremental search.
414 .ti -\w'right-margin'u+4n
415 info-node Text of Info menu items.
417 .ti -\w'right-margin'u+4n
418 info-xref Text of Info cross references.
420 .B \fIface\fB.attributeForeground (\fPclass\fB Face.AttributeForeground)
421 Sets the foreground color for
424 .B \fIface\fB.attributeBackground (\fPclass\fB Face.AttributeBackground)
425 Sets the background color for
428 .B \fIface\fB.attributeBackgroundPixmap (\fPclass\fB Face.AttributeBackgroundPixmap)
429 Sets the background pixmap (stipple) for
432 .B \fIface\fB.attributeUnderline (\fPclass\fB Face.AttributeUnderline)
435 should be underlined.
437 .B reverseVideo (\fPclass\fB ReverseVideo)
440 the window will be displayed in reverse video. Consider
441 explicitly setting the foreground and background colors instead
442 of using this resources.
444 .B borderWidth (\fPclass\fB BorderWidth)
445 Sets the window's border width in pixels.
447 .B internalBorderWidth (\fPclass\fB InternalBorderWidth)
448 Sets the window's internal border width in pixels.
450 .B borderColor (\fPclass\fB BorderColor)
451 Sets the color of the window's border.
453 .B cursorColor (\fPclass\fB Foreground)
454 Sets the color of the window's text cursor.
456 .B pointerColor (\fPclass\fB Foreground)
457 Sets the color of the window's mouse cursor.
459 .B emacsVisual (\fPclass\fB EmacsVisual)
460 Sets the default visual
462 will try to use (as described above).
464 .B privateColormap (\fPclass\fB PrivateColormap)
467 will default to using a private colormap.
469 .B geometry (\fPclass\fB Geometry)
470 Sets the geometry of the
472 window (as described above).
474 .B iconic (\fPclass\fB Iconic)
477 window will initially appear as an icon.
479 .B menubar (\fPclass\fB Menubar)
482 window will have a menubar. Defaults to true.
484 .B initiallyUnmapped (\fPclass\fB InitiallyUnmapped)
487 will leave the initial frame unmapped when it starts up.
489 .B barCursor (\fPclass\fB BarCursor)
490 Whether the cursor should be a bar instead of the traditional box.
492 .B title (\fPclass\fB Title)
493 Sets the title of the
497 .B iconName (\fPclass\fB Title)
498 Sets the icon name for the
502 .B scrollBarWidth (\fPclass\fB ScrollBarWidth)
503 Sets the width of the vertical scrollbars, in pixels. A width of 0
504 means no vertical scrollbars.
506 .B scrollBarHeight (\fPclass\fB ScrollBarHeight)
507 Sets the height of the horizontal scrollbars, in pixels. A height of 0
508 means no horizontal scrollbars.
510 .B scrollBarPlacement (\fPclass\fB ScrollBarPlacement)
511 Sets the position of vertical and horizontal scrollbars. Should be one
512 of the strings "top-left", "bottom-left", "top-right", or "bottom-right".
513 The default is "bottom-right" for the Motif and Lucid scrollbars and
514 "buttom-left" for the Athena scrollbars.
516 .B topToolBarHeight (\fPclass\fB TopToolBarHeight)
517 Sets the height of the top toolbar, in pixels. 0 means no top toolbar.
519 .B bottomToolBarHeight (\fPclass\fB BottomToolBarHeight)
520 Sets the height of the bottom toolbar, in pixels. 0 means no
523 .B leftToolBarWidth (\fPclass\fB LeftToolBarWidth)
524 Sets the width of the left toolbar, in pixels. 0 means no left toolbar.
526 .B rightToolBarWidth (\fPclass\fB RightToolBarWidth)
527 Sets the width of the right toolbar, in pixels. 0 means no right toolbar.
529 .B topToolBarShadowColor (\fPclass\fB TopToolBarShadowColor)
530 Sets the color of the top shadows for the toolbars. (For all toolbars,
531 \fBnot\fR just the toolbar at the top of the frame.)
533 .B bottomToolBarShadowColor (\fPclass\fB BottomToolBarShadowColor)
534 Sets the color of the bottom shadows for the toolbars. (For all toolbars,
535 \fBnot\fR just the toolbar at the bottom of the frame.)
537 .B topToolBarShadowPixmap (\fPclass\fB TopToolBarShadowPixmap)
538 Sets the pixmap of the top shadows for the toolbars. (For all toolbars,
539 \fBnot\fR just the toolbar at the top of the frame.) If set, this
540 resource overrides the corresponding color resource.
542 .B bottomToolBarShadowPixmap (\fPclass\fB BottomToolBarShadowPixmap)
543 Sets the pixmap of the bottom shadows for the toolbars. (For all toolbars,
544 \fBnot\fR just the toolbar at the bottom of the frame.) If set, this
545 resource overrides the corresponding color resource.
547 .B toolBarShadowThickness (\fPclass\fB ToolBarShadowThickness)
548 Thickness of the shadows around the toolbars, in pixels.
550 .B visualBell (\fPclass\fB VisualBell)
551 Whether XEmacs should flash the screen rather than making an audible beep.
553 .B bellVolume (\fPclass\fB BellVolume)
554 Volume of the audible beep. Range is 0 through 100.
556 .B useBackingStore (\fPclass\fB UseBackingStore)
559 should set the backing-store attribute of the
561 windows it creates. This increases the memory usage of the
563 server but decreases the amount of
565 traffic necessary to update the screen, and is useful when the
568 server goes over a low-bandwidth line such as a modem connection.
570 .B textPointer (\fPclass\fB Cursor)
571 The cursor to use when the mouse is over text.
573 .B selectionPointer (\fPclass\fB Cursor)
574 The cursor to use when the mouse is over a mouse-highlighted
577 .B spacePointer (\fPclass\fB Cursor)
578 The cursor to use when the mouse is over a blank space in a buffer (that
579 is, after the end of a line or after the end-of-file).
581 .B modeLinePointer (\fPclass\fB Cursor)
582 The cursor to use when the mouse is over a mode line.
584 .B gcPointer (\fPclass\fB Cursor)
585 The cursor to display when a garbage-collection is in progress.
587 .B scrollbarPointer (\fPclass\fB Cursor)
588 The cursor to use when the mouse is over the scrollbar.
590 .B pointerColor (\fPclass\fB Foreground)
591 The foreground color of the mouse cursor.
593 .B pointerBackground (\fPclass\fB Background)
594 The background color of the mouse cursor.
598 The following lists the mouse button bindings for the
602 .in +\w'CTRL-SHIFT-middle'u+4n
603 .ta \w'CTRL-SHIFT-middle'u+4n
604 .ti -\w'CTRL-SHIFT-middle'u+4n
605 MOUSE BUTTON FUNCTION
607 .ti -\w'CTRL-SHIFT-middle'u+4n
608 left Set point or make a text selection.
610 .ti -\w'CTRL-SHIFT-middle'u+4n
613 .ti -\w'CTRL-SHIFT-middle'u+4n
614 right Pop up a menu of options.
616 .ti -\w'CTRL-SHIFT-middle'u+4n
617 SHIFT-left Extend a selection.
619 .ti -\w'CTRL-SHIFT-middle'u+4n
620 CTRL-left Make a selection and insert it at point.
622 .ti -\w'CTRL-SHIFT-middle'u+4n
623 CTRL-middle Set point and move selected text there.
625 .ti -\w'CTRL-SHIFT-middle'u+4n
626 CTRL-SHIFT-left Make a selection, delete it, and insert it at point.
628 .ti -\w'CTRL-SHIFT-middle'u+4n
629 META-left Make a rectangular selection.
631 Lisp code is read at startup from the user's init file,
634 /usr/local/info - files for the Info documentation browser
637 to refer to. The complete text of the
638 .I XEmacs Reference Manual
640 .I XEmacs Lisp Programmer's Manual
641 is included in a convenient tree structured form.
643 /usr/local/lib/xemacs-$VERSION/info - the Info files may be here instead.
645 /usr/local/lib/xemacs-$VERSION/src - C source files and object files.
646 (May not be present.)
648 /usr/local/lib/xemacs-$VERSION/lisp/* - Lisp source files and compiled files
649 that define most editing commands. The files are contained in subdirectories,
650 categorized by function or individual package. Some are preloaded;
651 others are autoloaded from these directories when used.
653 /usr/local/lib/xemacs-$VERSION/etc - some files of information, pixmap
654 files, other data files used by certain packages, etc.
656 /usr/local/lib/xemacs-$VERSION/$CONFIGURATION - various programs that are used
659 /usr/local/lib/xemacs-$VERSION/$CONFIGURATION/DOC -
660 contains the documentation strings for the Lisp primitives and
661 preloaded Lisp functions of \fIXEmacs\fP.
662 They are stored here to reduce the size of \fIXEmacs\fP proper.
665 /usr/local/lib/xemacs-$VERSION/etc/SERVICE - lists people offering
666 various services to assist users of \fIXEmacs\fP,
667 including education, troubleshooting, porting and customization.
669 /usr/local/lib/xemacs/lock - holds lock files that are made for all
670 files being modified in
672 to prevent simultaneous modification of one file by two users.
674 /usr/local/lib/xemacs/site-lisp - locally-provided Lisp files.
676 /usr/lib/X11/rgb.txt - list of valid X color names.
679 There is a newsgroup, comp.emacs.xemacs, for reporting
681 bugs and fixes and requesting help. But before reporting something
682 as a bug, please try to be sure that it really is a bug, not a
683 misunderstanding or a deliberate feature. We ask you to read the section
684 ``Reporting XEmacs Bugs'' near the end of the reference manual (or Info
685 system) for hints on how and when to report bugs. Also, include the version
688 you are running and the system you are running it on
689 in \fIevery\fR bug report that you send in. Finally, the more you can
690 isolate the cause of a bug and the conditions it happens under, the more
691 likely it is to be fixed, so please take the time to do so.
693 The newsgroup is bidirectionally gatewayed to and from the mailing list
694 xemacs@xemacs.org. You can read the list instead of the newsgroup if
695 you do not have convenient Usenet news access. To request to be added
696 to the mailing list, send mail to xemacs-request@xemacs.org. (Do not
697 send mail to the list itself.)
701 maintainers read the newsgroup regularly and will attempt to
702 fix bugs reported in a timely fashion. However, not every message will
703 get a response from one of the maintainers. Note that there are many
704 people other than the maintainers who read the newsgroup, and will usually
705 be of assistance in helping with any problems encountered.
707 If you need more personal assistance than can be provided by the
708 newsgroup, look in the SERVICE file (see above) for a list of people
711 For more information about XEmacs mailing lists, see the
712 file /usr/local/lib/xemacs-$VERSION/etc/MAILINGLISTS.
716 is free; anyone may redistribute copies of
719 anyone under the terms stated in the
721 General Public License,
722 a copy of which accompanies each copy of
725 appears in the reference manual.
729 may sometimes be received packaged with distributions of Unix systems,
730 but it is never included in the scope of any license covering those
731 systems. Such inclusion violates the terms on which distribution
732 is permitted. In fact, the primary purpose of the General Public
733 License is to prohibit anyone from attaching any other restrictions
737 X(1), xlsfonts(1), xterm(1), xrdb(1), emacs(1), vi(1)
742 Steve Baur <steve@xemacs.org>,
743 Martin Buchholz <martin@xemacs.org>,
744 Richard Mlynarik <mly@adoc.xerox.com>,
745 Hrvoje Niksic <hniksic@srce.hr>,
746 Chuck Thompson <cthomp@xemacs.org>,
747 Ben Wing <wing@666.com>,
748 Jamie Zawinski <jwz@netscape.com>,
750 It was based on an early version of
753 written by Richard Stallman <rms@gnu.org> of the Free Software
754 Foundation, and has tracked subsequent releases of
756 as they have become available. It was originally written by Lucid, Inc.
757 (now defunct) and was called
761 Chuck Thompson wrote the
763 redisplay engine, maintains the
765 FTP and WWW sites, and has put out all releases of
767 since 19.11 (the first release called
769 Ben Wing wrote the Asian-language support, the on-line documentation
770 (including this man page and much of the FAQ), the external widget code,
771 and retooled or rewrote most of the basic, low-level
773 subsystems. Jamie Zawinski put out all releases of
776 from the first (19.0) through the last (19.10), and was the primary
777 code contributor for all of these releases. Richard Mlynarik rewrote
780 Lisp-object allocation system, improved the keymap and minibuffer code,
781 and did the initial synching of
787 Many others have also contributed significantly. For more detailed
788 information, including a long history of \fIXEmacs\fP from multiple
789 viewpoints and pretty pictures and bios of the major \fIXEmacs\fP
790 contributors, see the
792 (the About XEmacs option on the Help menu).
794 For more information about \fIXEmacs\fP, see the
797 look in the file /usr/local/lib/xemacs-$VERSION/etc/NEWS,
798 or point your Web browser at
800 http://www.xemacs.org/
802 for up-to-the-minute information about \fIXEmacs\fP.
806 FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) can be found at the Web site just listed.
807 A possibly out-of-date version is also accessible through the Info system
808 inside of \fIXEmacs\fP.
810 The latest version of \fIXEmacs\fP can be downloaded using anonymous
813 ftp://ftp.xemacs.org/pub/xemacs/
815 or from a mirror site near you. Mirror sites are listed in the file
816 etc/FTP in the XEmacs distribution or see the Web site for an up-to-date
817 list of mirror sites.