Solutions: Common Problem Guide
In order to view this from EMacro's help menu, you must install the full
tarball, in particular, browse-url.el, advice.el, term.el and thingatpt.el
Solutions
Your ".emacs" file might also be called "_emacs" on MS Windows. You should set
the environment variable "HOME" (Skip this, if you run classic Mac OS
v8-9). You can inspect this variable by entering at a prompt:
set
This is your home directory. EMacro is kicked off by a file called ".emacs".
You can see this hidden file on Linux compatible systems by entering
cd; ls -a
- Know the 'Control G' (C-G) keys. This is your escape key for exiting
commands in the minibuffer (status line). Hitting the Esc key 3 times works
similarly.
- Life in XEmacs is better, when you download the latest sumo tarball from
http://www.xemacs.org/
- Check resources.html for answers to FAQs (Frequently
Asked Questions) and for the latest version of any *.el elisp file.
Note that resources.html may be more up-to-date than the
links that EMacro generates in *cache.el.
- Be sure to check the PROBLEMS file in your site's emacs directory.
release_notes.html may also help.
- Check resources.html for the latest versions of all
software
- EMacro's source code is neatly organized. You may find commented code that
fixes your solution. Try the following:
M-x grep [return]
grep -n "problem keyword" ~/emacs/emacro/*.el or
grep -n "problem keyword" ~/emacs/programmer/*.el
Emacro should have already loaded the grep.el or igrep.el library.
- Try running
cd %HOME%\emacs\bin\w32 #For Microsoft Windows
cd ~/emacs/bin/unix/ #For all other systems
e-refresh
Finally, if you still need help with EMacro, be sure to provide me with the
following:
Version of EMacro C-h v
emacro-version
Version and Name of operating system
uname -a (on unix)
Version and Emacs or XEmacs
M-x version
Ideally, you should be able to reproduce any error with a freshly logged in
system, and should have the latest stable release of everything.
I recommend against bytecompiling EMacro, unless you are trying to track down
a bug. This is because *.elc files are less portable, and offer EMacro no
increase in speed. Bytecompiling is useful for some other programs, such as
semantic, which is used in JDE.
EMacro goes to great lengths to avoid byte-compiler warnings.
In general, errors marked by !! are serious, warnings are
not. Try running the e-refresh script, to remove *cache.el files.
If you see the error
!! End of stream ((#<buffer " *Compiler Input*">))
this means that you have an unbalanced parenthesis or quote.
You can generally, and easily find an unbalaced quote, by refreshing font-lock,
choosing Tools menu -> Refresh colors, or with
M-x font-lock-fontify-buffer
You can find an unbalanced parenthesis with
C-home
(top of file). Repeat by holding
M-C-n
until Emacs complains with a beep. Note that an unbalanced single quote is
often proper in lisp.
M-x describe-installation
Show duplicate libraries in multiple directories:
M-x list-load-path-shadows
You can hit 'C-x e' at the end of
(member (format "%semacs/packages/" use-home) load-path)
or simply,
(member "/home/my-login/emacs/packages/" load-path)
to see if that directory is in your load-path. Of course, you can also do
C-h v
load-path
and search the results.
You really should visit the FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions) for problems
like these. This one is common enough to annoy many new users. Download
CUA-mode.el, run e-refresh to remove *cache.el. If you are running GNU
Emacs, you should be pleased with the results. You cannot use native Emacs
shortcuts on selected text, such as C-x C-l to lowercase a region.
Instead, you would have to use long commands, such as M-x downcase-region
. EMacro does not support the older, buggy version of cua-mode for
XEmacs.
Emacs supports the true CUA standard: ('C-' means Control key; 'S-' means
Shift)
| C-insert | copy |
| S-delete | cut |
| S-insert | paste |
Microsoft, Motif, IBM & others adhere to this standard. Microsoft, however, has
been steering users to C-c, C-x, C-v keybindings.
If you are in text mode, and the display looks wierd, hit C-l
There appears to be a bug in older XEmacs, in X window, where the right side
does not display. This goes away when you generate a refresh event, such as
resizing. You probably need to choose a smaller "use-height" in configure.el
Some adjustments must be done through your operating system. You may need to
edit ~/.Xdefaults, on Linux compatible OSes. You can view the
system resources with xrdb -query and for emacs with appres
emacs. Check also the environment variables XUSERFILESEARCHPATH,
XAPPLRESDIR, XFILESEARCHPATH for Xdefaults. Also look at
~/.Xresources
Here is some sample .Xdefault entries, to change the menubar font:
#Emacs only?
Emacs*menubar*Font: -*-helvetica-bold-r-*-*-*-60-80-80-*-*-*-*
#XEmacs only?
Emacs*XlwMenu.Font: -*-arial-bold-i-normal--*-120-*-*-*-*-iso8859-*
C-x RET f undecided-dos RET
Your best bet is to call dos2unix. This is available on Solaris, and as a
contributed package at
http://www.rpmfind.org/ or at
http://www.redhat.com/mirrors.html
You can also remove them with
| C-% | (shortcut for M-x query-replace) |
| C-q C-m | (literally insert a ^M) |
| RET |
(hit enter again to replace with nothing) |
| ! | (replace all) |
If you use both Gnu Emacs & [Gnu] XEmacs or even 2 versions on the same system,
do not bytecompile your .el files.
These are optional, but may help in running Emacs remotely. I include some
example paths.
| EMACSPATH | /usr/local/share/emacs |
| EMACSDATA | $EMACSPATH/etc |
| EMACSDOC | $EMACSPATH/21.0/etc/DOC-21.0.1 |
| EMACSLOADPATH |
$EMACSPATH/21.0/site-lisp:$EMACSPATH/21.0/lisp |
| EMACSLOCKDIR | ~/.lock/ |
| INFOPATH | /usr/local/share/info |
EMacro probes your system for libraries & programs, as each .el file is
loaded. If you move or add such files, you'd do best to run the
e-refresh script, to remove *.elc and *cache.el, then restart Emacs or
XEmacs.
If you get wierd, unexplained errors, try increasing the following elisp
limits. Use C-h v to inspect them:
max-lisp-eval-depth
max-specpdl-size
Try this to debug your connection:
telnet news.myNewsServer.com nntp
You should install the Emacs W3 HTML browser from
http://www.cs.indiana.edu/elisp/w3/docs.html. If you have lynx in your PATH
then you can edit ~/preferences/e-prefs.el with this line:
(defconst use-browser 'lynx)
The line should be entered exactly as above, including the single unbalanced
single quote. To restore your graphical mode browser, you can remove or comment
out this line, by preceding it with a ; semicolon.
See "Code Indentation/Formatting Styles" in programmer.el
Keys don't work? Try turning off your Caps Lock!
Fixing X window key bindings. Get XKeycaps from
http://www.jwz.org/xkeycaps/ or see
resources.html. Also check unix style help: man -s1
xmodmap or man -s1 xev
Another keyboard project is Linux Easy Access Keyboard at
http://lineak.sf.net/
Keybindings are annoying with Classic Mac OS 9.x. I have not done enough
testing on Mac OS X, to see if it works better.
For example, the 'end' key generates a control-d, which works well as an
existing Emacs standard for delete-char (forward). This will not improve,
without help from the Mac community.
For international use, also see about turning off dead keys.
Running emacs -debug-init or xemacs -debug-init from
the command line will help you track down problems. The -q --no-site-file
flags will allow you turn off your .emacs (EMacro) and shared init
files, respectively.
Do not try to run an older version of Emacs with *.elc files that have been
byte-compiled by a newer version. Sometimes it helps to remove ~/emacs/*.elc
files then restart, which will recompile them.
Also, make sure that you do not have compressed files or compiled of the same
name, especially in the same directory, eg: ~/emacro.el and ~/emacro.el.gz or
~/emacro.elc
Visit the Emacs Lisp List. See resources.html
e-refresh in the bin directory may help.
Emacs may be waiting for the network to time out, to get info.
Put a fully qualified domain name for your machine in /etc/hosts,
and tell the /etc/resolv routines to look in /etc/hosts before
looking at the network. On Windows NT, this might be
c:\winnt\system32\drivers\etc\hosts or c:\winnt\system32\drivers\etc\lmhosts
If you are running XEmacs, try upgrading to at least 21.4.4 and rebuild using
--with-ipv6-cname=no.
EMacro will check the web for upgrades. If you told EMacro that you have a fast
connection, and a suitable tool, such as lynx is in the PATH, then EMacro will
attempt this check. You can turn off this check (perhaps you are using a laptop
on the road) by editing ~/emacs/preferences/e-prefs.el
The first step to problems with any third party program is to get it to work
from the command line. If you use MS Windows's SMB networking, try this:
print -d\\printer\portName emacro.el
Graphical Approach:
Where emacro.el is a plain text file in the current directory, and
\\printer\portName comes from Control Panel -> Printers ->
default printer -> Printer -> Properties -> Ports -> Port
Command Line:
NET HELP will list the networking commands.
If you know your server name, 'NET VIEW SERVER' will list its printer(s).
NET USE LPT1: \\servername\sharename will map your printer to the
default local port
EMacro prompts, creates and stores this printer name in
~/emacs/preferences/e-prefs.el. You can see how it is used in
~/emacs/emacro/e-w32.el
Be sure to also take a look at ~/emacs/contrib/lpr.
For more details, see the FAQ at
http://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/windows/big.html#printing
See tips.html on opening a command line shell in Emacs.
- Check from the shell, that you can FTP to the remote site
- Check that the shell you use (e.g. /bin/zsh) is in the host's /etc/shells
- Is the server running ftpd daemon/service? If it runs rlogin/rcp or is
secured with ssh/scp then get TRAMP from
http://tramp.sf.net/
For older versions on MS Windows you need to download a patched ftp.exe.
First, do a
M-x shell [return]
then run ftp (or telnet, etc to check these, instead). Older emacs have a bug
that reveals your password to the screen. If this does not work, try
M-x eshell
Switching from wu-ftpd to ProFTPd may also help.
EMacro will work in a TTY text terminal, such as emacs -nw'.
However, keybindings may not work very well. You may need to try a console, or
other stty or termcap settings. See also tips.html
In Emacs, you can enter M-x customize or, more simply, choose
Options->Customize Emacs from the menu.
If Watson does not work, resulting in timer warnings in the minibuffer, try
disabling Tiny Tools (see section).
Thanks to Max Polk for his solution to get browse-url() to open only one
Netscape 6 window. Note that Netscape 6 has nonstandard MS Windows Registry
settings.
WARNING: Do not attempt the following, if you are unfamiliar with
editing the registry! Note that some versions of Microsoft Windows mistake
restoring a backed up copy of the registry for a license violation and will not
allow recovery!! You (and Microsoft) take full responsiblity, if you attempt
the following. Back up your data before proceeding. This also has not had
recent testing, and may have changed.
For starters, Netscape does not support DDE, so you will likely do well to
remove all Netscape references to DDE. You should leave just the command entry
in
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\MozillaHTML\shell\open
to only
C:\path\NETSCP6.EXE -url "%1"
From: Johan Kullstam
Xfree86 with 101 key mapping uses alt for meta. Xfree86 with 104 key mapping
uses alt for alt and windows key for meta. Note that sometimes only your right
alt key is the meta key.
Use this to make alt-key meta-modifier and windows-key the super-modifier.
$ cat /etc/xmodmap
keycode 64 = Meta_L
keycode 113 = Meta_R
keycode 115 = Super_L
keycode 116 = Super_R
add mod4 = Super_L Super_R
keycode 117 = Menu
| 