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Defining generic and mode-specific Emacs Lisp functions with cl-defmethod

| elisp, emacs, subed

2022-01-27: Added example function description.
2022-01-02: Changed quote to function in the defalias.

I recently took over the maintenance of subed, an Emacs mode for editing subtitles. One of the things on my TODO list was to figure out how to handle generic and format-specific functions instead of relying on defalias. For example, there are SubRip files (.srt), WebVTT files (.vtt), and Advanced SubStation Alpha (.ass). I also want to add support for Audacity labels and other formats.

There are some functions that will work across all of them once you have the appropriate format-specific functions in place, and there are some functions that have to be very different depending on the format that you're working with. Now, how do you do those things in Emacs Lisp? There are several ways of making general functions and specific functions.

For example, the forward-paragraph and backward-paragraph commands use variables to figure out the paragraph separators, so buffer-local variables can change the behaviour.

However, I needed a bit more than regular expressions. An approach taken in some packages like smartparens is to have buffer-local variables have the actual functions to be called, like sp-forward-bound-fn and sp-backward-bound-fn.

(defvar-local sp-forward-bound-fn nil
  "Function to restrict the forward search")

(defun sp--get-forward-bound ()
  "Get the bound to limit the forward search for looking for pairs.
If it returns nil, the original bound passed to the search
function will be considered."
  (and sp-forward-bound-fn (funcall sp-forward-bound-fn)))

Since there were so many functions, I figured that might be a little bit unwieldy. In Org mode, custom export backends are structs that have an alist that maps the different types of things to the functions that will be called, overriding the functions that are defined in the parent export backend.

(cl-defstruct (org-export-backend (:constructor org-export-create-backend)
          (:copier nil))
  name parent transcoders options filters blocks menu)

(defun org-export-get-all-transcoders (backend)
  "Return full translation table for BACKEND.

BACKEND is an export back-end, as return by, e.g,,
`org-export-create-backend'.  Return value is an alist where
keys are element or object types, as symbols, and values are
transcoders.

Unlike to `org-export-backend-transcoders', this function
also returns transcoders inherited from parent back-ends,
if any."
  (when (symbolp backend) (setq backend (org-export-get-backend backend)))
  (when backend
    (let ((transcoders (org-export-backend-transcoders backend))
          parent)
      (while (setq parent (org-export-backend-parent backend))
        (setq backend (org-export-get-backend parent))
        (setq transcoders
              (append transcoders (org-export-backend-transcoders backend))))
      transcoders)))

The export code looked a little bit complicated, though. I wanted to see if there was a different way of doing things, and I came across cl-defmethod. Actually, the first time I tried to implement this, I was focused on the fact that cl-defmethod could call different things depending on the class that you give it. So initially I had created a couple of classes: subed-backend class, and then subclasses such as subed-vtt-backend. This allowed me to store the backend as a buffer-local variable and differentiate based on that.

(require 'eieio)

(defclass subed-backend ()
  ((regexp-timestamp :initarg :regexp-timestamp
                     :initform ""
                     :type string
                     :custom string
                     :documentation "Regexp matching a timestamp.")
   (regexp-separator :initarg :regexp-separator
                     :initform ""
                     :type string
                     :custom string
                     :documentation "Regexp matching the separator between subtitles."))
  "A class for data and functions specific to a subtitle format.")

(defclass subed-vtt-backend (subed-backend) nil
  "A class for WebVTT subtitle files.")

(cl-defmethod subed--timestamp-to-msecs ((backend subed-vtt-backend) time-string)
  "Find HH:MM:SS,MS pattern in TIME-STRING and convert it to milliseconds.
Return nil if TIME-STRING doesn't match the pattern.
Use the format-specific function for BACKEND."
  (save-match-data
    (when (string-match (oref backend regexp-timestamp) time-string)
      (let ((hours (string-to-number (match-string 1 time-string)))
            (mins  (string-to-number (match-string 2 time-string)))
            (secs  (string-to-number (match-string 3 time-string)))
            (msecs (string-to-number (subed--right-pad (match-string 4 time-string) 3 ?0))))
        (+ (* (truncate hours) 3600000)
           (* (truncate mins) 60000)
           (* (truncate secs) 1000)
           (truncate msecs))))))

Then I found out that you can use major-mode as a context specifier for cl-defmethod, so you can call different specific functions depending on the major mode that your buffer is in. It doesn't seem to be mentioned in the elisp manual, so at some point I should figure out how to suggest mentioning it. Anyway, now I have some functions that get called if the buffer is in subed-vtt-mode and some functions that get called if the buffer is in subed-srt-mode.

The catch is that cl-defmethod can't define interactive functions. So if I'm defining a command, an interactive function that can be called with M-x, then I will need to have a regular function that calls the function defined with cl-defmethod. This resulted in a bit of duplicated code, so I have a macro that defines the method and then defines the possibly interactive command that calls that method. I didn't want to think about whether something was interactive or not, so my macro just always creates those two functions. One is a cl-defmethod that I can override for a specific major mode, and one is the function that actually calls it, which may may not be interactive. It doesn't handle &rest args, but I don't have any in subed.el at this time.

(defmacro subed-define-generic-function (name args &rest body)
  "Declare an object method and provide the old way of calling it."
  (declare (indent 2))
  (let (is-interactive
        doc)
    (when (stringp (car body))
      (setq doc (pop body)))
    (setq is-interactive (eq (caar body) 'interactive))
    `(progn
       (cl-defgeneric ,(intern (concat "subed--" (symbol-name name)))
           ,args
         ,doc
         ,@(if is-interactive
               (cdr body)
             body))
       ,(if is-interactive
            `(defun ,(intern (concat "subed-" (symbol-name name))) ,args
               ,(concat doc "\n\nThis function calls the generic function `"
                        (concat "subed--" (symbol-name name)) "' for the actual implementation.")
               ,(car body)
               (,(intern (concat "subed--" (symbol-name name)))
                ,@(delq nil (mapcar (lambda (a)
                                      (unless (string-match "^&" (symbol-name a))
                                        a))
                                    args))))
          `(defalias (quote ,(intern (concat "subed-" (symbol-name name))))
             (function ,(intern (concat "subed--" (symbol-name name))))
             ,doc)))))

For example, the function:

(subed-define-generic-function timestamp-to-msecs (time-string)
  "Find timestamp pattern in TIME-STRING and convert it to milliseconds.
Return nil if TIME-STRING doesn't match the pattern.")

expands to:

(progn
  (cl-defgeneric subed--timestamp-to-msecs
      (time-string)
    "Find timestamp pattern in TIME-STRING and convert it to milliseconds.
Return nil if TIME-STRING doesn't match the pattern.")
  (defalias 'subed-timestamp-to-msecs 'subed--timestamp-to-msecs "Find timestamp pattern in TIME-STRING and convert it to milliseconds.
Return nil if TIME-STRING doesn't match the pattern."))

and the interactive command defined with:

(subed-define-generic-function forward-subtitle-end ()
  "Move point to end of next subtitle.
Return point or nil if there is no next subtitle."
  (interactive)
  (when (subed-forward-subtitle-id)
    (subed-jump-to-subtitle-end)))

expands to:

(progn
  (cl-defgeneric subed--forward-subtitle-end nil "Move point to end of next subtitle.
Return point or nil if there is no next subtitle."
                 (when
                     (subed-forward-subtitle-id)
                   (subed-jump-to-subtitle-end)))
  (defun subed-forward-subtitle-end nil "Move point to end of next subtitle.
Return point or nil if there is no next subtitle.

This function calls the generic function `subed--forward-subtitle-end' for the actual implementation."
         (interactive)
         (subed--forward-subtitle-end)))

Then I can define a specific one with:

(cl-defmethod subed--timestamp-to-msecs (time-string &context (major-mode subed-srt-mode))
  "Find HH:MM:SS,MS pattern in TIME-STRING and convert it to milliseconds.
Return nil if TIME-STRING doesn't match the pattern.
Use the format-specific function for MAJOR-MODE."
  (save-match-data
    (when (string-match subed--regexp-timestamp time-string)
      (let ((hours (string-to-number (match-string 1 time-string)))
            (mins  (string-to-number (match-string 2 time-string)))
            (secs  (string-to-number (match-string 3 time-string)))
            (msecs (string-to-number (subed--right-pad (match-string 4 time-string) 3 ?0))))
        (+ (* (truncate hours) 3600000)
           (* (truncate mins) 60000)
           (* (truncate secs) 1000)
           (truncate msecs))))))

The upside is that it's easy to either override or extend a function's behavior. For example, after I sort subtitles, I want to renumber them if I'm in an SRT buffer because SRT subtitles have numeric IDs. This doesn't happen in any of the other modes. So I can just define that this bit of code runs after the regular code that runs.

(cl-defmethod subed--sort :after (&context (major-mode subed-srt-mode))
  "Renumber after sorting. Format-specific for MAJOR-MODE."
  (subed-srt--regenerate-ids))

The downside is that going to the function's definition and stepping through it is a little more complicated because it's hidden behind this macro and the cl-defmethod infrastructure. I think that if you describe-function the right function, the internal version with the --, then it will list the different implementations of it. I added a note to the regular function's docstring to make it a little easier.

Here's what M-x describe-function subed-forward-subtitle-end looks like:

describe-function.svg

Figure 1: Describing a generic function

I'm going to give this derived-mode branch a try for a little while by subtitling some more EmacsConf talks before I merge it into the main branch. This is my first time working with cl-defmethod, and it looks pretty interesting.

Emacs: Making a hydra cheatsheet for Lispy

| elisp, emacs, elisp

I wanted to get the hang of Lispy thanks to Leo Vivier's presentation at EmacsSF, but there are a lot of keyboard shortcuts to explore. In Karl Voit's demo of Org Mode at GLT21, he showed how he uses Hydra to make cheat sheets. That makes perfect sense, of course, as Hydra can display text and allow you to run commands while the text is displayed. I wanted to make a Hydra that would show me categorized commands to make it easier to look up and eventually remember them. I also wanted to skip the commands that I already knew or that I didn't want to focus on just yet.

Fortunately, the function reference had a link to the Org file used to generate it. I copied the tables, merged them together, named them with #+NAME: bindings, replaced the links with plain text, and added a third column with the category I wanted to put commands into.

#bindings
key function column
< lispy-barf  
A lispy-beginning-of-defun  
j lispy-down  
Z lispy-edebug-stop  
B lispy-ediff-regions  
G lispy-goto-local  
h lispy-left  
N lispy-narrow  
y lispy-occur  
o lispy-other-mode  
J lispy-outline-next  
K lispy-outline-prev  
P lispy-paste  
l lispy-right  
I lispy-shifttab  
> lispy-slurp  
SPC lispy-space  
xB lispy-store-region-and-buffer  
u lispy-undo  
k lispy-up  
v lispy-view  
V lispy-visit  
W lispy-widen  
D pop-tag-mark  
x see  
L unbound  
U unbound  
X unbound  
Y unbound  
H lispy-ace-symbol-replace Edit
c lispy-clone Edit
C lispy-convolute Edit
n lispy-new-copy Edit
O lispy-oneline Edit
r lispy-raise Edit
R lispy-raise-some Edit
\ lispy-splice Edit
S lispy-stringify Edit
i lispy-tab Edit
xj lispy-debug-step-in Eval
xe lispy-edebug Eval
xT lispy-ert Eval
e lispy-eval Eval
E lispy-eval-and-insert Eval
xr lispy-eval-and-replace Eval
p lispy-eval-other-window Eval
q lispy-ace-paren Move
z lispy-knight Move
s lispy-move-down Move
w lispy-move-up Move
t lispy-teleport Move
Q lispy-ace-char Nav
lispy-ace-subword Nav
a lispy-ace-symbol Nav
b lispy-back Nav
d lispy-different Nav
f lispy-flow Nav
F lispy-follow Nav
g lispy-goto Nav
xb lispy-bind-variable Refactor
xf lispy-flatten Refactor
xc lispy-to-cond Refactor
xd lispy-to-defun Refactor
xi lispy-to-ifs Refactor
xl lispy-to-lambda Refactor
xu lispy-unbind-variable Refactor
M lispy-multiline Other
xh lispy-describe Other
m lispy-mark-list Other

I wrote this Emacs Lisp code with the header arguments #+begin_src emacs-lisp :var bindings=bindings :colnames yes:

(eval
 (append
  '(defhydra my/lispy-cheat-sheet (:hint nil :foreign-keys run)
     ("<f14>" nil :exit t))
  (cl-loop for x in bindings
           unless (string= "" (elt x 2))
           collect
           (list (car x)
                 (intern (elt x 1))
                 (when (string-match "lispy-\\(?:eval-\\)?\\(.+\\)"
                                     (elt x 1))
                   (match-string 1 (elt x 1)))
                 :column
                 (elt x 2)))))
(with-eval-after-load "lispy"
  (define-key lispy-mode-map (kbd "<f14>") 'my/lispy-cheat-sheet/body))

Here's the result:

Screenshot_20210413_002503.png

Figure 1: Hydra-based cheat sheet

I'm experimenting with having my Windows key be F14 if tapped and Super_L if held down. I use KDE, so I disabled the Applications shortcut with:

kwriteconfig5 --file ~/.config/kwinrc --group ModifierOnlyShortcuts --key Meta ""
qdbus org.kde.KWin /KWin reconfigure

and then used xcape -e 'Super_L=F14' to make it work.

Looking forward to getting the hang of this!

This is part of my Emacs configuration.

Org Mode: Inserting a function definition

| elisp, emacs, org, elisp

While nudging jcs to add a definition of jcs-insert-url to the blog post about Making Things Easier, I realized it might be handy to have a quick function for inserting a function definition without thinking about where it's defined. This tries to use the definition from the source, and it can fall back to using the stored function definition if necessary. There's probably a better way to do this, but this was small and fun to write. =)

Naturally, I used it to insert itself:

(defun my/org-insert-defun (function)
  "Inserts an Org source block with the definition for FUNCTION."
  (interactive (find-function-read))
  (let* ((buffer-point (condition-case nil (find-definition-noselect function nil) (error nil)))
         (new-buf (car buffer-point))
         (new-point (cdr buffer-point))
         definition)
    (if buffer-point        
      (with-current-buffer new-buf ;; Try to get original definition
        (save-excursion
          (goto-char new-point)
          (setq definition (buffer-substring-no-properties (point) (save-excursion (end-of-defun) (point))))))
      ;; Fallback: Print function definition
      (setq definition (concat (prin1-to-string (symbol-function function)) "\n")))
    (insert "#+begin_src emacs-lisp\n" definition "#+end_src\n")))

Using your own Emacs Lisp functions in Org Mode table calculations: easier dosage totals

Posted: - Modified: | emacs, org, elisp

UPDATE 2015-06-17: In the comments below, Will points out that if you use proper dates ([yyyy-mm-dd] instead of yyyy-mm-dd), Org will do the date arithmetic for you. Neato! Here’s what Will said:

Hi Sacha. Did you know you can do date arithmetic directly on org’s inactive or active timestamps? It can even give you an answer in fractional days if the time of day is different in the two timestamps:

| Start                  | End                    | Interval |
|------------------------+------------------------+----------|
| [2015-06-16 Tue]       | [2015-06-23 Tue]       |        7 |
| <2015-06-13 Sat>       | <2015-06-15 Mon>       |        2 |
| [2015-06-10 Wed 20:00] | [2015-06-17 Wed 08:00] |      6.5 |
#+TBLFM: $3=$2 - $1 

Here’s my previous convoluted way of doing things… =)
—-

I recently wrote about calculating how many doses you need to buy using an Org Mode table. On reflection, it’s easier and more flexible to do that calculation using an Emacs Lisp function instead of writing a function that processes and outputs entire tables.

First, we define a function that calculates the number of days between two dates, including the dates given. I put this in my Emacs config.

(defun my/org-days-between (start end)
  "Number of days between START and END.
This includes START and END."
  (1+ (- (calendar-absolute-from-gregorian (org-date-to-gregorian end))
         (calendar-absolute-from-gregorian (org-date-to-gregorian start)))))

Here’s the revised table. I moved the “Needed” column to the left of the medication type because this makes it much easier to read and confirm.

| Needed | Type         | Per day |      Start |        End | Stock |
|--------+--------------+---------+------------+------------+-------|
|     30 | Medication A |       2 | 2015-06-16 | 2015-06-30 |     0 |
|      2 | Medication B |     0.1 | 2015-06-16 | 2015-06-30 |   0.2 |
#+TBLFM: @2$1..@>$1='(ceiling (- (* (my/org-days-between $4 $5) (string-to-number $3)) (string-to-number $6)))

C-c C-c on the #+TBLFM: line updates the values in column 1.

@2$1..@>$1 means the cells from the second row (@2) to the last row (@>) in the first column ($1).  '  tells Org to evaluate the following expression as Emacs Lisp, substituting the values as specified ($4 is the fourth column’s value, etc.).

The table formula calculates the value of the first column (Needed) based on how many you need per day, the dates given (inclusive), and how much you already have in stock. It rounds numbers up by using the ceiling function.

Because this equation uses the values from each row, the start and end date must be filled in for all rows. To quickly duplicate values downwards, set org-table-copy-increment to nil, then use S-return (shift-return) in the table cell you want to copy. Keep typing S-return to copy more.

This treats the calculation inputs as strings, so I used string-to-number to convert some of them to numbers for multiplication and subtraction. If you were only dealing with numbers, you can convert them automatically by using the ;N flag, like this:

| Needed | Type         | Per day | Days | Stock |
|--------+--------------+---------+------+-------|
|      6 | Medication A |       2 |    3 |     0 |
|      1 | Medication B |     0.1 |    3 |   0.2 |
#+TBLFM: @2$1..@>$1='(ceiling (- (* $3 $4) $5)));N

Continuous integration and code coverage for Emacs packages with Travis and Coveralls

Posted: - Modified: | emacs, elisp

Do you maintain an Emacs package hosted on Github? Would you like to get those confidence-building, bragging-rights-granting, other-developers-inspiring build: passing and coverage: 100% badges into your README file?

It turns out that this is pretty easy with ERT, Cask, Travis CI, undercover.el, and Coveralls.io.

  1. Log on to Travis and enable continuous integration for your repository.
  2. Log on to Coveralls.io and enable coverage testing for your repository.
  3. Set up a git branch, since you'll probably be making lots of small commits while you smooth out the testing workflow.
  4. Define your tests with ERT. See https://github.com/abo-abo/tiny/blob/master/tiny-test.el for an example. For undercover support, you'll want to include something like:
    (when (require 'undercover nil t)
      (undercover "tiny.el"))
    
  5. Define your dependencies with Cask. Include undercover. For example, here's a simple Cask file:
    (source gnu)
    (source melpa)
    
    (development
      (depends-on "undercover"))
    
  6. Add a .travis.yml that specifies how to test your package on Travis. For example, see this .travis.yml and Makefile.
  7. Commit and push.
  8. Check your repository status in Travis to see if it ran properly.
  9. Check your coverage status in Coveralls.io to see if it displayed properly.
  10. Get the badge code from Travis and Coveralls, and add them to your README (probably using Markdown). You can get the badge code from Travis by clicking on your build status badge next to your repository name. Coveralls has prominent instructions for getting your badge. Yay!

Incidentally, if you want to see your test coverage locally, you can (require 'testcover) and then use testcover-this-defun or testcover-start to instrument the macros and functions for coverage. Run your tests, then use testcover-mark-all to look at the results. See the documentation in testcover.el to find out what the coloured overlays mean. Edebug has a test coverage tool too, so you can explore that one if you prefer it.

Additional notes on testing:

Resources:

Read Lisp, Tweak Emacs (Beginner 4/4): “How can I add more features? How do I deal with errors?”

Posted: - Modified: | elisp, emacs, elisp

Previous module: “How can I make things more convenient?”

Some conventions we'll use:

  • Inline code will be boxed and monospace in the HTML version and generally surrounded by equal signs in plain text.
  • Code samples will be monospace and in boxes in the HTML version, and enclosed in #+begin_src#+end_src in plain text. Example:
    (message "Hello world")
    

After this module, you'll be able to:

  • load libraries so that you can add new features or set configuration variables
  • install and configure packages in order to add more features to your Emacs
  • understand and fix common errors
  • learn more! =)

Adding more features to Emacs

Most Emacs libraries are not loaded automatically. This saves memory and keeps things simpler. Some of the customizations you may want to make require that other parts of Emacs are loaded first. For example, if you want to define a key for the c-mode-map (used for editing C code) or add a function to org-mode-hook (called when a buffer is set up with Org Mode), those libraries need to be loaded first. You can load libraries by using require, like this:

(require 'org)

This loads the org library. require looks for a file named after the name provided to it, loads it, and double-checks that the library includes (provide 'feature-name-goes-here). It signals a Cannot open load file error if the library is not found. If the library exists but does not provide that symbol, you'll get a Required feature FEATURE was not provided error instead.

Note that the symbol you give to require might not be the same as the function you call. For example, c-mode is actually defined in the cc-mode library, while org-mode is defined in org. To find out what file a function is defined in, use C-h f (describe-function) followed by the name of the function. The first line will tell you what file the function is defined in, if any. For example, c-mode‘s definition starts with:

c-mode is an interactive autoloaded compiled Lisp function in
`cc-mode.el'.

The first part of the filename (before the .el or .elc) is usually what you would use with require. If you have the source installed (the .el file), you can look for the (provide ...) expression to find the actual symbol to use.

Installing packages

Emacs comes with a lot of code, but there are even more packages out there. When you read other people's Emacs configurations, you might come across other interesting packages to try out.

Sometimes people don't indicate which packages they use, so you have to guess the package name based on the function. For example, (global-auto-complete-mode) turns on a completion mode called auto-complete-mode in all buffers. Before you can use this, you will need to install the auto-complete package. In general, you can find package names by looking at functions that include mode in their name, removing global, turn-on, and other prefixes as needed.

The default package repository in Emacs 24 has a limited number of packages. For more choices, you may want to add another repository such as MELPA or Marmalade Here's the code that you would run in order to add these repositories to your Emacs:

(require 'package)
(add-to-list 'package-archives '("melpa" . "http://melpa.milkbox.net/packages/"))
(add-to-list 'package-archives '("marmalade" . "http://marmalade-repo.org/packages/"))

Note that MELPA includes many packages under active development. If you prefer to install only the packages marked as stable, replace the MELPA line with this:

(add-to-list 'package-archives '("melpa-stable" . "http://hiddencameras.milkbox.net/packages/"))

If you're connected to the Internet, use M-x package-refresh-contents to update the list of packages. Use M-x package-list-packages to list the available packages. RET displays the package's description. i marks the current package for installation, and x actually performs the operations. If you know the name of the package you want to install, you can skip the list and use M-x package-install instead.

A lightweight list of the key functions defined by packages is loaded after your init.el is run. You can start that initialization earlier by adding (package-initialize), which is useful if you want to call functions that are defined in packages.

Sometimes people want to install some packages on one computer but not on another. Here's some code that runs some configuration if the miniedit package can be loaded, but silently continues if the package has not been installed.

(when (require 'miniedit nil t)
   (miniedit-install)
   (define-key minibuffer-local-map (kbd "C-c e") 'miniedit))

If you use C-h f (describe-function) on require, you'll see that it has one required argument (feature) and two optional arguments (filename, noerror). require returns non-nil (or true) if the library was loaded, so if the library exists, then the rest of the code inside the when expression gets called.

Along those lines, you may come across code that looks like this:

(eval-after-load "dash" 
  '(dash-enable-font-lock))

This runs (dash-enable-font-lock) only after dash is loaded. It does not automatically load dash. You'll see this when people have configuration that they want to run only if something is loaded, which can make sense for performance reasons. When you're starting out, you may want to use require instead of eval-after-load, since the argument to eval-after-load has to be quoted.

Other Emacs Lisp files

Some files are not yet available as packages. If you search for the function, you'll probably find a webpage with an .el file. You can save those to your computer and load them with:

(load "/path/to/file")

You can also use this technique to split up your Emacs configuration file into smaller files. For example, you might have an org-config.el file, a programming-config.el file, and so forth. If you would like to load a host-specific file only if it exists, you can take advantage of the optional NOERROR argument for load like this:

(load (concat "~/.emacs.d/" (system-name) ".el") t)

Want to find out what that filename is? Position your cursor after the ​".el") and use C-x C-e (eval-last-sexp) to see the value in the buffer.

Use C-h f (describe-function) to learn more about the load function, including other arguments you can pass to it.

If you would like to use the require syntax to load files only if they haven't already been loaded, you can do that as long as they include the (provide ...) expression somewhere. First, you'll need to add your downloaded Emacs Lisp file to the load-path with something like this.

(add-to-list 'load-path "/path/to/dir/with/el/files")

Then you can use require to load the Emacs Lisp code if it exists.

(require 'feature-name)

“Oh no! I have an error!”

Part of learning Emacs is having the confidence to experiment, which you can develop by learning how to recognize and deal with different errors.

If you've already added the code to your ~/.emacs.d/init.el, you can start Emacs with emacs --debug-init to display debugging messages, or you can start Emacs with emacs -q to skip your personal configuration. Before reporting a bug with Emacs or with a package, use emacs -q (or emacs -Q, which skips site-wide configuration as well) to see if it works as intended without your personal configuration.

To make it easier to find errors while Emacs is running, use M-x toggle-debug-on-error, then do whatever you did to trigger the error. You will probably see a detailed list of functions called in the *Messages* buffer. If you find this useful, you can enable this by default in your ~/.emacs.d/init.el. Add:

(setq debug-on-error t)

If you have code that takes a while, you might find the debug-on-quit variable or the M-x toggle-debug-on-quit function useful as well. You can quit a long-running operation by using C-g (keyboard-quit).

You can narrow down the source of the problem by progressively commenting out more and more of the code. Make sure you comment out balanced sets of parentheses. To comment a region, select it and use M-x comment-region. You can use M-x uncomment-region to uncomment it. M-x comment-dwim (do what I mean) guesses whether you want to comment or uncomment something, and has the handy keyboard shortcut M-;.

Here are some common error messages and how you can try fixing them. If you don't see the error you're struggling with here, ask the relevant mailing list, help-gnu-emacs, the #emacs channel on irc.freenode.net, or StackOverflow for help. Good luck!

Scan error: “Unbalanced parentheses” or “Containing expression ends prematurely”

You may have pasted in something that has a “(” but no matching “)“, which results in unbalanced parentheses. Alternatively, you may have pasted in something that has “)” but no “(“, which results in a premature end. You can use M-x check-parens to quickly check for mismatched parentheses, or try reading the code carefully in order to find the mismatched pair. You can also use C-M-f (forward-sexp) and C-M-b (backward-sexp) to navigate by complete expressions until you find the specific one that causes the error.

Cannot open load file: …

The code is trying to require or load a file that Emacs can't find.

  • Have you installed the appropriate package? Use M-x list-packages to see if it has been packaged into a form that's easy to install. You may need to add other sources to your package-archives to see a wider range of packages.
  • Have you downloaded it manually and added it to your load-path? See the notes on load-path for more details.
  • If you're using load, does the file exist?

Lisp error: (void-function …)

The code calls a function that has not been defined.

  • Have you installed the appropriate package? Look at the function name and try to guess the name of the package. People usually start the function name with the package name in order to make the function names unique. Use M-x list-packages to see the available packages. You may need to add other sources to your package-archives to see a wider range of packages.
  • If you downloaded the library manually, load or require it.
  • If you're copying some code that isn't packaged in a library, check if there are any defun (define function) expressions that you forgot to copy. Make sure to include and evaluate those.

Symbol's value as variable is void: _

The code is trying to get the value of a variable that has not yet been set. See if there's other code that you need to evaluate first in order to set up those variables. If the expression involves add-to-list or add-hook, you may need to use require to load the library that defines that list or hook first.

You might also get this if you're using C-x C-e (eval-last-sexp) to evaluate an expression that's inside let or other things that create variables. When you're starting out, make sure you use C-x C-e (eval-last-sexp) after the outermost set of parentheses.

I'm using C-x C-e (eval-last-sexp) and I don't get the results I expected

Make sure you call C-x C-e after the outermost ) for the expression you want to evaluate.

(ido-mode 1)
            ^
            |
            +---- Your cursor should be here

If the code you're looking at has multiple expressions, you'll need to call C-x C-e after each of them. It might be easier to select the region and use M-x eval-region, or evaluate the entire buffer with M-x eval-buffer. Alternatively, use M-x ielm to evaluate the code instead.

Again, if you don't see the error you're struggling with here, ask the relevant mailing list, help-gnu-emacs, the #emacs channel on irc.freenode.net, or StackOverflow for help. Good luck!

Wrapping up the beginner course

I hope that this course has helped you become more comfortable with reading and tweaking Emacs Lisp configuration code from blog posts, wiki pages, and other resources. There's much more to learn, of course. With describe-function, describe-variable, and the ability to quickly experiment with Emacs Lisp code without restarting Emacs all the time, I'm sure you'll get the hang of it! If you'd like to review or refer to this course, you can get it as one page at http://emacslife.com/how-to-read-emacs-lisp.html .

Check out An Introduction to Programming in Emacs Lisp, and delve into the Emacs Lisp Reference Manual for more details. Both are available within Emacs as Info manuals, which you can read with C-h i (info). Look for the Emacs Lisp Intro and Elisp entries, and browse through those manuals for more details. To search the current info manuals, type s (Info-search). To search all info manuals, use M-x info-apropos.

If you liked this or you have other questions, please get in touch – sacha@sachachua.com. I'd love to hear from you, and I'm happy to help with other Emacs questions you may have. Good luck and have fun!

More links:

Read Lisp Tweak Emacs (Beginner 3/4): How can I make things more convenient?

Posted: - Modified: | elisp, emacs, elisp

“How can I customize Emacs to make things more convenient?”

After this module, you'll be able to:

  • define your own keyboard shortcuts so that you can call functions more easily
  • work with custom functions that other people have defined in their configurations
  • copy and use anonymous functions

Keyboard shortcuts

The default keyboard shortcuts (or “keybindings”) can be difficult to remember, and many useful functions don't have any keyboard shortcuts at all. People often set up their own keyboard shortcuts to make other commands easier to use. There are different ways to assign keys depending on where you want the keybinding to be available.

Setting keybindings in all buffers

You can assign a key to a function globally, which means that it will be available in buffers of any type if there are no mode maps or local keybindings that override it. (Mode maps are set by major modes like emacs-lisp-mode or minor modes like auto-fill-mode.) Setting a global keybinding is usually done with global-set-key, although sometimes you'll see it done with define-key and global-map.

You can use global-set-key interactively by calling it with M-x global-set-key. Type the keyboard shortcut you would like to set, then specify the name of the function you would like Emacs to call. Note that the function must be interactive – that is, it must be something you can call with M-x and it should include (interactive ...) in its definition. For example, try M-x global-set-key, then press <f10>, and assign it to save-buffer. After you do that, you should be able to press <f10> to save the current buffer.

If you like a keybinding that you've interactively set, use C-x ESC ESC (repeat-complex-command) to see the Emacs Lisp code for it. You can copy and paste that into your configuration. For example, setting the keybinding above will result in:

(global-set-key [f10] (quote save-buffer))

You can also write keybindings from scratch. For example, the code below redefines the Return key (or the Enter key) so that it calls the newline-and-indent function by default.

(global-set-key (kbd "RET") 'newline-and-indent)

Remember, ​'newline-and-indent and (quote newline-and-indent) are the same thing – they both refer to the name of a thing (a function, in this case) instead of its value.

(global-set-key (kbd "C-+") 'text-scale-increase)
(global-set-key (kbd "C--") 'text-scale-decrease)

These set C-+ (Ctrl and <plus>) and C-- (Ctrl and <minus>) to increase and decrease the font size when you're running Emacs in a graphical environment.

If you want to set a keyboard shortcut only in particular modes or types of files, jump ahead to Setting keybindings in a particular mode.

What does kbd do? How can I figure out which key it sets?

If you've gone through the Emacs Tutorial (Help – Emacs Tutorial or C-h t), you'll be familiar with many of the conventions used for writing keyboard shortcuts. C- stands for the Ctrl key, M- stands for the Meta key (which is probably Alt or Option on your keyboard). There are other prefixes as well. S- is for Shift, H- is for Hyper, and s- is for Super. Some people use operating system tools (such as setxkbmap for Linux) to change keys on their keyboard to Super or Hyper in order to enable even more keyboard shortcuts.

Uppercase or lowercase depends on the character in the shortcut. C-x means Control + x, while C-X is actually Control + Shift + X. You can also specify shift by adding S-, so C-X and C-S-x are the same.

In addition, there are some special characters: RET, SPC, TAB, and ESC must be written in uppercase to mean the special keys they refer to. (There's also LFD and NUL, but you're probably not going to encounter those as often.) You can use angle brackets to refer to some other keys, like <return>, <up>, <down>, <left>, <right>. Function keys are written like this: <f1>.

There are different ways to specify the key. Many people use (kbd ...) because it makes bindings easy to read.

(global-set-key (kbd "M-/") 'hippie-expand)

This is the same as

(global-set-key "\M-/" 'hippie-expand)

or

(global-set-key [?\M-/] 'hippie-expand)

You can use ^ to mean Control, so

(global-set-key (kbd "C-s") 'isearch-forward-regexp)

is the same as either of these lines:

(global-set-key "\C-s" 'isearch-forward-regexp)
(global-set-key (kbd "^s") 'isearch-forward-regexp)

but C- is probably easier to read.

When you use kbd, whitespace doesn't usually matter, but it's easier to read if you use space to separate the keys to type. For more information about the syntax used by kbd, see C-h f (describe-function) for kbd, then follow the link to the documentation for edmacro-mode.

In general, you can use C-h k (describe-key) followed by a keyboard shortcut to see if it's already bound, and if so, what function it calls. If you type C-h k and the key you're interested in, and Emacs is still waiting for another key, then you're probably looking at a prefix key. For example, C-x is a prefix key that's used in keyboard shortcuts like C-x C-e (eval-last-sexp).

Multi-key shortcuts

You can set up keybindings that use more than one key combination. This is a popular technique since you can only have so many short keybindings. For example, the following code changes C-x C-b to call ibuffer, which lists your buffers and makes it easy to jump to another buffer.

(global-set-key (kbd "C-x C-b") 'ibuffer)

You don't have to start with C-c or C-x. Consider using one of your function keys like <f9> as the start of your keyboard shortcuts. Then you can create shortcuts that don't involve using Ctrl, Alt, or other modifier keys. For example:

(global-set-key (kbd "<f9> b") 'ibuffer)

Read other people's configurations to get a sense of useful commands and handy keyboard shortcuts. By convention, shortcuts like C-c followed by a lowercase or uppercase letter are reserved for your use, as are the function keys <f5> to <f9>. Other keyboard shortcuts are likely to already be defined by modes. You can override them if you want.

Some people like using a function key followed by letters in order to minimize the need to press Control or Meta. For example, you might use:

(global-set-key (kbd "C-c r") 'query-replace)

or

(global-set-key (kbd "<f9> r") 'query-replace)

to make it easier to replace strings. You can even bind it to both shortcuts.

Binding keys to other keys

In addition to setting keyboard shortcuts for functions, you can also define keys to expand to a longer sequence of keystrokes. You can use this for inserting strings or calling keyboard macros. For example:

(global-set-key (kbd "<f7> e") "you@example.com")
(global-set-key (kbd "<f7> w") "http://example.com")
(global-set-key (kbd "<f7> u") (kbd "C-x C-s"))

These might be handy for quickly inserting your e-mail address or website.

Dealing with errors: “Key sequence __ starts with non-prefix key _

If you want to create a multi-key shortcut, the preceding keys must not already be assigned to functions. For example, if you want M-t l to call transpose-lines, you'll need to get rid of M-t‘s default binding to transpose-words first. To unset a key, bind it to nil or use global-unset-key. Here's a group of shortcuts you can try.

(global-set-key (kbd "M-t") nil) ;; Remove the old keybinding
(global-set-key (kbd "M-t c") 'transpose-chars)
(global-set-key (kbd "M-t w") 'transpose-words)
(global-set-key (kbd "M-t t") 'transpose-words)
(global-set-key (kbd "M-t M-t") 'transpose-words)
(global-set-key (kbd "M-t l") 'transpose-lines)
(global-set-key (kbd "M-t e") 'transpose-sexps)
(global-set-key (kbd "M-t s") 'transpose-sentences)
(global-set-key (kbd "M-t p") 'transpose-paragraphs)

The example above has three bindings for transpose-words. M-t w uses the mnemonic of t-ranspose w-ords. M-t t is similar to the original binding for transpose-words, which was M-t. M-t M-t may seem like overkill, but sometimes you'll find it easier to hold the Meta key down and hit t twice quickly instead of typing M-t, releasing Meta, and then typing t. As you read other people's keybindings, you'll get a sense of how people have configured their keyboard shortcuts to speed up typing and minimize thinking.

Setting keybindings in a particular mode

Sometimes you want keys to do different things in different types of files. Modes are how Emacs changes behaviour based on context. For example, Java files use java-mode, Org files use org-mode, and so forth. In addition to the major mode for a buffer, you may have several minor modes that modify the behaviour. Each mode has a keybinding map (or a “keymap”). You can assign a key in a mode map, which means it will override global keybindings in buffers with that mode. You can do this with define-key if you know the name of the keymap you want to change, which is generally the name of the mode + -map. For example:

(define-key emacs-lisp-mode-map (kbd "C-c f") 'find-function)

changes the C-c f keyboard shortcut to find-function (which jumps to the definition of a function), but only in Emacs Lisp buffers.

Note that if you use define-key with a mode map, the mode must already be loaded by the time this code is run. That's why you'll often see this after a require (which loads the code) or inside an eval-after-load (which postpones the code until after the mode is loaded). See Adding more features to Emacs for information on loading packages and adding new functions to Emacs.

Other ways people bind keys

The bind-key package provides a function that makes it easier to see your personal keybindings, but bind-key is not part of Emacs by default. I use bind-key a lot in my configuration. The syntax is similar to global-set-key, except it automatically wraps the keyboard shortcut string in kbd. It also keeps track of which keyboard shortcuts you've overridden so that you can use M-x describe-personal-keybindings to review them.

(bind-key "C-+" 'text-scale-increase)
(bind-key "C--" 'text-scale-decrease)

You'll need to install and use the bind-key package before you can use that code.

Because keybinding is something that lots of people do to customize their Emacs, you may find other ways that people have simplified writing keybindings for themselves. When in doubt, use C-h f (describe-function) to explore how something works. If the function can't be found, see if it's in a package somewhere, or search the Web for more information.

For more about keybindings, see the Emacs manual and this Mastering Emacs post on keybindings.

Defuns – function definitions

In addition to the functions built into Emacs or available in packages, many people define their own with the defun function.

People often distinguish custom functions by starting them with my/ or their initials. This makes it easier to tell which functions they've customized and which ones are part of a package. It also minimizes the risk of accidentally overriding a function defined elsewhere. You can change the name of a function as long as you make sure you change the name wherever it's called, such as in keyboard shortcuts, hooks, or other functions.

For example, here's a custom function from Jorgan Schaefer's config:

(defun fc/kill-to-beginning-of-line ()
  "Kill from the beginning of the line to point."
  (interactive)
  (kill-region (point-at-bol) (point)))

This creates a function called fc/kill-to-beginning-of-line. () is the argument list. Since it doesn't contain anything, that means this function does not take arguments. ​"Kill from the beginning of the line to point."​ is a documentation string (or docstring) that describes what the function does. Docstrings are optional, but highly recommended. (interactive) means that this can be called with M-x (execute-extended-command) or bound to a keyboard shortcut.

If a function does not have the (interactive) keyword, you won't be able to call it with M-x or assign it to a keyboard shortcut, but you will still be able to write Emacs Lisp code that calls the function. This means M-x (execute-extended-command) lists only the commands that people will probably find useful while working directly with Emacs, skipping internal functions used by code.

Once you've defined a custom function, you can bind it to a keyboard shortcut if you want. The code below binds the fc/kill-to-beginning-of-line function to C-c C-u:

(global-set-key (kbd "C-c C-u") 'fc/kill-to-beginning-of-line)

You will often see custom functions added to hooks. A hook is a list of functions that's called by some other code. Modes usually define a hook that's called after the mode is initialized so that you can further customize its behaviours. For example, emacs-lisp-mode has an associated emacs-lisp-mode-hook which is run when a buffer is set up in Emacs Lisp Mode. You can add built-in functions or custom functions to hooks, and they'll be run when that hook is called.

People sometimes use hook functions to set up keybindings instead of using define-key. For example, this code:

(add-hook 'emacs-lisp-mode-hook 'turn-on-eldoc-mode)
(define-key emacs-lisp-mode-map (kbd "C-c f") 'find-function)

can also be written as:

(defun my/set-up-emacs-lisp-shortcuts ()
  "Set up some conveniences for Emacs Lisp."
  (turn-on-eldoc-mode)
  (local-set-key (kbd "C-c f") 'find-function))
(add-hook 'emacs-lisp-mode-hook 'my/set-up-emacs-lisp-shortcuts)

Lambdas – anonymous functions

Sometimes people just want to create a keyboard binding or process some data without defining a new function. lambda creates an anonymous function, which is a function that doesn't have a name. Here's an example:

(global-set-key (kbd "C-c e") (lambda () (interactive) (find-file "~/.emacs.d/init.el")))

This binds C-c e to an anonymous function. The () means it doesn't take any arguments. (interactive) means it can be called through a keyboard shortcut, although since it's anonymous, it can't be called with M-x. The function opens the ~/.emacs.d/init.el file, which is a handy way to edit your configuration.

  1. Look for an Emacs configuration file that defines keybindings that you're curious about. Install any packages or copy any custom functions needed. Experiment with using those keybindings. Do you like them? Do you want to tweak them further?
  2. Think about how you use Emacs. What kinds of keyboard shortcuts would make your work easier? How can you adapt some of the functions you've read into things that would make them even more convenient for you?
You can find the draft of the complete course at emacslife.com/how-to-read-emacs-lisp.html. Enjoy!