XEmacs FAQ [4/6]


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Subject: Introduction

This is part 4 of the XEmacs Frequently Asked Questions list. This section is devoted to major XEmacs subsystems.

If you have a Web browser, the official hypertext version is at: <URL:http://www.sccon.com/~andreas/xemacs-subsystems.html>, and also at: <URL:http://www.xemacs.org/faq/xemacs-subsystems.html>. This version is much nicer than the unofficial hypertext versions that are archived at Utrecht, Oxford, Smart Pages, and other FAQ archives.

Changes this month:

This file was last modified on Feburary 23, 1998.

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Subject: Roadmap

  1. Introduction, policy, credits.
  2. Installation and Trouble Shooting
  3. Customization and Options
  4. Major Subsystems[You are here]
  5. Miscellaneous
  6. Current Events

4.0 Reading Mail with VM


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Subject: Q4.0.1 How do I set up VM to retrieve mail from a remote site using POP?

Use vm-spool-files, like this for example:
(setq vm-spool-files '("/var/spool/mail/wing"
                       "netcom23.netcom.com:110:pass:wing:MYPASS"))

Of course substitute your actual password for MYPASS.

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Subject: Q4.0.2 How do I get VM to filter mail for me?

One possibility is to use procmail to split your mail before it gets to VM. I prefer this personally, since there are many strange and wonderful things one can do with procmail. Procmail may be found at <URL:ftp://ftp.informatik.rwth-aachen.de/pub/packages/procmail/>.

Also see the Mail Filtering FAQ at:
<:URL:http://www.cis.ohio-state.edu/hypertext/faq/usenet/mail/filtering-faq/faq.html>.

Another possibility is to check out Gnus 5. Gnus 5 has mail splitting capability, and can use VM as a mail reading backend.

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Subject: Q4.0.3 How can I get VM to automatically (asynchronously) check for and retrieve new mail every so often?

John Turner <turner@lanl.gov> writes:
Use the following:
(setq vm-auto-get-new-mail 60)

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Subject: Q4.0.4 [Tis question intentionally left blank]

Obsolete question, left blank to avoid renumbering.

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Subject: Q4.0.5 How do I get my outgoing mail archived?

(setq mail-archive-file-name "~/outbox")

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Subject: Q4.0.6 I have various addresses at which I receive mail. How can I tell VM to ignore them when doing a "reply-all"?

Set vm-reply-ignored-addresses to a list, like
(setq vm-reply-ignored-addresses '("wing@netcom[0-9]*.netcom.com"
				   "wing@netcom.com" "wing@666.com"))

Note that each string is a regular expression.

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Subject: Q4.0.7 Is there a mailing list or FAQ for VM?

A FAQ for VM exists at <URL:http://www.cyberpass.net/~gorkab/vmfaq.htm>.

VM has its own newsgroup: gnu.emacs.vm.info.

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Subject: Q4.0.8 Remote Mailreading with VM

My mailbox lives at the office on a big honkin server. My regular INBOX lives on my honkin desktop machine. I now can PPP to the office from home which is far from honking... I'd like to be able to read mail at home without storing it here and I'd like to use xemacs and VM at home... Is there a recommended setup?

Joseph J. Nuspl Jr. <nuspl@nvwls.cc.purdue.edu> writes:

There are several ways to do this.

  1. Set your display to your home machine and run dxpc or one of the other X compressors.
  2. NFS mount your desktop machine on your home machine and modify your pop command on your home machine to rsh to your desktop machine and actually do the pop get's.
  3. Run a POP server on your desktop machine as well and do a sort of two tiered POP get.

William Perry <wmperry@monolith.spry.com> adds:

Or you could run a pop script periodically on your desktop machine, and just use ange-ftp or NFS to get to your mailbox. I used to do this all the time back at IU.

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Subject: Q4.0.9 rmail or VM gets an error incorporating new mail

From the XEmacs PROBLEMS file:

Rmail and VM get new mail from /usr/spool/mail/$USER using a program called movemail. This program interlocks with /bin/mail using the protocol defined by /bin/mail.

There are two different protocols in general use. One of them uses the flock system call. The other involves creating a lock file; movemail must be able to write in /usr/spool/mail in order to do this. You control which one is used by defining, or not defining, the macro MAIL_USE_FLOCK in config.h or the m- or s- file it includes. IF YOU DON'T USE THE FORM OF INTERLOCKING THAT IS NORMAL ON YOUR SYSTEM, YOU CAN LOSE MAIL!

If your system uses the lock file protocol, and fascist restrictions prevent ordinary users from writing the lock files in /usr/spool/mail, you may need to make `movemail' setgid to a suitable group such as `mail'. To do this, use the following commands (as root) after doing the make install.

        chgrp mail movemail
        chmod 2755 movemail
Installation normally copies movemail from the build directory to an installation directory which is usually under /usr/local/lib. The installed copy of movemail is usually in the directory /usr/local/lib/emacs/VERSION/TARGET. You must change the group and mode of the installed copy; changing the group and mode of the build directory copy is ineffective.

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Subject: Q4.0.10 How do I make VM stay in a single frame?

John S Cooper <John.Cooper@Eng.Sun.COM> writes:
; Don't use multiple frames
(setq vm-frame-per-composition nil)
(setq vm-frame-per-folder nil)
(setq vm-frame-per-edit nil)
(setq vm-frame-per-summary nil)

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Subject: Q4.0.11 How do I make VM or mh-e display graphical smilies?

For mh-e use the following:
(add-hook 'mh-show-mode-hook '(lambda () (smiley-region (point-min)
                                                        (point-max))))

For vm use the following:

(require 'messagexmas)
(require 'smiley)
(add-hook 'vm-select-message-hook '(lambda () (smiley-region (point-min)
                                                             (point-max))))

For tm use the following:

(autoload 'smiley-buffer "smiley" nil t)
(add-hook 'mime-viewer/plain-text-preview-hook 'smiley-buffer)

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Subject: Q4.0.12 Customization of VM not covered in the manual, or here

giacomo boffi <boffi@hp735.stru.polimi.it> writes:

The meta-answer is to look into the file vm-vars.el, in the vm directory of the lisp library.

vm-vars.el contains, initializes and carefully describes, with examples of usage, the plethora of user options that fully control VM's behavior.

Enter vm-vars, forward-search for toolbar, find the variables that control the toolbar placement, appearance, existence, copy to your .emacs or .vm and modify according to the detailed instructions.

The above also applies to all the various features of VM: search for some keywords, maybe the first you conjure isn't appropriate, find the appropriate variables, copy and experiment.

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4.1 Web browsing with W3


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Subject: Q4.1.1 What is W3?

An advanced graphical browser written in Emacs lisp that runs on XEmacs. It has full support for cascaded style sheets, and more ... It has a home web page at:

<URL:http://www.cs.indiana.edu/elisp/w3/docs.html>.

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Subject: Q4.1.2 How do I run W3 from behind a firewall?

There is a long, well-written, detailed section in the W3 manual that describes how to do this. Look in the section entitled Firewalls.

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Subject: Q4.1.3 Is it true that W3 supports style sheets and tables? >

Yes, and much more. W3, as distributed with the latest XEmacs is a full-featured web browser.

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4.2 Reading Netnews and Mail with Gnus


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Subject: Q4.2.1 GNUS, (ding) GNUS, Gnus 5, September Gnus, Red Gnus, Mamey Sapote Gnus, argh!

Please see <URL:http://www.ccs.neu.edu/software/gnus/>.

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Subject: Q4.2.2 This question intentionally left blank.

Obsolete question, left blank to avoid renumbering.

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Subject: Q4.2.3 How do I make Gnus stay within a single frame?

The toolbar code to start Gnus opens the new frame--and it's a feature rather than a bug. If you don't like it, but would still like to click on the seemly icon, use the following code:
     (defun toolbar-news ()
       (gnus))
It will redefine the callback function of the icon to just call `gnus', without all the fancy frame stuff. y

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Subject: Q4.2.4 How do I customize the From: line?

How do I change the From: line? I have set gnus-user-from-line to Gail Gurman <gail.gurman@sybase.com>, but XEmacs Gnus doesn't use it. Instead it uses Gail Mara Gurman <gailg@deall> and then complains that it's incorrect. Also, as you perhaps can see, my Message-ID is screwy. How can I change that?

Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen <larsi@aegir.ifi.uio.no> writes:

Set user-mail-address to gail.gurman@sybase.com or mail-host-address to sybase.com.

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4.3 Other Mail & News


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Subject: Q4.3.1 How can I read and/or compose MIME messages?

One answer is tra-vm-mime. You may find it at

<URL:http://lenkkari.cs.tut.fi/~tra/software/tra-vm-mime.el>.

Another possibility is RMIME. You may find RMIME at

<URL:http://www.cinti.net/~rmoody/rmime/index.html>.

You probably want to use the Tools for MIME. See the next question for details.

Trey Jackson <trey@cs.berkeley.edu> has an Emacs & MIME web page at <URL:http://bmrc.berkeley.edu/~trey/emacs/mime.html>.

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Subject: Q4.3.2 What is TM and where do I get it?

TM stands for Tools for MIME and not Tiny MIME. TM integrates with all major XEmacs packages like Gnus (all flavors), VM, MH-E, and mailcrypt. It provides totally transparent and trouble-free MIME support. When appropriate a message will be decoded in place in an XEmacs buffer.

TM was written by MORIOKA Tomohiko <morioka@jaist.ac.jp> and KOBAYASHI Shuhei <shuhei-k@jaist.ac.jp>. It is based on the work of UMEDA Masanobu <umerin@mse.kyutech.ac.jp>, the original writer of GNUS. The following information is from the README.

tm is a MIME package for GNU Emacs. tm has following functions:

tm is available from following anonymous ftp site:
<URL:ftp://ftp.jaist.ac.jp/pub/GNU/elisp/mime/> (Japan)
and its mirrors:
<URL:ftp://ftp.nis.co.jp/pub/gnu/emacs-lisp/tm/> (Japan)
<URL:ftp://ftp.nisiq.net/pub/gnu/emacs-lisp/tm/> (US)
<URL:ftp://ftp.miranova.com/pub/gnus/jaist.ac.jp/> (US)
<URL:ftp://ftp.unicamp.br/pub/mail/mime/tm/> (Brasil)
<URL:ftp://ftp.th-darmstadt.de/pub/editors/GNU-Emacs/lisp/mime/> (Germany)
<URL:ftp://ftp.tnt.uni-hannover.de/pub/editors/xemacs/contrib/> (Germany).

Don't let the installation procedure & instructions stop you from trying this package out -- it's much simpler than it looks, and once installed, trivial to use.

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Subject: Q4.3.3 What's the deal with this movemail program? Why isn't it working?

Ben Wing <ben@666.com> writes:

It wasn't chown'ed/chmod'd correctly.

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Subject: Q4.3.4 Movemail is also distributed by Netscape? Can that cause problems?

Steve Baur <steve@altair.xemacs.org> writes:

Yes. Always use the movemail installed with your XEmacs. Failure to do so can result in lost mail.

Please refer to Jamie Zawinski's <jwz@netscape.com> notes at <URL:http://home.netscape.com/eng/mozilla/2.0/relnotes/demo/movemail.html>. In particular, this document will show you how to make Netscape use the version of movemail configured for your system by the person who built XEmacs.

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Subject: Q4.3.5 Where do I find pstogif (required by tm)?

pstogif is part of the latex2html package.

Jan Vroonhof <vroonhof@math.ethz.ch> writes:

latex2html is best found at the CTAN hosts and their mirrors in tex-archive/support/latex2html.

CTAN hosts are

there is a good mirror at ftp.cdrom.com.

<URL:ftp://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/tex/ctan/support/latex2html/>.

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4.4 SPARCworks and EOS


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Subject: Q4.4.1 What is SPARCworks, EOS, and WorkShop

John Turner <turner@lanl.gov> writes:

SPARCworks is SunSoft's development environment, comprising compilers (C, C++, FORTRAN 77, Fortran 90, Ada, and Pascal), a debugger, and other tools such as TeamWare (for configuration management), MakeTool, etc.

See <URL:http://www.sun.com/sunsoft/Developer-products/products.html> for more info.

EOS stands for Era on SPARCworks, but I don't know what Era stands for.

EOS is the integration of XEmacs with the SPARCworks debugger. It allows one to use an XEmacs frame to view code (complete with fontification, etc.), set breakpoints, print variables, etc., while using the SPARCworks debugger. It works very well and I use it all the time.

Chuck Thompson <cthomp@xemacs.org> writes:

Era stood for Emacs Rewritten Again. It was what we were calling the modified version of Lucid Emacs for Sun when I was dragged, er, allowed to work on this wonderful editor.

Martin Buchholz <Martin.Buchholz@sun.com> writes:

EOS is being replaced with a new graphical development environment called Sun WorkShop, which is currently (07/96) in Alpha Test. For more details, check out

<URL:http://www.sun.com/sunsoft/Products/Developer-products/programs.html>.

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4.5 Energize


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Subject: Q4.5.1 What is/was Energize?

David N Gray <gray@meteor.harlequin.com> writes:

The files in lisp/energize are to enable Emacs to interface with the Energize Programming System, a C and C++ development environment, which was a product of Lucid, Inc. Tragically, Lucid went out of business in 1994, so although Energize is still a great system, if you don't already have it, there isn't any way to get it now. (Unless you happen to be in Japan; INS Engineering may still be selling it there. Tartan bought the rights to sell it in the rest of the world, but never did so.)

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4.6 Infodock


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Subject: Q4.6.1 What is Infodock?

NB: the information in this section is quite dated.

InfoDock is an integrated productivity toolset, mainly aimed at technical people. It is built atop the XEmacs variant of GNU Emacs and so has all of the power of Emacs, but with an easier to use and more comprehensive menu-based user interface. The next section describes how it differs from XEmacs and GNU Emacs from the Free Software Foundation.

The quickest way to get a feel for InfoDock is to browse the InfoDock Manual, especially the section on tools. This will help you decide whether or not to download InfoDock for local use. This manual is available in gzipped Postscript form, alongside the InfoDock distribution. (See below for FTP retrieval instructions.)

InfoDock is aimed at people who want a free, turn-key productivity environment. Although InfoDock is customizable, it is not intended for people who like basic versions of Emacs which need to be customized extensively for local use; standard Emacs distributions are better for such uses. InfoDock is for those people who want a complete, pre-customized environment in one package, which they need not touch more than once or twice a year to update to new revisions.

InfoDock is pre-built for SPARCstations running SunOS V4 or V5 (Solaris). It is intended for use on a color display, although most features will work on monochrome monitors. Simply unpack InfoDock according to the instructions in the ID-INSTALL file and you are ready to run.

The InfoDock Manual is concise, yet sufficient as a user guide for users who have never used an Emacs-type editor before. For users who are already familiar with Emacs, it supplements the information in the GNU Emacs Manual.

InfoDock menus are much more extensive and more mature than standard Emacs menus. Each menu offers a Manual item which displays documentation associated with the menu's functions.

Three types of menubars are provided:

  1. An extensive menubar providing access to global InfoDock commands.
  2. Mode-specific menubars tailored to the current major mode.
  3. A simple menubar for basic editing to help novices get started with InfoDock.

Most modes also include mode-specific popup menus. Additionally, region and rectangle popup menus are included.

InfoDock saves a more extensive set of user options than other Emacs versions.

InfoDock inserts a useful file header in many file types, showing the author, summary, and last modification time of each file. A summary program can then be used to summarize all of the files in a directory, for easy MANIFEST file creation.

Your working set of buffers is automatically saved and restored (if you answer yes to a prompt) between InfoDock sessions.

Refined color choices for code highlighting are provided for both dark and light background display frames.

The C-z key prefix performs frame-based commands which parallel the C-x key prefix for window-based commands.

The Smart Menu system is included for producing command menus on dumb terminals. (InfoDock does not yet run on dumb terminals but will in 1995.)

Lisp libraries are better categorized according to function.

Extensions and improvements to many areas of Emacs are included, such as: paragraph filling, mail reading with Rmail, shell handling, outlining, code highlighting and browsing, and man page browsing.

InfoDock questions, answers and discussion should go to the mail list <URL:mailto:infodock@hub.ucsb.edu>. Use <URL:mailto:infodock-request@hub.ucsb.edu> to be added or removed from the list. Always include your InfoDock version number when sending help requests.

InfoDock is available across the Internet via anonymous FTP. To get it, first move to a directory into which you want the InfoDock archive files placed. We will call this <DIST-DIR>.

   cd <DIST-DIR>

FTP to ftp.xemacs.org

   prompt> ftp ftp.xemacs.org

Login as anonymous with your own <user-id>@<site-name> as a password.

   Name (ftp.xemacs.org): anonymous
   331 Guest login ok, send your complete e-mail address as password.
   Password: -<your-user-id@your-domain>
   230 Guest login ok, access restrictions apply.

Move to the location of the InfoDock archives:

   ftp> cd pub/infodock
Set your transfer mode to binary:
   ftp> bin
   200 Type set to I.

Turn off prompting:

   ftp> prompt
   Interactive mode off.

Retrieve the InfoDock archives that you want, either by using a get <file> for each file you want or by using the following to get a complete distribution, including all binaries:

   ftp> mget ID-INSTALL
   ftp> mget id-*

Close the FTP connection:

   ftp> quit
   221 Goodbye.

Read the ID-INSTALL file which you just retrieved for step-by-step installation instructions.

Note: Hyperbole, the KOutliner, and OO-Browser are included in XEmacs 19.15.

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4.7 Other Unbundled Packages


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Subject: Q4.7.1 What is AucTeX? Where do you get it?

AucTeX is a package written by Per Abrahamsen <abraham@dina.kvl.dk>. The following information is from the README and website.

AUC TeX is an extensible package that supports writing and formatting TeX files for most variants of GNU Emacs. Many different macro packages are supported, including AMS TeX, LaTeX, and TeXinfo.

The most recent version is always available by ftp at

<URL:ftp://sunsite.auc.dk/packages/auctex/auctex.tar.gz>.

In case you don't have access to anonymous ftp, you can get it by an email request to <URL:mailto:ftpmail@decwrl.dec.com>.

WWW users may want to check out the AUC TeX page at

<URL:http://sunsite.auc.dk/auctex/>.

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Subject: Q4.7.2 Are there any Emacs Lisp Spreadsheets?

Yes. Check out dismal (which stands for Dis' Mode Ain't Lotus) at <URL:ftp://cs.nyu.edu/pub/local/fox/dismal/>.

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Subject: Q4.7.3 Byte compiling AucTeX on XEmacs 19.14

Georges Brun-Cottan <bruncott@dormeur.inria.fr> writes:

You must use the command

xemacs -batch -l lpath.el
when byte compiling auxtex-9.4g.

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Subject: Q4.7.4 Problems installing AucTeX

Jan Vroonhof <vroonhof@math.ethz.ch> writes:

AucTeX works fine on both stock Emacs and XEmacs has been doing so for a very very long time. This is mostly due to the work of Per Abrahamsen <abraham@dina.kvl.dk> (clap clap) in particular his easymenu package. Which leads to what is probably the problem ...

Most problems with AucTeX are one of two things:

  1. The TeX-lisp-directory in tex-site.el and the makefile don't match

    Fix: make sure you configure AucTeX properly before installing

  2. You have an old version of easymenu.el in your path

    Fix: use locate-library and remove old versions to make sure it only finds the one that came with XEmacs.


This FAQ is Copyright © 1998 by various people and edited by Andreas Kaempf. Please send comments, and suggestions to Andreas Kaempf <andreas@sccon.com>.

<= Part 3  Part 5 =>