tr37ion / revive

Resume Emacs - save current editing status/session including window splitting

What is 'revive'?

Revive.el saves current editing status including the window splitting configuration, which can't be recovered by 'desktop.el' nor by 'saveconf.el', into a file and reconstructs that status correctly.

Installation

Put revive.el into your elisp directory included in load-path and write the next expressions.

(autoload 'save-current-configuration "revive" "Save status" t)
(autoload 'resume "revive" "Resume Emacs" t)
(autoload 'wipe "revive" "Wipe Emacs" t)

And define favorite keys to those functions. Here is a sample.

(define-key ctl-x-map "S" 'save-current-configuration)
(define-key ctl-x-map "F" 'resume)
(define-key ctl-x-map "K" 'wipe)

How to use

Call 'save-current-configuration' with C-x S if you define key as above) when you want to save current editing status and call 'resume' to restore it. Numerical prefix arg to them specifies the buffer number in which the editing status will be saved.

Sample Operations

C-u 2 C-x ;save status into the buffer #2
C-u 3 C-x F;load status from the buffer #3

Save Variables

Revive.el can save global or local variables. The default variables to be saved are in revive:save-variables-global-default and revive:save-variables-local-default. If you want to save other global/local variables, define them in revive:save-variables-global-private or revive:save-variables-local-private in a form of a list. If you are using 'gmhist', the next expression in ~/.emacs is useful.

(setq revive:save-variables-global-private
  '(file-history buffer-history minibuffer-history))

Restoring abnormal buffers

The variable revive:major-mode-command-alist-default holds the list of major-mode name vs. command name. For example, mh-rmail command sees the directory ~/Mail/inbox/ and sets the major-mode to 'mh-folder-mode. And gnus command sets the major-mode to 'gnus-Group-mode. If you want to define other relations between major-mode and command, set the user variable revive:major-mode-command-alist-private as follows:

(setq revive:major-mode-command-alist-private
  '((your-own-mode. your-own)
   (foo-mode. foo)
   ("*Hanoi*". hanoi)

it tells revive.el to execute the corresponding command when the saved configuration has the buffer with that major-mode. To know the major-mode of a certain buffer, type M-ESC' and major-mode CR'. And as you see above, buffer-name string can be used instead of major-mode symbol.

For other special modes that cannot be resumed by executing certain function, define a function to resume and declare it in the variable revive:major-mode-command-alist-private. In that function, the following values are available.

(revive:prop-file-name x)   ;file name
(revive:prop-buffer-name x) ;buffer name
(revive:prop-major-mode x)  ;major-mode
(revive:prop-point x)       ;(point)
(revive:prop-mark x)        ;(mark)
(revive:prop-varlist x)     ;alist of pairs of (var . val)

For programmers

This program provides two powerful functions:

• current-window-configuration-printable
• restore-window-configuration

When you want to save a screen your program manages into a file, and restore it, save the return value of current-window- configuration-printable, and read and give it to restore-window- configuration.

Sample

• To save: (insert (prin1-to-string (current-window-configuration-printable)))
• To restore: (restore-window-configuration (read (current-buffer)))

Since set-window-configuration cannot set the configuration of other frame, the program as below should be useful.

Sample

(defun frame-copy-configuration (nth)

• Copy confinguration of current frame to NTH next frame.

  (let ((config (current-window-configuration-printable))) (other-frame nth) (restore-window-configuration config)))

Copying

This program is distributed as a free software. The author is not responsible for any possible defects caused by this software.

Notes

Comments and bug reports are welcome. Don't hesitated to report. My possible e-mail address is following:

[email protected]

Origin

http://www.gentei.org/~yuuji/software/revive.el