comparison man/mule.texi @ 37584:9a7fd51a92b3

(International): Add an overview of Mule features, with pointers to detailed description. (Enabling Multibyte): Describe how to switch a unibyte session to multibyte. Mention that by default, all sessions are multibyte. (Coding Systems): Make it clear that cpNNN are coding systems, and should be used as such. (Recognize Coding): Explain that Emacs decodes text as part of reading it. Mention revert-buffer as a means to redecode a file.

37583:313d4c5de5ca

``MULti-lingual Enhancement to GNU Emacs'')

  Emacs also supports various encodings of these characters used by
other internationalized software, such as word processors and mailers.

@menu
* International Intro::     Basic concepts of multibyte characters.
* Enabling Multibyte::      Controlling whether to use multibyte characters.
* Language Environments::   Setting things up for the language you use.
* Input Methods::           Entering text characters not on your keyboard.

@end ignore

@node Enabling Multibyte
@section Enabling Multibyte Characters

  You can enable or disable multibyte character support, either for
Emacs as a whole, or for a single buffer.  When multibyte characters are
disabled in a buffer, then each byte in that buffer represents a
character, even codes 0200 through 0377.  The old features for
supporting the European character sets, ISO Latin-1 and ISO Latin-2,

  However, there is no need to turn off multibyte character support to
use ISO Latin; the Emacs multibyte character set includes all the
characters in these character sets, and Emacs can translate
automatically to and from the ISO codes.

  To edit a particular file in unibyte representation, visit it using
@code{find-file-literally}.  @xref{Visiting}.  To convert a buffer in
multibyte representation into a single-byte representation of the same
characters, the easiest way is to save the contents in a file, kill the

@vindex default-enable-multibyte-characters
  To turn off multibyte character support by default, start Emacs with
the @samp{--unibyte} option (@pxref{Initial Options}), or set the
environment variable @env{EMACS_UNIBYTE}.  You can also customize
@code{enable-multibyte-characters} or, equivalently, directly set the
variable @code{default-enable-multibyte-characters} in your init file to
have basically the same effect as @samp{--unibyte}.

@cindex Lisp files, and multibyte operation
@cindex multibyte operation, and Lisp files
@cindex unibyte operation, and Lisp files
@cindex init file, and non-ASCII characters

language name.  Some coding systems are used for several languages;
their names usually start with @samp{iso}.  There are also special
coding systems @code{no-conversion}, @code{raw-text} and
@code{emacs-mule} which do not convert printing characters at all.

  A special class of coding systems, collectively known as
@dfn{codepages}, is designed to support text encoded by MS-Windows and
MS-DOS software.  To use any of these systems, you need to create it
with @kbd{M-x codepage-setup}.  @xref{MS-DOS and MULE}.

  In addition to converting various representations of non-ASCII
characters, a coding system can perform end-of-line conversion.  Emacs
handles three different conventions for how to separate lines in a file:
newline, carriage-return linefeed, and just carriage-return.

the usual three variants to specify the kind of end-of-line conversion.

@node Recognize Coding
@section Recognizing Coding Systems

  Most of the time, Emacs can recognize which coding system to use for
any given file---once you have specified your preferences.

  Some coding systems can be recognized or distinguished by which byte
sequences appear in the data.  However, there are coding systems that
cannot be distinguished, not even potentially.  For example, there is no
way to distinguish between Latin-1 and Latin-2; they use the same byte

overrides @samp{-*-coding:-*-} tags in the file itself.  Emacs uses this
feature for tar and archive files, to prevent Emacs from being confused
by a @samp{-*-coding:-*-} tag in a member of the archive and thinking it
applies to the archive file as a whole.

@vindex buffer-file-coding-system
  Once Emacs has chosen a coding system for a buffer, it stores that
coding system in @code{buffer-file-coding-system} and uses that coding
system, by default, for operations that write from this buffer into a
file.  This includes the commands @code{save-buffer} and

37584:9a7fd51a92b3

``MULti-lingual Enhancement to GNU Emacs'')

  Emacs also supports various encodings of these characters used by
other internationalized software, such as word processors and mailers.

  Emacs allows editing text with international characters by supporting
all the related activities:

@itemize @bullet
@item
You can visit files with non-ASCII characters, save non-ASCII text, and
pass non-ASCII text between Emacs and programs it invokes (such as
compilers, spell-checkers, and mailers).  Setting your language
environment (@pxref{Language Environments}) takes care of setting up the
coding systems and other options for a specific language or culture.
Alternatively, you can specify how Emacs should encode or decode text
for each command; see @ref{Specify Coding}.

@item
You can display non-ASCII characters encoded by the various scripts.
This works by using appropriate fonts on X and similar graphics
displays (@pxref{Defining Fontsets}), and by sending special codes to
text-only displays (@pxref{Specify Coding}).  If some characters are
displayed incorrectly, refer to @ref{Undisplayable Characters}, which
describes possible problems and explains how to solve them.

@item
You can insert non-ASCII characters or search for them.  To do that,
you can specify an input method (@pxref{Select Input Method}) suitable
for your language, or use the default input method set up when you set
your language environment.  (Emacs input methods are part of the Leim
package, which must be installed for you to be able to use them.)  If
your keyboard can produce non-ASCII characters, you can select an
appropriate keyboard coding system (@pxref{Specify Coding}), and Emacs
will accept those characters.  Latin-1 characters can also be input by
using the @kbd{C-x 8} prefix, see @ref{Single-Byte Character Support,
C-x 8}.
@end itemize

  The rest of this chapter describes these issues in detail.

@menu
* International Intro::     Basic concepts of multibyte characters.
* Enabling Multibyte::      Controlling whether to use multibyte characters.
* Language Environments::   Setting things up for the language you use.
* Input Methods::           Entering text characters not on your keyboard.

@end ignore

@node Enabling Multibyte
@section Enabling Multibyte Characters

@cindex turn multibyte support on or off
  You can enable or disable multibyte character support, either for
Emacs as a whole, or for a single buffer.  When multibyte characters are
disabled in a buffer, then each byte in that buffer represents a
character, even codes 0200 through 0377.  The old features for
supporting the European character sets, ISO Latin-1 and ISO Latin-2,

  However, there is no need to turn off multibyte character support to
use ISO Latin; the Emacs multibyte character set includes all the
characters in these character sets, and Emacs can translate
automatically to and from the ISO codes.

  By default, Emacs starts in multibyte mode, because that allows you to
use all the supported languages and scripts without limitations.

  To edit a particular file in unibyte representation, visit it using
@code{find-file-literally}.  @xref{Visiting}.  To convert a buffer in
multibyte representation into a single-byte representation of the same
characters, the easiest way is to save the contents in a file, kill the

@vindex default-enable-multibyte-characters
  To turn off multibyte character support by default, start Emacs with
the @samp{--unibyte} option (@pxref{Initial Options}), or set the
environment variable @env{EMACS_UNIBYTE}.  You can also customize
@code{enable-multibyte-characters} or, equivalently, directly set the
variable @code{default-enable-multibyte-characters} to @code{nil} in
your init file to have basically the same effect as @samp{--unibyte}.

@findex toggle-enable-multibyte-characters
  To convert a unibyte session to a multibyte session, set
@code{default-enable-multibyte-characters} to @code{t}.  Buffers which
were created in the unibyte session before you turn on multibyte support
will stay unibyte.  You can turn on multibyte support in a specific
buffer by invoking the command @code{toggle-enable-multibyte-characters}
in that buffer.

@cindex Lisp files, and multibyte operation
@cindex multibyte operation, and Lisp files
@cindex unibyte operation, and Lisp files
@cindex init file, and non-ASCII characters

language name.  Some coding systems are used for several languages;
their names usually start with @samp{iso}.  There are also special
coding systems @code{no-conversion}, @code{raw-text} and
@code{emacs-mule} which do not convert printing characters at all.

@cindex international files from DOS/Windows systems
  A special class of coding systems, collectively known as
@dfn{codepages}, is designed to support text encoded by MS-Windows and
MS-DOS software.  To use any of these systems, you need to create it
with @kbd{M-x codepage-setup}.  @xref{MS-DOS and MULE}.  After
creating the coding system for the codepage, you can use it as any
other coding system.  For example, to visit a file encoded in codepage
850, type @kbd{C-x @key{RET} c cp850 @key{RET} C-x C-f @var{filename}
@key{RET}}.

  In addition to converting various representations of non-ASCII
characters, a coding system can perform end-of-line conversion.  Emacs
handles three different conventions for how to separate lines in a file:
newline, carriage-return linefeed, and just carriage-return.

the usual three variants to specify the kind of end-of-line conversion.

@node Recognize Coding
@section Recognizing Coding Systems

  Emacs tries to recognize which coding system to use for a given text
as an integral part of reading that text.  (This applies to files
being read, output from subprocesses, text from X selections, etc.)
Emacs can select the right coding system automatically most of the
time---once you have specified your preferences.

  Some coding systems can be recognized or distinguished by which byte
sequences appear in the data.  However, there are coding systems that
cannot be distinguished, not even potentially.  For example, there is no
way to distinguish between Latin-1 and Latin-2; they use the same byte

overrides @samp{-*-coding:-*-} tags in the file itself.  Emacs uses this
feature for tar and archive files, to prevent Emacs from being confused
by a @samp{-*-coding:-*-} tag in a member of the archive and thinking it
applies to the archive file as a whole.

  If Emacs recognizes the encoding of a file incorrectly, you can
reread the file using the correct coding system by typing @kbd{C-x
@key{RET} c @var{coding-system} @key{RET} M-x revert-buffer
@key{RET}}.

@vindex buffer-file-coding-system
  Once Emacs has chosen a coding system for a buffer, it stores that
coding system in @code{buffer-file-coding-system} and uses that coding
system, by default, for operations that write from this buffer into a
file.  This includes the commands @code{save-buffer} and