NEWS revision 56160
1This file records noteworthy changes. 2 34.0 (28 September 1999) 4* Language: 5 . New command @anchor for cross references to arbitrary points. 6 . New commands @documentlanguage sets the main document language, 7 and @documentencoding sets the document input encoding (although not 8 much is done yet with either). 9 . New command @pagesizes allows limited control of text area for typesetting. 10 . New command @acronym for abbreviations in all caps, such as `NASA'. 11 . New command @alias for simple command aliases. 12 . New command @definfoenclose for better control of info output. 13 . New commands @deftypeivar for typed instance variables of a class 14 and @deftypeop for typed operations of a class. 15 . New command @novalidate suppresses cross-reference checking and (in 16 TeX) auxiliary file creation. 17 . New commands @setcontentsaftertitlepage and 18 @setshortcontentsaftertitlepage to force printing the table of 19 contents after @end titlepage. Also, @contents and @shortcontents 20 themselves can now appear at the beginning of the document as 21 well as the end. 22 . New markup commands: @env (for environment variables), @command (for 23 command names), @option (for command-line options). 24 . New commands @smallformat and @smalldisplay, a la @smallexample. 25 . New command @exampleindent to set indentation of example-like 26 environments a la @paragraphindent. 27 . @uref takes an optional third argument of text to show instead of 28 (rather than in addition to) the url for info and dvi output. 29 . @footnote works in an @item for a @table. 30* texinfo.tex: 31 . latest version always at ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/texinfo.tex (and mirrors). 32 . implements @macro. 33 . implements @paragraphindent (except asis). 34 . @emph and @i use true italic type (cmti) instead of slanted (cmsl). 35 . implements pdf output when run with pdftex. 36 . better support for internationalization via txi-??.tex files. 37* makeinfo: 38 . supports HTML output with the --html option. 39 . implication of --html: @top nodes should be wrapped in @ifnottex 40 rather than @ifinfo. @ifinfo conditionals are not expanded with --html. 41 . new option --number-sections to output chapter/section numbers. 42 . dashes and quotes are not treated specially in node names. 43 . new option --commands-in-node-names to allow @-commands in node names. 44 (Not implemented in TeX, and most likely never will be.) 45 . @emph output uses _underscores_. 46 . @image looks for .png files before .jpg. 47 . only output `Making ... file' line when verbose. 48 . allow -v as synonym for --verbose. 49 . new command line options to specify which conditionals to process 50 (but --iftex is not fully implemented). 51 . warns if @var contains any of ,[](). 52 . @quote-arg implicitly done for all one-argument macros, so commas in 53 the argument text are allowed. 54 . \\ required in macro body to get single \, no other `escapes' defined. 55* info: 56 . ISO Latin 1 characters are displayed and input as-is by default. 57 . new option --vi-keys to enable vi-like and less-like key bindings. 58 . new command S does case-sensitive searching. 59 . new commands C-x n and C-x N repeat last search, respectively, in the 60 same and in reverse direction, without prompting for the string. These 61 commands are bound to n and N under --vi-keys, like in Less. 62 . new command G menu1 menu2 ... searches for menu items from (dir), 63 as allowed on the command line. 64 . new command O (capital o, not zero) goes directly to the node that 65 describes command-line options. 66 . new command-line option --show-options causes the node which 67 describes command-line options to be the first node displayed. 68 . M-prior and M-DEL do new command info-scroll-other-window-backward. 69 . / searches like s does. 70 . If the search string includes upper-case letters, in both incremental 71 and non-incremental search, the search is case-sensitive. 72 . S searches case-sensitively even if the search string is all 73 lower-case. 74 . - makes the argument negative (so e.g. `- /' searches backward). 75 . l restores point in the window returned to. 76 . SPC/DEL do not move outside the current document. 77 . foo.info is found before foo. 78 . `info foo --index-search=bar' now searches for bar in foo's index. 79 . support for files compressed with bzip2. 80* install-info: 81 . handles gzipped dir files. 82 . sort entries into alphabetical order. 83 . install direntries only in preceding dircategory, not in all. 84 . --delete does not require the info file to exist. 85 . --delete can handle XEmacs-style dir entries. 86* texi2dvi: 87 . bug fixed: now uses only the @iftex and @tex parts of the source. 88 . process LaTeX source as well as Texinfo source. 89 . output PDF (using pdftex) with new option --pdf. 90 . handles --OPTION=ARG style of command line arguments. 91 . new option --batch for progress reports but no interaction. 92 . new option --clean to remove all auxiliary files. 93 . new option --quiet for silence (unless there are errors). 94 . new option -I for specifying directories for @include to search. 95 . handles LaTeX files (running BibTeX etc.). 96* Fixes to util/gen-dir-node and util/fix-info-dir (formerly util/update-info). 97* Distribution: 98 . Man pages included. 99 . Czech and Norwegian message translations. 100 . Various translations for texinfo.tex fixed words included. 101 . DJGPP support. 102 103 1043.12 (3 March 1998) 105* Elisp files removed, since they are only usefully distributed with Emacs. 106* Restore inclusion of compile-time $(infodir) to INFOPATH. 107* install-info creates a proper dir file. 108* Various portability fixes. 109 110 1113.11 (31 July 1997) 112* New commands: 113 - @uref to make a reference to a url; @url now only indicates such. 114 - @image to include graphics (epsf for TeX). 115 - @deftypemethod and @deftypemethodx to document methods in strongly 116 typed object-oriented languages, such as C++. 117 - @html for raw HTML. 118 - @ifnothtml @ifnotinfo @ifnottex for more precise conditionals. 119 - @kbdinputstyle to control when @kbd uses the slanted typewriter font. 120 - @email takes second optional argument. 121* texinfo.tex reads texinfo.cnf (if present) for site-wide TeX 122 configuration; for example, A4 paper sizes. 123* info: 124 - arrow keys supported. 125 - trailing : in INFOPATH appends default path. 126 - new option --index-search for online help support. 127* makeinfo: 128 - output files removed if errors unless (new option) --force. 129 - new option -P to prepend to search path. 130 - macro expansion file can be standard output. 131* install-info creates a new dir file if necessary. 132* update-info script to create a dir file from all info files. 133* Elisp: texnfo-tex.el and detexinfo.el removed from the distribution; 134 - texnfo-tex features are now part of standard TeX & Texinfo packages; 135 - makeinfo --no-headers does a better job than detexinfo.el. 136* Documentation: 137 - Updates, revisions, corrections in the manual. 138 - makeinfo.texi removed, as it was a copy of what was in texinfo.texi. 139* gettext support in sources, French and German translations included. 140* info man page removed; use the Texinfo manual. 141* Automake used, other portability fixes. 142 1433.10 (nonexistent) 144 145 1463.9 (4 October 1996) 147* makeinfo: 148 - Give a suppressible (with --no-validate) error for references 149 outside of any node. 150 - Keep track of multitable output correctly for split files; this 151 caused nodes after the first multitable to be ``undefined''. 152* install-info: 153 - Rename --infodir option to --info-dir. 154 - More robust error checking to avoid various crashes. 155* configure: Include replacements for memcpy and memmove functions in 156 the distribution, in case they are missing. 157 158 1593.8 (30 September 1996) 160* Define and/or document new and/or previously existing commands: 161 Accents: @" @' @, @" @= @^ @` @~ @H @d @dotaccent @dotless @ringaccent 162 @tieaccent @u @ubaraccent @v 163 Special characters: @AA @AE @L @O @OE @aa @ae @exclamdown @l @o @oe 164 @pounds @questiondown @ss 165 Special punctuation: @! @? @enddots 166 dir file maintenance: @dircategory @direntry; also new program, install-info 167 HTML support: @email @url @ifhtml...@end ifhtml 168 Macros: @macro @unmacro 169 Tables: @multitable @tab 170 Hyphenation: @- @hyphenation 171 Spacing: @ @<TAB> @<NEWLINE> 172 Sectioning: 173 @headings singleafter/doubleafter (change heading style after current page) 174 @centerchap 175 @setchapterstyle 176 Other: 177 @shorttitlepage (simple title pages) 178 @detailmenu...@end detailmenu (help makeinfo parse master menus) 179* Makeinfo prefers an input file named `foo.texinfo' or `foo.texi' or 180 `foo.txinfo' to just `foo' (the latter most likely being an executable). 181* Makeinfo implements @. @! @? correctly, as end-of-sentence punctuation. 182* @key marks its argument with a lozenge in TeX and <...> in Info. 183* TeX output has substantially decreased interline spacing and other 184 formatting changes. 185* Remove these obsolete and never-documented commands: 186 @infotop 187 @infoappendix @infoappendixsec @infoappendixsubsec @infoappendixsubsubsec 188 @infochapter @infosection @infosubsection @infosubsubsection 189 @infounnumbered @infounnumberedsec @infounnumberedsubsec 190 @infounnumberedsubsubsec 191 @input 192 @smallbreak @medbreak 193 @overfullrule 194 @br 195* Deprecate these obsolete commands, to be removed in the next release: 196 @ctrl 197 @infoinclude 198 @iappendix @iappendixsection @iappendixsec @iappendixsubsec 199 @iappendixsubsubsec 200 @ichapter @isection @isubsection @isubsubsection 201 @iunnumbered @iunnumberedsec @iunnumberedsubsec @iunnumberedsubsubsec 202 @setchapterstyle 203 @titlespec 204 205 2063.7 (24 December 1995) 207* Have --version print texinfo release number as well as the individual 208 program version. 209* Better man page cleaning. 210* Update Elisp files from current Emacs release. 211 212 2133.6 (21 June 1995) 214* Unmatched brace error reporting improved. 215* Missing comment terminator prevented compilation. 216 217 2183.5 (20 June 1995) 219* Autoconf update. 220* Support for parallel makes. 221* make install does not install Elisp files. 222 223 2243.4 (19 June 1995) 225* Handle @ifhtml in Elisp. 226* Update FSF address. 227 228 2293.3 (15 June 1995) 230* Portability changes. 231* Compile Elisp files. 232* Don't distribute .info* files. 233 234 2353.2 (9 June 1995) 236* Standalone Info can read Unix man pages. 237* New commands: @! @? @^ @" @enddots. 238* makeinfo -E does macro expansion (and nothing else). 239 240 2413.1 (23 May 1993) 242Just bug fixes, see ChangeLog for full details. 243 244 2453.0: first release of Texinfo version 2, with many new commands. 246 247 248 249Here is the separate NEWS for old releases of Info: 250 251Version 2.11, Sat Apr 1 09:15:21 1995 252 253Changes since 2.7 beta: 254 255Although the basic code remains the same, there are numerous nits 256fixed, including some display bugs, and a memory leak. Some changes 257that have taken place with larger impact include the way in which the 258(dir) node is built; I have added in support for "localdir" 259directories among other things. Info files may be stored in 260compressed formats, and in their own subdirectories; menu items which 261do not explicitly name the node to which they are attached have the 262menu item name looked up as an Info file if it is not found within the 263current document. This means that the menu item: 264 265* Info:: The Info documentation reader. 266 267in (dir) refers to the info node "(info)Top". 268 269Please see the ChangeLog and documentation for details on other 270changes. 271 272Version 2.7 beta, Wed Dec 30 02:02:38 1992 273Version 2.6 beta, Tue Dec 22 03:58:07 1992 274Version 2.5 beta, Tue Dec 8 14:50:35 1992 275Version 2.4 beta, Sat Nov 28 14:34:02 1992 276Version 2.3 beta, Fri Nov 27 01:04:13 1992 277Version 2.2 beta, Tue Nov 24 09:36:08 1992 278Version 2.1 beta, Tue Nov 17 23:29:36 1992 279 280Changes since 2.5 beta: 281 282Note that versions 2.6 and 2.7 Beta were only released to a select group. 283 284* "info-" removed from the front of M-x commands. 285 286* Automatic footnote display. When you enter a node which contains 287 footnotes, and the variable "automatic-footnotes" is "On", Info pops 288 up a window containing the footnotes. Likewise, when you leave that 289 node, the window containing the footnotes goes away. 290 291* Cleaner built in documentation, and documentation functions. 292 293 Use: 294 o `M-x describe-variable' to read a variable's documenation 295 o `M-x describe-key' to find out what a particular keystroke does. 296 o `M-x describe-function' to read a function's documentation. 297 o `M-x where-is' to find out what keys invoke a particular function. 298 299* Info can "tile" the displayed windows (via "M-x tile-windows"). If 300 the variable "automatic-tiling" is "On", then splitting a window or 301 deleting a window causes the remaining windows to be retiled. 302 303* You can save every keystroke you type in a "dribble file" by using the 304 `--dribble FILENAME' option. You can initially read keystrokes from an 305 alternate input stream with `--restore FILENAME', or by redirecting 306 input on the command line `info < old-dribble'. 307 308* New behaviour of menu items. If the label is the same as the 309 target node name, and the node couldn't be found in the current file, 310 treat the label as a file name. For example, a menu entry in "DIR" 311 might contain: 312 313 * Emacs:: Cool text-editor. 314 315 Info would not find the node "(dir)Emacs", so just plain "(emacs)" 316 would be tried. 317 318* New variable "ISO-Latin" allows you to use European machines with 319 8-bit character sets. 320 321* Cleanups in echo area reading, and redisplay. Cleanups in handling the 322 window which shows possible completions. 323 324* Info can now read files that have been compressed. An array in filesys.c 325 maps extensions to programs that can decompress stdin, and write the results 326 to stdout. Currently, ".Z"/uncompress, ".z"/gunzip, and ".Y"/unyabba are 327 supported. The modeline for a compressed file shows "zz" in it. 328 329* There is a new variable "gc-compressed-files" which, if non-zero, says 330 it is okay to reclaim the file buffer space allocated to a file which 331 was compressed, if, and only if, that file's contents do not appear in 332 any history node. 333 334* New file `nodemenu.c' implements a few functions for manipulating 335 previously visited nodes. `C-x C-b' (list-visited-nodes) produces a 336 menu of the nodes that could be reached by info-history-node in some 337 window. `C-x b' (select-visited-node) is similar, but reads one of 338 the node names with completion. 339 340* Keystroke `M-r' (move_to_screen_line) allows the user to place the cursor at 341 the start of a specific screen line. Without a numeric argument, place the 342 cursor on the center line; with an arg, place the cursor on that line. 343 344* Interruptible display implemented. Basic display speedups and hacks. 345* The message "*** Tags Out of Date ***" now means what it says. 346* Index searching with `,' (info-index-next) has been improved. 347* When scrolling with C-v, C-M-v, or M-v, only "Page Only" scrolling 348 will happen. 349 350* Continous scrolling (along with `]' (info-global-next) and `[' 351 (info-global-prev) works better. `]' and `[' accept numeric 352 arguments, moving that many nodes in that case. 353 354* `C-x w' (info-toggle-wrap) controls how lines wider than the width 355 of the screen are displayed. If a line is too long, a `$' is 356 displayed in the rightmost column of the window. 357 358* There are some new variables for controlling the behaviour of Info 359 interactively. The current list of variables is as follows: 360 361 Variable Name Default Value Description 362 ------------- ------------- ----------- 363 `automatic-footnotes' On When "On", footnotes appear and 364 disappear automatically. 365 366 `automatic-tiling' Off When "On", creating of deleting a 367 window resizes other windows. 368 369 `visible-bell' Off If non-zero, try to use a visible bell. 370 371 `errors-ring-bell' On If non-zero, errors cause a ring. 372 373 `show-index-match' On If non-zero, the portion of the string 374 matched is highlighted by changing its 375 case. 376 377 `scroll-behaviour' Continuous One of "Continuous", "Next Only", or 378 "Page Only". "Page Only" prevents you from 379 scrolling past the bottom or top of a node. 380 "Next Only" causes the Next or Prev node to 381 be selected when you scroll past the bottom 382 or top of a node. "Continous" moves 383 linearly through the files hierchichal 384 structure. 385 386 `scroll-step' 0 Controls how scrolling is done for you when 387 the cursor moves out of the current window. 388 Non-zero means it is the number of lines 389 you would like the screen to shift. A 390 value of 0 means to center the line 391 containing the cursor in the window. 392 393 `gc-compressed-files' Off If non-zero means it is okay to reclaim the 394 file buffer space allocated to a file which 395 was compressed, if, and only if, that 396 file's contents do not appear in the node 397 list of any window. 398 399 `ISO-Latin' Off Non-zero means that you are using an ISO 400 Latin character set. By default, standard 401 ASCII characters are assumed. 402________________________________________ 403This release of Info is version 2.5 beta. 404 405Changes since 2.4 beta: 406 407* Index (i) and (,) commands fully implemented. 408* "configure" script now shipped with Info. 409* New function "set-variable" allows users to set various variables. 410* User-settable behaviour on end or beginning of node scrolling. This 411 supercedes the SPC and DEL changes in 2.3 beta. 412 413________________________________________ 414This release of Info is version 2.4 beta. 415 416Changes since 2.3 beta: 417 418* info-last-node now means move to the last node of this info file. 419* info-history-node means move backwards through this window's node history. 420* info-first-node moves to the first node in the Info file. This node is 421 not necessarily "Top"! 422* SPC and DEL can select the Next or Prev node after printing an informative 423 message when pressed at the end/beg of a node. 424 425---------------------------------------- 426This release of Info is version 2.3 beta. 427 428Changes since 2.2 beta: 429 430* M-x command lines if NAMED_COMMANDS is #defined. Variable in Makefile. 431* Screen height changes made quite robust. 432* Interactive function "set-screen-height" implements user height changes. 433* Scrolling on some terminals is faster now. 434* C-l with numeric arguement is fixed. 435 436---------------------------------------- 437This release of Info is version 2.2 beta. 438 439Changes since 2.0: 440 441* C-g can now interrupt multi-file searches. 442* Incremental search is fully implemented. 443* Loading large tag tables is much faster now. 444* makedoc.c replaces shell script, speeding incremental builds. 445* Scrolling in redisplay is implemented. 446* Recursive uses of the echo area made more robust. 447* Garbage collection of unreferenced nodes. 448