The newest release is at the top. For further details, please consult the manual: https://protesilaos.com/emacs/pulsar.
This version includes quality-of-life refinements to an already stable package.
Pulsar will produce a highlight on the current line after one of the
functions in pulsar-pulse-functions
is used. This now works for
aliases of those functions as well, even if they are not explicitly
referenced in pulsar-pulse-functions
. Whereas before, only the
explicitly named functions would produce the pulse effect.
Thanks to shipmints for the contribution, which was originally done in in pull request 12 and then refined over a series of commits: #12. The author has assigned copyright to the Free Software Foundation.
Users who want to opt out of this behaviour, can set the user option
pulsar-resolve-pulse-function-aliases
to a nil value.
This command is added to the pulsar-pulse-functions
. It is
consistent with what we do with the other-window
command.
Thanks to Maxim Dunaevsky for the contribution. This was done in pull request 6: #6. The change is small, meaning that Maxim does not need to assign copyright to the Free Software Foundation.
I added the following to pulsar-pulse-functions
:
evil-goto-first-line
evil-goto-line
evil-scroll-down
evil-scroll-line-to-bottom
evil-scroll-line-to-center
evil-scroll-line-to-top
evil-scroll-up
goto-line
handle-switch-frame
logos-backward-page-dwim
logos-forward-page-dwim
narrow-to-defun
narrow-to-page
narrow-to-region
widen
If you are using setq
, setopt
, the :custom
keyword of
use-package
, or related, make sure to update the value accordingly.
You do not need to do anything if you are doing it with add-to-list
.
The command pulsar-pulse-region
pulses the active region. Thanks to
Bahman Movaqar for the contribution. This was done on the
now-deprecated mailing list:
https://lists.sr.ht/~protesilaos/pulsar/[email protected]
The change is below the ~15 line limit and thus Bahman is not require to assign copyright to the Free Software Foundation.
I still want to make this work with rectangular regions, which are not contiguous (in terms of character positions reading from left to right), but it is tricky. Maybe I will do it for the next version.
Remember that the command pulsar-highlight-dwim
will apply a
temporary highlight to the active region or the current line. The
highlight is removed as soon as another key is pressed.
- The
next-buffer
andprevious-buffer
commands are added to the default value of the user optionpulsar-pulse-functions
. They will now trigger a pulse effect after they are called (ifpulsar-mode
is enabled in the current buffer orpulsar-global-mode
is in use). - The command
pulsar-recenter-middle
is now an alias forpulsar-recenter-center
, instead of being the original name. Users do not need to change anything on their end: this is just an internal arrangement to use a name that corresponds to the one of the underlying “recenter” mechanism. - The Lisp macro that was used to derive the Pulsar “recenter”
commands has been removed. The commands are
pulsar-recenter-top
andpulsar-recenter-center
. I originally thought the macro would be useful in more places, but I ended up relying on it only twice.Thanks to Ryan Kaskel for pointing out an intermediate typo/error I made while redefining the macro and before I decided to remove it altogether. This was done as a comment on the GitHub mirror: https://github.com/protesilaos/pulsar/commit/c5086de779a0226d72eca4d5cba8c7689bc278b2#r123397272.
- The Lisp macro
pulsar-pulse-with-face
is renamed topulsar-define-pulse-with-face
. Its definition is updated to simplify how a Pulsar function is defined with a given face. Examples of such functions arepulsar-pulse-line-red
,pulsar-pulse-line-blue
. - Pulsar now retrieves the absolute beginning of the minibuffer
prompt. This means that a pulse in the minibuffer will cover the
text of the prompt, as opposed to only affecting the input area. As
such, the pulse is visible even if the minibuffer is empty
(e.g. what happens with the default completion setup when calling
M-x
). - The manual provides instructions on how to set up Pulsar to produce
a pulse when the minibuffer is activated. It cannot be done with
the
pulsar-pulse-functions
, though the setup is not too involved. In short:(add-hook 'minibuffer-setup-hook #'pulsar-pulse-line) ;; OR something like this, replacing "blue" with one among red, ;; green, yellow, magenta, cyan: (add-hook 'minibuffer-setup-hook #'pulsar-pulse-line-blue)
- Added convenience functions/commands to pulse a line using one of the
provided faces. These can be used interactively or via Lisp (e.g. be
assigned to a hook). They are:
pulsar-pulse-line-red
pulsar-pulse-line-green
pulsar-pulse-line-yellow
pulsar-pulse-line-blue
pulsar-pulse-line-magenta
pulsar-pulse-line-cyan
- Deprecated
pulsar-pulse-on-window-change
due to complications it created in some edge cases. Part of this effort was to fix a bug that pertained to a duplicate pulse when the pulsar commands were invoked viaM-x
. The duplication had the effect of potentially overriding the color of the pulse such as if, say,pulsar-pulse-line-red
was invoked while thepulsar-face
was blue. - Restored several command symbols to the default value of
pulsar-pulse-functions
. Those were disabled to support the use optionpulsar-pulse-on-window-change
, but as that is now removed we revert to the old and more predictable way of handling things. - Introduced conditionality that checks for
real-this-command
. This is necessary for commands that have to fudgethis-command
to provide their functionality. Such is the case with theevil-scroll-up
andevil-scroll-down
commands which are internally reported asprevious-line
andnext-line
, respectively. I discovered this problem while trying to support Duy Nguyen attempts that makingpulsar
work withevil
.Thanks to Duy Nguyen for reporting the issue on the mailing list and then to Tom Dalziel who explained why
evil
does things the way it does (it is a good reason): - Documented how to use pulsar with the
next-error-hook
. By default, then
andp
keys in Emacs’ compilation buffers (e.g. the results of agrep
search) produce a highlight for the locus of the given match. Due to how the code is implemented, we cannot use Pulsar’s standard mechanism to trigger a pulse after the match is highlighted (i.e. by adding the commands topulsar-pulse-functions
. Instead, the user must add this to their configuration:(add-hook 'next-error-hook #'pulsar-pulse-line)
- Made other miscellaneous changes to tweak the code base and the manual.
- Added the user option
pulsar-pulse-on-window-change
. This covers all commands or functions that affect the current window, so there is no need to include them individually in thepulsar-pulse-functions
. Users who prefer to trigger a pulse only after select functions (e.g. only afterother-window
) are advised to set this user option to nil and update thepulsar-pulse-functions
accordingly. Thanks to Ivan Popovych for the patch (commitb1a78dd
). - Changed the default value of
pulsar-pulse-functions
to omit all those commands which are already covered by the aforementioned. In the interest of continuity, the old value is kept in the source code, with the relevant symbols commented out. - Named the mailing list email address as the
Maintainer:
of Pulsar. The package headers help the user find our primary sources and/or communication channels. This change conforms with work being done upstream in package.el by Philip Kaludercic. I was informed about it here: https://lists.sr.ht/~protesilaos/general-issues/%3C875ykl84yi.fsf%40posteo.net%3E. - Updated the documentation, where necessary and made other minor tweaks to the code.
- Changed the source repository from GitLab to SourceHut: https://git.sr.ht/~protesilaos/pulsar. Use the mailing list to start a discussion, report a bug, send a patch, etc.: https://lists.sr.ht/~protesilaos/pulsar. The GitLab URL will serve as a mirror from now on (a GitHub mirror is still available and will remain that way).
- Refined how Pulsar behaves in the case of the last line. Basically, when the last line cannot be highlighted we want to pulse the one right above. Thanks to JD Smith for fine-tuning this behaviour in merge request 1 over at the GitLab mirror: https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/pulsar/-/merge_requests/1 (exempt from the requirement to assign copyright to the Free Software Foundation as it is below the threshold).
- Ensured that the Pulsar effect are limited to the current window when the buffer is displayed in multiple windows. This avoids the common problem of simultaneous highlights in multiple locations, which confuse rather than inform the user of where the point is. Thanks to Aymeric Agon-Rambosson for the contribution in merge request 2 over at the GitLab mirror: https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/pulsar/-/merge_requests/2. Aymeric has assigned copyright to the Free Software Foundation.
- Wrote a buffer-local and a global minor mode that sets up Pulsar.
This supersedes the old design which had a built-in assumption that
the “pulse line” effect should always be global. Now the user has
more flexibility. They may also disable Pulsar on demand. Note that
pulsar still only triggers its effect for entries in the user option
pulsar-pulse-functions
. Thanks to Rudolf Adamkovič for the feedback in issue 9 over at the GitLab mirror: https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/pulsar/-/issues/9. - Implement the
pulsar-highlight-dwim
command. It is like thepulsar-highlight-line
except it also understands regions, be they regular or rectangular. Thanks to Mark Barton for the feedback in issue 13 over at the GitLab mirror: https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/pulsar/-/issues/13. - Clarified some technical points in various doc strings and the manual,
such as what is the
pulsar-delay
and thepulsar-iterations
. Thanks to Rudolf Adamkovič for the feedback in issue 12 over at the GitLab mirror: https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/pulsar/-/issues/12.
- Fixed an inconsistency that was present when Emacs was running in a server-client model where the highlight would never pulse but instead remain fixed in place until another command was invoked. By default, the pulse effect should now work for that use-case. Thanks to Mark Barton, Petter Storvik, and user kb for their feedback in issue 1: https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/pulsar/-/issues/1.
- Implemented the
pulsar-highlight-line
command and abstracted the relevant code. Unlikepulsar-pulse-line
, it never pulses the current line. Instead it keeps the highlight in place until another command is invoked. Thanks to Mark Barton for proposing this in issue 1. - Introduced the user option
pulsar-pulse
which determines whether pulsar should use a pulse effect (notwithstanding the aforementioned new command). When its value is non-nil (the default) pulsing takes place. Thanks to Petter Storvik for suggesting this approach in issue 1. - Added the user option
pulsar-iterations
which controls how smooth or abrupt the pulse effect is. This complements the existing variablepulsar-delay
. Both apply only whenpulsar-pulse
is non-nil. - Wrote the
pulsar-generic
face and made it the default value of thepulsar-face
user option. This is consistent with the original design of a theme-agnostic presentation, though now it ensures that the:extend
attribute is used to stretch the highlight to the edge of the window (without it and depending on the theme, the highlight would only reach the last character on the line). - Updated the manual to reflect those changes.
Initial release of the package. Please read the manual.
The core idea for this package was implemented in the prot-pulse.el
file that is part of my dotfiles (now deprecated). I was using it at
least since December 2020.