This manual, written by Protesilaos Stavrou, describes the customization
options for pulsar (or pulsar.el), and provides every other piece of
information pertinent to it.
The documentation furnished herein corresponds to stable version {{{stable-version}}}, released on {{{release-date}}}. Any reference to a newer feature which does not yet form part of the latest tagged commit, is explicitly marked as such.
Current development target is {{{development-version}}}.
- Package name (GNU ELPA):
pulsar - Official manual: https://protesilaos.com/emacs/pulsar
- Change log: https://protesilaos.com/emacs/pulsar-changelog
- Git repositories:
- Backronym: Pulsar Unquestionably Luminates, Strictly Absent the Radiation.
Copyright (C) 2022-2024 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.3 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, with the Front-Cover Texts being “A GNU Manual,” and with the Back-Cover Texts as in (a) below. A copy of the license is included in the section entitled “GNU Free Documentation License.”
(a) The FSF’s Back-Cover Text is: “You have the freedom to copy and modify this GNU manual.”
This is a small package that temporarily highlights the current line
after a given function is invoked. The affected functions are defined
in the user option pulsar-pulse-functions and the effect takes place
when either pulsar-mode (buffer-local) or pulsar-global-mode is
enabled.
By default, Pulsar does not try to behave the same way for a function’s
aliases. If those are not added explicitly to the pulsar-pulse-functions,
they will not have a pulse effect. However, the user option
pulsar-resolve-pulse-function-aliases can be set to a non-nil value
to change this behaviour, meaning that Pulsar will cover a function’s
aliases even if those are not explicitly added to the pulsar-pulse-functions.
The overall duration of the highlight is determined by a combination of
pulsar-delay and pulsar-iterations. The latter determines the
number of blinks in a pulse, while the former sets their delay in
seconds before they fade out. The applicable face is specified in
pulsar-face.
To disable the pulse but keep the temporary highlight, set the user
option pulsar-pulse to nil. The current line will remain highlighted
until another command is invoked.
The user option pulsar-inhibit-hidden-buffers controls whether
Pulsar is active in hidden buffers. These are buffers that users
normally do not interact with and are not displayed in the interface
of the various buffer-switching commands. When this user option is
nil, pulsar-mode will work in those buffers as well. [ The
pulsar-inhibit-hidden-buffers is part of {{{development-version}}}. ]
To highlight the current line on demand, use the pulsar-pulse-line
command. When pulsar-pulse is non-nil (the default), its highlight
will pulse before fading away. Whereas the pulsar-highlight-line
command never pulses the line: the highlight stays in place as if
pulsar-pulse is nil.
The command pulsar-pulse-region pulses the active region. The effect
of the pulse is controlled by the aforementioned user options, namely,
pulsar-delay, pulsar-iterations, pulsar-face.
A do-what-I-mean command is also on offer: pulsar-highlight-dwim. It
highlights the current line line like pulsar-highlight-line. If the
region is active, it applies its effect there. The region may also be a
rectangle (internally they differ from ordinary regions).
To help users differentiate between the pulse and highlight effects, the
user option pulsar-highlight-face controls the presentation of the
pulsar-highlight-line and pulsar-highlight-dwim commands. By
default, this variable is the same as pulsar-face.
Pulsar depends on the built-in pulse.el library.
Why the name “pulsar”? It sounds like “pulse” and is a recognisable word. Though if you need a backronym, consider “Pulsar Unquestionably Luminates, Strictly Absent the Radiation”.
Depending on the user’s workflow, there may be a need for differently
colored pulses. These are meant to provide an ad-hoc deviation from the
standard style of the command pulsar-pulse-line (which is governed by
the user option pulsar-face). Pulsar thus provides the following for
the user’s convenience:
pulsar-pulse-line-red
pulsar-pulse-line-green
pulsar-pulse-line-yellow
pulsar-pulse-line-blue
pulsar-pulse-line-magenta
pulsar-pulse-line-cyan
These can be called with M-x, assigned to a hook and/or key binding,
or be incorporated in custom functions.
The package is available as pulsar. Simply do:
M-x package-refresh-contents M-x package-install
And search for it.
GNU ELPA provides the latest stable release. Those who prefer to follow the development process in order to report bugs or suggest changes, can use the version of the package from the GNU-devel ELPA archive. Read: https://protesilaos.com/codelog/2022-05-13-emacs-elpa-devel/.
Assuming your Emacs files are found in ~/.emacs.d/, execute the
following commands in a shell prompt:
cd ~/.emacs.d
# Create a directory for manually-installed packages
mkdir manual-packages
# Go to the new directory
cd manual-packages
# Clone this repo, naming it "pulsar"
git clone https://github.com/protesilaos/pulsar pulsarFinally, in your init.el (or equivalent) evaluate this:
;; Make Elisp files in that directory available to the user.
(add-to-list 'load-path "~/.emacs.d/manual-packages/pulsar")Everything is in place to set up the package.
Remember to read the doc string of each of these variables.
(require 'pulsar)
;; Check the default value of `pulsar-pulse-functions'. That is where
;; you add more commands that should cause a pulse after they are
;; invoked
(setq pulsar-pulse t)
(setq pulsar-delay 0.055)
(setq pulsar-iterations 10)
(setq pulsar-face 'pulsar-magenta)
(setq pulsar-highlight-face 'pulsar-yellow)
(pulsar-global-mode 1)
;; OR use the local mode for select mode hooks
(dolist (hook '(org-mode-hook emacs-lisp-mode-hook))
(add-hook hook #'pulsar-mode))
;; pulsar does not define any key bindings. This is just a sample that
;; respects the key binding conventions. Evaluate:
;;
;; (info "(elisp) Key Binding Conventions")
;;
;; The author uses C-x l for `pulsar-pulse-line' and C-x L for
;; `pulsar-highlight-line'.
;;
;; You can replace `pulsar-highlight-line' with the command
;; `pulsar-highlight-dwim'.
(let ((map global-map))
(define-key map (kbd "C-c h p") #'pulsar-pulse-line)
(define-key map (kbd "C-c h h") #'pulsar-highlight-line))By default, the n and p keys in Emacs’ compilation buffers (e.g. the
results of a grep 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.
Instead, the user must add this to their configuration in lieu of a
Pulsar-level solution that “just works”:
(add-hook 'next-error-hook #'pulsar-pulse-line)Due to how the minibuffer works, the user cannot rely on the user
option pulse-pulse-functions to automatically pulse in that context.
Instead, the user must add a function to the minibuffer-setup-hook:
it will trigger a pulse as soon as the minibuffer shows up:
(add-hook 'minibuffer-setup-hook #'pulsar-pulse-line)The pulsar-pulse-line function will use the default Pulsar face, per
the user option pulsar-face.
A convenience function can also be used (Convenience functions). The idea is to apply a different color than the one applied by default. For example:
(add-hook 'minibuffer-setup-hook #'pulsar-pulse-line-blue)Beside pulsar-pulse-line, Pulsar defines a few functions that can be
added to hooks that are provided by other packages.
There are two functions to recenter and then pulse the current line:
pulsar-recenter-top and pulsar-recenter-center (alias
pulsar-recenter-middle).
There also exists pulsar-reveal-entry which displays the hidden
contents of an Org or Outline heading. It can be used in tandem with
the aforementioned recentering functions.
Example use-cases:
;; integration with the `consult' package:
(add-hook 'consult-after-jump-hook #'pulsar-recenter-top)
(add-hook 'consult-after-jump-hook #'pulsar-reveal-entry)
;; integration with the built-in `imenu':
(add-hook 'imenu-after-jump-hook #'pulsar-recenter-top)
(add-hook 'imenu-after-jump-hook #'pulsar-reveal-entry)Pulsar is meant to be a collective effort. Every bit of help matters.
- Author/maintainer
- Protesilaos Stavrou.
- Contributions to the code or manual
- Aymeric Agon-Rambosson, Bahman Movaqar, Daniel Mendler, Ivan Popovych, JD Smith, Maxim Dunaevsky, Ryan Kaskel, shipmints.
- Ideas and user feedback
- Duy Nguyen, Mark Barton, Petter Storvik, Rudolf Adamkovič, Toon Claes, and users djl, kb.