/helpful

A better Emacs *help* buffer
  1. Emacs Lisp 100.0%
Emacs Lisp
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Latest commit deb66c4 Nov 4, 2017 @Wilfred Wilfred Show the value of buffer-local values 
When creating a helpful buffer, associate it with an underlying
buffer, and look up the variable in that context. This ensures that we
show the correct value for buffer-local variables.

Fixes #50
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screenshots Add a link to the manual, if this symbol is documented Sep 5, 2017
test Ensure that we don't leave any temporary buffers lying about Oct 14, 2017
.gitignore Ignore byte-compiled files Apr 2, 2017
.travis.yml Test against more emacs versions Sep 29, 2017
CHANGELOG.md Update changelog Oct 8, 2017
Cask Set up unit testing Apr 2, 2017
README.md Add a link to the manual, if this symbol is documented Sep 5, 2017
helpful.el Show the value of buffer-local values Nov 3, 2017

README.md

Helpful Build Status Coverage Status MELPA

Helpful is an alternative to the built-in Emacs help that provides much more contextual information.

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Features

Source code

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Helpful will try really hard to show the source code. It shows the source code for interactively defined functions (unlike the built-in Help) and falls back to the raw sexp if no source is available.

View Callers

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Helpful will show you where a function is being called!

Prettier Docstrings

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Docstrings in helpful:

  • Highlight the summary (the first sentence)
  • Include cross-references
  • Hide superfluous puncuation

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If a symbol is also documented in the Info manual, helpful will provide a link to the relevant section too.

Symbol Properties

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Helpful will show you the properties that have been applied to the current symbol. This provides visibility of features like edebug or byte-code optimisation.

Describe Commands

Helpful provides a separate helpful-command function, for when you just want to view interactive functions.

View Keymaps

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Helpful displays any keybindings that apply to interactive functions.

Integrated Tooling

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You can trace, debug (coming soon) or disassemble functions from inside Helpful. This is discoverable and doesn't require memorisation of commands.

Inspirations

This project has been heavily influenced by: