sysuplist-mode

Emacs Major mode for Yaourt's update selection

Commentary:

Yaourt is a 3rd party package manager for Arch Linux that also builds packages from the AUR. Arch Linux, being a rolling release distro, often has lots of updates. One doesn't always want to install all of the updates. Yaourt provides a nice way to quickly deactivate the unwanted updates. This is done by modifying a text file opened in the default editor (chosen via $EDITOR). This file is called the sysuplist, hence the name of this mode.

A snippet from an example sysuplist:

#######################...
# Package upgrade only (new release):                 (1)
#######################...
core/krb5 # 1.9.1-2 2 -> 3
# The Kerberos network authentication system
core/grub # 0.97-17 17 -> 20
# A GNU multiboot boot loader
community/exaile # 0.3.2.2-1 1 -> 3
# A full-featured media player for GTK+
...

Updates can be deactivated by commenting them out, i.e. by putting a # in front of them.

The sysuplist files can be quite hard to read because they are quite dense and have little whitespace. That's why this mode was written; to provide colouring, extra whitespace and convenient bindings for quickly activating or deactivating updates.

After opening a sysuplist file, extra newlines are added between the updates (the terms: updates, packages and items all mean the same thing), with the aim of avoiding confusion as to whether a description of an update belongs to the update above or below it. This means the file is modified right after the user opens it.

The headers indicating new sections are made read-only (via text-properties). For an example of a header, see (1) in the snippet above. The user is not supposed to type any text in the sysuplist file except for the #s. For this reason, the whole buffer is made read-only. But this can be turned off (and on again) with C-x C-q.

The navigation code is quite fragile. When the user starts to manually edit a sysuplist file, some features might stop working properly.

Extra newlines are added every time after opening a sysuplist files. But sysuplist files are meant to be edited only once, so this should not be an issue.

Dependencies:

No known dependencies. This mode was written for Emacs 23(.3), compatibility with other versions cannot be guaranteed. No exotic features are used, so it should work with most versions.

Installation:

Make sure to place sysuplist-mode.el somewhere in the load-path and add the following lines to your .emacs file:

(autoload 'sysuplist-mode "sysuplist-mode.el"
   "Major mode for selection Yaourt updates" t)

Customization:

There is only setting that can be configured: sysuplist-switch-mark-unmark, this variable indicates whether 'marking' means 'commenting out' or 'commenting in'.

Usage:

Open a sysuplist file and be greeted with colours and welcome whitespace. Users should only use the following bindings:

• Move between items with n and p.
• Move between sections with N and P.
• Mark an item with m and remove the mark with u.
• Toggle an item between marked an unmarked with t.
• Toggle all items with T: marked items become unmarked, and vice versa.

Bugs:

Submit your bug reports to dewinant@gmail.com. Thanks.

Copyright (C) 2011 Thomas Winant dewinant@gmail.com