Re: [AUCTeX-devel] Re: Accessing TeX-related documentation

[David Kastrup]

Ralf Angeli <address@hidden> writes:

> * David Kastrup (2005-11-20) writes:
>
>> Ralf Angeli <address@hidden> writes:
>>
>>> Anyway, it works, i.e. an xdvi window is displayed, if
>>> `process-connection-type' is bound to nil when `start-process' is
>>> being called:
>>>
>>> (let ((process-connection-type nil))
>>>   (start-process "texdoc-proc" (current-buffer) "texdoc" "float"))
>>
>> Hmmm.  Makes one think about our viewer starting stuff.  We had the
>> problem that we could not figure out whether starting the viewer
>> failed.
>
> You mean that the user gets no feedback of it failed?  I don't recall
> any discussion about that.  Maybe this was before my time.
>
> The viewer is called with `TeX-run-discard' which uses `(call-process
> blah blah 0 blah blah blah)' and yes, this discards all output from
> the process.

Not only that.  It also discards the exit status and does not tell us
if the program even exists.

The problem with start-process was that it caused for example
xdvi -source-special
to be killed when it tried detaching itself from the controlling tty.

So TeX-run-discard was changed not to use start-process, and the
viewer commands were changed to use TeX-run-discard instead of, I
think, TeX-run-silent.

-- 
David Kastrup, Kriemhildstr. 15, 44793 Bochum