getting started with emacs zephyr

1. Put the accompanying zephyr-setup.el file somewhere easy to find, e.g. ~/emacs


2. In your ~/.emacs file, put in the following:

   
   (setq load-path (cons (expand-file-name "~/emacs/") load-path))
   
   (defvar running-xemacs (string-match "XEmacs\\|Lucid" emacs-version))
   
   (cond (running-xemacs
         (load "zephyr-setup.el")
   
   ;; Uncomment the following (and change to whatever number you want) to
   ;; get a large zephyr buffer and a longer zephyr history
   ;      (setq zephyr-buffer-size 256000)
   
   ;; Comment out the following to not launch zephyr-personal on startup
         (zephyr-personal)
   
   ;; Comment out the following to not launch zephyr-nonpersonal on startup
        (zephyr-nonpersonal)
   
         ;; To enable logging, put something similar to the following into your
         ;; .emacs AFTER you have created your zephyr buffer(s), and AFTER you
         ;; have set zephyr-send-function (if you do so). Modify the names
         ;; of the log file and zephyr buffer as appropriate, of course.
         ;;
         ; (require 'zephyr-logging)
         ; (zephyr-enable-logging "~/.zephyrlog" "*zephyr-personal-zgrams*")
         ;;
         ;; To log only sent zephyrgrams or only received zephyrgrams, use
         ;; zephyr-enable-send-logging or zephyr-enable-receive-logging.
         ;; For example,
         ;;   (zephyr-enable-send-logging "~/.zephyrlog" "*zephyr-personal-zgrams*")
         ;;
         ;; To turn off all logging in a buffer, use zephyr-disable-logging.
   ))
   (custom-set-faces)
   
   

3. Customization:

   Things you might want to fiddle with in the zephyr-setup.el file (grep for these and read the comments):
   

   • zephyr-initial-history
   • zephyr-aliases
   • zephyr-deiconify-on-receive
   • zephyr-extra-subscriptions
   • zephyr-filters
   
   Things to modify in your .emacs file:
   
   
   • zephyr-enable-logging
   • zephyr-buffer-size
   • zephyr-personal
   • zephyr-nonpersonal
   
   
4. If you don't want zephyr to start-up every time you launch xemacs, you can do one of two things:
   
   
   1. comment out all the stuff from your .emacs, and run all these commands manually after starting emacs.
   
   
   2. keep two versions of your .emacs, one with zephyr and one without, and set an alias for each of them. For example, I have in my .bashrc:

      	alias xe='xemacs -q -l ~/.emacs'
      	alias xez='xemacs -q -l ~/.emacs_zephyr
      

   
   
5. Using zephyr: following are some useful keybindings that work with the above setup for xemacs zephyr:
   
   
   • Ctrl-j : send
   • Alt-p/Alt-n : cycle back and forth through instances/recipients
   • Ctrl-c Ctrl-y : to quote a zephyr
   
   Check all available zephyr-related commands by typing Ctrl-h a zephyr in your emacs window.