Info Catalog elisp: Abbrev Tables elisp: Abbrevs elisp: Abbrev Files

elisp: Defining Abbrevs

 
 35.2 Defining Abbrevs
 =====================
 
 ‘define-abbrev’ is the low-level basic function for defining an abbrev
 in an abbrev table.
 
    When a major mode defines a system abbrev, it should call
 ‘define-abbrev’ and specify ‘t’ for the ‘:system’ property.  Be aware
 that any saved non-system abbrevs are restored at startup, i.e., before
 some major modes are loaded.  Therefore, major modes should not assume
 that their abbrev tables are empty when they are first loaded.
 
  -- Function: define-abbrev abbrev-table name expansion &optional hook
           &rest props
      This function defines an abbrev named NAME, in ABBREV-TABLE, to
      expand to EXPANSION and call HOOK, with properties PROPS (
      Abbrev Properties).  The return value is NAME.  The ‘:system’
      property in PROPS is treated specially here: if it has the value
      ‘force’, then it will overwrite an existing definition even for a
      non-system abbrev of the same name.
 
      NAME should be a string.  The argument EXPANSION is normally the
      desired expansion (a string), or ‘nil’ to undefine the abbrev.  If
      it is anything but a string or ‘nil’, then the abbreviation expands
      solely by running HOOK.
 
      The argument HOOK is a function or ‘nil’.  If HOOK is non-‘nil’,
      then it is called with no arguments after the abbrev is replaced
      with EXPANSION; point is located at the end of EXPANSION when HOOK
      is called.
 
      If HOOK is a non-‘nil’ symbol whose ‘no-self-insert’ property is
      non-‘nil’, HOOK can explicitly control whether to insert the
      self-inserting input character that triggered the expansion.  If
      HOOK returns non-‘nil’ in this case, that inhibits insertion of the
      character.  By contrast, if HOOK returns ‘nil’, ‘expand-abbrev’ (or
      ‘abbrev-insert’) also returns ‘nil’, as if expansion had not really
      occurred.
 
      Normally, ‘define-abbrev’ sets the variable ‘abbrevs-changed’ to
      ‘t’, if it actually changes the abbrev.  This is so that some
      commands will offer to save the abbrevs.  It does not do this for a
      system abbrev, since those aren’t saved anyway.
 
  -- User Option: only-global-abbrevs
      If this variable is non-‘nil’, it means that the user plans to use
      global abbrevs only.  This tells the commands that define
      mode-specific abbrevs to define global ones instead.  This variable
      does not alter the behavior of the functions in this section; it is
      examined by their callers.
 

Info Catalog elisp: Abbrev Tables elisp: Abbrevs elisp: Abbrev Files