GNU bug report logs - #16005
inferior-lisp and filenames with spaces

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Message #5 received at submit <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Steven Litvintchouk <sdlitvin <at> earthlink.net>
To: bug-gnu-emacs <at> gnu.org
Subject: 24.3;
 function inferior-lisp needs patch to work with certain filenames
 in Windows-NT
Date: Fri, 29 Nov 2013 15:27:25 -0500

[Message part 1 (text/plain, inline)]

Trying to run an inferior lisp program on Windows 7,
with the value of inferior-lisp-program set to
"D:/More Program Files (x86)/clisp-2.49/clisp.exe",

caused an error with error message:
"Spawning child process: invalid argument"

The reason is that the function inferior-lisp (defined in inf-lisp.el)
calls the function split-string, whose arg SEPARATORS defaults to "[ 
\f\t\n\r\v]+".
But Microsoft Windows allows spaces in filenames (as in the
inferior-lisp-program filename given above).

I patched this to check if we're on Windows-nt, and if so, to call
split-string with SEPARATORS bound to "[\f\t\n\r\v]+".  (no space)


(defun inferior-lisp (cmd)
  "Run an inferior Lisp process, input and output via buffer 
`*inferior-lisp*'.
If there is a process already running in `*inferior-lisp*', just switch
to that buffer.
With argument, allows you to edit the command line (default is value
of `inferior-lisp-program').  Runs the hooks from
`inferior-lisp-mode-hook' (after the `comint-mode-hook' is run).
\(Type \\[describe-mode] in the process buffer for a list of commands.)"
  (interactive (list (if current-prefix-arg
             (read-string "Run lisp: " inferior-lisp-program)
               inferior-lisp-program)))
  (if (not (comint-check-proc "*inferior-lisp*"))
      (let ((cmdlist (if (equal system-type 'windows-nt)
             (split-string cmd "[\f\t\n\r\v]+") ; SDL: Windows allows 
spaces in filenames
               (split-string cmd)
               )))
    (set-buffer (apply (function make-comint)
               "inferior-lisp" (car cmdlist) nil (cdr cmdlist)))
    (inferior-lisp-mode)))
  (setq inferior-lisp-buffer "*inferior-lisp*")
  (pop-to-buffer-same-window "*inferior-lisp*"))






In GNU Emacs 24.3.1 (i386-mingw-nt6.1.7601)
 of 2013-03-17 on MARVIN
Windowing system distributor `Microsoft Corp.', version 6.1.7601
Configured using:
 `configure --with-gcc (4.7) --cflags
 -ID:/devel/emacs/libs/libXpm-3.5.8/include
 -ID:/devel/emacs/libs/libXpm-3.5.8/src
 -ID:/devel/emacs/libs/libpng-dev_1.4.3-1/include
 -ID:/devel/emacs/libs/zlib-dev_1.2.5-2/include
 -ID:/devel/emacs/libs/giflib-4.1.4-1/include
 -ID:/devel/emacs/libs/jpeg-6b-4/include
 -ID:/devel/emacs/libs/tiff-3.8.2-1/include
 -ID:/devel/emacs/libs/gnutls-3.0.9/include
 -ID:/devel/emacs/libs/libiconv-1.13.1-1-dev/include
 -ID:/devel/emacs/libs/libxml2-2.7.8/include/libxml2'

Important settings:
  value of $LANG: ENU
  locale-coding-system: cp1252
  default enable-multibyte-characters: t

Major mode: Info

Minor modes in effect:
  tooltip-mode: t
  mouse-wheel-mode: t
  tool-bar-mode: t
  menu-bar-mode: t
  file-name-shadow-mode: t
  global-font-lock-mode: t
  font-lock-mode: t
  blink-cursor-mode: t
  auto-composition-mode: t
  auto-encryption-mode: t
  auto-compression-mode: t
  buffer-read-only: t
  line-number-mode: t
  transient-mark-mode: t

Recent input:
<help-echo> <help-echo> <help-echo> <help-echo> C-x
o C-x b i n f - l i s SPC - w i n SPC p a SPC SPC <return>
<down-mouse-1> <mouse-1> i f SPC ( e q u a l SPC s
y s t e m - t y p e SPC " w i n d o w s - n t " <return>
<tab> C-e C-p ) C-n C-a <tab> C-e C-b C-b C-j <tab>
C-p C-f C-f C-f C-b ( C-a <tab> C-n C-a <tab> C-p C-e
C-j ( s p l i t - s t r i n g SPC c m d ) <down-mouse-1>
<mouse-1> <down-mouse-1> <mouse-1> <escape> ; SPC W
i n d o w s SPC a l l o w s SPC b l a n k s SPC i n
SPC f i l e n a m e s <left> <left> <left> <left> <left>
<left> <left> <left> <left> <left> <left> <left> <left>
<left> <backspace> <backspace> <backspace> <backspace>
<backspace> s p a c e C-x s y y <help-echo> <help-echo>
<help-echo> <down-mouse-1> <mouse-1> C-h ? <help-echo>
<mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1>
<mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1>
<mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1>
<mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1>
<mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1>
<mouse-1> C-p <mouse-1> <down-mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1>
<mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1>
<mouse-1> <mouse-1> <mouse-1> <help-echo> <down-mouse-1>
<mouse-1> C-x 1 C-h i m e m a c s <return> SPC SPC
<help-echo> <down-mouse-1> <mouse-2> <help-echo> <help-echo>
<down-mouse-1> <mouse-2> <mouse-1> <help-echo> <help-echo>
<help-echo> <tool-bar> <Back in history> <help-echo>
<help-echo> <help-echo> <help-echo> <help-echo> <down-mouse-1>
<mouse-2> <escape> x r e p o e r <backspace> <backspace>
r t - = e <backspace> <backspace> e m a c s = b i g
<backspace> <backspace> <backspace> <backspace> - b
u g <return>

Recent messages:

Quit
Making completion list...
Type C-x 1 to delete the help window.
Saving file d:/More Program 
Files/Shareware/emacs-24.3/lisp/progmodes/inf-lisp-windows-patch.el...
Wrote d:/More Program 
Files/Shareware/emacs-24.3/lisp/progmodes/inf-lisp-windows-patch.el
Saving file d:/More Program 
Files/Shareware/emacs-24.3/lisp/progmodes/inf-lisp.el...
Wrote d:/More Program Files/Shareware/emacs-24.3/lisp/progmodes/inf-lisp.el
View mode: type C-h for help, h for commands, q to quit.
Composing main Info directory...done

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inf-lisp comint ansi-color ring gnus gnus-ems nnheader gnus-util
mail-utils mm-util mail-prsvr wid-edit cus-start cus-load time-date
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button faces cus-face macroexp files text-properties overlay sha1 md5
base64 format env code-pages mule custom widget hashtable-print-readable
backquote make-network-process w32 multi-tty emacs)

[Message part 2 (text/html, inline)]

[C:\Users\Steven\My Templates\Thunderbird\yellow-spine.gif (image/gif, inline)]

Message #8 received at 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Glenn Morris <rgm <at> gnu.org>
To: Steven Litvintchouk <sdlitvin <at> earthlink.net>
Cc: 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: Re: bug#16005: 24.3;
 function inferior-lisp needs patch to work with certain filenames in
 Windows-NT
Date: Sat, 30 Nov 2013 17:12:16 -0500

Steven Litvintchouk wrote:

> But Microsoft Windows allows spaces in filenames

I think every platform that Emacs supports allows spaces in filenames;
just that people on non-MS Windows platforms generally know to avoid
such filenames. ;)

> I patched this to check if we're on Windows-nt, and if so, to call
> split-string with SEPARATORS bound to "[\f\t\n\r\v]+"

That doesn't work, consider eg

/bin/lisp --some-arg

versus

/Program Files/lisp

Message #13 received at 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi <at> gnus.org>
To: Steven Litvintchouk <sdlitvin <at> earthlink.net>
Cc: 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: Re: bug#16005: inferior-lisp and filenames with spaces
Date: Thu, 15 Jul 2021 07:33:33 +0200

Steven Litvintchouk <sdlitvin <at> earthlink.net> writes:

> Trying to run an inferior lisp program on Windows 7,
> with the value of inferior-lisp-program set to 
> "D:/More Program Files (x86)/clisp-2.49/clisp.exe",
>
> caused an error with error message:
> "Spawning child process: invalid argument"
>
> The reason is that the function inferior-lisp (defined in inf-lisp.el)
> calls the function split-string, whose arg SEPARATORS defaults to "[ \f\t\n\r\v]+".

This problem is still present in Emacs 28:

  (interactive (list (if current-prefix-arg
			 (read-string "Run lisp: " inferior-lisp-program)
		       inferior-lisp-program)))
  (if (not (comint-check-proc "*inferior-lisp*"))
      (let ((cmdlist (split-string cmd)))
	(set-buffer (apply (function make-comint)
			   "inferior-lisp" (car cmdlist) nil (cdr cmdlist)))
	(inferior-lisp-mode)))

The only way this could work is that if we either split the prompt into
two parts (one for the command and one for the options), or that we
require that the user quotes the spaces, and then use a splitting
function that's aware of that.  So the user would have to type

"D:/More Program Files (x86)/clisp-2.49/clisp.exe" -some -option

or the like.

I thought Emacs had a shell-syntax-aware splitting function (that would
tokenise that into a list of three items), but I can't find it now...
anybody remember what it's called (if we do have it)?  I.e.,

(that-func "\"foo bar\" zot") => ("foo bar" "zot")

and

(that-func "foo\\ bar zot") => ("foo bar" "zot")


-- 
(domestic pets only, the antidote for overdose, milk.)
   bloggy blog: http://lars.ingebrigtsen.no

Message #18 received at 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org>
To: Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi <at> gnus.org>
Cc: 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org, sdlitvin <at> earthlink.net
Subject: Re: bug#16005: inferior-lisp and filenames with spaces
Date: Thu, 15 Jul 2021 09:58:56 +0300

> From: Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi <at> gnus.org>
> Date: Thu, 15 Jul 2021 07:33:33 +0200
> Cc: 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
> 
> Steven Litvintchouk <sdlitvin <at> earthlink.net> writes:
> 
> > Trying to run an inferior lisp program on Windows 7,
> > with the value of inferior-lisp-program set to 
> > "D:/More Program Files (x86)/clisp-2.49/clisp.exe",
> >
> > caused an error with error message:
> > "Spawning child process: invalid argument"
> >
> > The reason is that the function inferior-lisp (defined in inf-lisp.el)
> > calls the function split-string, whose arg SEPARATORS defaults to "[ \f\t\n\r\v]+".
> 
> This problem is still present in Emacs 28:
> 
>   (interactive (list (if current-prefix-arg
> 			 (read-string "Run lisp: " inferior-lisp-program)
> 		       inferior-lisp-program)))
>   (if (not (comint-check-proc "*inferior-lisp*"))
>       (let ((cmdlist (split-string cmd)))
> 	(set-buffer (apply (function make-comint)
> 			   "inferior-lisp" (car cmdlist) nil (cdr cmdlist)))
> 	(inferior-lisp-mode)))
> 
> The only way this could work is that if we either split the prompt into
> two parts (one for the command and one for the options), or that we
> require that the user quotes the spaces, and then use a splitting
> function that's aware of that.  So the user would have to type
> 
> "D:/More Program Files (x86)/clisp-2.49/clisp.exe" -some -option
> 
> or the like.

If we prompt the users for a shell command, we should expect the users
to quote it as they would when they type at the shell's prompt.  is
this prompt for the complete shell command, or is it only for the name
of the program's executable file?  If the latter, we should run the
result through shell-quote-argument before using it; if the former,
the user should do the quoting, and there's no bug in Emacs.

Message #21 received at 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi <at> gnus.org>
To: Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org>
Cc: 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org, sdlitvin <at> earthlink.net
Subject: Re: bug#16005: inferior-lisp and filenames with spaces
Date: Thu, 15 Jul 2021 09:10:33 +0200

Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org> writes:

>>       (let ((cmdlist (split-string cmd)))
>> 	(set-buffer (apply (function make-comint)
>> 			   "inferior-lisp" (car cmdlist) nil (cdr cmdlist)))

[...]

> If we prompt the users for a shell command, we should expect the users
> to quote it as they would when they type at the shell's prompt.  is
> this prompt for the complete shell command, or is it only for the name
> of the program's executable file?  If the latter, we should run the
> result through shell-quote-argument before using it; if the former,
> the user should do the quoting, and there's no bug in Emacs.

It's the former.  The problem is that there is no way for the user to
quote the command, since we do a `split-string' on what they typed in
before executing it.

-- 
(domestic pets only, the antidote for overdose, milk.)
   bloggy blog: http://lars.ingebrigtsen.no

Message #24 received at 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org>
To: Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi <at> gnus.org>
Cc: 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org, sdlitvin <at> earthlink.net
Subject: Re: bug#16005: inferior-lisp and filenames with spaces
Date: Thu, 15 Jul 2021 10:25:19 +0300

> From: Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi <at> gnus.org>
> Cc: sdlitvin <at> earthlink.net,  16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
> Date: Thu, 15 Jul 2021 09:10:33 +0200
> 
> Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org> writes:
> 
> >>       (let ((cmdlist (split-string cmd)))
> >> 	(set-buffer (apply (function make-comint)
> >> 			   "inferior-lisp" (car cmdlist) nil (cdr cmdlist)))
> 
> [...]
> 
> > If we prompt the users for a shell command, we should expect the users
> > to quote it as they would when they type at the shell's prompt.  is
> > this prompt for the complete shell command, or is it only for the name
> > of the program's executable file?  If the latter, we should run the
> > result through shell-quote-argument before using it; if the former,
> > the user should do the quoting, and there's no bug in Emacs.
> 
> It's the former.  The problem is that there is no way for the user to
> quote the command, since we do a `split-string' on what they typed in
> before executing it.

Then how about using split-string-and-unquote instead of split-string?

Message #27 received at 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi <at> gnus.org>
To: Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org>
Cc: 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org, sdlitvin <at> earthlink.net
Subject: Re: bug#16005: inferior-lisp and filenames with spaces
Date: Thu, 15 Jul 2021 09:30:34 +0200

Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org> writes:

> Then how about using split-string-and-unquote instead of split-string?

That would be an improvement, certainly.  It'd take care of
"\"foo bar\" zot".  However, it doesn't do "foo\\ bar zot", and both are
equivalent in shells.

Which is why I wondered whether we had a function to split based on
shell(ish) syntax, which would be the optimal solution here...

-- 
(domestic pets only, the antidote for overdose, milk.)
   bloggy blog: http://lars.ingebrigtsen.no

Message #30 received at 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org>
To: Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi <at> gnus.org>
Cc: 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org, sdlitvin <at> earthlink.net
Subject: Re: bug#16005: inferior-lisp and filenames with spaces
Date: Thu, 15 Jul 2021 10:45:05 +0300

> From: Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi <at> gnus.org>
> Cc: sdlitvin <at> earthlink.net,  16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
> Date: Thu, 15 Jul 2021 09:30:34 +0200
> 
> Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org> writes:
> 
> > Then how about using split-string-and-unquote instead of split-string?
> 
> That would be an improvement, certainly.  It'd take care of
> "\"foo bar\" zot".  However, it doesn't do "foo\\ bar zot", and both are
> equivalent in shells.

Users will have to use quoting "like this".  We can document that.
It's a relatively rare use case, so I don't think the partial support
for quoting is such a bad idea.

> Which is why I wondered whether we had a function to split based on
> shell(ish) syntax, which would be the optimal solution here...

I think split-string-and-unquote is the only one that comes close.  If
someone wants to emulate the shells we support, patches are welcome
(and then there will still be the problem to know the exact shell
which is being targeted in each use case).

Message #33 received at 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi <at> gnus.org>
To: Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org>
Cc: 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org, sdlitvin <at> earthlink.net
Subject: Re: bug#16005: inferior-lisp and filenames with spaces
Date: Thu, 15 Jul 2021 10:00:23 +0200

Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org> writes:

>> Which is why I wondered whether we had a function to split based on
>> shell(ish) syntax, which would be the optimal solution here...
>
> I think split-string-and-unquote is the only one that comes close.  If
> someone wants to emulate the shells we support, patches are welcome
> (and then there will still be the problem to know the exact shell
> which is being targeted in each use case).

That's true.   However, this reminded me that we do have pretty good
completion in `M-!', so I thought we must have some tokenisation support
somewhere, and indeed: `shell--parse-pcomplete-arguments' seems to fit
the bill here.  So adding a `shell-split-string' by wrapping that
function seems like it should be possible.  I'll poke some more at it;
it doesn't quite seem to handle \ as expected in all circumstances.

It handles "" and '' fine, as far as I can tell:

'foo"bar' zot
-> (("foo\"bar" "zot") 1 11)

-- 
(domestic pets only, the antidote for overdose, milk.)
   bloggy blog: http://lars.ingebrigtsen.no

Message #36 received at 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org>
To: Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi <at> gnus.org>
Cc: 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org, sdlitvin <at> earthlink.net
Subject: Re: bug#16005: inferior-lisp and filenames with spaces
Date: Thu, 15 Jul 2021 11:19:45 +0300

> From: Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi <at> gnus.org>
> Cc: sdlitvin <at> earthlink.net,  16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
> Date: Thu, 15 Jul 2021 10:00:23 +0200
> 
> That's true.   However, this reminded me that we do have pretty good
> completion in `M-!', so I thought we must have some tokenisation support
> somewhere, and indeed: `shell--parse-pcomplete-arguments' seems to fit
> the bill here.  So adding a `shell-split-string' by wrapping that
> function seems like it should be possible.  I'll poke some more at it;
> it doesn't quite seem to handle \ as expected in all circumstances.

If that works, I'd suggest to call the function something that begins
with split-string-, like split-string-shell-command or somesuch.  I
think this would make its discovery easier.

Message #39 received at 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi <at> gnus.org>
To: Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org>
Cc: 16005 <at> debbugs.gnu.org, sdlitvin <at> earthlink.net
Subject: Re: bug#16005: inferior-lisp and filenames with spaces
Date: Thu, 15 Jul 2021 10:30:30 +0200

Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org> writes:

> If that works,

It did -- I just had to wrap it in a binding for the shell escaped.

> I'd suggest to call the function something that begins
> with split-string-, like split-string-shell-command or somesuch.  I
> think this would make its discovery easier.

Good point.  I've now renamed it.

So back to the original bug report -- I'll change it to use the new
splitting function, and then document that it's doing so.

-- 
(domestic pets only, the antidote for overdose, milk.)
   bloggy blog: http://lars.ingebrigtsen.no

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