7

I am trying to get session to work, and I am especially keen on having my registers persistent between sessions. I installed the package sessions.el via Melpa (M-x list-packages) and I added this to my .emacs

(require 'session)
(add-hook 'after-init-hook 'session-initialize)

and I also added this as recommended in the session.el file (even though desktop is not enabled)

(setq desktop-globals-to-save '(desktop-missing-file-warning))

This doesn't seem to be working though. I tried saving my registers but they are not persistent across sessions. I tried changing the value of session-globals-include via M-x customize-group RET session RET to include register. This is what emacs added to my .emacs file after the changes in custom

 '(session-globals-include
   (quote
    ((kill-ring 10 nil)
     (session-file-alist 100 t)
     (file-name-history 200 nil)
     search-ring regexp-search-ring
     (register-alist 100 t))))
 '(session-use-package t nil (session)))

Still, when I try to invoke a register using C-x r j r (the set register from the previous session), it says "Register doesn't contain a buffer position or configuration". I am not even sure anything is being saved between sessions. What am I doing wrong?

Vivi
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  • Emacs's built-in desktop.el works out-of-box, simply put (desktop-save-mode) to your init.el or .emacs, the package is also documented in Emacs manual ((info "(emacs) Saving Emacs Sessions")). – xuchunyang Sep 25 '15 at 14:42
  • @xuchunyang OK, I will try that. I found out about desktop after having already wasted 2 hours trying to get sessions to work, so I didn't want it to be for nothing... BTW, should it be (desktop-save-mode 1)? – Vivi Sep 25 '15 at 14:43
  • (desktop-save-mode) is the same as (desktop-save-mode 1) for relatively new Emacs version (24?) according to its docstring "If called from Lisp, enable the mode if ARG is omitted or nil.", you can read its docstring with C-h f to make sure that, – xuchunyang Sep 25 '15 at 14:51
  • @xuchunyang OK, makes sense. When I was typing desktop-save-mode my minibuffer displayed the name of the function followed by "optional arg" so of course you are right. Desktop worked by the way, thank you :) – Vivi Sep 25 '15 at 14:52
  • @xuchunyang would you post this as an answer so this doesn't show as a question with no answers? Vivi, would you then accept this to show this has been addressed? – rocky Oct 18 '15 at 12:56
  • @rocky I have posted an answer anyway. – xuchunyang Oct 18 '15 at 16:37

2 Answers2

7

You can use Emacs's built-in package desktop.el instead, it saves registers by default. To use it, put following to your init file:

(desktop-save-mode)
;; prior to Emacs 24
(desktop-save-mode 1)

You can also use other packages, such as built-in package savehist.el, as long as you can use it to keep value of the variable register-alist across session.

xuchunyang
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5

This is what I use:

;; don't use desktop mode for terminal
(when (display-graphic-p)
  (desktop-save-mode 1);; is x window
  ())

;; Add variables to desktop saving
(add-to-list 'desktop-globals-to-save 'register-alist)
Tyler
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