Installing Emacs 24 on Waldorf

wtagg · 2014-06-03 14:31:53

Hello,

This is my first (original) question post to the Crunchbang forums. As this question involves both Crunchbang and Emacs, I'm mindful that it might be better posted on the Emacs listserv. However, I think the question(s) I have are more related to Crunchbang than Emacs.

One of the first things I plan to do after installing Crunchbang is install Emacs 24. I found some intstructions that worked quite well on the Virtualbox installation of Crunchbang that I'm running at http://hal.case.edu/~rrc/blog/2013/11/0 … runchbang/

$ wget -q -O - http://emacs.naquadah.org/key.gpg | sudo apt-key add -
$ sudo geany /etc/apt/sources.list
    deb http://emacs.naquadah.org/ stable/
    deb-src http://emacs.naquadah.org/ stable/
$ sudo apt-get update
$ sudo apt-get install emacs-snapshot

The blogger goes on to describe some additional steps to take but I had no trouble getting this to work. I did a little more searching and found this:

Debian Forum - Installing Emacs 24
http://forums.debian.net/viewtopic.php? … 24#p450944

It appears that the source for the repository (http://emacs.naquadah.org) is the same as the instructions I have. But one of the posters warns:

"However unless you really need emacs24, I would highly recommend installing emacs23 from the standard Debian repository instead."

So, my question to other Crunchbangers is this: Will adding this repository cause problems in the future? I'm planning to install the latest 64-bit Crunchbang release ("Waldorf" as of 3 June 2014). I'm just concerned with running into problems when I update my machine.

I'd appreciate any advice you may have on how to evaluate this. Underlying this question is a lack of familiarity with how to troubleshoot and more importantly avoid problems with updates. In addition to asking the specific question about the best way to install Emacs 24, I'd welcome suggestions for resources that would help me better understand how Crunchbang works with Debian repos as well.

Thanks,

Will

uname · 2014-06-03 14:50:06

Crunbang Waldorf based on Debian Wheezy. For your problem Crunchbang Waldorf is Debian Wheezy. In Debian Wheezy you normally get Emacs 23.

https://packages.debian.org/wheezy/emacs
https://packages.debian.org/wheezy/emacs23

In Debian Jessie (Testing) you get normally Emacs 23

https://packages.debian.org/jessie/emacs
https://packages.debian.org/jessie/emacs23

but you can install Emacs 24

https://packages.debian.org/jessie/emacs24

Do you really need Emacs 24? I think it is better for a stable system to use Emacs 23. Perhaps you can use APT-Pinning (jessie repository) to install Emacs 24 on Debian Wheezy (Crunchbang Waldorf). Search for "apt-pinning emacs 24". I think you can better use apt-pinning than a different non-debian-repository.

Greetings from a vim-user ;-)

Last edited by uname (2014-06-03 15:00:12)

wtagg · 2014-06-03 15:18:44

Thank you for that advice! I'll try searching for "apt-pinning emacs 24" as you suggest. As I understand it, installing Emacs 24 from this older Debian repository wouldn't present the same issue for stability as the source (http://emacs.naquadah.org) I mentioned in my post. This is helpful! And I also think it helps me to appreciate the issue that I was uncertain about: the wisdom of using a non-Debian repository. I know this is obvious for most but I'm trying to develop a more informed intuition around my Linux maintenance tasks.

As for whether I need Emacs 24, I need to think. I believe that Emacs 24 had some feature I really wanted that was related to org-mode. I wish I would have made note of what this feature was so I could weigh it against the possible instability you warned me about.

I also appreciate vim! In fact, I would benefit from knowing more about how to use it! Emacs is a writing and text-processing environment for me. I do a little web editing with it but no programming. Maybe if I did I would learn both. ; )

Thanks again.

Sector11 · 2014-06-03 16:49:15

emacs23

Stable:
emacs23 (23.4+1-4) The GNU Emacs editor (with GTK+ user interface)

Testing
emacs23 (23.4+1-4.1+b1) The GNU Emacs editor (with GTK+ user interface)

SID
emacs23 (23.4+1-4.1+b1)

With SID I get:

 03 Jun 14 | 13:47:04 ~
    $ get emacs23
[sudo] password for sector11: 
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
The following packages were automatically installed and are no longer required:
  libboost-date-time1.54.0 libpython3.3 libpython3.3-minimal
  libpython3.3-stdlib libqt4-opengl stellarium-data
Use 'apt-get autoremove' to remove them.
The following extra packages will be installed:
  emacs23-bin-common emacs23-common libm17n-0 libotf0 m17n-contrib m17n-db
Suggested packages:
  emacs23-common-non-dfsg emacs23-el m17n-docs
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  emacs23 emacs23-bin-common emacs23-common libm17n-0 libotf0 m17n-contrib
  m17n-db
0 upgraded, 7 newly installed, 0 to remove and 38 not upgraded.
Need to get 0 B/23.1 MB of archives.
After this operation, 80.7 MB of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue? [Y/n] 
Retrieving bug reports... Done
Parsing Found/Fixed information... Done
serious bugs of emacs23 (→ 23.4+1-4.1+b1) <Outstanding>
 #738638 - emacs23: needs Breaks: vm-bonus-el (<< 35.8)
Summary:
 emacs23(1 bug)
Are you sure you want to install/upgrade the above packages? [Y/n/?/...]

so, my suggestion is to stay away from the Testing/SID emacs23 for a while.

But we are talking stable here anyway.

PhilipDaniels · 2014-06-03 17:10:19

Emacs 24 has been out for yonks and is fine for daily use.

I suggest compiling it from source, it is quite easy. Last time I did it it was just this (but there are probably some pre-reqs you will need to apt-get as well)

bzr checkout --lightweight --quiet bzr://bzr.savannah.gnu.org/emacs/emacs-24
./autogen.sh
./configure
make bootstrap
make install

wtagg · 2014-06-03 19:48:47

PhilipDaniels wrote:

Last time I did it it was just this (but there are probably some pre-reqs you will need to apt-get as well)

@PhilipDaniels thanks for these steps. I don't usually build Emacs from source but maybe I will start! Also, I think I'm concerned about the possibility that obtaining the pre-req files would require adding repositories that might make system less stable. But I'm not quite sure how to evaluate that...although the feedback I've gotten here so far has helped!

wtagg · 2014-06-03 19:50:44

Sector11 wrote:

so, my suggestion is to stay away from the Testing/SID emacs23 for a while. But we are talking stable here anyway.

@Sector11, I'm sorry if this seems like a dumb question but does that also imply that installing Emacs 24, as I would like to do, would be a bad idea on Crunchbang Waldorf? I am concerned about stability.

brontosaurusrex · 2014-06-03 22:03:02

delete me.

Last edited by brontosaurusrex (2014-06-03 22:07:34)

wtagg · 2014-06-03 22:15:21

@Red Menace, thanks for sharing that! I should have thought to actually *look* at the web page on the other end of that deb-src. I assumed there wouldn't be a webpage there at all. This clarifies something I didn't understand and adds to my question.

First, it clarifies things in that the site http://emacs.naquadah.org/ seems to be solely a repository for Emacs so there doesn't seem to be a reason to be concerned about other unwanted updates outside of Emacs itself...and since it isn't maintained, not even that matters much.

My evolving question seems to be two parts: 1) What, if any, are the risks of installing Emacs 24 and any prerequisite packages on Crunchbang Waldorf and 2) what is the best method for installation of Emacs 24 on Crunchbang Waldorf?

Thanks to everyone who has taken the time to answer. I imagine this must seem very basic to most forum readers but working it the rationale for this in writing and with input like this is very helpful. smile

brontosaurusrex · 2014-06-04 08:02:44

Thanks to everyone who has taken the time to answer. I imagine this must seem very basic to most forum readers but working it the rationale for this in writing and with input like this is very helpful.

Not really, it gets complex really fast (especially when you include the uncertain future, good thing is that wheezy updates really slowly this days). But, my guess is that app like emacs won't really break anything system-important-wise.

tty-tourist · 2014-06-04 10:59:57

I've been running the emacs 24 snapshot from http://emacs.naquadah.org/ installed as described in your original post for some time.

It works really well and haven't given me any problems. I'm not contesting that apt-pinning or compiling from source are better ways to do it - they probably are but installing the snapshot is easy and not that risky.

Anyways, don't settle for emacs 23 - 24 is a great improvement!

Last edited by tty-tourist (2014-06-04 11:12:08)

wtagg · 2014-06-05 18:45:47

@brontosaurusrex, @andreas-r thanks again for your reassurance and encouragement. In many ways, my Crunchbang installation is all an effort to allow me some distraction free writing (perhaps like your CLI Typewriter, @andreas-r). So keeping my writing environment as close to my expectation (Emacs 24) as possible is a relief. This is one more thing I can cross off my installation list!

Now to get on with installing on my Acer C720 Chromebook!

CrunchBang Linux

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#1 2014-06-03 14:31:53

Installing Emacs 24 on Waldorf

#2 2014-06-03 14:50:06

Re: Installing Emacs 24 on Waldorf

#3 2014-06-03 15:18:44

Re: Installing Emacs 24 on Waldorf

#4 2014-06-03 16:49:15

Re: Installing Emacs 24 on Waldorf

#5 2014-06-03 17:10:19

Re: Installing Emacs 24 on Waldorf

#6 2014-06-03 19:48:47

Re: Installing Emacs 24 on Waldorf

#7 2014-06-03 19:50:44

Re: Installing Emacs 24 on Waldorf

#8 2014-06-03 22:03:02

Re: Installing Emacs 24 on Waldorf

#9 2014-06-03 22:15:21

Re: Installing Emacs 24 on Waldorf

#10 2014-06-04 08:02:44

Re: Installing Emacs 24 on Waldorf

#11 2014-06-04 10:59:57

Re: Installing Emacs 24 on Waldorf

#12 2014-06-05 18:45:47

Re: Installing Emacs 24 on Waldorf

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