Emacs: copy things at point without marking

This emacs config snippet is the predecessor to viking-mode: it allows me to copy thing at point without marking it beforehand. I just press a prefix key followed by an abbreviation of the thing to copy:

Like viking-mode the copied thing is being highlighted shortly for visual feedback.

Put this into your .emacs config to try it out:

;; ** Easily copy word, line, paragraph or buffer without marking
;; with ideas from:
;; http://emacs.stackexchange.com/questions/1051/copy-region-from-emacs-without-newlines
;; https://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/CopyWithoutSelection 
(defun my-blink(begin end)
  "blink a region. used for copy and delete"
  (interactive)
  (let* ((rh (make-overlay begin end)))
    (progn
      (overlay-put rh 'face '(:background "DodgerBlue" :foreground "White"))
      (sit-for 0.2 t)
      (delete-overlay rh)
      )))

(defun get-point (symbol &optional arg)
“get the point”
(funcall symbol arg)
(point)
)


(defun copy-thing (begin-of-thing end-of-thing &optional arg)
“Copy thing between beg & end into kill ring. Remove leading and
trailing whitespace while we’re at it. Also, remove whitespace before
column, if any. Also, font-lock will be removed, if any. Also, the
copied region will be highlighted shortly (it ‘blinks’)."
(save-excursion
(let* ((beg (get-point begin-of-thing 1))
(end (get-point end-of-thing arg)))
(progn
(copy-region-as-kill beg end)
(with-temp-buffer
(yank)
(goto-char 1)
(while (looking-at ”[ \t\n\r]")
(delete-char 1))
(delete-trailing-whitespace)
(delete-whitespace-rectangle (point-min) (point-max)) ;; del column \s, hehe
           (font-lock-unfontify-buffer) ;; reset font lock
           (kill-region (point-min) (point-max))
)
))))


(defun copy-word (&optional arg)
“Copy word at point into kill-ring”
(interactive “P”)
(my-blink (get-point ‘backward-word 1) (get-point ‘forward-word 1))
(copy-thing ‘backward-word ‘forward-word arg)
(message “word at point copied”))


(defun copy-line (&optional arg)
“Copy line at point into kill-ring, truncated”
(interactive “P”)
(my-blink (get-point ‘beginning-of-line 1) (get-point ’end-of-line 1))
(copy-thing ‘beginning-of-line ’end-of-line arg)
(message “line at point copied”))


(defun copy-paragraph (&optional arg)
“Copy paragraph at point into kill-ring, truncated”
(interactive “P”)
(my-blink (get-point ‘backward-paragraph 1) (get-point ‘forward-paragraph 1))
(copy-thing ‘backward-paragraph ‘forward-paragraph arg)
(message “paragraph at point copied”))


(defun copy-buffer(&optional arg)
“Copy the whole buffer into kill-ring, as-is”
(interactive “P”)
(progn
(my-blink (point-min) (point-max))
(copy-region-as-kill (point-min) (point-max))
(message “buffer copied”)))


;; “speaking” bindings CTRL-[c]opy [w]ord, etc… 
(global-set-key (kbd “C-c w”)           ‘copy-word)
(global-set-key (kbd “C-c l”)           ‘copy-line)
(global-set-key (kbd “C-c p”)           ‘copy-paragraph)
(global-set-key (kbd “C-c a”)           ‘copy-buffer)

Update 2017-02-12:

Sometimes during programming in emacs I need to copy a whole function. If a function contains empty lines, copy-paragraph is insuffcient. So, I added copy-defun, which copies the whole function (at point, that is, point must be inside the function). This works with almost all programming modes, as long as it implements beginning-of-defun and end-of-defun.

<pre>

(defun copy-defun (&optional arg) “Copy function at point into kill-ring” (interactive “P”) (my-blink (get-point ‘beginning-of-defun) (get-point ’end-of-defun)) (kill-ring-save (get-point ‘beginning-of-defun) (get-point ’end-of-defun)) (message “function at point copied”))

(global-set-key (kbd “C-c f”) ‘copy-defun)

#emacs

↷ 27.05.2016      ⤒