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This section explains the structure and semantics of the style
variable c-offsets-alist
, the principal variable for configuring
indentation. Details of how to set it up, and its relationship to
CC Mode’s style system are given in Style Variables.
This is an alist which associates an offset with each syntactic symbol. This offset is a rule specifying how to indent a line whose syntactic context matches the symbol. See Syntactic Analysis.
Note that the buffer-local binding of this alist in a CC Mode buffer contains an entry for every syntactic symbol. Its global binding and its settings within style specifications usually contain only a few entries. See Style Variables.
The offset specification associated with any particular syntactic
symbol can be an integer, a variable name, a vector, a function or
lambda expression, a list, or one of the following special symbols:
+
, -
, ++
, --
, *
, or /
. The
meanings of these values are described in detail below.
Here is an example fragment of a c-offsets-alist
, showing some
of these kinds of offsets:
((statement . 0) (substatement . +) (cpp-macro . [0]) (topmost-intro-cont . c-lineup-topmost-intro-cont) (statement-block-intro . (add c-lineup-whitesmith-in-block c-indent-multi-line-block)) … )
This command changes the entry for a syntactic symbol in the current
binding of c-offsets-alist
, or it inserts a new entry if there
isn’t already one for that syntactic symbol.
You can use c-set-offset
interactively within a CC Mode
buffer to make experimental changes to your indentation settings.
C-c C-o prompts you for the syntactic symbol to change
(defaulting to that of the current line) and the new offset
(defaulting to the current offset).
c-set-offset
takes two arguments when used programmatically:
symbol, the syntactic element symbol to change and offset,
the new offset for that syntactic element. You can call the command
in your .emacs to change the global binding of
c-offsets-alist
(see Style Variables); you can use it in a
hook function to make changes from the current style. CC Mode
itself uses this function when initializing styles.
The “offset specifications” in c-offsets-alist
can be any of
the following:
The integer specifies a relative offset. All relative
offsets44 will
be added together and used to calculate the indentation relative to an
anchor position earlier in the buffer. See Indentation Calculation, for details. Most of the time, it’s probably better to
use one of the special symbols like +
than an integer (apart
from zero).
+
, -
, ++
, --
, *
, or /
These special symbols describe a relative offset in multiples of
c-basic-offset
:
By defining a style’s indentation in terms of c-basic-offset
,
you can change the amount of whitespace given to an indentation level
while maintaining the same basic shape of your code. Here are the
values that the special symbols correspond to:
+
c-basic-offset
times 1
-
c-basic-offset
times -1
++
c-basic-offset
times 2
--
c-basic-offset
times -2
*
c-basic-offset
times 0.5
/
c-basic-offset
times -0.5
The first element of the vector, an integer, sets the absolute indentation column. This will override any previously calculated indentation, but won’t override relative indentation calculated from syntactic elements later on in the syntactic context of the line being indented. See Indentation Calculation. Any elements in the vector beyond the first will be ignored.
The function will be called and its return value will in turn be evaluated as an offset specification. Functions are useful when more context than just the syntactic symbol is needed to get the desired indentation. See Line-Up Functions, and Custom Line-Up, for details about them.
If the symbol also has a function binding, the function takes precedence over the variable. Otherwise the value of the variable is used. It must be an integer (which is used as relative offset) or a vector (an absolute offset).
The offset can also be a list containing several offset
specifications; these are evaluated recursively and combined. A list
is typically only useful when some of the offsets are line-up
functions. A common strategy is calling a sequence of functions in
turn until one of them recognizes that it is appropriate for the
source line and returns a non-nil
value.
nil
values are always ignored when the offsets are combined.
The first element of the list specifies the method of combining the
non-nil
offsets from the remaining elements:
first
Use the first offset that doesn’t evaluate to nil
. Subsequent
elements of the list don’t get evaluated.
min
Use the minimum of all the offsets. All must be either relative or absolute - they can’t be mixed.
max
Use the maximum of all the offsets. All must be either relative or absolute - they can’t be mixed.
add
Add all the evaluated offsets together. Exactly one of them may be absolute, in which case the result is absolute. Any relative offsets that preceded the absolute one in the list will be ignored in that case.
As a compatibility measure, if the first element is none of the above
then it too will be taken as an offset specification and the whole list
will be combined according to the method first
.
If an offset specification evaluates to nil
, then a relative
offset of 0 (zero) is used45.
The syntactic context ((defun-block-intro 2724) (comment-intro))
would likely have two relative offsets.
There is however a variable
c-strict-syntax-p
that when set to non-nil
will cause an
error to be signaled in that case. It’s now considered obsolete since
it doesn’t work well with some of the alignment functions that return
nil
instead of zero. You should therefore leave
c-strict-syntax-p
set to nil
.
Next: Interactive Customization, Previous: Customizing Indentation, Up: Customizing Indentation [Index]