Re: [h-e-w] How do I make Emacs use the Cygwin BASH shell with the "Esc-x shell" feature?

[Dr Francis J. Wright]

From: "David C Hubbard" <address@hidden>
To: <address@hidden>
Sent: Tuesday, June 18, 2002 7:37 PM
Subject: [h-e-w] How do I make Emacs use the Cygwin BASH shell with the
"Esc-x shell" feature?


> I have used Emacs on UNIX/LINUX machines before and the "shell" feature
> works by default. How do I get the "shell" to work on windows with the
> Cygwin BASH? I installed Cygwin tool set first and then installed NTEMACS.
> Emacs seems to work just fine except when I do the Esc-x feature to get a
> shell it doesn't go to DOS prompt or anything. I do see a "cmdproxy -i"
for
> that buffer when I try and close Emacs.

A couple of remarks.  Firstly, by default you can use the Alt key as the
Emacs Meta key, so you can type Esc-x quicker as Alt-x.  I much prefer using
Alt as a shift key rather than typing Esc key sequences.  Secondly, by
default you should get an MS-DOS command prompt when you open an Emacs shell
buffer.  If that's not working then I suggest you try starting Emacs with no
init file (runemacs -q).  If that works then something in your init file is
preventing the command interpreter from starting up correctly.  Finally, if
you are running Windows 9x or ME then you need to terminate ANY shell
explicitly before you close its buffer or Emacs itself.  Otherwise, you will
get hung processes left (that all have the same unhelpful name, which IIRC
is winoldapp) that will prevent Windows from later shutting down cleanly.
Windows NT et seq. don't have this problem.  For most purposes I find the
MS-DOS command interpreter within Emacs to be adequate; when I really need
bash I start it up outside Emacs.  Emacs itself provides all the interactive
support, so even COMMAND.COM becomes almost useable.

Francis