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Org mode for Emacs – Old Release notes

Table of Contents

Org mode is for keeping notes, maintaining TODO lists, planning projects, and authoring documents with a fast and effective plain-text system.

Version 9.2

Incompatible changes

Removal of OrgStruct mode mode and radio lists

OrgStruct minor mode and radio lists mechanism (org-list-send-list and org-list-radio-lists-templates) are removed from the code base.

Note that only radio lists have been removed, not radio tables.

If you want to manipulate lists like in Org in other modes, we suggest to use orgalist.el, which you can install from GNU ELPA.

If you want to use Org folding outside of Org buffers, you can have a look at the outshine package in the MELPA repository.

Change in the structure template expansion

Org 9.2 comes with a new template expansion mechanism, combining org-insert-structure-template bound to C-c C-,.

If you customized the org-structure-template-alist option manually, you probably need to udpate it, see the docstring for accepted values.

If you prefer using previous patterns, e.g. <s, you can activate them again by requiring Org Tempo library: 

(require 'org-tempo)

or add it to org-modules.

If you need complex templates, look at the tempo-define-template function or at solutions like Yasnippet.

Change to Noweb expansion

Expansion check :noweb-ref only if no matching named block is found in the buffer. As a consequence, any :noweb-ref value matching the name of a source block in the buffer is ignored. A simple fix is to give every concerned source-block, including the named one, a new, unique, Noweb reference. 

#+NAME: foo
#+BEGIN_SRC emacs-lisp
  1
#+END_SRC

#+BEGIN_SRC emacs-lisp :noweb-ref foo
  2
#+END_SRC

#+BEGIN_SRC emacs-lisp :noweb yes
  <<foo>>
#+END_SRC

should become 

#+NAME: foo
#+BEGIN_SRC emacs-lisp :noweb-ref bar
  1
#+END_SRC

#+BEGIN_SRC emacs-lisp :noweb-ref bar
  2
#+END_SRC

#+BEGIN_SRC emacs-lisp :noweb yes
  <<bar>>
#+END_SRC

Default/accepted values of org-calendar-to-agenda-key

The default value and accepted value of org-calendar-to-agenda-key changed. This is an excerpt of the new docstring: 

When set to ‘default’, bind the function to ‘c’, but only if it is
available in the Calendar keymap.  This is the default choice because
‘c’ can then be used to switch back and forth between agenda and calendar.

When nil, ‘org-calendar-goto-agenda’ is not bound to any key.

Check the full docstring for more.

Change the signature of the org-set-effort function

Here is the new docstring: 

(org-set-effort &optional INCREMENT VALUE)

Set the effort property of the current entry.
If INCREMENT is non-nil, set the property to the next allowed
value.  Otherwise, if optional argument VALUE is provided, use
it.  Eventually, prompt for the new value if none of the previous
variables is set.

Placeholders in (eval ...) macros are always strings

Within (eval ...) macros, $1-like placeholders are always replaced with a string. As a consequence, they must not be enclosed within quotes. As an illustration, consider the following, now valid, examples: 

#+macro: join (eval (concat $1 $2))
#+macro: sum (eval (+ (string-to-number $1) (string-to-number $2)))

{{{join(a,b)}}} => ab
{{{sum(1,2)}}}  => 3

However, there is no change in non-eval macros: 

#+macro: disp argument: $1

{{{disp(text)}}} => argument: text

align STARTUP value no longer narrow table columns

Columns narrowing (or shrinking) is now dynamic. See Dynamically narrow table columns for details. In particular, it is decoupled from aligning.

If you need to automatically shrink columns upon opening an Org document, use shrink value instead, or in addition to align: 

#+STARTUP: align shrink

org-get-tags meaning change

Function org-get-tags used to return local tags to the current headline. It now returns all the inherited tags in addition to the local tags. In order to get the old behaviour back, you can use: 

(org-get-tags nil t)

Alphabetic sorting in tables and lists

When sorting alphabetically, org-table-sort-lines and org-sort-list now sort according to the locale’s collation rules instead of by code-point.

Change the name of the :tags clocktable option to :match

The :match (renamed from :tags) option allows to limit clock entries to those matching a todo-tags matcher.

The old :tags option can be set to t to display a headline's tags in a dedicated column.

This is consistent with the naming of org-dblock-write:columnview options, where :match is also used as a headlines filter.

New features

Add :results link support for Babel

With this output format, create a link to the file specified in :file header argument, without actually writing any result to it: 

#+begin_src shell :dir "data/tmp" :results link :file "crackzor_1.0.c.gz"
wget -c "http://ben.akrin.com/crackzor/crackzor_1.0.c.gz"
#+end_src

#+results:
[[file:data/tmp/crackzor_1.0.c.gz]]

Add :session support of ob-js for js-comint

console.log("stardiviner")

Add :session support of ob-js for Indium

console.log("stardiviner")

Add :session support of ob-js for skewer-mode

console.log("stardiviner")

Add support for links to LaTeX equations in HTML export

Use MathJax links when enabled (by org-html-with-latex), otherwise add a label to the rendered equation.

Org Tempo may used for snippet expansion of structure template.

See manual and the commentary section in org-tempo.el for details.

Exclude unnumbered headlines from table of contents

Set their UNNUMBERED property to the special notoc value. See manual for details.

org-archive functions update status cookies

Archiving headers through org-archive-subtree and org-archive-to-archive-sibling such as the ones listed below: 

* Top [1/2]
** DONE Completed
** TODO Working

Will update the status cookie in the top level header.

Disable org-agenda-overriding-header by setting to empty string

The org-agenda-overriding-header inserted into agenda views can now be disabled by setting it to an empty string.

Dynamically narrow table columns

With C-c TAB, it is now possible to narrow a column to the width specified by a width cookie in the column, or to 1 character if there is no such cookie. The same keybinding expands a narrowed column to its previous state.

Editing the column automatically expands the whole column to its full size.

org-columns-summary-types entries can take an optional COLLECT function

You can use this to make collection of a property from an entry conditional on another entry. E.g. given this configuration: 

(defun custom/org-collect-confirmed (property)
  "Return `PROPERTY' for `CONFIRMED' entries"
  (let ((prop (org-entry-get nil property))
        (confirmed (org-entry-get nil "CONFIRMED")))
    (if (and prop (string= "[X]" confirmed))
        prop
      "0")))

(setq org-columns-summary-types
      '(("X+" org-columns--summary-sum
         custom/org-collect-confirmed)))

You can have a file bananas.org containing: 

#+columns: %ITEM %CONFIRMED %Bananas{+} %Bananas(Confirmed Bananas){X+}

* All shipments
** Shipment 1
   :PROPERTIES:
   :CONFIRMED: [X]
   :Bananas:  4
   :END:

** Shipment 2
   :PROPERTIES:
   :CONFIRMED: [ ]
   :BANANAS:  7
   :END:

… and when going to the top of that file and entering column view you should expect to see something like:

ITEM CONFIRMED Bananas Confirmed Bananas
All shipments   11 4
Shipment 1 [X] 4 4
Shipment 2 [ ] 7 7 
#+STARTUP: shrink

Allow to filter by tags/property when capturing colview

You can now use :match to filter entries using a todo/tags/properties matcher.

Add support for Oracle's database alias in Babel blocks

ob-sql library already support running SQL blocks against an Oracle database using sqlplus. Now it's possible to use alias names defined in TNSNAMES file instead of specifying full connection parameters. See example bellow. 

you can use the previous full connection parameters
#+BEGIN_SRC sql :engine oracle :dbuser me :dbpassword my_insecure_password :database my_db_name :dbhost my_db_host :dbport 1521
select sysdate from dual;
#+END_SRC

or the alias defined in your TNSNAMES file
#+BEGIN_SRC sql :engine oracle :dbuser me :dbpassword my_insecure_password :database my_tns_alias
select sysdate from dual;
#+END_SRC

org-agenda-set-restriction-lock toggle agenda restriction at point

You can set an agenda restriction lock with C-x C-x < or with < at the beginning of a headline when using Org speed commands. Now, if there is already a restriction at point, hitting < again (or C-x C-x <) will remove it.

New commands and functions

org-insert-structure-template

This function can be used to wrap existing text of Org elements in a #+BEGIN_FOO/#+END_FOO block. Bound to C-c C-x w by default.

org-export-excluded-from-toc-p

See docstring for details.

org-timestamp-to-time

org-timestamp-from-string

org-timestamp-from-time

org-attach-dired-to-subtree

See docstring for details.

org-toggle-narrow-to-subtree

Toggle the narrowing state of the buffer: when in a narrowed state, widen, otherwise call org-narrow-to-subtree to narrow.

This is attached to the "s" speed command, so that hitting "s" twice will go back to the widen state.

org-browse-news

Browse https://orgmode.org/Changes.html to let users read informations about the last major release.

There is a new menu entry for this in the "Documentation" menu item.

org-info-find-node

From an Org file or an agenda switch to a suitable info page depending on the context.

The function is bound to C-c C-x I.

Removed commands and functions

org-outline-overlay-data

Use org-save-outline-visibility instead.

org-set-outline-overlay-data

Use org-save-outline-visibility instead.

org-get-string-indentation

It was not used throughout the code base.

org-fix-indentation

It was not used throughout code base.

org-context-p

Use org-element-at-point instead.

org-preserve-lc

It is no longer used in the code base.

org-try-structure-completion

Org Tempo may be used as a replacement. See details above.

Removed options

org-babel-use-quick-and-dirty-noweb-expansion

See Change to Noweb expansion for explanations.

Miscellaneous

New default value for org-texinfo-table-scientific-notation

It is now nil, which means numbers in scientific notation are not handled specially by default.

New default value for org-latex-table-scientific-notation

It is now nil, which means numbers in scientific notation are not handled specially by default.

New face: org-upcoming-distant-deadline

It is meant to be used as the face for distant deadlines, see org-agenda-deadline-faces

org-paste-subtree no longer breaks sections

Unless point is at the beginning of a headline, org-paste-subtree now pastes the tree before the next visible headline. If you need to break the section, use org-yank instead.

org-table-insert-column inserts a column to the right

It used to insert it on the left. With this change, org-table-insert-column and org-table-delete-column are reciprocal.

org-publish-resolve-external-link accepts a new optional argument.

org-irc.el now supports exporting irc: links properly

Previously, irc links were exported by ox-md and ox-html as normal file links, which lead to them being broken in web browsers. Now both of these exporters will properly export to irc: links, which will open properly in irc clients from web browsers.

org-comment-dwim (bound to M-;) now comments headings, if point is on a heading

Add support for open source block in window below

Set option org-src-window-setup to split-window-below.

Alphabetic sorting in headings and tags now uses the locale’s sorting rules

When sorting alphabetically, org-sort-entries and org-tags-sort-function now sort according to the locale’s collation rules instead of by code-point.

New speed command "k" to kill (cut) the subtree at point

Version 9.1

Incompatible changes

Variables relative to clocksum duration are obsolete

org-time-clocksum-format, org-time-clocksum-use-fractional and org-time-clocksum-fractional-format are obsolete. If you changed them, consider modifying org-duration-format instead.

Variable org-time-clocksum-use-effort-durations is also obsolete. Consider setting org-duration-units instead.

org-at-timestamp-p optional argument accepts different values

See docstrings for the allowed values. For backward compatibility, (org-at-timestamp-p t) is still supported, but should be updated accordingly.

org-capture-templates no longer accepts S-expressions as file names

Since functions are allowed there, a straightforward way to migrate is to turn, e.g., 

(file (sexp))

into 

(file (lambda () (sexp)))

Deleted contributed packages

org-ebib.el, =org-bullets.el and org-mime.el have been deleted from the contrib/ directory.

You can now find them here :

Change org-texinfo-classes value

The value cannot support functions to create sectionning commands anymore. Also, the sectionning commands should include commands for appendices. See the docstring for more information.

Removal of :sitemap-sans-extension

The publishing property is no longer recognized, as a consequence of changes to site-map generation.

You can get the same functionality by setting :sitemap-format-entry to the following 

(lambda (entry style project)
  (cond ((not (directory-name-p entry))
         (format "[[file:%s][%s]]"
                 (file-name-sans-extension entry)
                 (org-publish-find-title entry project)))
        ((eq style 'tree) (file-name-nondirectory (directory-file-name entry)))
        (t entry)))

Change signature for :sitemap-function

:sitemap-function now expects to be called with two arguments. See org-publish-project-alist for details.

Change signature for some properties in org-list-to-generic

:istart, :icount, :iend and :isep now expect the type of the list as their first argument.

Change signature for org-get-repeater

The optional argument is now a string to extract the repeater from. See docstring for details.

Change signature for org-time-string-to-time

See docstring for changes.

Change order of items in org-agenda-time-grid

org-agenda-time-grid gained an extra item to allow users to customize the string displayed after times in the agenda. See docstring for details.

tags-todo custom searches now include DONE keywords

Use "/!" markup when filtering TODO keywords to get only not-done TODO keywords.

Removal of ob-scala.el

See this github issue.

You can use ob-scala.el as packaged in scala-mode, available from the MELPA repository.

New features

iCalendar export uses inheritance for TIMEZONE and LOCATION properties

Both these properties can be inherited during iCalendar export, depending on the value of org-use-property-inheritance.

iCalendar export respects a TIMEZONE property

Set the TIMEZONE property on an entry to specify a time zone for that entry only during iCalendar export. The property value should be specified as in "Europe/London".

org-attach can move directory contents

When setting a new directory for an entry, org-attach offers to move files over from the old directory. Using a prefix arg will reset the directory to old, ID based one.

New Org duration library

This new library implements tools to read and print time durations in various formats (e.g., "H:MM", or "1d 2h 3min"…).

See org-duration-to-minutes and org-duration-from-minutes docstrings.

Agenda

  • New variable : org-agenda-show-future-repeats
  • New variable : org-agenda-prefer-last-repeat
  • New variable : org-deadline-past-days

    See docstring for details.

  • Binding C-c C-x < for org-agenda-set-restriction-lock-from-agenda
  • New auto-align default setting for org-agenda-tags-column

    org-agenda-tags-column can now be set to auto, which will automatically align tags to the right edge of the window. This is now the default setting.

New value for org-publish-sitemap-sort-folders

The new ignore value effectively allows toggling inclusion of directories in published site-maps.

Babel

  • Scheme: support for tables
  • Scheme: new variable: org-babel-scheme-null-to

    This new custom option allows to use a empty list or null symbol to format the table output, initially assigned to hlines.

  • Scheme: new header :prologue

    A new block code header has been created for Org Babel that enables developers to prepend code to the scheme block being processed.

    Multiple :prologue headers can be added each of them using a string with the content to be added.

    The scheme blocks are prepared by surronding the code in the block with a let form. The content of the :prologue headers are prepended before this let form.

  • Support for hledger accounting reports added
  • Clojure: new setting org-babel-clojure-sync-nrepl-timeout

    Creation of a new setting to specify the Cider timeout. By setting the org-babel-clojure-sync-nrepl-timeout setting option. The value is in seconds and if set to nil then no timeout will occur.

  • Clojure: new header :show-process

    A new block code header has been created for Org Babel that enables developers to output the process of an ongoing process into a new window/buffer.

    You can tell Org Babel to output the process of a running code block.

    To show that output you only have to specify the :show-process option in the code block's header like this: 

    #+BEGIN_SRC clojure :results output :show-process t
  (dotimes [n 10]
    (println n ".")
    (Thread/sleep 500))
#+END_SRC

    If :show-process is specified that way, then when you will run the code using C-c C-c a new window will open in Emacs. Everything that is output by the REPL will immediately be added to that new window.

    When the processing of the code is finished, then the window and its buffer will be closed and the results will be reported in the #+RESULTS section.

    Note that the :results parameter's behavior is not changed. If silent is specified, then no result will be displayed. If output is specified then all the output from the window will appears in the results section. If value is specified, then only the last returned value of the code will be displayed in the results section.

  • Maxima: new headers :prologue and :epilogue

    Babel options :prologue and :epilogue have been implemented for Maxima src blocks which prepend and append, respectively, the given code strings. This can be useful for specifying formatting settings which would add clutter to exported code. For instance, you can use this :prologue "fpprintprec: 2; linel: 50;" for presenting Maxima results in a beamer presentation.

  • PlantUML: add support for header arguments

    Plantuml source blocks now support the :prologue, :epilogue and :var header arguments.

  • SQL: new engine added sqsh

    A new engine was added to support sqsh command line utility for use against Microsoft SQL Server or Sybase SQL server.

    More information on sqsh can be found here: sourceforge/sqsh

    To use sqsh in an sql SRC_BLK set the :engine like this: 

    #+BEGIN_SRC sql :engine sqsh :dbhost my_host :dbuser master :dbpassword pass :database support
Select * From Users
Where clue > 0
#+END_SRC
  • SQL: new engine added vertica

    A new engine was added to support vsql command line utility for use against HP Vertica.

    More information on vsql can be found here: my.vertica.com

    To use vertica in an sql SRC_BLK set the :engine like this: 

    #+BEGIN_SRC sql :engine vertica :dbhost my_host :dbuser dbadmin :dbpassword pw :database vmart
SELECT * FROM nodes;
#+END_SRC
  • C++: New header :namespaces

    The new :namespaces export option can be used to specify namespaces to be used within a C++ org source block. Its usage is similar to :includes, in that it can accept multiple, space-separated namespaces to use. This header is equivalent to adding using namespace <name>; in the source block. Here is a "Hello World" in C++ using :namespaces: 

    #+BEGIN_SRC C++ :results output :namespaces std :includes <iostream>
  cout << "Hello World" << endl;
#+END_SRC
  • Support for Vala language

    Vala language blocks support two special header arguments:

    • :flags passes arguments to the compiler
    • :cmdline passes commandline arguments to the generated executable

    Support for :var does not exist yet, also there is no :session support because Vala is a compiled language.

    The Vala compiler binary can be changed via the defcustom org-babel-vala-compiler.

New function scope argument for the Clock Table

Added a nullary function that returns a list of files as a possible argument for the scope of the clock table.

Export

  • Implement vernacular table of contents in Markdown exporter

    Global table of contents are generated using vanilla Markdown syntax instead of HTML. Also #+TOC keyword, including local table of contents, are now supported.

  • Add Slovanian translations
  • Implement org-export-insert-image-links

    This new function is meant to be used in back-ends supporting images as descriptions of links, a.k.a. image links. See its docstring for details.

  • New macro : {{{n}}}

    This macro creates and increment multiple counters in a document. See manual for details.

  • Add global macros through org-export-global-macros

    With this variable, one can define macros available for all documents.

  • New keyword #+EXPORT_FILE_NAME

    Similarly to :EXPORT_FILE_NAME: property, this keyword allows the user to specify the name of the output file upon exporting the document. This also has an effect on publishing.

  • Horizontal rules are no longer ignored in LaTeX table math mode
  • Use compilation-mode for compilation output
  • Plain lists accept a new :separator attribute in Texinfo

    The new :separator attribute splits a tag from a description list item into multiple parts. This allows to have two-column tables with multiple entries in the first column. See manual for more details.

  • latex-environment elements support caption keywords for LaTeX export

org-edit-special can edit LaTeX environments

Using C-c ' on a LaTeX environment opens a sub-editing buffer. By default, major mode in that buffer is latex-mode, but it can be changed by configuring org-src-lang-modes.

org-list-to-generic includes a new property: :ifmt

:ifmt is a function to be called on the body of each item. See org-list-to-generic documentation for details.

New variable : org-bibtex-headline-format-function

This allow to use a different title than entry title.

org-attach supports attaching files from URLs

Using C-c C-a u prompts for a URL pointing to a file to be attached to the document.

New option for org-refile-use-outline-path

org-refile-use-outline-path now supports the setting buffer-name, which causes refile targets to be prefixed with the buffer’s name. This is particularly useful when used in conjunction with uniquify.el.

org-file-contents now allows the FILE argument to be a URL.

This allows #+SETUPFILE: to accept a URL instead of a local file path. The URL contents are auto-downloaded and saved to a temporary cache org--file-cache. A new optional argument NOCACHE is added to org-file-contents.

org-mode-restart now resets the newly added org--file-cache.

Using C-c C-c on any keyword (like #+SETUPFILE) will reset the that file cache.

New option : org-table-duration-hour-zero-padding

This variable allow computed durations in tables to be zero-padded.

New mode switch for table formulas : U

This mode omits seconds in durations.

Removed functions

Org Timeline

This feature has been removed. Use a custom agenda view, possibly narrowed to current buffer to achieve a similar functionality.

org-agenda-skip-entry-when-regexp-matches is obsolete

Use org-agenda-skip-if instead.

org-agenda-skip-subtree-when-regexp-matches is obsolete

Use org-agenda-skip-if instead.

org-agenda-skip-entry-when-regexp-matches-in-subtree is obsolete

Use org-agenda-skip-if instead.

org-minutes-to-clocksum-string is obsolete

Use org-duration-from-minutes instead.

org-hh:mm-string-to-minutes is obsolete

Use org-duration-to-minutes instead.

org-duration-string-to-minutes is obsolete

Use org-duration-to-minutes instead.

org-gnus-nnimap-cached-article-number is removed.

This function relied on nnimap-group-overview-filename, which was removed from Gnus circa September 2010.

Removed options

org-agenda-repeating-timestamp-show-all is removed.

For an equivalent to a nil value, set org-agenda-show-future-repeats to nil and org-agenda-prefer-last-repeat to t.

org-gnus-nnimap-query-article-no-from-file is removed.

This variable has no effect, as it was relying on a function that was removed from Gnus circa September 2010.

org-usenet-links-prefer-google is obsolete.

Use org-gnus-prefer-web-links instead.

org-publish-sitemap-file-entry-format is deprecated

One can provide new :sitemap-format-entry property for a function equivalent to the removed format string.

org-enable-table-editor is removed.

Setting it to a nil value broke some other features (e.g., speed keys).

org-export-use-babel cannot be set to inline-only

The variable is now a boolean.

org-texinfo-def-table-markup is obsolete

Use org-texinfo-table-default-markup instead.

New functions

org-publish-find-property

This function can be used as a tool to format entries in a site-map, in addition to org-publish-find-title and org-publish-find-date.

org-list-to-org

It is the reciprocal of org-list-to-lisp, which see.

org-agenda-set-restriction-lock-from-agenda

Call org-agenda-set-restriction-lock from the agenda.

Miscellaneous

The Library of Babel now on Worg

The library-of-babel.org used to be accessible from the doc/ directory, distributed with Org’s core. It is now accessible from the Worg community-driven documentation here.

If you want to contribute to it, please see how to contribute.

Allow multiple columns view

Columns view is not limited to a single buffer anymore.

Org Attach obeys dired-dwim-target

When a Dired buffer is opened next to the Org document being edited, the prompt for file to attach can start in the Dired buffer's directory if `dired-dwim-target' in non-nil.

org-fill-paragraph can now fill a whole region

More specific anniversary descriptions

Anniversary descriptions (used in the agenda view, for instance) include the point in time, when the anniversary appears. This is, in its most general form, just the date of the anniversary. Or more specific terms, like "today", "tomorrow" or "in n days" are used to describe the time span.

This feature allows to automatically change the description of an anniversary, depending on if it occurs in the next few days or far away in the future.

Computed dates in tables appear as inactive time stamps

Save point before opening a file with an unknown search option

When following a file link with a search option (e.g., ::#custom-id) that doesn't exist in the target file, save positon before raising an error. As a consequence, it is possible to jump back to the original document with org-mark-ring-goto (default binding C-c &).

org-get-heading accepts two more optional arguments

See docstring for details.

New option org-babel-uppercase-example-markers

This variable is a defcustom and replaces the variable org-babel-capitalize-example-region-markers, which is a defvar and is now obselete.

INCLUDE keywords in commented trees are now ignored.

Default value for org-texinfo-text-markup-alist changed.

Now =...= markup uses @samp{} instead of @verb{}. You can use @verb{} again by customizing the variable.

Texinfo exports example blocks as @example

Texinfo exports inline src blocks as @code{}

Texinfo default table markup is @asis

It used to be @samp but @asis is neutral and, therefore, more suitable as a default value.

Texinfo default process includes --no-split option

New entities : \dollar and \USD

org-parse-time-string accepts a new optional argument

ZONE specifies the current time zone.

org-time-string-to-seconds now accepts an optional ZONE argument

Support for date style URLs in org-protocol://open-source

URLs like https://cool-blog.com/2017/05/20/cool-post/ are covered by rewrite rules.

Add (C) COMMENT support to org-structure-template-alist

Version 9.0

Incompatible changes

Emacs 23 support has been dropped

From now on, Org expects at least Emacs 24.3, although Emacs 24.4 or above is suggested.

XEmacs support has been dropped

Incomplete compatibility layer with XEmacs has been removed. If you want to take over maintainance of this compatibility, please contact our mailing list.

New syntax for export blocks

Export blocks are explicitly marked as such at the syntax level to disambiguate their parsing from special blocks. The new syntax is 

#+BEGIN_EXPORT backend
...
#+END_EXPORT

instead of 

#+BEGIN_backend
...
#+END_backend

As a consequence, INCLUDE keywords syntax is modified, e.g., 

#+INCLUDE: "file.org" HTML

becomes 

#+INCLUDE: "file.org" export html

The following function repairs export blocks and INCLUDE keywords using previous syntax: 

(defun org-repair-export-blocks ()
  "Repair export blocks and INCLUDE keywords in current buffer."
  (interactive)
  (when (eq major-mode 'org-mode)
    (let ((case-fold-search t)
          (back-end-re (regexp-opt
                        '("HTML" "ASCII" "LATEX" "ODT" "MARKDOWN" "MD" "ORG"
                          "MAN" "BEAMER" "TEXINFO" "GROFF" "KOMA-LETTER")
                        t)))
      (org-with-wide-buffer
       (goto-char (point-min))
       (let ((block-re (concat "^[ \t]*#\\+BEGIN_" back-end-re)))
         (save-excursion
           (while (re-search-forward block-re nil t)
             (let ((element (save-match-data (org-element-at-point))))
               (when (eq (org-element-type element) 'special-block)
                 (save-excursion
                   (goto-char (org-element-property :end element))
                   (save-match-data (search-backward "_"))
                   (forward-char)
                   (insert "EXPORT")
                   (delete-region (point) (line-end-position)))
                 (replace-match "EXPORT \\1" nil nil nil 1))))))
       (let ((include-re
              (format "^[ \t]*#\\+INCLUDE: .*?%s[ \t]*$" back-end-re)))
         (while (re-search-forward include-re nil t)
           (let ((element (save-match-data (org-element-at-point))))
             (when (and (eq (org-element-type element) 'keyword)
                        (string= (org-element-property :key element) "INCLUDE"))
               (replace-match "EXPORT \\1" nil nil nil 1)))))))))

Moreover, :export-block keyword used in org-export-define-backend and org-export-define-derived-backend is no longer used and needs to be removed.

org-file-apps no longer accepts S-expressions as commands

The variable now accepts functions of two arguments instead of plain S-expressions. Replacing a S-expresion with an appropriate function is straightforward. For example 

("pdf" . (foo))

becomes 

("pdf" . (lambda (file link) (foo)))

The {{{modification-time}}} macro can get time via vc

The modification time will be determined via vc.el if the second argument is non-nil. See the manual for details.

Preparation and completion functions in publishing projects change signature

Preparation and completion functions are now called with an argument, which is the project property list. It used to be dynamically scoped through the project-plist variable.

Old Babel header properties are no longer supported

Using header arguments as property names is no longer possible. As such, the following 

* Headline
:PROPERTIES:
:exports: code
:var: a=1 b=2
:var+: c=3
:END:

should be written instead 

* Headline
:PROPERTIES:
:header-args: :exports code
:header-args: :var a=1 b=2
:header-args+: :var c=3
:END:

Please note that, however, old properties were defined at the source block definition. Current ones are defined where the block is called.

New features

org-eww has been moved into core

New org-protocol key=value syntax

Org-protocol can now handle query-style parameters such as: 

org-protocol://store-link?url=http:%2F%2Flocalhost%2Findex.html&title=The%20title
org-protocol://capture?template=x&title=Hello&body=World&url=http:%2F%2Fexample.com

Old-style links such as 

org-protocol://store-link:/http:%2F%2Flocalhost%2Findex.html/The%20title

continue to be supported.

If you have defined your own handler functions for org-protocol-protocol-alist, change them to accept either a property list (for new-style links) or a string (for old-style links). Use org-protocol-parse-parameters to convert old-style links into property lists.

New Org linter library

org-lint can check syntax and report common issues in Org documents.

New option date-tree-last for org-agenda-insert-diary-strategy

When org-agenda-insert-diary-strategy is set to date-tree-last, diary entries are added to last in the date tree.

New vbar entity

\vbar or \vbar{} will be exported unconditionnally as a |, unlike to existing \vert, which is expanded as &vert; when using a HTML derived export back-end.

Export

  • New #+latex_compiler keyword to set LaTeX compiler.

    PDFLaTeX, XeLaTeX, and LuaLaTeX are supported. See the manual for details.

  • New option org-export-with-broken-links

    This option tells the export process how to behave when encountering a broken internal link. See its docstring for more information.

  • Attributes support in custom language environments for LaTeX export

    Custom language environments for LaTeX export can now define the string to be inserted during export, using attributes to indicate the position of the elements. See variable org-latex-custom-lang-environments for more details.

  • New Texinfo options attribute on special blocks

    Using :options as a Texinfo attribute, it is possible to add information to custom environments. See manual for details.

  • New HTML id attributes on special, example and quote blocks

    If the block has a #+NAME: attribute assigned, then the HTML element will have an id attribute with that name in the HTML export. This enables one to create links to these elements in other places, e.g., <a href="#name">text</a>.

  • Listings with captions are now numbered in HTML export

    The class associated to the numbering is "listing-number". If you don't want these blocks to be numbered, as it was the case until now, You may want to add .listing-number { display: none; } to the CSS used.

  • Line Numbering in SRC/EXAMPLE blocks support arbitrary start number

    The -n option to SRC and EXAMPLE blocks can now take a numeric argument to specify the staring line number for the source or example block. The +n option can now take a numeric argument that will be added to the last line number from the previous block as the starting point for the SRC/EXAMPLE block. 

    #+BEGIN_SRC emacs-lisp -n 20
;; this will export with line number 20
(message "This is line 21")
#+END_SRC
#+BEGIN_SRC emacs-lisp +n 10
;; This will be listed as line 31
(message "This is line 32")
#+END_SRC
  • Allow toggling center for images in LaTeX export

    With the global variable org-latex-images-centered or the local attribute :center it is now possible to center an image in LaTeX export.

  • Default CSS class org-svg for SVG images in HTML export

    SVG images exported in HTML are now by default assigned a CSS class org-svg if no CSS class is specified with the :class attribute. By default, the CSS styling of class org-svg specifies an image width of 90 % of the container the image.

  • Markdown footnote export customization

    Variables org-md-footnotes-section and org-md-footnote-format introduced for ox-md.el. Both new variables define template strings which can be used to customize the format of the exported footnotes section and individual footnotes, respectively.

Babel

  • Blocks with coderefs labels can now be evaluated

    The labels are removed prior to evaluating the block.

  • Support for Lua language
  • Support for SLY in Lisp blocks

    See org-babel-lisp-eval-fn to activate it.

  • Support for Stan language

    New ob-stan.el library.

    Evaluating a Stan block can produce two different results.

    1. Dump the source code contents to a file.

      This file can then be used as a variable in other blocks, which allows interfaces like RStan to use the model.

    2. Compile the contents to a model file.

      This provides access to the CmdStan interface. To use this, set org-babel-stan-cmdstan-directory and provide a :file argument that does not end in ".stan".

    For more information and usage examples, visit https://orgmode.org/worg/org-contrib/babel/languages/ob-doc-stan.html

  • Support for Oracle databases via sqlplus

    ob-sql library supports running SQL blocks against an Oracle database using sqlplus. Use with properties like this (all mandatory): 

    :engine oracle
:dbhost <host.com>
:dbport <1521>
:dbuser <username>
:database <database>
:dbpassword <secret>
  • Improved support to Microsoft SQL Server via sqlcmd

    ob-sql library removes support to the msosql engine which uses the deprecated osql command line tool, and replaces it with mssql engine which uses the sqlcmd command line tool. Use with properties like this: 

    :engine mssql
:dbhost <host.com>
:dbuser <username>
:dbpassword <secret>
:database <database>

    If you want to use the trusted connection feature, omit both the dbuser and dbpassword properties and add cmdline -E to the properties.

    If your Emacs is running in a Cygwin environment, the ob-sql library can pass the converted path to the sqlcmd tool.

  • Improved support of header arguments for postgresql

    The postgresql engine in a sql code block supports now :dbport nd :dbpassword as header arguments.

  • Support for additional plantuml output formats

    The support for output formats of plantuml has been extended to now include:

    All Diagrams:

    png
    svg
    eps
    pdf
    vdx
    txt
    ASCII art
    utxt
    ASCII art using unicode characters

    Class Diagrams:

    xmi
    html

    State Diagrams:

    scxml

    The output formats are determined by the file extension specified using the :file property, e.g.: 

    @startuml
Alice -> Bob: Authentication Request
Bob --> Alice: Authentication Response

Alice -> Bob: Another authentication Request
Alice <-- Bob: another authentication Response
@enduml

    Please note that pdf does not work out of the box and needs additional setup in addition to plantuml. See http://plantuml.com/pdf.html for details and setup information.

Rewrite of radio lists

Radio lists, i.e, Org plain lists in foreign buffers, have been rewritten to be on par with Radio tables. You can use a large set of parameters to control how a given list should be rendered. See manual for details.

org-bbdb-anniversaries-future

Used like org-bbdb-anniversaries, it provides a few days warning for upcoming anniversaries (default: 7 days).

Clear non-repeated SCHEDULED upon repeating a task

If the task is repeated, and therefore done at least one, scheduling information is no longer relevant. It is therefore removed.

See commit message for more information.

Support for ISO week trees

ISO week trees are an alternative date tree format that orders entries by ISO week and not by month.

For example: 

* 2015
** 2015-W35
** 2015-W36
*** 2015-08-31 Monday

They are supported in org-capture via file+weektree and file+weektree+prompt target specifications.

Accept :indent parameter when capturing column view

When defining a "columnview" dynamic block, it is now possible to add an :indent parameter, much like the one in the clock table.

On the other hand, stars no longer appear in an ITEM field.

Columns view

  • org-columns accepts a prefix argument

    When called with a prefix argument, org-columns apply to the whole buffer unconditionally.

  • New variable : org-agenda-view-columns-initially

    The variable used to be a defvar, it is now a defcustom.

  • Allow custom summaries

    It is now possible to add new summary types, or override those provided by Org by customizing org-columns-summary-types, which see.

  • Allow multiple summaries for any property

    Columns can now summarize the same property using different summary types.

Preview LaTeX snippets in buffers not visiting files

New option org-attach-commit

When non-nil, commit attachments with git, assuming the document is in a git repository.

Allow conditional case-fold searches in org-occur

When set to smart, the new variable org-occur-case-fold-search allows to mimic isearch.el: if the regexp searched contains any upper case character (or character class), the search is case sensitive. Otherwise, it is case insensitive.

More robust repeated ox-latex footnote handling

Repeated footnotes are now numbered by referring to a label in the first footnote.

The org-block face is inherited by src-blocks

This works also when org-src-fontify-natively is non-nil. It is also possible to specify per-languages faces. See org-src-block-faces and the manual for details.

Links are now customizable

Links can now have custom colors, tooltips, keymaps, display behavior, etc. Links are now centralized in org-link-parameters.

New functions

org-next-line-empty-p

It replaces the deprecated next argument to org-previous-line-empty-p.

org-show-children

It is a faster implementation of outline-show-children.

Removed functions

org-agenda-filter-by-tag-refine has been removed.

Use org-agenda-filter-by-tag instead.

org-agenda-todayp is deprecated.

Use org-agenda-today-p instead.

org-babel-get-header is removed.

Use org-babel--get-vars or assq instead, as applicable.

org-babel-trim is deprecated.

Use org-trim instead.

org-element-remove-indentation is deprecated.

Use org-remove-indentation instead.

org-image-file-name-regexp is deprecated

Use image-file-name-regexp instead. The never-used-in-core extensions argument has been dropped.

org-list-parse-list is deprecated

Use org-list-to-lisp instead.

org-on-heading-p is deprecated

A comment to this effect was in the source code since 7.8.03, but now a byte-compiler warning will be generated as well.

org-table-p is deprecated

Use org-at-table-p instead.

org-table-recognize-table.el is deprecated

It was not called by any org code since 2010.

Various reimplementations of cl-lib functions are deprecated

The affected functions are:

  • org-count
  • org-remove-if
  • org-remove-if-not
  • org-reduce
  • org-every
  • org-some

Additionally, org-sublist is deprecated in favor of cl-subseq. Note the differences in indexing conventions: org-sublist is 1-based and end-inclusive; cl-subseq is 0-based and end-exclusive.

Removed options

Remove all options related to ido or iswitchb

This includes org-completion-use-iswitchb and org-completion-use-ido. Instead Org uses regular functions, e.g., completion-read so as to let those libraries operate.

Remove org-list-empty-line-terminates-plain-lists

Two consecutive blank lines always terminate all levels of current plain list.

fixltx2e is removed from org-latex-default-packages-alist

fixltx2e is obsolete, see LaTeX News 22.

Miscellaneous

Add Icelandic smart quotes

Allow multiple receiver locations in radio tables and lists

Allow angular links within link descriptions

It is now allowed to write, e.g., [[http:orgmode.org][<file:unicorn.png>]] as an equivalent to [[http:orgmode.org][file:unicorn.png]]. The advantage of the former is that spaces are allowed within the path.

Beamer export back-ends uses org-latex-prefer-user-labels

:preparation-function called earlier during publishing

Functions in this list are called before any file is associated to the current projet. Thus, they can be used to generate to be published Org files.

Function org-remove-indentation changes.

The new algorithm doesn't remove TAB characters not used for indentation.

Secure placeholders in capture templates

Placeholders in capture templates are no longer expanded recursively. However, %(...) constructs are expanded very late, so you can fill the contents of the S-exp with the replacement text of non-interactive placeholders. As before, interactive ones are still expanded as the very last step, so the previous statement doesn't apply to them.

Note that only %(...) placeholders initially present in the template, or introduced using a file placeholder, i.e., %[...] are expanded. This prevents evaluating potentially malicious code when another placeholder, e.g., %i expands to a S-exp.

Links stored by org-gnus-store-link in nnir groups

Since gnus nnir groups are temporary, org-gnus-store-link now refers to the article's original group.

org-babel-check-confirm-evaluate is now a function instead of a macro

The calling convention has changed.

HTML export table row customization changes

Variable org-html-table-row-tags has been split into org-html-table-row-open-tag and org-html-table-row-close-tag. Both new variables can be either a string or a function which will be called with 6 parameters.

ITEM special property returns headline without stars

Rename org-insert-columns-dblock into org-columns-insert-dblock

The previous name is, for the time being, kept as an obsolete alias.

org-trim can preserve leading indentation.

When setting a new optional argument to a non-nil value, org-trim preserves leading indentation while removing blank lines at the beginning of the string. The behavior is identical for white space at the end of the string.

Function org-info-export changes.

HTML links created from certain info links now point to gnu.org URL's rather than just to local files. For example info links such as info:emacs#List Buffers used to be converted to HTML links like this: 

<a href="emacs.html#List-Buffers">emacs#List Buffers</a>

where local file emacs.html is referenced. For most folks this file does not exist. Thus the new behavior is to generate this HTML link instead: 

<a href="http://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_mono/emacs.html#List-Buffers">emacs#List Buffers</a>

All emacs related info links are similarly translated plus few other gnu.org manuals.

Repeaters with a ++ interval and a time can be shifted to later today

Previously, if a recurring task had a timestamp of <2016-01-01 Fri 20:00 ++1d> and was completed on 2016-01-02 at 08:00, the task would skip 2016-01-02 and would be rescheduled for 2016-01-03. Timestamps with ++ cookies and a specific time will now shift to the first possible future occurrence, even if the occurrence is later the same day the task is completed. (Timestamps already in the future are still shifted one time further into the future.)

org-mobile-action-alist is now a defconst

It used to be a defcustom, with a warning that it shouldn't be modified anyway.

file+emacs and file+sys link types are deprecated

They are still supported in Org 9.0 but will eventually be removed in a later release. Use file link type along with universal arguments to force opening it in either Emacs or with system application.

New defcustom org-babel-J-command stores the j command

New defalias org-babel-execute:j

Allows J source blocks be indicated by letter j. Previously the indication letter was solely J.

org-open-line ignores tables at the very beginning of the buffer

When org-special-ctrl-o is non-nil, it is impractical to create a blank line above a table at the beginning of the document. Now, as a special case, org-open-line behaves normally in this situation.

org-babel-hash-show-time is now customizable

The experimental variable used to be more or less confidential, as a defvar.

New :format property to parsed links

It defines the format of the original link. Possible values are: plain, bracket and angle.

Version 8.3

Incompatible changes

Properties drawers syntax changes

Properties drawers are now required to be located right after a headline and its planning line, when applicable.

It will break some documents as TODO states changes were sometimes logged before the property drawer.

The following function will repair them: 

(defun org-repair-property-drawers ()
  "Fix properties drawers in current buffer.
 Ignore non Org buffers."
  (when (eq major-mode 'org-mode)
    (org-with-wide-buffer
     (goto-char (point-min))
     (let ((case-fold-search t)
           (inline-re (and (featurep 'org-inlinetask)
                           (concat (org-inlinetask-outline-regexp)
                                   "END[ \t]*$"))))
       (org-map-entries
        (lambda ()
          (unless (and inline-re (org-looking-at-p inline-re))
            (save-excursion
              (let ((end (save-excursion (outline-next-heading) (point))))
                (forward-line)
                (when (org-looking-at-p org-planning-line-re) (forward-line))
                (when (and (< (point) end)
                           (not (org-looking-at-p org-property-drawer-re))
                           (save-excursion
                             (and (re-search-forward org-property-drawer-re end t)
                                  (eq (org-element-type
                                       (save-match-data (org-element-at-point)))
                                      'drawer))))
                  (insert (delete-and-extract-region
                           (match-beginning 0)
                           (min (1+ (match-end 0)) end)))
                  (unless (bolp) (insert "\n"))))))))))))

#+CATEGORY keywords no longer apply partially to document

It was possible to use several such keywords and have them apply to the text below until the next one, but strongly deprecated since Org 5.14 (2008).

#+CATEGORY keywords are now global to the document. You can use node properties to set category for a subtree, e.g., 

* Headline
   :PROPERTIES:
   :CATEGORY: some category
   :END:

New variable to control visibility when revealing a location

org-show-following-heading, org-show-siblings, org-show-entry-below and org-show-hierarchy-above no longer exist. Instead, visibility is controlled through a single variable: org-show-context-detail, which see.

Replace disputed keys again when reading a date

org-replace-disputed-keys has been ignored when reading date since version 8.1, but the former behavior is restored again.

Keybinding for reading date can be customized with a new variable org-read-date-minibuffer-local-map.

No default title is provided when TITLE keyword is missing

Skipping TITLE keyword no longer provides the current file name, or buffer name, as the title. Instead, simply ignore the title.

Functions signature changes

The following functions require an additional argument. See their docstring for more information.

  • org-export-collect-footnote-definitions
  • org-html-format-headline-function
  • org-html-format-inlinetask-function
  • org-latex-format-headline-function
  • org-latex-format-inlinetask-function
  • org-link-search

Default bindings of C-c C-n and C-c C-p changed

The key sequences C-c C-n and C-c C-p are now bound to org-next-visible-heading and org-next-visible-heading respectively, rather than the outline-mode versions of these functions. The Org version of these functions skips over inline tasks (and even-level headlines when org-odd-levels-only is set).

org-element-context no longer return objects in keywords

org-element-context used to return objects on some keywords, i.e., TITLE, DATE and AUTHOR. It now returns only the keyword.

Behavior of org-return changed

If point is before or after the headline title, insert a new line without changing the headline.

org-timer-default-timer type changed from number to string

If you have, in your configuration, something like (setq org-timer-default-timer 10) replace it with (setq org-timer-default-timer "10").

New features

Hierarchies of tags

The functionality of nesting tags in hierarchies is added to org-mode. This is the generalization of what was previously called "Tag groups" in the manual. That term is now changed to "Tag hierarchy".

The following in-buffer definition: 

#+TAGS: [ Group : SubOne SubTwo ]
#+TAGS: [ SubOne : SubOne1 SubOne2 ]
#+TAGS: [ SubTwo : SubTwo1 SubTwo2 ]

Should be seen as the following tree of tags:

  • Group
    • SubOne
      • SubOne1
      • SubOne2
    • SubTwo
      • SubTwo1
      • SubTwo2

Searching for "Group" should return all tags defined above. Filtering on SubOne filters also it's sub-tags. Etc.

There is no limit on the depth for the tag hierarchy.

Additional syntax for non-unique grouptags

Additional syntax is defined for grouptags if the tags in the group don't have to be distinct on a heading.

Grouptags had to previously be defined with { }. This syntax is already used for exclusive tags and Grouptags need their own, non-exclusive syntax. This behaviour is achieved with [ ]. Note: { } can still be used also for Grouptags but then only one of the given tags can be used on the headline at the same time. Example:

[ group : sub1 sub2 ] 

* Test                                                            :sub1:sub2:

This is a more general case than the already existing syntax for grouptags; { }.

Define regular expression patterns as tags

Tags can be defined as grouptags with regular expressions as "sub-tags".

The regular expressions in the group must be marked up within { }. Example use: 

#+TAGS: [ Project : {P@.+} ]

Searching for the tag Project will now list all tags also including regular expression matches for P@.+. Good for example if tags for a certain project is tagged with a common project-identifier, i.e. P@2014_OrgTags.

Filtering in the agenda on grouptags (Tag hierarchies)

Filtering in the agenda on grouptags filter all of the related tags. Exception if filter is applied with a (double) prefix-argument.

Filtering in the agenda on subcategories does not filter the "above" levels anymore.

If a grouptag contains a regular expression the regular expression is also used as a filter.

Minor refactoring of org-agenda-filter-by-tag

Now uses the argument arg and optional argument exclude instead of strip and narrow. ARG because the argument has multiple purposes and makes more sense than strip now. The term narrowing is changed to exclude.

The main purpose is for the function to make more logical sense when filtering on tags now when tags can be structured in hierarchies.

Babel: support for sed scripts

Thanks to Bjarte Johansen for this feature.

Babel: support for Processing language

New ob-processing.el library.

This library implements necessary functions for implementing editing of Processing code blocks, viewing the resulting sketches in an external viewer, and HTML export of the sketches.

Check the documentation for more.

Thanks to Jarmo Hurri for this feature.

New behaviour for `org-toggle-latex-fragment'

The new behaviour is the following:

  • With a double prefix argument or with a single prefix argument when point is before the first headline, toggle overlays in the whole buffer;
  • With a single prefix argument, toggle overlays in the current subtree;
  • On latex code, toggle overlay at point;
  • Otherwise, toggle overlays in the current section.

Additional markup with #+INCLUDE keyword

The content of the included file can now be optionally marked up, for instance as HTML. See the documentation for details.

File links with #+INCLUDE keyword

Objects can be extracted via #+INCLUDE using file links. It is possible to include only the contents of the object. See manual for more information.

Drawers do not need anymore to be referenced in #+DRAWERS

One can use a drawer without listing it in the #+DRAWERS keyword, which is now obsolete. As a consequence, this change also deprecates org-drawers variable.

org-edit-special can edit export blocks

Using C-c ' on an export block now opens a sub-editing buffer. Major mode in that buffer is determined by export backend name (e.g., "latex" → "latex-mode"). You can define exceptions to this rule by configuring org-src-lang-modes, which see.

Additional :hline processing to ob-shell

If the argument :hlines yes is present in a babel call, an optional argument :hlines-string can be used to define a string to use as a representation for the lisp symbol 'hline in the shell program. The default is hline.

Markdown export supports switches in source blocks

For example, it is now possible to number lines using the -n switch in a source block.

New option in ASCII export

Plain lists can have an extra margin by setting org-ascii-list-margin variable to an appopriate integer.

New blocks in ASCII export

ASCII export now supports #+BEGIN_JUSTIFYRIGHT and #+BEGIN_JUSTIFYLEFT blocks. See documentation for details.

More back-end specific publishing options

The number of publishing options specific to each back-end has been increased. See manual for details.

Export inline source blocks

Inline source code was used to be removed upon exporting. They are now handled as standard code blocks, i.e., the source code can appear in the output, depending on the parameters.

Extend org-export-first-sibling-p and org-export-last-sibling-p

These functions now support any element or object, not only headlines.

New function: org-export-table-row-in-header-p

New function: org-export-get-reference

New function: org-element-lineage

This function deprecates org-export-get-genealogy. It also provides more features. See docstring for details.

New function: org-element-copy

New filter: org-export-filter-body-functions

Functions in this filter are applied on the body of the exported document, befor wrapping it within the template.

Various improvements on radio tables

Radio tables feature now relies on Org's export framework ("ox.el"). :no-escape parameter no longer exists, but additional global parameters are now supported: :raw, :backend. Moreover, there are new parameters specific to some pre-defined translators, e.g., :environment and :booktabs for orgtbl-to-latex. See translators docstrings (including orgtbl-to-generic) for details.

Non-floating minted listings in Latex export

It is not possible to specify #+attr_latex: :float nil in conjunction with source blocks exported by the minted package.

Field formulas can now create columns as needed

Previously, evaluating formulas that referenced out-of-bounds columns would throw an error. A new variable org-table-formula-create-columns was added to adjust this behavior. It is now possible to silently add new columns, to do so with a warning or to explicitly ask the user each time.

ASCII plot

Ability to plot values in a column through ASCII-art bars. See manual for details.

New hook: org-archive-hook

This hook is called after successfully archiving a subtree, with point on the original subtree, not yet deleted.

New option: org-attach-archive-delete

When non-nil, attachments from archived subtrees are removed.

New option: org-latex-caption-above

This variable generalizes org-latex-table-caption-above, which is now deprecated. In addition to tables, it applies to source blocks, special blocks and images. See docstring for more information.

New option: org-latex-prefer-user-labels

See docstring for more information.

Export unnumbered headlines

Headlines, for which the property UNNUMBERED is non-nil, are now exported without section numbers irrespective of their levels. The property is inherited by children.

Tables can be sorted with an arbitrary function

It is now possible to specify a function, both programatically, through a new optional argument, and interactively with f or F keys, to sort a table.

Table of contents can be local to a section

The TOC keywords now accepts an optional local parameter. See manual for details.

Countdown timers can now be paused

org-timer-pause-time now pauses and restarts both relative and countdown timers.

New option only-window for org-agenda-window-setup

When org-agenda-window-setup is set to only-window, the agenda is displayed as the sole window of the current frame.

{{{date}}} macro supports optional formatting argument

It is now possible to supply and optional formatting argument to {{{date}}}. See manual for details.

{{{property}}} macro supports optional search argument

It is now possible to supply an optional search option to {{{property}}} in order to retrieve remote properties optional. See manual for details.

New option org-export-with-title

It is possible to suppress the title insertion with #+OPTIONS: title:nil or globally using the variable org-export-with-title.

New entities family: " "

" " are used to insert up to 20 contiguous spaces in various back-ends. In particular, this family can be used to introduce leading spaces within table cells.

New MathJax configuration options

Org uses the MathJax CDN by default. See the manual and the docstring of org-html-mathjax-options for details.

New behaviour in `org-export-options-alist'

When defining a back-end, it is now possible to specify to give `parse' behaviour on a keyword. It is equivalent to call `org-element-parse-secondary-string' on the value.

However, parsed KEYWORD is automatically associated to an :EXPORT_KEYWORD: property, which can be used to override the keyword value during a subtree export. Moreover, macros are expanded in such keywords and properties.

Viewport support in html export

Viewport for mobile-optimized website is now automatically inserted when exporting to html. See org-html-viewport for details.

New #+SUBTITLE export keyword

Org can typeset a subtitle in some export backends. See the manual for details.

Remotely edit a footnote definition

Calling org-edit-footnote-reference (C-c ') on a footnote reference allows to edit its definition, as long as it is not anonymous, in a dedicated buffer. It works even if buffer is currently narrowed.

New function org-delete-indentation bound to M-^

Work as delete-indentation unless at heading, in which case text is added to headline text.

Support for images in Texinfo export

Texinfo back-end now handles images. See manual for details.

Support for captions in Texinfo export

Tables and source blocks can now have captions. Additionally, lists of tables and lists of listings can be inserted in the document with #+TOC keyword.

Countdown timer support hh:mm:ss format

In addition to setting countdown timers in minutes, they can also be set using the hh:mm:ss format.

Extend org-clone-subtree-with-time-shift

org-clone-subtree-with-time-shift now accepts 0 as an argument for the number of clones, which removes the repeater from the original subtree and creates one shifted, repeating clone.

New time block for clock tables: untilnow

It encompasses all past closed clocks.

Support for the polyglossia LaTeX package

See the docstring of org-latex-classes and org-latex-guess-polyglossia-language for details.

None-floating tables, graphics and blocks can have captions

`org-insert-heading' can be forced to insert top-level headline

Removed functions

Removed function org-translate-time

Use org-timestamp-translate instead.

Removed function org-beamer-insert-options-template

This function inserted a Beamer specific template at point or in current subtree. Use org-export-insert-default-template instead, as it provides more features and covers all export back-ends. It is also accessible from the export dispatcher.

Removed function org-timer-cancel-timer

org-timer-stop now stops both relative and countdown timers.

Removed function org-export-solidify-link-text

This function, being non-bijective, introduced bug in internal references. Use org-export-get-reference instead.

Removed function org-end-of-meta-data-and-drawers

The function is superseded by org-end-of-meta-data, called with an optional argument.

Removed functions org-table-colgroup-line-p, org-table-cookie-line-p

These functions were left-over from pre 8.0 era. They are not correct anymore. Since they are not needed, they have no replacement.

Removed options

org-list-empty-line-terminates-plain-lists is deprecated

It will be kept in code base until next release, for backward compatibility.

If you need to separate consecutive lists with blank lines, always use two of them, as if this option was nil (default value).

org-export-with-creator is a boolean

Special comment value is no longer allowed. It is possible to use a body filter to add comments about the creator at the end of the document instead.

Removed option org-babel-sh-command

This undocumented option defaulted to the value of shell-file-name at the time of loading ob-shell. The new behaviour is to use the value of shell-file-name directly when the shell langage is shell. To chose a different shell, either customize shell-file-name or bind this variable locally.

Removed option org-babel-sh-var-quote-fmt

This undocumented option was supposed to provide different quoting styles when changing the shell type. Changing the shell type can now be done directly from the source block and the quoting style has to be compatible across all shells, so a customization doesn't make sense anymore. The chosen hard coded quoting style conforms to POSIX.

Removed option org-insert-labeled-timestamps-at-point

Setting this option to anything else that the default value (nil) would create invalid planning info. This dangerous option is now removed.

Removed option org-koma-letter-use-title

Use org-export-with-title instead. See also below.

Removed option org-entities-ascii-explanatory

This variable has no effect since Org 8.0.

Removed option org-table-error-on-row-ref-crossing-hline

This variable has no effect since August 2009.

Removed MathML-related options from org-html-mathjax-options

MathJax automatically chooses the best display technology based on the end-users browser. You may force initial usage of MathML via org-html-mathjax-template or by setting the path property of org-html-mathjax-options.

Removed comment-related filters

org-export-filter-comment-functions and org-export-filter-comment-block-functions variables do not exist anymore.

Miscellaneous

Strip all meta data from ITEM special property

ITEM special property does not contain TODO, priority or tags anymore.

File names in links accept are now compatible with URI syntax

Absolute file names can now start with /// in addition to /. E.g., [[file:///home/me/unicorn.jpg]].

Footnotes in included files are now local to the file

As a consequence, it is possible to include multiple Org files with footnotes in a master document without being concerned about footnote labels colliding.

Mailto links now use regular URI syntax

This change deprecates old Org syntax for mailto links: mailto:user@domain::Subject.

QUOTE keywords do not exist anymore

QUOTE keywords have been deprecated since Org 8.2.

Select tests to perform with the build system

The build system has been enhanced to allow test selection with a regular expression by defining BTEST_RE during the test invocation. This is especially useful during bisection to find just when a particular test failure was introduced.

Exact heading search for external links ignore spaces and cookies

Exact heading search for links now ignore spaces and cookies. This is the case for links of the form file:projects.org::*task title, as well as links of the form file:projects.org::some words when org-link-search-must-match-exact-headline is not nil.

org-latex-hyperref-template, org-latex-title-command formatting

New formatting keys are supported. See the respective docstrings. Note, org-latex-hyperref-template has a new default value.

float, wasysym, marvosym are removed from org-latex-default-packages-alist

If you require any of these package add them to your preamble via org-latex-packages-alist. Org also uses default LaTeX \tolerance now.

When exporting, throw an error on unresolved id/fuzzy links and code refs

This helps spotting wrong links.

Version 8.2

Incompatible changes

xdg-open has been removed again from org-file-apps-defaults-gnu

This did not work properly in some environments as xdg-open is desktop specific.

Important bug fixes

Match string for sparse trees can now contain a slash in a property value

You can now have searches like SOMEPROP="aaa/bbb". Until now, this would break because the slash would be interpreted as the separator starting a TOTO match string.

New features

Changes in the default packages loaded for LaTeX

  • rotating is now a default package, to support sideways tables.
  • amsmath is a default package
  • eucal package removed, no longer needed since amsmath is present

Furthermore, the manual now specifically notes if an additional package is needed for one of the documented attributes.

Microsoft Outlook support has been added to org-mac-link.el

Thanks to Marc McLean for this patch.

Lazy autoloading of org-id.el to follow links

When following a link that has an id: prefix, org-id.el will now automatically be loaded.

Thanks to Oleh for this patch

New functions for paragraph motion

The commands C-down and C-up now invoke special commands that use knowledge from the org-elements parser to move the cursor in a paragraph-like way.

Thanks to Nicolas Goaziou for the implementation.

New agenda fortnight view

The agenda has now, in addition to day, week, month, and year views, also a fortnight view covering 14 days.

Thanks to Michael Gauland for the implementation.

New options

New option: org-special-ctrl-o

This variable can be used to turn off the special behavior of C-o in tables.

Version 8.1

Incompatible changes

Combine org-mac-message.el and org-mac-link-grabber into org-mac-link.el

Please remove calls to (require 'org-mac-message) and (require 'org-mac-link-grabber) in your .emacs initialization file. All you need now is (require 'org-mac-link).

Additionally, replace any calls to ogml-grab-link to org-mac-grab-link. For example, replace this line: 

(define-key org-mode-map (kbd "C-c g") 'omgl-grab-link)

with this: 

(define-key org-mode-map (kbd "C-c g") 'org-mac-grab-link)

HTML export: Replace HTML_HTML5_FANCY by :html-html5-fancy (…)

Some of the HTML specific export options in Org <8.1 are either nil or t, like #+HTML_INCLUDE_STYLE. We replaced these binary options with option keywords like :html-include-style.

So you need to replace 

#+HTML_INCLUDE_STYLE: t

by 

#+OPTIONS: :html-include-style t

Options affected by this change: HTML5_FANCY, HTML_INCLUDE_SCRIPTS and HTML_INCLUDE_STYLE.

Important bugfixes

org-insert-heading has been rewritten and bugs are now fixed

The replacement of disputed keys is now turned of when reading a date

New features

You can now use xdg-open to control how to open files

C-c ^ x will now sort checklist items by their checked status

See org-sort-list: hitting C-c ^ x will put checked items at the end of the list.

Various LaTeX export enhancements

  • Support SVG images
  • Support for .pgf files
  • LaTeX Babel blocks can now be exported as .tikz files
  • Allow latexmk as an option for org-latex-pdf-process
  • When using \usepackage[AUTO]{inputenc}, AUTO will automatically be replaced with a coding system derived from buffer-file-coding-system.
  • The dependency on the latexsym LaTeX package has been removed, we now use amssymb symbols by default instead.

Remapping forward-paragraph and backward-paragraph

forward-paragraph and backward-paragraph are now remapped to org-forward-element and org-backward-element respectively. E.g. hitting C-<down> on a headline will move to the next headline.

New entities in org-entities.el

Add support for ell, imath, jmath, varphi, varpi, aleph, gimel, beth, dalet, cdots, S (§), dag, ddag, colon, therefore, because, triangleq, leq, geq, lessgtr, lesseqgtr, ll, lll, gg, ggg, prec, preceq, preccurleyeq, succ, succeq, succurleyeq, setminus, nexist(s), mho, check, frown, diamond. Changes loz, vert, checkmark, smile and tilde.

New options

New option org-bookmark-names-plist

This allows to specify the names of automatic bookmarks.

New option org-agenda-ignore-drawer-properties

This allows more flexibility when optimizing the agenda generation. See https://orgmode.org/worg/agenda-optimization.html for details.

New option: org-html-link-use-abs-url to force using absolute URLs

This is an export/publishing option, and should be used either within the #+OPTIONS line(s) or within a org-publish-project-alist.

Setting this option to t is needed when the HTML output does not allow relative URLs. For example, the contrib/lisp/ox-rss.el library produces a RSS feed, and RSS feeds need to use absolute URLs, so a combination of :html-link-home "..." and :html-link-use-abs-url t is required—see the configuration example in the comment section of ox-rss.el.

New option org-babel-ditaa-java-cmd

This makes java executable configurable for ditaa blocks.

New options org-babel-latex-htlatex and org-babel-latex-htlatex-packages

This enables SVG generation from latex code blocks.

New option: org-habit-show-done-alwyays-green

See this message from Max Mikhanosha.

New option: org-babel-inline-result-wrap

If you set this to the following 

(setq org-babel-inline-result-wrap "$%s$")

then inline code snippets will be wrapped into the formatting string.

New contributed packages

ox-bibtex.el by Nicolas Goaziou
an utility to handle BibTeX export to both LaTeX and HTML exports. It uses the bibtex2html software.
org-screenshot.el by Max Mikhanosha
an utility to handle screenshots easily from Org, using the external tool scrot.

Version 8.0.3

Installation

Installation instructions have been updated and simplified.

If you have troubles installing or updating Org, focus on these instructions:

  • when updating via a .zip/.tar.gz file, you only need to set the load-path in your .emacs. Set it before any other Org customization that would call autoloaded Org functions.
  • when updating by pulling Org's Git repository, make sure to create the correct autoloads. You can do this by running ~$ make autoloads (to only create the autoloads) or by running ~$ make (to also compile the Emacs lisp files.) ~$ make help and ~$ make helpall gives you detailed explanations.
  • when updating through ELPA (either from GNU ELPA or from Org ELPA), you have to install Org's ELPA package in a session where no Org function has been called already.

When in doubt, run M-x org-version RET and see if you have a mixed-up installation.

See https://orgmode.org/org.html#Installation for details.

Incompatible changes

Org 8.0 is the most disruptive major version of Org.

If you configured export options, you will have to update some of them.

If you used #+ATTR_* keywords, the syntax of the attributes changed and you will have to update them.

Below is a list of changes for which you need to take action.

See https://orgmode.org/worg/org-8.0.html for the most recent version of this list and for detailed instructions on how to migrate.

  • New export engine

    Org 8.0 comes with a new export engine written by Nicolas Goaziou. This export engine relies on org-element.el (Org's syntax parser), which was already in Org's core. This new export engine triggered the rewriting of all export back-ends.

    The most visible change is the export dispatcher, accessible through the keybinding C-c C-e. By default, this menu only shows some of the built-in export formats, but you can add more formats by loading them directly (e.g., (require 'ox-texinfo) or by configuring the option org-export-backends.

    More contributed back-ends are available from the contrib/ directory, the corresponding files start with the ox- prefix.

    If you customized an export back-end (like HTML or LaTeX), you will need to rename some options so that your customization is not lost. Typically, an option starting with org-export-html- is now named org-html-. See the manual for details and check this Worg page for directions.

  • New syntax for #+ATTR_HTML/LaTeX/… options
    #+ATTR_HTML width="200px"

    should now be written 

    #+ATTR_HTML :width 200px

    Keywords like #+ATTR_HTML and #+ATTR_LaTeX are defined in their respective back-ends, and the list of supported parameters depends on each backend. See Org's manual for details.

  • org-remember.el has been removed

    You cannot use remember.el anymore to capture notes.

    Support for remember templates has been obsoleted since long, it is now fully removed.

    Use M-x org-capture-import-remember-templates RET to import your remember templates into capture templates.

  • org-jsinfo.el has been merged into ox-html.el

    If you were requiring ox-jsinfo.el in your .emacs.el file, you will have to remove this requirement from your initialization file.

  • Note for third-party developers

    The name of the files for export back-end have changed: we now use the prefix ox- for those files (like we use the ob- prefix for Babel files.) For example org-html.el is now ox-html.el.

    If your code relies on these files, please update the names in your code.

  • Packages moved from core to contrib

    Since packages in Org's core are meant to be part of GNU Emacs, we try to be minimalist when it comes to adding files into core. For 8.0, we moved some contributions into the contrib/ directory.

    The rationale for deciding that these files should live in contrib/ is either because they rely on third-part softwares that are not included in Emacs, or because they are not targeting a significant user-base.

    • org-colview-xemacs.el
    • org-mac-message.el
    • org-mew.el
    • org-wl.el
    • ox-freedmind.el
    • ox-taskjuggler.el

    Note that ox-freedmind.el has been rewritten by Jambunathan, org-mew.el has been enhanced by Tokuya Kameshima and ox-taskjuggler.el by Nicolas Goaziou and others.

    Also, the Taskjuggler exporter now uses TJ3 by default. John Hendy wrote a tutorial on Worg for the TJ3 export.

New packages in core

ob-makefile.el by Eric Schulte and Thomas S. Dye

ob-makefile.el implements Org Babel support for Makefile tangling.

ox-man.el by Luis Anaya

ox-man.el allows you to export Org files to man pages.

ox-md.el by Nicolas Goaziou

ox-md.el allows you to export Org files to Markdown files, using the vanilla Markdown syntax.

ox-texinfo.el by Jonathan Leech-Pepin

ox-texinfo.el allows you to export Org files to Texinfo files.

New packages in contrib

ob-julia.el by G. Jay Kerns

Julia is a new programming language.

ob-julia.el provides Org Babel support for evaluating Julia source code.

ob-mathomatic.el by Luis Anaya

mathomatic a portable, command-line, educational CAS and calculator software, written entirely in the C programming language.

ob-mathomatic.el provides Org Babel support for evaluating mathomatic entries.

ob-tcl.el by Luis Anaya

ob-tcl.el provides Org Babel support for evaluating Tcl source code.

org-bullets.el by Evgeni Sabof

Display bullets instead of stars for headlines.

Also see this updated FAQ on how to display another character than "*" for starting headlines.

ox-confluence.el by Sébastien Delafond

ox-confluence.el lets you convert Org files to Confluence Wiki files.

ox-deck.el and ox-s5.el by Rick Frankel

deck.js is a javascript library for displaying HTML ages as presentations. ox-deck.el exports Org files to HTML presentations using deck.js.

s5 is a set of scripts which also allows to display HTML pages as presentations. ox-s5.el exports Org files to HTML presentations using s5.

ox-groff.el by Luis Anaya and Nicolas Goaziou

The groff (GNU troff) software is a typesetting package which reads plain text mixed with formatting commands and produces formatted output.

Luis Anaya and Nicolas Goaziou implemented ox-groff.el to allow conversion from Org files to groff.

ox-koma-letter.el by Nicolas Goaziou and Alan Schmitt

This back-end allow to export Org pages to the KOMA Scrlttr2 format.

ox-rss.el by Bastien

This back-end lets you export Org pages to RSS 2.0 feeds. Combined with the HTML publishing feature, this allows you to build a blog entirely with Org.

New features

Export

  • New export generic options

    If you use Org exporter, we advise you to re-read the manual section about it. It has been updated and includes new options.

    Among the new/updated export options, three are of particular importance:

    org-export-allow-bind-keywords
    This option replaces the old option org-export-allow-BIND and the default value is nil, not confirm. You will need to explicitly set this to t in your initialization file if you want to allow #+BIND keywords.
    org-export-with-planning
    This new option controls the export of SCHEDULED:, DEADLINE:, CLOSED: lines, and planning information is now skipped by default during export. This use to be the job of org-export-with-timestamps, but this latter option has been given a new role: it controls the export of standalone time-stamps. When set to nil, Org will not export active and inactive time-stamps standing on a line by themselves or within a paragraph that only contains time-stamps.

    To check if an option has been introduced or its default value changed in Org 8.0, do C-h v [option] RET and check if the documentation says that the variable has been introduced (or changed) in version 24.4 of Emacs.

  • Enhanced default stylesheet for the HTML exporter

    See the new default value of org-html-style-default.

  • New tags, classes and ids for the HTML exporter

    See the new default value of org-html-divs.

  • Support for tikz pictures in LaTeX export
  • org-man.el: New export function for "man" links
  • org-docview.el: New export function for docview links

Structure editing

  • C-u C-u M-RET inserts a heading at the end of the parent subtree
  • Cycling to the CONTENTS view keeps inline tasks folded

    org-cycle-hook as a new function org-cycle-hide-inline-tasks which prevents the display of inline tasks when showing the content of a subtree.

  • C-c - in a region makes a list item for each line

    This is the opposite of the previous behavior, where C-c - on a region would create one item for the whole region, and where C-u C-c - would create an item for each line. Now C-c - on the selected region creates an item per line, and C-u C-c - creates a single item for the whole region.

  • When transposing words, markup characters are now part of the words

    In Emacs, you can transpose words with M-t. Transposing *these* _words__ will preserve markup.

  • New command org-set-property-and-value bound to C-c C-x P

    This command allows you to quickly add both the property and its value. It is useful in buffers where there are many properties and where C-c C-x p can slow down the flow of editing too much.

  • New commands org-next-block and org-previous-block

    These commands allow you to go to the previous block (C-c M-b or the speedy key B) or to the next block (C-c M-f or the speedy key F.)

  • New commands org-drag-line-forward and org-drag-line-backward

    These commands emulate the old behavior of M-<down> and M-<up> but are now bound to S-M-<down> and S-M-<up> respectively, since M-<down> and M-<up> now drag the whole element at point (a paragraph, a table, etc.) forward and backward.

  • When a list item has a checkbox, inserting a new item uses a checkbox too
  • When sorting entries/items, only the description of links is considered

    Now Org will sort this list 

    - [[http://abc.org][B]]
- [[http://def.org][A]]

    like this: 

    - [[http://def.org][A]]
- [[http://abc.org][B]]

    by comparing the descriptions, not the links. Same when sorting headlines instead of list items.

  • New option orgstruct-heading-prefix-regexp

    For example, setting this option to "^;;; " in Emacs lisp files and using orgstruct-mode in those files will allow you to cycle through visibility states as if lines starting with ";;; *…" where headlines.

    In general, you want to set orgstruct-heading-prefix-regexp as a file local variable.

  • New behavior of org-clone-subtree-with-time-shift

    The default is now to ask for a time-shift only when there is a time-stamp. When called with a universal prefix argument C-u, it will not ask for a time-shift even if there is a time-stamp.

  • New option org-agenda-restriction-lock-highlight-subtree

    This defaults to t so that the whole subtree is highlighted when you restrict the agenda view to it with C-c C-x < (or the speed command <). The default setting helps ensuring that you are not adding tasks after the restricted region. If you find this highlighting too intrusive, set this option to nil.

  • New option org-closed-keep-when-no-todo

    When switching back from a DONE keyword to a TODO keyword, Org now removes the CLOSED planning information, if any. It also removes this information when going back to a non-TODO state (e.g., with C-c C-t SPC). If you want to keep the CLOSED planning information when removing the TODO keyword, set org-closed-keep-when-no-todo to t.

  • New option org-image-actual-width

    This option allows you to change the width of in-buffer displayed images. The default is to use the actual width of the image, but you can use a fixed value for all images, or fall back on an attribute like 

    #+attr_html: :width 300px

Scheduled/deadline

  • Implement "delay" cookies for scheduled items

    If you want to delay the display of a scheduled task in the agenda, you can now use a delay cookie like this: SCHEDULED: <2004-12-25 Sat -2d>. The task is still scheduled on the 25th but will appear in your agenda starting from two days later (i.e. from March 27th.)

    Imagine for example that your co-workers are not done in due time and tell you "we need two more days". In that case, you may want to delay the display of the task in your agenda by two days, but you still want the task to appear as scheduled on March 25th.

    In case the task contains a repeater, the delay is considered to affect all occurrences; if you want the delay to only affect the first scheduled occurrence of the task, use --2d instead. See org-scheduled-delay-days and org-agenda-skip-scheduled-delay-if-deadline for details on how to control this globally or per agenda.

  • Use C-u C-u C-c C-s will insert a delay cookie for scheduled tasks

    See the previous section for why delay cookies may be useful.

  • Use C-u C-u C-c C-d will insert a warning delay for deadline tasks

    C-u C-u C-c C-d now inserts a warning delay to deadlines.

Calendar, diary and appts

  • New variable org-read-date-minibuffer-local-map

    By default, this new local map uses "." to go to today's date, like in the normal M-x calendar RET. If you want to deactivate this and to reassign the "@" key to calendar-goto-today, use this: 

    ;; Unbind "." in Org's calendar:
(define-key org-read-date-minibuffer-local-map (kbd ".") nil)

;; Bind "@" to `calendar-goto-today':
(define-key org-read-date-minibuffer-local-map
            (kbd "@")
            (lambda () (interactive) (org-eval-in-calendar '(calendar-goto-today))))
  • In Org's calendar, ! displays diary entries of the date at point

    This is useful when you want to check if you don't already have an appointment when setting new ones with C-c . or C-c s. ! will call diary-view-entries and display the diary in a separate buffer.

  • org-diary: only keep the descriptions of links

    org-diary returns diary information from Org files, but it returns it in a diary buffer, not in an Org mode buffer. When links are displayed, only show their description, not the full links.

Agenda

  • New agenda type agenda* and entry types :scheduled* :deadline*

    When defining agenda custom commands, you can now use agenda*: this will list entries that have both a date and a time. This is useful when you want to build a list of appointments.

    You can also set org-agenda-entry-types either globally or locally in each agenda custom command and use :timestamp* and/or :deadline* there.

    Another place where this is useful is your .diary file: 

    %%(org-diary :scheduled*) ~/org/rdv.org

    This will list only entries from ~/org/rdv.org that are scheduled with a time value (i.e. appointments).

  • New agenda sorting strategies

    org-agenda-sorting-strategy allows these new sorting strategies:

    Strategy Explanations
    timestamp-up Sort by any timestamp, early first
    timestamp-down Sort by any timestamp, late first
    scheduled-up Sort by scheduled timestamp, early first
    scheduled-down Sort by scheduled timestamp, late first
    deadline-up Sort by deadline timestamp, early first
    deadline-down Sort by deadline timestamp, late first
    ts-up Sort by active timestamp, early first
    ts-down Sort by active timestamp, late first
    tsia-up Sort by inactive timestamp, early first
    tsia-down Sort by inactive timestamp, late first
  • New options to limit the number of agenda entries

    You can now limit the number of entries in an agenda view. This is different from filters: filters only hide the entries in the agenda, while limits are set while generating the list of agenda entries.

    These new options are available:

    org-agenda-max-entries
    limit by number of entries.
    org-agenda-max-todos
    limit by number of TODOs.
    org-agenda-max-tags
    limit by number of tagged entries.
    org-agenda-max-effort
    limit by effort (minutes).

    For example, if you locally set org-agenda-max-todos to 3 in an agenda view, the agenda will be limited to the first three todos. Other entries without a TODO keyword or beyond the third TODO headline will be ignored.

    When setting a limit (e.g. about an effort's sum), the default behavior is to exclude entries that cannot be checked against (e.g. entries that have no effort property.) To include other entries too, you can set the limit to a negative number. For example (setq org-agenda-max-tags -3) will not show the fourth tagged headline (and beyond), but it will also show non-tagged headlines.

  • ~ in agenda view sets temporary limits

    You can hit ~ in the agenda to temporarily set limits: this will regenerate the agenda as if the limits were set. This is useful for example when you want to only see a list of N tasks, or a list of tasks that take only N minutes.

  • "=" in agenda view filters by regular expressions

    You can now filter agenda entries by regular expressions using =. C-u = will filter entries out. Regexp filters are cumulative. You can set org-agenda-regexp-filter-preset to suit your needs in each agenda view.

  • | in agenda view resets all filters

    Since it's common to combine tag filters, category filters, and now regexp filters, there is a new command | to reset all filters at once.

  • Allow writing an agenda to an .org file

    You can now write an agenda view to an .org file. It copies the headlines and their content (but not subheadings) into the new file.

    This is useful when you want to quickly share an agenda containing the full list of notes.

  • New commands to drag an agenda line forward (M-<down>) or backward (M-<up>)

    It sometimes handy to move agenda lines around, just to quickly reorganize your tasks, or maybe before saving the agenda to a file. Now you can use M-<down> and M-<up> to move the line forward or backward.

    This does not persist after a refresh of the agenda, and this does not change the .org files who contribute to the agenda.

  • Use %b for displaying "breadcrumbs" in the agenda view

    org-agenda-prefix-format now allows to use a %b formatter to tell Org to display "breadcrumbs" in the agenda view.

    This is useful when you want to display the task hierarchy in your agenda.

  • Use %l for displaying the headline's level in the agenda view

    org-agenda-prefix-format allows to use a %l formatter to tell Org to display entries with additional spaces corresponding to their level in the outline tree.

  • org-agenda-write will ask before overwriting an existing file

    M-x org-agenda-write RET (or C-c C-w from an agenda buffer) used to overwrite preexisting file with the same name without confirmation. It now asks for a confirmation.

  • New commands M-m and M-* to toggle (all) mark(s) for bulk action
    org-agenda-bulk-toggle
    this command is bound to M-m and toggles the mark of the entry at point.
    org-agenda-bulk-toggle-all
    this command is bound to M-* and toggles all the marks in the current agenda.
  • New option org-agenda-search-view-max-outline-level

    This option sets the maximum outline level to display in search view. E.g. when this is set to 1, the search view will only show headlines of level 1.

  • New option org-agenda-todo-ignore-time-comparison-use-seconds

    This allows to compare times using seconds instead of days when honoring options like org-agenda-todo-ignore-* in the agenda display.

  • New option org-agenda-entry-text-leaders

    This allows you to get rid of the ">" character that gets added in front of entries excerpts when hitting E in the agenda view.

  • New formatting string for past deadlines in org-agenda-deadline-leaders

    The default formatting for past deadlines is "%2d d. ago: ", which makes it explicit that the deadline is in the past. You can configure this via org-agenda-deadline-leaders. Note that the width of the formatting string is important to keep the agenda alignment clean.

  • New allowed value repeated-after-deadline for org-agenda-skip-scheduled-if-deadline-is-shown

    When org-agenda-skip-scheduled-if-deadline-is-shown is set to repeated-after-deadline, the agenda will skip scheduled items if they are repeated beyond the current dealine.

  • New option for org-agenda-skip-deadline-prewarning-if-scheduled

    This variable may be set to nil, t, the symbol `pre-scheduled', or a number which will then give the number of days before the actual deadline when the prewarnings should resume. The symbol `pre-scheduled' eliminates the deadline prewarning only prior to the scheduled date.

    Read the full docstring for details.

  • org-class now supports holiday strings in the skip-weeks parameter

    For example, this task will now be skipped only on new year's day: 

    * Task
  <%%(org-class 2012 1 1 2013 12 12 2 "New Year's Day")>

Capture

  • Allow C-1 as a prefix for org-agenda-capture and org-capture

    With a C-1 prefix, the capture mechanism will use the HH:MM value at point (if any) or the current HH:MM time as the default time for the capture template.

  • Expand keywords within %(sexp) placeholder in capture templates

    If you use a %:keyword construct within a %(sexp) construct, Org will expand the keywords before expanding the %(sexp).

  • Allow to contextualize capture (and agenda) commands by checking the name of the buffer

    org-capture-templates-contexts and org-agenda-custom-commands-contexts allow you to define what capture templates and what agenda commands should be available in various contexts. It is now possible for the context to check against the name of the buffer.

Tag groups

Using #+TAGS: { Tag1 : Tag2 Tag3 } will define Tag1 as a group tag (note the colon after Tag1). If you search for Tag1, it will return headlines containing either Tag1, Tag2 or Tag3 (or any combination of those tags.)

You can use group tags for sparse tree in an Org buffer, for creating agenda views, and for filtering.

See https://orgmode.org/org.html#Tag-groups for details.

Links

  • C-u C-u M-x org-store-link RET will ignore non-core link functions

    Org knows how to store links from Org buffers, from info files and from other Emacs buffers. Org can be taught how to store links from any buffer through new link protocols (see "Adding hyperlink types" in the manual.)

    Sometimes you want Org to ignore added link protocols and store the link as if the protocol was not known.

    You can now do this with C-u C-u M-x org-store-link RET.

  • C-u C-u C-u M-x org-store-link RET on an active region will store links for each lines

    Imagine for example that you want to store a link for every message in a Gnus summary buffer. In that case C-x h C-u C-u C-u M-x org-store-link RET will store a link for every line (i.e. message) if the region is active.

  • C-c C-M-l will add a default description for links which don't have one

    C-c C-M-l inserts all stored links. If a link does not have a description, this command now adds a default one, so that we are not mixing with-description and without-description links when inserting them.

  • No curly braces to bracket links within internal links

    When storing a link to a headline like 

    * See [[https://orgmode.org][Org website]]

    org-store-link used to convert the square brackets into curly brackets. It does not anymore, taking the link description or the link path, when there is no description.

Table

  • Switching between #+TBLFM lines

    If you have several #+TBLFM lines below a table, C-c C-c on a line will apply the formulas from this line, and C-c C-c on another line will apply those other formulas.

  • You now use "nan" for empty fields in Calc formulas

    If empty fields are of interest, it is recommended to reread the section 3.5.2 Formula syntax for Calc of the manual because the description for the mode strings has been clarified and new examples have been added towards the end.

  • Handle localized time-stamps in formulas evaluation

    If your LOCALE is set so that Org time-stamps use another language than english, and if you make time computations in Org's table, it now works by internally converting the time-stamps with a temporary LOCALE=C before doing computation.

  • New lookup functions

    There are now three lookup functions:

    See the manual for details.

Startup keywords

These new startup keywords are now available:

Startup keyword Option
#+STARTUP: logdrawer (setq org-log-into-drawer t)
#+STARTUP: nologdrawer (setq org-log-into-drawer nil)
#+STARTUP: logstatesreversed (setq org-log-states-order-reversed t)
#+STARTUP: nologstatesreversed (setq org-log-states-order-reversed nil)
#+STARTUP: latexpreview (setq org-startup-with-latex-preview t)
#+STARTUP: nolatexpreview (setq org-startup-with-latex-preview nil)

Clocking

  • New option org-clock-rounding-minutes

    E.g. if org-clock-rounding-minutes is set to 5, time is 14:47 and you clock in: then the clock starts at 14:45. If you clock out within the next 5 minutes, the clock line will be removed; if you clock out 8 minutes after your clocked in, the clock out time will be 14:50.

  • New option org-time-clocksum-use-effort-durations

    When non-nil, C-c C-x C-d uses effort durations. E.g., by default, one day is considered to be a 8 hours effort, so a task that has been clocked for 16 hours will be displayed as during 2 days in the clock display or in the clocktable.

    See org-effort-durations on how to set effort durations and org-time-clocksum-format for more on time clock formats.

  • New option org-clock-x11idle-program-name

    This allows to set the name of the program which prints X11 idle time in milliseconds. The default is to use x11idle.

  • New option org-use-last-clock-out-time-as-effective-time

    When non-nil, use the last clock out time for org-todo. Note that this option has precedence over the combined use of org-use-effective-time and org-extend-today-until.

  • S-<left/right> on a clocksum column will update the sum by updating the last clock
  • C-u 3 C-S-<up/down> will update clock timestamps synchronously by 3 units
  • New parameter :wstart for clocktables to define the week start day
  • New parameter :mstart to state the starting day of the month
  • Allow relative times in clocktable tstart and tend options
  • The clocktable summary is now a caption
  • :tstart and :tend and friends allow relative times like "<-1w>" or "<now>"

Babel

  • You can now use C-c C-k for org-edit-src-abort

    This allows you to quickly cancel editing a source block.

  • C-u C-u M-x org-babel-tangle RET tangles by the target file of the block at point

    This is handy if you want to tangle all source code blocks that have the same target than the block at point.

  • New options for auto-saving the base buffer or the source block editing buffer

    When org-edit-src-turn-on-auto-save is set to t, editing a source block in a new window will turn on auto-save-mode and save the code in a new file under the same directory than the base Org file.

    When org-edit-src-auto-save-idle-delay is set to a number of minutes N, the base Org buffer will be saved after this number of minutes of idle time.

  • New :post header argument post-processes results

    This header argument may be used to pass the results of the current code block through another code block for post-processing. See the manual for a usage example.

  • Commented out heading are ignored when collecting blocks for tangling

    If you comment out a heading (with C-c ; anywhere on the heading or in the subtree), code blocks from within this heading are now ignored when collecting blocks for tangling.

  • New option org-babel-hash-show-time to show a time-stamp in the result hash
  • Do not ask for confirmation if cached value is current

    Do not run org-babel-confirm-evaluate if source block has a cache and the cache value is current as there is no evaluation involved in this case.

  • ob-sql.el and ob-python.el have been improved.
  • New Babel files only need to (require 'ob)

    When writing a new Babel file, you now only need to use (require 'ob) instead of requiring each Babel library one by one.

Faces

  • Org now fontifies radio link targets by default
  • In the agenda, use org-todo-keyword-faces to highlight selected TODO keywords
  • New face org-priority, enhanced fontification of priority cookies in agenda
  • New face org-tag-group for group tags

Miscellaneous

  • New speedy key s pour org-narrow-to-subtree
  • Handling of org-html-table-row has been updated (incompatible change)
  • org-export-html-table-tag is replaced by org-html-table-default-attributes
  • Support using git-annex with Org attachments
  • org-protocol: Pass optional value using query in url to capture from protocol
  • When the refile history is empty, use the current filename as default
  • When you cannot change the TODO state of a task, Org displays the blocking task
  • New option org-mobile-allpriorities
  • org-bibtex.el now use visual-line-mode instead of the deprecated longlines-mode
  • org-format-latex-options allows to set the foreground/background colors automatically
  • New option org-archive-file-header-format
  • New "neg" entity in org-entities
  • New function org-docview-export to export docview links
  • New :eps header argument for ditaa code blocks
  • New option org-gnus-no-server to start Gnus with gnus-no-server
  • Org is now distributed with htmlize.el version 1.43
  • org-drill.el has been updated to version 2.3.7
  • org-mac-iCal.el now supports MacOSX version up to 10.8
  • Various improvements to org-contacts.el and orgpan.el

Outside Org

Spanish translation of the Org guide by David Arroyo Menéndez

David (and others) translated the Org compact guide in Spanish:

You can read the PDF guide.

poporg.el and outorg.el

Two new libraries (poporg.el by François Pinard and outorg.el by Thorsten Jolitz) now enable editing of comment-sections from source-code buffers in temporary Org-mode buffers, making the full editing power of Org-mode available. outorg.el comes together with outshine.el and navi-mode.el, two more libraries by Thorsten Jolitz with the goal to give source-code buffers the look & feel of Org-mode buffers while greatly improving navigation and structure editing. A detailed description can be found here: https://orgmode.org/worg/org-tutorials/org-outside-org.html

Here are two screencasts demonstrating Thorsten's tools:

MobileOrg for iOS

MobileOrg for iOS back in the App Store The 1.6.0 release was focused on the new Dropbox API and minor bug fixes but also includes a new ability to launch in Capture mode. Track development and contribute on github.

Version 7.9.4

This is bug-fix release.

Version 7.9.3

No need to require org-install anymore

You don't need to require org-install anymore. If you load Org from a directory extracted from the .tar.gz or .zip sources, or if you are using it from a git clone, setting the load-paths is enough.

If you want to make sure the correct autoloads are in place, you can do: 

(require 'org-loaddefs.el)

New option org-agenda-use-tag-inheritance

org-use-tag-inheritance controls whether tags are inherited when org-tags-view is called (either in tags, tags-tree or tags-todo agenda views.)

When generating other agenda types such as agenda, todo and todo-tree, tags inheritance is not used when selecting the entries to display. Still, you might want to have all tag information correct in the agenda buffer, e.g. for tag filtering. In that case, add the agenda type to this variable.

Setting this variable to nil should considerably speeds up the agenda generation.

Note that the default was to display inherited tags in the agenda lines even if `org-use-tag-inheritance' was nil. The default is now to never display inherited tags in agenda lines, but to know about them when the agenda type is listed in org-agenda-use-tag-inheritance.

New default value nil for org-agenda-dim-blocked-tasks

Using `nil' as the default value speeds up the agenda generation. You can hit `#' (or `C-u #') in agenda buffers to temporarily dim (or turn invisible) blocked tasks.

New speedy keys for org-speed-commands-default

You can now use `:' (instead of `;') for setting tags—this is consistent with using the `:' key in agenda view.

You can now use `=' for org-columns.

org-float is now obsolete, use diary-float instead

No GPL manual anymore

There used to be a GPL version of the Org manual, but this is not the case anymore, the Free Software Foundation does not permit this.

The GNU FDL license is now included in the manual directly.

Enhanced compatibility with Emacs 22 and XEmacs

Thanks to Achim for his work on enhancing Org's compatibility with various Emacsen. Things may not be perfect, but Org should work okay in most environments.

Version 7.9.2

This page describes changes against the 7.8[.x] versions of Org. It includes changes in previous 7.9[.x] releases.

New committers who signed the FSF copyright assigment

Welcome and thanks to these new core contributors:

  • Abdó Roig-Maranges
  • Andrew Hyatt
  • Andrzej Lichnerowicz
  • Ethan Ligon
  • Feng Shu
  • George Kettleborough
  • Henning Dietmar Weiss
  • Ilya Shlyakhter
  • Ivan Kanis
  • Konrad Hinsen
  • Madan Ramakrishnan
  • Max Mikhanosha
  • Moritz Ulrich
  • Rick Frankel
  • Toby Cubitt

Online documentation for hooks, commands and options

You can read the documentation for hooks, commands (i.e. interactive functions) and options (i.e. customizable variables) online. Clicking on a command/option in this ChangeLog will take you to the online documentation for that command/option.

New ELPA repository for Org packages

You can now add the Org ELPA repository like this: 

(add-to-list 'package-archives '("org" . "https://orgmode.org/elpa/") t)

It contains both the org-*.tar package (the core Org distribution, also available through http://elpa.gnu.org) and the org-plus*.tar package (the extended Org distribution, with non-GNU packages from the contrib/ directory.)

See https://orgmode.org/elpa/

Overview of the new keybindings

Keybinding Speedy Command
C-c C-x C-z   org-clock-resolve
C-c C-x C-q   org-clock-cancel
C-c C-x C-x   org-clock-in-last
M-h   org-mark-element
*   org-agenda-bulk-mark-all
C-c C-M-l   org-insert-all-links
C-c C-x C-M-v   org-redisplay-inline-images
C-c C-x E E org-inc-effort
  # org-toggle-comment
  : org-columns
  W Set APPT_WARNTIME
k   org-agenda-capture
C-c , , org-priority

New build system and new packages

New build system

Achim implemented a new build system.

The basic method for installing Org is the same:

  1. Download or clone Org.
  2. run `make install' from the Org directory.
  3. Add (require 'org-install) in your .emacs.el.

But the build system is now more flexible and can be more easily adapted to suit your needs.

See https://orgmode.org/worg/dev/org-build-system.html for details.

New packages in core

  • org-eshell.el by Konrad Hinsen is now in Org's core

    org-eshell.el allows you to create links from Eshell.

New packages in contrib/

Note: The EXPERIMENTAL/ directory has been deleted. The files have been moved to the contrib/lisp/ directory.

  • org-notify.el by Peter Münster

    From the comment section: 

    Get notifications, when there is something to do.
Sometimes, you need a reminder a few days before a deadline, e.g. to buy a
present for a birthday, and then another notification one hour before to
have enough time to choose the right clothes.
For other events, e.g. rolling the dustbin to the roadside once per week,
you probably need another kind of notification strategy.
This package tries to satisfy the various needs.
  • org-bibtex-extras.el by Eric Schulte

    From the comment section: 

    This file add some extra functionality to your bibtex entries which
are stored as Org-mode headlines using org-bibtex.el.  Most
features expect that you keep all of your reading notes in a single
file, set the `obe-bibtex-file' variable to the path to this file.

New exporters in contrib/

Nicolas export engine org-export.el lives in the contrib/lisp/ directory. To use it: 

Make sure contrib/lisp/ is in your load-path
M-: (require 'org-export) RET
M-: (require 'org-e-latex) RET ; or any other library
M-x org-export-dispatch RET

These are the currently available exporters:

  • org-e-ascii.el by Nicolas
  • org-e-beamer.el by Nicolas
  • org-e-groff.el by Luis Anaya
  • org-e-html.el by Jambunathan
  • org-e-latex.el by Nicolas
  • org-e-man.el by Luis Anaya
  • org-e-odt.el by Jambunathan
  • org-e-texinfo.el by Jonathan Leech-Pepin
  • org-md.el by Nicolas

If we have enough testers, the new export engine is very likely to replace the current one for the next major release. Please report any problem on the mailing list!

If you want to write a new export backend based on this export engine, please check the online documentation.

New Babel languages

  • Support for execution of Scala code blocks (see lisp/ob-scala.el)
  • Support for execution of IO code blocks (see lisp/ob-io.el)

Incompatible changes

  • If your code relies on org-write-agenda, please use org-agenda-write from now on.
  • If your code relies on org-make-link, please use concat instead.
  • org-link-to-org-use-id has been renamed to org-id-link-to-org-use-id and its default value is nil. The previous default was create-if-interactive-and-no-custom-id.

New features and user-visible changes

Org Element

org-element.el is a toolbox for parsing and analysing "elements" in an Org-mode buffer. This has been written by Nicolas Goaziou and has been tested for quite some time. It is now part of Org's core and many core functions rely on this package.

Two functions might be particularily handy for users: org-element-at-point and org-element-context. See the docstrings for more details.

Below is a list of editing and navigating commands that now rely on org-element.el.

  • org-fill-paragraph has been completely rewritten

    The filling mechanisms now rely on org-element, trying to do the right thing on each element in various contexts. E.g. filling in a list item will preserve indentation; filling in message-mode will fall back on the relevant filling functions; etc.

  • org-metaup and org-metadown will drag the element backward/forward

    If you want to get the old behavior (i.e. moving a line up and down), you can first select the line as an active region, then org-metaup/down to move the region backward/forward. This also works with regions bigger than just one line.

  • org-up-element and org-down-element (respectively C-c C-^ and C-c C-_)

    This will move the point up/down in the hierarchy of elements.

  • org-backward-element and org-forward-element (respectively M-{ and M-})

    This will move the point backward/forward in the hierarchy of elements.

  • org-narrow-to-element will narrow to the element at point
  • org-mark-element will mark the element at point

    This command is bound to M-h and will mark the element at point. If the point is at a paragraph, it will mark the paragraph. If the point is at a list item, it will mark the list item. Etc.

    Note that if point is at the beginning of a list, it will mark the whole list.

    To mark a subtree, you can either use M-h on the headline (since there is no ambiguity about the element you're at) or org-mark-subtree (C-c @) anywhere in the subtree.

    Invoking org-mark-element repeatedly will try to mark the next element on top of the previous one(s). E.g. hitting M-h twice on a headline will mark the current subtree and the next one on the same level.

Org Agenda

  • New option org-agenda-sticky

    There is a new option org-agenda-sticky which enables "sticky" agendas. Sticky agendas remain opened in the background so that you don't need to regenerate them each time you hit the corresponding keystroke. This is a big time saver.

    When org-agenda-sticky is non-nil, the agenda buffer will be named using the agenda key and its description. In sticky agendas, the q key will just bury the agenda buffers and further agenda commands will show existing buffer instead of generating new ones.

    If org-agenda-sticky is set to nil, q will kill the single agenda buffer.

  • New option org-agenda-custom-commands-contexts

    Setting this option allows you to define specific context where agenda commands should be available from. For example, when set to this value 

    (setq org-agenda-custom-commands-contexts
      '(("p" (in-file . "\\.txt"))))

    then the p agenda command will only be available from buffers visiting *.txt files. See the docstring and the manual for more details on how to use this.

  • Changes in bulk actions

    The set of commands starting with k ... as been deleted and the features have been merged into the "bulk action" feature.

    After you marked some entries in the agenda, if you call B s, the agenda entries will be rescheduled using the date at point if on a date header. If you are on an entry with a timestamp, you will be prompted for a date to reschedule your marked entries to, using the timestamp at point as the default prompt.

    You can now use k to capture the marked entry and use the date at point as an overriding date for the capture template.

    To bind this behavior to M-x org-capture RET (or its keybinding), set the new option org-capture-use-agenda-date to t.

  • N and P in the agenda will move to the next/previous item
  • New command org-agenda-bulk-mark-all to mark all items

    This new command is bound to * in agenda mode.

    There is also a new option org-agenda-bulk-mark-char to set the character to use as a mark for bulk actions.

  • New option org-agenda-persistent-marks

    When set to non-nil, marks will remain visible after a bulk action. You can temporarily toggle this by pressing p when invoking org-agenda-bulk-action.

  • New option org-agenda-skip-timestamp-if-deadline-is-shown

    Non-nil means skip timestamp line if same entry shows because of deadline.

    In the agenda of today, an entry can show up multiple times because it has both a plain timestamp and has a nearby deadline. When this variable is t, then only the deadline is shown and the fact that the entry has a timestamp for or including today is not shown. When this variable is nil, the entry will be shown several times.

  • New todo-unblocked and nottodo-unblocked skip conditions

    See the git commit for more explanations.

  • Allow category filtering in the agenda

    You can now filter the agenda by category. Pressing "<" will filter by the category of the item on the current line, and pressing "<" again will remove the filter. You can combine tag filters and category filters.

    You can use org-agenda-category-filter in your custom agenda views and org-agenda-category-filter-preset in your main configuration.

    See also the new command org-agenda-filter-by-top-category: hitting `^' will filter by "Top" category: only show entries that are of the same category than the Top category of the entry at point.

Org Links

  • Inserting links

    When inserting links through org-insert-link, the description is now displayed first, followed by the literal link, as the description is often more useful when you look for the link you want to insert.

    Completion now complete both literal links and description. If you complete a description, the literal link and its description will be inserted directly, whereas when you complete the literal link, you will be prompted for a description (as with Org 7.8.)

    In the completion buffer, links to the current buffer are now highlighted.

  • New templates %h and %(sexp) for abbreviated links

    On top of %s template, which is replaced by the link tag in abbreviated links, you can now use %h (which does the same than %s but does not hexify the tag) and %(sexp) (which can run a function that takes the tag as its own argument.)

  • New link type help

    You can now create links from help buffers.

    For example, if you request help for the command org-agenda with C-h f org-agenda RET, creating a link from this buffer will let you go back to the same buffer.

  • New command org-insert-all-links

    This will insert all links as list items. With a universal prefix argument, links will not be deleted from org-stored-links.

    This new command is bound to C-c C-M-l.

  • New option org-url-hexify-p

    When set to nil, the URL part of a link will not be hexified.

  • Org can now open multiple shell links
  • New option org-doi-server-url to specify an alternate DOI server
  • RET now follows time stamps links

Org Editing

  • org-todo and org-archive-* can now loop in the active region

    When org-loop-over-headlines-in-active-region is non-nil, using org-todo or org-archive-* commands in the active region will loop over headlines. This is handy if you want to set the TODO keyword for several items, or archive them quickly.

  • You can now set tags for headlines in a region

    If org-loop-over-headlines-in-active-region is non-nil, then selecting the region and hitting C-c C-q will set the tags for all headlines in the region.

  • New command org-insert-drawer to insert a drawer interactively
  • Comments start with "^[ \t]*# " anywhere on a line

    Note that the space after the hashtag is mandatory. Comments with "^#+" are not supported anymore.

  • New speed key # to toggle the COMMENT cookie on a headline
  • indent-region-function is now set to org-indent-region

    C-M-\ should now produce useful results.

    You can unindent the buffer with org-unindent-buffer.

  • New option org-allow-promoting-top-level-subtree

    When non-nil, S-M-<left> will promote level-1 subtrees containing other subtrees. The level-1 headline will be commented out. You can revert to the previous state with M-x undo RET.

Org Clock

  • New keybinding C-c C-x C-z for org-clock-resolve
  • New keybinding C-c C-x C-q for org-clock-cancel
  • New command org-clock-in-last to clock in the last clocked item

    This command is bound to C-c C-x C-x and will clock in the last clocked entry, if any.

  • C-u M-x org-clock-out RET now prompts for a state to switch to
  • S-M-<up/down> on a clock timestamps adjusts the previous/next clock
  • New option org-clock-continuously

    When set to nil, clocking in a task will first try to find the last clocked out task and restart from when that task was clocked out.

    You can temporarily activate continuous clocking with C-u C-u C-u M-x org-clock-in RET (three universal prefix arguments) and C-u C-u M-x org-clock-in-last RET (two universal prefix arguments).

  • New option org-clock-frame-title-format

    This option sets the value of frame-title-format when clocking in.

  • New options for controlling the clockreport display

    org-clock-file-time-cell-format: Format string for the file time cells in clockreport.

    org-clock-total-time-cell-format: Format string for the total time cells in clockreport.

  • New options for controlling the clock/timer display

    org-clock-clocked-in-display: control whether the current clock is displayed in the mode line and/or frame title.

    org-timer-display: control whether the current timer is displayed in the mode line and/or frame title.

    This allows the clock and timer to be displayed in the frame title instead of, or as well as, the mode line. This is useful for people with limited space in the mode line but with ample space in the frame title.

Org Appearance

  • New option org-custom-properties

    The visibility of properties listed in this options can be turn on/off with org-toggle-custom-properties-visibility. This might be useful for properties used by third-part tools or that you don't want to see temporarily.

  • New command org-redisplay-inline-images

    This will redisplay all images. It is bound to C-c C-x C-M-v.

  • New entities in org-entities.el

    There are these new entities: 

    ("tilde" "\\~{}" nil "&tilde;" "~" "~" "~")
("slash" "/" nil "/" "/" "/" "/")
("plus" "+" nil "+" "+" "+" "+")
("under" "\\_" nil "_" "_" "_" "_")
("equal" "=" nil "=" "=" "=" "=")
("asciicirc" "\\textasciicircum{}" nil "^" "^" "^" "^")
  • New face org-list-dt for definition terms
  • New face org-date-selected for the selected calendar day
  • New face value for org-document-title

    The face is back to a normal height.

Org Columns

  • New speed command : to activate the column view
  • New special property CLOCKSUM_T to display today's clocked time

    You can use CLOCKSUM_T the same way you use CLOCKSUM. It will display the time spent on tasks for today only.

  • Use the :COLUMNS: property in columnview dynamic blocks

    If the :COLUMNS: is set in a subtree, the columnview dynamic block will use its value as the column format.

  • Consider inline tasks when computing a sum

Org Dates and Time Stamps

  • Enhanced org-sparse-tree

    C-c / can now check for time ranges.

    When checking for dates with C-c / it is useful to change the type of dates that you are interested in. You can now do this interactively with c after C-c / and/or by setting org-sparse-tree-default-date-type to the default value you want.

  • Support for hourly repeat cookies

    You can now use 

    SCHEDULED: <2012-08-20 lun. 08:00 +1h>

    if you want to add an hourly repeater to an entry.

  • C-u C-u C-c . inserts a time-stamp with no prompt
  • When (setq org-read-date-prefer-future 'time), accept days in the prompt

    "8am Wed" and "Wed 8am" are now acceptable values when entering a date from the prompt. If org-read-date-prefer-future is set to time, this will produce the expected prompt indication.

  • New option org-datetree-add-timestamp

    When set to non-nil, datetree entries will also have a timestamp. This is useful if you want to see these entries in a sparse tree with C-c /.

Org Capture

  • New command org-capture-string

    M-x org-capture-string RET will prompt for a string and a capture template. The string will be used as an annotation for the template. This is useful when capturing in batch mode as it lets you define the content of the template without being in Emacs.

  • New option org-capture-templates-contexts

    Setting this option allows you to define specific context where capture templates should be available from. For example, when set to this value 

    (setq org-capture-templates-contexts
      '(("c" (in-mode . "message-mode"))))

    then the c capture template will only be available from message-mode buffers. See the docstring and the manual for more details on how to use this.

  • New %l template to insert the literal link
  • New option org-capture-bookmark

    Org used to automatically add a bookmark with capture a note. You can now turn this on by setting org-capture-bookmark to nil.

  • Expand %<num> escape sequences into text entered for <num>'th %^{PROMPT} escape

    See the manual for more explanations.

  • More control over empty lines

    You can use :empty-lines-before and :empty-lines-after to control the insertion of empty lines. Check the manual for more explanations.

  • New hook org-capture-prepare-finalize-hook

    This new hook runs before the finalization process starts.

Org Export

  • New functions orgtbl-to-table.el and orgtbl-to-unicode

    orgtbl-to-table.el convert the table to a table.el table, and orgtbl-to-unicode will use ascii-art-to-unicode.el (when available) to print beautiful tables.

  • org-table-export now a bit clever about the target format

    When you specify a file name like table.csv, org-table-export will now suggest orgtbl-to-csv the default method for exporting the table.

  • New option org-export-date-timestamp-format

    The option allows to set a time string format for Org timestamps in the #+DATE option.

  • LaTeX: New options for exporting table rules :tstart, :hline and :tend

    See org-export-latex-tables-hline and org-export-latex-tables-tend.

  • LaTeX: You can now set :hfmt from #+ATTR_LaTeX
  • Beamer: Add support and keybinding for the exampleblock environment

    Add support for these languages in org-export-language-setup. More languages are always welcome.

  • Beamer: New option org-beamer-inherited-properties

    This option allows Beamer export to inherit some properties. Thanks to Carsten for implementing this.

  • ODT: Add support for ODT export in org-bbdb.el
  • ODT: Add support for indented tables (see this commit for details)
  • ODT: Improve the conversion from ODT to other formats
  • ASCII: Swap the level-1/level-2 characters to underline the headlines
  • Support for Chinese, simplified Chinese, Russian, Ukrainian and Japanese
  • HTML: New option org-export-html-date-format-string

    Format string to format the date and time in HTML export. Thanks to Sébastien Vauban for this patch.

Org Babel

  • New :results drawer parameter

    :results drawer replaces :results wrap, which is deprecated but still supported.

  • :results org now put results in a #+BEGIN_SRC org block

    :results org used to put results in a #+BEGIN_ORG block but it now puts results in a #+BEGIN_SRC org block, wich comma-escaped lines.

    #+BEGIN_ORG blocks are obsolete.

  • Exporting #+BEGIN_SRC org blocks exports the code

    It used to exports the results of the code.

Miscellaneous

  • New menu entry for org-refile
  • Allow capturing to encrypted entries

    If you capture to an encrypted entry, it will be decrpyted before inserting the template then re-encrypted after finalizing the capture.

  • Inactive timestamps are now handled in tables

    Calc can do computation on active time-stamps like <2012-09-29 Sat>. Inactive time-stamps in a table's cell are now internally deactivated so that Calc formulas can operate on them.

  • org-table-number-regexp accept comma as a decimal mark to represent numbers
  • Org allows a new property APPT_WARNTIME

    You can set it with the W speedy key or set it manually. When set, exporting to iCalendar and org-agenda-to-appt will use the value of this property as the number of minutes for the warning alarm.

  • New command org-inc-effort

    This will increment the effort value.

    It is bound to C-c C-x E and to E as a speedy command.

  • Attach: Add support for creating symbolic links

    `org-attach-method' now supports a new method lns, allowing to attach symbolic links.

  • Archive: you can now archive to a datetree
  • New option org-inlinetask-show-first-star

    Non-nil means display the first star of an inline task as additional marker. When nil, the first star is not shown.

  • New option org-latex-preview-ltxpng-directory

    This lets you define the path for the ltxpng/ directory.

  • You can now use imagemagick instead of dvipng to preview LaTeX fragments
  • You can now turn off orgstruct++-mode safely
  • C-u C-c C-c on list items to add check boxes

    C-u C-c C-c will add an empty check box on a list item.

    When hit from the top of the list, it will add check boxes for all top level list items.

  • org-list-ending-method and org-list-end-regexp are now obsolete

    Fall back on using org-list-end-re only, which see.

  • org-feed.el now expands %(sexp) templates
  • New option org-protocol-data-separator
  • New option org-ditaa-jar-option to specify the ditaa jar file
  • New possible value for org-loop-over-headlines-in-active-region

    When org-loop-over-headlines-in-active-region is set to start-level, the command will loop over the active region but will only act upon entries that are of the same level than the first headline in the region.

  • New option org-habit-show-all-today

    When set to t, show all (even unscheduled) habits on today's agenda.

Important bug fixes

M-TAB on options keywords perform completion correctly again

If you hit M-TAB on keywords like #+TITLE, Org will try to perform completion with meaningful values.

Add licenses to javascript embedded and external code snippets

Embedded javascript code produced when exporting an Org file to HTML is now licensed under GPLv3 (or later), and the copyright is owned by the Free Software Foundation, Inc.

The javascript code for embedding MathJax in the browser mentions the MathJax copyright and the Apache 2.0 license.

The javascript code for embedding org-injo.js in the browser mentions the copyright of Sebastian Rose and the GPLv3 (or later) license.

org-export-html-scripts is now a variable, so that you can adapt the code and the license to your needs.

See http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/javascript-trap.html for explanations on why these changes were necessary.

Version 7.8.11

Incompatible changes

Emacs 21 support has been dropped

Do not use Org mode 7.xx with Emacs 21, use version 6.36c instead.

XEmacs support requires the XEmacs development version

To use Org mode 7.xx with XEmacs, you need to run the developer version of XEmacs. We were about to drop XEmacs support entirely, but Michael Sperber stepped in and made changes to XEmacs that made it easier to keep the support. Thanks to Michael for this last-minute save.

New keys for TODO sparse trees

The key C-c C-v is now reserved for Org Babel action. TODO sparse trees can still be made with C-c / t (all not-done states) and C-c / T (specific states).

The Agenda org-agenda-ndays is now obsolete

The variable org-agenda-ndays is obsolete - please use org-agenda-span instead.

Thanks to Julien Danjou for this.

Changes to the intended use of org-export-latex-classes

So far this variable has been used to specify the complete header of the LaTeX document, including all the \usepackage calls necessary for the document. This setup makes it difficult to maintain the list of packages that Org itself would like to call, for example for the special symbol support it needs.

First of all, you can opt out of this change in the following way: You can say: I want to have full control over headers, and I will take responsibility to include the packages Org needs. If that is what you want, add this to your configuration and skip the rest of this section (except maybe for the description of the [EXTRA] place holder): 

(setq org-export-latex-default-packages-alist nil
      org-export-latex-packages-alist nil)

Continue to read here if you want to go along with the modified setup.

There are now two variables that should be used to list the LaTeX packages that need to be included in all classes. The header definition in org-export-latex-classes should then not contain the corresponding \usepackage calls (see below).

The two new variables are:

  1. org-export-latex-default-packages-alist :: This is the variable where Org-mode itself puts the packages it needs. Normally you should not change this variable. The only reason to change it anyway is when one of these packages causes a conflict with another package you want to use. Then you can remove that packages and hope that you are not using Org-mode functionality that needs it.
  2. org-export-latex-packages-alist :: This is the variable where you can put the packages that you'd like to use across all classes.

The sequence how these customizations will show up in the LaTeX document are:

  1. Header from org-export-latex-classes
  2. org-export-latex-default-packages-alist
  3. org-export-latex-packages-alist
  4. Buffer-specific things set with #+LaTeX_HEADER:

If you want more control about which segment is placed where, or if you want, for a specific class, have full control over the header and exclude some of the automatic building blocks, you can put the following macro-like place holders into the header: 

[DEFAULT-PACKAGES]      \usepackage statements for default packages
[NO-DEFAULT-PACKAGES]   do not include any of the default packages
[PACKAGES]              \usepackage statements for packages
[NO-PACKAGES]           do not include the packages
[EXTRA]                 the stuff from #+LaTeX_HEADER
[NO-EXTRA]              do not include #+LaTeX_HEADER stuff

If you have currently customized org-export-latex-classes, you should revise that customization and remove any package calls that are covered by org-export-latex-default-packages-alist. This applies to the following packages:

  • inputenc
  • fontenc
  • fixltx2e
  • graphicx
  • longtable
  • float
  • wrapfig
  • soul
  • t1enc
  • textcomp
  • marvosym
  • wasysym
  • latexsym
  • amssymb
  • hyperref

If one of these packages creates a conflict with another package you are using, you can remove it from org-export-latex-default-packages-alist. But then you risk that some of the advertised export features of Org will not work properly.

You can also consider moving packages that you use in all classes to org-export-latex-packages-alist. If necessary, put the place holders so that the packages get loaded in the right sequence. As said above, for backward compatibility, if you omit the place holders, all the variables will dump their content at the end of the header.

The constant org-html-entities is obsolete

Its content is now part of the new constant org-entities, which is defined in the file org-entities.el. org-html-entities was an internal variable, but it is possible that some users did write code using it.

org-bbdb-anniversary-format-alist has changed

Please check the docstring and update your settings accordingly.

Deleted org-mode-p

This function has been deleted: please update your code.

Important new features

New Org to ODT exporter

Jambunathan's Org to ODT exporter is now part of Org.

To use it, it `C-c C-e o' in an Org file. See the documentation for more information on how to customize it.

org-capture.el is now the default capture system

This replaces the earlier system org-remember. The manual only describes org-capture, but for people who prefer to continue to use org-remember, we keep a static copy of the former manual section chapter about remember.

The new system has a technically cleaner implementation and more possibilities for capturing different types of data. See Carsten's announcement for more details.

To switch over to the new system:

  1. Run 

    M-x org-capture-import-remember-templates RET

    to get a translated version of your remember templates into the new variable org-capture-templates. This will "mostly" work, but maybe not for all cases. At least it will give you a good place to modify your templates. After running this command, enter the customize buffer for this variable with 

    M-x customize-variable RET org-capture-templates RET

    and convince yourself that everything is OK. Then save the customization.

  2. Bind the command org-capture to a key, similar to what you did with org-remember: 

    (define-key global-map "\C-cc" 'org-capture)

    If your fingers prefer C-c r, you can also use this key once you have decided to move over completely to the new implementation. During a test time, there is nothing wrong with using both system in parallel.

New libraries

New Org libraries

  • org-eshell.el (Konrad Hinsen)

    Implement links to eshell buffers.

  • org-special-blocks (Carsten Dominik)

    This package generalizes the #+begin_foo and #+end_foo tokens.

    To use, put the following in your init file: 

    (require 'org-special-blocks)

    The tokens #+begin_center, #+begin_verse, etc. existed previously. This package generalizes them (at least for the LaTeX and html exporters). When a #+begin_foo token is encountered by the LaTeX exporter, it is expanded into \begin{foo}. The text inside the environment is not protected, as text inside environments generally is. When #+begin_foo is encountered by the html exporter, a div with class foo is inserted into the HTML file. It is up to the user to add this class to his or her stylesheet if this div is to mean anything.

  • org-taskjuggler.el (Christian Egli)

    Christian Egli's org-taskjuggler.el module is now part of Org. He also wrote a tutorial for it.

  • org-ctags.el (Paul Sexton)

    Targets like <<my target>> can now be found by Emacs' etag functionality, and Org-mode links can be used to to link to etags, also in non-Org-mode files. For details, see the file org-ctags.el.

    This feature uses a new hook org-open-link-functions which will call function to do something special with text links.

    Thanks to Paul Sexton for this contribution.

  • org-docview.el (Jan Böcker)

    This new module allows links to various file types using docview, where Emacs displays images of document pages. Docview link types can point to a specific page in a document, for example to page 131 of the Org-mode manual: 

    [[docview:~/.elisp/org/doc/org.pdf::131][Org-Mode Manual]]

    Thanks to Jan Böcker for this contribution.

New Babel libraries

  • ob-picolisp.el (Thorsten Jolitz)
  • ob-fortran.el (Sergey Litvinov)
  • ob-shen.el (Eric Schulte)
  • ob-maxima.el (Eric S Fraga)
  • ob-java.el (Eric Schulte)
  • ob-lilypond.el (Martyn Jago)
  • ob-awk.el (Eric Schulte)

Other new features and various enhancements

Hyperlinks

  • Org-Bibtex – major improvements

    Provides support for managing bibtex bibliographical references data in headline properties. Each headline corresponds to a single reference and the relevant bibliographic meta-data is stored in headline properties, leaving the body of the headline free to hold notes and comments. Org-bibtex is aware of all standard bibtex reference types and fields.

    The key new functions are

    org-bibtex-check
    queries the user to flesh out all required (and with prefix argument optional) bibtex fields available for the specific reference type of the current headline.
    org-bibtex-create
    Create a new entry at the given level, using org-bibtex-check to flesh out the relevant fields.
    org-bibtex-yank
    Yank a bibtex entry on the kill ring as a formatted Org-mode headline into the current buffer
    org-bibtex-export-to-kill-ring
    Export the current headline to the kill ring as a formatted bibtex entry.
  • org-gnus.el now allows link creation from messages

    You can now create links from messages. This is particularly useful when the user wants to stored messages that he sends, for later check. Thanks to Ulf Stegemann for the patch.

  • Modified link escaping

    David Maus worked on `org-link-escape'. See his message: 

    Percent escaping is used in Org mode to escape certain characters
in links that would either break the parser (e.g. square brackets
in link target oder description) or are not allowed to appear in
a particular link type (e.g. non-ascii characters in a http:
link).

With this change in place Org will apply percent escaping and
unescaping more consistently especially for non-ascii characters.
Additionally some of the outstanding bugs or glitches concerning
percent escaped links are solved.

    Thanks a lot to David for this work.

  • Make org-store-link point to directory in a dired buffer

    When, in a dired buffer, the cursor is not in a line listing a file, `org-store-link' will store a link to the directory.

    Patch by Stephen Eglen.

  • Allow regexps in org-file-apps to capture link parameters

    The way extension regexps in org-file-apps are handled has changed. Instead of matching against the file name, the regexps are now matched against the whole link, and you can use grouping to extract link parameters which you can then use in a command string to be executed.

    For example, to allow linking to PDF files using the syntax file:/doc.pdf::<page number>, you can add the following entry to org-file-apps: 

    Extension: \.pdf::\([0-9]+\)\'
Command:   evince "%s" -p %1

    Thanks to Jan Böcker for a patch to this effect.

Dates and time

  • Allow relative time when scheduling/adding a deadline

    You can now use relative duration strings like "-2d" or "++3w" when calling org-schedule or org-deadline: it will schedule (or set the deadline for) the item respectively two days before today and three weeks after the current timestamp, if any.

    You can use this programmatically: (org-schedule nil "+2d") will work on the current entry.

    You can also use this while (bulk-)rescheduling and (bulk-)resetting the deadline of (several) items from the agenda.

    Thanks to Memnon Anon for a heads up about this!

  • American-style dates are now understood by org-read-date

    So when you are prompted for a date, you can now answer like this 

    2/5/3         --> 2003-02-05
2/5           --> <CURRENT-YEAR>-02-05

Agenda

  • org-agenda-custom-commands has a default value

    This option used to be `nil' by default. This now has a default value, displaying an agenda and all TODOs. See the docstring for details. Thanks to Carsten for this.

  • Improved filtering through org-agenda-to-appt

    The new function allows the user to refine the scope of entries to pass to org-agenda-get-day-entries and allows to filter out entries using a function.

    Thanks to Peter Münster for raising a related issue and to Tassilo Horn for this idea. Also thanks to Peter Münster for fixing a small bug in the final implementation.

  • Allow ap/pm times in agenda time grid

    Times in the agenda can now be displayed in am/pm format. See the new variable org-agenda-timegrid-use-ampm. Thanks to C. A. Webber for a patch to this effect.

  • Agenda: Added a bulk "scattering" command

    B S in the agenda buffer will cause tasks to be rescheduled a random number of days into the future, with 7 as the default. This is useful if you've got a ton of tasks scheduled for today, you realize you'll never deal with them all, and you just want them to be distributed across the next N days. When called with a prefix arg, rescheduling will avoid weekend days.

    Thanks to John Wiegley for this.

Exporting

  • Simplification of org-export-html-preamble/postamble

    When set to `t', export the preamble/postamble as usual, honoring the org-export-email/author/creator-info variables.

    When set to a formatting string, insert this string. See the docstring of these variable for details about available %-sequences.

    You can set :html-preamble in publishing project in the same way: `t' means to honor :email/creator/author-info, and a formatting string will insert a string.

  • New exporters to Latin-1 and UTF-8

    While Ulf Stegemann was going through the entities list to improve the LaTeX export, he had the great idea to provide representations for many of the entities in Latin-1, and for all of them in UTF-8. This means that we can now export files rich in special symbols to Latin-1 and to UTF-8 files. These new exporters can be reached with the commands C-c C-e n and C-c C-e u, respectively.

    When there is no representation for a given symbol in the targeted coding system, you can choose to keep the TeX-macro-like representation, or to get an "explanatory" representation. For example, \simeq could be represented as "[approx. equal to]". Please use the variable org-entities-ascii-explanatory to state your preference.

  • HTML export: Add class to outline containers using property

    The HTML_CONTAINER_CLASS property can now be used to add a class name to the outline container of a node in HTML export.

  • Throw an error when creating an image from a LaTeX snippet fails

    This behavior can be configured with the new option variable org-format-latex-signal-error.

  • Support for creating BEAMER presentations from Org-mode documents

    Org-mode documents or subtrees can now be converted directly in to BEAMER presentation. Turning a tree into a simple presentations is straight forward, and there is also quite some support to make richer presentations as well. See the BEAMER section in the manual for more details.

    Thanks to everyone who has contributed to the discussion about BEAMER support and how it should work. This was a great example for how this community can achieve a much better result than any individual could.

Refiling

  • Refile targets can now be cached

    You can turn on caching of refile targets by setting the variable org-refile-use-cache. This should speed up refiling if you have many eligible targets in many files. If you need to update the cache because Org misses a newly created entry or still offers a deleted one, press C-0 C-c C-w.

  • New logging support for refiling

    Whenever you refile an item, a time stamp and even a note can be added to this entry. For details, see the new option org-log-refile.

    Thanks to Charles Cave for this idea.

Completion

  • In-buffer completion is now done using John Wiegley's pcomplete.el

    Thanks to John Wiegley for much of this code.

Tables

  • New command org-table-transpose-table-at-point

    See the docstring. This hack from Juan Pechiar is now part of Org's core. Thanks to Juan!

  • Display field's coordinates when editing it with C-c `

    When editing a field with C-c `, the field's coordinate will the displayed in the buffer.

    Thanks to Michael Brand for a patch to this effect.

  • Spreadsheet computation of durations and time values

    If you want to compute time values use the T flag, either in Calc formulas or Elisp formulas:

    Task 1 Task 2 Total
    35:00 35:00 1:10:00

    Values must be of the form [HH:]MM:SS, where hours are optional.

    Thanks to Martin Halder, Eric Schulte and Carsten for code and feedback on this.

  • Implement formulas applying to field ranges

    Carsten implemented this field-ranges formulas. 

    A frequently requested feature for tables has been to be able to define
row formulas in a way similar to column formulas.  The patch below allows
things like

@3=
@2$2..@5$7=
@I$2..@II$4=

as the left hand side for table formulas in order to write a formula that
is valid for an entire column or for a rectangular section in a
table.

    Thanks a lot to Carsten for this.

  • Sending radio tables from org buffers is now allowed

    Org radio tables can no also be sent inside Org buffers. Also, there is a new hook which get called after a table has been sent.

    Thanks to Seweryn Kokot.

Lists

  • Improved handling of lists

    Nicolas Goaziou extended and improved the way Org handles lists.

    1. Indentation of text determines again end of items in lists. So, some text less indented than the previous item doesn't close the whole list anymore, only all items more indented than it.
    2. Alphabetical bullets are implemented, through the use of the variable `org-alphabetical-lists'. This also adds alphabetical counters like [@c] or [@W].
    3. Lists can now safely contain drawers, inline tasks, or various blocks, themselves containing lists. Two variables are controlling this: `org-list-forbidden-blocks', and `org-list-export-context'.
    4. Improve `newline-and-indent' (C-j): used in an item, it will keep text from moving at column 0. This allows to split text and make paragraphs and still not break the list.
    5. Improve `org-toggle-item' (C-c -): used on a region with standard text, it will change the region into one item. With a prefix argument, it will fallback to the previous behavior and make every line in region an item. It permits to easily integrate paragraphs inside a list.
    6. `fill-paragraph' (M-q) now understands lists. It can freely be used inside items, or on text just after a list, even with no blank line around, without breaking list structure.

    Thanks a lot to Nicolas for all this!

Inline display of linked images

Images can now be displayed inline. The key C-c C-x C-v does toggle the display of such images. Note that only image links that have no description part will be inlined.

Implement offsets for ordered lists

If you want to start an ordered plain list with a number different from 1, you can now do it like this: 

1. [@start:12] will star a lit a number 12

Babel: code block body expansion for table and preview

In org-babel, code is "expanded" prior to evaluation. I.e. the code that is actually evaluated comprises the code block contents, augmented with the extra code which assigns the referenced data to variables. It is now possible to preview expanded contents, and also to expand code during during tangling. This expansion takes into account all header arguments, and variables.

A new keybinding `C-c M-b p' bound to `org-babel-expand-src-block' can be used from inside of a source code block to preview its expanded contents (which can be very useful for debugging). tangling

The expanded body can now be tangled, this includes variable values which may be the results of other source-code blocks, or stored in headline properties or tables. One possible use for this is to allow those using org-babel for their emacs initialization to store values (e.g. usernames, passwords, etc…) in headline properties or in tables.

Org-babel now supports three new header arguments, and new default behavior for handling horizontal lines in tables (hlines), column names, and rownames across all languages.

Editing Convenience and Appearance

  • New command org-copy-visible (C-c C-x v)

    This command will copy the visible text in the region into the kill ring. Thanks to Florian Beck for this function and to Carsten for adding it to org.el and documenting it!

  • Make it possible to protect hidden subtrees from being killed by C-k

    See the new variable org-ctrl-k-protect-subtree. This was a request by Scott Otterson.

  • Implement pretty display of entities, sub-, and superscripts.

    The command C-c C-x \ toggles the display of Org's special entities like \alpha as pretty unicode characters. Also, sub and superscripts are displayed in a pretty way (raised/lower display, in a smaller font). If you want to exclude sub- and superscripts, see the variable org-pretty-entities-include-sub-superscripts.

    Thanks to Eric Schulte and Ulf Stegeman for making this possible.

  • New faces for title, date, author and email address lines

    The keywords in these lines are now dimmed out, and the title is displayed in a larger font, and a special font is also used for author, date, and email information. This is implemented by the following new faces:

    org-document-title org-document-info org-document-info-keyword

    In addition, the variable org-hidden-keywords can be used to make the corresponding keywords disappear.

    Thanks to Dan Davison for this feature.

  • Simpler way to specify faces for tags and todo keywords

    The variables org-todo-keyword-faces, org-tag-faces, and org-priority-faces now accept simple color names as specifications. The colors will be used as either foreground or background color for the corresponding keyword. See also the variable org-faces-easy-properties, which governs which face property is affected by this setting.

    This is really a great simplification for setting keyword faces. The change is based on an idea and patch by Ryan Thompson.

  • <N> in tables now means fixed width, not maximum width

    Requested by Michael Brand.

  • Better level cycling function

    TAB in an empty headline cycles the level of that headline through likely states. Ryan Thompson implemented an improved version of this function, which does not depend upon when exactly this command is used. Thanks to Ryan for this improvement.

  • Adaptive filling

    For paragraph text, org-adaptive-fill-function did not handle the base case of regular text which needed to be filled. This is now fixed. Among other things, it allows email-style ">" comments to be filled correctly.

    Thanks to Dan Hackney for this patch.

  • `org-reveal' (C-c C-r) also decrypts encrypted entries (org-crypt.el)

    Thanks to Richard Riley for triggering this change.

  • Better automatic letter selection for TODO keywords

    When all first letters of keywords have been used, Org now assigns more meaningful characters based on the keywords.

    Thanks to Mikael Fornius for this patch.

Clocking

  • Clock: Allow synchronous update of timestamps in CLOCK log

    Using S-M-<up/down> on CLOCK log timestamps will increase/decrease the two timestamps on this line so that duration will keep the same. Note that duration can still be slightly modified in case a timestamp needs some rounding.

    Thanks to Rainer Stengele for this idea.

  • Localized clock tables

    Clock tables now support a new new :lang parameter, allowing the user to customize the localization of the table headers. See the variable org-clock-clocktable-language-setup which controls available translated strings.

  • Show clock overruns in mode line

    When clocking an item with a planned effort, overrunning the planned time is now made visible in the mode line, for example using the new face org-mode-line-clock-overrun, or by adding an extra string given by org-task-overrun-text.

    Thanks to Richard Riley for a patch to this effect.

  • Clock reports can now include the running, incomplete clock

    If you have a clock running, and the entry being clocked falls into the scope when creating a clock table, the time so far spent can be added to the total. This behavior depends on the setting of org-clock-report-include-clocking-task. The default is nil.

    Thanks to Bernt Hansen for this useful addition.

Misc

  • Improvements with inline tasks and indentation

    There is now a configurable way on how to export inline tasks. See the new variable org-inlinetask-export-templates.

    Thanks to Nicolas Goaziou for coding these changes.

  • A property value of "nil" now means to unset a property

    This can be useful in particular with property inheritance, if some upper level has the property, and some grandchild of it would like to have the default settings (i.e. not overruled by a property) back.

    Thanks to Robert Goldman and Bernt Hansen for suggesting this change.

  • New helper functions in org-table.el

    There are new functions to access and write to a specific table field. This is for hackers, and maybe for the org-babel people. 

    org-table-get
org-table-put
org-table-current-line
org-table-goto-line
  • Archiving: Allow to reverse order in target node

    The new option org-archive-reversed-order allows to have archived entries inserted in a last-on-top fashion in the target node.

    This was requested by Tom.

  • Org-reveal: Double prefix arg shows the entire subtree of the parent

    This can help to get out of an inconsistent state produced for example by viewing from the agenda.

    This was a request by Matt Lundin.

Version 7.8

Summary

  • Jambunathan's ODT exporter is now part of Org's core.
  • Nicolas' new export engine is now part of contrib/
  • Standard code block keywords
  • 10 new committers
  • Many bugfixes

See below for details.

New committers who signed the FSF copyright assigment

Here is the list of new contributors who signed the FSF papers since Org 7.7 - welcome, and thanks for your contributions!

  • Andreas Leha
  • Christian Moe
  • Julian Gehring
  • Max Mikhanosha
  • Michael Brand
  • Niels Giessen
  • Pieter Praet
  • Sergey Litvinov
  • Thomas Holst
  • Thorsten Jolitz

The ODT exporter is now part of Org's core

  • Full refresh of the OpenDocument Text section in the manual. All new features listed below are fully-documented.
  • Associate custom styles on per-file basis using #+ODT_STYLES_FILE: directive.
  • Fontify code listings using an enhanced version of htmlfontify.el and generate line numbers natively.
  • Embed MathML and OpenDocument formula files.
  • Use LaTeX to MathML converter – say MathToWeb (http://www.mathtoweb.com/) – for handling LaTeX Math fragments.
  • In tables, use column width cookies to control relative width of columns.
  • Also for tables, you can specify custom styles using #+ATTR_ODT: lines.
  • Lots of bug fixes.

Experimental

The following features are experimental. These features are specific to the ODT export engine and their implementation and usage could change considerably in future versions.

Special thanks to Jambunathan for his work and his patience through the process of integrating this vital contribution into Org's core.

New export engine by Nicolas

See the comment sections in org-element.el and in org-export.el (in contrib/lisp/). Also check the experimental LaTeX exporter using in EXPERIMENTAL/org-e-latex.el.

Check Nicolas' announcement on the list and hack around!

Thanks a lot to Nicolas for this great and promising achievement.

Incompatible changes

Standardized code block keywords

Following a round of on-list discussion, many code block synonyms have been removed. You can safely move forward the following syntax:

  • call lines are specified with #+call:
  • code blocks are named with #+name:
  • results are named with #+name:, however results generated by a code block may still be labeled with #+results:, and tables named with #+tblname: will be considered to be named results

The following function may be used to update an existing Org mode buffer to the new syntax: 

(defun update-org-buffer ()
  "Update an Org mode buffer to the new data, code block and call line syntax."
  (interactive)
  (save-excursion
    (flet ((to-re (lst) (concat "^[ \t]*#\\+" (regexp-opt lst t)
                                "\\(\\[\\([[:alnum:]]+\\)\\]\\)?\\:[ \t]*"))
           (update (re new)
                   (goto-char (point-min))
                   (while (re-search-forward re nil t)
                     (replace-match new nil nil nil 1))))
      (let ((old-re (to-re '("RESULTS" "DATA" "SRCNAME" "SOURCE")))
            (lob-re (to-re '("LOB")))
            (case-fold-search t))
        (update old-re "name")
        (update lob-re "call")))))

Note: If an old version of Org mode (e.g., the one shipped with Emacs) is installed on your system, many of the important variables will be pre-defined with a defvar and will not have their values automatically updated – these include the following:

  • org-babel-data-names
  • org-babel-result-regexp
  • org-babel-src-block-regexp
  • org-babel-src-name-regexp
  • org-babel-src-name-w-name-regexp

It may be necessary to either remove the source code of older versions of Org mode or to explicitly evaluate the ob.el file.

Removed the #+BABEL: keyword

Code block header arguments may now be specified using the standard #+Property: keyword. See Property names ending in + accumulate for more information on the extended property syntax.

Deleted org-mode-p (git)

This function has been deleted: please update your hacks if you relied on it.

New features and user-visible improvements

Day names are optional when you type timestamps manually (git)

You can type "<2011-12-12 Mon>" or [2011-12-12 Mon] and modify this timestamps with S-<right> like other timestamps. Thanks to Carsten for implementing this.

Improved filtering through org-agenda-to-appt (git)

The new function allows the user to refine the scope of entries to pass to org-agenda-get-day-entries and allows to filter out entries using a function.

Thanks to Peter Münster for raising a related issue and to Tassilo Horn for this idea. Also thanks to Peter Münster for fixing a small bug in the final implementation.

org-agenda-date-later jumps to today when modifying past date (git)

The command org-agenda-date-later (<S-right> in the Agenda Mode) directly jumps to today. Thanks to Carsten for implementing this.

Use prefix arg 0 to inhibit note taking for TODO change (git)

See Carsten's comment: "Sometimes I want to quickly make a few TODOs done in the agenda and I want to bypass the note taking I have normally set up. With this change, I can press `0 t d' in the agenda to do this."

Thanks to Carsten for implementing this.

Various improvements to org-indent.el

Nicolas Goaziou worked on refactoring and improving org-indent.el, which should now be faster. It also better combines with visual-line-mode.

Property names ending in + accumulate

This results in the following behavior. 

#+property: var  foo=1
#+property: var+ bar=2

#+begin_src emacs-lisp
,  (+ foo bar)
#+end_src

#+results:
,: 3

#+begin_src emacs-lisp
,  (org-entry-get (point) "var" t)
#+end_src

#+results:
,: foo=1 bar=2

* overwriting a file-wide property
,  :PROPERTIES:
,  :var:      foo=7
,  :END:

#+begin_src emacs-lisp
,  foo
#+end_src

#+results:
,: 7

#+begin_src emacs-lisp
,  (org-entry-get (point) "var" t)
#+end_src

#+results:
,: foo=7

* appending to a file-wide property
,  :PROPERTIES:
,  :var+:      baz=3
,  :END:

#+begin_src emacs-lisp
,  (+ foo bar baz)
#+end_src

#+results:
,: 6

#+begin_src emacs-lisp
,  (org-entry-get (point) "var" t)
#+end_src

#+results:
,: foo=1 bar=2 baz=3

org-agenda-custom-commands has a default value (git)

This option used to be `nil' by default. This now has a default value, displaying an agenda and all TODOs. See the docstring for details. Thanks to Carsten for this.

outline-demote/promote points to org-demote/promote-subtree

Users who use this outline commands in outline-mode will want them to behave the Org way in Org. Thanks to Michael Brand for the suggestion.

New escape characters for org-log-note-headings (git)

The option org-log-note-headings now supports %d and %D for inactive and active timestamps. This affect the behavior of the command org-store-log-note. Thanks to John J Foerch for a patch for this.

New command org-table-transpose-table-at-point (git)

See the docstring. This hack from Juan Pechiar is now part of Org's core. Thanks to Juan!

Allow recursive edit of minibuffer (git)

You can now use the command C-c ! (org-time-stamp-inactive) when prompted e.g. for a link name. This is because the central function org-completing-read now support recursive edit. Only C-c ! is available at the moment, but if you can think of a useful command to use, please let me know.

Thanks to Skip Collins for the idea and to Nick Dokos for the implementation.

Allow dynamic construction of the publishing destination (git)

Thanks to Kai Tetzlaff for adding this.

Set the capture default time to the prompt time (git)

In the file+datetree+promt target type, the user is being asked for a date, where to file an entry. In the template, he can use the escape placeholders for active and inactive time stamps. So far, these were filled with todays date. This behavior changed so that, also at %t and %u, the date to use is the one entered at the prompt.

Reported by Erik Hetzner and fixed by Carsten.

org-agenda-skip-additional-timestamps-same-entry defaults to `nil' (git)

org-sudoku.el – small sudoku solver

Carsten wrote org-sudoku.el, a little sudoku solver, which lives in the contrib/ directory.

From his message: "my daughter got stuck with a couple of SUDOKU puzzles during the vacation (where wh had no internet connection), so I hacked a small SUDOKU solver that reads a 9x9 Org table and solves it as a sudoku puzzle. A little silly, but maybe fun for someone - I have pushed it into the contrib/lisp directory."

Code Block related features and improvements

Added tikzDevice support to ob-R.el

Support for Pico Lisp code blocks

Thanks to Thorsten Jolitz Pico Lisp code blocks are now supported. See ob-picolisp.el for more information.

Extension to the eval code block header argument

The eval code block header argument now accepts four (six) possible values the meaning of which is shown in the table below.

never or no The code block will not be evaluated under any
  circumstances.
query Evaluation of the code block will require a query.
never-export or no-export The code block will not be evaluated during export
  but may still be called
query-export Evaluation of the code block during export will
  require a query.

Update of intermediate results during code block evaluation

When set to t, the new org-babel-update-intermediate variable will update in-buffer results for code blocks which are evaluated in the resolution of a variable reference. This can be used to ensure that the latest returned results are always shown in buffer.

Support for Fortran code block is now in the core

Thanks to Sergey Litvinov for contributing this support.

The sbe function allows header argument specification

If first variable is a string and not a cons cell, then interpret it as a string of header arguments to be passed to the code block.

Support for Shen code blocks

See http://www.shenlanguage.org/ for information on Shen.

A major mode for shen code blocks is available through the GNU ELPA.

New options and faces

New option org-export-html-headline-anchor-format (git)

Format for anchors in HTML headlines.

It requires to %s: both will be replaced by the anchor referring to the headline (e.g. "sec-2"). When set to `nil', don't insert HTML anchors in headlines.

This was requested by Alan L Tyree.

New option org-table-formula-field-format (git)

Format for fields which contain the result of a formula. For example, using \"%s\" will display the result within tilde characters. Beware that modifying the display can prevent the field from being used in another formula.

Thanks to Dov Grobgeld for this idea.

New option org-loop-over-headlines-in-active-region (git)

When set to `t', some commands will loop over the active region. Currently, org-schedule and org-deadline uses this option: pressing C-c C-s or C-c C-d when the region is active will let you schedule/deadline all the visible headlines in the region.

Thanks a lot to David Maus for implementing this.

New option org-catch-invisible-edits (git)

This option makes it possible to check what is the right thing to do before editing invisible regions. Here are the possible values of this option: 

+nil              Do not check, so just do invisible edits.
+error            Throw an error and do nothing.
+show             Make point visible, and do the requested edit.
+show-and-error   Make point visible, then throw an error and abort the edit.
+smart            Make point visible, and do insertion/deletion if it is
                  adjacent to visible text and the change feels predictable.

See the docstring for more details.

Thanks to Carsten for implementing this.

New option org-export-latex-table-caption-above

Let the user place a caption above its table in LaTeX. Thanks to Thomas Dye for a patch to this effect.

New option org-agenda-follow-indirect (git)

By setting `org-agenda-follow-indirect' to a non-nil value, `org-agenda-follow-mode' will use an indirect buffer to display only the current item, rather than the whole agenda file in which it lives.

Thanks to Dave Abrahams for implementing this.

New option org-refile-active-region-within-subtree (git)

Non-nil means also refile active region within a subtree.

By default org-refile doesn't allow refiling regions if they don't contain a set of subtrees, but it might be convenient to do so sometimes: in that case, the first line of the region is converted to a headline before refiling.

Thanks to Jeff Horn for raising the issue of refiling a list item, and to Nicolas Goaziou, Nick Dokos and Suvayu Ali for discussing them patiently.

New option org-latex-to-mathml-convert-command

This option lets you specify a way to convert LaTeX fragments to MathML. See also org-latex-to-mathml-jar-file and the docstring of org-create-math-formula.

Thanks to Jambunathan K for implementing this.

New option org-properties-postprocess-alist (git)

See its docstring: 

Alist of properties and functions to adjust inserted values.
Elements of this alist must be of the form

  ([string] [function])

where [string] must be a property name and [function] must be a
lambda expression: this lambda expression must take one argument,
the value to adjust, and return the new value as a string.

For example, this element will allow the property "Remaining"
to be updated wrt the relation between the "Effort" property
and the clock summary:

 (("Remaining" 
     (lambda(value)
       (let ((clocksum (org-clock-sum-current-item))
             (effort (org-duration-string-to-minutes
                     (org-entry-get (point) "Effort"))))
         (org-minutes-to-hh:mm-string (- effort clocksum))))))

This is inspired by a request from Pascal Mattia.

New options org-habit-today-glyph and org-habit-completed-glyph (git)

This gives you control over the character used for displaying today (default is `!') and days on which a task has been completed (default is `*'). Thanks to John Wiegley for this.

New option org-bibtex-type-property-name (git)

Configurable property name for bibtex entry types. Thanks to Eric Schulte for this.

New face org-agenda-filter-tags (git)

This face is used for highlighting the tag(s) filter in the modeline. Thanks to Sébastien Vauban for this idea and its implementation.

New faces org-agenda-calendar-event and org-agenda-calendar-sexp (git)

org-agenda-calendar-event is the face used to show events and appointments in the agenda, and org-agenda-calendar-sexp the one used to show events computed from a S-expression.

Thanks to Sébastien Vauban for this addition.

Important bugfixes

Respect org-export-with-tags when exporting a subtree (git)

Thanks to Suvayu Ali for spotting this problem and fixing it.

Fix XEmacs compatibility issue when creating an indirect buffer (git)

Thanks to Michael Sperber for this fix.

Testing

New test function org-test-with-temp-text-in-file (https://code.orgmode.org/bzg/org-mode/commit/1f206ed4)

Version 7.7

New features and user-visible improvements

New command org-copy-visible (C-c C-x v)

This command will copy the visible text in the region into the kill ring.

Thanks to Florian Beck for this function and to Carsten for adding it to org.el and documenting it!

New hook org-ctrl-c-ctrl-c-final-hook

This hook will be called when nothing special can be performed by the busy C-c C-c key. Thanks to Paul Sexton for this idea!

(git commit)

Allow relative time when scheduling/adding a deadline

You can now use relative duration strings like "-2d" or "++3w" when calling org-schedule or org-deadline: it will schedule (or set the deadline for) the item respectively two days before today and three weeks after the current timestamp, if any.

You can use this programmatically: (org-schedule nil "+2d") will work on the current entry.

You can also use this while (bulk-)rescheduling and (bulk-)resetting the deadline of (several) items from the agenda.

Thanks to Memnon Anon for a heads up about this!

(git commit)

New functions: org-todo-yesterday and org-agenda-todo-yesterday

This is useful when you need to mark things done yesterday.

Thanks to Max Mikhanosha for this patch.

(git commit)

org-set-property defaults to the last interactively modified property

When setting a property with C-c C-x p, it will offered the last interactively modified property as a default choice. If this command is called on a property line, the property in this line will take precedence over the last set property.

(git commit)

Clock: Allow synchronous update of timestamps in CLOCK log

Using S-M-<up/down> on CLOCK log timestamps will increase/decrease the two timestamps on this line so that duration will keep the same. Note that duration can still be slightly modified in case a timestamp needs some rounding.

Thanks to Rainer Stengele for this idea.

(git commit)

Clock: New function org-clock-remove-empty-clock-drawer

This function removes empty CLOCK drawers and has been added to org-clock-out-hook: when clocking out, if no CLOCK log has been inserted and the drawer is empty, the drawer will be removed.

(git commit)

Capture: new escape sequence %F for templates

Using %F in capture templates will insert the full path of the file or the directory the capture mechanism was called from (whereas %f only insert the filename.)

Thanks to Nicolas Goaziou for this change.

(git commit)

Agenda: new variable org-agenda-bulk-custom-functions for custom bulk functions

When using org-agenda-bulk-action in agenda view, the user could already call custom functions by pressing f and entering the function's name.

This variable lets the user add custom choices and reach them more quickly. Set the variable to an alist of keys (chars) and functions, and these keys will be accessible through the org-agenda-bulk-action interface.

If there is a conflict between custom keys and hardcoded choices, the latter ones take precedence.

Thanks to Julien Cubizolles for triggering this idea.

(git commit)

Refile: exclude irrelevant headings

When refiling from an org-mode buffer, the current heading and its subheadings will be excluded from the list of possible targets.

This only works when org-refile-use-cache is nil and in org-mode buffers, not in agenda buffers.

Thanks to Jason Dunsmore for this idea!

Lists: new variable org-list-use-circular-motion

This variable allows some commands to consider lists as cyclic structures. For example, when non-nil, moving past the last item of a list with S-down will bring you back to the first one.

Lists: New variable org-list-indent-offset

This variable helps improving readability of sub-items by increasing their indentation. E.g., if org-list-indent-offset is set to 2, you may see the following list: 

- First item
	  - Sub-item 1
	  - Sub-item 2
- Second item

Table: New flag ";t" to tailor the display of computed durations

See the new variable org-table-duration-custom-format and the updated example from the manual:

Task 1 Task 2 Total
3:02:20 -2:07:00 0.92

In this example, 0.92 is a fraction of hour, the default for org-table-duration-custom-format.

Thanks to Daniel E. Doherty for discussions about this.

(git commit)

Table: display field's coordinates when editing it with C-c `

When editing a field with C-c `, the field's coordinate will the displayed in the buffer.

Thanks to Michael Brand for a patch to this effect.

(git commit)

Babel: support for java code blocks

Evaluation of blocks of Java code is now possible. Currently only external evaluation of Java code is supported (i.e., no session evaluation) and only the :results output results are collected. Code blocks are compiled to a Java class file which are then evaluated and the values printed to STDOUT are returned.

Java code blocks required a :classname header argument which is used by the compiler to name .java and .class files.

Example Java code block: 

#+begin_src java :classname myfirstjavaprog
,  class myfirstjavaprog
,  {
,      public static void main(String args[])
,      {
,          System.out.println("Hello World!");
,      }
,  }
#+end_src

#+results:
,: Hello World!

Babel: support for fortran code blocks by Sergey Litvinov

The contrib/babel/langs/ contains the new library ob-fortran.el by Sergey Litvinov.

Thanks to him for this addition.

(git commit)

Babel: support for the fomus language by Torsten Anders

ob-fomus.el has been added to contrib/babel/langs/.

Thanks to Torsten Anders for contributing this functionality.

(git commit)

Publish: hide .orgx files and use theindex.org directly

When :makeindex is `non-nil' in the publishing options, Org will export an index. It populates the directory with .orgx files: those files are now hidden (.file.orgx). Also the index is directly stored in the file theindex.org, not in the file theindex.inc (which you can delete).

Thanks to Nathan Neff and Carsten for pointing at the problems and solutions.

(git commit)

Export: new variable org-export-html-divs to allow custom divs

The default value of org-export-html-divs is ("preamble" "content" "postamble") and is used to define the <div "%s"> for the main structure of the exported HTML file.

Note that modifying the default value will break compatibility with the org-info.js script.

Also note that the variable org-export-html-content-div will still be checked for compatibility reasons but is not a custom variable anymore.

Thanks to Sébastian Vauban for a preliminary version of this patch.

(git commit)

Export: new variable org-export-latex-quotes to customize quotes in LaTeX export

This allows users to define what quotes they want to use as a replacement of english double-quotes while exporting to LaTeX.

In particular, if you use the csquote package, you can configure Org to output something like \endquote{some quoted text} instead of "some quoted text".

Thanks to Frederik for bringing this issue up, and to Thomas S. Dye, Nick Dokos and Stefan Nobis for elaborating this solution.

(git commit)

Important bugfixes

Duration computations now work for complex ranges in tables

Thanks to Christian Moe for signaling this problem.

Handle recursive setup files correctly

Thanks to Stefan Vollmar for mentioning this problem.

(git commit)

Details

org-map-entries can now have 'region as its scope

Thanks to David Maus for suggesting related improvements to org-map-entries. This one prepares the possibility of letting some commands to loop over the active region.

(git commit)

org-depend.el: new chain-find-next trigger option

See the updated docstring of this file.

Thanks a lot to Max Mikhanosha for this!

(git commit)

Export: new experimental exporter to MoinMoin by Puneeth Chaganti.

The EXPERIMENTAL/ directory contains a new file org-mm.el that allows you to export an Org file to a MoinMoin file.

Thanks to Puneeth Chaganti for this addition.

(git commit)

Export: new default for org-export-html-preamble

The default value included the title. It now defaults to the empty string, as the title is hardcoded and included in the "content" div. Including the title here is necessary to let org-info.js find it and display the page properly.

Export: new variable org-lparse-use-flashy-warning defaulting to nil

Flashy and verbose warnings while exporting to ODT have been disabled. Set this to t if you want it back.

Export: new default value for org-export-latex-image-default-option

This used to be width=10em and this is now width=.9\linewidth, which makes more sense.

Thanks to Sebastien Vauban for this suggestion.

(git commit)

Export: allow org-export-latex-href-format to have only one "%s"

This is useful when you want to use \url{link} instead of the default \href{link}{path}.

Thanks to Henri-Paul Indiogine for bringing this up.

Known issues

The ODT exporter will choke when using some Org-defined strings

For example, using the hungarian version of the table of contents, as defined in org-export-language-setup, the ODT exporter will complain about a problem with the translated string.

The workaround is to customize org-export-language-setup and to use accents directly.

Version 7.6

Incompatible changes

New features and user-visible improvements

Integration of Jambunathan's OpenDocumentText Exporter

  • Activation

    Org mode 7.6 supports exporting to OpenDocument Text (odt) format using org-odt.el. Depending on how you installed Org, this module can be enabled in one of the following ways:

    1. If you have downloaded the Org from the Web, either as a distribution .zip or .tar.gz file, or as a Git archive, enable the odt option in the variable org-modules.
    2. If you are using Org mode 7.6 that comes bundled with Emacs-24.0.50 (or future Emacs-24.1), then you can install the OpenDocumentText exporter using the package manager. Check the list of available packages with M-x list-packages and install the org-odt package.

    Thanks a lot to Jambunathan K for this great contribution.

  • Keybindings

    The following interactive commands are provided:

    1. C-c C-e o (org-export-as-odt): Export as an odt file.
    2. C-c C-e O (org-export-as-odt-and-open): Export as an odt file and open the resulting file.

    See the contrib/odt/README.org file for further details; you may check in particular the commands M-x org-lparse and M-x org-export-convert.

Ob-Lilypond – new Babel language to allow score generation

ob-lilypond - an org-babel language, provided to allow LilyPond music score generation, complete with optional auditioning via midi, whilst leveraging the full power of org mode, and literate programming. See https://github.com/mjago/ob-lilypond for more documentation.

Thanks to Martyn Jago for this addition.

Org-Bibtex – major improvements

Provides support for managing bibtex bibliographical references data in headline properties. Each headline corresponds to a single reference and the relevant bibliographic meta-data is stored in headline properties, leaving the body of the headline free to hold notes and comments. Org-bibtex is aware of all standard bibtex reference types and fields.

The key new functions are

org-bibtex-check
queries the user to flesh out all required (and with prefix argument optional) bibtex fields available for the specific reference type of the current headline.
org-bibtex-create
Create a new entry at the given level, using org-bibtex-check to flesh out the relevant fields.
org-bibtex-yank
Yank a bibtex entry on the kill ring as a formatted Org mode headline into the current buffer
org-bibtex-export-to-kill-ring
Export the current headline to the kill ring as a formatted bibtex entry.

Spreadsheet computation of durations and time values

If you want to compute time values use the T flag, either in Calc formulas or Elisp formulas:

Task 1 Task 2 Total
35:00 35:00 1:10:00

Values must be of the form [HH:]MM:SS, where hours are optional.

Thanks to Martin Halder, Eric Schulte and Carsten for code and feedback on this.

Links within inlined footnotes.

It as also possible to have footnotes side-by-side correctly exported. New variables org-export-latex-footnote-separator, org-export-html-footnote-separator and org-export-docbook-footnote-separator are used to separate them in that case.

Fontification of footnotes is also more accurate.

New variable org-export-with-tasks

Non-nil means include TODO items for export.

This may have the following values:

  • t include tasks independent of state.
  • todo include only tasks that are not yet done.
  • done include only tasks that are already done.
  • nil remove all tasks before export
  • list of TODO kwds keep only tasks with these keywords

Thanks to Carsten for implementing this!

New variable org-export-latex-timestamp-inactive-markup

This variable allows the user to define the LaTeX markup for inactive timestamps. It defaults to the same markup than active timestamps. Thanks to Eric S Fraga for this patch.

New org-default face

M-x customize-face RET org-default RET will let you define the default face for org-mode buffers.

Babel improvements

  • In line code block call syntax

    It is now possible to call code blocks from within blocks of prose.

    The new syntax is exactly analogous to the existing #+call: line syntax, only it may be present embedded in a block of prose for example call_double(num=8) would call the double code block assigning the num variable to the value 8.

  • Optional variable names in code block calls

    Variable names are now optional when passing variables to a code block reference. Un-named variables will be assigned in order as shown below. 

    #+source: minus
#+begin_src emacs-lisp :var a=0 :var b=0
  (- a b)
#+end_src

#+call: minus(a=8, b=4)

#+call: minus(8,4)
  • Sub-tree ID as valid code block variable reference

    It is now possible to assign the textual contents of an Org mode subtree to a code block variable using the ID of the subtree. Both custom IDs and Org mode IDs may be used. For example; 

    #+begin_src sh :var text=foo
,  echo "$text"|wc
#+end_src

#+results:
,: 8      58     415

* example foo
,  :PROPERTIES:
,  :CUSTOM_ID: foo
,  :END:

,Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Donec
,hendrerit tempor tellus. Donec pretium posuere tellus. Proin quam
,nisl, tincidunt et, mattis eget, convallis nec, purus. Cum sociis
,natoque penatibus et magnis dis parturient montes, nascetur ridiculus
,mus. Nulla posuere. Donec vitae dolor. Nullam tristique diam non
,turpis. Cras placerat accumsan nulla. Nullam rutrum. Nam vestibulum
,accumsan nisl.
  • org-babel-tangle-body-hook for reprocessing code block bodies during tangling
  • padline header argument controls newline padding during tangling
  • Maxima code blocks are now supported

    Thanks to Eric Fraga for contributing this support.

  • awk code blocks are now supported
  • Added xmpfilter to Ruby code blocks for annotated code output
  • New noweb-ref header argument

    This header argument may be used to concatenate the bodies of many code blocks into a single noweb reference. This brings Org mode's tangling functionality in line with traditional noweb tangling.

    A no web reference like the following 

    #+begin_src sh
,  <<the-ref>>
#+end_src

    will now expand to include the bodies of all code blocks which are named the-ref, as well as all code blocks which have a :noweb-ref header argument set to the value the-ref.

New tests

The tests/ directory has been extensively updated.

Important bugfixes

Org-exp-blocks — proper handling of recursively nested blocks

During export pre-processing org-exp-blocks will now ensure that all matched blocks contain a proper balanced number of recursively nested blocks.

Before this fix nested blocks such as the following would break during export. 

#+begin_src org
,  ,#+begin_example
,  ,  nested example
,  ,#+end_example
#+end_src

List handling

Fix an infinite loop when a list has an end of block string without the corresponding beginning.

Auto-filling cannot happen at a location where it would otherwise insert a new item.

Details

Footnotes have gone through some bug-fixing:

  • properly ignore footnotes in comments,
  • export calls to previously defined footnotes in LaTeX using \footnotemark,
  • export footnotes before first heading (LaTeX),
  • export footnotes when selecting a subtree not holding their definition (LaTeX).

Many small bug fixes have been applied to list handling

  • fix `org-timer-item',
  • fix insertion of a new item with a non-nil `indent-tabs-mode',
  • fix use of `fill-region' in an item,
  • correct export lists within footnotes and footnotes within lists,
  • correctly export lists containing macros,
  • don't ignore with-case specification when sorting a list,
  • better indentation handling when changing an item to an headline or the other way,
  • fix check-boxes' cookies updating.

Version 7.5

Incompatible changes

Code block variable initialized with Emacs Lisp code in tables and lists

It is no longer possible to assign code block variables using executable Emacs Lisp statements contained in tables or lists. As per the following example.

(a b c) 
$data

(a b c)

Thanks to Vladimir Alexiev for raising this issue.

`org-bbdb-anniversary-format-alist' has changed

Please check the docstring and update your settings accordingly.

New features and user-visible improvements

Implement formulas applying to field ranges

Carsten implemented this field-ranges formulas. 

A frequently requested feature for tables has been to be able to define
row formulas in a way similar to column formulas.  The patch below allows
things like

@3=
@2$2..@5$7=
@I$2..@II$4=

as the left hand side for table formulas in order to write a formula that
is valid for an entire column or for a rectangular section in a
table.

Thanks a lot to Carsten for this.

Improved handling of lists

Nicolas Goaziou extended and improved the way Org handles lists.

  1. Indentation of text determines again end of items in lists. So, some text less indented than the previous item doesn't close the whole list anymore, only all items more indented than it.
  2. Alphabetical bullets are implemented, through the use of the variable `org-alphabetical-lists'. This also adds alphabetical counters like [@c] or [@W].
  3. Lists can now safely contain drawers, inline tasks, or various blocks, themselves containing lists. Two variables are controlling this: `org-list-forbidden-blocks', and `org-list-export-context'.
  4. Improve `newline-and-indent' (C-j): used in an item, it will keep text from moving at column 0. This allows to split text and make paragraphs and still not break the list.
  5. Improve `org-toggle-item' (C-c -): used on a region with standard text, it will change the region into one item. With a prefix argument, it will fallback to the previous behavior and make every line in region an item. It permits to easily integrate paragraphs inside a list.
  6. `fill-paragraph' (M-q) now understands lists. It can freely be used inside items, or on text just after a list, even with no blank line around, without breaking list structure.

Thanks a lot to Nicolas for all this!

Modified link escaping

David Maus worked on `org-link-escape'. See his message: 

Percent escaping is used in Org mode to escape certain characters
in links that would either break the parser (e.g. square brackets
in link target oder description) or are not allowed to appear in
a particular link type (e.g. non-ascii characters in a http:
link).

With this change in place Org will apply percent escaping and
unescaping more consistently especially for non-ascii characters.
Additionally some of the outstanding bugs or glitches concerning
percent escaped links are solved.

Thanks a lot to David for this work.

Simplification of org-export-html-preamble/postamble

When set to `t', export the preamble/postamble as usual, honoring the org-export-email/author/creator-info variables.

When set to a formatting string, insert this string. See the docstring of these variable for details about available %-sequences.

You can set :html-preamble in publishing project in the same way: `t' means to honor :email/creator/author-info, and a formatting string will insert a string.

New command `org-agenda-append-agenda'

You can now use `org-agenda-append-agenda' to dynamically add new agendas views to the current one. It is particularily useful to compare multiple small agendas.

Localized clock tables

Clock tables now support a new new :lang parameter, allowing the user to customize the localization of the table headers. See the variable org-clock-clocktable-language-setup which controls available translated strings.

New sorting options when publishing projects

The :sitemap-sort-file option now allows sorting the sitemap file (anti-)alphabetically and (anti-)chronogically. Thanks a lot to Manuel Giraud for a patch to this effet.

Testing with ERT

Martyn Jago added new tests to testing/ - thanks to him!

New file in contrib/: org-notmuch.el

Org is now distributed with org-notmuch.el, by Matthieu Lemerre. See explanations in the header of org-notmuch.el: 

=org-notmuch.el= implements links to notmuch messages and
"searchs". A search is a query to be performed by notmuch; it is
the equivalent to folders in other mail clients. Similarly, mails
are refered to by a query, so both a link can refer to several
mails.

org-gnus.el now allows link creation from messages

You can now create links from messages. This is particularily useful when the user wants to stored messages that he sends, for later check. Thanks to Ulf Stegemann for the patch.

Important bug fixes

Capturing to narrowed buffers

You can now safely capture entries to narrowed buffers. Thanks a lot to Memnon Anon for bringing this up.

Better handling of the new `org-agenda-span' variable

Agendas were a bit confused by the introduction of this variable, in particular block agendas. This is now fixed.

Thanks to Julien and Carsten for helping find the right fix for this issue, and to Michael Brand and Matt Lundin for their patient testing and reporting.

Security warning: using org-crypt with auto-save

To prevent Emacs from auto-saving encrypted entries in clear text, the user should not use auto-save with org-crypt.el. We now send a warning when users are both using auto-saving and org-crypt.el. Thanks to Peter Jones for bringing this up.

Details

Babel

  • :file argument causes results to be written to file for all languages

    :file <filename> should be understood as saying "write the result to <filename> and return a link to <filename>".

    This works for all languages. For graphics languages (e.g. ditaa, dot, gnuplot) there is no change in behavior: "result" in the above is the graphics, and a link to the image is placed in the org buffer. For general-purpose languages (e.g. emacs-lisp, python, R, ruby, shell), the "result" written to file is the normal org-babel result (string, number, table).

    In order to return a file link from a src block without telling babel to save any results to that file, use :results <filename> and do not use :file. The code block can of course write arbitrary content to <filename>.

    Some examples:

    Save the output of ls -l as a .csv file (recall that :results value is the default): 

    ls -l

    Send the text output of ls -l directly to file: 

    ls -l
  • R requires :results graphics :file filename when generating graphics

    ":results graphics" is now required in addition to ":file filename" in order for graphical output to be sent automatically to file. If :file is supplied, but not ":results graphics", then non-graphical, "value" or "output" results are written to file, depending on which of those options is in effect.

  • Calc code blocks can now accept vectors

    For example; 

    3 y

    [3, 6, 9]

    Thanks to Eric S. Fraga for raising this issue

  • Code blocks with empty bodies are now acceptable

    Previously these caused errors on export. Thanks to Martyn Jago for this patch.

  • Emacs Lisp variable assignments which don't eval cleanly passed literally

    This makes it possible to easily pass through non-elisp variable assignments which may initially look like valid elisp.

  • Unified naming of c++ functions to C++

    Thanks to Martyn Jago for this patch.

  • `org-babel-execute-buffer' and `org-babel-execute-subtree' now eval inline code blocks as well
  • New :mkdirp header argument creates parent dirs of tangle targets
  • New ":comments noweb" option for wrapping noweb references in comment links

    This can be useful to allow backward linking from tangle code files to the original code block holding noweb-expanded content.

  • Allow detangling of text containing '\'s – Thanks to Seth Burleigh
  • :sep specifies table separator when opening or writing tabular results
  • `org-edit-src-content-indentation' can now be a buffer-local variable

All export configuration variables can now be buffer-local variables

org-complete.el has been renamed to org-pcomplete.el

In case you were manually loading org-complete.el (which is not necessary anyway), please be aware that the name of this library was changed to org-pcomplete.el.

New user options for LaTeX source code export via minted and listings packages

New variables `org-export-latex-listings-options' and `org-export-latex-minted-options' allow package options to be controlled; `org-export-latex-custom-lang-environments' allows arbitrary configuration on a per-language basis.

Effort durations now support 2d, 2m, etc.

Effort duration can now be set as 2h (for 2 hours), etc. This will be converted to minutes automatically when clocking in an entry with an effort property. See the org-effort-durations variable.

Thanks a lot to Lawrence Mitchell for this patch.

New option :clock-keep for capture templates

A capture template with :clock-keep t will prevent the refiling process from clocking out the entry. If :clock-resume is also `t', :clock-keep will take precedence and :clock-resume will be ignored.

So now :immediate-finish t :clock-in t :clock-keep t makes sense: it will capture a new task and clock it.

Misc

  • New command `org-agenda-bulk-mark-regexp'

    M-x org-agenda-bulk-mark-regexp RET will mark agenda entries which headings match against a regular expression. You can call this command with the `%' key from an agenda buffer.

  • New command `org-agenda-reset-view'

    Julien Danjou implemented this: 

    This new command lets you switch to day/week/month/year view.

When switching to day or week view, this setting becomes the default for
subsequent agenda refreshes.  Since month and year views are slow to
create, they do not become the default.  A numeric prefix argument may be
used to jump directly to a specific day of the year, ISO week, month, or
year, respectively.  For example, `32 d' jumps to February 1st, `9 w' to
ISO week number 9.  When setting day, week, or month view, a year may be
encoded in the prefix argument as well.  For example, `200712 w' will jump
to week 12 in 2007.  If such a year specification has only one or two
digits, it will be mapped to the interval 1938-2037. `v SPC'' will reset to
what is set in `org-agenda-span'.

    Thanks a lot to Julien for this.

  • New options for ignoring past or future items in the global todo list

    This patch gives users greater control over which past or future items they would like to ignore in the global todo list. By setting org-agenda-todo-ignore-scheduled to 7, for instance, a user can ignore all items scheduled 7 or more days in the future. Similarly, by setting org-agenda-todo-ignore-scheduled to -1, a user can ignore all items that are truly in the past (unlike the 'past setting, which ignores items scheduled today).

    See the docstrings of these variables:

    • org-agenda-todo-ignore-deadlines
    • org-agenda-todo-ignore-scheduled
    • org-agenda-todo-ignore-timestamp

    Thanks a lot to Matt Lundin for implementing this and to Paul Sexton for the idea.

  • New variable `org-export-table-remove-empty-lines'

    When set to `nil', don't remove empty tables when exporting tables. This was requested by Eric S Fraga.

  • New variable `org-table-fix-formulas-confirm'

    Sometime, editing the structure of a table should not edit the corresponding formulas. This new variable lets the user decide whether he wants to confirm formula fixes or not.

  • New variable `org-export-initial-scope'

    This variable controls the initial scope when exporting with `org-export'. It can be set to 'buffer or 'subtree. If there is an active region, tell it when prompting the user for an export command.

  • Show and use the default refile location

    M-x org-refile RET now shows the default refile location. Thanks to Tassilo Horn for a patch to this effect.

  • New variable `org-archive-subtree-add-inherited-tags'

    Non-nil means append inherited tags when archiving a subtree.

  • New variable `org-export-current-backend'

    This variable is dynamically set by exporters. You can check against its value anytime in your code to see if you are exporting to HTML, LaTeX, etc. Possible values are 'html, 'latex, 'ascii, 'docbook. Thanks to Eric Schulte and Dan Davison for ideas and patches in this area.

  • New hook `org-clock-before-select-task-hook'

    Hook called in task selection just before prompting the user.

    Thanks to Benjamin Drieu for the patch.

  • = = emphasis now uses \protectedtexttt
  • Author's email now included in the LaTeX title

    When `org-export-email-info' is non-nil, the LaTeX title will also include the author's email. Thanks to Lawrence Mitchell for the patch.

  • Update contrib/scripts/ditaa.jar to ditaa v0.9 of 2009-11-24
  • New variable `org-mobile-files-exclude-regexp'

    This variable lets you exclude files that you don't want in org-mobile-files.

  • New variable `org-confirm-elisp-link-not-regexp'

    Set this to a regexp if you want to skip the confirmation step for Elisp/Shell code matching this regexp.

  • New variable `org-attach-store-link-p'

    When set to `t', store link to the attached file, at its original location.

  • `org-table-use-standard-references' now defaults to 'from
  • Better `org-agenda-repeating-timestamp-show-all'

    When this is set to a list of TODO keywords, the agenda will only show occurrences of repeating stamps for these TODO keywords.

  • New command `org-narrow-to-block'

    This command (`C-x n b') will narrow the buffer to the current block.

Version 7.4

Incompatible changes

Agenda: rework ndays and span handling

The variable org-agenda-ndays is obsolete - please use org-agenda-span instead.

Thanks to Julien Danjou for this.

Details

Improvements with inline tasks and indentation

There is now a configurable way on how to export inline tasks. See the new variable org-inlinetask-export-templates.

Thanks to Nicolas Goaziou for coding these changes.

Agenda: Added a bulk "scattering" command

B S in the agenda buffer will cause tasks to be rescheduled a random number of days into the future, with 7 as the default. This is useful if you've got a ton of tasks scheduled for today, you realize you'll never deal with them all, and you just want them to be distributed across the next N days. When called with a prefix arg, rescheduling will avoid weekend days.

Thanks to John Wiegley for this.

In-buffer completion is now done using John Wiegleys pcomplete.el

Thanks to John Wiegley for much of this code.

Sending radio tables from org buffers is now allowed

Org radio tables can no also be sent inside Org buffers. Also, there is a new hook which get called after a table has been sent.

Thanks to Seweryn Kokot.

Command names shown in manual

The reference manual now lists command names for most commands. Thanks to Andreas Röhler who started this project.

Allow ap/pm times in agenda time grid

Times in the agenda can now be displayed in am/pm format. See the new variable org-agenda-timegrid-use-ampm. Thanks to C. A. Webber for a patch to this effect.

Rewriten clock table code

The entire clocktable code has been rewritten to add more options and to make hacking time reports easier.

Thanks to Erwin Vrolijk for a patch introducing clock tables for quarters.

Babel

  • Add msosql engine to sql code blocks

    SQL code blocks can now be executed using the myosql engine using the osql command (from MS SQL Server) on Windows systems.

    Thanks to Sébastien Vauban for this contribution.

  • Python code blocks now accept a preamble header argument

    This allows specification of coding declarations and library imports which must take place in the beginning of a file of executed python code (note this header argument is used during code block evaluation unlike the shebang header argument which is used during tangling). For example 

    #+begin_src python :preamble # -*- coding: utf-8 -*- :return s
,s = "é"
#+end_src

    Thanks to Vincent Beffara for this idea.

  • Code block name is shown during evaluation query

    When the user is queried about the evaluation of a named code block the name of the code block is now displayed.

    Thanks to Tom Dye for this suggestion.

  • Clojure code blocks results insertion

    The results of Clojure code blocks have been improved in two ways.

    1. lazy sequences are now expanded for insertion into the Org mode buffer
    2. pretty printing of results is now possible with both "code" and "data" pretty print formats

    Thanks to Rick Moynihan for suggesting these changes.

  • Python code blocks now accept a :return header argument

    This alleviates the need to explicitly insert return statements into the bode of Python code blocks. This change both

    • allows the same python code blocks to be run both in sessions and externally
    • removes the floating return statements which violated python syntax

    Thanks to Darlan Cavalcante for proposing this feature.

  • :results wrap header argument wraps code block results

    The new :results wrap wraps code blocks results in a custom environment making it possible to offset their contents during export. For example 

    #+begin_src emacs-lisp :results wrap
,  "code block results"
#+end_src

#+results:
#+BEGIN_RESULT
,: code block results
#+END_RESULT

    Thanks to Sébastien Vauban for persistently suggesting this enhancement.

  • Code block error buffer wiped clean between executions

    Previously the code block error buffer accumulated errors making it difficult to distinguish between previous and current errors. This buffer is now cleaned before every interactive code block evaluation.

  • Lists now recognized by code blocks

    It is now possible for code blocks to both read and write list contents from and to Org mode buffers. For example 

    #+results: a-list
,- babel
,- and
,- org-mode

#+source: a-list
#+begin_src emacs-lisp :var lst=a-list :results list
,  (reverse lst)
#+end_src
  • Calc added as a supported code block language

    The Emacs Calc package can be used through calc code blocks allowing both regular arithmetic operations as well as stack based calculation. For example 

    #+source: calc-stack
#+begin_src calc
,  8
,  1
,  '+
,  9
,  '*
#+end_src

#+results: calc-stack
,: 81

#+source: calc-arithmetic
#+begin_src calc :var in=calc-stack
,  in / 9
#+end_src

#+results: calc-arithmetic
,: 9
  • "org-babel-detangle" propagates change to source code files into code blocks

    `org-babel-detangle' can be used to propagate changes to pure source code files tangled from embedded code blocks in Org mode files back to the original code blocks in the Org mode file. This can be used on collaborative projects to keep embedded code blocks up to date with edits made in pure source code files.

Version 7.02

:CUSTOM_ID: v7.02

Incompatible Changes

Code block hashes

Due to changes in the code resolving code block header arguments hashing of code block results should now re-run a code block when an argument to the code block has changed. As a result of this change all code blocks with cached results will be re-run after upgrading to the latest version.

Testing update

Anyone using the org-mode test suite will need to update the jump repository for test navigation by executing the following from the root of the org-mode repository. 

git submodule update

Failure to update this repository will cause loading of org-test.el to throw errors.

Details

Org-babel speed commands

All Org-babel commands (behind the C-c C-v key prefix) are now available as speed commands when the point is on the first line of a code block. This uses the existing Org mode speed key mechanisms.

Thanks to Jambunathan K for implementation this new feature.

Fontify code in code blocks.

Source code in code blocks can now be fontified. Please customize the varable org-src-fontify-natively. For very large blocks (several hundreds of lines) there can be delays in editing such fontified blocks, in which case C-c ' should be used to bring up a dedicated edit buffer.

Thanks to Dan Davison for this.

Language-mode commands are available in the Org-buffer

The most general machinery for doing this is the macro `org-babel-do-in-edit-buffer'. There is also the convenience function `org-babel-do-key-sequence-in-edit-buffer' which makes use of this macro, and is bound to C-c C-v C-x and C-c C-v x. If there is an active region contained within the code block, then this is inherited by the edit buffer. Some examples of the sorts of usage this permits are

C-c C-v C-x M-; comment region according to language C-c C-v C-x C-M-\ indent region according to language

Users can make these more convenient, e.g.

(defun my/org-comment-dwim (&optional arg) (interactive "P") (or (org-babel-do-key-sequence-in-edit-buffer "\M-;") (comment-dwim arg)))

(define-key org-mode-map "\M-;" 'my/org-comment-dwim)

A common instance of this general pattern is built in to Org mode, controlled by the variable `org-src-tab-acts-natively': if this variable is set, then TAB in a code block has the effect that it would have in the language major mode buffer.

Org-babel commands are available in language-mode edit buffer

Mirroring the language-native commands in Org buffers above, a new macro `org-src-do-at-code-block' and convenience function `org-src-do-key-sequence-at-code-block' provide the converse. When used in a language major-mode edit buffer (i.e. a buffer generated by C-c '), `org-src-do-key-sequence-at-code-block' executes a key sequence at the code block in the source Org buffer. The command bound to the key sequence in the Org-babel key map is executed remotely with point temporarily at the start of the code block in the Org buffer.

The command is not bound to a key by default, to avoid conflicts with language major mode bindings. To bind it to C-c @ in all language major modes, you could use

(add-hook 'org-src-mode-hook (lambda () (define-key org-src-mode-map "\C-c@" 'org-src-do-key-sequence-at-code-block)))

In that case, for example, C-c @ t issued in code edit buffers would tangle the current Org code block, C-c @ e would execute the block and C-c @ h would display the other available Org-babel commands.

Multi-line header arguments to code blocks

Code block header arguments can now span multiple lines using the new #+header: or #+headers: lines preceding a code block or nested in between the name and body of a named code block. Examples are given below.

  • multi-line header arguments on an un-named code block 

    #+headers: :var data1=1
#+begin_src emacs-lisp :var data2=2
  (message "data1:%S, data2:%S" data1 data2)
#+end_src

#+results:
: data1:1, data2:2

  • multi-line header arguments on a named code block 

    #+source: named-block
#+header: :var data=2
#+begin_src emacs-lisp
  (message "data:%S" data)
#+end_src

#+results: named-block
: data:2

Unified handling of variable expansion for code blocks

The code used to resolve variable references in code block header arguments has now been consolidated. This both simplifies the code base (especially the language-specific files), and ensures that the arguments to a code block will not be evaluated multiple times. This change should not be externally visible to the Org mode user.

Improved Caching

Code block caches now notice if the value of a variable argument to the code block has changed, if this is the case the cache is invalidated and the code block is re-run. The following example can provide intuition for the new behavior. 

#+srcname: random
#+begin_src R :cache yes
,runif(1)
#+end_src

#+results[a2a72cd647ad44515fab62e144796432793d68e1]: random
,: 0.4659510825295

#+srcname: caller
#+begin_src emacs-lisp :var x=random :cache yes
,x
#+end_src

#+results[bec9c8724e397d5df3b696502df3ed7892fc4f5f]: caller
,: 0.254227238707244

Added :headers header argument for LaTeX code blocks

This makes it possible to set LaTeX options which must take place in the document pre-amble for LaTeX code blocks. This header argument accepts either a single string or a list, e.g. 

#+begin_src latex :headers \usepackage{lmodern} :file name1.pdf
,  latex body
#+end_src

#+begin_src latex :headers '("\\usepackage{mathpazo}" "\\usepackage{fullpage}") :file name2.pdf
,  latex body
#+end_src

New function `org-export-string'

Allows exporting directly from a string to the specified export format.

Code block header argument ":noweb tangle"

Only expands syntax references when tangling, not during export (weaving).

New function `org-babel-switch-to-session-with-code'

C-c C-v z (`org-babel-switch-to-session-with-code') is a variant of C-c C-v C-z (`org-babel-switch-to-session'): instead of switching to the session buffer, it splits the window between (a) the session buffer and (b) a language major-mode edit buffer for the code block in question. This can be convenient for using language major mode for interacting with the session buffer.

Improvements to R sessions

R now uses standard ESS code evaluation machinery in the :results value case, which avoids unnecessary output to the comint buffer. In addition, the R command responsible for writing the result to file is hidden from the user. Finally, the R code edit buffer generated by C-c ' is automatically linked to the ESS session if the current code block is using :session.

Temporary file directory

All babel temporary files are now kept in a single sub-directory in the /tmp directory and are cleaned up when Emacs exits.

Function for demarcating blocks `org-babel-demarcate-block'

Can be called to wrap the region in a block, or to split the block around point, bound to (C-c C-v d).

Function for marking code block contents `org-babel-mark-block'

Bound to C-M-h in the babel key map (i.e. C-c C-v C-M-h by default). This can be useful in conjunction with `org-babel-do-in-edit-buffer', for example for language-native commenting or indenting of the whole block.

Lists of anniversaries are now handeled better

When several anniversaries are defined in the bbdb anniversaries field (separated by semicolon), this is now handled nicely by the agenda.

Thanks to Łukasz Stelmach for a patch to this effect.

Table fields are now aligned better, new <c> cookie.

In HTML export, table fields are now properly aligned in accord with automatic alignment in org, or as set by the <r>, <l>, and <c> cookies. The <c> cookie is new and has no effect in Org, but it does do the right thing in HTML export. A LaTeX export implementation will follow, but is currently still missing.

Update freemind converter to include body text

The freemind exporter now incorporates body text into the mind map.

Thanks to Lennard Borgman for this patch.

Make footnotes work correctly in message-mode

The footnotes code now searches for message-signature-separator (which is "– " by default) in order to place footnotes before the signature. Thanks to Tassilo Horn for this patch.

Improve XEmacs compatibility

Org mode 7.02 now runs again in 21.4.22 if the new XEmacs base package is installed.

Thanks to Uwe Bauer, Volker Ziegler, Michael Sperber and others for a discussion that lead to this nice result.

Make it configurable wether agenda jumping prefers the future

When jumping to a date from the agenda using the j key, you may or may not like the property of Org's date reader to prefer the future when you enter incomplete dates. This can now be configured using the variable =org-agenda-jump-prefer-future'.

Add publishing functions for ASCII, Latin-1 and UTF-8

There are now publishing functions org-publish-org-to-ascii, org-publish-org-to-latin1, and org-publish-org-to-utf8.

Thanks to Matthias Danzl for showing how to do this.

Indentation and headline insertion after inline tasks

Indentation in inline tasks, and headline insertion after inline tasks now behave as expected.

Encryption in MobileOrg finally works

As soon as MobilOrg 1.5 hits the Apple's AppStore, you can encrypt your org files on public servers. Please see the documentation of MobileOrg and Appendix B of the manual for more details.

MobileOrg: Do not force to insert IDs

If you dislike the property of MobileOrg to insert ID properties for in all entries being part of an agenda view, you can now turn this off using the variable org-mobile-force-id-on-agenda-items. When this variable is set to nil, MobileOrg will use outline paths to identify entries. Note that this may fail if several entries have identical outline paths.

LaTeX minted package for fontified source code export

Patch by Dan Davison.

A non-nil value of `org-export-latex-minted' means to export source code using the minted package, which will fontify source code with color. If you want to use this, you need to make LaTeX use the minted package. Add minted to `org-export-latex-packages-alist', for example using customize, or with something like

(require 'org-latex) (add-to-list 'org-export-latex-packages-alist '("" "minted"))

In addition, it is neccessary to install pygments (http://pygments.org), and to configure `org-latex-to-pdf-process' so that the -shell-escape option is passed to pdflatex.

Allow to use texi2dvi or rubber for processing LaTeX to pdf

Please see the variable org-export-latex-to-pdf-process for more information.

Thanks to Olivier Schwander for the rubber part.

New STARTUP keywords to turn on inline images

If you want to inline images whenever you visit an Org file, use 

#+STARTUP: inlineimages

Support for user-extensible speed commands.

There is a new hook org-speed-command-hook. Thanks to Jambunathan for a patch to this effect.

Add macro to insert property values into exported text

you can use {{{property{NAME}}}} to insert the value of a property upon export.

Thanks to David Maus for a patch to this effect.

LaTeX package fixes

We updated the list of default packages loaded by LaTeX exported files.

Allow "#" and "%" in tags

Tags can now also contain the characters # and %, in addition to @ and letters.

Show command names in manual

Andreas Röhler is adding command names to keys in the manual. This will take a while to complete, but a start has been made.

Make backslash escape "-" in property matches

When entering a tags/property query, "-" is a logical operator. However, "-" is also allowed in property names. So you can now write "SOME­NAME" to work around this issue.

This was a request by Ilya Shlyakhter.

Document quick insertion of empty structural elements

Org mode has a built-in template mechanism for inserting block templates. This was undocumented until now.

Thanks to Jambunathan K for the patch.

Implement MathJax support

Org mode now uses MathJax to display math on web pages. We serve MathJax from the orgmode.org server, at least for the time being (thanks Bastien!). If you are going to use this for pages which are viewed often, please install MathJax on your own webserver.

To return to the old way of creating images and inserting them into web pages, you would have to set 

(setq org-export-with-LaTeX-fragments 'dvipng)

or on a per-file basis 

#+OPTIONS: LaTeX:dvipng

Agenda: Allow compact two-column display in agenda dispatcher

If you have many custom agenda commands, you can have the display in the dispatcher use two columns with the following settings 

(setq org-agenda-menu-show-match nil
      org-agenda-menu-two-column t)

This was a request by John Wiegley.

Add org-wikinodes.el as a contributed package

One frequent request has been to be able to use CamelCase words for automatic cross links in a Wiki created by Org. THis is now possible with org-wikinodes.el, which is available in the contrib directory. We also have some documentation for this feature up on Worg.

Timer/clock enhancements

org-timer-set-timer displays a countdown timer in the modeline. From the agenda, `J' invokes org-agenda-clock-goto.

Version 7.01

Incompatible Changes

Emacs 21 support has been dropped

Do not use Org mode 7.xx with Emacs 21, use version 6.36c instead.

XEmacs support requires the XEmacs development version

To use Org mode 7.xx with XEmacs, you need to run the developer version of XEmacs. I was about to drop XEmacs support entirely, but Michael Sperber stepped in and made changes to XEmacs that made it easier to keep the support. Thanks to Michael for this last-minute save. I had hoped to be able to remove xemacs/noutline.el from release 7 by moving it into XEmacs, but this is not yet done.

Org-babel configuration changes

Babel took the integration into Org mode as an opportunity to do some much needed house cleaning. Most importantly we have simplified the enabling of language support, and cleared out unnecessary configuration variables – which is great unless you already have a working configuration under the old model.

The most important changes regard the location and enabling of Babel (both core functionality and language specific support).

Babel

Babel is now part of the core of Org mode, so it is now loaded along with the rest of Org mode. That means that there is no configuration required to enable the main Babel functionality. For current users, this means that statements like 

(require 'org-babel)

or 

(require 'org-babel-init)

that may by lying around in your configuration must now be removed.

load path
Babel (including all language specific files – aside from those which are located in the contrib/ directory for reasons of licencing) now lives in the base of the Org mode lisp directory, so no additional directories need to be added to your load path to use babel. For Babel users this means that statements adding babel-specific directories to your load-path should now be removed from your config.
language support

It is no longer necessary to require language specific support on a language-by-language basis. Specific language support should now be managed through the `org-babel-load-languages' variable. This variable can be customized using the Emacs customization interface, or through the addition of something like the following to your configuration (note: any language not mentioned will not be enabled, aside from emacs-lisp which is enabled by default) 

(org-babel-do-load-languages
 'org-babel-load-languages
 '((R . t)
   (ditaa . t)
   (dot . t)
   (emacs-lisp . t)
   (gnuplot . t)
   (haskell . nil)
   (ocaml . nil)
   (python . t)
   (ruby . t)
   (screen . nil)
   (sh . t)
   (sql . nil)
   (sqlite . t)))

Despite this change it is still possible to add language support through the use of require statements, however to conform to Emacs file-name regulations all Babel language files have changed prefix from org-babel-* to ob-*, so the require lines must also change e.g. 

(require 'org-babel-R)

should be changed to 

(require 'ob-R)

We have eliminated the org-babel-tangle-w-comments variable as well as the two main internal lists of languages, namely

  • org-babel-interpreters and
  • org-babel-tangle-langs

so any config lines which mention those variables, can/should be stripped out in their entirety. This includes any calls to the org-babel-add-interpreter function, whose sole purpose was to add languages to the org-babel-interpreters variable.

With those calls stripped out, we may still in some cases want to associate a file name extension with certain languages, for example we want all of our emacs-lisp files to end in a .el, we can do this will the org-babel-tangle-lang-exts variable. In general you shouldn't need to touch this as it already has defaults for most common languages, and if a language is not present in org-babel-tangle-langs, then babel will just use the language name, so for example a file of c code will have a .c extension by default, shell-scripts (identified with sh) will have a .sh extension etc…

The configuration of shebang lines now lives in header arguments. So the shebang for a single file can be set at the code block level, e.g. 

#+begin_src clojure :shebang #!/usr/bin/env clj
,  (println "with a shebang line, I can be run as a script!")
#+end_src

Note that whenever a file is tangled which includes a shebang line, Babel will make the file executable, so there is good reason to only add shebangs at the source-code block level. However if you're sure that you want all of your code in some language (say shell scripts) to tangle out with shebang lines, then you can customize the default header arguments for that language, e.g. 

;; ensure this variable is defined defined
(unless (boundp 'org-babel-default-header-args:sh)
  (setq org-babel-default-header-args:sh '()))

;; add a default shebang header argument
(add-to-list 'org-babel-default-header-args:sh
             '(:shebang . "#!/bin/bash"))

The final important change included in this release is the addition of new security measures into Babel. These measures are in place to protect users from the accidental or uninformed execution of code. Along these lines every execution of a code block will now require an explicit confirmation from the user. These confirmations can be stifled through customization of the `org-confirm-babel-evaluate' variable, e.g. 

;; I don't want to be prompted on every code block evaluation
(setq org-confirm-babel-evaluate nil)

In addition, it is now possible to remove code block evaluation form the C-c C-c keybinding. This can be done by setting the org-babel-no-eval-on-ctrl-c-ctrl-c variable to a non-nil value, e.g. 

;; I don't want to execute code blocks with C-c C-c
(setq org-babel-no-eval-on-ctrl-c-ctrl-c t)

An additional keybinding has been added for code block evaluation, namely C-c C-v e.

Whew! that seems like a lot of effort for a simplification of configuration.

New keys for TODO sparse trees

The key C-c C-v is now reserved for Org Babel action. TODO sparse trees can still be made with C-c / t (all not-done states) and C-c / T (specific states).

Customizable variable changes for DocBook exporter

To make it more flexible for users to provide DocBook exporter related commands, we start to use format-spec to format the commands in this release. If you use DocBook exporter and use it to export Org files to PDF and/or FO format, the settings of the following two customizable variables need to be changed:

  • org-export-docbook-xslt-proc-command
  • org-export-docbook-xsl-fo-proc-command

Instead of using %s in the format control string for all arguments, now we use three different format spec characters:

  • %i: input file argument
  • %o: output file argument
  • %s: XSLT stylesheet argument

For example, if you set org-export-docbook-xslt-proc-command to 

java com.icl.saxon.StyleSheet -o %s %s /path/to/docbook.xsl

in the past, now you need to change it to 

java com.icl.saxon.StyleSheet -o %o %i %s

and set a new customizable variable called org-export-docbook-xslt-stylesheet to /path/to/docbook.xsl.

Please check the documentation of these two variables for more details and other examples.

Along with the introduction of variable org-export-docbook-xslt-stylesheet, we also added a new in-buffer setting called #+XSLT:. You can use this setting to specify the XSLT stylesheet that you want to use on a per-file basis. This setting overrides org-export-docbook-xslt-stylesheet.

Details

Org Babel is now part of the Org core

See Org-babel configuration changes for instructions on how to update your babel configuration.

The most significant result of this change is that Babel now has documentation! It is part of Org mode's documentation, see Chapter 14 Working With Source Code. The Babel keybindings are now listed in the refcard, and can be viewed from any Org mode buffer by pressing C-c C-v h. In addition this integration has included a number of bug fixes, and a significant amount of internal code cleanup.

The default capture system for Org mode is now called org-capture

This replaces the earlier system org-remember. The manual only describes org-capture, but for people who prefer to continue to use org-remember, we keep a static copy of the former manual section chapter about remember.

The new system has a technically cleaner implementation and more possibilities for capturing different types of data. See Carsten's announcement for more details.

To switch over to the new system:

  1. Run 

    M-x org-capture-import-remember-templates RET

    to get a translated version of your remember templates into the new variable org-capture-templates. This will "mostly" work, but maybe not for all cases. At least it will give you a good place to modify your templates. After running this command, enter the customize buffer for this variable with 

    M-x customize-variable RET org-capture-templates RET

    and convince yourself that everything is OK. Then save the customization.

  2. Bind the command org-capture to a key, similar to what you did with org-remember: 

    (define-key global-map "\C-cc" 'org-capture)

    If your fingers prefer C-c r, you can also use this key once you have decided to move over completely to the new implementation. During a test time, there is nothing wrong with using both system in parallel.

Implement pretty display of entities, sub-, and superscripts.

The command C-c C-x \ toggles the display of Org's special entities like \alpha as pretty unicode characters. Also, sub and superscripts are displayed in a pretty way (raised/lower display, in a smaller font). If you want to exclude sub- and superscripts, see the variable org-pretty-entities-include-sub-superscripts.

Thanks to Eric Schulte and Ulf Stegeman for making this possible.

Help system for finding entities

The new command M-x org-entities-help creates a structured buffer that lists all entities available in Org. Thanks to Ulf Stegeman for adding the necessary structure to the internal entity list.

New module to create Gantt charts

Christian Egli's org-taskjuggler.el module is now part of Org. He also wrote a tutorial for it.

Refile targets can now be cached

You can turn on caching of refile targets by setting the variable org-refile-use-cache. This should speed up refiling if you have many eligible targets in many files. If you need to update the cache because Org misses a newly created entry or still offers a deleted one, press C-0 C-c C-w.

Enhanced functionality of the clock resolver

Here are the new options for the clock resolver: 

i/q/C-g  Ignore this question; the same as keeping all the idle time.

k/K      Keep X minutes of the idle time (default is all).  If this
         amount is less than the default, you will be clocked out
         that many minutes after the time that idling began, and then
         clocked back in at the present time.
g/G      Indicate that you \"got back\" X minutes ago.  This is quite
         different from 'k': it clocks you out from the beginning of
         the idle period and clock you back in X minutes ago.
s/S      Subtract the idle time from the current clock.  This is the
         same as keeping 0 minutes.
C        Cancel the open timer altogether.  It will be as though you
         never clocked in.
j/J      Jump to the current clock, to make manual adjustments.

For all these options, using uppercase makes your final state to be CLOCKED OUT. Thanks to John Wiegley for making these changes.

A property value of "nil" now means to unset a property

This can be useful in particular with property inheritance, if some upper level has the property, and some grandchild of it would like to have the default settings (i.e. not overruled by a property) back.

Thanks to Robert Goldman and Bernt Hansen for suggesting this change.

The problem with comment syntax has finally been fixed

Thanks to Leo who has been on a year-long quest to get this fixed and finally found the right way to do it.

Make it possible to protect hidden subtrees from being killed by C-k

This was a request by Scott Otterson. See the new variable org-ctrl-k-protect-subtree.

New module org-mac-link-grabber.el

This module allows to grab links to all kinds of applications on a mac. It is available in the contrib directory.

Thanks to Anthony Lander for this contribution.

LaTeX export: Implement table* environment for wide tables

Thanks to Chris Gray for a patch to this effect.

When cloning entries, remove or renew ID property

Thanks to David Maus for this change.

Version 6.36

:CUSTOM_ID: v6.36

Details

Inline display of linked images

Images can now be displayed inline. The key C-c C-x C-v does toggle the display of such images. Note that only image links that have no description part will be inlined.

Implement offsets for ordered lists

If you want to start an ordered plain list with a number different from 1, you can now do it like this: 

1. [@start:12] will star a lit a number 12

Extensions to storing and opening links to Wanderlust messages

  • Remove filter conditions for messages in a filter folder

    If customization variable `org-wl-link-remove-filter' is non-nil, filter conditions are stripped of the folder name.

  • Create web links for messages in a Shimbun folder

    If customization variable `org-wl-shimbun-prefer-web-links' is non-nil, calling `org-store-link' on a Shimbun message creates a web link to the messages source, indicated in the Xref: header field.

  • Create web links for messages in a nntp folder

    If customization variable `org-wl-nntp-prefer-web-links' is non-nil, calling `org-store-link' on a nntp message creates a web link either to gmane.org if the group can be read trough gmane or to googlegroups otherwise. In both cases the message-id is used as reference.

  • Open links in namazu search folder

    If `org-wl-open' is called with one prefix, WL opens a namazu search folder for message's message-id using `org-wl-namazu-default-index' as search index. If this variable is nil or `org-wl-open' is called with two prefixes Org asks for the search index to use.

Thanks to David Maus for these changes.

Org-babel: code block body expansion for table and preview

In org-babel, code is "expanded" prior to evaluation. I.e. the code that is actually evaluated comprises the code block contents, augmented with the extra code which assigns the referenced data to variables. It is now possible to preview expanded contents, and also to expand code during during tangling. This expansion takes into account all header arguments, and variables.

A new key-binding C-c M-b p bound to `org-babel-expand-src-block' can be used from inside of a source code block to preview its expanded contents (which can be very useful for debugging). tangling

The expanded body can now be tangled, this includes variable values which may be the results of other source-code blocks, or stored in headline properties or tables. One possible use for this is to allow those using org-babel for their emacs initialization to store values (e.g. usernames, passwords, etc…) in headline properties or in tables.

Org-babel now supports three new header arguments, and new default behavior for handling horizontal lines in tables (hlines), column names, and rownames across all languages.

Version 6.35

Incompatible Changes

Changes to the intended use of org-export-latex-classes

So far this variable has been used to specify the complete header of the LaTeX document, including all the \usepackage calls necessary for the document. This setup makes it difficult to maintain the list of packages that Org itself would like to call, for example for the special symbol support it needs. Each time I have to add a package, I have to ask people to revise the configuration of this variable. In this release, I have tried to fix this.

First of all, you can opt out of this change in the following way: You can say: I want to have full control over headers, and I will take responsibility to include the packages Org needs. If that is what you want, add this to your configuration and skip the rest of this section (except maybe for the description of the [EXTRA] place holder): 

(setq org-export-latex-default-packages-alist nil
      org-export-latex-packages-alist nil)

Continue to read here if you want to go along with the modified setup.

There are now two variables that should be used to list the LaTeX packages that need to be included in all classes. The header definition in org-export-latex-classes should then not contain the corresponding \usepackage calls (see below).

The two new variables are:

  1. org-export-latex-default-packages-alist :: This is the variable where Org mode itself puts the packages it needs. Normally you should not change this variable. The only reason to change it anyway is when one of these packages causes a conflict with another package you want to use. Then you can remove that packages and hope that you are not using Org mode functionality that needs it.
  2. org-export-latex-packages-alist :: This is the variable where you can put the packages that you'd like to use across all classes. For example, I am putting amsmath and tikz here, because I always want to have them.

The sequence how these customizations will show up in the LaTeX document are:

  1. Header from org-export-latex-classes
  2. org-export-latex-default-packages-alist
  3. org-export-latex-packages-alist
  4. Buffer-specific things set with #+LaTeX_HEADER:

If you want more control about which segment is placed where, or if you want, for a specific class, have full control over the header and exclude some of the automatic building blocks, you can put the following macro-like place holders into the header: 

[DEFAULT-PACKAGES]      \usepackage statements for default packages
[NO-DEFAULT-PACKAGES]   do not include any of the default packages
[PACKAGES]              \usepackage statements for packages
[NO-PACKAGES]           do not include the packages
[EXTRA]                 the stuff from #+LaTeX_HEADER
[NO-EXTRA]              do not include #+LaTeX_HEADER stuff

If you have currently customized org-export-latex-classes, you should revise that customization and remove any package calls that are covered by org-export-latex-default-packages-alist. This applies to the following packages:

  • inputenc
  • fontenc
  • fixltx2e
  • graphicx
  • longtable
  • float
  • wrapfig
  • soul
  • t1enc
  • textcomp
  • marvosym
  • wasysym
  • latexsym
  • amssymb
  • hyperref

If one of these packages creates a conflict with another package you are using, you can remove it from org-export-latex-default-packages-alist. But then you risk that some of the advertised export features of Org will not work properly.

You can also consider moving packages that you use in all classes to org-export-latex-packages-alist. If necessary, put the place holders so that the packages get loaded in the right sequence. As said above, for backward compatibility, if you omit the place holders, all the variables will dump their content at the end of the header.

Damn, this has become more complex than I wanted it to be. I hope that in practice, this will not be complicated at all.

The constant org-html-entities is obsolete

Its content is now part of the new constant org-entities, which is defined in the file org-entities.el. org-html-entities was an internal variable, but it is possible that some users did write code using it - this is why I am mentioning it here.

Editing Convenience and Appearance

New faces for title, date, author and email address lines.

The keywords in these lines are now dimmed out, and the title is displayed in a larger font, and a special font is also used for author, date, and email information. This is implemented by the following new faces:

org-document-title org-document-info org-document-info-keyword

In addition, the variable org-hidden-keywords can be used to make the corresponding keywords disappear.

Thanks to Dan Davison for this feature.

Simpler way to specify faces for tags and todo keywords

The variables org-todo-keyword-faces, org-tag-faces, and org-priority-faces now accept simple color names as specifications. The colors will be used as either foreground or background color for the corresponding keyword. See also the variable org-faces-easy-properties, which governs which face property is affected by this setting.

This is really a great simplification for setting keyword faces. The change is based on an idea and patch by Ryan Thompson.

<N> in tables now means fixed width, not maximum width

Requested by Michael Brand.

Better level cycling function

TAB in an empty headline cycles the level of that headline through likely states. Ryan Thompson implemented an improved version of this function, which does not depend upon when exactly this command is used. Thanks to Ryan for this improvement.

Adaptive filling

For paragraph text, org-adaptive-fill-function did not handle the base case of regular text which needed to be filled. This is now fixed. Among other things, it allows email-style ">" comments to be filled correctly.

Thanks to Dan Hackney for this patch.

`org-reveal' (C-c C-r) also decrypts encrypted entries (org-crypt.el)

Thanks to Richard Riley for triggering this change.

Better automatic letter selection for TODO keywords

When all first letters of keywords have been used, Org now assigns more meaningful characters based on the keywords.

Thanks to Mikael Fornius for this patch.

Export

Much better handling of entities for LaTeX export

Special entities like \therefore and \alpha now know if they need to be in LaTeX math mode and are formatted accordingly.

Thanks to Ulf Stegemann for the tedious work to make this possible.

LaTeX export: Set coding system automatically

The coding system of the LaTeX class will now be set to the value corresponding to the buffer's file coding system. This happens if your setup sets up the file to have a line \usepackage[AUTO]{inputenc} (the default setup does this).

New exporters to Latin-1 and UTF-8

While Ulf Stegemann was going through the entities list to improve the LaTeX export, he had the great idea to provide representations for many of the entities in Latin-1, and for all of them in UTF-8. This means that we can now export files rich in special symbols to Latin-1 and to UTF-8 files. These new exporters can be reached with the commands C-c C-e n and C-c C-e u, respectively.

When there is no representation for a given symbol in the targeted coding system, you can choose to keep the TeX-macro-like representation, or to get an "explanatory" representation. For example, \simeq could be represented as "[approx. equal to]". Please use the variable org-entities-ascii-explanatory to state your preference.

Full label/reference support in HTML, Docbook, and LaTeX backends

#+LABEL definitions for tables and figures are now fully implemented in the LaTeX, Docbook, and HTML interfaces. \ref{xxx} is expanded to a valid link in all backends.

BEAMER export: Title of the outline frame is now customizable

The new option org-outline-frame-title allows to set the title for outline frames in Beamer presentations.

Patch by Łukasz Stelmach.

BEAMER export: fragile frames are better recognized

A lstlisting environment now also triggers the fragile option in a beamer frame, just like verbatim environments do.

Thanks to Eric Schulte for this patch.

BEAMER export: Protect <…> macro arguments

Macros for the BEAMER package can have arguments in angular brackets. These are now protected just like normal arguments.

Requested by Bill Jackson.

HTML export: Add class to outline containers using property

The HTML_CONTAINER_CLASS property can now be used to add a class name to the outline container of a node in HTML export.

New option org-export-email-info to turn off export of the email address

Default is actually off now.

Throw an error when creating an image from a LaTeX snippet fails

This behavior can be configured with the new option variable org-format-latex-signal-error.

Index generation

Org mode can now produce a 2-level subject index spanning an entire publishing project. Write index entries in your files as 

* What is org-mode?
#+index: Org mode
#+index: Definitions!Org mode

where the first line will produce an index entry Org mode, while the second line will create Definitions with a sub-item Org mode. Three-level entries are not supported.

To produce the index, set 

:makeindex t

in the project definition in org-publish-project-alist. You may have to force re-export of all files to get the index by using a C-u prefix to the publishing command: 

C-u M-x org-publish-all

Whenever an Org file is published in this project, a new file with the extension "orgx" will be written. It contains the index entries and corresponding jump target names. When all project files are published, Org will produce a new file "theindex.inc" containing the index as a to-level tree. This file can be included into any project file using 

#+include: "theindex.inc"

Org mode will also create a file "theindex.org" with this include statement, and you can build a more complex structure (for example style definitions, top and home links, etc) around this statement. When this file already exists, it will not be overwritten by Org.

Thanks to Stefan Vollmar for initiating and driving this feature.

TODO Still need to do the LaTeX portion

MobileOrg

Encrypting stage files for MobileOrg

Since the use of (often pubic) servers is needed for MobileOrg, it is now possible to encrypt the files to be staged for MobileOrg. Version 1.2 of MobileOrg will be needed for this feature, and Richard Moreland will show instructions on his website once that is available. Basically, on the Org-side this will require the following settings: 

(setq org-mobile-use-encryption t
      org-mobile-encryption-password "My_MobileOrg_Password")

So the password will be visible in your local setup, but since the encryption is only for the public server, this seems acceptable.

Agenda

Specify entry types as an option

Custom Agenda commands can now limit the sets of entry types considered for this command by binding org-agenda-entry-types temporarily in the options section of the command. This can lead to significant speedups, because instead of laboriously finding entries and then rejecting them, a whole search cycle is skipped. For more information see this worg page.

Thanks to Matt Lundin for this feature.

Speed up multiple calls to org-diary by only doing buffer prep once

Also a patch by Matt Lundin.

Show and hide deadlines in the agenda

You can now hide all deadline entries in the agenda by pressing !.

Thanks to John Wiegley for this feature.

Agenda: Allow to suppress deadline warnings for entries also scheduled

The the docstring of the variable org-agenda-skip-deadline-prewarning-if-scheduled.

Expand file names in org-agenda-files (external file case)

If you are using a file to manage the list of agenda files, the names in this file can now contain environment variables and "~" to write them more compactly and portable.

Thanks to Mikael Fornius for a patch to this effect.

Agenda: Allow TODO conditions in the skip functions

The agenda skip function has now special support for skipping based on the TODO state. Here are just two examples, see the manual for more information. 

(org-agenda-skip-entry-if 'todo '(\"TODO\" \"WAITING\"))
(org-agenda-skip-entry-if 'nottodo 'done)

Thanks to Łukasz Stelmach for this patch.

Extracting the time-of-day when adding diary entries

The time of day can now be extracted from new diary entries made from the agenda with (for example) i d. When org-agenda-insert-diary-extract-time is set, this is done, and the time is moved into the time stamp.

Thanks to Stephen Eglen for this feature.

The customization group org-font-lock has been renamed

The new name is `org-appearance'.

Thanks to Dan Davison for a patch to this effect.

The TODO list: Allow skipping scheduled or deadlined entries

Skipping TODO entries in the global TODO list based on whether they are scheduled or have a deadline can now be controlled in more detail. Please see the docstrings of org-agenda-todo-ignore-scheduled and org-agenda-todo-ignore-deadline.

Thanks to Łukasz Stelmach for patches to this effect.

Hyperlinks

Make org-store-link point to directory in a dired buffer

When, in a dired buffer, the cursor is not in a line listing a file, `org-store-link' will store a link to the directory.

Patch by Stephen Eglen.

Allow regexps in org-file-apps to capture link parameters

The way extension regexps in org-file-apps are handled has changed. Instead of matching against the file name, the regexps are now matched against the whole link, and you can use grouping to extract link parameters which you can then use in a command string to be executed.

For example, to allow linking to PDF files using the syntax file:/doc.pdf::<page number>, you can add the following entry to org-file-apps: 

Extension: \.pdf::\([0-9]+\)\'
Command:   evince "%s" -p %1

Thanks to Jan Böcker for a patch to this effect.

Clocking

Show clock overruns in mode line

When clocking an item with a planned effort, overrunning the planned time is now made visible in the mode line, for example using the new face org-mode-line-clock-overrun, or by adding an extra string given by org-task-overrun-text.

Thanks to Richard Riley for a patch to this effect.

Tables

Repair the broken support for table.el tables again.

Tables created with the table.el package now finally work again in Org mode. While you cannot edit the table directly in the buffer, you can use C-c ' to edit it nicely in a temporary buffer.

Export of these tables to HTML seem to work without problems. Export to LaTeX is imperfect. If fails if the table contains special characters that will be replaced by the exporter before formatting the table. The replacement operation changes the length of some lines, breaking the alignment of the table fields. Unfortunately this is not easy to fix. It is also not an option to not do these replacements. The table.el LaTeX exporter will for example not escape "&" in table fields, causing the exported tables to be broken.

Misc

New logging support for refiling

Whenever you refile an item, a time stamp and even a note can be added to this entry. For details, see the new option org-log-refile.

Thanks to Charles Cave for this idea.

New helper functions in org-table.el

There are new functions to access and write to a specific table field. This is for hackers, and maybe for the org-babel people. 

org-table-get
org-table-put
org-table-current-line
org-table-goto-line

Tables: Field coordinates for formulas, and improved docs

Calc and Emacs-Lisp formulas for tables can access the current field coordinates with @# and $# for row and column, respectively. These can be useful in some formulas. For example, to sequentially number the fields in a column, use =@# as column equation.

One application is to copy a column from a different table. See the manual for details.

Thanks to Michael Brand for this feature.

Archiving: Allow to reverse order in target node

The new option org-archive-reversed-order allows to have archived entries inserted in a last-on-top fashion in the target node.

Requested by Tom.

Better documentation on calc accuracy in tables

Thanks to Michael Brand for this fix.

Clock reports can now include the running, incomplete clock

If you have a clock running, and the entry being clocked falls into the scope when creating a clock table, the time so far spent can be added to the total. This behavior depends on the setting of org-clock-report-include-clocking-task. The default is nil.

Thanks to Bernt Hansen for this useful addition.

American-style dates are now understood by org-read-date

So when you are prompted for a date, you can now answer like this 

2/5/3         --> 2003-02-05
2/5           --> <CURRENT-YEAR>-02-05

org-timer.el now allows just one timer

There is now only a single free timer supported by org-timer.el. Thanks to Bastien for cleaning this up, after a bug report in this area by Frédéric Couchet.

Remember: Allow to file as sibling of current clock

C-3 C-c C-c will file the remember entry as a sibling of the last filed entry.

Patch by Łukasz Stelmach.

Org-reveal: Double prefix arg shows the entire subtree of the parent

This can help to get out of an inconsistent state produced for example by viewing from the agenda.

This was a request by Matt Lundin.

Add org-secretary.el by Juan Reyero to the contrib directory

org-secretary.el is a possible setup for group work using Org mode.

Thanks to Juan Reyero for this contribution.

Babel

Eric and Dan have compiled the following list of changes in and around org-babel.

  • Added support for Matlab and Octave.
  • Added support for C and C++ code blocks.
  • Added support for the Oz programming language. Thanks to Torsten Anders for this contribution
  • Can now force literal interpretation of table cell contents with extra "$" in table formula. Thanks to Maurizio Vitale for this suggestion.
  • Variable references which look like lisp forms are now evaluated.
  • No longer adding extension during tangling when filename is provided. Thanks to Martin G. Skjæveland and Nicolas Girard for prompting this.
  • Added `org-babel-execute-hook' which runs after code block execution.

  • Working directories and remote execution

    This introduces a new header argument :dir. For the duration of source block execution, default-directory is set to the value of this header argument. Consequences include:

    • external interpreter processes run in that directory
    • new session processes run in that directory (but existing ones are unaffected)
    • relative paths for file output are relative to that directory

    The name of a directory on a remote machine may be specified with tramp syntax (/user@host:path), in which case the interpreter executable will be sought in tramp-remote-path, and if found will execute on the remote machine in the specified remote directory.

  • Tramp syntax can be used to tangle to remote files. Thanks to Maurizio Vitale and Rémi Vanicat.
  • org-R removed from contrib.
  • gnuplot can now return it's string output – when session is set to "none".
  • Now including source code block arguments w/source name on export.
  • Now able to reference file links as results.
  • Allow pdf/png generation directly from latex source blocks with :file header argument.

Version 6.34

Incompatible changes

Tags in org-agenda-auto-exclude-function must be lower case.

When defining an org-agenda-auto-exclude-function, you need to be aware that tag that is being passed into the function is always lower case - even if it was defined in upper case originally.

Details

Support for creating BEAMER presentations from Org mode documents

Org mode documents or subtrees can now be converted directly in to BEAMER presentation. Turning a tree into a simple presentations is straight forward, and there is also quite some support to make richer presentations as well. See the BEAMER section in the manual for more details.

Thanks to everyone who has contributed to the discussion about BEAMER support and how it should work. This was a great example for how this community can achieve a much better result than any individual could.

Hyperlinks

  • Add Paul Sexton's org-ctags.el

    Targets like <<my target>> can now be found by Emacs' etag functionality, and Org mode links can be used to to link to etags, also in non-Org mode files. For details, see the file org-ctags.el.

    This feature uses a new hook org-open-link-functions which will call function to do something special with text links.

    Thanks to Paul Sexton for this contribution.

  • Add Jan Böcker's org-docview.el

    This new module allows links to various file types using docview, where Emacs displays images of document pages. Docview link types can point to a specific page in a document, for example to page 131 of the Org mode manual: 

    [[docview:~/.elisp/org/doc/org.pdf::131][Org mode Manual]]

    Thanks to Jan Böcker for this contribution.

  • New link types that force special ways of opening the file
    • file+sys:/path/to/file will use the system to open the file, like double-clicking would.
    • file:///path/to/file will force opening the linked file with Emacs.

    This was a request by John Wiegley.

  • Open all links in a node

    When using C-c C-o on a headline to get a list of links in the entry, pressing RET will open all links. This allows something like projects to be defined, with a number of files that have to be opened by different applications.

    This was a request by John Wiegley.

Agenda Views

  • Improve the logic of the search view.

    The logic of search views is changed a bit. See the docstring of the function or-search-view.

    These changes resulted from a discussion with Matt Lundin.

  • New face for entries from the Emacs diary

    Entries that enter the Agenda through the Emacs diary now get the face org-agenda-diary.

    This was a request by Thierry Volpiatto.

  • New function `org-diary-class' to schedule classes with skipped weeks.

    This was a request by Daniel Martins.

  • Empty matcher means prompt in agenda custom commands

    When an agenda custom command has an empty string as MATCH element, so far this would lead to a meaningless search using an empty matcher. Now an empty (or white) string will be interpreted just like a nil matcher, i.e. the user will be prompted for the match.

  • Agenda: Selectively remove some tags from agenda display

    If you use tags very extensively, you might want to exclude some from being displayed in the agenda, in order to keep the display compact. See the new option org-agenda-hide-tags-regexp for details.

    This was largely a patch by Martin Pohlack.

Export

  • Direct export of only the current subtree

    Pressing 1 after C-c C-e and before the key that selects the export backend, only the current subtree will be exported, exactly as it you had selected it first with C-c @. So for example, C-c C-e 1 b will export the current subtree to HTML and open the result in the browser.

  • Direct export of enclosing node

    Pressing SPC after C-c C-e and before the key that selects the export backend, the enclosing subree that is set up for subtree export will be exported, exactly as it you had selected it first with C-c @. So for example, C-c C-e SPC d will find the enclosing node with a LaTeX_CLASS property or an EXPORT_FILE_NAME property and export that.

  • Caching export images

    Images that are created for example using LaTeX or ditaa for inclusion into exported files are now cached. This works by adding a hash to the image name, that reflects the source code and all relevant settings. So as long as the hash does not change, the image does not have to be made again. His can lead to a substantial reduction in export/publishing times.

    Thanks to Eric Schulte for a patch to this effect.

  • Preserving line breaks for export no longer works

    ASCII export always preserves them - no other export format does. We had attempted to use \obeylines for this in LaTeX, but that does create too many problems.

  • New symbols \EUR and \checkmark

    \EUR symbols from Marvosym package, and \checkmark are now supported symbols in Org mode, i.e. they will be exported properly to the various backends.

  • Allow LaTeX_CLASS_OPTIONS to set options, also from a property

    You can set the options to the \documentclass command on a per-file basis, using 

    #+LaTeX_CLASS_OPTIONS: [11pt]

    or on a per-tree basis using the corresponding property. The defined string will replace the default options entirely.

  • The encoding of LaTeX files is now handled property

    Org now makes sure that the encoding used by the file created through the export mechanism is reflected correctly in the 

    \usepackage[CODINGSYSTEM]{inputenc}

    command. So as long as the org-export-latex-classes definition contains an \usepackage[utf8]{inputenc} statement, that statement will be modified so that the correct option is used.

    If you wan to use special encodings, for example utf8x instead of utf8, see the variable org-export-latex-inputenc-alist.

    This was a request by Francesco Pizzolante.

Property API enhancements

  • Make a new special property BLOCKED, indicating if entry is blocked

    A new special property BLOCKED returns "t" when the entry is blocked from switching the TODO state to a DONE state.

    This was a request by John Wiegley.

  • New hooks for external support for allowed property values

    It is now possible to hook into Org in order to provide the allowed values for any property with a lisp function. See the docstring of the variable org-property-allowed-value-functions

  • Allow unrestricted completion on properties

    When listing the allowed values for a property, for example with a :name_ALL: property, completion on these values enforces that one of the values will be chosen. Now, if you add ":ETC" to the list of allowed values, it will be interpreted as a switch, and the completion will be non-restrictive, so you can also choose to type a new value.

Changes to Org-babel

  • The documentation for Org-babel has been drastically improved and is available on Worg at https://orgmode.org/worg/org-contrib/babel/
  • Source-code block names are now exported to HTML and LaTeX
  • Org-babel functions are now bound to keys behind a common key prefix (see https://orgmode.org/manual/Working-with-source-code.html)
  • Results are now foldable with TAB
  • Header argument values can now be lisp forms
  • Readable aliases for #+srcname: and #+resname:
  • Sha1 hash based caching of results in buffer
  • Can now index into variable values
  • org-babel-clojure now supports multiple named sessions

Miscellaneous changes

  • Make C-c r C customize remember templates

    C-c r C is now a shortcut for 

    M-x customize-variable RET org-remember-templates RET

    This was a proposal by Adam Spiers.

  • Use John Gruber's regular expression for URL's

    We now use a better regexp to spot plain links in text. This regexp is adopted from John Gruber's blogpost.

    Thanks to William Henney for the pointer.

  • Implement tag completion of all tags in all agenda files

    The new option org-complete-tags-always-offer-all-agenda-tags makes Org complete all tags from all agenda files if non-nil. Usually, setting it locally to t in org-remember buffers is the most useful application of this new feature.

    Thanks to Tassilo Horn for a patch to this effect.

Version 6.33

Incompatible changes

Reorganize key bindings for archiving

The following keys now do archiving

C-c C-x C-a
archive using the command specified in org-archive-default-command. This variable is by default set to org-archive-subtree, which means arching to the archive file.

The three specific archiving commands are available through

C-c C-x C-s
archive to archive file
C-c C-x a
toggle the archive tag
C-c C-x A
move to archive sibling

These bindings work the same in an Org file, and in the agenda.

In addition:

  • In the agenda you can also use a to call the default archiving command, but you need to confirm the command with y so that this cannot easily happen by accident.
  • For backward compatibility, C-c $ in an org-mode file, and $ in the agenda buffer continue to archive to archive file.

Details

Level indentation cycling new empty entries and plain list items

To speed up data entry, TAB now behaves special in an empty headline, i.e. if the current line only contains the headline starter stars, maybe a TOD keyword, but no further content. This is usually the situation just after creating a new headline with M-RET or M-S-RET.

Then, TAB will first make the current entry a child of the entry above, then a parent, then a grand parent etc until it reaches top level. Yet another TAB and you will be back at the initial level at which the headline was created.

New plain list items behave in just the same way.

Sounds strange? Try it, it is insanely fast when entering data. If you still don't like it, turn it off by customizing org-cycle-level-after-item/entry-creation.

Thanks to Samuel Wales and John Wiegley for ideas that contributed to this new feature.

Speed commands at the start of a headline

If you set the variable org-use-speed-commands, the cursor position at the beginning of a headline (i.e. before the first star) becomes special. Single keys execute special commands in this place, for example outline navigation with f, b, n, and p, equivalent to the corresponding C-c C-f, C-c C-b, C-c C-n, and C-c C-f commands. The full list of commands can be seen by pressing ? at the special location. More commands can be added and existing ones modified by configuring the variable org-speed-commands-user.

This was a request by John Wiegley, based on similar speed navigation in allout.el.

Logging changes in scheduling and deadline time stamps

Setting the variables org-log-reschedule and org-log-redeadline to either time or note will arrange for recording a logbook entry whenever a scheduling date or deadline is changed.

This was a request by Rick Moynihan.

File remember notes into a date tree

Remember notes can now be filed to a location in a date tree. A date tree is an outline tree with years as top levels, months as level 2 headings, and days as level three headings. These are great for journals and for recording appointments and other loose dates because it will be easy to find all entries referencing a particular date, and it will be easy to archive all such entry from last year, for example.

To select date tree filing, set the HEADLINE part of the remember template to the symbol date-tree. The date tree will be build in the file on top level. However, if the file contains an entry with a non-nil DATE_TREE property, then the tree will be build under that headline.

New commands to create entries from agenda and calendar

If you make the variable org-agenda-diary-file point to an org-mode file, the i key in both the agenda buffer and in the Emacs calendar will be made to insert entries into that Org file. The dates at the cursor and the mark are being used when making entries for specific dates or blocks. In the new file, anniversaries will be collected under a special headline, and day/block entries will be filed into a date tree (see previous section).

This was a request by Stephen Eglen.

A new freemind exporter has been integrated with Org mode

org-freemind.el has a number of entry points (for details, see the source code), but you can also use Org's C-c C-e m to export a file or a selected subtree.

Thanks to Lennart Borgman for this contribution. An earlier version of this file was part of the nxhtml package, under the name freemind.el.

Drawers are now exported properly

Drawers are now exported when the configuration requires it, i.e. if the variable `org-export-with-drawers' is t or a list containing the drawers to export.

Min/Max/Mean age operators in Column View.

This lets you see how much time has passed since the specified timestamp property each entry. The three operators (@min, @max, @mean) show either the age of the youngest or oldest entry or the average age of the children.

Thanks to James TD Smith for a patch to this effect.

Allow source code block indentation to be preserved

If org-src-preserve-indentation is non-nil, or if a block has a -i switch, then the behavior of org-exp-blocks is altered as follows:

  1. Indentation is not removed before passing the block contents to the block-transforming plugin.
  2. The result returned by the plugin is not re-indented.
  3. Editing the source code block with C-c ' preserves it's indentation.

Thanks to Dan Davison for this feature.

Frame/window control when switching to source code edit buffer.

When switching to a source code editing buffer with C-c ', you can now control the frame / window setup using the new variable org-src-window-setup.

Thanks to Dan Davison for this feature.

Refile an entry to the current clock

You can now quickly refile an entry to become a child of the entry currently being clocked. The keys for doing this are C-2 C-c C-w.

This was a request by Bernt Hansen.

Make C-c C-o open the attachment directory is there are no links

If there is no link in an entry, C-c C-o will now open the attachment directory instead.

This was a request/patch by John Wiegley.

org-mac-iCal.el: work with calendar "groups"

Some calendar systems (Google, Zimbra) handle subscriptions to multiple calendars (or to an account) by grouping them under a single caldav directory in the calendar tree. org-mac-iCal used to assumes there is only one ics file created per caldav directory, so while it creates all of the needed merged ics files, it only copies one of them to ~/Library/Calendar before importing the contents into the diary.

Thanks to Doug Hellmann for a patch to fix this.

New module org-learn.el in the contrib directory

The file implements the learning algorithm described at http://supermemo.com/english/ol/sm5.htm, which is a system for reading material according to "spaced repetition". See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spaced_repetition for more details.

Thanks to John Wiegley for this contribution.

New contributed package org-git-link.el

org-git-link.el defines two new link types. The git link type is meant to be used in the typical scenario and mimics the file link syntax as closely as possible. The gitbare link type exists mostly for debugging reasons, but also allows e.g. linking to files in a bare git repository for the experts.

Thanks to Raimar Finken for this contribution.

org-annotation-helper.el and org-browser-url.e. have been removed

Please switch to org-protocol.el, into which contains the same functionality in a more general framework.

The contributed org-export-freemind package has been removed.

Org now contains a new freemind exporter, org-freemind.el.

Org-babel Changes

  • Clojure is supported [Thanks to Joel Boehland]
  • Perl is supported
  • Ruby and Python now respond to the :file header argument
  • Added :results_switches header argument for passing switches through to raw src blocks
  • Preserve indentation in source blocks on export and tangle
  • Possible to evaluate noweb reference on tangling or code block evaluation
  • Allowing multiple noweb references on a single line
  • Cleaned up the passing of parameter values from Org-babel to language specific functions

Older changes

For even older Changes, see older changes.