= Changelog

To control the startup info message, see <<options#startup-info,`:doc options startup-info`>>

This changelog contains major and/or breaking changes to Kakoune between
released versions.

== Kakoune 2026.05.21

* Support the `\N` escape sequence in regex (like in PCRE, matches `[^\n]`).

* `enter-user-mode` support the `-count` and `-register` switches to forward
  those parameters to the underlying normal mode

* `arrange-buffers -back` switch to arrange provided buffers to the back of
  the buffer list.

== Kakoune 2026.04.12

* `finaleol` option to support writing files that do not end with an final
  end-of-line byte

* `FocusIn`/`FocusOut` events on suspend

* `%val{buffile}` is now empty for scratch buffers

* Reworked Json UI draw_status call to give UI implementation more control,
  added cursor pos to the draw call and removed the set_cursor call

* `number-lines -full-relative` switch to keep a smaller line number gutter.

* `<a-I>` and `<a-A>` to select nested text objects

* `kak -C <session>` connects to a session or creates it if it does not exist.

== Kakoune 2025.06.03

* Expose env vars that are mentioned in the arguments passed to shell expansions

* Support for colored double underlines

* `git apply` can now operate on selected changes in the current buffer's
  file (useful for quick (un)staging and reverting)

* `exec/eval -client` switch accepts '*' for all clients and comma separated
  list of client names.

== Kakoune 2024.05.18

* Fixed tests on Alpine Linux and *BSD

== Kakoune 2024.05.09

* `flag-lines -after` switch to display text after the line

* `shell-script-candidates` completion now runs the script asynchronously
  while displaying and updating results live.

* `%val{window_range}` elements are now emitted as different strings

* `+` only duplicates identical selections a single time to avoid surprising
  and slow exponential growth in the number of selections.

* `daemonize-session` command makes it possible to convert the current session
  to a daemon one (which will not exit on last client disconnecting)

* View mode commands and mouse scrolling no longer change selections when those go off-screen.

* New commands `git apply`, `git blame-jump`, `git edit` and `git grep`.

* `git blame` now also works in `git-diff` and `git-log` buffers.

* Completions provided via `shell-script-candidates` or `completers` are no longer sorted if the typed text is empty.

* The `terminal` alias has been replaced with a command that selects terminal program and placement based on windowing options.

* `local` scopes in `commands` and `evaluate-commands`.

== Kakoune 2023.08.08

* Fix compilation errors on FreeBSD and MacOS using clang

== Kakoune 2023.07.29

* `<a-u>` and `<a-U>` now undo/redo selection changes; the previous meaning
  of moving in history tree has been moved to `<c-j>` and `<c-k>`

* `%exp{...}` expansions provide flexible quoting for expanded strings
  (as double quoted strings)

* `<c-g>` cancels the current operation and goes back to the main event
  loop, this provides an escape hatch when Kakoune seems to hang due to
  a costly operation

* `show-matching -previous` highlighter will fall back onto the character
  preceeding the cursor

== Kakoune 2022.10.31

* `complete-command` (See <<commands#configuring-command-completion,`:doc commands configuring-command-completion`>>)

* `p`, `P`, `!` and `<a-!>` commands now select the inserted text

* `x` now just extends the selection to contain full lines (as `<a-x>` did)
  `<a-x>` trims partial lines from the selection (as `<a-X>` did)

* User mappings is now bound to `<space>` while keeping/removing main selection
  moved to `,` and `<a-,>`

* Prompt history registers `%reg{colon}`, `%reg{slash}` and `%reg{pipe}` now
  have reverse chronological order

* Executing user mode mappings no longer adds to prompt history registers.

== Kakoune 2021.11.07

* Support for curly and separately colored underlines (undocumented in 2021.10.28)

* Fixes for terminal flickering

* Fixes for command and response fifo corner cases

== Kakoune 2021.10.28

* `g` and `v` do not auto lower case the next key, so `GL` needs to be
  manually mapped to `Gl` for example.

== Kakoune 2021.08.28

* command and response fifo support
  (See <<expansions#command-and-response-fifo,`:doc expansions command-and-response-fifo`>>)

* Shell expansions only trim the last trailing newline instead of all of
  them to make is possible to losslessly pass text through `%sh{...}`. 

* `set-option -remove` support for subtracting/removing from option values

* Menu completions such as command name completion are now auto-inserted on
  space

* `write -atomic` was replaced with `write -method [replace|overwrite]` to
  make both write methods available explicitly

* `write <filename>` will fail if the given filename already exists and is
  a regular file. Use the `-force` switch to override that behaviour.

== Kakoune 2020.09.01

* The `repl` and `send-text` aliases have been renamed respectively into
  `repl-new` and `repl-send-text`.

* Daemon mode (`-d` switch) does not fork anymore.

* Replace NCursesUI with a custom terminal UI implementation

== Kakoune 2020.08.04

* Introduce `User` hook support.

* The `bold` and `italic` faces are no longer built-in. Highlighters
  are expected to use face attributes (`+b` and `+i`, respectively) to
  decorate text.

* The `lint-enable` command no longer needs to be called to display
  linting errors. The `lint-disable` command was renamed into
  `lint-hide-diagnostics`.

* The `+<length>` part of a `range-specs` highlighter consistently
  refers to the length of the target range.

* clients stdin is transferred to the server, making it possible
  to pipe into `kak -c <session>`

* Faces can have an alpha channel, specified using the 
  `rgba:RRGGBBAA` format.

* replace-ranges highlighter now support empty and multi-lines ranges

* `%val{...}` now expands to list of strings, `$kak_quoted_...` now work
  as expected with these.

* `*SetOption` hooks filter string will contain a value only for options
  of int/str/bool types to avoid performance issue with generating those
  on more complex option types. 

== Kakoune 2020.01.16

* Expose history tree through `$kak_history` and
  `$kak_uncommitted_modifications`

* `InsertCompletionHide` parameter is the list of inserted
  ranges

== Kakoune 2019.12.10

* Arrow keys and `<home>`, `<end>` are not normal mode commands
  anymore but default key mappings.
  
* `ModeChange` hook parameter now takes `push:` or `pop:` prefix,
  `InsertBegin`, `InsertEnd`, `NormalBegin` and `NormalEnd`
  were removed.

* `-verbatim` switch in `evaluate-commands` for perfect command
  forwarding to another context.

* `WrapMarker` face used by `wrap -marker` highlighter

* `info` supports markup with the `-markup` switch

* `rename-buffer` gained `-file` and `-scratch` switches
  to support converting buffer types.  

== Kakoune 2019.07.01

* Re-organized bundled script files directory hierarchy.

* Introduced helpers to write/read from file in scripts with
  `%file{...}` expansion and `echo -to-file <filename>`.

* Added `ClientCreate` and `ClientClose` hooks

* `edit -scratch` with no buffer name will create a new
  scratch buffer with a unique autogenerated name.

* `info -placement` is now `info -style` and supports
  `menu` and `modal` additional styles.

* `completions` option type `docstring` are now arbitrary
  kakoune commands that are run on item select.

* `InsertCompletionSelect` hook has been removed as
  `completions` commands now provides a similar feature.

* Introduced a module system using the `provide-module` and
  `require-module` commands that allows for lazily loading language
  support files with dependency resolution.

* Added a new hook `ModuleLoaded` which is run after a module is
  loaded, allowing for module specific configuration.

* Shell quoting of lists is not automatic anymore, `$kak_quoted_...`
  makes it opt-in, and works for all option types.

* Lower case function key syntax is not accepted anymore,
  `<f1>` should be converted to `<F1>`.

== Kakoune 2019.01.20

* `auto_complete` has been renamed to `autocomplete` for more
  consistency.

* Start of a builtin key parser in the ncurses ui bypassing
  the ncurses one. Can be favored by setting the ui option
  `ncurses_builtin_key_parser` to `true`.

* Right clicks extend the current selection, the control modifier allows
  merging all the selections after extension.

* The `regex` highlighter now supports named capture groups to
  ease readability.

== Kakoune 2018.10.27

* `remove-hooks` <group> argument is now a regex and removes all
  hooks whose group matches it.

* `exclusive` face attribute (e) has been replaced with more
  granular `final foreground` (f), `final background` (g), and `final
  attributes` (a), or the three combined as `final` (F).  Semantics
  changed slightly as those attributes apply to the existing face as
  well (a final face will not get modified by a following face if that
  following face does not have the final attribute itself.

* `<a-m>` aka "merge consecutive selections" has been moved to `<a-_>`.
  The new `<a-m>` and `<a-M>` are now symmetrical with `m` and `M`.
  Those commands select (or extend) to the matching char backwards.

* `define-command` switches `-shell-completion` and `-shell-candidates`
  have been renamed to `-shell-script-completion` and
  `-shell-script-candidates` to make way for a new `-shell-completion`
  which completes like the shell (shell command name then filename).

* `asciidoc` is not a dependency anymore, the last file that required
  it (Kakoune's manpage) has been converted to troff format.

== Kakoune 2018.09.04

This version contains a significant overhaul of various Kakoune
features that can break user configuration. This was a necessary
change to make Kakoune command model cleaner and more robust.

* `%sh{...}` strings are not reparsed automatically anymore, they need
  to go through an explicit `evaluate-commands`

* The `-allow-override` switch from `define-command` has been renamed
  `-override`.

* The search prompt uses buffer word completion so that fuzzy completion
  can be used to quickly search for a buffer word.

* The `wrap` highlighter can accept a new `-marker <marker_text>` switch.

* The command line syntax has changed to support robust escaping.

  - `%sh{...}` is not expanded to multiple tokens automatically anymore,
    to evaluate its output as multiple tokens/commands, use the
    `evaluate-commands` command:

   -------------------------------------------------------------
   evaluate-commands %sh{ echo "first command; second command" }
   -------------------------------------------------------------

  - Escaping of `'` in `'...'` and `"` and `%` in `"..."` strings is done
    by doubling up (`''`, `""` and `%%`) instead of using a backslash

  - Bare words escaping has been tweaked.

  See <<command-parsing#,`:doc command-parsing`>>.

* Various lists (options, registers...) in Kakoune are now written using
  the command line syntax:

  - `set-register` now take an arbitrary number of parameters and sets
    the register to multiple strings. `%reg` expands to a list of strings.

  - the `$kak_reg_*` environment variable is now a list, `$kak_main_reg_*`
    provides the previous behaviour.

  - `%opt` expands list options as list of strings.

  - selection descs are whitespaces separated instead of `:` separated

* Highlighters syntax has changed to permit explicit naming and remove
  highlighter specific name parameters (such as for the group highlighter)
  `add-highlighter <path>/<name> <type> <params>` is the new syntax.

* Regions highlighters have been overhauled and are now specified with
  a sequence of commands instead of a single one:

  ------------------------------------------------------------------
  add-highlighter <path>/<name> regions
  add-highlighter <path>/<name>/<region name> region <begin> <end> \
  <type> <params>
  ------------------------------------------------------------------

  The recursion regex is opt-in through a `-recurse <recurse>` flag.

  They also are not necessarily groups anymore, a region can directly
  apply any other highlighter

  See <<highlighters#,`:doc highlighters`>>

* Highlighter type names have been unified, types that used `_` as
  word separators, such as `show_whitespaces` are now using `-`
  (`show-whitespace`).

* `a` on end of line is not treated specially anymore, it will start
  inserting on the next character, which will be the first character
  of the next line.

* `autoshowcompl` options has been renamed `auto_complete` and is
  now a `flags(insert|prompt)` option, allowing more granular
  configuration of when the completions should be displayed
  automatically.

* Prompt editing shortcuts have been changed to match readline.

== Kakoune 2018.04.13

First official Kakoune release.
