link python output to emacs buffer

Question

Goal

To parse text file in Python, search for string, and insert in current emacs buffer

Purpose

I do my document writing in LaTeX under Emacs and I would like to be able to do quick insertion of Bible verses as I type. I am aware of esv-mode in esv.el, which inserts Bible verses by querying biblegateway.org. However, that only works when I am online, and I want to be able to do insertion offline (I frequently work offline) as well.

I am aware of pymacs, which I have not tried since it looks to be severely outdated (I could not even open the help file under the GitHub repository...so it seems to be dying).

What I have tried

I created a simple test file in Python to read dummy text from dummy file:

def get_verse():
    with open('/home/test.txt','r') as tmp:
        text = tmp.read()

    return text

a = get_verse()
print(a)

I normally use Python for data transfer, analysis, and processing, so the current application is outside my experience. If there is some general improvement I would appreciate the suggestions.

I then define that function under my .emacs file as:

;; testing function
(defun bible-verse ()
  (interactive)
;  (insert (shell-command "python /home/test.py")))
  (insert (shell-command-to-string "python /home/test.py")))

(global-set-key
 (kbd "C-c pytest")
 'bible-verse
 )

As you can see, I have tried both the shell-command and shell-command-to-string commands. Neither of which work (i.e. no text is inserted).

However, I do get the text from the dummy file inserted when I execute the following in Emacs:

C-u M-! python /home/test.py

Right now I have two problems:

How do I get Emacs to execute my Python code and insert the returned text within the current buffer?
How can I pass a variable to the Python code from Emacs (i.e. to pull from specific book, chapter, verse)?

Since this is more of an Emacs issue I am not tagging this as Python (feel free to edit that if you think otherwise).

Toby Speight · Accepted Answer · 2016-11-23 14:43:05Z

2

The documentation for shell-command recommends that you use call-process for programmatic use:

(call-process PROGRAM &optional INFILE DESTINATION DISPLAY &rest ARGS)

However, the code you wrote with shell-command-to-string works for me, with M-x bible-verse. You'll need to fix the invalid key sequence to get your key binding to work, though:

(global-set-key (kbd "C-c p") 'bible-verse)

Here's a version that takes arguments and passes them to the process:

(defun bible-verse (book chapter verse)
  (interactive "*sBook: \ns%s, chapter: \ns%s, chapter %s, verse: ")
  (call-process "python" nil t t
                "~/test.py" book chapter verse))

I've used the * flag in (interactive) to refuse to run in a non-writable buffer, and I've shown how to format prior arguments when prompting.

answered Nov 23, 2016 at 14:43

Toby Speight

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1 Comment

tnknepp Over a year ago

Worked beautifully, thanks for the tip. I definitely need to get up to speed on lisp though...

Andreas Röhler · Accepted Answer · 2016-11-23 20:30:02Z

0

With example code below in Emacs buffer and python-mode, C-c C-c should print a line starting with chars "1.2" in a Python3 shell-buffer - given there is such a line in text.

#! /usr/bin/env python3
import re

DATEI="My-path-to-bible.txt"
SATZ = re.compile('^1.2')

with open(DATEI, "r") as jetzt:
    for line in jetzt:
        k = SATZ.match(line)
        if k:
            print(line)

python-mode.el comes with an option py-store-result-p: when t, result is in kill-ring, ready being yanked.

https://gitlab.com/python-mode-devs/python-mode

answered Nov 23, 2016 at 20:30

Andreas Röhler

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2 Comments

tnknepp Over a year ago

Thanks Andreas, but I was looking for something to insert text directly in the document. Though this would have been a good alternative.

Andreas Röhler Over a year ago

Just write a My-command be followed by a yank. This requires some very basic Emacs lisp.

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