$file-ignore(5)

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NAME

$file-ignore - File extensions to ignore

SYNOPSIS

$file-ignore "string"; Default is ""

DESCRIPTION

$file-ignore specifies a space separated list of file endings which the file completion is to ignore. This is used by any function which prompts the user for a file name, such as find-file(2). A file ending in this case is NOT the extension but the last n characters where n is the number of characters in the specified ignore file.

The variable can be used to ignore directories by making the last character of the postfix a '/' directory character, see examples below. The variable can also affect the directories listed by the directory-tree(2) command.

EXAMPLE

To ignore all files which have the extension "o", using:

set-variable $file-ignore "o"

would not only ignore "foo.o", but also "foo.oo", "foo.po" and "foo" as well as any file that ends in an "o". What is really required is

set-variable $file-ignore ".o"

It is useful to ignore the "./" and "../" directories so that a directory containing one file will auto-complete to that one file. This is achieved by using:

set-variable $file-ignore "./"

To ignore MicroEmacs backup files ("~"), C object files (".o"), "./" and "../" directories try using:

set-variable $file-ignore "~ .o ./"

NOTES

The file completion only completes further than the first non-unique point in the current list of possibles if and only if it can ignore all but one file, so if the current directory contains:

./ ../ foo foo.c foo.c~ foo.o