🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <"900830133819.71510.517.EHE51-2"@CompuServe.COM> 71510.517@compuserve.com (mike schroeder) writes:

   ... am having trouble getting 18.55 to work on our Microvax and VAX 780
   both running VMS 4.7.  Emacs compiles, links and loads correctly.  But
   when I do C-x C-f the minibuffer displays SHOW DEF instead of
   displaying the default directory.

This is because Emacs is using "getenv" to fetch the value of the PWD
environment variable and is using this instead of the current directory.
Under VMS, where environment variables don't exist, getenv looks at DCL
symbols and VMS logical names instead.  You have a symbol that was defined
like this:

  $ PWD :== SHOW DEF

This is such a common problem on VMS that perhaps a fix like this should
be installed:

----------------------------------------------------------------------
*** /usr14/gnu/dist-18.55/lisp/startup.el	Fri Apr  7 22:03:10 1989
--- startup.el	Sun Sep  2 20:44:46 1990
***************
*** 81,86 ****
      (setq command-line-processed t)
      ;; In presence of symlinks, switch to cleaner form of default directory.
      (if (getenv "PWD")
! 	(setq default-directory (file-name-as-directory (getenv "PWD"))))
      (unwind-protect
  	(command-line)
--- 81,87 ----
      (setq command-line-processed t)
      ;; In presence of symlinks, switch to cleaner form of default directory.
+     (if (not (eq system-type 'vax-vms))
  	(if (getenv "PWD")
! 	    (setq default-directory (file-name-as-directory (getenv "PWD")))))
      (unwind-protect
  	(command-line)
----------------------------------------------------------------------

   I've not found any way of successfully doing a find-file.

Actually, you could just have deleted the "SHOW DEF" from the minibuffer
and typed in the directory name you wanted.

Enjoy,

-- 
Joe Wells <jbw@bu.edu>