Re: --daemon vs. server-start

[Dan Nicolaescu]

Stephen Berman <address@hidden> writes:

  > GNU Emacs 23.0.60.30 (i686-pc-linux-gnu, GTK+ Version 2.14.4) of
  > 2009-01-21 on escher
  > 
  > The discussion of the Emacs server in the Emacs manual (node Emacs
  > Server) suggests that --daemon and server-start are basically equivalent
  > methods of starting the server (aside from the difference with respect
  > to frames, of course).  

That's an overreach, yes the --daemon starts the server, but it's not
equivalent. 


  > This leads me to expect that regardless of which
  > way I start the server, the result of subsequently invoking emacsclient
  > should be the same.  But I have encountered some systematic asymmetries.
  > I don't know if these are expected but undocumented, or I have failed to
  > find the documentation, or there is a bug.

  > (i) One asymmetry concerns certain X resources passed via the -xrm
  > command line option (these are all shell invocations):
  > 
  > emacs -Q -xrm 'Emacs.ReverseVideo: on' -f server-start
  > emacsclient -c
  > => The client frame is in reverse video

You seem to assume that "emacs" and "emacs --daemon" are doing the same
thing, they are not,
emacs --daemon 
is similar to 
emacs -nw -f server-start

so emacs --daemon it will ignore all the X11 related options.


  > 
  > emacs -Q -xrm 'Emacs.ReverseVideo: on' --daemon
  > emacsclient -c
  > => The client frame is in normal video
  > 
  > The same pattern holds for the resources Foreground, Background,
  > MenuBar, ToolBar.  (I haven't tested all X resources yet.)  In contrast,
  > for resources that have their own command line option, there is no
  > asymmetry:
  > 
  > emacs -Q -rv -f server-start
  > emacsclient -c
  > => The client frame is in reverse video

This works because -rv works when using -nw.