Using proportional (variable-width) fonts in Emacs23

[Erin Brinkley]

Hi!

I'm using Emacs 23 now and LOVE using proportional fonts! (AKA variable width 
fonts.) It FINALLY makes Emacs look beautiful, makes text easy to read.

But I discovered a huge problem: the fill and word wrap commands are hard coded 
to work for monospaced fonts only! For instance the fill-column is based on 
monospace fonts: if you use a proportional font and set the fill column to what 
you think is a reasonable number, you'll soon find out that you are WRONG and 
you get extra whitespace at the end of a line, and words will wrap! The only 
way out is to set the fill-column to an insanely low number, and that's not a 
real solution either!

I saw a copy of the old Emacs 21 manual online where it says that yes, you can 
use variable width fonts but the fill and wrap commands aren't yet set up for 
it. Something about how they were working on it. I'm curious how that's been 
going over the years. Is there any support for these fonts in Emacs now? Anyone 
know of a hack - kludge - tip - workaround I can try in the meantime? I love 
how this looks but admit to going crazy here with all my documents having these 
weird wrap problems.

Appreciate the help everyone!