dear unix desktop people (Gnome, Emacs, Firefox)

[waider]

Here in my Firefox window I have some highlighted text. In my head this is, perhaps, the X Primary selection. For a transient period in time it is also X Cut Buffer 0. From Firefox's context menu I've selected Copy, so it should now also be in the X Clipboard selection. However, in the Emacs buffer I wanted to paste to, it is not in any of these places. I don't know where it is. Why is this, exactly? I've read what is probably the clearest doc available on what should be happening (Note that despite the fact that Emacs has scragged the X Primary selection through a kill operation in another window, the text remains highlighted in Firefox). Someone here is not reading from the correct hymn sheet, and I want them found and shot, because if I select and copy text I fully expect it to be available to the next application that says, "insert clipboard contents here". Of course, it could well be that emacs, in its wisdom, is scragging the X Primary selection, X Cut Buffer 0, and the Clipboard all in one go... gah.

Comments

[candice.livejournal.com]

I also have noticed firefox's cut/paste buffers being strange, so I would assume that over emacs is the problem.

I seem to recall that there's some little included x application that shows you clipboard contents and stuff, but those are really old, vodka-soaked braincells and you should not trust them.

[peglegpete.livejournal.com]

Mmmm... vodka.
I think if I were a zombie, I'd try to subsist entirely on vodka-soaked braincells.

[candice.livejournal.com]

little program 'xclipboard' - probably still in the main x distributions, crappy Xaw thing to at least show you what goes on in that buffer.

[bitpuddle.livejournal.com]

Oh, please. That is like cold fusion. Only rumored to work.

[waider.livejournal.com]

Oh, it's not the not-working that bothers me; it's the fact that it's not working in a subtle and devious fashion. As if to prove the point, I just now fired up xclipboard and there is my selected, copied text. Emacs, however, insists that not only is there nothing on the clipboard, there is in fact, no clipboard.

[candice.livejournal.com]

"but what you must realize, is that there is no spoon."

(over there, hiding from the flying pint glass)

[dwenius.livejournal.com]

It is your reliance on emacs, foul acolyte. In joe (nee WordStar), things work just fine :)

[waider.livejournal.com]

Hey, don't make me get mediæval on your ass with my awesome keyboard-chording skillz.