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I would like to write a function that starts a search (evil-search-forward specifically), with some arbitrary text already in the minibuffer.

Following directions in this link I came up with the following:

  (defun my/insert-headline-string ()
    (insert "foobar"))

  (minibuffer-with-setup-hook
      (:append 'my/insert-headline-string)
    (call-interactively #'evil-search-forward))

But it doesn't work for me: evil-search-forward runs just fine, but there is no text in the mini-buffer. If I use a different function (eg find-file) it prefills mini-buffer as expected, like so:

  (minibuffer-with-setup-hook
      (:append 'my/insert-headline-string)
    (call-interactively #'find-file))

Is there a reason this won't work for the search minibuffer?

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  • 1
    I don't use Evil, but did you try just using insert instead of :append? (Dunno what :append does.) And does evil-search-forward actually use the minibuffer? Isearch does not, for example, even though it looks like it does.
    – Drew
    Commented Jul 9, 2022 at 15:42
  • Thanks for the tip! Looking into evil-search-forward, it's basically a wrapper for isearch, which explains why editting the minibuffer doesn't do what I want. Would there be a way to prefill the isearch minibuffer I wonder? (Also, played with insert instead of :append but could not get that to work).
    – randouser
    Commented Jul 10, 2022 at 1:44
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    You ask how to "prefill the isearch minibuffer". There is no Isearch minibuffer - that's what I said. But you can predefine ("prefill") the initial search string: (defun the () (setq isearch-string "the")) (defun find-the ()(interactive) (add-hook 'isearch-mode-hook 'the) (isearch-mode t))
    – Drew
    Commented Jul 10, 2022 at 4:11
  • That did it, thanks! I just added a remove-hook after the search to clean things up and it's just what I wanted. I can post the final code I'm using as an answer? Or do you want to? I don't know SE etiquette.
    – randouser
    Commented Jul 12, 2022 at 9:47
  • Sure. Please post your answer. (And you can accept your own answer.) Thx.
    – Drew
    Commented Jul 12, 2022 at 15:34

1 Answer 1

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Following @Drew 's suggestions, I managed to achieve this with the following code:


  (defun my/set-isearch-string ()
    (setq isearch-string "^\*+[[:space:]].*"))

  (defun my/search-headlines-only ()
    (interactive)
    (add-hook 'isearch-mode-hook 'my/set-isearch-string)
    (evil-search-forward) 
    (remove-hook 'isearch-mode-hook 'my/set-isearch-string))
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