How to have a consistent use of CDLaTeX between Org and AUCTeX?

Question

I'm trying to evaluate the differences of writing in Org and LaTeX for my Master's thesis. A feature I find very useful in Org is CDLaTeX. To have a unique workflow between the two, I'd like to use CDLaTeX also for LaTeX, instead of LaTeX-math-mode. For what I know (correct me if I'm worng), this is possible in LaTeX (AUCTeX) buffers, but the functionalities of the two packages sometimes conflicts.

My current config for AUCTeX is:

(setq TeX-auto-save t)
(setq TeX-parse-self t)
(setq TeX-debug-bad-boxes t)
(setq-default TeX-master nil)
(setq TeX-electric-math (cons "\\(" "\\)"))
(setq LaTeX-electric-left-right-brace t)
(setq prettify-symbols-unprettify-at-point 'right-edge)

(add-hook 'LaTeX-mode-hook 'prettify-symbols-mode)
(add-hook 'latex-mode-hook 'prettify-symbols-mode)

(add-hook 'LaTeX-mode-hook 'turn-on-cdlatex)
(add-hook 'latex-mode-hook 'turn-on-cdlatex)

(defun my--LaTeX-CDLaTeX-utils-setup ()
  "Set up variables and similar that should be active only in LaTeX (AUCTeX) buffers."
  (setq-local cdlatex-takeover-dollar nil
          cdlatex-takeover-parenthesis nil))

(add-hook 'LaTeX-mode-hook 'my--LaTeX-CDLaTeX-utils-setup)
(add-hook 'latex-mode-hook 'my--LaTeX-CDLaTeX-utils-setup)

Since in Italian the apostrophe (') is used as a punctuation mark, I'd like to have cdlatek-math-modify disabled when non in a math environment, so that I can type apostrophized words. Instead, If I type it in a "text" area, it triggers the completion (but I don't really need the basic font formatting functions, as they are already in AUCTeX). How can I make CDLaTeX detect the difference and not kick in in text areas?

My Emacs version is GNU Emacs 29.0.50 (build 1, x86_64-pc-linux-gnu, GTK+ Version 3.24.34, cairo version 1.17.6) of 2022-07-31, Org is Org mode version 9.5.4 (release_9.5.4-17-g6e991f @ /usr/share/emacs/29.0.50/lisp/org/)

Answer 1

One solution would be to change the prefix-key from ' to something, that is used less often in Italian. This can be achieved by, for example:

(setq cdlatex-math-modify-prefix [f7])

Another solution would be to remove the functionality of cdlatex-math-modify in non-math mode, such that when pressing ' b the same happens as when pressing ' w, namely it just gets inserted normally.

This can be achieved by the following:

(setq cdlatex-math-modify-alist-default
  '(
   ( ?\.   "\\dot"               nil        t   t   nil )
   ( ?\:   "\\ddot"              nil        t   t   nil )
   ( ?\~   "\\tilde"             nil        t   t   nil )
   ( ?N    "\\widetilde"         nil        t   t   nil )
   ( ?^    "\\hat"               nil        t   t   nil )
   ( ?H    "\\widehat"           nil        t   t   nil )
   ( ?\-   "\\bar"               nil        t   t   nil )
   ( ?T    "\\overline"          nil        t   nil nil )
   ( ?\_   "\\underline"         nil        t   nil nil )
   ( ?\]    "\\overbrace"         nil        t   nil nil )
   ( ?\}   "\\underbrace"        nil        t   nil nil )
   ( ?\>   "\\vec"               nil        t   t   nil )
   ( ?/    "\\grave"             nil        t   t   nil )
   ( ?\\   "\\acute"             nil        t   t   nil )
   ( ?v    "\\check"             nil        t   t   nil )
   ( ?u    "\\breve"             nil        t   t   nil )
   ( ?m    "\\mbox"              nil        t   nil nil )
   ( ?t    "\\text"              nil        t   nil nil )
   ( ?c    "\\mathcal"           nil        t   nil nil )
   ( ?r    "\\mathrm"            nil        t   nil nil )
   ( ?i    "\\mathit"            nil        t   nil nil )
   ( ?l    nil                   nil        t   nil nil )
   ( ?b    "\\mathbf"            nil        t   nil nil )
   ( ?e    "\\mathem"            nil        t   nil nil )
   ( ?y    "\\mathtt"            nil        t   nil nil )
   ( ?f    "\\mathsf"            nil        t   nil nil )
   ( ?0    "\\textstyle"         nil        nil nil nil )
   ( ?1    "\\displaystyle"      nil        nil nil nil )
   ( ?2    "\\scriptstyle"       nil        nil nil nil )
   ( ?3    "\\scriptscriptstyle" nil        nil nil nil )
   ( ?\(    "\\left( ? \\right)"  nil        nil nil nil )
   ( ?\[    "\\left[ ? \\right]"  nil        nil nil nil )
   ( ?\{    "\\left\\{ ? \\right\\}" nil     nil nil nil )
   ( ?<    "\\left< ? \\right>"  nil        nil nil nil )
   ( ?|    "\\left| ? \\right|"  nil        nil nil nil )
   )
"Default for `cdlatex-math-modify-alist'.")

Note that I just copied the definition of cdlatex-math-modify-alist-default and substituted the commands like "\textrm", which should be executed by Keystrokes like ' r in Textmode, by nil.

(But be aware, that hereby I changed a constant, because cdlatex-math-modify-alist was defined via defconst. Since this is not enforced in emacs-lisp one can change it nevertheless but it is bad style.)

Answer 2

Turned out CDLaTeX provides two minor modes: cdlatex-mode and org-cdlatex-mode.

org-cdlatex-mode is the one designed to integrate with Org, and behaves in the same way as in Org buffers (checking if it's inside a math fragment).

cdlatex-mode is wider, gives more keybindings, but works differently. I suppose(?) it is designed as a replacement for LaTeX-math-mode (infos about this are very welcome)

Therefore, changing

(add-hook 'LaTeX-mode-hook 'turn-on-cdlatex)
(add-hook 'latex-mode-hook 'turn-on-cdlatex)

to

(add-hook 'LaTeX-mode-hook 'org-cdlatex-mode)
(add-hook 'latex-mode-hook 'org-cdlatex-mode)

does the trick