multi-term terminal messages configurations not working as expected

Question

I'm trying to follow this article and configure my multi-term to work with remote files seamlessly. Edit: That article seems to be down currently. Try the cached version here.

But it's not working as expected. I'm running OS X 10.9.5 and GNU Emacs 24.4.1.

As explained in the above article, I have placed the following code in my .emacs.d/init.el:

(when (require 'term nil t)
  (defun term-handle-ansi-terminal-messages (message)
    (while (string-match "\eAnSiT.+\n" message)
      ;; Extract the command code and the argument.
      (let* ((start (match-beginning 0))
             (command-code (aref message (+ start 6)))
             (argument
              (save-match-data
                (substring message
                           (+ start 8)
                           (string-match "\r?\n" message
                                         (+ start 8))))))
        ;; Delete this command from MESSAGE.
        (setq message (replace-match "" t t message))

        (cond ((= command-code ?c)
               (setq term-ansi-at-dir argument))
              ((= command-code ?h)
               (setq term-ansi-at-host argument))
              ((= command-code ?u)
               (setq term-ansi-at-user argument))
              ((= command-code ?e)
               (save-excursion
                 (find-file-other-window argument)))
              ((= command-code ?x)
               (save-excursion
                 (find-file argument))))))

    (when (and term-ansi-at-host term-ansi-at-dir term-ansi-at-user)
      (setq buffer-file-name
            (format "%s@%s:%s" term-ansi-at-user term-ansi-at-host term-ansi-at-dir))
      (set-buffer-modified-p nil)
      (setq default-directory (if (string= term-ansi-at-host (system-name))
                                  (concatenate 'string term-ansi-at-dir "/")
                                (format "/%s@%s:%s/" term-ansi-at-user term-ansi-at-host term-ansi-at-dir))))
    message))

And I have placed the following code in my .bashrc:

# are we an interactive shell?
if [ "$PS1" ]; then
  case $TERM in
    eterm-color*)
      if [ -n "$SSH_CONNECTION" ]
      then
        echo "if"
        _HOST=$(echo -n $SSH_CONNECTION | cut -d\  -f3)
      else
        _HOST=$HOSTNAME
      fi

      echo -ne "${PWD/#$HOME/~}\n"
      PROMPT_COMMAND='echo -ne "\033AnSiTh ${_HOST}\n\033AnSiTu ${USER}\n\033AnSiTc ${PWD/#$HOME/~}\n"'
      ;;
    xterm*)
      PROMPT_COMMAND='echo -ne "\033]0;${USER}@${HOSTNAME%%.*}:${PWD/#$HOME/~}"; echo -ne "\007"'
      ;;
    screen)
      PROMPT_COMMAND='echo -ne "\033_${USER}@${HOSTNAME%%.*}:${PWD/#$HOME/~}"; echo -ne "\033\\"'
      ;;
    *)
      [ -e /etc/sysconfig/bash-prompt-default ] && PROMPT_COMMAND=/etc/sysconfig/bash-prompt-default
      ;;
  esac
fi

if [ "${TERM}x" = "eterm-colorx" ]
then
  alias e='echo -ne "\033AnSiTe"'
  alias x='echo -ne "\033AnSiTx"'
  echo "eterm-colorx"
else
  alias e='emacsclient -n -t -a nano'
fi

After adding these, I see 2 issues.

1. When I open a multi-term buffer, I see the current working directory being printed before each prompt. I also see a box (some unprintable character) and / preceding the path.

   

   I don't know where this string is coming from.

2. Also when I try to open with command x samp.txt it opens a file with some terminal messages attached at the end of filename. The file name it tries to open is samp.txt^[AnSiTh xyz.

   xyz (renamed here) is the hostname of the system. It looks like the terminal message for setting the hostname somehow got appended to the filename. I couldn't figure out who/which code is appending this.

Answer 1

I ran into the same problem and this seems to be something to do with bash. Switching the configuration around to zsh has solved the problem.

I ran into the issue on an ubuntu install with bash 4.3. Compiling a local version of bash 4.1 didn't help either. On a RHEL install with bash 4.1.2 the shell/emacs interaction work well.

Answer 2

multi-term already support this feature so I don't think you need to add anything to your init.el file.

And according to emacswiki (http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/AnsiTermHints#toc5), you just need to add this to your .bash_profile:

function set-eterm-dir {
    echo -e "\033AnSiTu" "$LOGNAME" # $LOGNAME is more portable than using whoami.
    echo -e "\033AnSiTc" "$(pwd)"
    if [ $(uname) = "SunOS" ]; then
    # The -f option does something else on SunOS and is not needed anyway.
        hostname_options="";
    else
        hostname_options="-f";
    fi
    echo -e "\033AnSiTh" "$(hostname $hostname_options)" # Using the -f option can
                                                         # cause problems on some OSes.
    history -a # Write history to disk.
}

# Track directory, username, and cwd for remote logons.
if [ "$TERM" = "eterm-color" ]; then
    PROMPT_COMMAND=set-eterm-dir
fi

Answer 3

With emacs 25, changed the function in your .bashrc with this one:

if [ "$TERM" = "eterm-color" ]; then
   function eterm-set-cwd {
         $@
    echo -e "\033AnSiTc" $(pwd)
   }
   # set hostname, user, and cwd
   function eterm-reset {
      echo -e "\033AnSiTu" $(whoami)
      echo -e "\033AnSiTc" $(pwd)
      echo -e "\033AnSiTh" $(hostname)
   }
   for temp in cd pushd popd; do
      alias $temp="eterm-set-cwd $temp"
   done
   # set hostname, user, and cwd now
   eterm-reset
fi

source: https://gist.github.com/mkhattab/1739578