[h-e-w] "Esc-x shell" does not bring up the DOS Prompt

[David C Hubbard]

I am running windows 98 and Emacs 21.2.1. The reason I had decided to
originally use BASH was that me DOS prompt was not working. I have tried to
run "runemacs -q" and the problem is still there. Could I substitute the
"bash" reference in the shell settings for getting BASH to work with the
DOS command prompt?
David



                                                                                
               
                    "Dr Francis J.                                              
               
                    Wright"               To:     David C 
Hubbard/DEF/address@hidden                  
                    <F.J.Wright           cc:     address@hidden                
   
                    @qmul.ac.uk>          Subject:     Re: [h-e-w] How do I 
make Emacs use the 
                    Sent by:              Cygwin BASH shell with the "Esc-x 
shell" feature?    
                    help-emacs-win                                              
               
                    dows-admin                                                  
               
                                                                                
               
                                                                                
               
                    06/19/02 06:42                                              
               
                    AM                                                          
               
                                                                                
               
                                                                                
               




From: "David C Hubbard" <address@hidden>
To: <address@hidden>
Sent: Tuesday, June 18, 2002 7:37 PM
Subject: [h-e-w] How do I make Emacs use the Cygwin BASH shell with the
"Esc-x shell" feature?


> I have used Emacs on UNIX/LINUX machines before and the "shell" feature
> works by default. How do I get the "shell" to work on windows with the
> Cygwin BASH? I installed Cygwin tool set first and then installed
NTEMACS.
> Emacs seems to work just fine except when I do the Esc-x feature to get a
> shell it doesn't go to DOS prompt or anything. I do see a "cmdproxy -i"
for
> that buffer when I try and close Emacs.

A couple of remarks.  Firstly, by default you can use the Alt key as the
Emacs Meta key, so you can type Esc-x quicker as Alt-x.  I much prefer
using
Alt as a shift key rather than typing Esc key sequences.  Secondly, by
default you should get an MS-DOS command prompt when you open an Emacs
shell
buffer.  If that's not working then I suggest you try starting Emacs with
no
init file (runemacs -q).  If that works then something in your init file is
preventing the command interpreter from starting up correctly.  Finally, if
you are running Windows 9x or ME then you need to terminate ANY shell
explicitly before you close its buffer or Emacs itself.  Otherwise, you
will
get hung processes left (that all have the same unhelpful name, which IIRC
is winoldapp) that will prevent Windows from later shutting down cleanly.
Windows NT et seq. don't have this problem.  For most purposes I find the
MS-DOS command interpreter within Emacs to be adequate; when I really need
bash I start it up outside Emacs.  Emacs itself provides all the
interactive
support, so even COMMAND.COM becomes almost useable.

Francis