Re: show tabs and white space

[rgb]

mgrd wrote:
> For editing a Makefile I need to display/show the tabs and white
spaces
> within it.
>
> Does anybody know how to obtain this?
>

If you want to be able to spot the difference between a tab
and a space character you could highlight tabs like this.

(defface tab-face '((t (:background "red")))
  "highlight tabs")
(font-lock-add-keywords 'tacl-mode '(("\t" 0 tab-face   prepend)))
;;                       ^^^ substitute your mode name here

;; spaces can be highlighted too if you really want.
(defface space-face '((t (:background "grey" )))
  "highlight whitespace")
(font-lock-add-keywords 'tacl-mode '((" "  0 space-face prepend)))
;;                       ^^^ substitute your mode name here

If you only want to see trailing whitespace I use this
(defun stw () "Toggles `show-trailing-whitespace' on/off"
  (interactive)
  (setq show-trailing-whitespace (not show-trailing-whitespace)))