Re: multi-line highlighting

[Stefan Monnier]

> I have in an org-mode file a need to color the face of the string
> between 'Alpha:' and a period. To achieve this I have
>
> #+begin_src elisp
> (add-hook 'org-mode-hook (lambda ()
>    (font-lock-add-keywords nil
>      '(("\\(Alpha:\\)\\([^\n\r\t]+\\)\\(.\\)"
                                         ^^^
This is not the regexp for a "period".

Also this regexp will clearly not match multiple lines since you
explicitly exclude \n from the matched chars.

> as a local variable, but to no avail. I have searched online, but all
> the examples I've found are based on adding keywords, which is not what
> I want. I'm probably overlooking something simple.

Have you looked at the ELisp reference manual that comes with your Emacs?
It has a section called "Font Lock Multiline".


        Stefan