gnus-topic-update-topic-line: Wrong type argument: number-or-marker-p, nil

[Loris Bennett]

Hi,

Does any one know what could be causing this error:

gnus-topic-update-topic-line: Wrong type argument: number-or-marker-p,
nil

Is there some way of resetting the topics?

Cheers,

Loris

[Emanuel Berg]

Post by Loris Bennett
Does any one know what could be causing this
gnus-topic-update-topic-line: Wrong type
argument: number-or-marker-p,
nil

I don't have that as a function but it means it
expects an argument that is accepted by the
`number-or-marker-p' test, and now what it gets
is nil which doesn't pass.

This most often doesn't happen because some
complete lamer is sending it nil and expect it
to work, but rather some symbol is passed that
most often makes sense, only right now it isn't
set, or set incorrectly/unexpectedly to nil.

[Loris Bennett]

Post by Emanuel Berg

Post by Loris Bennett
Does any one know what could be causing this
gnus-topic-update-topic-line: Wrong type
argument: number-or-marker-p,
nil

I don't have that as a function but it means it
expects an argument that is accepted by the
`number-or-marker-p' test, and now what it gets
is nil which doesn't pass.
This most often doesn't happen because some
complete lamer is sending it nil and expect it
to work, but rather some symbol is passed that
most often makes sense, only right now it isn't
set, or set incorrectly/unexpectedly to nil.

Here the backtrace when I start Gnus and then try to toggle topics

Debugger entered--Lisp error: (wrong-type-argument char-or-string-p nil)
insert(nil)
(progn (insert name) (point))
(gnus-add-text-properties (point) (progn (insert name) (point)) (cons (quote face) (cons (list (quote bold) (quote default)) (quote (gnus-face t)))))
(progn (gnus-add-text-properties (point) (progn (insert name) (point)) (cons (quote face) (cons (list (quote bold) (quote default)) (quote (gnus-face t))))) (point))
(gnus-put-text-property (point) (progn (gnus-add-text-properties (point) (progn (insert name) (point)) (cons (quote face) (cons (list (quote bold) (quote default)) (quote (gnus-face t))))) (point)) gnus-mouse-face-prop gnus-mouse-face)
(progn (insert indentation "[ ") (gnus-put-text-property (point) (progn (gnus-add-text-properties (point) (progn (insert name) (point)) (cons (quote face) (cons (list (quote bold) (quote default)) (quote (gnus-face t))))) (point)) gnus-mouse-face-prop gnus-mouse-face) (insert (format " -- %d ]%s\n" total-number-of-articles visible)))
eval((progn (insert indentation "[ ") (gnus-put-text-property (point) (progn (gnus-add-text-properties (point) (progn (insert name) (point)) (cons (quote face) (cons (list (quote bold) (quote default)) (quote (gnus-face t))))) (point)) gnus-mouse-face-prop gnus-mouse-face) (insert (format " -- %d ]%s\n" total-number-of-articles visible))))
gnus-topic-insert-topic-line(nil t t 1 nil 0)
gnus-topic-prepare-topic(((nil visible)) 1 5 nil nil 1 nil)
gnus-topic-prepare-topic((("Gnus" visible nil nil) (("Drafts" visible nil nil)) (("FU" visible nil nil) (("Exchange" invisible nil nil) (("General" invisible nil nil) (("Unix" invisible nil nil))) (("Work" invisible nil nil) (("Old org structure" invisible nil nil)) (("Archive" invisible nil nil))) (("Private" invisible nil nil))) (("Gmail" invisible nil nil)) (("GMX" invisible nil nil))) (("Newsgroups" visible nil nil) (("Emacs" visible nil nil)) (("HPC" visible nil nil))) (("Mail" invisible nil nil)) ((nil visible))) 0 5 nil nil 1 nil)
gnus-group-prepare-topics(5 nil nil)
gnus-group-list-groups(nil)
#[nil "\204 \204\306 \207\307\310!\210\311\n!\f\204
gnus-1(nil nil nil)
gnus(nil)
funcall-interactively(gnus nil)
call-interactively(gnus record nil)
command-execute(gnus record)
execute-extended-command(nil "gnus" "gnus")
funcall-interactively(execute-extended-command nil "gnus" "gnus")
call-interactively(execute-extended-command nil nil)
command-execute(execute-extended-command)
recursive-edit()
debug()
funcall-interactively(debug)
call-interactively(debug record nil)
command-execute(debug record)
execute-extended-command(nil "debug" "debu")
funcall-interactively(execute-extended-command nil "debug" "debu")
call-interactively(execute-extended-command nil nil)
command-execute(execute-extended-command)

My assumption is that something happened to .newsrc and/or .newsrc.eld
and that has occurred. Is there someway to discard all the topic
information and start afresh?

Cheers,

Loris

[Emanuel Berg]

Post by Loris Bennett
Here the backtrace when I start Gnus and then
try to toggle topics [...]
My assumption is that something happened to
.newsrc and/or .newsrc.eld and that has
occurred. Is there someway to discard all the
topic information and start afresh?

Well, which one do you use?

In .newsrc.eld it says

;; Never delete this file -- if you want to force Gnus to read the
;; .newsrc file (if you have one), touch .newsrc instead.

But that's almost never a good idea. If you
solve the problem by deleting files that have
been populated automatically, what will happen
is what once produced the bug will just do
so again!

Rather, what hits do you get when you search
all your Emacs init files for "topic"?

[Loris Bennett]

Post by Emanuel Berg

Post by Loris Bennett
Here the backtrace when I start Gnus and then
try to toggle topics [...]
My assumption is that something happened to
.newsrc and/or .newsrc.eld and that has
occurred. Is there someway to discard all the
topic information and start afresh?

Well, which one do you use?

Well I have both. In .newsrc there are just the following two lines:

gnu.emacs.gnus: 1-89003
gnu.emacs.help: 1-228165

In .newsrc.eld there is

(setq gnus-topic-alist ...)

so maybe I could just bin that.

Post by Emanuel Berg
In .newsrc.eld it says
;; Never delete this file -- if you want to force Gnus to read the
;; .newsrc file (if you have one), touch .newsrc instead.
But that's almost never a good idea. If you
solve the problem by deleting files that have
been populated automatically, what will happen
is what once produced the bug will just do
so again!
Rather, what hits do you get when you search
all your Emacs init files for "topic"?

My init.el just contains

(add-hook 'gnus-group-mode-hook 'gnus-topic-mode)

as it has for many a moon.

I have fiddled around a bit I can now get topics to show without the
'wrong type argument' error. However, the topics are behaving
strangely. If I try to unindent the topic 'FU that is displayed as
indented, i.e. as a subtopic, I get the error

Nothing to indent Drafts into

where 'Drafts' is the topic under which 'FU' currently and incorrectly
appears (the amount of indentation makes 'FU' actually look like a
subsubtopic of 'Drafts').

Other topics exist, but I can only see them if I explicitly do a
'jump to topic'. If I then fold the parent topics and then try to
unfold them, I get a 'no group on current line' at some point.

So basically the whole hierarchical structure of the topics seems
borked, so I would really like to throw it away and start anew, as I
only have around a dozen topic.

Cheers,

Loris

[Emanuel Berg]

Post by Loris Bennett
So basically the whole hierarchical structure
of the topics seems borked, so I would really
like to throw it away and start anew, as
I only have around a dozen topic.

OK, then do what it says in .newsrc.eld and
touch(1) .newsrc and see what happens :)

(man "touch")