Re: variable-width font in summary buffer?

on Sat Jul 05 2008, Miles Bader <miles-AT-gnu.org> wrote:

> David Abrahams <dave <at> boostpro.com> writes:
>> I'd like to use a variable-width font in my summary buffers, but it
>> seems that, especially when displaying threads, much of what Gnus does there
>> depends on a monospaced font.
>>
>> Is anyone successfully using a variable-pitch font in the summary
>> buffer, and if so, do you have any configuration tips?
>
> It shouldn't be that hard if gnus maintains lets you add text-properties
> to the summary-buffer format string.  If it does, you could add display
> properties like (space :align-to COLUMN) instead of using spaces for
> padding.

Hi Miles,

That's an interesting idea.  Do you have any pointers that might help me
discover how to do that?  I'm a longtime emacs user but this sounds like
a bit of a stretch for me to figure out on my own.

> Actually, gnus probably ought to have a format spec that allows doing
> this simply.
>
> E.g., it could use %N| to add a space which aligns to column N ("%45|"
> would align to column 45).
>
> Perhaps just "%|" (without a column) could auto-calculate the column
> based on the calculated "fixed-width" position.