Variable: allout-distinctive-bullets-string

allout-distinctive-bullets-string is a customizable and buffer-local variable defined in allout.el.gz.

Documentation

Persistent outline header bullets used to distinguish special topics.

These bullets are distinguish topics with particular character. They are not used by default in the topic creation routines, but are offered as options when you modify topic creation with a universal argument (C-u (universal-argument)), or during rebulleting (M-x allout-rebullet-current-heading (allout-rebullet-current-heading)).

Distinctive bullets are not cycled when topics are shifted or otherwise automatically rebulleted, so their marking is persistent until deliberately changed. Their significance is purely by convention, however. Some conventions suggest themselves:

 ( - open paren -- an aside or incidental point
 ? - question mark -- uncertain or outright question
 ! - exclamation point/bang -- emphatic
 [ - open square bracket -- meta-note, about item instead of item's subject
 " - double quote -- a quotation or other citation
 = - equal sign -- an assignment, some kind of definition
 ^ - carat -- relates to something above

Some are more elusive, but their rationale may be recognizable:

 + - plus -- pending consideration, completion
 _ - underscore -- done, completed
 & - ampersand -- addendum, furthermore

(Some other non-plain bullets have special meaning to the
software. By default:

 ~ marks encryptable topics -- see allout-topic-encryption-bullet
 # marks auto-numbered bullets -- see allout-numbered-bullet.)

See allout-plain-bullets-string for the standard, alternating bullets.

You must run allout-set-regexp in order for outline mode to adopt changes of this value.

DO NOT include the close-square-bracket, ], on either of the bullet strings.

Source Code

;; Defined in /usr/src/emacs/lisp/allout.el.gz
;;;_  = allout-distinctive-bullets-string
(defcustom allout-distinctive-bullets-string "*+-=>()[{}&!?#%\"X@$~_\\:;^"
  "Persistent outline header bullets used to distinguish special topics.

These bullets are distinguish topics with particular character.
They are not used by default in the topic creation routines, but
are offered as options when you modify topic creation with a
universal argument (\\[universal-argument]), or during rebulleting (\\[allout-rebullet-current-heading]).

Distinctive bullets are not cycled when topics are shifted or
otherwise automatically rebulleted, so their marking is
persistent until deliberately changed.  Their significance is
purely by convention, however.  Some conventions suggest
themselves:

 `(' - open paren -- an aside or incidental point
 `?' - question mark -- uncertain or outright question
 `!' - exclamation point/bang -- emphatic
 `[' - open square bracket -- meta-note, about item instead of item's subject
 `\"' - double quote -- a quotation or other citation
 `=' - equal sign -- an assignment, some kind of definition
 `^' - carat -- relates to something above

Some are more elusive, but their rationale may be recognizable:

 `+' - plus -- pending consideration, completion
 `_' - underscore -- done, completed
 `&' - ampersand -- addendum, furthermore

\(Some other non-plain bullets have special meaning to the
software.  By default:

 `~' marks encryptable topics -- see `allout-topic-encryption-bullet'
 `#' marks auto-numbered bullets -- see `allout-numbered-bullet'.)

See `allout-plain-bullets-string' for the standard, alternating
bullets.

You must run `allout-set-regexp' in order for outline mode to
adopt changes of this value.

DO NOT include the close-square-bracket, `]', on either of the bullet
strings."
  :type 'string
  :local t
  :group 'allout)