GNU ELPA - comint-mime

To start enjoying comint-mime, simply call M-x comint-mime-setup from a supported buffer (which, at the moment, are the M-x shell and M-x run-python buffers). To apply this permanently, add that same function to the appropriate mode hook:

(add-hook 'shell-mode-hook 'comint-mime-setup)
(add-hook 'inferior-python-mode-hook 'comint-mime-setup)

For Python it is recommended to use the IPython interpreter. It can be configured to have the same look-and-feel as the classic python program as follows.

(when (executable-find "ipython3")
  (setq python-shell-interpreter "ipython3"
	python-shell-interpreter-args "--simple-prompt --classic"))

If using the regular python interpreter, only Matplotlib figures are supported, and you need to call plt.show() and plt.close() manually to display and create new figures.

Advertisement: For an even more featureful Python shell with improved completion, graphic capabilities and more, have a look at the dREPL package.

The following options are available:

• comint-mime-use-mathjax: Whether to use the mathjax package to render LaTeX fragments. It is true by default, as long as you have the necessary external prerequisites installed (namely, the Node JavaScript runtime.)
• comint-mime-use-vtable: Whether to use the vtable package when displaying HTML tables. This improves alignment and makes the tables navigable and sortable. This option is enabled by default if vtable is available (Emacs 29 or newer).

To add support for new MIME types, see comint-mime-renderer-alist.

To add support for new Comints, an entry should be added to comint-mime-setup-function-alist. This function should arrange for the inferior process to emit an escape sequence whenever some MIME content is to be displayed.

The escape sequence has the following shape:

ESC ] 5 1 5 1 ; header LF payload ESC \

Here, header is a JSON object containing, at least, the entry type, which should be the name of a MIME type. Other header entries can be passed; the interpretation is up to the rendering function.

The payload can be either the content of the attachment, encoded in base64 (which is decoded before being passed to the selected renderer), or a file:// URL (whose content is read and passed to the renderer), or yet a tmpfile:// URL, which indicates that the file should be deleted after it is read.

Note that it can take considerable time to insert large amounts of data in a Comint buffer, specially if it contains long lines. Consider using a temporary file for large data transfers.

Discussions, suggestions and code contributions are welcome! Since this package is part of GNU ELPA, contributions require a copyright assignment to the FSF.