Syntax highliting in ESS

[Stephen Eglen]

 > I am a newbie to ESS and Emacs, and I was a little disappointed by
 > the syntax highlighting.  The only thing that seems to change
 > colors/fonts is the <- symbol.  Do I have ESS configured wrong?  Or
 > is there some way to customize the syntax highlighting so that
 > other symbols and function names are highlighted?

It sounds like you might not be getting the default syntax
highlighting.  If I have the following in a file called "foo.R":

test <- function () {
  if (1 >0 ) {
    TRUE
  }
}

then the words `test' `function' `if' and `TRUE' are in different
colours.

Maybe ESS is not installed properly for you.  when you are in a buffer
called foo.R, what mode is it in?  (Type "C-h m" and you should see
a *Help* buffer with something like the follownig near the top:

ESS[S] mode:
Major mode for editing ESS source.
Optional arg ALIST describes how to customize the editing mode.
Optional arg PROC-NAME is name of associated inferior process.

Stephen