crux-start-or-switch-to

When trying to use crux-start-or-switch-to with slime-connect function there is problem that slime-connect names its buffer according to the type of common lisp implementation that it connected to, so the resulting buffer can be named "slime-repl sbcl", "slime-repl ccl" etc. I slightly changed the function, adding a helper get-buffer-extended function:

(defun get-buffer-extended (buffer-name &optional match)
"Finds a buffer by its name. If the optional parameter MATCH is then call the standard
GET-BUFFER, if MATCH is :PREFIX, then it looks for buffers with names starting with BUFFER-NAME
and returns the first one that matches. When MATCH is :REGEXP does the same but BUFFER-NAME
is a regular expression."
    (cond ((null match) (get-buffer buffer-name))
          ((eq match :regexp)
           (catch 'done
             (dolist (buffer (buffer-list))
               (let ((name (buffer-name buffer)))
                 (when (string-match buffer-name name)
                   (throw 'done buffer))))))
          ((eq match :prefix)
           (catch 'done
             (dolist (buffer (buffer-list))
               (let ((name (buffer-name buffer)))
                 (when (string-prefix-p buffer-name name)
                   (throw 'done buffer))))))))

  (defun start-or-switch-to (function buffer-name &optional match)
    "Modified crux-start-or-switch-to from https://github.com/bbatsov/crux/blob/master/crux.el
  Add MATCH parameter that can be :prefix to find any buffer that starts with BUFFER-NAME or
  :REGEXP to use regular expressions in the search string."
    (let ((buf (get-buffer-extended buffer-name match)))
      (if (not buf)
          (progn
            (split-window-sensibly (selected-window))
            (other-window 1)
            (funcall function))
        (switch-to-buffer-other-window buf))))

There probably are other cases like this, where the names of the buffers can vary, so maybe such generalization may be of use.

bbatsov / crux

crux-start-or-switch-to #25