I started using Emacs the other day, and it's a fairly nice experience so far.
What I miss the most is Shift-movement to select text. That's a very convenient thing in Windows, and I now realize I use it all the time.
Below is my collection of Emacs survival-knowledge so far.
Did I miss anything?
1.1 Moving around Emacs
C-x C-c Exit Emacs C-g Stop current command sequence C-x C-s Save buffer C-x b Jump to different Buffer C-x C-b Buffer menu C-x ESC ESC Display most recent Lisp code C-x 1 Only display one window C-x 2 Display two windows
1.1.1 Repeat command
C-u n COMMAND
1.2 Moving around your document
C-SPC Put Mark at Point/Cursor C-x C-x Exchange Point and Mark C-u C-SPC Go back to previous locations (like undo but non-destructive)
1.2.1 Search
C-s Incremental Search C-r Reverse Incremental Search C-s C-w Search with the current word highlighted C-M-s Regexp Incremental Search C-M-r Regexp Incremental Search
1.2.2 Bookmarks
C-x r m <somekey> Mark bookmark C-x r b <somekey> Visit bookmark C-x r l List bookmarks
1.3 Display
C-x 2 Split window into two C-x 1 Only one window
C-x 5 2 Create new Emacs window
1.3.1 Don't wrap lines
toggle-truncate-lines
1.3.2 Display only functions
Almost. Display only lines with a maximum indentation
C-u 2 C-x $ Hide lines with text in column 1 or 2 C-x $ Show all lines again
1.4 Editing
M-x delete-trailing-whitespace
C-x C-q Make read-only file writable
M-c Capitalize the following word, moving over. M-l Convert following word to lower case, moving over. M-u Convert following word to upper case, moving over.
M-h Put point at beginning of this paragraph, mark at end.
1.4.1 Copy & Paste
C-k Kill to right of line, or blank line C-SPC Set Mark C-w Kill Region (between Mark and Point) (Cut) M-w Copy Region (Copy) C-y Yank copied text (Paste) M-y Yank older text (repeatedly)
1.4.2 Undo
C-x u Undo one step. C-f to "turn around" and redo instead C-_ Undo, same as above C-u C-_ Undo only in region
1.4.3 Typing
M-/ Command Completion with words from open buffers
1.4.4 Indentation
http://www.fnal.gov/docs/products/emacs/emacs/emacs_23.html#SEC182
C-M \ Indent several lines to same column (indent-region). (ESC C-M \)
1.4.5 Comparing
M-x compare-windows
1.4.6 Narrow to Region
This will dive into the current region and hide the rest of the document
C-x n n Narrow region C-x n w Widen region
1.5 Programming
1.5.1 Find Other Source file
Jump to corresponding header/cpp file, or the one on the point
ff-find-other-file
1.5.2 C++ etags
http://www.yolinux.com/TUTORIALS/LinuxTutorialXemacs.html
First, create a TAGS file, from the shell
find . -iregex '.*\.\(c\|h\|cpp\|cc\)' -print | etags -d -t --members -
Then tell Emacs you want to use it
M-x visit-tags-table
M-. Find a definition for a tag. The default tag is identifier under the cursor. Name completion type partial name and then TAB. M-, Find the next definition for the tag. M-* Pop tag stack (go back one level)
1.6 Useful tricks
1.6.1 Speedbar
The speedbar is a file/tags list
M-x speedbar
1.6.2 Shell Functions
M-x shell M-x grep M-! Single shell command
1.6.3 Macro recording
C-x ( Start recording C-x ) Stop recording X-x e Execute macro
Apply to the entire Region
M-x apply-macro-to-region-lines
Name the last recorded macro
M-x name-last-kbd-macro
Welcome to emacs.
Re:Selecting with shift...
jplindstrom on 2004-08-03T15:28:09
EXCELLENT!
Thanks!
;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;
;
; Selecting text with Shift+arrows, like in Windoze
;
;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;
(defun previous-line-and-select (&optional arg)
(interactive "_p")
(if (null (region-active-p))
(set-mark-command nil))
(previous-line arg))
(defun next-line-and-select (&optional arg)
(interactive "_p")
(if (null (region-active-p))
(set-mark-command nil))
(next-line arg))
(defun forward-char-and-select (&optional arg)
(interactive "_p")
(if (null (region-active-p))
(set-mark-command nil))
(forward-char arg))
(defun backward-char-and-select (&optional arg)
(interactive "_p")
(if (null (region-active-p))
(set-mark-command nil))
(backward-char arg))
(global-set-key '(shift up) 'previous-line-and-select)
(global-set-key '(shift down) 'next-line-and-select)
(global-set-key '(shift right) 'forward-char-and-select)
(global-set-key '(shift left) 'backward-char-and-select)
There is an old "emacs quick reference" (aka cheat sheet) floating around that you can print out.
Regarding changing file mode, do that from `dired` (when you edit a directory, just like a file) by typing 'M' with the cursor on the line the file is listed on
Re:How do I keep truncate lines?
merlyn on 2004-08-03T16:21:49
Because it's a buffer-local variable. You have to:which affects the value for each new buffer. You can determine this by asking for the help on that variable and noticing that it says "automatically becomes buffer-local when set in any fashion".(setq-default truncate-lines t)Generally, for most user settings, the modern "customize" mechanism is much easier. For example, M-x customize-apropos RET truncate RET brings up the settings for this variable.
Startup times are slow, compared to other editors. In my work, I hit a lot of different systems and investigate problems and questions. It's so much easier to fire up my personal vi-like favorite editor, vile, than it is to start emacs.
Do people seriously use emacs with Ange-FTP and the various shell/telnet modes to manage a lot of different environments and stay in one emacs all day? I think this might be a Good Thing, seeing as it would be convenient to have all the logs from your telnet sessions handy for reference, but I've not got the knack of it yet.
Re:Good information and comments
merlyn on 2004-08-05T16:22:17
"screen emacs" is your friend. I fire up an Emacs only about once a month or so on each machine I visit. Then, I just reuse it and abuse it.I also read mail, news, and connect to IRC from within Emacs. I use dired mode to avoid ever typing "rm mumble*mumble". I use shell mode to fire up a few shells inside Emacs, to allow me a consistent cut-paste environment.
At the risk of repeating myself, "screen emacs" is your friend.
Re:Good information and comments
jordan on 2004-08-05T16:42:12
Thanks for the pointer. I've been using it at home on my Linux machine like that a lot. I read email and news, connect to IRC and I've even been playing with the various WWW browsers from within emacs as an immersive technique.
I doubt that I could really keep an emacs running for days on the work machines. Some sys admin might object and they're often rebooting, but I could setup to fire off a set of rsh commands from my desktop each morning as I'm starting up to startup my various emacs sessions that I'd use all day. I typically check my Outlook email first anyway...
Re:Good information and comments
perrin on 2004-08-09T14:42:54
Ange-FTP (or rather it's successor) is pretty good, but these days I just let KDE handle that for me. It can deal with SCP in addition to FTP, and lets you edit in whichever editor you like.
