eintr: Note for Novices
A Note for Novices
==================
If you don’t know GNU Emacs, you can still read this document
profitably. However, I recommend you learn Emacs, if only to learn to
move around your computer screen. You can teach yourself how to use
Emacs with the built-in tutorial. To use it, type ‘C-h t’. (This means
you press and release the <CTRL> key and the ‘h’ at the same time, and
then press and release ‘t’.)
Also, I often refer to one of Emacs’s standard commands by listing
the keys which you press to invoke the command and then giving the name
of the command in parentheses, like this: ‘M-C-\’ (‘indent-region’).
What this means is that the ‘indent-region’ command is customarily
invoked by typing ‘M-C-\’. (You can, if you wish, change the keys that
are typed to invoke the command; this is called “rebinding”. 
Keymaps Keymaps.) The abbreviation ‘M-C-\’ means that you type your
<META> key, <CTRL> key and <\> key all at the same time. (On many
modern keyboards the <META> key is labeled <ALT>.) Sometimes a
combination like this is called a keychord, since it is similar to the
way you play a chord on a piano. If your keyboard does not have a
<META> key, the <ESC> key prefix is used in place of it. In this case,
‘M-C-\’ means that you press and release your <ESC> key and then type
the <CTRL> key and the <\> key at the same time. But usually ‘M-C-\’
means press the <CTRL> key along with the key that is labeled <ALT> and,
at the same time, press the <\> key.
In addition to typing a lone keychord, you can prefix what you type
with ‘C-u’, which is called the “universal argument”. The ‘C-u’
keychord passes an argument to the subsequent command. Thus, to indent
a region of plain text by 6 spaces, mark the region, and then type
‘C-u 6 M-C-\’. (If you do not specify a number, Emacs either passes the
number 4 to the command or otherwise runs the command differently than
it would otherwise.) Numeric Arguments (emacs)Arguments.
If you are reading this in Info using GNU Emacs, you can read through
this whole document just by pressing the space bar, <SPC>. (To learn
about Info, type ‘C-h i’ and then select Info.)
A note on terminology: when I use the word Lisp alone, I often am
referring to the various dialects of Lisp in general, but when I speak
of Emacs Lisp, I am referring to GNU Emacs Lisp in particular.
Info Catalog
eintr: Lisp History
eintr: Preface
eintr: Thank You