oreilly.com -- Online Catalog: Writing GNU Emacs Extensions

Buy Print Book:
$32.95 USD

Buy Print Book:
£23.50 GBP

Writing GNU Emacs Extensions Editor Customizations and Creations with Lisp

By Bob Glickstein
First Edition April 1997
Pages: 236 (More details)
(Average of 1 Customer Reviews)

Book description

This book introduces Emacs Lisp and tells you how to make the editor do whatever you want, whether it's altering the way text scrolls or inventing a whole new "major mode." Topics progress from simple to complex, from lists, symbols, and keyboard commands to syntax tables, macro templates, and error recovery.
Full Description

Yes, it is possible to be all things to all people, if you're talking about the Emacs editor. As a user, you can make any kind of customization you want, from choosing the keystrokes that invoke your favorite commands to creating a whole new work environment that looks like nothing ever developed before. It's all in Emacs Lisp -- and in this short but fast-paced book. GNU Emacs is more than an editor; it's a programming environment, a communications package, and many other things. To provide such a broad range of functions, it offers a full version of the Lisp programming language -- something much more powerful than the little macro languages provided in other editors (including older versions of Emacs). GNU Emacs is a framework in which you can create whole new kinds of editors or just alter aspects of the many functions it already provides. In this book, Bob Glickstein delves deep into the features that permit far-reaching Emacs customizations. He teaches you the Lisp language and discusses Emacs topics (such as syntax tables and macro templates) in easy-to-digest portions. Examples progress in complexity from simple customizations to extensive major modes. You will learn how to write interactive commands, use hooks and advice, perform error recovery, manipulate windows, buffers, and keymaps, exploit and alter Emacs's main loop, and more. Each topic is explored through realistic examples and a series of successive refinements that illustrate not only the Emacs Lisp language, but the development process as well, making learning pleasant and natural.

Post-purchase benefits:

Browse within this book

Cover | Table of Contents | Index | Colophon

No time right now?

Email these links Customers interested in this book may also be interested in:

Course: Unix for Web Programming Learn the fundamentals of Linux/Unix and how to prepare a server for Web Programming using Apache. Read more	Conference: O'Reilly Open Source Convention July 23-27, 2007 Portland, Oregon Read more	Course: Linux/Unix Sysadmin I Learn the basics of System Administration on your very own root server. Read more
Course: Learn C Programming These two courses will take you from newbie to advanced skills in open-source C programming. Read more	Course: Linux/Unix Sysadmin II Learn system administration skills in networking and DNS, on your very own root server. Read more	Course: Linux/Unix Sysadmin III Gain skills in linux/unix services, including email and web servers, on your very own root server. Read more

Book details

Title: Writing GNU Emacs Extensions
Subtitle: Editor Customizations and Creations with Lisp
First Edition: April 1997
ISBN 10: 1-56592-261-1
ISBN 13: 9781565922617
Pages: 236
Average Customer Reviews: (Based on 1 Reviews)

Featured customer reviews

Writing GNU Emacs Extensions Review 1998-03-21 00:00:00 Jonathan Headland [Reply | View]

?27?
In the function clobber-symlink, shouldn't
the prompt text for yes-or-no-p be more like:

(format "Disconnect %s from %s? "
buffer-file-name
target)

rather than:

(format "Replace %s with %s? "
buffer-file-name
target)

since the contents of target are never written
into buffer-file-name (and one wouldn't want
to either, since that would lose any unsaved
edits in the buffer)?

The code works fine, it's the prompt that seems
to be misleading.

Read all reviews

Media reviews

"A well-written, well-laid out tutorial and reference." --Craig McDonald, Computing Reviews, June 1998

"Just wanted to thank you for your book -- it's _exactly_ what I needed.... I'm a somewhat competent programmer who doesn't know Lisp, and I find the way you walk through examples and improve them to be exactly right for my interest and understanding...." --James A. Cherry

"This book is well-written with many good real-world examples. The writing style is very easy to read and the book is certainly up to the expectations I have of O'Reilly books. I highly recommend this book, as well as "Learning GNU Emacs," also published by O'Reilly...." --Eric Crampton, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, Virginia

Read all reviews