EmacsWiki: Category Documentation (original) (raw)

This category is about Emacs Documentation. See also CategoryHelp.

There is also a page on other BooksAboutEmacs. For an introduction to Emacs, see EmacsNewbie.

Emacs comes with a tutorial, which can be accessed using C-h t or the Help menu. It will walk you step-by-step through an editing session in which you will learn the basics of using Emacs as an editor. See EmacsTutorial.

Emacs also comes with a complete manual, called the EmacsManual. It might be helpful to know some EmacsDocumentationNotation.

If you wish to extend Emacs, you can do so using EmacsLisp, or Elisp for short. You can learn the basics of simple Emacs Lisp programming by reading the EmacsLispIntro, and a complete reference manual for Emacs Lisp is available in the EmacsLispReference.

See EmacsNewbieHelpReference for finding help in Emacs.

Emacs comes with ReferenceCards. Emacs is known as “the SelfDocumenting” editor, though, so while the refcard can be useful, one should learn to rely on InfoMode for most of the more complicated features of this editor.

If you need information on a specific library within Emacs, use FinderCommentary. And FinderMode lists available libraries by keyword categories.

Reading within Emacs documentation that is not about Emacs but about other parts of the system is available with WoMan, ManMode, and InfoMode.

ExternalDocumentation is about integrating other sources of information, it explains how to install Info-format documentation for Git manual, Python manual, etc.

To access Emacs related documentation online without Emacs, see Emacs Docs which includes the manuals for Emacs, Elisp, OrgMode, Magit and AUCTeX.