This is a collection of useful things I learned while searching the web for how to do something in Emacs. This blog is my effort to better remember and share these lessons.
The basics of Emacs copy/paste
Start visual selection C-SPC then navigate to end of selection.
M-w puts that text in the kill ring without deleting it. (Copy)
C-w puts that test in the kill ring and deletes it. (Cut)
C-y will “yank” that text out of the kill ring back into the buffer. (Paste)
Org Mode
Sparse tree search and tags
https://orgmode.org/manual/Sparse-trees.html https://orgmode.org/manual/Tag-Searches.html#Tag-Searches
C-c / m then the tag value.
Exiting a sparse tree is kind of weird but can be accomplished with C-c C-c and some Shift+Tab to cycle visibilities.
Narrowing Scope
Learn more: here
C-x n s To narrow a org mode to items under a single header
C-x n w To widen it back out. :praise:
Date and Time insertion
C-c ! Insert the current date
C-u C-c ! Will get you the current date and time!
Archiving DONE items
Learn more: here
C-c C-x C-a Archive a single item.
C-u C-c C-x C-s. Prompts for archives of items with status DONE. This can also be shortened to C-u C-c $.
Adding a CREATED property timestamp to an org item after it was made
- Add the CREATED property
C-C C-x p, choose created, nil - Go edit it and do
C-u C-c !to insert the timestamp.
VIM/EVIL
Selecting and changing quoted strings.
Learn more: here
va"visually select string including the quotes.vi"visually select the content of the string.ci"change the content of the string, between the quotes.
Substitution
Replace from the current line to the end of the file: :.,$s/target/replacement/g
Replace in the region all occurrences: :'<,'>s/target/replacement/g.
You can do this by visually selecting and then pressing : to enter ex mode.
Motion
Remember to move around with { and }. Moving by code blocks/paragraphs.
Ivy Mode
C-M-j Don’t use the selection, just enter the text you’ve written!
man
M-x man Opening man pages.
ispell spell check
brew install ispell
M-x ispell to run the spell checker.
Press A to accept a word for session. Use numbers in prompt at the top of the screen to select the suggestions.
Undo Tree
C-_ is undo. You can visualize the tree of things you undo. It’s C-x u. You can then move around that buffer, and the buffer you were editing gets previewed at each place in the undo tree.
Info mode
I cloned https://github.com/webframp/sicp-info and then I can read it in emacs by opening the .info buffer and running:
M-x Info-on-current-buffer
Python Debugging
Be in a file you want to run the debugger from. Or you can use M-x cd to change your working directory. To start the emacs pdb integration type M-x pdb.
This will prompt you in the minibuffer with:
Run pdb (like this?): pdb
You want to replace that pdb part with:
Run pdb (like this?): python -m pdb your_code.py
OR
Run pdb (like this?): python -m pdb -m module.path.to.your_code
That is going to kick you into the pdb prompt. Now you need to type help and read the pdb docs.