This piece of code tells emacs where to find packages from or in more proper they are called 'repositories'. I personally use MELPA, ELPA and the official org-mode repo to get the latest version of orgmode. So keep what you want take out there rest. Oh and asuming you are new to elisp and emacs while editting these lines watch for the '()' and you should be fine.
Occasionally emacs will tell you it can't find a package in any of your declared repos all you will have to do is refresh your repositories. Unless the package doesn't actually exist in the repos the problem should be fixed.
You can install the packages manually by:
1. first hit [Meta] and x
2. then type 'package-install' and hit enter
3. then type in the name of the package you wish to install and hit enter again.
If the package exists in the repositories that you have asked emacs to look in, the packages will be installed or you will recieve an error message. If we directly use use package command in our config it will install the packages everytime emacs starts up even if they're already installed so we cannot use it in our configs.
You could also alternatively download packages as an archive file from the repos like the ones mentioned above and ask emacs to install them from the file. But unless you are developing packages for emacs and wish to test your package before publishing it, I do not recommend this method.
As you may have noticed both process are a bit tedious and will only get worse as time goes by. A better approach in my opinion would be to use a package manager like use-package which is what I do. You just need i the name of the package you wish to install and it will do the rest including updating the package.
This is one of the things people usually want to change right away. Bydefault, Emacs saves backup files in the current directory. These are the files ending in =~= that are cluttering up your directory lists. The following code stashes them all in =~/.emacs.d/backups=, where I can find them with =C-x C-f= (=find-file=) if I really need to.
As you may have seen when you start-up Emacs you are welcomed with a pretty boring welcome screen. It's not terrible, infact most of it is either to help you or for other functional purposes but a bit ugly nontheless. Since we're past the novice level or because you're reading this, it's safe to persume that you won't be using any of those so we might as well take it out and put on something good looking. I wouldn't claim that my dashboard is that good looking but it's functionality i believe makes up for it. the dashboard lists the most recent 5 files and projects that you have accessed. It also has a welcome message which you can configure it to say whatever you want, mine just says "Hey Abraham!". You must also notice that a new package is going to be installed for this functionality. If you want to keep things minimal you can skip this section.
I do quite a bit of web-development and have snippets, automatic indentation and autocompletion is a big help . =web-mode.el= is an autonomous emacs major-mode for editing web templates. It also takes care of basic stuff like syntax highlighting, auto pairing tags, removing white spaces etc. Web-mode is feature rich and as extensible as Emacs itself. For more details visit this [[http://web-mode.org/][link]]
#+BEGIN_SRC emacs-lisp
(use-package web-mode
:ensure t)
;;Automatically load web-mode when opening web-related files
Emmet (formerly *Zen Coding*) is a web-developer’s toolkit that can greatly improve your HTML & CSS workflow.
With Emmet, you can type CSS-like expressions that can be dynamically parsed, and produce output depending on what you type in the abbreviation. Emmet is developed and optimised for web-developers whose workflow depends on HTML/XML and CSS, but can be used with programming languages too.
For example, this abbreviation:
#+BEGIN_SRC html
ul#nav>li.item$*4>a{Item $}
#+END_SRC
...can be expanded into:
#+BEGIN_SRC html
<ul id="nav">
<li class="item1"><a href="">Item 1</a></li>
<li class="item2"><a href="">Item 2</a></li>
<li class="item3"><a href="">Item 3</a></li>
<li class="item4"><a href="">Item 4</a></li>
</ul>
#+END_SRC
#+BEGIN_SRC emacs-lisp
(use-package emmet-mode
:ensure t)
;;Turn on Emmet in web-mode.
(add-hook 'web-mode-hook 'emmet-mode)
;;Web-mode is able to switch modes into css (style tags) or js (script tags) in an html file. For Emmet to switch between html and css properly in the same document, this hook is added.
(add-hook 'web-mode-before-auto-complete-hooks
'(lambda ()
(let ((web-mode-cur-language
(web-mode-language-at-pos)))
(if (string= web-mode-cur-language "php")
(yas-activate-extra-mode 'php-mode)
(yas-deactivate-extra-mode 'php-mode))
(if (string= web-mode-cur-language "css")
(setq emmet-use-css-transform t)
(setq emmet-use-css-transform nil)))))
#+END_SRC
*** Rainbow
Mostly useful if you are into web development or game development. Every time emacs encounters a hexadecimal code that resembles a color, it will automatically highlight it in the appropriate color. This is a lot cooler than you may think.
If you write any code, you may enjoy this. Typing the first character in a set of 2, completes the second one after your cursor. Opening a bracket? It’s closed for you already. Quoting something? It’s closed for you already. You can easily add and remove pairs yourself, have a look.
So what this package does is it select text in way that's sensibe towards the syntax. So for example if I'm in a html tag that is the child of another tag, invoking the keybinding for this package will first select the child then the parent and hierarchichally move upwards. No need to drag the mouse around, this is selection done sensibly.
Unlike autocomplete which suggests words / symbols, snippets are pre-prepared templates which you fill in. I'm using a community library (=[[https://github.com/AndreaCrotti/yasnippet-snippets]]=) with *lots* of ready made options, and have my own directory of custom snippets I've added. Not sure if I should unify these by forking =yasnippet-snippets=. Type the shortcut and press =TAB= to complete, or =M-/= to autosuggest a snippet.
Inserts lorem ipsum text in your emacs buffer. This text has been used since the 16th Century as a dummy text when you are preparing the layout of some presentation but don’t have the final text yet, or want to demonstrate the layout without distracting the reader with actual content. The lorem ipsum text originated from “de Finibus Bonorum et Malorum” (The Extremes of Good and Evil) by Marcus Tullius Cicero, written in 45 BC but it has been so transformed along the years that now, it is relatively meaningless.
Multiple cursors for Emacs. Multiple cursors is a very nice package that lets you create several cursors that all do the same thing as you type (see the example below). You can add it to emacs using the steps described here Once you have installed it, it is useful to set up a keybinding (a keyboard short-cut) for it. You can do this by adding the following to your emacs config file to set C-c m c as the binding for multiple cursors.
*Projectile* is a project interaction library for Emacs. Its goal is to provide a nice set of features operating on a project level without introducing external dependencies (when feasible). For instance - finding project files has a portable implementation written in pure Emacs Lisp without the use of GNU find (but for performance sake an indexing mechanism backed by external commands exists as well).
Projectile tries to be practical - portability is great, but if some external tools could speed up some task substantially and the tools are available, Projectile will leverage them
Magit is an interface to the version control system Git, implemented as an Emacs package. Magit aspires to be a complete Git porcelain. While we cannot (yet) claim that Magit wraps and improves upon each and every Git command, it is complete enough to allow even experienced Git users to perform almost all of their daily version control tasks directly from within Emacs. While many fine Git clients exist, only Magit and Git itself deserve to be called porcelains.
I love it. You could get the same functionality with other text editors too but none so light wieght or polished in my opinion.
_k_: previous hunk _r_evert hunk _Q_uit and deactivate git-gutter
^ ^ _p_opup hunk
_h_: first hunk
_l_: last hunk set start _R_evision
"
("j" git-gutter:next-hunk)
("k" git-gutter:previous-hunk)
("h" (progn (goto-char (point-min))
(git-gutter:next-hunk 1)))
("l" (progn (goto-char (point-min))
(git-gutter:previous-hunk 1)))
("s" git-gutter:stage-hunk)
("r" git-gutter:revert-hunk)
("p" git-gutter:popup-hunk)
("R" git-gutter:set-start-revision)
("q" nil :color blue)
("Q" (progn (git-gutter-mode -1)
;; git-gutter-fringe doesn't seem to
;; clear the markup right away
(sit-for 0.1)
(git-gutter:clear))
:color blue))
#+END_SRC
*** Time machine
TimeMachine lets us step through the history of a file as recorded in git. Visit a git-controlled file and issue M-x git-timemachine (or bind it to a keybinding of your choice). If you just need to toggle the time machine you can use M-x git-timemachine-toggle. Use the following keys to navigate historic version of the file:
- =p= Visit previous historic version
- =n= Visit next historic version
- =w= Copy the abbreviated hash of the current historic version
- =W= Copy the full hash of the current historic version
- =g= Goto nth revision
- =t= Goto revision by selected commit message
- =q= Exit the time machine.
- =b= Run magit-blame on the currently visited revision (if magit available).
- =c= Show current commit using magit (if magit available).
This is a package for GNU Emacs that can be used to tie related commands into a family of short bindings with a common prefix - a Hydra.
Imagine that you have bound C-c j and C-c k in your config. You want to call C-c j and C-c k in some (arbitrary) sequence. Hydra allows you to:
- Bind your functions in a way that pressing C-c jjkk3j5k is equivalent to pressing C-c j C-c j C-c k C-c k M-3 C-c j M-5 C-c k. Any key other than j or k exits this state.
- Assign a custom hint to this group of functions, so that you know immediately after pressing C-c that you can follow up with j or k.
If you want to quickly understand the concept, see [the video demo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qZliI1BKzI).
[_p_] Next [_n_] Next [_l_] Edit lines [_0_] Insert numbers
[_P_] Skip [_N_] Skip [_a_] Mark all [_A_] Insert letters
[_M-p_] Unmark [_M-n_] Unmark [_s_] Search
[Click] Cursor at point [_q_] Quit"
("l" mc/edit-lines :exit t)
("a" mc/mark-all-like-this :exit t)
("n" mc/mark-next-like-this)
("N" mc/skip-to-next-like-this)
("M-n" mc/unmark-next-like-this)
("p" mc/mark-previous-like-this)
("P" mc/skip-to-previous-like-this)
("M-p" mc/unmark-previous-like-this)
("s" mc/mark-all-in-region-regexp :exit t)
("0" mc/insert-numbers :exit t)
("A" mc/insert-letters :exit t)
("<mouse-1>" mc/add-cursor-on-click)
;; Help with click recognition in this hydra
("<down-mouse-1>" ignore)
("<drag-mouse-1>" ignore)
("q" nil)
("<mouse-1>" mc/add-cursor-on-click)
("<down-mouse-1>" ignore)
("<drag-mouse-1>" ignore))
#+END_SRC
* Windmove
Windmove is a library built into GnuEmacs starting with version 21. It lets you move point from window to window using Shift and the arrow keys. This is easier to type than ‘C-x o’ and, for some users, may be more intuitive.
As you keep using emacs or a specific desktop setup, you'll notice that you open certain files/folder more often than others, hence it's only sensible to set up key bindings that will open those specific files and save you the time of navigating through your file system.
This is a habit of mine. Whenever a find some good material on a paricular topic I list it in this org file.A small description on what it is and a link to it.
This package converts the buffer text and the associated decorations to HTML. To use it, just switch to the buffer you want HTML-ized and type M-x htmlize-buffer. You will be switched to a new buffer that contains the resulting HTML code. You can edit and inspect this buffer, or you can just save it with C-x C-w. M-x htmlize-file will find a file, fontify it, and save the HTML version in FILE.html, without any additional intervention. M-x htmlize-many-files allows you to htmlize any number of files in the same manner. M-x htmlize-many-files-dired does the same for files marked in a dired buffer.
;; What executable of Python will be used (if nil nothing will be showed).
(setq doom-modeline-python-executable "python")
;; Whether show `all-the-icons' or not (if nil nothing will be showed).
;; The icons may not be showed correctly on Windows. Disable to make it work.
(setq doom-modeline-icon t)
;; Whether show the icon for major mode. It should respect `doom-modeline-icon'.
(setq doom-modeline-major-mode-icon t)
;; Whether display minor modes or not. Non-nil to display in mode-line.
(setq doom-modeline-minor-modes nil)
(setq find-file-visit-truename t)
#+END_SRC
* Try
Sometimes if I'm not really sure about a package, I find it hard to convince myself to add them to my config just for the sake of trying it or to install them to find that I dont really like it and then uninstall it. This package let's me "try" stuff. It actually installs a package but only temporarely. Any package I install with try will be lost if and when I restart emacs.
