Quick and Dirty EMACS

Note that any ordinary character goes into the buffer (no insert is needed).

For a more detailed emacs manual, check out the GNU emacs manual


Some necessary abbreviations:
  C-   a control character, hit the control key (CTRL) and the character key simultaneously
  M-   a two-character command sequence where the first character is the escape key (DEL/ESC)
  (CR)   the carriage return key
  RUBOUT   on an HP terminal, shift the DEL/ESC key on a VT100, hit the DELETE key

Cursor operations:
  C-B   move left (backwards)
  C-F   move right (forwards)
  C-P   move up a line (previous)
  C-N   move down a line(next)
  RUBOUT   delete character to the left
  C-D   delete character to the right
  C-T   transpose two characters to the left (th --> ht)

Word operations:
  M-B   move left (backwards)
  M-F   move right (forwards)
  M-RUBOUT   kill word to the left (C-Y yanks it back)
  M-D   kill word to the right (C-Y yanks it back)
  M-T   transpose two words around cursor (if only --> only if)
  M-C   capitalize word (first letter only)
  M-U   uppercase entire word
  M-L   lowercase entire word

Line operations:
  C-A   move cursor to the beginning of the line
  C-E   move cursor to the end of the line
  C-K   kill from cursor to end of line (C-Y yanks it back)
  M-0 C-K   kill from beginning of line to cursor (C-Y yanks it back)

Sentence operations:
  M-A   move cursor to beginning of sentence
  M-E   move cursor to end of sentence
  M-K   kill from cursor to end of sentence (C-Y yanks it back)
  M-X RUBOUT   kill from beginning of sentence to cursor (C-Y yanks it back)

Paragraph operations:
  M-[   move cursor to beginning of paragraph
  M-]   move cursor to end of paragraph

Screen operations:
  C-V   show next screen
  M-V   show previous screen
  C-L   redisplay screen so that line with cursor on it is in the middle of the screen
  M-0 C-L   move line with cursor on it to top of screen

Buffer operations:
  C-X C-F   get a file into a buffer for editing
  C-X C-V   visit a file -- into buffer for editing
  M-<   move cursor to top of the current buffer
  M->   move cursor to bottom of the current buffer

Search and Replace:
  C-G   terminates all searches (sometimes you have to hit it twice)
  C-S string   search for "string"
  C-R string   reverse search for "string"
  M-X Replace String$string1$string2 (CR)   the $ is the result of hitting the M- key, search for "string1" and replace it with "string2"
  M-X Query Replace$string1$string2 (CR)   the $ is the result of hitting the M- key, search for "string1" and query: replace it with "string2"?
      if yes, hit the space bar
      if no, hit the RUBOUT key
halt the procedure with C-G

Leaving:
  C-X C-S   write the current buffer into a new version of the current file name
  C-X C-W   write the current buffer into a file with a different name
  C-X C-Z   exit to the exec (the @ prompt)

Help and its functions:
  C-G   abort anything at any time (it beeps, sometimes you need to hit it twice)
  M-? x   show what key "x" does
  C-_   general help
  C-_ L   show the last 60 keys pressed
  C-_ A string (CR)   show every command containing "string"
  C-_ D string   describe the command "string"
  M-X Undo M-   restore the buffer before the last kill, unkill, fill, sort, etc.
  C-Y   yank back the last thing killed