The Absolute Beginner's Guide to Emacs

This video is intended for people who have used other code editors or IDEs before and are curious to try out Emacs! The goal is to teach you everything you need to know to get started with Emacs and use it for basic editing tasks. Once you get comfortable with the basics, check out the other Emacs video series that I've created to learn a whole lot more!

Check out my other video series on Emacs!

We cover the following topics:

- 0:00 Intro
- 1:33 Installation
- 2:17 GNU/Linux
- 3:03 GUI or Terminal?
- 4:06 macOS
- 4:46 Windows
- 5:13 Basic Concepts
- 5:29 The User Interface (Menu Bar, Tool Bar)
- 9:11 Menu Bar in the Terminal
- 10:02 Where's the file browser?
- 11:14 Windows and Frames
- 15:12 Buffers
- 19:01 The *scratch* buffer
- 19:49 The *Messages* buffer
- 20:37 The *Warnings* buffer
- 21:08 The Mode Line
- 25:22 The Echo Area and Minibuffer
- 27:06 Commands
- 29:27 Dired
- 30:49 Calendar
- 31:12 eshell
- 31:57 Tetris?
- 32:40 Major Modes
- 36:20 Minor Modes
- 37:01 Minor mode: highlight current line
- 38:46 Basic Key Bindings
- 39:40 Understanding Emacs Key Bindings
- 44:53 The Key Prefixes C-x and C-c
- 47:25 Opening and Saving Files
- 50:00 Switching Buffers
- 52:41 Cutting and Copying Text
- 55:31 Pasting Text
- 56:15 CUA Mode (C-c, C-x, and C-v)
- 57:53 Undo and Redo
- 59:41 Cancelling Operations
- 1:01:04 Learning More Key Bindings
- 1:03:20 The Help System
- 1:04:28 Configuring Emacs
- 1:04:42 The Customization UI
- 1:07:40 What's next?

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Intro music: Coriolis Effect by logos feat. stefsax, licensed CC-BY

[haiteng]

emacs intro videos like this, willing to reach down to people who don't know much command-line/linux, willing to take time to explain emacs parlance, is really rare. I am a scientist without programming background trying to establish org-mode as my note system, and I want the author to know that your video is immensely helpful

[stephenmcconnell]

Ok. I am 70 years old and a retired software developer. I have never used Emacs. I used vi and various IDEs. I never even THOUGHT of using Emacs, because it was “too hard and complex”. After being retired for the past 6 years and playing guitar in bars and restaurants, I got bored and started studying programming again. I eventually got interested in LISP and began looking for an IDE to use. Surprise! The one I heard the most about was EMACS. So, I’ve been trying to read the several books out there on EMACS and they were a confused jumble. I stumbled across your Channel and saw this Absolute Beginners guide. Your explaination of EMACS (so far) has been FANTASTIC. It is very clear and (once I get my Linux partition set up on my Mac) I will review this and other videos you have published on YouTube. I feel that in reality, EMACS is actually easy, now. Thank you a million. I’m gonna REALLY have some fun!!! I really love development and your videos have gotten me excited about it again.

[billmccaffrey]

I used emacs on and off for years, but it has been a decade since I touched it. Your series on emacs is helping me come back up to speed.

[phraggers]

Fantastic! I learned the very basics of Emacs around 5 years ago as I was teaching myself C and wanted an oldschool editor. I tend to move between projects and hobbies so it kinda got put to the side and I was exploring other editors, such as VS Code which is really good... but I found I really missed Emacs so I've come back, but suddenly realised I'd forgotten all the bindings lol! So I came to youtube for help and you didn't disappoint, fantastic tutorial, over an hour but it flew by!

[oryimangabriel]

Thank you very much. Learning software engineering and learning emacs is part of our curriculum. Your explanation was very clear for a newbie like me. Thanks.

[fikrirahmatnurhidayat]

The only video that makes me want to give emacs a try.
Well explained, now I understand that emacs is not a text editor in the first place.

It's just like Graphical version of Terminal. The evolution of the Terminal.

[zhaowang]

dude, you are the hero for someone unfamiliar with english. really save my time to read the mannual.

[dipalzambare]

Time to learn it again the 'right way'. Thanks for this!

[CandyCaneChris]

I can already tell this is one of those videos I will have to watch a few times. Thanks for the great Emacs content!

[zrodger]

I've been using emacs since around 1987. I worked at a company in the 90s writing accounting software. First day on the job, without thinking, I typed "emacs" on my (dumb) terminal. I say "cool, emacs!" Guy in the next cubicle says "you know emacs!?" Lots of emacs nerding out ensued. But over the years I took a break, and this video was great at helping me get back my emacs chops!

[arionlove]

Bless you for making this video, I have been thinking of making my own EMACS instead of using DOOM EMACS and I am being blessed with this video.

[MartinLeggewie]

Thanks again, David, for publishing such a beginner level video. You have explained the basics very well. I guess I have now finally understood the relationships between buffer, window, and frame. Thumbs up!

[archaiclord]

Thank you! Definitely the first video anyone should watch. Made things clear. Looking forward to starting your Emacs from scratch!

[adrianlewis]

I have been using Vim and Tmux for 10+ years, but I start a job with Clojure on Monday so I thought I'd move to Emacs. This guy has blown my mind,

[qsam]

I am interested in Linux and the world of cloud and data analytics. I have heard of people debating between vim and emacs. I used vim as a terminal text editor but could not figure out the keybindings for the life of me. I would always go back to using 'nano' in terminal. Consequently - I looked up emacs and your video is very straight-forward and I see there is so much more to emacs than just a terminal interface, the fact it has a GUI and many more features is astounding. It also makes for a very aesthetically pleasing pdf viewer.

[laserdiscbisque]

Years ago, I flunked out of a Math degree, but my first proper CS lessons were in DrRacket. Although I didn't make it for other reasons, the exposure to the functional-ish paradigm of lisp dialects was the biggest thing that helped me understand computer science.
I've gone back to school and am taking a second swing at a CS-adjacent career now, and remembering how much learning Racket helped me, my big extracurricular project has been to learn Common Lisp. Seems like SLIME is a must, and of course Emacs is a must for that.
I've been looking for MONTHS for a proper tutorial that could help me tackle the UI that's so unintuitive for a Windows 98 baby like me. But the great things I've heard about Emacs kept me looking, and I'm glad I found a tutorial for honest-to-god know-nothing beginners like myself :) Thanks boss!

[gurriato]

There's some really psychotic advice in the official Emacs tutorial, like how you should spend time practicing C-f/b/n/p instead of the arrow keys because it will make you so much more productive. It's like they're trying to alienate the maximum amount of people they can.

[LiterateProgramming]

Fantastic video. I thought about doing a similar thing for my students, but now I'm just having them watch this. Really digging your style. Thank

[yixingliu]

Thank you so much for making a great video for users of all levels. The emacs concepts are well explained.

[nqobilemdlalose]

I like the background music makes it feel like I'm listening to the radio which makes it easier to pay attention.