Re: Cool and Useful LISP for the .emacs file

[Dan Anderson <dan@mathjunkies.com>]

> Here's my cool tip:
> 
>    Delete your .emacs!
> 
> This means that you can go to a new machine, run Emacs on it, and it
> works just the same as on your old machine!  No more confusion over
> non-default keybindings, unusual settings for variables, bizarre mode
> hooks, etc.  And when you find a problem you know it's really to do with
> Emacs and not with some "cool" trick you copied out of someone else's
> .emacs without understanding it.

	Start emacs with -q when you have a problem.  It sets it to default
mode.  If you can only reproduce the problem when using your .emacs you
can go about debugging your .emacs file.  

	Of course, some people are probably saying "but debugging LISP is
hard!"  Well, fear not.  Remove the last thing you inserted.  It's
probably what's causing the screw up.  (Or restore the backup you made
of your .emacs from the last time you edited it.  Didn't make one?  Try
loading ~/.emacs~)

	I'd also like to point out that many of us who use Emacs and customize
it until we couldn't think of another feature to code use Emacs for
coding.  Learning LISP is not hard and we are certainly qualified to
make changes to the .emacs

	I'd also like to point out that your site administrator probably has
created a site lisp file similar to the .emacs to customize emacs for
your company or organization.  That or you've never needed to install a
single .el file.  (Come on, not everything is stock).

	Plus, if you've ever changed anything in Emacs and hit the save button
you probably /have/ created machine generated in your .emacs to save
your settings.  

-Dan