From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: main.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Thien-Thi Nguyen Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.help Subject: Re: Emacs internals + lisp guru question Date: 29 Sep 2002 07:48:55 +0000 Organization: sometimes Sender: help-gnu-emacs-admin@gnu.org Message-ID: References: NNTP-Posting-Host: localhost.gmane.org X-Trace: main.gmane.org 1033286775 11339 127.0.0.1 (29 Sep 2002 08:06:15 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@main.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 29 Sep 2002 08:06:15 +0000 (UTC) Return-path: Original-Received: from monty-python.gnu.org ([199.232.76.173]) by main.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 3.35 #1 (Debian)) id 17vZ5h-0002wl-00 for ; Sun, 29 Sep 2002 10:06:14 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1] helo=monty-python.gnu.org) by monty-python.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.10) id 17vZ5t-0007T0-00; Sun, 29 Sep 2002 04:06:25 -0400 Original-Path: shelby.stanford.edu!nntp.stanford.edu!newsfeed.stanford.edu!newsfeed.berkeley.edu!ucberkeley!sjc-peer.news.verio.net!news.verio.net!iad-read.news.verio.net.POSTED!not-for-mail Original-Newsgroups: gnu.emacs.help Original-Lines: 40 X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.7/Emacs 20.4 Original-NNTP-Posting-Host: 192.220.78.38 Original-X-Complaints-To: abuse@verio.net Original-X-Trace: iad-read.news.verio.net 1033285492 192.220.78.38 (Sun, 29 Sep 2002 07:44:52 GMT) Original-NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 29 Sep 2002 07:44:52 GMT Original-Xref: nntp.stanford.edu gnu.emacs.help:105474 Original-To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org Errors-To: help-gnu-emacs-admin@gnu.org X-BeenThere: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.0.11 Precedence: bulk List-Help: List-Post: List-Subscribe: , List-Id: Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: Xref: main.gmane.org gmane.emacs.help:2019 X-Report-Spam: http://spam.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.help:2019 gnuist006@hotmail.com (gnuist006) writes: > There are some functions that take a list as argument. > Text can be read from the buffer as a string. > There are some functions that take a "symbol" as an argument. > A string can be converted to a symbol. this is like poetry! > However, when symbol is provided to the function by converting a string > it is not working. move point after the close-paren for each of these forms and do C-x C-e: (describe-function 'make-symbol) (describe-function 'intern) (describe-function (intern "describe-function")) > What is the meaning of the gibberish from > (insert (format "%s" (symbol-function 'describe-function) )) the only gibberish i see is the white space here...........^ (which might be significant according to some demented read-table mungers). which gibberish are you referring to, specifically? > What is out there to learn more about emacs/emacs_lisp and become more > sophisticated? grep the net for "elisp manual". if that's too heavy, try ttn's elisp tutorial (still incomplete but maybe you can help): http://www.glug.org/people/ttn/software/elisp-tutorial/ but be careful of trying to be too sophisticated: http://www.glug.org/people/random/flame.txt [newsgroups trimmed.] thi