Re: How does M-x completion works

[Kevin Rodgers <kevin.d.rodgers@gmail.com>]

Hibou57 (Yannick Duchêne) wrote:
> Le Mon, 22 Feb 2010 23:06:45 +0100, Colin S. Miller 
>> An emacs autoload is where a function can be registered with emacs, but
>> not actually loaded.
>> When the function is first used in this instance of emacs, the defining
>> library is automatically loaded, and then the function is called as 
>> per usual.
>> This allows emacs to provide a lot of functionality without the memory 
>> and start-up
>> over head of actually loading the function at start up.
> Yes, I've seen about section 15.1 and 15.5 in the Emacs Lisp reference.
> Something else also takes part here : a file named loaddefs.el, which 
> contains a list of autoload definitions (which seems to confirm Emacs is 
> not scanning modules at start up). I've also tried to remove this file, 
> this does not change anything.

See also E.1 (Building Emacs), specifically the parts about dumping.

-- 
Kevin Rodgers
Denver, Colorado, USA