Changing default starting directory

Changing default starting directory

[Charles Muller]

When I start up my Emacs (21.2 on Redhat 8) my startup directory in
*scratch* is by default

/home/chuck

I want to change this to 

/mnt/win_d/docs

And so I added the following to my .emacs file:

 '(default-directory "/mnt/win_d/docs")

This does not do the trick. I have Googled around a bit, and looked through
the Emacs manual to try to figure out how to do this, but with no luck
(probably, such a basic question, no one asks it).

Can anyone help me on this?

Thanks,

Chuck

---------------------------
Charles Muller  <acmuller@gol.com>
Faculty of Humanities,  Toyo Gakuen University
Digital Dictionary of Buddhism and CJKV-English Dictionary [http://www.acmuller.net]
H-Buddhism List Editor [http://www2.h-net.msu.edu/~buddhism/]
Mobile Phone: 090-9310-1787

Re: Changing default starting directory

[Benjamin Riefenstahl]

Hi Charles,


Charles Muller <acmuller@gol.com> writes:
> And so I added the following to my .emacs file:
> 
>  '(default-directory "/mnt/win_d/docs")

That doesn't look like a LISP function call.  Instead it looks like a
snippet from the customize section.  You know, that section that says
quite explicitly "don't edit or cut/paste it!" ;-).

For a LISP call you want 

 (cd "/mnt/win_d/docs")

Note that this is actually suggested when you do "C-h v
default-directory".


Hope this helps, benny

Re: Changing default starting directory

[Jesper Harder]

Charles Muller <acmuller@gol.com> writes:

> When I start up my Emacs (21.2 on Redhat 8) my startup directory in
> *scratch* is by default
>
> /home/chuck
>
> I want to change this to 
>
> /mnt/win_d/docs
>
> And so I added the following to my .emacs file:
>
>  '(default-directory "/mnt/win_d/docs")
>
> This does not do the trick.

Put 
    (cd "/mnt/win_d/docs")

in your .emacs instead.

Re: Changing default starting directory

[Charles Muller]

Thanks to Benny and Jesper for this solution.

Benny wrote:

>  You know, that section that says
> quite explicitly "don't edit or cut/paste it!" ;-).

Aha! So that's what they mean.

Chuck

---------------------------
Charles Muller  <acmuller@gol.com>
Faculty of Humanities,  Toyo Gakuen University
Digital Dictionary of Buddhism and CJKV-English Dictionary [http://www.acmuller.net]
H-Buddhism List Editor [http://www2.h-net.msu.edu/~buddhism/]
Mobile Phone: 090-9310-1787