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I need to know how to make Emacs usable for a person so used to windows... Specifically what I really need are:

1) Copy-paste keys

2) Shift arrow to select text

3) The backspace acting regularly, i.e. I don't want the cursor to have to be on the letter to delete it.

Thank you very much for any help.

JDS
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2 Answers2

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  1. The Emacs defaults are M-w (Alt + w) for copy and C-y (Ctrl + y) for paste. If you want to use your standard shortcuts, go into the Options menu at the top of the window and activate the option labelled "C-x/C-c/C-v Cut and Paste (CUA)".

  2. This is not active by default. You start a selection by hitting C+<space> and then moving your pointer around (you can actually "set your mark" this way, and then do an incremental search with C-s to the place you'd like to select up to). You can activate Options > Active Region Highlighting to make the region more obvious. If you're in a windowing environment, you can use your mouse to make a selection.

  3. I'm not entirely sure what you mean by this one. Far as I know, backspace should work as normal in Emacs (though I have been using it for a while; I may have just forgotten what "normal" means here).

Also, as a former Windows/current Emacs user, keep it up. Learning Emacs really is worth it if you can put up with the alien UI (you may eventually want to get into a little bit of Lisp too).

Inaimathi
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  • The backspace solution may be `(global-set-key [(control h)] 'delete-backward-char)`, from http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs-en/BackspaceKey – ccoakley Jan 23 '12 at 07:07
  • @ccoakley - That'd definitely do it, but my backspace key does that already and my `.emacs` doesn't seem to modify its behavior. – Inaimathi Jan 23 '12 at 14:13
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For copy/paste, shift select see the packages (pc selection, cua mode, etc.) here.

Tom
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