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This quick reference is arranged topically, in roughly the same order as the commands were treated in the text. Unfortunately, it's impossible to be both "quick" and thorough, particularly with an editor as large and comprehensive as GNU Emacs. We've tried to take a middle road between "completeness" and "quickness"; we'll confess that, if we've erred, we've erred on the side of quickness.
| Keystrokes | Command Name | Action |
|---|---|---|
| emacs | (none) | When typed at the shell prompt, start Emacs. |
| C-x C-f | find-file | Find file and read it. |
| Files | ||
| C-x C-v | find-alternate-file | Read an alternate file, replacing the one read with C-x C-f. |
| C-x i | insert-file | Insert file at cursor position. |
| Files | ||
| C-x C-s | save-buffer | Save file. |
| Files | ||
| C-x C-w | write-file | Write buffer contents to file. |
| Files | ||
| C-x C-c | save-buffers-kill-emacs | Exit Emacs. |
| Files | ||
| C-z | suspend-emacs | Suspend Emacs (use exit or fg to restart). |
| C-x b | switch-to-buffer | Moves to the buffer specified. |
| C-x C-b | list-buffers | Displays the buffer list. |
| Buffers |