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201/NMODE Manual (Extended (Meta-X) Commands and Functions) Page 6-1
202/6. Extended (Meta-X) Commands and Functions
201/Not all NMODE commands are of the one or two character variety you have
seen so far. Most commands have long invocations composed of English
words. This is for two reasons: the long invocations are easier to remember
and more suggestive, and there are not enough two-character combinations
for every command to have one.
The commands with long names are known as 202/extended commands 201/because
they extend the set of two-character commands.
202/6.1 Issuing Extended Commands
201/M-X Begin an extended command. Follow by the command
invocation only; the command will ask for any
arguments.
C-M-X Same as M-X.
Extended commands are also called 202/M-X commands201/, because they all start
with the character Meta-X (203/m-x-prefix201/). The M-X is followed by the
command's long, suggestive invocation. The invocation is terminated with a
Return. For example, Meta-X Auto Fill Mode<CR> invokes
203/auto-fill-mode-command201/. This function when executed turns Auto Fill mode on
or off.
There are a great many functions in NMODE for you to call. They will be
described elsewhere in the manual, according to what they do. Here we are
concerned only with extended commands in general.
202/6.1.1 Typing The Command Name
201/When you type M-X, the cursor moves down to the echo area at the bottom
of the screen. "Extended Command:" is printed there, and when you type
the command name it echoes there. This is known as 202/reading a line in the
echo area201/. You can use any moving or deleting command (C-A, C-E, C-F,
C-B , C-D, Backspace, etc.) to help construct the M-X command. A C-G
cancels the whole M-X. These editing characters apply any time NMODE
reads a line in the echo area, not just within M-X.
The string "Extended Command:" which appears in the echo area is called a
202/prompt201/. The prompt always tells you what sort of argument is required and
what it is going to be used for; "Extended Command:" means that you are
inside of the command M-X, and should type the invocation of a function to
be called.
202/6.1.2 Completion
201/You can abbreviate the name of the command, typing only the beginning of
the name, as much as is needed to identify the command unambiguously. You
can also use completion on the function name. This means that you type part
of the command name, and NMODE visibly fills in the rest, or as much as can
be determined from the part you have typed.
201/Page 6-2 NMODE Manual (Completion)
You request completion by typing Return. For example, if you type M-X
Au<CR>, the "Au" expands to "Auto Fill Mode" because "Auto Fill Mode" is
the only command invocation that starts with "Au". If you ask for completion
when there are several alternatives for the next character, the bell rings and
nothing else happens.
Space is another way to request completion, but it completes only one word.
Successive Spaces complete one word each, until either there are multiple
possibilities or the end of the name is reached. If the first word of a
command is Edit, List, Kill, View or What, it is sufficient to type just the
first letter and complete it with a Space. (This does not follow from the
usual definition of completion, since the single letter is ambiguous; it is a
special feature added because these words are so common).
202/6.2 Arcane Information about M-X Commands
201/You can skip this section if you are not interested in customization, unless
you want to know what is going on behind the scenes.
Actually, 203/every 201/command in NMODE simply runs a function. For example,
when you type the command C-N, it runs the function
"203/move-down-extending-command201/". C-N can be thought of as a sort of
abbreviation. We say that the command C-N has been 202/connected 201/to the
function 203/move-down-extending-command201/. The name is looked up once when
the command and function are connected, so that it does not have to be
looked up again each time the command is used. The documentation for
individual NMODE commands usually gives the name of the function which
really implements the command in parentheses after the command itself.
Just as any function can be called directly with M-X, so almost any
function can be connected to a command. You can use the command M-X Set
Key (203/set-key-command201/) to do this. M-X Set Key reads the name of the
function from the keyboard, then reads the character command (including
metizers or other prefix characters) directly from the terminal. To define
C-N, you could type
M-X Set Key<CR>move-down-extending-command<CR>
and then type C-N. If, for instance, you use the function
203/{auto-fill-mode-command} 201/often, you could connect it to the command C-X Z
(not normally defined). You could even connect it to the command C-M-V,
replacing that command's normal definition. Set Key is good for redefining
commands in the middle of editing. An init file can do it each time you run
NMODE. See Section 22.1 [Init], page 1.