install.haml

%h1 Install the right Emacs

Install the latest release of [GNU Emacs]( http://www.gnu.org/s/emacs/) (24.1
as of this writing). Not XEmacs, not EmacsW32, not AquaMacs, not Carbon Emacs.

%h2 Linux

Emacs is probably already installed; if not, use your distro's package manager
(yum, apt-get, etc).

If your distro only has older Emacs packages, you could try finding a
third-party package repository, or [building the latest version from source](
http://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/emacs-faq.html#Compiling-and-installing-Emacs)
if you are comfortable doing so.

%h2 OS X

If you use [macports]( http://www.macports.org/), install the `emacs-app` port,
which gives you a native OS X application. By default macports will install
Emacs.app into /Applications/MacPorts. If you use a laptop I recommend the
`fullscreen` variant (i.e. `port install emacs-app +fullscreen`) which adds the
command `ns-toggle-fullscreen` to Emacs.

If you use [homebrew]( http://mxcl.github.com/homebrew/):
`brew install emacs --cocoa`.

Otherwise, you can use a [pre-built emacs]( http://emacsformacosx.com/), but do
consider installing macports or homebrew so that you can easily install other
Unixy tools as you need them.

%h2 Windows

You are mostly on your own as I am not a Windows user; I apologize in advance
if some of the examples in this guide don't work on your system, as I haven't
tested on Windows.

You'll want to download the latest `emacs-xx.x-bin-i386.zip` from
<http://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/emacs/windows/> and unzip it into a directory of
your choice. Then run `addpm.exe` from the `bin` subdirectory, as an
administrator (this adds a start menu shortcut and various registry entries).

Some Emacs functionality requires Unixy tools like `find` and `grep`, which you
can get by installing a posix emulation environment such as [Cygwin](
http://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/windows/Other-useful-ports.html). You will
have to ensure that the posix utilities are on the system PATH so that Emacs
can find them.

For further help refer to the [GNU Emacs FAQ for MS Windows](
http://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/windows/) and the (often outdated)
[EmacsWiki]( http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/MsWindowsInstallation).

%h2 Remove any existing .emacs configuration

If you have existing Emacs customizations in a `.emacs` file or `.emacs.d`
directory, you should move it out of the way if you want your Emacs behavior to
exactly mirror the examples in this guide.