The Help System

To invoke the help system type the key sequence Ctrl-h or if your keyboard has it the HELP key.

A prompt will be displayed in the status line showing you which keys you can press next to enter one of the main options of the help system explained below. Alternatively, you can type either Ctrl-h or HELP again to display some text telling you more about the help system and how to use it.

The help system is exited after successfully invoking one of the commands described below or typing anything which is not a recognised command to the help system.

a

To list all function names matching regexp, type a regexp RET when in the help system.

b

Prints all key bindings and their associated commands which are installed in the current buffer.

e

Similarly to the a command, to list all variable names matching regexp, type e regexp RET when in the help system.

f

Displays the online documentation for a function. After invoking this option type the name of the function.

h

Shows some helpful text describing how to use the help system.

i

Enters the Info viewer. This allows you to browse through files written in the Info hypertext format. For more information see section Info Mode, for more information on Info files in general see @xref{Top,Info,,info}.

k

Displays the command (with its documentation) for a key sequence. After typing Ctrl-h k enter the key sequence you want documented as if you were going to invoke the command.

m

Display the documentation for the current major mode.

v

Displays the online documentation and current value of a variable. Type the name of the variable after invoking this option.

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