Hi all,
I'd like to change the default location Emacs looks when first you press C-x C-f (ie. open file). By default the directory is the one containing the emacs binary, and having to change that to somewhere a few directories below ~ each time I open it is getting old...

Not had much luck on google, but there's so many .emacs options that I suspect I'm just not searching for the right one.
Thanks,
-Laura

Would you tell me what command you use in EMacs to change directory?

I typed Esc-x, but when I type in a directory,like /etc/tmp, I just get the response, 'no match'.

thanks

Well, I don't really mean in terms of changing directory - I mean the initial directory it looks in when trying to open a file (Ctrl+X Ctrl+F).

I understand your question - unfortunately I can't help - but my own question (albeit ignorance) is how do you change the directory to be able to call up a file.

If I use Ctrl-x, Esc-x and then type the new directory I just get "no match". I am wondering if I am typing the directory incorrectly or nedd some other command?

I am using syntax like: "/etc/X11" for directory.

I found your post searching for emacs help and it seemed like you were able to change directory.

If y can help I would appreciate it.

Well, I'm not really sure what you're asking. Are you trying to get a directory listing of /etc/X11, or are you trying to open a file which is located in /etc/X11? "Changing directory" is a shell operation, not a text-editing operation, so I'm a little confused :-)

If what you're trying to do is open a file- the command that I listed in my post (Ctrl-x, Ctrl-F) is the command that you should be using.
For example, if you want to open /etc/X11/XF86Config, type Ctrl-x Ctrl-f, and type /etc/X11/XF86Config.

emacs supports tab-completion, if that helps you any :-) Entering a partial path and hitting Tab will give you the full completion, if the path/filename is unique, or let you know if it's not. If the path is not unique hitting Tab again will bring up the "Completions" buffer, which will give you a listing of everything that emacs finds matching your entry.

As another thought, if you're trying to run a shell command, the emacs command is M-! (i.e. Alt+Shift+1), and you'll get a prompt saying "Shell command:" from which you can run a single command (ls /etc/X11/, perhaps?). To get a whole shell running inside of emacs as a separate buffer, the command would be 'M-x shell'

Hopefully that's not too much information!

that's an interesting question however i don't think you can without going into the source code directly
emacs kind of "thinks" about what directory is default like if you are currently editing in a directory it guesses you mean the same one and like that..... or it defaults to ~

there is a behavior you can use but it's most likely not any easier
ESC - x shell
then cd in that shell process should change default dir (this behaviour can be blocked in .emacs)

or better yet i think someone else was saying just from a xterm type shell
cd to the directory you want and type
emacs ./
or just emacs ./ in ~ and tunnel to where you want to be
emacs is a file and directory browser as well

Okay - I figured out my problem. It was especially confusing as my very similar version of emacs onmy desktop and laptop did not quite behave the same and I am not too familiar with unix commands (mdk 10 vs 10.1). It turns out that on the 10.1 there is a "~/" that is put in place after you hit C-x C-f, so that you are in a certain directory and when I added the path it was already after the original directory.

Anyway, thanks much for your help. I learned a lot just from both of your comments