C-h i (info) runs the Info program, which is used for
browsing through structured documentation files. The entire SXEmacs manual
is available within Info. Eventually all the documentation of the GNU
system will be available. Type h after entering Info to run
a tutorial on using Info.
If you specify a numeric argument, C-h i prompts for the name of a documentation file. This way, you can browse a file which doesn’t have an entry in the top-level Info menu. It is also handy when you need to get to the documentation quickly, and you know the exact name of the file.
There are two special help commands for accessing SXEmacs documentation
through Info. C-h C-f function RET enters Info and
goes straight to the documentation of the SXEmacs function
function. C-h C-k key enters Info and goes straight
to the documentation of the key key. These two keys run the
commands Info-elisp-ref and
Info-goto-emacs-key-command-node. (GNU Emacs binds C-h C-f
to Info-goto-emacs-command-node, but this is less helpful to
programmers.)
If something surprising happens, and you are not sure what commands you
typed, use C-h l (view-lossage). C-h l prints the last
100 command characters you typed in. If you see commands that you don’t
know, you can use C-h c to find out what they do.
SXEmacs has several major modes. Each mode redefines a few keys and
makes a few other changes in how editing works. C-h m
(describe-mode) prints documentation on the current major mode,
which normally describes all the commands that are changed in this mode.
C-h b (describe-bindings) and C-h s
(describe-syntax) present information about the current SXEmacs
mode that is not covered by C-h m. C-h b displays a list of
all the key bindings currently in effect, with the local bindings of the
current major mode first, followed by the global bindings (see Key Bindings). C-h s displays the contents of the syntax table with
explanations of each character’s syntax (see Syntax).
You can get a similar list for a particular prefix key by typing C-h after the prefix key. (There are a few prefix keys for which this does not work—those that provide their own bindings for C-h. One of these is ESC, because ESC C-h is actually C-M-h, which marks a defun.)
The other C-h options display various files of useful
information. C-h C-w (describe-no-warranty) displays the
full details on the complete absence of warranty for SXEmacs. C-h
n (view-emacs-news) displays the file sxemacs/etc/NEWS,
which contains documentation on SXEmacs changes arranged chronologically.
C-h F (sxemacs-local-faq) displays local version of the
SXEmacs frequently-answered-questions-list. C-h t
(help-with-tutorial) displays the learn-by-doing SXEmacs
tutorial. C-h C-c (describe-copying) displays the file
sxemacs/etc/COPYING, which tells you the conditions you must obey
in distributing copies of SXEmacs. C-h C-d
(describe-distribution) displays another file named
sxemacs/etc/DISTRIB, which tells you how you can order a copy of
the latest version of SXEmacs.