49 Customization

This chapter describes some simple methods to customize the behavior of Emacs.

Apart from the methods described here, see X Resources for information about using X resources to customize Emacs, and see Keyboard Macros for information about recording and replaying keyboard macros. Making more far-reaching and open-ended changes involves writing Emacs Lisp code; see Emacs Lisp in The Emacs Lisp Reference Manual.

• Easy Customization		Convenient way to browse and change settings.
• Variables		Many Emacs commands examine Emacs variables to decide what to do; by setting variables, you can control their functioning.
• Key Bindings		The keymaps say what command each key runs. By changing them, you can redefine keys.
• Init File		How to write common customizations in the initialization file.
• Authentication		Keeping persistent authentication information.