Emacs/emacs/Yes-or-No-Prompts
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8.8 Yes or No Prompts
An Emacs command may require you to answer a yes-or-no question during the course of its execution. Such queries come in two main varieties.
For the first type of yes-or-no query, the prompt ends with
‘(y or n)
’. You answer the query by typing a single key,
either ‘y
’ or ‘n
’, which immediately exits the minibuffer
and delivers the response. For example, if you type C-x C-w
(write-file) to save a buffer, and enter the name of an existing
file, Emacs issues a prompt like this:
File ‘foo.el’ exists; overwrite? (y or n)
The second type of yes-or-no query is typically employed if giving
the wrong answer would have serious consequences; it thus features a
longer prompt ending with ‘(yes or no)
’. For example, if you
invoke C-x k (kill-buffer
) on a file-visiting buffer with
unsaved changes, Emacs activates the minibuffer with a prompt like
this:
Buffer foo.el modified; kill anyway? (yes or no)
To answer, you must type ‘yes
’ or ‘no
’ into the minibuffer,
followed by RET
.
With both types of yes-or-no query the minibuffer behaves as described in the previous sections; you can recenter the selected window with C-l, scroll that window (C-v or PageDown scrolls forward, M-v or PageUp scrolls backward), switch to another window with C-x o, use the history commands M-p and M-n, etc. Type C-g to dismiss the query, and quit the minibuffer and the querying command (see Quitting).