Appendix E. Obtaining and Building Emacs

Availability of Packages

All the software packages described in this book, with the exception of TEX, are GNU software from the Free Software Foundation. Their software and other packages can be retrieved via anonymous FTP from the Internet site ftp.gnu.ai.mit.edu in the directory /pub/gnu. There are numerous mirror sites, information about which is in GNUinfo/FTP.

If you cannot download the packages you want from the Internet, or if you wish an easier solution, you can order software distributions from the Free Software Foundation. They are available in diskette, tape, and CD-ROM form. You can also order printed, bound copies of many GNU manuals, including several about Emacs, plus the Texinfo manual mentioned in Appendix D. For more information, including prices, contact the FSF:

Free Software Foundation, Inc.
59 Temple Place – Suite 330
Boston, MA 02111-1307 USA
Telephone: +1-617-542-5942
Fax: +1-617-542-2652
Email:

The packages mentioned in this book that are available from the FSF are:

Emacs

The editor itself, plus a huge number of Lisp extensions. Available in source form as file emacs-x.y.tar.gz, where x and y are the major and minor version numbers of the latest version (presently 19.34).

Texinfo

The GNU documentation system, including makeinfo and a manual on writing Texinfo documents. Requires TEX to make printed manuals. Available as ...

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