Sean Whitton
60da04d179
* README: * configure.ac: * exec/configure.ac: * java/AndroidManifest.xml.in (Version-code): * msdos/sed2v2.inp: * nt/README.W32: Bump Emacs version to 31.0.91.
317 lines
12 KiB
Plaintext
317 lines
12 KiB
Plaintext
Copyright (C) 2001-2026 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
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See the end of the file for license conditions.
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Emacs version 31.0.91 for MS-Windows
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This README file describes how to set up and run a precompiled
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distribution of the latest version of GNU Emacs for MS-Windows. You
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can find the precompiled distribution on the ftp.gnu.org server and
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its mirrors:
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https://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/emacs/windows/
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This server contains other distributions, including the full Emacs
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source distribution, as well as older releases of Emacs for Windows.
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Information on how to compile Emacs from sources on Windows is in
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the files README and INSTALL in the nt/ sub-directory of the
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top-level Emacs directory in the source distribution, as is this
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file under the name README.W32. If you received this file as part
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of the Emacs source distribution, and are looking for information on
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how to build Emacs on MS-Windows, please read those 2 files and not
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this one.
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* Preliminaries
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There are two binary distributions named
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emacs-VER-x86_64.zip and emacs-VER-i686.zip,
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where VER is the Emacs version. These are 64-bit and 32-bit builds,
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respectively. If you are running a 32-bit version of MS-Windows,
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you need to install the 32-bit build; users of 64-bit Windows can
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use either build, but we recommend to install the 64-bit one, as it
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will be able to edit larger buffers and will generally run faster.
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The binary distribution has these top-level directories:
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+ bin
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+ libexec
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+ share
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+ var
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* Setting up Emacs
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To install Emacs, simply unpack the binary package into a directory
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of your choice. If you use the Windows Explorer and its "Extract"
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action, by default this will be in a top-level directory with the
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same name as the zip file.
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Emacs is completely portable. You can create your own shortcut to
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runemacs.exe and place this wherever you find it convenient (the
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desktop and/or the Taskbar), or run it from a USB or network drive
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without copying or installing anything on the machine itself.
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It is also possible, although not recommended to use the program
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bin/addpm.exe which will place an icon for Emacs on the start page.
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* Prerequisites for Windows 9X
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The 32-bit build supports MS-Windows 9X (Windows 98/Me). To run
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Emacs on these versions of Windows, you will need to have the
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Microsoft Layer for Unicode (MSLU) installed. It can be downloaded
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from the Microsoft site, and comes in a form of a single dynamic
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library called UNICOWS.DLL. If this library is not accessible to
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Emacs on Windows 9X, it will pop up a dialog saying that it cannot
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find the UNICOWS library, and will refuse to start up.
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* Starting Emacs
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To run Emacs, simply select Emacs from the Start Menu, or invoke
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runemacs.exe directly from Explorer or from a command prompt. This
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will start Emacs in its default GUI mode, ready to use. If you have
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never used Emacs before, you should follow the tutorial at this
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point (select Emacs Tutorial from the Help menu), since Emacs is
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quite different from ordinary Windows applications in many respects.
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If you want to use Emacs in tty or character mode within a command
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window, you can start it by typing "emacs -nw" at the command prompt.
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(Obviously, you need to ensure that the Emacs bin subdirectory is in
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your Path first, or specify the path to emacs.exe.) The -nw
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(non-windowed) mode of operation is most useful if you have a telnet
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server on your machine, allowing you to run Emacs remotely.
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* EXE files included
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Emacs comes with the following executable files in the bin directory.
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+ emacs.exe - The main Emacs executable. As this is designed to run
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as both a text-mode application (emacs -nw) and as a GUI application,
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it will pop up a command prompt window if run directly from Explorer.
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+ runemacs.exe - A wrapper for running Emacs as a GUI application
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without popping up a command prompt window. If you create a
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desktop shortcut for invoking Emacs, make it point to this
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executable, not to emacs.exe. If you pin Emacs to the task bar,
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edit the properties of the pinned shortcut (with Shift-right mouse
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click) to point to this executable.
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+ emacsclient.exe - A command-line client program that can
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communicate with a running Emacs process. See the `Emacs Server'
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node of the Emacs manual.
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+ emacsclientw.exe - A version of emacsclient that does not open
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a command-line window.
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+ addpm.exe - A basic installer that adds Emacs to "Start" menus and
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adds Emacs-related entries to the Windows Registry.
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+ etags.exe - Tool for generating tag files. See the
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`Tags' node of the Emacs manual.
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+ ebrowse.exe - A tool for generating C++ browse information. See the
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`Ebrowse' manual.
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Several helper programs are in a version-specific subdirectory of
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the libexec directory:
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+ cmdproxy.exe - Used internally by Emacs to work around problems with
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the native shells in various versions of Windows.
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+ ddeclient.exe - A tool for interacting with DDE servers. To be
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invoked as "ddeclient SERVER [TOPIC]", where SERVER is the DDE
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server name, and sends each line of its standard input to the DDE
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server using the DdeClientTransaction API. This program is
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supposed to be invoked via the 'call-process-region' Emacs
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primitive.
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+ hexl.exe - A tool for producing hex dumps of binary files. See the
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`Editing Binary Files' node of the Emacs manual.
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+ movemail.exe - A helper application for safely moving mail from
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a mail spool or POP server to a local user mailbox. See the
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`Movemail' node of the Emacs manual.
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+ profile.exe - A helper program that generates periodic events for
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profiling Emacs Lisp code.
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+ update-game-score.exe - A utility for updating the score files of
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Emacs games.
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* Emacs without optional dependencies
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The files emacs-VER-x86_64.zip and emacs-VER-i686.zip contain a
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large number of optional dependencies for Emacs.
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Emacs has a number of optional features which use these additional
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dependencies. They enable support for the following:
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- displaying inline images of many types (PNG, JPEG, GIF, TIFF, SVG)
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- SSL/TLS secure network communications (HTTPS, IMAPS, etc.)
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- HTML and XML parsing (necessary for the built-in EWW browser)
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- built-in decompression of compressed text
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If you do not want these files (if you have them already for
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instance, or you want the smallest possible Emacs), then you may use
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the files emacs-VER-x86_64-no-deps.zip or
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emacs-VER-i686-no-deps.zip. The dependency files are also available
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as emacs-MVER-x86_64-deps.zip and emacs-MVER-i686-deps.zip. Source
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code for these dependencies is available as
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emacs-26-deps-mingw-w64-src.zip.
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All distributions of Emacs have built in support for XBM and
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PPM/PGM/PBM images, and the libXpm library is bundled, providing XPM
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support (required for color toolbar icons and splash screen).
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Source for libXpm should be available from the same place from which
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you got this binary distribution.
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* Installing Emacs with an existing MSYS2 installation
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You may also use Emacs with an existing MSYS2 installation by
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unpacking the emacs-VER-x86_64-no-deps.zip over the MSYS2
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distribution. You should not use the emacs-VER-x86_64.zip from this
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site, as this will overwrite MSYS2 files (the dependency bundle
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derives from MSYS2, but will be from a different version). You can
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then use the 'pacman' utility to install dependencies.
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Some of the optional libraries need to be of certain versions to
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work with your Emacs binary. Make sure you install those versions
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of dependencies, and no others. Emacs variables such as
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libpng-version and libjpeg-version tell what versions of the
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corresponding libraries are expected by Emacs. (We recommend that
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you use the dependency bundle, where these issues are always
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resolved.)
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To install the optional libraries, start the MSYS2 Bash window and
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type the following command:
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pacman -S PACKAGES
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where PACKAGES is the list of packages you want to install. The
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full list is as follows:
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base-devel
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mingw-w64-x86_64-toolchain
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mingw-w64-x86_64-xpm-nox
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mingw-w64-x86_64-gmp
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mingw-w64-x86_64-gnutls
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mingw-w64-x86_64-libtiff
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mingw-w64-x86_64-giflib
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mingw-w64-x86_64-libpng
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mingw-w64-x86_64-libjpeg-turbo
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mingw-w64-x86_64-librsvg
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mingw-w64-x86_64-libwebp
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mingw-w64-x86_64-lcms2
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mingw-w64-x86_64-libxml2
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mingw-w64-x86_64-zlib
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mingw-w64-x86_64-harfbuzz
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mingw-w64-x86_64-libgccjit
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mingw-w64-x86_64-sqlite3
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mingw-w64-x86_64-libtree-sitter (or mingw-w64-x86_64-tree-sitter)
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You can type any subset of this list. When asked whether to proceed
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with installation, answer Y.
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Alternatively, you could install the packages manually from this
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page:
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https://sourceforge.net/projects/msys2/files/REPOS/MINGW/x86_64/
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However, the packages there are not self-contained, so you will need
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to manually download all their dependencies as well.
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* Uninstalling Emacs
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If you should need to uninstall Emacs, simply delete all the files
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and subdirectories from the directory where it was unpacked (Emacs
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does not install or update any files in system directories or
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anywhere else).
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If you ran the addpm.exe program to create the Start menu icon, this
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can be removed by right-clicking and "Uninstall".
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Finally, addpm.exe also creates a few registry entries; these can be
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safely left, but if you really wish to remove them, all of the
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settings are written under the Software\GNU\Emacs key in
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HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, or if you didn't have administrator privileges
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when you installed, the same key in HKEY_CURRENT_USER. Just delete
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the whole Software\GNU\Emacs key.
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* Troubleshooting
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Some known problems and their solutions can be found in the file
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etc\PROBLEMS in the unpacked Emacs distribution.
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Virus scanners
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Some virus scanners interfere with Emacs's use of subprocesses. If you
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are unable to use subprocesses and you use Dr. Solomon's WinGuard or
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McAfee's Vshield, turn off "Scan all files" (WinGuard) or "boot sector
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scanning" (McAfee exclusion properties).
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Windows 9X
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On Windows 9X, make sure you have the UNICOWS.DLL library either in
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the same directory where you have emacs.exe or in the directory
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where system-wide DLLs are kept.
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* Further information
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The Emacs User manual describes Windows-specific issues in the
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appendix named "Emacs and Microsoft Windows/MS-DOS". You can read
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it in Emacs by typing
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C-h r g Microsoft Windows RET
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This appendix is also available (as part of the entire manual) at
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https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_mono/emacs.html#Microsoft-Windows
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In addition to the manual, there is a mailing list for help with
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Emacs here:
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https://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/help-gnu-emacs
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To ask questions on this mailing list, send email to
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help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org.
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A mailing list for issues specifically related to the MS-Windows port
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of Emacs is here:
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https://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/help-emacs-windows
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To ask questions on this mailing list, send email to
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help-emacs-windows@gnu.org.
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* Reporting bugs
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If you encounter a bug in this port of Emacs, we would like to hear
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about it. First check the FAQ on the web page above to see if the bug
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is already known and if there are any workarounds. Then check whether
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the bug has something to do with code in your `.emacs' file, e.g. by
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invoking Emacs with the "-Q" option.
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If you decide that it is a bug in Emacs, use the built in bug
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reporting facility to report it (from the menu: Help -> Send Bug Report).
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If you have not yet configured Emacs for mail, then when you press
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C-c C-c to send the report, it will ask you to paste the text of the
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report into your mail client. If the bug is related to subprocesses,
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also specify which shell you are using (e.g., include the values of
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`shell-file-name' and `explicit-shell-file-name' in your message).
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Enjoy!
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This file is part of GNU Emacs.
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GNU Emacs is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
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it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
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the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
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(at your option) any later version.
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GNU Emacs is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
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but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
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MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
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GNU General Public License for more details.
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You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
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along with GNU Emacs. If not, see <https://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
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