Example installation: ange-ftp

A good example of emacs lisp packages and their installation is the ange-ftp package. This package overloads some of the basic emacs commands (such as C-x C-f, find-file) to support getting files with ftp using an extended file name syntax (kinda like VMS).

In this case, the source code consists of just two files: The emacs lisp 'source code', and the texinfo documentation source code. A step-by-step installation goes like this:

  1. makeinfo ange-ftp.texinfo
  2. texi2dvi ange-ftp.texinfo
  3. dvips -f < ange-ftp.dvi > ange-ftp.ps
  4. In emacs: M-x byte-compile-file ange-ftp.el
  5. Copy ange-ftp.ps and ange-ftp.dvi into the ver-X.XX/doc/ange-ftp directory.
  6. Copy ange-ftp.el and ange-ftp.elc into the ver-X.XX/emacs/lisp directory.
  7. Copy ange-ftp.info into the ver-X.XX/emacs/info directory.
  8. In the same directory, make a file called ange-ftp.dir.packages, containing the following line: 
    * Ange-FTP (ange-ftp.info):     Transparent FTP support for GNU Emacs
    This will be merged into the 'dir' file as a menu choice, in the subsection Emacs-lisp packages.

Now, users will have to put the following line in their .emacs files to use ange-ftp: (require 'ange-ftp) - if ange-ftp is always wanted for all users, this line may be put into a file named default.el-ange-ftp in the ver-X.XX/emacs/lisp directory.

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