@menu
* International Chars:: Basic concepts of multibyte characters.
-* Disabling Multibyte:: Controlling whether to use multibyte characters.
* Language Environments:: Setting things up for the language you use.
* Input Methods:: Entering text characters not on your keyboard.
* Select Input Method:: Specifying your choice of input methods.
decomposition: (65 768) ('A' '`')
@end smallexample
-@c FIXME? Does this section even belong in the user manual?
-@c Seems more appropriate to the lispref?
-@node Disabling Multibyte
-@section Disabling Multibyte Characters
-
- By default, Emacs starts in multibyte mode: it stores the contents
-of buffers and strings using an internal encoding that represents
-non-@acronym{ASCII} characters using multi-byte sequences. Multibyte
-mode allows you to use all the supported languages and scripts without
-limitations.
-
-@cindex turn multibyte support on or off
- Under very special circumstances, you may want to disable multibyte
-character support, for a specific buffer.
-When multibyte characters are disabled in a buffer, we call
-that @dfn{unibyte mode}. In unibyte mode, each character in the
-buffer has a character code ranging from 0 through 255 (0377 octal); 0
-through 127 (0177 octal) represent @acronym{ASCII} characters, and 128
-(0200 octal) through 255 (0377 octal) represent non-@acronym{ASCII}
-characters.
-
- To edit a particular file in unibyte representation, visit it using
-@code{find-file-literally}. @xref{Visiting}. You can convert a
-multibyte buffer to unibyte by saving it to a file, killing the
-buffer, and visiting the file again with @code{find-file-literally}.
-Alternatively, you can use @kbd{C-x @key{RET} c}
-(@code{universal-coding-system-argument}) and specify @samp{raw-text}
-as the coding system with which to visit or save a file. @xref{Text
-Coding}. Unlike @code{find-file-literally}, finding a file as
-@samp{raw-text} doesn't disable format conversion, uncompression, or
-auto mode selection.
-
-@c Not a single file in Emacs uses this feature. Is it really worth
-@c mentioning in the _user_ manual? Also, this duplicates somewhat
-@c "Loading Non-ASCII" from the lispref.
-@cindex Lisp files, and multibyte operation
-@cindex multibyte operation, and Lisp files
-@cindex unibyte operation, and Lisp files
-@cindex init file, and non-@acronym{ASCII} characters
- Emacs normally loads Lisp files as multibyte.
-This includes the Emacs initialization
-file, @file{.emacs}, and the initialization files of packages
-such as Gnus. However, you can specify unibyte loading for a
-particular Lisp file, by adding an entry @samp{coding: raw-text} in a file
-local variables section. @xref{Specify Coding}.
-Then that file is always loaded as unibyte text.
-@ignore
-@c I don't see the point of this statement:
-The motivation for these conventions is that it is more reliable to
-always load any particular Lisp file in the same way.
-@end ignore
-You can also load a Lisp file as unibyte, on any one occasion, by
-typing @kbd{C-x @key{RET} c raw-text @key{RET}} immediately before
-loading it.
-
-@c See http://debbugs.gnu.org/11226 for lack of unibyte tooltip.
-@vindex enable-multibyte-characters
-The buffer-local variable @code{enable-multibyte-characters} is
-non-@code{nil} in multibyte buffers, and @code{nil} in unibyte ones.
-The mode line also indicates whether a buffer is multibyte or not.
-@xref{Mode Line}. With a graphical display, in a multibyte buffer,
-the portion of the mode line that indicates the character set has a
-tooltip that (amongst other things) says that the buffer is multibyte.
-In a unibyte buffer, the character set indicator is absent. Thus, in
-a unibyte buffer (when using a graphical display) there is normally
-nothing before the indication of the visited file's end-of-line
-convention (colon, backslash, etc.), unless you are using an input
-method.
-
-@findex toggle-enable-multibyte-characters
-You can turn off multibyte support in a specific buffer by invoking the
-command @code{toggle-enable-multibyte-characters} in that buffer.
-
@node Language Environments
@section Language Environments
@cindex language environments
accented letters and punctuation needed by various European languages
(and some non-European ones). Note that Emacs considers bytes with
codes in this range as raw bytes, not as characters, even in a unibyte
-buffer, i.e., if you disable multibyte characters. However, Emacs
-can still handle these character codes as if they belonged to
-@emph{one} of the single-byte character sets at a time. To specify
-@emph{which} of these codes to use, invoke @kbd{M-x
-set-language-environment} and specify a suitable language environment
-such as @samp{Latin-@var{n}}.
-
- For more information about unibyte operation, see
-@ref{Disabling Multibyte}.
+buffer, i.e., if you disable multibyte characters. However, Emacs can
+still handle these character codes as if they belonged to @emph{one}
+of the single-byte character sets at a time. To specify @emph{which}
+of these codes to use, invoke @kbd{M-x set-language-environment} and
+specify a suitable language environment such as @samp{Latin-@var{n}}.
+@xref{Disabling Multibyte, , Disabling Multibyte Characters, elisp,
+GNU Emacs Lisp Reference Manual}.
@vindex unibyte-display-via-language-environment
Emacs can also display bytes in the range 160 to 255 as readable
@menu
* Text Representations:: How Emacs represents text.
+* Disabling Multibyte:: Controlling whether to use multibyte characters.
* Converting Representations:: Converting unibyte to multibyte and vice versa.
* Selecting a Representation:: Treating a byte sequence as unibyte or multi.
* Character Codes:: How unibyte and multibyte relate to
result a unibyte string.
@end defun
+@node Disabling Multibyte
+@section Disabling Multibyte Characters
+@cindex disabling multibyte
+
+ By default, Emacs starts in multibyte mode: it stores the contents
+of buffers and strings using an internal encoding that represents
+non-@acronym{ASCII} characters using multi-byte sequences. Multibyte
+mode allows you to use all the supported languages and scripts without
+limitations.
+
+@cindex turn multibyte support on or off
+ Under very special circumstances, you may want to disable multibyte
+character support, for a specific buffer.
+When multibyte characters are disabled in a buffer, we call
+that @dfn{unibyte mode}. In unibyte mode, each character in the
+buffer has a character code ranging from 0 through 255 (0377 octal); 0
+through 127 (0177 octal) represent @acronym{ASCII} characters, and 128
+(0200 octal) through 255 (0377 octal) represent non-@acronym{ASCII}
+characters.
+
+ To edit a particular file in unibyte representation, visit it using
+@code{find-file-literally}. @xref{Visiting Functions}. You can
+convert a multibyte buffer to unibyte by saving it to a file, killing
+the buffer, and visiting the file again with
+@code{find-file-literally}. Alternatively, you can use @kbd{C-x
+@key{RET} c} (@code{universal-coding-system-argument}) and specify
+@samp{raw-text} as the coding system with which to visit or save a
+file. @xref{Text Coding, , Specifying a Coding System for File Text,
+emacs, GNU Emacs Manual}. Unlike @code{find-file-literally}, finding
+a file as @samp{raw-text} doesn't disable format conversion,
+uncompression, or auto mode selection.
+
+@c See http://debbugs.gnu.org/11226 for lack of unibyte tooltip.
+@vindex enable-multibyte-characters
+The buffer-local variable @code{enable-multibyte-characters} is
+non-@code{nil} in multibyte buffers, and @code{nil} in unibyte ones.
+The mode line also indicates whether a buffer is multibyte or not.
+With a graphical display, in a multibyte buffer, the portion of the
+mode line that indicates the character set has a tooltip that (amongst
+other things) says that the buffer is multibyte. In a unibyte buffer,
+the character set indicator is absent. Thus, in a unibyte buffer
+(when using a graphical display) there is normally nothing before the
+indication of the visited file's end-of-line convention (colon,
+backslash, etc.), unless you are using an input method.
+
+@findex toggle-enable-multibyte-characters
+You can turn off multibyte support in a specific buffer by invoking the
+command @code{toggle-enable-multibyte-characters} in that buffer.
+
@node Converting Representations
@section Converting Text Representations
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