Do you love Emacs, but have never understood the strange code with lots of brackets? You're missing out on one of the great joys of Emacs — customising it to work exactly the way you want. It turns out that Emacs is little more than an interpreter for Lisp code interpreter, and once you know a little Emacs Lisp, almost anything is possible.

After attending this tutorial, you will know how to:

• make persistent customisations to your Emacs
• read basic Emacs Lisp code
• modify Emacs Lisp code as well as writing your own
• customise behaviour for distinct modes
• bind your favourite commands to keys
• answer your own questions with the amazing documentation system
• use built-in Emacs Lisp development tools like the debugger
• write your own reusable modules for Emacs customisations

This workshop will be enjoyed most if you already have a little programming experience.