[OS X Emacs] Re: Select all: how to *not* jump to the beginning of the file + how to not change the selection?

[Piet van Oostrum]

"Hofert  Jan Marius" <marius.hofert at math.ethz.ch> writes:


> Dear Piet,
>
> I tried that:
> (1) C-<SPC> to set the mark
> (2) then I moved the cursor [this of course does *not* select *all*, just a region...]
> (3) typing C-<SPC> again [that just cleared the marking]...
> (4) hitting C-<SPC> once more [this just set a new mark]
>
> I can't be that hard. In textmate it is just Command + A to select all without moving and in many modern editors it is not much more complicated either. As a newbie to emacs, I get quite confused by all these many keys to hit and although being easier in the long run, having to type that much seems complicated. Hmm...

Sorry, that should have been C-U C-<SPC>. And as has been said,
selecting all without moving the current position is impossible in
Emacs. But it wouldn't be hard to change C-x h / Cmd-A such that it
saves the current position and introduce another key to return to
it. But then probably another selection command would come up with the
same requirement etc.
-- 
Piet van Oostrum <piet at vanoostrum.org>
WWW: http://pietvanoostrum.com/
PGP key: [8DAE142BE17999C4]