Files
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In Emacs, you can find, create, view, save, and otherwise work with
files and file directories. This chapter describes most of the
file-related functions of Emacs Lisp, but a few others are described in
Note:Buffers, and those related to backups and auto-saving are
described in Note:Backups and Auto-Saving.
Many of the file functions take one or more arguments that are file
names. A file name is actually a string. Most of these functions
expand file name arguments by calling `expand-file-name', so that `~'
is handled correctly, as are relative file names (including `../').
These functions don't recognize environment variable substitutions such
as `$HOME'. Note:File Name Expansion.
When file I/O functions signal Lisp errors, they usually use the
condition `file-error' (Note:Handling Errors). The error message is
in most cases obtained from the operating system, according to locale
`system-message-locale', and decoded using coding system
`locale-coding-system' (Note:Locales).