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(emacs-lisp-intro.info)Kill Ring Overview

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Kill Ring Overview
==================

   The kill ring is a list of textual strings.  This is what it looks
like:

     ("some text" "a different piece of text" "yet more text")

   If this were the contents of my kill ring and I pressed `C-y', the
string of characters saying `some text' would be inserted in this
buffer where my cursor is located.

   The `yank' command is also used for duplicating text by copying it.
The copied text is not cut from the buffer, but a copy of it is put on
the kill ring and is inserted by yanking it back.

   Three functions are used for bringing text back from the kill ring:
`yank', which is usually bound to `C-y'; `yank-pop', which is usually
bound to `M-y'; and `rotate-yank-pointer', which is used by the two
other functions.

   These functions refer to the kill ring through a variable called the
`kill-ring-yank-pointer'.  Indeed, the insertion code for both the
`yank' and `yank-pop' functions is:

     (insert (car kill-ring-yank-pointer))

   To begin to understand how `yank' and `yank-pop' work, it is first
necessary to look at the `kill-ring-yank-pointer' variable and the
`rotate-yank-pointer' function.