Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!hplabs!hpfcdc!hpfcdq!todd
From: todd@hpfcdq.HP.COM (Todd Spencer)
Newsgroups: comp.emacs
Subject: Re: Is there a fix for "File tags not a valid tag table"?
Message-ID: <380002@hpfcdq.HP.COM>
Date: 13 Jun 89 17:49:21 GMT
References: <380001@hpfcdq.HP.COM>
Organization: Hewlett-Packard - Fort Collins, CO
Lines: 28


For those of you who are interested in using tags within emacs but haven't
been able to get it to work listen up:  (The find-tag command is a great
way of locating where functions, macros, and typedefs are defined - very
useful when working with several thousand lines of code.)

Use the "etags" command to create your TAGS file.  This file is
found under the emacs etc directory, e.g.,
/usr/local/gnu-emacs/dist-18.51/etc/etags
and by default creates a TAGS file in the current directory containing
the location information for all functions/macros/typedefs found in
the files specified, (etags *.c *.h ../mystuff/*).  Do a man on ctags/etags
for more information.

To use emacs tags you will need to modify your ~/.emacs file to include
the following lines:

  ;; Load tags file - otherwise might encounter ABS undefined error.
  (load-file "/usr/local/gnu-emacs/dist-18.51/lisp/tags.elc")
  ;; Suppress prompt asking for name of tags file by binding variable.
  (setq-default tags-file-name "TAGS")

Now, to use the find-tag command position the cursor over the
function you desire to locate and press ESC followed by period (ESC-.).
A new buffer will be created (if necessary) and the cursor positioned
at the start of the function's definition.  It works like a charm.

Todd