Vernon Grant over at Discovering Emacs has an interesting video on using the mark ring. Most Irreal readers already know about the mark ring but its exact operation is a little mysterious. That’s especially true about the global mark ring. When, exactly, are locations put on the mark rings?
Grant discusses these and other issues involving the mark ring. He gives his understanding of when entries are added to the global mark ring—a definitely mysterious set of rules—and some of the most usual events that cause them to be added to the mark ring.
Most of us know that you can visit the locations on the mark ring with Ctrl+u Ctrl+Space and the global mark ring with Ctrl+x Ctrl+Space. What I didn’t know is that by setting set-mark-command-repeat-pop to non nil you can type the first Ctrl+u Ctrl+Space or Ctrl+x Ctrl+Space for the first entry and then simply hold down the Ctrl key and press Space to cycles through the other entries.
The video is only 7 minutes, 14 seconds long so it’s easy to find time for it. Unless you’re already a mark ring expert, it’s definitely worth your time.