# Starting from scratch with small jams 🤔

**URL:** <https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/starting-from-scratch-with-small-jams/800>\
**Category:** Emacs\
**Created:** [June 18, 2024, 10:53am UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/starting-from-scratch-with-small-jams/800 "2024-06-18T10:53:12Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Quijote\_Libre](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/user_avatar/forum.systemcrafters.net/quijote_libre/32/596_2.png) [@Quijote\_Libre](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/u/Quijote_Libre)\
**Post date:** [June 18, 2024, 10:53am UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/starting-from-scratch-with-small-jams/800/1 "2024-06-18T10:53:12Z")

</div>

I started an exercise with my laptop to build an Arch/Hyprland from scratch.

It is a very enriching process, but sometimes I find surprises, like the one I got when building Emcas.

For the building process I was guided by [this site](https://protesilaos.com/codelog/2022-07-06-build-emacs-arch-linux/) and there were no problems.

My problem is that I configured a font and theme and saved the options, but I can’t find where I saved them. I hoped to find a custom.el in .emacs.d but it does not exist.

Can you help me to find the generated configuration?

Thanks. 😊

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Quijote\_Libre](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/user_avatar/forum.systemcrafters.net/quijote_libre/32/596_2.png) [@Quijote\_Libre](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/u/Quijote_Libre)\
**Post date:** [June 18, 2024, 11:32am UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/starting-from-scratch-with-small-jams/800/2 "2024-06-18T11:32:34Z")

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I reply to myself.

I saw it saved in an .emacs file, but not in .config.

Sorry about that. 😳

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![GoldAyan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/9d8465/32.png) [@GoldAyan](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/u/GoldAyan)\
**Post date:** [June 18, 2024, 12:58pm UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/starting-from-scratch-with-small-jams/800/3 "2024-06-18T12:58:30Z")

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Yep i faced this issue myself. I usually delete .emacs file in home folder and move the stuff to ~/.config/emacs/init.el

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![snamellit](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/user_avatar/forum.systemcrafters.net/snamellit/32/101_2.png) [@snamellit](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/u/snamellit)\
**Post date:** [June 23, 2024, 8:54pm UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/starting-from-scratch-with-small-jams/800/4 "2024-06-23T20:54:31Z")

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By default it will use the `~/.emacs.d` folder to store various bits and pieces, however if a `.config/emacs` folder exists (and no `.emacs` file or `~/.emacs.d` folder) it will use that one.  
This can be very confusing as just starting emacs on an unconfigured system will likely create a `~/.emacs.d/` folder and if you add your desired config in the `.config` folder, emacs will ignore it. I have been bitten by that a few times now. The solution is to that is to `rm -rf ~/.emacs.d`.  
Similarly the custom settings are by default persisted to the init file being used, i.e. `.config/emacs/init.el` or `.emacs` unless a separate custom file is configured. If you want to share your config over different machines this wreaks havoc and causes frequent conflicts.  
I have as the first thing in my ` ~/.config/emacs` the snippet

```auto
(setq custom-file (concat user-emacs-directory "custom.el"))
(when (and custom-file
           (file-exists-p custom-file))
  (load custom-file nil :nomessage))

```

to save the customization settings in a `custom.el` file in the default emacs directory.