Get into emacs and call up one of the “hello” programs. Change it so that it contains one or more syntax errors, and save this file. Now give the emacs command: M-x compile. At the bottom of the screen, you will be asked for the compile command. If the suggested command is not what you want (it won't be, until you learn to use make to manage your program compilations), then type in the proper command just as if you were typing it into the shell. emacs will invoke the compiler, showing its output in a window. Figure 1: Compiling a program in emacs, with syntax errors shows a typical emacs session after such a compilation.

In this case, there should be one or more error messages. The emacs next-error command (C-x `) will move you to the source code location of the first error. Each subsequent use of C-x ` will move you to the next error location in turn, until all the reported error messages have been dealt with.1