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17.6.4.4 User-interface Conventions

There are a few "global" user-interface conventions.

1. Temporary Buffers

   Some SLIME commands create temporary buffers to display their results.

   • Temporary buffers can be dismissed by pressing ‘q’.
   • Pressing ‘<RET>’ is supposed to “do the most obvious useful thing.”
   • Temporary buffers containing Lisp symbols use slime-mode in addition to any special mode of their own.
   • slime-description-autofocus (default ‘nil’); determines which buffer gets the initial focus.
2. ‘*inferior-lisp*’ Buffer

   SLIME internally uses the comint package to start Lisp processes.

   • The buffer ‘*inferior-lisp*’ contains the Lisp process’s own top-level. This direct access to Lisp is useful for troubleshooting, and some degree of SLIME integration is available using the inferior-slime-mode.
   • Many people load the better integrated ‘SLIME REPL’ contrib module (see REPL) and ignore the ‘*inferior-lisp*’ buffer.