GNU Emacs Manual - Tab Stops

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## Tab Stops

For typing in tables, you can use Text mode's definition of `TAB`, `tab-to-tab-stop`. This command inserts indentation before point, enough to reach the next tab stop column. If you are not in Text mode, this command can be found on the key `M-i`.

You can specify the tab stops used by `M-i`. They are stored in a variable called `tab-stop-list`, as a list of column-numbers in increasing order.

The convenient way to set the tab stops is with `M-x edit-tab-stops`, which creates and selects a buffer containing a description of the tab stop settings. You can edit this buffer to specify different tab stops, and then type `C-c C-c` to make those new tab stops take effect. `edit-tab-stops` records which buffer was current when you invoked it, and stores the tab stops back in that buffer; normally all buffers share the same tab stops and changing them in one buffer affects all, but if you happen to make `tab-stop-list` local in one buffer then `edit-tab-stops` in that buffer will edit the local settings.

Here is what the text representing the tab stops looks like for ordinary tab stops every eight columns.

            :       :       :       :       :       :
    0         1         2         3         4
    0123456789012345678901234567890123456789012345678
    To install changes, type C-c C-c

The first line contains a colon at each tab stop. The remaining lines are present just to help you see where the colons are and know what to do.

Note that the tab stops that control `tab-to-tab-stop` have nothing to do with displaying tab characters in the buffer. See section Variables Controlling Display, for more information on that.

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