1.3.4 Printing Notation

Many of the examples in this manual print text when they are evaluated. If you execute example code in a Lisp Interaction buffer (such as the buffer *scratch*) by typing C-j after the closing parenthesis of the example, the printed text is inserted into the buffer. If you execute the example by other means (such as by evaluating the function eval-region), the printed text is displayed in the echo area.

Examples in this manual indicate printed text with ‘-|’, irrespective of where that text goes. The value returned by evaluating the form follows on a separate line with ‘⇒’.

(progn (prin1 'foo) (princ "\n") (prin1 'bar))
     -| foo
     -| bar
     ⇒ bar