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Asked: 2026-05-31T20:05:22+00:00

I am trying to set [Ctrl]-[;] as a keybinding in my .emacs like this

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I am trying to set [Ctrl]-[;] as a keybinding in my .emacs like this

(global-set-key "\C-;" 'comment-or-uncomment-region)

however it doesn’t work when I try (i don’t get any error messages, it just has no effect). It will work though if i try a normal character (such as setting it to “\C-p”).

I have also tried

(global-set-key (kbd "C-;") 'comment-or-uncomment-region)

but I don’t like this option because for me it doesn’t work when i run “emacs -nw”. Any thoughts on how I can do this?

EDIT:
When I run C-hcC-; in emacs -nw I get the output:

; runs the command self-insert-command

which is exactly the same as when I run C-hc; in emacs -nw

So I believe phils is right, that it is a terminal problem, because emacs never actually sees C-;, it only sees ;

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    Using (kbd "C-;") is absolutely fine and correct.

    I suspect when you type C-; when running emacs -nw, your terminal is not actually sending anything to Emacs.

    So your problem is more likely to be a question of how to get your terminal to send C-; to Emacs (or alternatively how to get Emacs to recognise the sequence which is sent).

    If you run emacs -Q -nw and type C-hcC-;, do you get a "C-; is undefined" message?

    Assuming that it is a terminal issue, here are some related Q&As which may point you in the right direction, but it’s going to depend upon the particular terminal you are using.

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