1.5 The Init File

Customizations are saved to the file specified by custom-file, as calls to custom-set-variables and custom-set-faces.

When you save customizations, the current implementation removes the calls to custom-set-variables and custom-set-faces, and replaces them with code generated on the basis of the current customization state in Emacs.

By default custom-file is your `.emacs' file (for GNU Emacs and older XEmacs) and is `custom.el' in the same directory as `init.el' (in XEmacs 21.4 and later). If you use another file, you must explicitly load it yourself.

As of XEmacs 21.4.7, when custom-file is present, it is loaded after `init.el'. This is likely to change in the future, because (1) actions in `init.el' often would like to depend on customizations for consistent appearance and (2) Custom is quite brutal about enforcing its idea of the correct values at initialization.