From 641d3c33e56ddffb335bed01b6c8118273d37ea5 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: James Cherti <60946298+jamescherti@users.noreply.github.com>
Date: Wed, 23 Jul 2025 19:00:29 -0400
Subject: [PATCH] Update README.md

---
 README.md     | 25 +++++++++++++++----------
 early-init.el |  1 +
 2 files changed, 16 insertions(+), 10 deletions(-)

diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 5aaafb4..e20c1d5 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -91,12 +91,12 @@ In addition to *minimal-emacs.d*, startup speed is influenced by your computer's
     - [A better Emacs *help* buffer](#a-better-emacs-help-buffer)
     - [Enhancing the Elisp development experience](#enhancing-the-elisp-development-experience)
     - [Showing the tab-bar](#showing-the-tab-bar)
-    - [Preventing Emacs from saving custom.el](#preventing-emacs-from-saving-customel)
     - [Changing the Default Font](#changing-the-default-font)
+    - [Loading the custom.el file](#loading-the-customel-file)
     - [Which other customizations can be interesting to add?](#which-other-customizations-can-be-interesting-to-add)
   - [Customizations: pre-early-init.el](#customizations-pre-early-initel)
     - [Configuring straight.el](#configuring-straightel)
-    - [Configuring elpaca (package manager)](#configuring-elpaca-package-manager)
+    - [Configuring Elpaca (package manager)](#configuring-elpaca-package-manager)
   - [Frequently asked questions](#frequently-asked-questions)
     - [Customizing Scroll Recentering](#customizing-scroll-recentering)
     - [How to display Emacs startup duration?](#how-to-display-emacs-startup-duration)
@@ -1466,14 +1466,6 @@ Configure the `tab-bar-show` variable to 1 to display the tab bar exclusively wh
 (setopt tab-bar-show 1)
 ```
 
-### Preventing Emacs from saving custom.el
-
-To prevent Emacs from saving customization information to a custom file, set `custom-file` to `null-device` by adding to the following to `~/.emacs.d/post-init.el`:
-``` emacs-lisp
-;; Prevent Emacs from saving customization information to a custom file
-(setq custom-file null-device)
-```
-
 ### Changing the Default Font
 
 To customize the default font, add the following expression to your `~/.emacs.d/post-init.el`:
@@ -1493,6 +1485,19 @@ On Linux, you can display a comprehensive list of all installed font families by
 fc-list : family | sed 's/,/\n/g' | sort -u
 ```
 
+### Loading the custom.el file
+
+In Emacs, customization variables modified via the UI (e.g., `M-x customize`) are typically stored in a separate file, commonly named `custom.el`. To ensure these settings are loaded during Emacs initialization, it is necessary to explicitly load this file if it exists.
+
+To accomplish this, add the following form to your `~/.emacs.d/post-init.el`:
+
+```elisp
+(when (file-exists-p custom-file)
+  (load custom-file))
+```
+
+This ensures that any user-defined customizations are applied without interfering with manually maintained configuration files.
+
 ### Which other customizations can be interesting to add?
 
 1. Read the following article from the same author: [Essential Emacs Packages for Efficient Software Development and Text Editing](https://www.jamescherti.com/essential-emacs-packages/)
diff --git a/early-init.el b/early-init.el
index 9abbfb7..59a86f3 100644
--- a/early-init.el
+++ b/early-init.el
@@ -150,6 +150,7 @@ pre-early-init.el, and post-early-init.el.")
 
 (setq custom-theme-directory
       (expand-file-name "themes/" minimal-emacs-user-directory))
+
 (setq custom-file (expand-file-name "custom.el" minimal-emacs-user-directory))
 
 ;;; Garbage collection