This project is for making it easy to use SLIME in Quicklisp. To use it, do this: (ql:quickload "quicklisp-slime-helper") (quicklisp-slime-helper:install) It will create a file in the Quicklisp base directory called "slime-helper.el". That file will search the quicklisp-slime-helper dist for an installed slime.el file, and add its directory to the Emacs load-path. In your ~/.emacs, you could have something like this: (load (expand-file-name "~/quicklisp/slime-helper.el")) (require 'slime) (slime-setup '(slime-fancy)) (setq inferior-lisp-program "sbcl")