title: Conform on-the-fly to PEP8 using flycheck on emacs
body: <p>I unpack <a href="http://www.flycheck.org/en/27/_downloads/flycheck.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">flycheck</a> to <code>~/.</code> and put the following lines in <code>~/.emacs</code>:</p>
  
  <pre><code>;; (package-initialize)
  (setq load-path (cons "~/flycheck-20170415.1006" load-path))
  (require 'flycheck)
  (add-hook 'after-init-hook #'global-flycheck-mode)
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Starting Emacs 24.5.1 I get:</p>
  
  <pre><code>File error: Cannot open load file, no such file or directory, let-alist
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>With Emacs 25.1.1 I get:</p>
  
  <pre><code>File error: Cannot open load file, No such file or directory, dash
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>(These errors do not change if I uncomment <code>(package-initialize)</code>. Emacs 25 now inserts <code>(package-initialize)</code>, nudging those of us with a long setup to adapt.)</p>
  
  <p>My (subsequent) aim is to conform Python code on-the-fly to PEP8. Once the problem above is resolved, I'll add</p>
  
  <pre><code>(setq exec-path (append exec-path '("/opt/local/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/bin")))
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>to this brief <code>~/.emacs</code> (<code>/opt/..2.7/bin</code> is where MacPorts put <code>flake8</code>), but there is apparently an issue before I even specify the programming language.</p>
  
  <p><strong>Update</strong></p>
  
  <p>This is far more painful than I expected. Flycheck is heavy-handed about being installed through packages, and incorporating the steps described <a href="http://www.flycheck.org/en/27/_downloads/flycheck.html#Installation" rel="nofollow noreferrer">here</a> to my usual <code>~/.emacs</code> leads to the notorious</p>
  
  <pre><code>load-with-code-conversion: Symbol’s value as variable is void: &lt;!DOCTYPE
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>error. (I'm pretty sure I have no HTML files hiding under a <code>.el</code> extension.)</p>
  
  <p><strong>Update2</strong></p>
  
  <p>Uh.. I stand corrected! Some <code>dash.el</code> made its way to my usual elisp directory, and flycheck depends on it, but it was indeed an HTML file.</p>