I install el-get by typing this into my buffer, highlighting, and hitting C-j:
(url-retrieve
"https://raw.github.com/dimitri/el-get/master/el-get-install.el"
(lambda (s)
(goto-char (point-max))
(eval-print-last-sexp)))
...according to the installation documentation.
I can then install things using M-x el-get commands. Great so far.
However, when I close emacs and restart, M-x el-get cannot be found, nor can any of the packages I installed with it. When I try to reinstall el-get in the method above, installation says the git package already exists:
fatal: destination path 'el-get' already exists and is not an empty directory.
I can delete the el-get directory in my emacs.d/ folder and get back to the beginning, but can't seem to get el-get to stay installed beyond the first time. What am I missing or misunderstanding?
Also---I'm only using el-get in the first place to be able to install auto-complete for using emacs for python development. If you have an easier or better easy-installation recipe for that, I'd appreciate that suggestion, too.
(Never used el-get myself, but...)
a) You should add the code from one of the examples in the Basic Setup section. It includes forms like (add-to-list 'load-path ...) and (require 'el-get ...), which are more or less essential for loading Emacs packages.
b) You can just as well install auto-complete from Marmalade or Melpa. I think this is the recommended option if you're using Emacs 24. Add at least one of the repositories to package-archives, press M-x list-packages RET, look for auto-complete, press i, then x.