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When a recfile is visited in Emacs and rec-mode is activated, the contents of the file are examined and parsed in order to determine if it is a valid recfile and, in that case, to extract information like the kind of records stored in the file.
If the file does not contain valid rec data then the buffer is put in
fundamental-mode and a description of the syntax error, along
its location, is notified in the echo area.
If the file contains valid rec data, the mode sets itself in what is known as “navigation mode”. In this mode the buffer is made read-only and it is narrowed to the first record present in the file. Also, the presentation of the record contents is slightly changed in order to improve the visualization of the data: continuation line marks are replaced by indentation, big fields are folded, etc. The modeline is changed in order to reflect the type of the records being navigated.
At this point the user can navigate through the records and fields contained in the file, and edit the contents of the fields and the structure of the records, by using the commands described in the following subsections.