Really new programming student here, and I'm trying to get tabs in emacs (browser style, like Aquamacs has).
So, how do you get tabs in emacs? A strip of labels showing me which buffers I have open, and clicking on one of them selects that buffer.
I have googled this extensively, but not being fluent in elisp makes it really hard to understand. I have installed the tabbar package, but I do not know where to go from here.
What do I want? Just tabs, and a command to open new tabs, for example C-t (or whatever is best).
I have installed the tabbar package, but I do not know where to go from here.
The tabbar library provides a global minor mode named tabbar-mode, so you will want to enable that in your init file. If it's installed somewhere in your load-path then the following will work:
(when (require 'tabbar nil t)
(tabbar-mode 1))
There is lots of documentation in the library's Commentary, which you can visit like so:
M-x find-library RET tabbar RET
Try this, it's called tabbar and should allow you to do what you're looking for.
As the other answers, tabbar is what you're looking for.
You need to copy it to wherever you keep your emacs files (if you don't have such a place - make one, tabbar will not be the last add-on you'll use :) ), load the file and start the tabbar-mode.
In the below code, the emacs files dir is .emacs.files and it is in my home dir.
(setq tabbar-file
(expand-file-name "tabbar.el"
(expand-file-name ".emacs.files" "~")))
(load-file tabbar-file)
(tabbar-mode 1)
(define-key global-map "\M-[" 'tabbar-backward)
(define-key global-map "\M-]" 'tabbar-forward)
In the above code, I also added binding of scrolling through the tabs to Alt-[ and Alt-].
As to opening new tabs - every time you'll open a new file, it will be opened in a new tab, so don't worry...
This question probably applies to other emacs modes than haskell-mode, since I assume emacs has got a general way of opening windows for automatically created buffers:
haskell-mode for emacs enables me to hit C-c C-l to load the contents of the current buffer into a Haskell interactive session, which automatically causes emacs to open the buffer for the session in a split window in the current frame. Since I am running a setup with multiple emacs clients connected to a server, I really don't want to show the buffer in each open frame I've got. Is there a way to prevent emacs from doing this kind of thing?
Ah, I found a solution just after posting this :).
Adding
(setq special-display-buffer-names
'("*haskell*" "*Help*"))
to my .emacs tells emacs to open these buffers in a frame instead of a split.
Edit: But still, an even better solution would be for emacs never to create frames/splits automatically, but just silently create special buffers in the background. I can't figure out how to specify this though.
in init.el
(setq split-height-threshold 5)
(setq split-width-threshold 5)
I'm trying to use emacs in fullscreen mode with a decent font. I have an nvidia-based laptop running Ubuntu. When it first loads, the font is huge think 16pt font. I used the menu options to set a decent font (8pt).
Now when I run emacs in fullscreen mode, it adjusts the window sort of for the huge font then loads my 8pt font. Now half of my screen is the minibuffer. How do I correctly set the font so that I can use fullscreen mode.
I have tried specifying displaysize in my x config and X does not start. I hear theres something else you need to do for nvidia drivers... but not sure how that works.
I use the following (from http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/FullScreen) in my .emacs:
(defun toggle-fullscreen (&optional f)
(interactive)
(let ((current-value (frame-parameter nil 'fullscreen)))
(set-frame-parameter nil 'fullscreen
(if (equal 'fullboth current-value)
(if (boundp 'old-fullscreen) old-fullscreen nil)
(progn (setq old-fullscreen current-value)
'fullboth)))))
(global-set-key [f11] 'toggle-fullscreen)
;; Make new frames fullscreen by default. Note: this hook doesn't do
;; anything to the initial frame if it's in your .emacs, since that file is
;; read _after_ the initial frame is created.
(add-hook 'after-make-frame-functions 'toggle-fullscreen)
Then F11 will toggle fullscreen on/off.
This is tough since I can't replicate the problem on my machine. I just add -fs and it seems to work. If you just want more real estate... do these work for you:
ditch the menu/toolbar
add (menu-bar-mode 0) and (tool-bar-mode 0) to .emacs
start up and maximze
you should just have the regular DE frame but nothing else
toggle from emacs using M-x menu-bar-mode and M-x tool-bar-mode as needed
manually fullscreen emacs
I can just start emacs, right click the window bar and choose fullscreen from xfce
I have F11 set to do this, but it doesn't seem to work from emacs (emacs seems to try and interpret it as a key binding rather than passing the key to the DE)
if this works, perhaps find a binding in your DE that emacs doesn't care about and just maximize normally
combine the two
I start emacs regularly (/usr/bin/emacs)
I disabled both tool-bar-mode and menu-bar-mode disabled
I manually fullscreen with a right mouse click on the window bar
I get THIS
that's the entire screen, not just a shot of the window contents
What do you think of those ideas? Sorry I can't help more with Ubuntu and/or nvidia. No experience and tough if one can't replicate the problem! Maybe if emacs starts regularly for you the above can help achieve close (or fully) what you're hoping for.
Hi I have been using Emacs23 for some time now and find it a really cool editor. However I am not happy with the cursor (or point in Emacs lingo) being a ' little black box'. I want it to be a nice thin straight line just the way it is in gedit or notepad. Any suggestions on how to do this?
Add this to your .emacs file:
(setq-default cursor-type 'bar)
The emacs tabbar.el package adds (buffer)tabs to each window and comes standard with aquamacs and can be added to emacs23 with the emacs-goodies-el package.
Are any of you hardcore emacs users actually using tabbar? I'm sort of used to having tabs, but I would like to know if working without them could be more productive, and if there are other ways besides checking your bufferlist (C-x C-b) to get an overview of your current project files.
As a side note, I really like textmate's project drawer (and tabs), but anything similar in emacs looks just plain hideous.
I've tried using it, but I felt it constraint my workflow rather than improve it. There are a lot of excellent Emacs modes to help with the organization of many buffers and I simply don't feel mapping buffers to tabs is one of those ways.
Just think about the most basic scenario - a lot of tabs. How different programs deal with it - limit the maximum tabs(IntelliJ IDEA); enable tabs bar scrolling(Firefox); infinitely reducing the tabs size(Google Chrome); creating rows of tabs(IntelliJ IDEA)... None of this solutions is that great and by not having tabs in Emacs we have one less problem to worry about. At least this is my subjective opinion - others will most certainly disagree... I personally need nothing more than ido and and iswitchb.
A video of ido in action: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsgPNVIMkIE
Ya, I use tabbar, along with sr-speedbar.
I customize tabbar to show files in specific groups, and mod some keybindings to make navigating the files easier.
FWIW, here's the relevant section from my ~/.emacs:
(require 'tabbar)
; turn on the tabbar
(tabbar-mode t)
; define all tabs to be one of 3 possible groups: “Emacs Buffer”, “Dired”,
;“User Buffer”.
(defun tabbar-buffer-groups ()
"Return the list of group names the current buffer belongs to.
This function is a custom function for tabbar-mode's tabbar-buffer-groups.
This function group all buffers into 3 groups:
Those Dired, those user buffer, and those emacs buffer.
Emacs buffer are those starting with “*”."
(list
(cond
((string-equal "*" (substring (buffer-name) 0 1))
"Emacs Buffer"
)
((eq major-mode 'dired-mode)
"Dired"
)
(t
"User Buffer"
)
)))
(setq tabbar-buffer-groups-function 'tabbar-buffer-groups)
(global-set-key [M-s-left] 'tabbar-backward)
(global-set-key [M-s-right] 'tabbar-forward)
There's lot's of other tips on emacswiki:
http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/TabBarMode
no.
I use iswitch-b
C-x b "first few letters of buffer", then C-s to rotate to the specific file I want takes me under 2 seconds without me having to move hand to mouse.
No. I could possibly be convinced to try it again with the right customisation, but by default it's pretty useless for me, as I habitually have in excess of 100 buffers open. ibuffer with its filtering and grouping is the best way for managing large numbers of buffers that I've tried.
I like to use speedbar for quick buffer navigation. I have in my .emacs
(speedbar-change-initial-expansion-list "buffers")
(global-set-key [f8] 'speedbar-get-focus)
so when I hit F8, a new frame pops up with a list of open buffers, there you can move point over the buffer you want to select and to activate it. One more F8 goes back to the main frame.
tabs are not reserved for mouse users. look at vim possible workflow: gt to go next tab, or gT to go previous. Say you've one dedicated window for vim: you might easily switch from one buffer to another. Yes, tabs are probably for users with few buffers. if you have hundreds, this won't work.
Quite frankly, you'll find better editors than emacs when speaking of tabs, menus and toolbar. Emacs clearly encourages you to use your keyboard and leave your mouse asleep.
Tabbar or any other tab management tool will have difficulties when you'll have lots of buffers opened. You also don't want to show all your buffers in tabs. Having to remove your hand from the keyboard to grasp the mouse and click on a tab and then remove your hand from the mouse and put it onto the keyboard is clearly a waste of time when a simple keystroke could be used instead.
The best thing you could do to your emacs and to you is to have the following configuration in your .emacs :
(menu-bar-mode -1) ;hide menu-bar
(scroll-bar-mode -1) ;hide scroll-bar
(tool-bar-mode -1) ;hide tool-bar
That will force you to forget the old way of doing things using a mouse (like using tabbar, or menus...), and to use your fingers instead.
Up until now, I haven't tried it, but before I switched back to GNU Emacs from XEmacs, I used the XEmacs tabs very heavily. I found that when I had many source files open, it was one of the fastest ways to jump to the correct file.
Now that I know about tabbar, I am trying it; and so far, I like it.
John
Tabs are really only useful if you use the mouse, and one of the main benefits (to me) of Emacs is that I can avoid the mouse.
So, no, tabbar isn't useful in general.
I did find the tabs useful when I was browsing web pages (using w3m), but I was using the mouse in that case...
Tabbar looks like it is godforsaken
So what about elscreen?
Can be found via http://melpa.milkbox.net/#/elscreen - or installed emacs-elpa (or melpa).
Elscreen is very useful for me.
C-x b<RET> always gives you the last edited buffer. And what do you do with tabs ? Mostly switch back & forth between two files. There you go.