Re: Delete M-TAB behaviour in Emacs

[Tim X <timx@spamto.devnul.com>]

Cesáreo García Rodicio <cesareo@cesareox.com> writes:

> Hi Peter!
> 
> Thanks for your response but the problem is when I'm in Emacs,
> something occurs in Emacs that grab Alt+TAB. With other rograms I have
> no problem only in Emacs. I use window maker and I know it is possible
> but I can't get it to work.
> 
> I have seen Window Maker and emacs with M-TAB function working fine.
> How can I do?
> 

That sounds very odd and certainly isn't standard behavior for window
managers under X. Normal behavior is for the window manager to first
interpret all key strokes, see if there is some window manager command
bound to it and execute it if there is. If there is no window manager
command bound to the key combination, it is passed through to the
application (if one is focused). In other words, window manager
bindings usually take preference over application key bindings. The
only other possible complication arises when the window managger is
able toalso pass the key combination through to the application (sort
of a chaining), in which case, the window manager performs its action
and then passes the key combination onto the application. 

I don't know about window maker, but if you run sawfish with the
merlyn add-ons, the M-Tab key switches applications (similar to the
same functionality in windows). If I have the merlyn extensions
installed, I have to change the key combination at the window manager
level because I muse M-Tab a lot.

I would strongly suggest moving the window maker key combination to
some other binding. The M-Tab key is used a lot by various modes and
it is unlikely you will reliably be able to identify all the hooks and
configurations you will need to ensure emacs no longer sees a binding
for M-Tab in any mode. You will also lose a lot of valuable
functionality without M-Tab within emacs. 

The only way that I can imagine you observe the problem with emacs and
no other application is that window maker has some sort of dynamic key
binding functionality and there is some configuration setup somewhere
on your system which is changing the window maker config when emacs is
run - though I find this an unlikely proposition. 

Tim

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