Re: buffer management in emacs

["B. T. Raven" <nihil@nihilo.net>]

Xah Lee wrote:
> On Apr 18, 2:17 pm, xtd8...@gmail.com (.Martin.) wrote:
>> Hi all,
>> 1. Is there any way of temporarily bookimaring buffers so that I can switch
>> between them more efficiently? Gnus itself has a good few buffers (of
>> which I only use the main one where groups are listed), then
>> when I open a few messages the buffers usually stay. I usually switch
>> between buffers by C-x and right/left arrows. I bet there's a much
>> better way of doing it.
>> I know of C-x b, but then I have to press TAB to list buffers and do
>> autocompletion. How do you switch between buffers?
> 
> there are several buffer switching packages, many comes with emacs 22
> and 23.
> 
> Personally, i use ibuffer. Just type Alt+x ibuffer. You should also
> replace the default keybinding.
> 
> there's also iswitch, and ido, among others.
> 
> they all help you manage buffers.
> 
> The emacs buffer management problem really has to do with emacs's lack
> of closing file command. There's kill-file, but it requires you to
> confirm, even a saved file. Plus, there's no keyboard shortcut for it.
> So, this tends to get people to leave behind lots of opened files.

C-x k is kill-buffer. If buffer is unchanged or saved, no confirmation
is necessary. In general, when a file is loaded into a buffer it is not
left open, so in w32 at least there is no sharing violation if you
manipulate it outside of Emacs.

> 
> Usually hundreds of buffers that are accumulated in weeks or months
> are reported by long time emacs users.
> 
> for me, i prefer to close a file or buffer whenever i'm done with it.
> So, my open buffers represent things i am working on, or need to work
> on. Typically they are no more than 10 open files. I've also
> customized my emacs extensively, so that i have single shortcut to
> close buffer (or create new one), and without asking me if the buffer
> is already saved, and can open accidentally closed buffer (similar to
> accidentally closed tabs in browsers). Also, for switching to next/
> previous buffer, i have easy shortcuts the same as switching tabs in
> browsers.

Electric-buffer-list and ibuffer-other-window let you kill multiple
buffers in much the same way you can delete files in dired.

> 
> If you are interested in this UI, you can try it or get the code at
> ergoemacs.org
> 
> some of these ideas are written here:
> 
>   http://xahlee.org/emacs/modernization_scratch_buffer.html
>   http://xahlee.org/emacs/effective_emacs.html
> 
>   Xah
> ∑ http://xahlee.org/
> 
> ☄