Tiling Window Managers

EXWM – full-featured tiling X window manager for Emacs

EXWM (Emacs X Window Manager) is a full-featured tiling X window manager for Emacs built on top of XELB.

XELB (X protocol Emacs Lisp Binding) is a pure Elisp implementation of X11 protocol based on the XML description files from XCB project.

EXWM is free and open source software.

Key Features

  • Fully keyboard-driven operations. EXWM uses the same syntax as Emacs itself to denote key events. Like Emacs, EXWM uses a key sequence (or key for short) rather than a single key event to make a key binding. There’s support for accessing keymaps in char-mode.
  • Hybrid layout modes (tiling & stacking).
  • Dynamic workspace support. They can be created or removed on-the-fly. There are several ways to add/or remove workspaces.
  • Autohide minibuffer & echo area – the minibuffer and echo area (sharing the same mini-window) are fixed at the bottom of each workspace by default.
  • Supports third-party compositing manager. EXWM is a non-reparenting window manager.
  • ICCCM/EWMH compliance.
  • (Optional) RandR (multi-monitor) support. RandR is disabled by default.
  • (Optional) Builtin system tray. The system tray is displayed on active workspace only.
  • (Optional) Builtin input method.
  • exwm-xim module for using Emacs builtin input methods in X windows.
  • Support for ‘managed’ per-application configuration to allow users to specify whether to manage an X window.
  • Support for replacing / being replaced by other window managers. exwm-init and exwm-exit can also be used to manually start/stop EXWM.

Website: github.com/emacs-exwm/exwm
Support:
Developer: Chris Feng
License: GNU General Public License version 3, or (at your option) any later version

EXWM does not provide a status bar itself.

EXWM is written in the Emacs Lisp programming language. Learn Lisp with our recommended free books and free tutorials.


Related Software

X11 Tiling Window Managers
i3Improved tiling window manager
StumpWMCommon Lisp window manager
bspwmBased on binary space partitioning
EXWMFull-featured tiling X window manager for Emacs
herbstluftwmBasic tiling concept is that the layout is represented by a binary tree
wmderlandOffers no bloated features, an easy-to-use config, and a very small footprint
NotionOriginally a fork of Ion
zwmMinimal, opinionated window manager with a keyboard-driven workflow
RatpoisonKeyboard-only window manager
NWMLightweight window manager with a simple, efficient workflow

Read our verdict in the software roundup.


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