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I'm trying to use Emacs as my main window manager, by using EXWM:

https://github.com/ch11ng/exwm

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Installation works fine. However, my default Emacs key binding to move between splits is: Shift + Arrow keys. This doesnt seem to work if you have say Firefox on the left split, and say an Emac buffers like scratch buffer on the right (a vertical split).

I can do Shift+ Left and it focuses the cursor on the Firefox instance. However, I cant seem to move from Firefox back to scratch buffer, i.e. doing Shift + Right doesnt work.

Please let me know how to get this to work. I can just use the mouse to click the buffer but I'd rather use the keyboard.

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  • Did you try modifying exwm-input-global-keys?
    – Aquaactress
    Nov 3, 2019 at 12:29
  • I havent modified that. But shouldnt the global key be the same as default, the meta key? In the user guide, to switch between workspace, it defaults to S-r, where S is the global key = meta key. And it works to switch between workspace. But it doesnt work for the above scenario that i described.
    – mle0312
    Nov 3, 2019 at 14:42
  • Let me explain what I said. What I'm saying is that to get this behavior you have to bind these keys globally with exwm. I'm not referring to workspaces. I just tried it and it works for me so I'll post my answer below.
    – Aquaactress
    Nov 4, 2019 at 13:25

1 Answer 1

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The reason your emacs bindings don't work in firefox is because they are not bound through EXWM. EXWM is the medium emacs uses to communicate to x-windows so you need to set the bindings through it. EXWM by default enables only a subset of your emacs bindings are available in x windows (and only in line-mode).

Like in Emacs, there are two kinds of bindings in EXWM, global and local. Based on your question it seems like you'd like these bindings to always work in x windows so I would recommend global binding.

To remedy this you need to set exwm-input-global-keys to the bindings you want. 

(setq exwm-input-global-keys
      `((,(kbd "S-<up>") . windmove-up)
        (,(kbd "S-<down>") . windmove-down)
        (,(kbd "S-<left>") . windmove-left)
        (,(kbd "S-<right>") . windmove-right)))

This will set the bindings in Emacs and in all x windows.

Sidenote: some modes like org-mode have these keys bound to something. So in that case you'd have to override those keys.

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