How to set the default font size?

Question

I find myself consistently zooming out (C-x C--) in every buffer that I am using in order to see more lines of code that I'm working on.

Is there a way to set the zoom level in my .emacs, not interactively? Or should I look into setting the fontsize? I've been using the zoom, because it's been the easiest/quickest solution, but I'd rather find a more permanent solution. Are there disadvantages or advantages to using one versus the other? I am unclear on the differences.

Answer 1

Yes. What you want is to zoom (the font size for) a frame, regardless of which buffers are displayed there.

See library zoom-frm.el, and these descriptions of zooming a frame and zooming a buffer.

See, in particular, command zoom-in/out, which does both. It is bound by default to the keys normally bound to just buffer zooming: C-x C-+, C-x C--, C-x C-0, and C-x C-=. You can also bind commands zoom-in and zoom-out to mouse-wheel rotations. Using C-u with any of these commands toggles between frame zooming and buffer zooming.

Besides interactively zooming frames or buffers, you can of course set the default font size you want for all frames.

The same Emacs-Wiki page has more info about setting fonts and font sizes.

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Update after you decided that you want to set the default font size

The answer is in the last line I wrote above: See section Globally Change the Default Font on the Emacs Wiki Set Fonts page. It tells you how to set the default font. (It also tells you how to zoom font sizes interactively.)

Here is that information in a nutshell - put this in your init file:

(add-to-list 'default-frame-alist '(font . FONT ))
(set-face-attribute 'default t :font FONT )

But do read the entire section of that page, as it tells you more, including how to set the default font using .Xresources and the Emacs daemon. An example of a line suitable for ~/.Xresources for setting the default font size is:

Emacs.default.attributeHeight: 94

Answer 2

If you want to use a GUI font picker with previews and all, you may use M-x menu-set-font

Answer 3

I'm using this for zooming Emacs-wide (not just the current buffer):

;; http://blog.vivekhaldar.com/post/4809065853/dotemacs-extract-interactively-change-font-size
(defun my/zoom-in ()
  "Increase font size by 10 points"
  (interactive)
  (set-face-attribute 'default nil
                      :height
                      (+ (face-attribute 'default :height)
                         10)))

(defun my/zoom-out ()
  "Decrease font size by 10 points"
  (interactive)
  (set-face-attribute 'default nil
                      :height
                      (- (face-attribute 'default :height)
                         10)))

;; change font size, interactively
(global-set-key (kbd "C->") 'my/zoom-in)
(global-set-key (kbd "C-<") 'my/zoom-out)

Answer 4

Here's a suggestion that doesn't try to answer your question but does try to solve your problem: consider adding a second display in portrait orientation (as opposed to the normal landscape orientation). I find it essential for precisely the reason you keep zooming out: being able to see enough lines of code to get the full context of what I'm looking at and working on.