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I am using Emacs 24.5.1 on OpenSUSE Tumbleweed, with Gnome 3.16, and the title of the GTK window with Emacs in it is always emacs@hostname. How can I change it to the name of the current file I'm editing?

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4
  • Why do you need this? I'm curious for your use case. The file name is already shown in the mode line, isn't it?
    – Dieter.Wilhelm
    Commented Sep 22, 2015 at 21:25
  • Gnome in Overview mode has the window title in big text below the window thumbnail, the one in the mode line is too small to see.
    – Sean
    Commented Sep 23, 2015 at 13:32
  • 1
    Just a side remark: If you have several frames open - for example if you open a file in another frame with C-x 5 f - then each frame will show the buffer name as title. It's only when you have just a single frame that you see "emacs@hostname".
    – pst
    Commented Aug 24, 2020 at 10:55
  • @Dieter.Wilhelm The title bar can show the buffer name and mode of the minibuffer, which the mode line doesn't display.
    – Arch Stanton
    Commented Jan 30, 2021 at 11:50

3 Answers 3

Reset to default
38

The file name as frame name

    (setq-default frame-title-format '("%f"))

The file name and the major mode as frame name (my conf)

    (setq-default frame-title-format '("%f [" mode-name "]"))

See

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5
  • 11
    Use %b to get the filename without the path
    – Adversus
    Commented Jun 12, 2017 at 7:24
  • 4
    '%b' is also better for unsaved buffers, like "scratch"
    – teroi
    Commented May 16, 2018 at 8:29
  • Does somebody know how to set it in custom-set-variables?
    – yPhil
    Commented Jan 6, 2021 at 22:50
  • @yPhil (custom-set-variables '(setq-default frame-title-format '("%f [%m]"))) ?
    – djangoliv
    Commented Jan 7, 2021 at 14:08
  • %m is now deprecated in favor of the variable mode-name. See %-Constructs in the Mode Line
    – Arch Stanton
    Commented Feb 21, 2023 at 15:35
9

Make emacs' window title show path of the current file:

(setq-default frame-title-format
              '(:eval
                (format "%s@%s: %s %s"
                        (or (file-remote-p default-directory 'user)
                            user-real-login-name)
                        (or (file-remote-p default-directory 'host)
                            system-name)
                        (buffer-name)
                        (cond
                         (buffer-file-truename
                          (concat "(" buffer-file-truename ")"))
                         (dired-directory
                          (concat "{" dired-directory "}"))
                         (t
                          "[no file]")))))
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0

Additionally you can also indicate if there any unsaved changes using the below code (as mentioned here):

(setq frame-title-format
      '((:eval (if (buffer-file-name)
                   (abbreviate-file-name (buffer-file-name))
                 "%b"))
        (:eval (if (buffer-modified-p)
                   " •"))
        " Emacs")
      )

Note that this doesn't work for Spacemacs. Below is the config for spacemacs which you need to add in dotspacemacs/init (as mentioned here)

Spacemacs documentation: https://develop.spacemacs.org/doc/DOCUMENTATION.html#title

dotspacemacs-frame-title-format   "%b - Spacemacs"
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