Make frames in Emacs GUI behaves like frames in Terminal

Question

In terminal, Emacs manage multiple frames with names like F1, F2.... because it can't create multiple OS windows. I want the GUI version to behave this way, that is, instead of creating multiple OS windows, I want it to create many virtual frames inside a single Emacs window. Is there a way?

Answer 1

There is a way to mimic the frame switching behavior of terminal emacs in GUI. Here is what I did. Basicly it uses make-frame-invisible to hide inactive frames. It works well on archlinux with i3.

(defsubst +amos--is-frame-daemons-frame (f)
(and (daemonp) (eq f terminal-frame)))

(defun +amos--frame-list-without-daemon ()
"Return a list of frames without the daemon's frame."
(if (daemonp)
    (filtered-frame-list
    #'(lambda (f) (not (+amos--is-frame-daemons-frame f))))
    (frame-list)))

(defun +amos/workspace-new ()
(interactive)
(let ((name (frame-parameter nil 'name))
        (oframe (selected-frame)))
    (select-frame (if (s-starts-with? "F" name)
                    (make-frame)
                    (make-frame `((name . ,name)))))
    (make-frame-invisible oframe t))
(setq +amos--frame-list (reverse (+amos--frame-list-without-daemon))))

(setq +amos-tmux-need-switch nil)

;; TODO ring lru
(defun +amos/workspace-delete ()
(interactive)
(let ((f (selected-frame)))
    (select-frame (previous-frame))
    (make-frame-visible)
    (delete-frame f))
(setq +amos--frame-list (reverse (+amos--frame-list-without-daemon)))
(+doom-modeline|set-selected-window)
(realign-windows)
(when +amos-tmux-need-switch
    (shell-command! "tmux switch-client -t amos\; run-shell -t amos '/home/amos/scripts/setcursor.sh $(tmux display -p \"#{pane_tty}\")'")
    (setq +amos-tmux-need-switch nil)))

(defun +amos/workspace-switch-to (index)
(interactive)
(when (< index (length +amos--frame-list))
    (let ((frame (nth index +amos--frame-list))
        (oframe (selected-frame)))
    (select-frame frame)
    (raise-frame frame)
    (make-frame-invisible oframe t)
    (setq +amos-tmux-need-switch nil)
    (realign-windows)
    (recenter))))

(defun +amos/workspace-switch-to-1 () (interactive) (+amos/workspace-switch-to 0))
(defun +amos/workspace-switch-to-2 () (interactive) (+amos/workspace-switch-to 1))
(defun +amos/workspace-switch-to-3 () (interactive) (+amos/workspace-switch-to 2))
(defun +amos/workspace-switch-to-4 () (interactive) (+amos/workspace-switch-to 3))
(defun +amos/workspace-switch-to-5 () (interactive) (+amos/workspace-switch-to 4))
(defun +amos/workspace-switch-to-6 () (interactive) (+amos/workspace-switch-to 5))
(defun +amos/workspace-switch-to-7 () (interactive) (+amos/workspace-switch-to 6))
(defun +amos/workspace-switch-to-8 () (interactive) (+amos/workspace-switch-to 7))
(defun +amos/workspace-switch-to-9 () (interactive) (+amos/workspace-switch-to 8))
(defun +amos-workspace-cycle (off)
(let* ((n (length +amos--frame-list))
        (index (-elem-index (selected-frame) +amos--frame-list))
        (i (% (+ off index n) n)))
    (+amos/workspace-switch-to i)))
(defun +amos/workspace-switch-left ()  (interactive) (+amos-workspace-cycle -1))
(defun +amos/workspace-switch-right () (interactive) (+amos-workspace-cycle +1))

(defun +amos|maybe-delete-frame-buffer (frame)
(let ((windows (window-list frame)))
    (dolist (window windows)
    (let ((buffer (window-buffer (car windows))))
        (when (eq 1 (length (get-buffer-window-list buffer nil t)))
        (kill-buffer buffer))))))
(add-to-list 'delete-frame-functions #'+amos|maybe-delete-frame-buffer)

Answer 2

If what you mean is that you want to be able to access frames by name, then yes, you can do this with Icicles.

By default, C-x 5 o is bound to multi-command icicle-select-frame. This lets you select one or more frames by name.

A frame's name comes from its name frame parameter. It is suffixed as needed by [NUMBER], to make it unique. For example, in a context where frames are named for their buffers and you have two frames showing buffer *Help*, one of the frames will be called *Help*[2] for use with this command.

Frame selection with C-x 5 o uses completion and cycling. The completion can be vanilla Emacs completion or regexp (including, of course, substring) completion. (It can also be any of several fuzzy completions.)

(If, for some reason, you want the frame names to be just F1, F2, etc., as with terminal Emacs, then you just need to do that at the level of frame parameter name. You can do that using hooks etc.)