emacs tab between buffers

Question

Is there some support for using tab to switch between your buffers? Also want to know whether it is possible to get a tab browser, much like all other IDEs has e.g. notepad++.

Answer 1

There's tabbar-mode. See TabBarMode in the Emacs Wiki. Here's the source at github. I have to say that I don't like it much myself.

For browsing buffers in Emacs, I recommend learning to use list-buffers (C-x C-b) or the fancier ibuffer.

Answer 2

I really don't think you want to make just the tab key switch to other buffers. If you were to make tab switch buffers, you would not be able to use it in any other place, including entering it into files or using it for automatic name completion. Now, using the tab key in combination with another key might work.

Ctrl-tab is not used in that many places, so that might be better choice. You can set cntrl-tab key to always switch to another buffer by adding the following to your .emacs file (~/.emacs).

(global-set-key [C-tab] 'next-buffer)

BTW, I have always found that using "C-x b" or "C-x C-b" to switch buffers really works well once you are used to it.

If what you are really looking for is a good way to jump between buffers and more of an IDE type environment, you might want to check out ecb-minor-mode (http://ecb.sourceforge.net/). I use it heavily.