RE: mouse-autoselect-window

[Drew Adams]

> The original post described a desire to shift automatically from frame
> to frame.

No, it did not. I simply asked some questions and reported an apparent doc
problem and perhaps a difference in behavior on MS Windows. I never said
anything about wanting the focus to follow the mouse across frames.

However, now that you bring it up, I would like to be able to do that ;-).

> You can only do that with a focus-follows-mouse policy.

Is there such a "policy" from within Emacs? I thought that
`focus-follows-mouse' was only to let Emacs know how the window mgr behaves,
not to prescribe a focus behavior (e.g. for the window manager). Here is
what the doc string says:

 You should set this variable to tell Emacs how your window manager
 handles focus, since there is no way in general for Emacs to find out
 automatically.

I've never seen it explained anywhere what Emacs does with that information,
however, or why it needs it...

> When you have a click-to-focus policy in your window manager, I would
> expect having to click on a new frame -- I do not expect an instance
> of Emacs within a window manager to govern an enclosing window
> manager.

That's more or less my understanding also. That seems to contradict what you
said above, though, about focus-follows-mouse letting one shift
automatically from frame to frame.

> That may be our difference.

I don't know that we have a difference - in point of view. We are using
different platforms, however, so that is one difference we have.

> The documentation for   mouse-autoselect-window  says
>
>     Non-nil means autoselect window with mouse pointer.
>
> and does not refer to frames at all, so I would not expect to select a
> different frame unless I had focus-follows-mouse policy.

If the window with the mouse pointer is in a different frame, then that
sentence implies that that window will be autoselected. The sentence does
not limit itself in any way to windows within the same frame, so it applies
to all windows. Whenever a window is selected, so is its frame.

But the window in the other frame is not, in fact, autoselected in MS
Windows. So the doc is not accurate in this case.

> Try auto-selecting an Emacs window in another frame when you have a
> focus-follows-mouse policy turned on.  Of course, the action may be
> the window manager's doing.

`focus-follows-mouse' has no effect in MS Windows, according to the doc and
to my experience.

> Indeed, I suspect it is; it does not matter, since it shows that some
> one can shift automatically from frame to frame.

? Howzat?

> I cannot doing anything for window managers that are limited in their
> focus policies.

You mean that Mr Gates doesn't follow your focus? ;-)

BTW, `mouse-autoselect-window' _could_ select the mouse window in MS
Windows, even on another frame, at the cost of also raising that frame -
just add `select-frame-set-input-focus' to its code. However, I'm not sure
that is a good idea.  I assume that on GNU/Linux etc. the focus moves but
the window is not raised - that's the behavior I would prefer, anyway.