29.8 Minibuffers and Frames

Normally, each frame has its own minibuffer window at the bottom, which is used whenever that frame is selected. If the frame has a minibuffer, you can get it with minibuffer-window (see section 20.9 Minibuffer Miscellany).

However, you can also create a frame with no minibuffer. Such a frame must use the minibuffer window of some other frame. When you create the frame, you can specify explicitly the minibuffer window to use (in some other frame). If you don't, then the minibuffer is found in the frame which is the value of the variable default-minibuffer-frame. Its value should be a frame that does have a minibuffer.

If you use a minibuffer-only frame, you might want that frame to raise when you enter the minibuffer. If so, set the variable minibuffer-auto-raise to t. See section 29.11 Raising and Lowering Frames.

Variable: default-minibuffer-frame

This variable specifies the frame to use for the minibuffer window, by default. It is always local to the current terminal and cannot be buffer-local. See section 29.2 Multiple Displays.