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39.1 Refreshing the Screen

The function redraw-frame clears and redisplays the entire contents of a given frame (see Frames). This is useful if the screen is corrupted.

— Function: redraw-frame &optional frame

This function clears and redisplays frame frame. If frame is omitted or nil, it redraws the selected frame.

Even more powerful is redraw-display:

— Command: redraw-display

This function clears and redisplays all visible frames.

In Emacs, processing user input takes priority over redisplay. If you call these functions when input is available, they don't redisplay immediately, but the requested redisplay does happen eventually—after all the input has been processed.

On text terminals, suspending and resuming Emacs normally also refreshes the screen. Some terminal emulators record separate contents for display-oriented programs such as Emacs and for ordinary sequential display. If you are using such a terminal, you might want to inhibit the redisplay on resumption.

— User Option: no-redraw-on-reenter

This variable controls whether Emacs redraws the entire screen after it has been suspended and resumed. Non-nil means there is no need to redraw, nil means redrawing is needed. The default is nil.