Each Emacs window (aside from minibuffer windows) includes a mode line, which displays status information about the buffer displayed in the window. The mode line contains information about the buffer, such as its name, associated file, depth of recursive editing, and the major and minor modes.
This section describes how the contents of the mode line are controlled. It is in the chapter on modes because much of the information displayed in the mode line relates to the enabled major and minor modes.
mode-line-format is a buffer-local variable that holds a
template used to display the mode line of the current buffer. All
windows for the same buffer use the same mode-line-format and
their mode lines appear the same (except for scrolling percentages and
line numbers).
The mode line of a window is normally updated whenever a different
buffer is shown in the window, or when the buffer's modified-status
changes from nil to t or vice-versa. If you modify any of
the variables referenced by mode-line-format (see section Variables Used in the Mode Line), you may want to force an update of the mode line so as to
display the new information.
The mode line is usually displayed in inverse video; see
mode-line-inverse-video in section Inverse Video.
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