Is there a way to run Emacs on MacOS with an updated interface? Running Emacs in the terminal limits the functionality, but the GUI versions I've tried are garish-looking to me.
I installed the Doom Emacs configuration and it looks really great and modern on macOS. I think you'd like it! Definitely worth a quick install to see what is possible - you can always go and make your own configuration based on that if you want
Doom Emacs: https://github.com/hlissner/doom-emacs
Doom Emacs themes: https://github.com/hlissner/emacs-doom-themes (can be installed standalone but not sure if they disable the toolbars etc)
Is that just the default installation with better choices in the settings? I should have been more patient Emacs and persistent in configuring it.
- better-defaults (removes the toolbars/etc): https://github.com/technomancy/better-defaults
- doom-modeline (a nicer-looking modeline - that's the bar at the bottom): https://github.com/seagle0128/doom-modeline
- base16-chalk theme from base16-theme
All of the above packages are in MELPA.
And then the transparent titlebar is:
(add-to-list 'default-frame-alist '(ns-transparent-titlebar . t))
(add-to-list 'default-frame-alist '(ns-appearance . dark))