How do I make a working emacs alias function?

Question

In an attempt to go around an annoying aspect of tmux, I have the following code in my .bashrc file:

alias emcs="command emacs"

# Fix emacs in tmux
emacs () {
    if [ $TERM != "xterm" ]
    then
        TERM=xterm emacs "$@"
    else
        emacs "$@"
    fi
    return;
}

The alias is simply for easier access to the original emacs command.

The function is supposed to replace emacs . . . with TERM-xterm emacs . . ., regardless of the arguments listed afterward.

My problem is that when I run emacs, it hangs on the command line. If I change the function to "emaacs" or anything other than "emacs" then it works flawlessly. Why is it hanging when I'm using the actual name of the command, and what can I do to make it work?

---

(If you are wondering why I am doing this, it's because tmux changes the terminal to screen, which for some reason changes the emacs colors where comments and variable names are the same color.)

Answer 1

Take a look at your function. In this example, I have changed some names to indict the guilty, and struck some irrelevancies to your problem:

recurse{} (
    recurse "$@"
}

What do you think this will do when invoked?

To fix this, you can call out the explicit binary:

emacs () {
    if [ $TERM != "xterm" ]
    then
        TERM=xterm /usr/bin/emacs "$@"
    else
        /usr/bin/emacs "$@"
    fi
    return;
}

Or you can rely on your path being properly set:

emacs () {
    if [ $TERM != "xterm" ]
    then
        TERM=xterm command emacs "$@"
    else
        command emacs "$@"
    fi
    return;
}

Answer 2

alias emacs='TERM=xterm emacs'

I believe this is all you need. It sets TERM to xterm unconditionally and runs emacs.

If you wish to only do this in tmux:

emacs () {
    if [ -n "$TMUX" ]; then
        TERM=xterm command emacs "$@"
    else
        command emacs "$@"
    fi
}

This uses command to not call the function recursively. This is not needed in the alias. There is also no need to return in this function.