Emacs Lisp ports framework: Overhaul

2026-04-11T16:03:58Z

This overhaul introduces four key changes to the elisp ports framework: 1. Remove support for packaged byte-compiled elisp. The primary motivation is to remove a large number of flavor-specific packages and to simplify the ports tree. As an example, supporting byte-compiled elisp for devel/tablist required six packages, one for each flavor of editors/emacs and editors/emacs-devel. With over 100 elisp ports and requests for new Emacs flavors, this was unmanageable. 2. Install configuration to integrate with Emacs's native compilation machinery, allowing elisp from ports to be compiled into the standard cache under the user's home directory. This matches the behavior of GNU ELPA packages and generally results in a faster experience. Speedups vary depending on the characteristics of the elisp code, but are often reported to be 2.5 to 5 times faster than byte-compiled code. 3. Perform byte compilation on the target host, but only when native compilation is unavailable. Compilation is initiated when Emacs starts, and the resulting .elc files are cached under the user's home directory. 4. Load all autoload files installed by FreeBSD elisp ports. This mirrors what package.el does for ELPA packages, ensuring that autoloaded functions are available without requiring users to explicitly load each package. Users with elisp packages (*-emacs_*) installed should consult the 2026-04-11 UPDATING entry for instructions on handling the transition. Reviewed by: ashish, Benjamin Jacobs , dinoex, mandree, mce, nobutaka, Pat Maddox , rhurlin Sponsored by: The FreeBSD Foundation Differential Revision: https://reviews.freebsd.org/D56001

misc/emacs-libvterm: New port for Emacs libvterm integration

2026-02-04T03:22:53Z

Emacs-libvterm (vterm) is fully-fledged terminal emulator inside GNU Emacs based on libvterm, a C library. As a result of using compiled code (instead of elisp), emacs-libvterm is fully capable, fast, and it can seamlessly handle large outputs. Reviewed by: jrm Pull Request: https://github.com/freebsd/freebsd-ports/pull/480

ports/misc/emacs-libvterm, branch main

Emacs Lisp ports framework: Overhaul

misc/emacs-libvterm: New port for Emacs libvterm integration