• Tired of writing Emacs configuration code? 🤯
• Afraid of or ever declared .emacs bankruptcy? 😰
• Don't want to spend your time writing Emacs Lisp code? 😳 [1]
• Need to quickly access help now and later on specific topic? 🤔
• Want to learn Emacs and try several built-in and external packages? 😇
• Want a fast single process startup even with a large number of external packages installed? 😃
• You also want to run Emacs daemon(s) with text and graphics clients on linux and macOS like a pro? 🥳

PEL might be for you! Then go ahead, install it [2] or update it [3] ! Leave feedback in the discussion if you wish.

Essentially PEL:

• extends the standard Emacs system and enhance the synergy in your use of Emacs,
• adds a large number (695) of convenient commands and provides glue logic to increase feature cohesion and simplify their use,
• provides the ability to easily install, update a large set (304) of external packages from various sources:
  • elpa compliant sites: GNU elpa, MELPA,
  • Github hosted files that are not setup as Emacs packages,
  • Gitlab hosted files that are not setup as Emacs packages,
  • and you can still install packages with Emacs package management commands, and manually configure them by adding specific logic in the PEL init.el file.
• provides contextual help commands that describe how to deal with indentation and hard tab control in several major modes,
• provides the ability to use Tree-Sitter based major modes but also dynamically switch from classic to Tree-Sitter based major mode and back at any time and without any impact on your original selection; the 🚦 Tree-sitter PDF lists these modes,
  • the 🚦 Tree-sitter PDF provides information on the various Tree-Sitter language grammar and major modes supporting it, and
  • the document titled Using tree-sitter with Emacs and PEL describes how to setup your environment to use the Tree-Sitter based modes,
• uses the extremely powerful Emacs customization system to drive activation of features,
  • PEL provides an Emacs init.el and early-init.el file; to use PEL you need to use the PEL specific init.el file, as described inside the PEL installation, and you won't need to edit it to control installation and manage the PEL supported packages. If you need to add extra logic that PEL does not yet implement then you can add it to your copy of that init.el file, otherwise all control is done by the PEL logic located in the PEL source code files stored in the PEL repository you get from this project. All activation and configuration is controlled by the customizable user-options.
• provides integrated features tying several built-in Emacs functionality and external packages to increase cohesion between those features in ways that external packages can't do alone (and would require more programming on your part),
• support Emacs in terminal mode, providing key bindings that can be used in terminal mode for commands that normally do not have them,
• support Emacs in graphical mode with some extensions specific to macOS and Linux,
• allow independent configuration of terminal-based and GUI-based Emacs customization to prevent slowing down terminal mode with logic that is only available in graphical mode,
• attempt to provide globally unified keyboard experience for a large set of commands across multiple major modes,
• document Emacs features in several (202) topic oriented PDF tables which provide and overview of the topic, list standard Emacs commands, PEL extra commands, their key bindings, links to the Emacs manual, to the external packages, to description articles and more. Some tables describe tools like GNU make or languages (like Perl 5).
  • All PDF tables are heavily hyperlinked, with table of contents links to the table topics, links to other tables, and links back to the ➢Index PDF that gives you a top level view of all topics inside one page.
  • The PDF tables use colour codes and icons (see the ➢Legend PDF for their meaning) to speed identification of commands, identify if they are available globally, for major mode, minor mode or under special circumstances to help you understand Emacs.
• PEL also provide documentation on several other topics.
• And PEL also provides several other tools:
  • shell scripts to start Emacs or execute various tools to help use several features inside Emacs.
  • awk scripts for text filtering and transformation.
  • You might also be interested by the tools provided by my USRHOME project.

PEL keeps evolving. It allows me to maintain my Emacs configuration on several macOS and Linux systems and also under Windows (whenever I have to use it). The configuration logic is inside the PEL source code, which is byte compiled by a make file. All I need to do is install PEL on the various systems and copy the customization files (which I keep under VCS control for historical and distribution control).

And, using PEL, I can still use other Emacs packages installed under Emacs package management and if I need to use them often in multiple systems I integrate their management under PEL.

If you find PEL useful please drop me a comment, and if you'd like some new features don't hesitate to ask. And if you like what you see why not give this project a star to encourage me further?

Again any feedback is welcome. Thanks!

• PEL supports terminal Emacs launched from a shell and graphics Emacs launched from a shell or a GUI program like Windows Explorer, macOS Finder, Linux file managers, etc...

• Want to start Emacs as an independent process or a text or GUI client to the Emacs daemon? PEL provides simple shell scripts for all of that (for macOS and Linux). See Using the Emacs daemon and clients for more info and the related quick shortcut installation script.

• With PEL, Emacs will start faster than with several other systems; PEL Emacs initialization is heavily optimized to auto-load and defer execution as much as possible. Emacs startup time under a second for a large number of activated package is easily achieved, even on old computers. Take a look at some screen shots in the startup directory:
  • On a 2014 iMac running Emacs 26.3 terminal (in normal mode)
  • On a 2014 iMac running Emacs 26.3 terminal in fast-startup mode
  • On Emacs 30.1 in terminal mode under Rocky Linux 8.10 VM running in a 2014 iMac, accessed via ssh with a GNU screen session. Note this one: it has 412 loaded features, yet the Emacs startup time is 0.5 seconds even if PEL fast startup mode is not used! Emacs is using native compilation mode here, and Emacs also runs faster on Linux than under macOS.
  • On a 2023 macStudio running Emacs 30.1 in terminal (in normal mode, without native compilation), starts in 0.58 seconds while providing 612 features (with 634 loaded files).
  • On a 2023 macStudio running Emacs 30.1 in Graphics mode (in normal-mode, without native compilation).
• On Emacs < 30, you can speed Emacs startup much more with PEL fast startup mode command (see also ⅀ Fast Startup PDF [5]). PEL supports 2 different Emacs startup operation modes:
  • The normal startup mode, using Emacs' standard package.el package manager with PEL's extensions that provide customization-driven package management built on Emacs easy customization to pick and chose packages and behaviours, all without having to write Emacs Lisp code. PEL enhances Emacs customization system: PEL provides keys to quickly access customization groups of Emacs built-in and external Emacs Lisp libraries even if they are not even loaded.
  • The fast startup mode. It can achieve 0.1 second startup with over 230 external packages, see [7]. In fast startup you can use all external packages you have already installed in normal startup mode but now Emacs starts much faster. In fast startup PEL does not support download and installation of new external packages but just return to normal mode to do so. PEL provides 2 commands to switch modes:
    • The pel-setup-fast (<f11> M-S f) activates the fast startup mode. It bundles all external packages that use a single directory inside a single directory to reduce Emacs load-path and sets up your Elpa directory for a fast startup.
    • The pel-setup-normal (<f11> M-S n) restores the normal Emacs setup with package management capabilities and PEL's automatic package installation via customization.
• PEL supports Emacs 26 and later.
  • For Emacs 27 and later the pel-early-init-template user-option (which defaults to example/init/early-init.el) allows you to identify a PEL-compatible early-init.el file that PEL edits to control whether fast startup and package-quickstart feature are used.
    • PEL provides the pel-setup-with-quickstart command (<f11> M-S q) to create and refresh all the package-quickstart files [8] and pel-setup-no-quickstart (<f11> M-S M-q) to disable it.

• PEL uses Emacs customization facility to control everything:
  • the selection,
  • installation and
  • configuration of packages,
  • the activation of various major and minor modes,
  • the improvement of behaviour of various major and minor modes,
  • the use of various features provided by PEL.
• PEL saves your customization data inside a file separate from your init.el file, providing an extra degree of freedom and control. This also gives you the ability to easily revision and clone your Emacs environment to other computers.
• PEL provides enhanced and easy access to relevant customization buffers for your specific context. Each supported topic or major mode context has a PEL prefix key and each supported major mode uses the <f12> key as the main prefix key. For instance in a C buffer, use <f12> <f1> to access the C-specific PEL PDF, <f12> <f2> to access the PEL customization buffer to activate C features, and f12> <f3> to the customization buffers controlling the major mode and related features.
  • Unlike default Emacs behaviour, PEL can open customization buffer for a group even if it is not yet loaded. If they are not loaded PEL will load them for you after prompting. Even if the package's code was not written to support auto-loading of customization variables.
• The classical way to control Emacs behaviour has been to write Emacs Lisp code to set variables. Although you can still do it with PEL you will benefit from PEL's integration better if you control all via the customization buffers and customization files. You can modify the behaviour by applying customization modification to test your changes and then save them to a file once you are happy with it.
• PEL supports the ability to have 2 independent customization files: one for Emacs running in terminal mode and another for Emacs running in graphics mode. PEL supports two sets of elpa directories to store the packages used for each mode when this independent dual customization mode is used. PEL provides the pel-setup-dual-environment command to activate this. Follow the installation instructions and see the ⅀ Customize PDF for more details.
  • A PEL compatible Emacs init.el is available for you to use right from the beginning. Instructions are inside. You can use it as is or modify some of the options.
  • For Emacs ≥ 27, PEL also provides a PEL compatible early-init.el. Instructions are inside. PEL will automatically install it if you want to use Emacs package quickstart feature available on Emacs ≥ 27. You can also modify it and add your own code. Instructions are located in the file.
  • PEL comes with samples of Emacs custom files you can use with PEL to quickly activate features. After following the PEL installation steps, Copy one of these files into your ~/.emacs.d/emacs-customization.el file then start Emacs and watch PEL download, install and activates the packages identified in the file you selected.
  • If you want to manage 2 set of customization files and package directory, one for Emacs in terminal mode and another for Emacs in graphics mode, use the pel-setup-dual-environment command (or <f11> <f2> M-d) to activate dual independent customization. It will create the required customization files.

Emacs gets its power from the large set of built-in and external packages available for it. A large number of external packages are available from package repositories like GNU Elpa, MELPA. There are also Emacs Lisp files available on Github and Gitlab. PEL provides access to a growing number of these packages as described in the next section.

One of PEL's goals is to enhance the cohesion and the integration of these packages to provide a more pleasant and customizable user experience. PEL implements various convenience commands, easy-to-remember key bindings and glue control code to enhance several minor and major modes, allowing behaviour selection through customization and PEL use-option variables.

Some of the improvements created for PEL are fed back to the original project(s) but it's available inside PEL if the code has not yet been merged in the original project.

PEL also implements various template-driven text insertion for various programming and markup languages.

As PEL evolves the goal is to support for programming languages will increase and each fully supported programming language will come with a topic-oriented help PDF, enhanced electric key behaviours, enhanced navigation integrating various packages, etc...

• In normal mode, PEL controls the download, installation, configuration and activation of 304 top-level [4] external packages through the use of easy-to-setup customization user-options that have a name that start with the "pel-use-" prefix.
  • Once activated by a PEL user option, PEL installs the newly activated packages on initialization (or when Emacs starts) from GNU Elpa, MELPA, and simple GitHub or Gitlab repositories even when the files have not been setup as an elpa-compliant package. PEL provides configuration logic and hooks where needed.
  • Use the pel-cleanup command to remove deactivated packages not requested by PEL user-options, moving those packages from the elpa or utils directory to the corresponding attic directories for backup and later re-activation.
  • PEL controls the activation and loading of selected packages, with emphasis on:
    • reducing Emacs initialization time to a minimum [7] in all modes,
    • providing key bindings when Emacs is running in both graphics mode and terminal mode,
    • adding extra commands that complement Emacs and external packages.
• PEL integrates these packages and adds a large number of key bindings that mostly do not interfere with the standard Emacs key bindings (except for a very small few documented ones).

• PEL provides 202 PDF topic-oriented reference sheets [6] packed with symbol annotated, colour coded key bindings and command descriptions, with hyperlinks to Emacs manuals, external packages, articles and other useful references.
  • See the PEL Index PDF [5] as a starting point. For the best user experience, use a browser, like Firefox, that can render the PDF inline (as opposed to downloading it) so you can use the links quickly. Inside Emacs use <f11> <f1> to open the PEL Index PDF and then navigate from it, or use <f12> <f1> to open the PDF describing the major mode of the current buffer and its key bindings.
    • Some major modes also support the opening of a language-specific PDF. This is done by using a key prefix: C-u <f12> <f1>. For example this now opens a PDF on zsh when the command is issued from a buffer editing a zsh script, or a GNU Make PDF from a buffer editing a make file in GNU Make mode.
• PEL's Manual describes PEL features in more details. See:
  • How to install PEL,
  • How to setup GUI Emacs environment to control GUI launched Emacs PATH and other environment variables easily with a fast starting Emacs,
  • PEL setup commands for dual customization and fast startup mode,
  • PEL initialization command and PEL cleanup command,
  • PEL Customization,
  • PEL Key Bindings,
  • PEL convenience features with PEL commands that extend several aspects of Emacs.
• Several Documentation Pages on various Emacs Topics, including:
  • How to build Emacs from source
  • How to recompile all Emacs Lisp files after upgrading Emacs
  • How to use Emacs stand-alone processes, daemon and clients
  • Install the Emacs launcher shortcut scripts

• PEL provides over 695 extra commands. PEL commands extend the packages it supports and provides some of its own features. Some commands are only available for a given OS, most are accessible in every OS.
• PEL provides 10 specialized Hydra key bindings when the pel-use-hydra and the topic specific user-options are activated.
• The key bindings of several commands are the same in several major-modes but they perform actions that are specialized to the major mode of the current buffer. This helps simplify using Emacs.
• All commands, PEL commands, standard Emacs commands and the commands provided by external packages are described in the various PDF quicksheets that you can access through the PEL Topic Index PDF.

When changing Emacs from a major version to another you have to recompile all Emacs Lisp files with the version of Emacs you are now using. It is simple to do it with PEL. Read the document titled How to recompile all Emacs Lisp files after updating Emacs to a different version; it describes a simple procedure.

PEL would not exist without the great software available for Emacs. Some of them are listed in the Credits section of the manual but the list is unfortunately incomplete as it grows continuously when PEL supports new packages. The external packages are identified in the PDF tables with the box symbol: 📦 with hyper-links to the author's project.

PEL is still evolving, with new packages being integrated, new documentation created and new features developed. The evolution is described in the NEWS file.

Questions, comments, constructive criticism, suggestions and requests are always welcome. Drop me a note in the wiki or in the discussion board!