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+++
date = 2024-07-11T20:24:02
title = "Emacs on iPadOS"
description = "Learn how to install and use Emacs on the Apple Silicon iPad natively."
draft = true
+++
This post describes the process to install and use Emacs on the iPad Air 13-inch
(M2). The iPad used in this post is running iPadOS 17.6.
## Shell Application
In order to use Emacs on an iPad, you will need a terminal emulator application.
I recommend [iSH](https://apps.apple.com/us/app/ish-shell/id1436902243), since
it runs a version of Alpine Linux within the app itself and will allow you to
install packages that you need.
## Require Packages
I started by adding the required packages directly within iSH. Emacs should
install dependencies by default, but I include a few other packages that I use
in my terminal as well.
```sh
apk add emacs ripgrep fd findutils
```
## Emacs
Once this is complete, you should be able to run Emacs natively on your iPad.
It's fairly effective, but can be slow at times.
I attempted to also install Doom Emacs, which technically worked, but was so
incredibly slow and buggy that I was not even able to take screenshots. Someone
smarter than me could likely get it to work with a little tinkering.
### Annoyances
While Emacs is running at this point, it's not perfect. There is no `.emacs`
file by default, installing a framework like Doom seemed to be too much, and
some utilities and packages are missing from the bare Alpine installation.
There also seems to be a problem getting a wider selection of packages from
MELPA, but you can see below that a handful of readily-available packages. I
likely just need to change my configuration for MELPA, but I did not explore
this area further.
You can test this out yourself with `M-x package-install <search-termœ>`.
|
