[gentoo-user] virtual/emacs-24

[Harry Putnam]

After reading a few google hits of gentoo documetation about virtual
pkgs.  I still didn't get it.

In my case I'm trying to avoid problems with a self built emacs (25)
not done thru portage.

I'm not looking to discuss the pros and cons of doing in this thead,
but want to understand how it will effect things in the situation
described below.

I also want to install emacs-w3m (thru portage)

emacs-w3m requires:

  [ebuild  N     ] app-admin/eselect-emacs-1.17  0 KiB
  [ebuild  N     ] app-emacs/emacs-common-gentoo-1.4-r1  [...]
  [ebuild  N     ] app-editors/emacs-24.4-r1:24  [..]
  [ebuild  N     ] virtual/emacs-24  0 KiB

  [...] a few other pkgs

I didn't want to have the confusion of another version of emacs
installed so resorted to use of:

/etc/portage/profile/package.provided: like so:
      app-editors/emacs-24
      
 To tell portage about my home rolled emacs

Well, that knocks down most of the unwanted pkgs but still as you see:

  emerge -vp emacs-w3m

    [ebuild  N     ] virtual/emacs-24  0 KiB
    [ebuild  N     ] virtual/w3m-0  0 KiB
    [ebuild  N     ] app-emacs/emacs-w3m-1.4.528_pre20140213

`virtual/emacs-24' still hanging in there

I didn't learn enough googling to understand what having that
virtual/emacs-24 installed would mean.

Would it be possible headaches with emacs-25 installed outside
portage.

Can anyone say what that package actually does?