# Enable syntax highlighting for REPL in terminal

**URL:** <https://racket.discourse.group/t/enable-syntax-highlighting-for-repl-in-terminal/1096>\
**Category:** Questions & Answers\
**Tags:** repl\
**Created:** [June 24, 2022, 9:01pm UTC](https://racket.discourse.group/t/enable-syntax-highlighting-for-repl-in-terminal/1096 "2022-06-24T21:01:20Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![kurinoku](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/aca169/32.png) [@kurinoku](https://racket.discourse.group/u/kurinoku)\
**Post date:** [June 24, 2022, 9:01pm UTC](https://racket.discourse.group/t/enable-syntax-highlighting-for-repl-in-terminal/1096/1 "2022-06-24T21:01:20Z")

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Recently my university lends us a VM for a course, I installed racket there and the REPL has colors, I know this is a bit off-topic and has to do with my configuration, but I didn't find any dot file or installation file from the package that point towards as to why this is the case in the VM and not in my computer.

VM runs Ubuntu 20.04 LTS  
 ![image](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/free1/uploads/racket/original/1X/17bd183fb7b15aafac31e1e433bda236badf7256.png)

Computer runs Manjaro Linux  
 ![image](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/free1/uploads/racket/original/1X/95548f5d23fa8ca86d8fcf8563978a6ae7d87feb.png)

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**Author:** ![joeld](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/racket.discourse.group/joeld/32/38_2.png) [@joeld](https://racket.discourse.group/u/joeld)\
**Post date:** [June 24, 2022, 9:16pm UTC](https://racket.discourse.group/t/enable-syntax-highlighting-for-repl-in-terminal/1096/2 "2022-06-24T21:16:26Z")

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I could be wrong but I think syntax highlighting on the terminal REPL is a fairly new feature.

I notice the top pic shows Racket 8.5 while the bottom one shows 8.3. If you update that one to 8.5 you may find that solves your issue.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![kurinoku](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/aca169/32.png) [@kurinoku](https://racket.discourse.group/u/kurinoku)\
**Post date:** [June 24, 2022, 9:47pm UTC](https://racket.discourse.group/t/enable-syntax-highlighting-for-repl-in-terminal/1096/3 "2022-06-24T21:47:57Z")

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I didn't realize that, unfortunately I can't update for the time being. But I will keep it in mind, thank you for the suggestion.

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**Author:** ![sschwarzer](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/free1/user_avatar/racket.discourse.group/sschwarzer/32/1940_2.png) [@sschwarzer](https://racket.discourse.group/u/sschwarzer)\
**Post date:** [June 24, 2022, 11:22pm UTC](https://racket.discourse.group/t/enable-syntax-highlighting-for-repl-in-terminal/1096/4 "2022-06-24T23:22:20Z")

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> [@joeld](#):
>
> I could be wrong but I think syntax highlighting on the terminal REPL is a fairly new feature.

Yes, it seems to have been added in Racket 8.4:

> **[Racket v8.4](https://blog.racket-lang.org/2022/02/racket-v8-4.html)**
>
> \_posted by John Clements\_ Racket version 8.4 is now available from https://download.racket-lang.org. Command-line Racket provides a new expression editor by default for its read-eval-print loop (REPL). The new REPL is based on the Chez Scheme...