With EAPI="4", if there is no src_compile or src_install function defined, then nothing is done, even if ${S}/Makefile exists. With EAPI="3", src_compile worked as required. As I understand pms, in EAPI="4" both functions should have a default.
It seems to work for me. Here's what it shows for those functions in $T/environment after I run the setup phase: src_compile () { _eapi2_src_compile "$@" } src_install () { _eapi4_src_install "$@" } The _eapi2_src_compile and _eapi4_src_install functions are both defined inside /usr/lib/portage/bin/ebuild.sh. The default_* variants are generarated by the _ebuild_phase_funcs function in the same file.
Sorry for the noise: Originally there was an "inherit latex-package" in the ebuild (this eclass EXPORTS src_compile src_install), and apparently, I had deleted the wrong line instead of the inherit...