Text editing with Nano made easy | Linux Today

Text editing with Nano made easy

Written By
Web Webster
Web Webster
Jun 23, 2010

“Nano supports syntax highlighting. Nano supports text
justification. And yet, Nano is so much easier than Emacs or Vim.
Discover the hidden power of this versatile command line text
editor – you may never want to go back to the GUI again! Oh, and
it’s well worth knowing a great CLI text editor too – if you end up
at the shell prompt with X not working, you’ll need a backup plan.
Here are the tricks, tips and shortcuts you need to know…

“Nano is a great command-line text editor for a number of
reasons:

* It’s small, lightweight and is included in most
distributions;
* It’s easy to use and gives plenty of on-screen feedback;
* It includes many power-user features to compete with Vi(m) and
Emacs.

“Nano runs in text mode at the command line; this may prompt you
to think: “Why would I want to learn a text mode editor? Kate,
Gedit and FooEdit 2000 do everything I need to on my desktop.”
Well, firstly, all regular Linux users and administrators should be
well-versed in a command line editor. If something goes wrong with
the X Window System, for example, you’ll end up at a CLI prompt and
your skills will be essential for editing config files.”

Complete
Story

Web Webster

Web Webster

Web Webster has more than 20 years of writing and editorial experience in the tech sector. He’s written and edited news, demand generation, user-focused, and thought leadership content for business software solutions, consumer tech, and Linux Today, he edits and writes for a portfolio of tech industry news and analysis websites including webopedia.com, and DatabaseJournal.com.

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