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submitted 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) by Skullgrid@lemmy.world to c/programmer_humor@programming.dev

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Nano has already supplanted the great EMacs and Vim as the most popular text editor of all linux distros, for though it has many omissions in functionality it scores over the older, more complete programs in two important respects. First, it is slightly simpler; and secondly it has the text "^ Exit" inscribed in highlighted text on its footer

EDIT : This sees to be going over some people's heads. It's a hitchiker's guide to the galaxy reference.

The Hitchhiker's Guide has already supplanted the great Encyclopaedia Galactica as the standard repository of all knowledge and wisdom, for though it has many omissions . . . it scores over the older, more pedestrian work in two important respects. First, it is slightly cheaper; and secondly it has the words DON'T PANIC inscribed in large friendly letters on its cover.

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[-] palordrolap@fedia.io 4 points 2 months ago

nano -x may be more to your liking then. Or nano -0 if you like being terrified.

Hints: Ctrl+X still works to quit. Alt-Z and Alt-X toggle the title and the help respectively.

You can also use the toggles in regular nano to hide one or the other if you're bothered by them.

[-] rumschlumpel@feddit.org 6 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

The UI isn't the issue with nano, it's that it needs that kind of UI ... you could memorize nano's shortcuts, but it doesn't have enough features to justify the effort.

[-] palordrolap@fedia.io 2 points 2 months ago

What extra features do you think it ought to have?

[+] Feyd@programming.dev 6 points 2 months ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

[deleted]

[-] palordrolap@fedia.io 4 points 2 months ago

Then you want nano -/ which uses the modern key bindings. They've been in nano for a while now.

For historical reasons, it doesn't use them by default.

[+] Feyd@programming.dev 6 points 2 months ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

[deleted]

[-] palordrolap@fedia.io 4 points 2 months ago

To flog this dead horse just a bit longer, micro is nearly seven times the size of nano, and Apple are clearly doing it wrong. Pointing an old name at a new thing is fine as long as there's backward compatibility, but a new name at an old thing that doesn't support the same features is a disservice to the old thing, the new thing and the user.

[-] rumschlumpel@feddit.org 2 points 2 months ago

, micro is nearly seven times the size of nano,

Still starts up instantly, though, and still smaller than practically every GUI editor.

-/

$ nano -/ test.txt 
nano: invalid option -- '/'

So much for that. Is this a really new option, or does it require a compilation flag that Debian doesn't bother with?

[-] esc@piefed.social 2 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

# nano --help | tail -n1  
-/             --modernbindings        Use better-known key bindings  
# cat /etc/debian_version 
13.6

[-] palordrolap@fedia.io 2 points 2 months ago

You must be on an old or LTS Debian. The -/ flag was added in the 8.0 release of nano in mid-2024. https://packages.debian.org/stable/editors/ lists 8.4 as the current version for Debian 13 / trixie.

[-] rumschlumpel@feddit.org 1 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

That's like yesterday by Debian standards, lol. And honestly, I'm surprised that they're adding this kind of feature after this long. Feels similar to how i3-wm eventually merged gaps functionality (as known from the popular i3-gaps patch by airblader), I never thought it would actually happen.

LTS Debian

Why would you run any other kind of Debian? I'm proudly running oldstable, my laptop has an Ubuntu version that's even older. And though tempting, I'm not upgrading for nano -/.

I really appreciate the info, though!

[-] rumschlumpel@feddit.org 1 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Well, micro has syntax highlighting and LSP support, and vim is just really efficient at text editing ... though nano's feature set is honestly fine for what it is, I'd much rather it used well-known shortcuts by default.

[-] palordrolap@fedia.io 2 points 2 months ago

Asking nano to use the modern keybinds by default is akin to insisting that Emacs run in evil mode by default. If you really must have it do that, set up a shell alias or put something in your .nanorc.

Also, nano has syntax highlighting. No LSP though. It's an editor, not an IDE.

Maybe that explains the size difference I was talking about elsewhere.

this post was submitted on 09 Aug 2026

478 points (98.2% liked)

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