nano: Pico Compatibility
9 Pico Compatibility
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‘nano’ emulates Pico quite closely, but there are some differences
between the two editors:
‘Hard-Wrapping’
Unlike Pico, ‘nano’ does not automatically hard-wrap the current
line when it becomes overlong during typing. This hard-wrapping
can be switched on with the ‘--breaklonglines’ option. With that
option, ‘nano’ by default breaks lines at screen width minus eight
columns, whereas Pico does it at screen width minus six columns.
You can make ‘nano’ do as Pico by using ‘--fill=-6’.
‘Scrolling’
By default, ‘nano’ will scroll just one line (instead of half a
screen) when the cursor is moved to a line that is just out of
view. And when paging up or down, ‘nano’ keeps the cursor in the
same screen position as much as possible, instead of always placing
it on the first line of the viewport. The Pico-like behavior can
be obtained with the ‘--jumpyscrolling’ option.
‘Edit Area’
Pico never uses the line directly below the title bar, leaving it
always blank. ‘nano’ includes this line in the editing area, in
order to not waste space, and because in this way it is slightly
clearer where the text starts. If you are accustomed to this line
being empty, you can get it back with the ‘--emptyline’ option.
‘Interactive Replace’
Instead of allowing you to replace either just one occurrence of a
search string or all of them, ‘nano’’s replace function is
interactive: it will pause at each found search string and query
whether to replace this instance. You can then choose Yes, or No
(skip this one), or All (don’t ask any more), or Cancel (stop with
replacing).
‘Search and Replace History’
When the option ‘-H’ or ‘--historylog’ is given (or set in a nanorc
file), text entered as search or replace strings is stored. These
strings can be accessed with the up/down arrow keys at their
respective prompts, or you can type the first few characters and
then use ‘Tab’ to cycle through the matching strings. A retrieved
string can subsequently be edited.
‘Position History’
When the option ‘-P’ or ‘--positionlog’ is given (or set in a
nanorc file), ‘nano’ will store the position of the cursor when you
close a file, and will place the cursor in that position again when
you later reopen the file.
‘Current Cursor Position’
The output of the "Display Cursor Position" command (‘^C’) displays
not only the current line and character position of the cursor, but
also (between the two) the current column position.
‘Spell Checking’
In the internal spell checker misspelled words are sorted
alphabetically and trimmed for uniqueness, such that the words
’apple’ and ’Apple’ will be prompted for correction separately.
‘Writing Selected Text to Files’
When using the Write-Out key (‘^O’), text that has been selected
using the marking key (‘^^’) can not just be written out to a new
(or existing) file, it can also be appended or prepended to an
existing file.
‘Reading Text from a Command’
When using the Read-File key (‘^R’), ‘nano’ can not just read a
file, it can also read the output of a command to be run (‘^X’).
‘Reading from Working Directory’
By default, Pico will read files from the user’s home directory
(when using ‘^R’), but it will write files to the current working
directory (when using ‘^O’). ‘nano’ makes this symmetrical: always
reading from and writing to the current working directory — the
directory that ‘nano’ was started in.
‘File Browser’
In the file browser, ‘nano’ does not implement the Add, Copy,
Rename, and Delete commands that Pico provides. In ‘nano’ the
browser is just a file browser, not a file manager.
‘Toggles’
Many options which alter the functionality of the program can be
"toggled" on or off using Meta key sequences, meaning the program
does not have to be restarted to turn a particular feature on or
off. ⇒Feature Toggles for a list of options that can be
toggled. Or see the list at the end of the main internal help text
(‘^G’) instead.
Info Catalog
nano: Nanorc Files
nano: Top
nano: Building and its Options