Text editors

These handy things let you write and edit code and other text-based things!

Vim

Vim is an editor that lives in the terminal accessible with the command vim. Simply use a command like vim filename.txt to open up the file you want to work on. See the cheat sheet for vim keystrokes and commands below:

An Infographic featuring Various Vim shortcuts and keywords. this information can be found again through links later in this article.

Here are some external links that will introduce you to the basic usage of vim:

And here are some external links for anyone who wants to explore advanced vim usages:

Emacs

Emacs is another text editor that lives inside your terminal widely supported by its customizability. Like Vim, Emacs can be either a graphical interface or just an editor right in your terminal.

According to Linux Learn , emacs is at minimum an interpreter for Lisp, which is a language (or a variation of Lisp) that you will encounter in department which means you will be able to easily change and configure Emacs to your will. If you need inspiration, Emacs in one year is an article by a self-proclaimed “computer dummy” who learned Emacs in a year.

Here is Emac’s wiki for in depth help.

Please feel free to take a look at our guide on Emacs created through the Peer Lecture Series. Click on the link below to download:

Emacs Student Guide

Nano

Nano is a simple, easy to understand text editor available on our machines. It was designed to replace the pico text editor when stricter standards were introduced for redistributing hardware.

Luckily Nano has a simpler command layout than other shell editors, To invoke it, you can simply type nano <file>. Activate a command by pressing CTRL and the corresponding letter. Despite some letters being uppercase in the command instruction, you don’t need to press Shift.

Nano is a simple, intuitive editor. For any further questions, make sure to consult the man documentation. Nano Documentation