Linux edit text file from terminal

How to open, create, edit, and view a file in Linux

One thing GNU/Linux does as well as any other operating system is give you the tools you need to create and edit text files. Ask ten Linux users to name their favorite text editor, and you might get ten different answers. On this page, we cover a few of the many text editors available for Linux.

GUI text editors

This section discusses text editing applications for the Linux windowing system, X Windows, more commonly known as X11 or X.

If you are coming from Microsoft Windows, you are no doubt familiar with the classic Windows text editor, Notepad. Linux offers many similar programs, including NEdit, gedit, and geany. Each of these programs are free software, and they each provide roughly the same functionality. It’s up to you to decide which one feels best and has the best interface for you. All three of these programs support syntax highlighting, which helps with editing source code or documents written in a markup language such as HTML or CSS.

NEdit

NEdit, which is short for the Nirvana Editor, is a straightforward text editor that is very similar to Notepad. It uses a Motif-style interface.

The NEdit homepage is located at https://sourceforge.net/projects/nedit/. If you are on a Debian or Ubuntu system, you can install NEdit with the following command:

For more information, see our NEdit information page.

Geany

Geany is a text editor that is a lot like Notepad++ for Windows. It provides a tabbed interface for working with multiple open files at once and has nifty features like displaying line numbers in the margin. It uses the GTK+ interface toolkit.

The Geany homepage is located at http://www.geany.org/. On Debian and Ubuntu systems, you can install Geany by running the command:

Gedit

Gedit is the default text editor of the GNOME desktop environment. It’s a great, text editor that can be used on about any Linux system.

The Gedit homepage is located at https://wiki.gnome.org/Apps/Gedit. On Debian and Ubuntu systems, Gedit can be installed by running the following command:

Terminal-based text editors

If you are working from the Linux command line interface and you need a text editor, you have many options. Here are some of the most popular:

pico started out as the editor built into the text-based e-mail program pine, and it was eventually packaged as a stand-alone program for editing text files. («pico» is a scientific prefix for very small things.)

The modern version of pine is called alpine, but pico is still called pico. You can find more information about how to use it in our pico command documentation.

On Debian and Ubuntu Linux systems, you can install pico using the command:

nano is the GNU version of pico and is essentially the same program under a different name.

On Debian and Ubuntu Linux systems, nano can be installed with the command:

vim, which stands for «vi improved,» is a text editor used by millions of computing professionals all over the world. Its controls are a little confusing at first, but once you get the hang of them, vim makes executing complex editing tasks fast and easy. For more information, see our in-depth vim guide.

On Debian and Ubuntu Linux systems, vim can be installed using the command:

emacs

emacs is a complex, highly customizable text editor with a built-in interpreter for the Lisp programming language. It is used religiously by some computer programmers, especially those who write computer programs in Lisp dialects such as Scheme. For more information, see our emacs information page.

On Debian and Ubuntu Linux systems, emacs can be installed using the command:

Redirecting command output into a text file

When at the Linux command line, you sometimes want to create or make changes to a text file without actually running a text editor. Here are some commands you might find useful.

Creating an empty file with the touch command

To create an empty file, it’s common to use the command touch. The touch command updates the atime and mtime attributes of a file as if the contents of the file had been changed — without actually changing anything. If you touch a file that doesn’t exist, the system creates the file without putting any data inside.

For instance, the command:

The above command creates a new, empty file called myfile.txt if that file does not already exist.

Redirecting text into a file

Sometimes you need to stick the output of a command into a file. To accomplish this quickly and easily, you can use the > symbol to redirect the output to a file.

For instance, the echo command is used to «echo» text as output. By default, this goes to the standard output — the screen. So the command:

The above command prints that text on your screen and return you to the command prompt. However, you can use > to redirect this output to a file. For instance:

The above command puts the text «Example text» into the file myfile.txt. If myfile.txt does not exist, it is created. If it already exists, its contents will be overwritten, destroying the previous contents and replacing them.

Be careful when redirecting output to a file using >. It will overwrite the previous contents of the file if it already exists. There is no undo for this operation, so make sure you want to completely replace the file’s contents before you run the command.

Here’s an example using another command:

The above command executes ls with the -l option, which gives a detailed list of files in the current directory. The > operator redirects the output to the file directory.txt, instead of printing it to the screen. If directory.txt does not exist, it is created first. If it already exists, its contents will be replaced.

Redirecting to the end of a file

The redirect operator >> is similar to >, but instead of overwriting the file contents, it appends the new data to the end of the file. For instance, the command:

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How to edit text files from the command line

Although you can edit text files in cPanel (if your account includes cPanel), it is often quicker and easier to do so from the command line. This article describes how to use the Nano and Vim editors to edit text files from the command line.

The Nano editor is probably easier for beginners to use initially. On the other hand, the Vim editor is in more widespread use, and has a long list of features. Try both editors, and use whichever one you feel more comfortable with.

Using the Nano editor

Editing files with the Nano text editor is easy. To open a file in Nano, type the following command at the command line:

Replace filename with the name of the file that you want to edit.

To edit the file, just start typing your changes. To navigate around the file, you can use the arrow keys on your keyboard. If the file’s contents are too long to fit on the screen, you can press Ctrl+V to move forward a page, and Ctrl+Y to move back a page.

When you are ready to save your changes, press Ctrl+O, verify the filename, and then press ENTER. To exit Nano, press Ctrl+X.

You can access Nano’s online help at any time by pressing Ctrl-G.

Using the Vim editor

To open a file for editing in Vim, type the following command at the command line:

Editing files with Vim is not as intuitive as with Nano. You can’t just start typing your changes, because Vim starts in normal mode. In normal mode, anything you type on the keyboard is interpreted as a potential command, not changes to the text.

To make changes to the text, you must enter insert mode. To do this, type i . Note that the status line at the bottom of the screen changes to —INSERT— . You can now make changes to the file. To navigate around the file while you are in insert mode, use the arrow keys and Page Up/Page Down keys.

To return to normal mode, press ESC. Note that the —INSERT— status line at the bottom of the screen goes blank. Now you can type commands to save your changes, search for text, and so on.

To write your changes without exiting Vim, type :w and then press ENTER. To exit Vim, type :q and then press ENTER. To write your changes and exit Vim at the same time, type :wq and then press ENTER.

More Information

This article is a very basic introduction to using the Nano and Vim text editors. Both of these editors, and Vim in particular, have many more features and customizations available:

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How to edit files in a terminal with nano?

Sometimes, a graphical text editor like gedit or kate cannot be used (because you’re in a virtual console for example). Luckily, there are text editors for the terminal. An easy one is nano , but I cannot understand how to work with it.

If I start nano by running nano , the bottom text is supposed to help me but all I see are things like ^G Get Help ^O WriteOut .

1. How can I open text files for editing?
2. How can I save the file?
3. How can I quit the editor without saving the changes?
4. How to edit? I heard that you’ve to enter some commands to begin editing in vi , is this true for nano too?
5. Sometimes, if I manage to open a file, the text is unreadable due to its colors. How can I disable these colors? (see the image below)
6. In the some files, lines are truncated because those do not fit in the screen. How can I prevent that from happening? (see the image below)

4 Answers 4

Ctrl + G will let you read the help. nano can do some pretty nice things so you might want to pootle around in there for a bit.

When you see ^G (et al) it means Ctrl + G . In the help pages, M-H means Alt + H .

How can I open text files for editing?

This is the default in nano . Open and file and you’re set to start editing:

Note: you won’t be able to save unless you have write permissions for that file.

How can I save the file?

F3 will let you save without exiting. Otherwise, Ctrl + X will prompt you if you’ve made changes. Press Y when it asks, and Enter to confirm the filename.

How can I quit the editor without saving the changes?

Ctrl + X , then N when it asks if you want to save.

How to edit? I heard that you’ve to enter some commands to begin editing in vi, is this true for nano too?

As above, no. nano is simple. It drops you in edit mode as soon as it opens. You can use arrow keys, Page Up / Page Down and Home / End as in gedit. You cannot use the mouse for moving the cursor position.

Sometimes, if I manage to open a file, the text is unreadable due to its colors. How can I disable these colors?

Colours are loaded through the nanorc framework. These are files that are loaded when nano loads which basically spell out the syntax highlighting. To toggle syntax highlighting, press Alt + Y . To disable it permanently for certain file types, edit /etc/nanorc and put a hash mark ( # ) before include «/usr/share/nano/*.nanorc» .

In the some files, lines are truncated because those do not fit in the screen. How can I prevent that from happening?

Well I’ve been trying to find something but the best I could see was enabling soft-line-wrap with the funky key-combination of: Alt + $ ( Alt + Shift + 4 ). To enable soft line wrapping by default, add the below line to

More information about this configuration file can be found at man nanorc .

In the bottom text the ^ stands for Ctrl and M- stands for Alt

So ^G is Ctrl-G and M-Y is Alt-Y (that one toggles the colors).

You can toggle line truncation with M-$ . See the help pages ( ^G ) for more functions.

The combination of ^ and a letter means you’re supposed to press Ctrl and that letter. So when nano says ^X Exit that means you’re gonna quit nano by pressing Ctrl + X .

To open a file called /etc/nanorc you can start nano with:

Note that /etc/groups is not writeable by regular users, therefore you need sudo :

If you’ve already opened nano , you can press Ctrl + R to open a file.

On exit ( Ctrl + X ) nano will ask you whether to save the file. You can save it manually with F3 .

Answer n for no in the Ctrl + X dialogue.

Basic editing is done by using the arrow keys to navigate and typing. Plain and simple.

Syntax highlighting is disabled in a hidden file called .nanorc in your home directory along with other options. Alt + Y toggles it.

In the aforementioned .nanorc you can add the line set fill 80 which will break long lines at 80 characters length. Alt + M toggles it.

Here is a list of stettings you can configure in .nanorc .

/.nanorc and /etc/nanorc . I’ve 2.2.6-1 installed (Natty) and a QWERTY keyboard layout.

Ctrl X : Exit the editor. If you’ve edited text without saving, you’ll be prompted as to whether you really want to exit.

Ctrl O : Write (output) the current contents of the text buffer to a file. A filename prompt will appear; press Ctrl T to open the file navigator shown above.

Ctrl R : Read a text file into the current editing session. At the filename prompt, hit Ctrl T for the file navigator.

Ctrl K : Cut a line into the clipboard. You can press this repeatedly to copy multiple lines, which are then stored as one chunk.

Ctrl J : Justify (fill out) a paragraph of text. By default, this reflows text to match the width of the editing window.

Ctrl U : Uncut text, or rather, paste it from the clipboard. Note that after a Justify operation, this turns into unjustify.

Ctrl T : Check spelling.

Ctrl W : Find a word or phrase. At the prompt, use the cursor keys to go through previous search terms, or hit Ctrl R to move into replace mode. Alternatively you can hit Ctrl T to go to a specific line.

Ctrl C : Show current line number and file information.

Ctrl G : Get help; this provides information on navigating through files and common keyboard commands.

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