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Nano for Beginners: A Guide to Using the Simple Text Editor
Nano for Beginners: A Guide to Using the Simple Text Editor
Updated over a week ago

Description:

Nano is a simple and easy-to-use text editor that is widely used in the Linux command-line. In this article, we'll take a look at the basics of using nano, including how to open and save files, as well as all the key combinations you need to navigate and edit text.

Section 1: Getting Started with Nano

In this section, we'll cover the basics of opening and closing files in nano, as well as how to start editing text.

Section 2: Saving Your Changes

Once you've started editing a file in nano, you'll want to save your changes. This section will cover how to do that, as well as some tips on naming your files.

Section 3: Navigating and Editing Text

In this section, we'll cover all of the key combinations you need to navigate and edit text, including:

Ctrl + G: Display the nano help menu

Ctrl + X: Exit nano

Ctrl + O: Save the current file

Ctrl + R: Open a file for reading

Ctrl + W: Search for a string of text within the current file

Ctrl + K: Cut the current line of text

Ctrl + U: Paste the last cut or copied text

Ctrl + J: Justify the current line of text

Ctrl + Y: Scroll the screen up one page

Ctrl + V: Scroll the screen down one page

Ctrl + _ : Go to a specific line number

Alt + G: Go to a specific line and column number

Section 4: Advanced Features

Ctrl + **: Search and replace text. After pressing Ctrl + , you will be prompted to enter the text you wish to search for and the text you want to replace it with.

Alt + Shift + 6: Go to a specific character or byte offset in the file. After pressing Alt + Shift + 6, you will be prompted to enter the offset you want to go to.

Ctrl + T: Check the spelling of the current file. Note that you will need to have the "aspell" or "ispell" utility installed for this to work.

Alt + J: Justify the entire file. This will align all text to the left and right margins.

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