What editor can I use as a simple vi/vim alternative?

Question

I'm a Windows user coming to Ubuntu's Bash thanks to WSL. Now I need to edit some files and I really hate Vi. Do I just have to deal with it, or is there a simpler alternative?

The features I am looking for are:

• CLI based
• easy to use (typing and editing should be similar to Notepad)
• simple editing capabilities are enough

I will try to master Vim, but I need to make a quick edit right now!

Answer 1

If you are looking for an alternative editor, you are not alone. Basically life is too short to learn vi and I say this being a software developer for a living. However you should learn how to exit it because it's a problem for one out of 20k programmers. Also performing some basic append/insert operation might be worth learning, because on some stubborn servers you won't find any other editor.

Now, the answer to your question is probably nano.

If you are running some automated build script, using git or running other commands, they might open vim without you wanting it. You can prevent this by running the following before proceeding:

export EDITOR=nano

Answer 2

It is a matter of opinion.

Beginners use nano.

vim ("vi improved") has a bit of a learning curve but it is very powerful. See this beginner's guide for vim or any other vim guides or the vim tutorial vimtutor (included in vim).

For now I highly suggest nano

nano -B /path/to/file/to/edit

-B makes a backup

Commands are issued with the control key and are listed at the bottom of the editor window.

There' a a guide on syntax highlighting see: How do I enable syntax highlighting in nano?

emacs is an alternate to both vim and nano and has many benefits as well. emacs is more complex than nano. You can see emac's tour.

Just for completeness, vim + themes such as Zenburn can be quite helpful

Answer 3

as a windows power user, after trying vim and nano I found out that I need something in between, complexity-wise. so I tried slap and It was the exact thing that I was looking for.

slap is a Sublime-like terminal-based text editor that strives to make editing from the terminal easier. slap has first-class mouse support, even over SSH connection.

---

installation:

curl -sL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/slap-editor/slap/master/install.sh | sh

Answer 4

Tilde is exactly what you're looking for.

To quote from Tilde's homepage

Tilde is a text editor for the console/terminal, which provides an intuitive interface for people accustomed to GUI environments such as Gnome, KDE and Windows. For example, the short-cut to copy the current selection is Control-C, and to paste the previously copied text the short-cut Control-V can be used. As another example, the File menu can be accessed by pressing Meta-F.

If you're used to keyboard shortcuts like

• Ctrl + C for copy,
• Ctrl + V for paste,
• Ctrl + A for select all,
• Ctrl + Z for undo,
• Ctrl + Y for redo,
• Ctrl + F for find,
• Ctrl + S for save,
• etc...

You'll find Tilde's default shortcuts and interface overall very intuitive.

See https://github.com/gphalkes/tilde#installing-tilde for installation instructions.

Here's how Tilde looks like.

Answer 5

Have you ever been frustrated that your text editor wasn’t doing what you wanted? Angered that you can’t remember...

• ...how to find help?
• ...what :wq means?
• ...any of the little lisper that you read as an undergrad?

A small, brave world awaits!

While we're advocating for our favourite lightweight text editors, let me recommend the eXcellent, tiny, and fast xo (exofrills).

It's a single Python 3 file, and it has good support for syntax highlighting through Pygments (although not perfect with non-Python):

It also has extremely simple and useful key combinations which can be readily and easily changed to your heart's content:

Other features:

• Less than 850 lines of code in a single file!
• Syntax highlighting!
• Regular expression matching and replacing!
• Search history caching!
• WTFPL licensed!
• Fully customizable!
• Start at non-origin locations!
• Hop between words on a line!
• Jump to anywhere in the file!
• Whole file insertion!
• Beginner friendly - maybe you are new to words!
• Copy and paste text!
• Line and column status!
• Only one row of non-text editing space!
• Both saving & loading!

The Python3 source is on github, and you can install it more easily using:

sudo apt install python3-pip
sudo pip3 install exofrills 

exofrills: your text has been edited...but you are still hungry.

_{Disclaimer: I am in no way affiliated with the exofrills project.}

Answer 6

Mcedit

This is the (seriously underrated) built-in editor of Midnight Commander. Install:

sudo apt install mc

To edit a file with it, issue

mcedit file-name

Adjustments for better usability

• Mouse support is enabled, but better disable the annoying "Persistent Selection" by pressing F9 and going into the General menu.

• Some of the default bindings are exotic, especially copy-cut-paste, but all are configurable via ~/.config/mc/mc.keymap under the [editor] section. That file will not exist initially, so you can grab a copy from /etc/mc/mc.keymap. For your convenience, I'm appending the one I used before I switched to Vim.

  [editor]
  Store                 =  ctrl-c
  Paste                 =  ctrl-v
  Cut                   =  ctrl-x
  Undo                  =  ctrl-z
  Redo                  =  ctrl-y
  Save                  =  ctrl-s
  EditNew               =  ctrl-n
  MarkAll               =  ctrl-a
  Search                =  ctrl-f
  SearchContinue        =  ctrl-alt-f
  Help                  =  f1
  UserMenu              =  f2
  Mark                  =  f3
  Replace               =  f4
  Copy                  =  f5
  Move                  =  f6
  Options               =  f7
  Remove                =  f8
  Menu                  =  f9
  Quit                  =  f10; esc
  SyntaxOnOff           =  f11
  SaveAs                =  f12
  SyntaxChoose          =  ctrl-alt-x
  ShowNumbers           =  alt-n
  Goto                  =  alt-l
  Up                    =  up
  Down                  =  down
  Left                  =  left
  Right                 =  right
  WordLeft              =  ctrl-left
  WordRight             =  ctrl-right
  Enter                 =  enter
  Return                =  shift-enter; ctrl-enter; ctrl-shift-enter
  BackSpace             =  backspace
  Delete                =  delete
  PageUp                =  pgup
  PageDown              =  pgdn
  Home                  =  home
  End                   =  end
  Tab                   =  tab
  Top                   =  ctrl-up
  Bottom                =  ctrl-down
  TopOnScreen           =  ctrl-pgup
  BottomOnScreen        =  ctrl-pgdn
  DeleteToWordBegin     =  alt-backspace
  DeleteToWordEnd       =  alt-d
  DeleteToEnd           =  ctrl-k
  MarkPageUp            =  shift-pgup
  MarkPageDown          =  shift-pgdn
  MarkLeft              =  shift-left
  MarkRight             =  shift-right
  MarkToWordBegin       =  ctrl-shift-left
  MarkToWordEnd         =  ctrl-shift-right
  MarkUp                =  shift-up
  MarkDown              =  shift-down
  MarkToHome            =  shift-home
  MarkToEnd             =  shift-end
  MarkToFileBegin       =  ctrl-shift-home
  MarkToFileEnd         =  ctrl-shift-end
  MarkToPageBegin       =  ctrl-shift-pgup
  MarkToPageEnd         =  ctrl-shift-pgdn
  MarkScrollUp          =  ctrl-shift-up
  MarkScrollDown        =  ctrl-shift-down
  MarkColumnPageUp      =  alt-pgup
  MarkColumnPageDown    =  alt-pgdn
  MarkColumnLeft        =  alt-left
  MarkColumnRight       =  alt-right
  MarkColumnUp          =  alt-up
  MarkColumnDown        =  alt-down
  MarkColumn            =  f13
  ReplaceContinue       =  f14
  Complete              =  alt-tab
  InsertOverwrite       =  insert
  Refresh               =  ctrl-l
  Sort                  =  alt-t
  Mail                  =  alt-m
  ParagraphFormat       =  alt-p
  MatchBracket          =  alt-b
  ExternalCommand       =  alt-u
  Bookmark              =  ctrl-u
  BookmarkFlush         =  ctrl-delete
  BookmarkNext          =  ctrl-alt-down
  BookmarkPrev          =  ctrl-alt-up
  Shell                 =  ctrl-o
  InsertLiteral         =  ctrl-q
  MacroStartStopRecord  =  ctrl-r
  ShowTabTws            =  alt-underline
  ShowMargin            =  ctrl-b
  FilePrev              =  alt-minus
  FileNext              =  alt-plus
  SelectCodepage        =  alt-e
  WindowFullscreen      =  ctrl-t
  # ExtendedKeyMap           =
  # WindowPrev               =
  # WindowNext               =
  # WindowList               =
  # WindowResize             =
  # WindowMove               =
  # LearnKeys                =
  # SpellCheckSelectLang     =
  # SpellCheckCurrentWord    =
  # SpellCheck               =
  # OptionsSaveMode          =
  # RepeatStartStopRecord    =
  # Find                     =
  # InsertFile               =
  # MacroDelete              =
  # MacroStopRecord          =
  # MacroStartRecord         =
  # History                  =
  # Date                     =
  # BlockSave                =
  # MarkColumnParagraphDown  =
  # MarkColumnParagraphUp    =
  # MarkColumnScrollDown     =
  # MarkColumnScrollUp       =
  # MarkParagraphDown        =
  # MarkParagraphUp          =
  # BlockShiftRight          =
  # BlockShiftLeft           =
  # Unmark                   =
  # MarkWord                 =
  # MarkLine                 =
  # Close                    =
  # EditFile                 =
  # ParagraphDown            =
  # ParagraphUp              =
  # DeleteToHome             =
  # DeleteLine               =
  # ScrollDown               =
  # ScrollUp                 =
  

If you like it, update your default editor by running select-editor.

Answer 7

micro seems to be right up your alley. It's a terminal editor similar to vi or nano but with much more sensible keybinds. e.g. Ctrl+C is copy, Ctrl+V is paste, Ctrl+S is save, Ctrl+Q to quit, etc. It's got built in syntax-highlighting for many languages, as well as mouse support.

If you just want to open a file, edit it, and close it, it's one of the most painless ways to do so.

Answer 8

You can try micro

It's natural for people who are familiar with windows, and it supports lsp

There are also some rust alternatives. Though not so powerful(But faster.).

• ox
• smith

Answer 9

While I cannot deny that I too struggled with vi in the beginning, I think an argument can be made that vi is actually very simple to learn. (When I began using Unix the choice was either vi or emacs, so at the time I chose ed, ed being a very simple line editor, which I had learned already from reading early Unix textbooks.) I use vi daily, but I probably use only a very small subset of its features.

Here's first an argument for using vi: vi exists on all systems, uses very few resources, and may be usable over unstable and slow connections, where other editors may fail or be slow and unusable. Or in situations where the system is broken, so arrow keys are not interpreted correctly (bad terminfo settings for example.) So vi can be used to fix the configuration files leading to the problem, without being affected by the problem.

And here is how to learn a useful subset of vi: First: stop thinking of vi as an interactive, terminal-GUI "editor", and see it as a programming language for manipulating text files. In the beginning "vi" stood for VIsual mode, and vi has a nonvisual counterpart ex, which is a good place to start. Type ex at the shell prompt (I will use ¬ to represent return):

$ ex¬
Entering Ex mode.  Type "visual" to go to Normal mode.
:

Now press enter.

:¬
E749: empty buffer
:

So, lets put something in it. Type "a¬", and type a line of text, then a period on a line by itself:

:a¬
Hello World¬
.¬
:

That was the append command. Easy, short and mnemonic. But it would be nice to see what is in the buffer:

:%p¬
Hello World
:

That was the print command, p, obviously. The % is a line range shorthand. Each command may be preceded by a line number or range which the command should apply to. % means "all lines". $ means the last line, and a period means the current line. A number means that particular line. A range is written n,m and a number can be added or subtracted, so .+1,$-1 mean from the next line to the second-last line. A command consisting of just a line number goes to that line. Here is the remaining small subset of commands I use:

:1i¬
this text is inserted before line 1.¬
.¬
:

:w /tmp/filename¬
"/tmp/filename" [New] 2L, 49C written
:

w writes all (or the chosen range of) lines to a file.

:1d¬

deletes line 1.

:.s/Hello/Hello,/¬
Hello, World
:.s/$/!/¬
Hello, World!

s substitutes a regular expression. It's good to know regular expressions!

:q¬
E37: No write since last change (add ! to override)

q quits. wq writes and quits. q! quits without writing, and in a similar vein, w! forces a write to a file if possible.

Now a cool one:

:p
Hello, World!
:.!tr a-z A-Z
:p
HELLO, WORLD!

! as a command filters the lines into a shell command.

And finally:

:vi¬

enters VISUAL mode. Don't be fooled. It looks like an editor, but it's still just an interactive programming shell. You just get to look at the buffer all the time, and a few more commands. In visual mode a : shows the : prompt from ex mode. The arrow keys (if they work) move around, and if they don't, then hjkl do! h left, j down, k up and l right. 0 moves to the first character and ^(think regex here!) to the first non-space character on the line. $ (regex again!) moves to the end of line. Typing :999¬ goes to line 999, naturally, just like in ex mode.

"i" enters insert mode, which now inserts on characters instead of lines, and ends with pressing escape instead of ".¬". "I" inserts at the beginning, "a" after the character under the cursor, and "A" after the end of the current line. Always press escape when done typing text. "x" deletes the character under the cursor, and "D" deletes from the cursor to end of line. "Y" yanks (copies) the current line, and "P" pastes it back. ":pu" does the same, but can be preceded by a line number. ":ya" is the ex equivalent of "Y", and again, useful to apply to a line range. I think there is a mark command as well, but I will admit I don't remember it. I don't miss it.

The above is what I use, and I know I am probably not a very "efficient" vi user. On the other hand, I do use ex's versatility, for example to script editing configuration files. Need to change your hostname foo.bar.com to www.foobar.com in a number of conf files?

for file in conf/*
do (echo "%s/foo.bar.com/www.foobar.com/" ; echo "wq") |ex $file ; done

What I am trying to say is, that I think the problem with vi is that people think of it as a difficult editor. All it takes is to change your mindset a little, and view it as a very simple yet also very powerful interactive programming language instead. So powerful that even with a subset of the available commands, you can use it to great effect - not just as an editor but as a general, scriptable tool well integrated with the rest of Unix. I doubt nano would do all of this - emacs...maybe.