The command-line text editor nano has been updated to version 8.0. According to Releasenotes, this update includes significant changes to how it’s used.

By default ^F is bound to starting a forward search, and ^B to starting a backward search, while M-F and M-B repeat the search in the corresponding direction. (See the documentation if you want the old bindings back.) Command-line option –modernbindings (-/) makes ^Q quit, ^X cut, ^C copy, ^V paste, ^Z undo, ^Y redo, ^O open a file, ^W write a file, ^R replace, ^G find again, ^D find again backwards, ^A set the mark, ^T jump to a line, ^P show the position, and ^E execute. Above modern bindings are activated also when the name of nano’s executable (or a symlink to it) starts with the letter “e”. To open a file at a certain line number, one can now use also nano filename:number, besides nano +number filename. <Alt+Home> and <Alt+End> put the cursor on the first and last row in the viewport, while retaining the horizontal position. When the three digits in an #RGB color code are all the same, the code is mapped to the xterm grey scale, giving access to fourteen levels of grey instead of just four. For easier access, M-" is bound to placing/removing an anchor, and M-’ to jumping to the next anchor. Whenever an error occurs, the keystroke buffer is cleared, thus stopping the execution of a macro or a string bind. The mousewheel scrolls the viewport instead of moving the cursor.

I’ve always enjoyed using nano, despite its peculiar key combinations, because it always felt more intuitive to me than vi. In recent weeks, however, I’ve also developed a strong preference for micro.

The text was automatically translated from German into English. The German quotations were also translated in sense.