nanorc - GNU nano's configuration file
The nanorc file contains the default settings for
nano, a small and friendly editor. The file should be in Unix format,
not in DOS or Mac format. During startup, nano will first read the
system-wide settings, from /etc/nanorc (the exact path might be
different on your system), and then the user-specific settings, either from
~/.nanorc or from $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/nano/nanorc or from
~/.config/nano/nanorc, whichever is encountered first.
The configuration file accepts a series of set and
unset commands, which can be used to configure nano on startup
without using command-line options. Additionally, there are some commands to
define syntax highlighting and to rebind keys -- see the two separate
sections on those. nano reads one command per line.
Options in nanorc files take precedence over nano's
defaults, and command-line options override nanorc settings. Also,
options that do not take an argument are unset by default. So using the
unset command is only needed when wanting to override a setting of
the system's nanorc file in your own nanorc. Options that take
an argument cannot be unset.
Below, the string parameters need to be enclosed in double
quotes. Quotes inside these string parameters don't have to be escaped with
backslashes. The last double quote in the string will be treated as its end.
For example, for the brackets option,
""')>]}" will match ", ',
), >, ], and }.
The supported commands and arguments are:
- set afterends
- Make Ctrl+Right stop at word ends instead of beginnings.
- set
allow_insecure_backup
- When backing up files, allow the backup to succeed even if its permissions
can't be (re)set due to special OS considerations. You should NOT enable
this option unless you are sure you need it.
- set atblanks
- When soft line wrapping is enabled, make it wrap lines at blank characters
(tabs and spaces) instead of always at the edge of the screen.
- set
autoindent
- Automatically indent a newly created line to the same number of tabs
and/or spaces as the previous line (or as the next line if the previous
line is the beginning of a paragraph).
- set backup
- When saving a file, create a backup file by adding a tilde (~) to
the file's name.
- set backupdir
directory
- Make and keep not just one backup file, but make and keep a uniquely
numbered one every time a file is saved -- when backups are enabled with
set backup or --backup or -B. The uniquely numbered
files are stored in the specified directory.
- set boldtext
- Use bold instead of reverse video for the title bar, status bar, key
combos, function tags, line numbers, and selected text. This can be
overridden by setting the options titlecolor, statuscolor,
keycolor, functioncolor, numbercolor, and
selectedcolor.
- set brackets
string
- Set the characters treated as closing brackets when justifying paragraphs.
This may not include blank characters. Only closing punctuation (see
set punct), optionally followed by the specified closing brackets,
can end sentences. The default value is
""')>]}".
- set
casesensitive
- Do case-sensitive searches by default.
- set
constantshow
- Constantly display the cursor position in the status bar. This overrides
the option quickblank.
- set
cutfromcursor
- Use cut-from-cursor-to-end-of-line by default, instead of cutting the
whole line. (The old form of this option, 'set cut', is
deprecated.)
- set errorcolor
fgcolor,bgcolor
- Use this color combination for the status bar when an error message is
displayed. See set titlecolor for valid color names.
- set fill
number
- Hard-wrap lines at column number number. If number is 0 or
less, the maximum line length will be the screen width less number
columns. The default value is -8. This option conflicts with
nowrap -- the last one given takes effect.
- set functioncolor
fgcolor,bgcolor
- Specify the color combination to use for the function descriptions in the
two help lines at the bottom of the screen. See set titlecolor for
more details.
- set
historylog
- Save the last hundred search strings and replacement strings and executed
commands, so they can be easily reused in later sessions.
- set keycolor
fgcolor,bgcolor
- Specify the color combination to use for the shortcut key combos in the
two help lines at the bottom of the screen. See set titlecolor for
more details.
- set
linenumbers
- Display line numbers to the left of the text area.
- set
locking
- Enable vim-style lock-files for when editing files.
- set matchbrackets
string
- Set the opening and closing brackets that can be found by bracket
searches. This may not include blank characters. The opening set must come
before the closing set, and the two sets must be in the same order. The
default value is "(<[{)>]}".
- set
morespace
- Use the blank line below the title bar as extra editing space.
- set mouse
- Enable mouse support, if available for your system. When enabled, mouse
clicks can be used to place the cursor, set the mark (with a double
click), and execute shortcuts. The mouse will work in the X Window System,
and on the console when gpm is running. Text can still be selected through
dragging by holding down the Shift key.
- set
multibuffer
- When reading in a file with ^R, insert it into a new buffer by
default.
- set
noconvert
- Don't convert files from DOS/Mac format.
- set nohelp
- Don't display the two help lines at the bottom of the screen.
- set
nonewlines
- When a file does not end with a newline, don't automatically add one.
- set
nopauses
- Don't pause between warnings at startup. This means that only the last one
will be visible (when there are multiple ones).
- set nowrap
- Don't hard-wrap text at all. This option conflicts with fill -- the
last one given takes effect.
- set numbercolor
fgcolor,bgcolor
- Specify the color combination to use for line numbers. See set
titlecolor for more details.
- set operatingdir
directory
- nano will only read and write files inside directory and its
subdirectories. Also, the current directory is changed to here, so files
are inserted from this directory. By default, the operating directory
feature is turned off.
- set
positionlog
- Save the cursor position of files between editing sessions. The cursor
position is remembered for the 200 most-recently edited files.
- set
preserve
- Preserve the XON and XOFF keys (^Q and ^S).
- set punct
string
- Set the characters treated as closing punctuation when justifying
paragraphs. This may not include blank characters. Only the specfified
closing punctuation, optionally followed by closing brackets (see
brackets), can end sentences. The default value is
"!.?".
- set
quickblank
- Do quick status-bar blanking: status-bar messages will disappear after 1
keystroke instead of 25. The option constantshow overrides
this.
- set quiet
- Obsolete option. Recognized but ignored.
- set quotestr
regex
- The email-quote string, used to justify email-quoted paragraphs. This is
an extended regular expression. The default value is
"^([ \t]*([#:>|}]|//))+". Note that \t
stands for an actual Tab character.
- set
rebinddelete
- Interpret the Delete key differently so that both Backspace and Delete
work properly. You should only need to use this option if Backspace acts
like Delete on your system.
- set
rebindkeypad
- Interpret the numeric keypad keys so that they all work properly. You
should only need to use this option if they don't, as mouse support won't
work properly with this option enabled.
- set regexp
- Do extended regular expression searches by default.
- set selectedcolor
fgcolor,bgcolor
- Specify the color combination to use for selected text. See set
titlecolor for more details.
- set
showcursor
- Put the cursor on the highlighted item in the file browser, to aid braille
users.
- set
smarthome
- Make the Home key smarter. When Home is pressed anywhere but at the very
beginning of non-whitespace characters on a line, the cursor will jump to
that beginning (either forwards or backwards). If the cursor is already at
that position, it will jump to the true beginning of the line.
- set smooth
- Use smooth scrolling by default.
- set
softwrap
- Enable soft line wrapping for easier viewing of very long lines.
- set speller
program
- Use the given program to do spell checking and correcting, instead
of the built-in corrector that calls spell.
- set statuscolor
fgcolor,bgcolor
- Specify the color combination to use for the status bar. See set
titlecolor for more details.
- set
suspend
- Allow nano to be suspended.
- set tabsize
number
- Use a tab size of number columns. The value of number must
be greater than 0. The default value is 8.
- set
tabstospaces
- Convert typed tabs to spaces.
- set
tempfile
- Save automatically on exit, don't prompt.
- set titlecolor
fgcolor,bgcolor
- Specify the color combination to use for the title bar. Valid names for
the foreground and background colors are: white, black,
blue, green, red, cyan, yellow,
magenta, and normal -- where normal means the default
foreground or background color. The name of the foreground color may be
prefixed with bright. And either "fgcolor" or
",bgcolor" may be left out.
- set
trimblanks
- Remove trailing whitespace from wrapped lines when automatic hard-wrapping
occurs or when text is justified. (The old form of this option, 'set
justifytrim', is deprecated.)
- set unix
- Save a file by default in Unix format. This overrides nano's default
behavior of saving a file in the format that it had. (This option has no
effect when you also use set noconvert.)
- set view
- Disallow file modification: read-only mode. This mode allows the user to
open also other files for viewing, unless --restricted is given on
the command line.
- set whitespace
string
- Set the two characters used to indicate the presence of tabs and spaces.
They must be single-column characters. The default pair for a UTF-8 locale
is "»⋅", and for other locales
">.".
- set
wordbounds
- Detect word boundaries differently by treating punctuation characters as
parts of words.
- set wordchars
string
- Specify which other characters (besides the normal alphanumeric ones)
should be considered as parts of words. This overrides the option
wordbounds.
- set zap
- Let an unmodified Backspace or Delete erase the marked region (instead of
a single character, and without affecting the cutbuffer).
Coloring the different syntactic elements of a file is done via
regular expressions (see the color command below). This is inherently
imperfect, because regular expressions are not powerful enough to fully
parse a file. Nevertheless, regular expressions can do a lot and are easy to
make, so they are a good fit for a small editor like nano.
For each kind of file a separate syntax can be defined via the
following commands:
- syntax name
["fileregex" ...]
- Start the definition of a syntax with this name. All subsequent
color and other such commands will be added to this syntax, until a
new syntax command is encountered.
When nano is run, this syntax will be automatically
activated if the current filename matches the extended regular
expression fileregex. Or the syntax can be explicitly activated
by using the -Y or --syntax command-line option followed
by the name.
The syntax default is special: it takes no
fileregex, and applies to files that don't match any syntax's
regexes. The syntax none is reserved; specifying it on the
command line is the same as not having a syntax at all.
- If from all defined syntaxes no fileregex matched, then compare
this regex (or regexes) against the first line of the current file,
to determine whether this syntax should be used for it.
- magic
"regex" ...
- If no fileregex matched and no header regex matched either,
then compare this regex (or regexes) against the result of querying
the magic database about the current file, to determine whether
this syntax should be used for it. (This functionality only works when
libmagic is installed on the system and will be silently ignored
otherwise.)
- linter program
[arg ...]
- Use the given program to run a syntax check on the current buffer.
(This overrides the speller function.)
- comment "string"
- Use the given string for commenting and uncommenting lines. If the
string contains a vertical bar or pipe character (|), this
designates bracket-style comments; for example, "/*|*/"
for CSS files. The characters before the pipe are prepended to the line
and the characters after the pipe are appended at the end of the line. If
no pipe character is present, the full string is prepended; for example,
"#" for Python files. If empty double quotes are
specified, the comment/uncomment function is disabled; for example,
"" for JSON. The default value is "#".
- color
fgcolor,bgcolor "regex"
...
- Display all pieces of text that match the extended regular expression
regex with foreground color fgcolor and background color
bgcolor, at least one of which must be specified. Valid names for
foreground and background colors are: white, black,
blue, green, red, cyan, yellow,
magenta, and normal -- where normal means the default
foreground or background color. You may use the prefix bright to
get a stronger color highlight for the foreground. If your terminal
supports transparency, not specifying a bgcolor tells nano
to attempt to use a transparent background.
- icolor
fgcolor,bgcolor "regex"
...
- Same as above, except that the matching is case insensitive.
- color
fgcolor,bgcolor
start="fromrx"
end="torx"
- Display all pieces of text whose start matches extended regular expression
fromrx and whose end matches extended regular expression
torx with foreground color fgcolor and background color
bgcolor, at least one of which must be specified. This means that,
after an initial instance of fromrx, all text until the first
instance of torx will be colored. This allows syntax highlighting
to span multiple lines.
- icolor
fgcolor,bgcolor
start="fromrx"
end="torx"
- Same as above, except that the matching is case insensitive.
- include
"syntaxfile"
- Read in self-contained color syntaxes from syntaxfile. Note that
syntaxfile may contain only the above commands, from syntax
to icolor.
- extendsyntax
name command [arg ...]
- Extend the syntax previously defined as name with another
command. This allows adding a new color, icolor,
header, magic, comment, or linter command to
an already defined syntax -- useful when you want to slightly improve a
syntax defined in one of the system-installed files (which normally are
not writable).
Note: the formatter command has been removed. It was
superseded by a more general mechanism: the filtering of buffer or marked
text through an external command. Such filtering is done by typing
^R^X and then preceding your formatter command with the pipe symbol
(|). It has the added advantage that the operation can be undone.
If you use such a formatting command regularly, you could assign
the relevant series of keystrokes to a single key in your nanorc:
bind M-F "^R^X|yourformatcommand^M"
main
(Note that the ^R, ^X, and ^M are each a
single, literal control character. You can enter them by preceding each with
M-V.)
Key bindings can be changed via the following three commands:
- bind key function
menu
- Rebinds the key key to a new function named function in the
context of menu menu (or in all menus where the function exists by
using all).
- bind key
"string" menu
- Makes the given key produce the given string in the given
menu (or in all menus where the key exists when all is
used). The string can consist of text or commands or a mix of them.
(To enter a command into the string, precede its keystroke with
M-V.)
- unbind key
menu
- Unbinds the key key from the menu named menu (or from all
menus where it exists by using all).
- The format of key should
be one of:
- ^
- followed by a Latin letter, by one of several ASCII characters (@, ], \,
^, or _), or by the word "Space". Example: ^C.
- M-
- followed by any ASCII character except [, or by the word
"Space". Example: M-C.
- F
- followed by a numeric value from 1 to 16. Example: F10.
- the word "Ins" or the
word "Del".
- Valid function names
to be bound are:
- help
- Invokes the help viewer.
- cancel
- Cancels the current command.
- exit
- Exits from the program (or from the help viewer or the file browser).
- writeout
- Writes the current buffer to disk, asking for a name.
- savefile
- Writes the current file to disk without prompting.
- insert
- Inserts a file into the current buffer (at the current cursor position),
or into a new buffer when option multibuffer is set.
- whereis
- Starts a forward search for text in the current buffer -- or for filenames
matching a string in the current list in the file browser.
- wherewas
- Starts a backward search for text in the current buffer -- or for
filenames matching a string in the current list in the file browser.
- findprevious
- Searches the next occurrence in the backward direction.
- findnext
- Searches the next occurrence in the forward direction.
- replace
- Interactively replaces text within the current buffer.
- cut
- Cuts and stores the current line (or the marked region).
- copy
- Copies the current line (or the marked region) without deleting it. (The
old form 'copytext' is deprecated.)
- paste
- Pastes the currently stored text into the current buffer at the current
cursor position. (The old form 'uncut' is deprecated.)
- zap
- Throw away the current line (or the marked region). (This function is
bound by default to <Meta+Delete>.)
- cutwordleft
- Cuts from the cursor position to the beginning of the preceding word.
(This function is not bound by default. If your terminal produces
^H for <Ctrl+Backspace>, you can make <Ctrl+Backspace>
delete the word to the left of the cursor by rebinding ^H to this
function.)
- cutwordright
- Cuts from the cursor position to the beginning of the next word. (This
function is bound by default to <Ctrl+Delete>.)
- cutrestoffile
- Cuts all text from the cursor position till the end of the buffer.
- mark
- Sets the mark at the current position, to start selecting text. Or, when
it is set, unsets the mark.
- curpos
- Shows the current cursor position: the line, column, and character
positions.
- wordcount
- Counts the number of words, lines and characters in the current
buffer.
- speller
- Invokes a spell-checking program (or linting program, if the active syntax
defines such a thing).
- linter
- A synonym of speller (for when the speller has not been
configured).
- justify
- Justifies the current paragraph. A paragraph is a group of contiguous
lines that, apart from possibly the first line, all have the same
indentation. The beginning of a paragraph is detected by either this lone
line with a differing indentation or by a preceding blank line.
- fulljustify
- Justifies the entire current buffer.
- indent
- Indents (shifts to the right) the currently marked text.
- unindent
- Unindents (shifts to the left) the currently marked text.
- Comments or uncomments the current line or marked lines, using the comment
style specified in the active syntax.
- complete
- Completes the fragment before the cursor to a full word found elsewhere in
the current buffer.
- left
- Goes left one position (in the editor or browser).
- right
- Goes right one position (in the editor or browser).
- up
- Goes one line up (in the editor or browser).
- down
- Goes one line down (in the editor or browser).
- scrollup
- Scrolls the viewport up one row (meaning that the text slides down) while
keeping the cursor in the same text position, if possible.
- scrolldown
- Scrolls the viewport down one row (meaning that the text slides up) while
keeping the cursor in the same text position, if possible.
- prevword
- Moves the cursor to the beginning of the previous word.
- nextword
- Moves the cursor to the beginning of the next word.
- home
- Moves the cursor to the beginning of the current line.
- end
- Moves the cursor to the end of the current line.
- beginpara
- Moves the cursor to the beginning of the current paragraph.
- endpara
- Moves the cursor to the end of the current paragraph.
- prevblock
- Moves the cursor to the beginning of the current or preceding block of
text. (Blocks are separated by one or more blank lines.)
- nextblock
- Moves the cursor to the beginning of the next block of text.
- pageup
- Goes up one screenful.
- pagedown
- Goes down one screenful.
- firstline
- Goes to the first line of the file.
- lastline
- Goes to the last line of the file.
- gotoline
- Goes to a specific line (and column if specified). Negative numbers count
from the end of the file (and end of the line).
- findbracket
- Moves the cursor to the bracket (brace, parenthesis, etc.) that matches
(pairs) with the one under the cursor.
- prevbuf
- Switches to editing/viewing the previous buffer when multiple buffers are
open.
- nextbuf
- Switches to editing/viewing the next buffer when multiple buffers are
open.
- verbatim
- Inserts the next keystroke verbatim into the file.
- tab
- Inserts a tab at the current cursor location.
- enter
- Inserts a new line below the current one.
- delete
- Deletes the character under the cursor.
- backspace
- Deletes the character before the cursor.
- recordmacro
- Starts the recording of keystrokes -- the keystrokes are stored as a
macro. When already recording, the recording is stopped.
- runmacro
- Replays the keystrokes of the last recorded macro.
- undo
- Undoes the last performed text action (add text, delete text, etc).
- redo
- Redoes the last undone action (i.e., it undoes an undo).
- refresh
- Refreshes the screen.
- suspend
- Suspends the editor (if the suspending function is enabled, see the
"suspendenable" entry below).
- casesens
- Toggles whether searching/replacing ignores or respects the case of the
given characters.
- regexp
- Toggles whether searching/replacing uses literal strings or regular
expressions.
- backwards
- Toggles whether searching/replacing goes forward or backward.
- older
- Retrieves the previous (earlier) entry at a prompt.
- newer
- Retrieves the next (later) entry at a prompt.
- flipreplace
- Toggles between searching for something and replacing something.
- flipgoto
- Toggles between searching for text and targeting a line number. (The form
'gototext' is deprecated.)
- flipexecute
- Toggles between inserting a file and executing a command.
- flippipe
- When executing a command, toggles whether the current buffer (or marked
region) is piped to the command.
- flipnewbuffer
- Toggles between inserting into the current buffer and into a new empty
buffer.
- flipconvert
- When reading in a file, toggles between converting and not converting it
from DOS/Mac format. Converting is the default.
- dosformat
- When writing a file, switches to writing a DOS format (CR/LF).
- macformat
- When writing a file, switches to writing a Mac format.
- append
- When writing a file, appends to the end instead of overwriting.
- prepend
- When writing a file, 'prepends' (writes at the beginning) instead of
overwriting.
- backup
- When writing a file, creates a backup of the current file.
- discardbuffer
- When about to write a file, discard the current buffer without saving.
(This function is bound by default only when option --tempfile is
in effect.)
- browser
- Starts the file browser, allowing to select a file from a list.
- gotodir
- Goes to a directory to be specified, allowing to browse anywhere in the
filesystem.
- firstfile
- Goes to the first file when using the file browser (reading or writing
files).
- lastfile
- Goes to the last file when using the file browser (reading or writing
files).
- nohelp
- Toggles the presence of the two-line list of key bindings at the bottom of
the screen.
- constantshow
- Toggles the constant display of the current line, column, and character
positions. (The form 'constupdate' is deprecated.)
- smoothscroll
- Toggles smooth scrolling (when moving around with the arrow keys).
- softwrap
- Toggles the displaying of overlong lines on multiple screen lines.
- linenumbers
- Toggles the display of line numbers in front of the text.
- whitespacedisplay
- Toggles the showing of whitespace.
- nosyntax
- Toggles syntax highlighting.
- smarthome
- Toggles the smartness of the Home key.
- autoindent
- Toggles whether a newly created line will contain the same amount of
leading whitespace as the preceding line -- or as the next line if the
preceding line is the beginning of a paragraph.
- cutfromcursor
- Toggles whether cutting text will cut the whole line or just from the
current cursor position to the end of the line. (The form 'cuttoend' is
deprecated.)
- nowrap
- Toggles whether long lines will be hard-wrapped to the next line.
- tabstospaces
- Toggles whether typed tabs will be converted to spaces.
- mouse
- Toggles mouse support.
- suspendenable
- Toggles whether the suspend sequence (normally ^Z) will suspend the editor
window.
- Valid menu
sections are:
- main
- The main editor window where text is entered and edited.
- search
- The search menu (AKA whereis).
- replace
- The 'search to replace' menu.
- replacewith
- The 'replace with' menu, which comes up after 'search to replace'.
- yesno
- The 'yesno' menu, where the Yes/No/All/Cancel question is asked.
- gotoline
- The 'goto line (and column)' menu.
- writeout
- The 'write file' menu.
- insert
- The 'insert file' menu.
- extcmd
- The menu for inserting output from an external command, reached from the
insert menu.
- help
- The help-viewer menu.
- spell
- The interactive spell checker Yes/no menu.
- linter
- The linter menu.
- browser
- The file browser for inserting or writing a file.
- whereisfile
- The 'search for a file' menu in the file browser.
- gotodir
- The 'go to directory' menu in the file browser.
- all
- A special name that encompasses all menus. For bind it means all
menus where the specified function exists; for unbind it
means all menus where the specified key exists.
- /etc/nanorc
- System-wide configuration file.
- ~/.nanorc or $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/nano/nanorc
or ~/.config/nano/nanorc
- Per-user configuration file.
Chris Allegretta and others (see the files AUTHORS and
THANKS for details). This manual page was originally written by Jordi
Mallach for the Debian system (but may be used by others).