nano: Pico Compatibility

1 
1 9 Pico Compatibility
1 ********************
1 
1 ‘nano’ attempts to emulate Pico as closely as possible, but there are
1 some differences between the editors:
1 
1 ‘Interactive Replace’
1      Instead of allowing you to replace either just one occurrence of a
1      search string or all of them, ‘nano’’s replace function is
1      interactive: it will pause at each found search string and query
1      whether to replace this instance.  You can then choose Yes, or No
1      (skip this one), or All (don’t ask any more), or Cancel (stop with
1      replacing).
1 
1 ‘Search and Replace History’
1      When the option ‘-H’ or ‘--historylog’ is given (or set in the a
1      nanorc file), text entered as search or replace strings is stored.
1      These strings can be accessed with the up/down arrow keys, or you
1      can type the first few characters and then use ‘Tab’ to cycle
1      through the matching strings.  A retrieved string can subsequently
1      be edited.
1 
1 ‘Position History’
1      When the option ‘-P’ or ‘--positionlog’ is given (or set in a
1      nanorc file), ‘nano’ will store the position of the cursor when you
1      close a file, and will place the cursor in that position again when
1      you later reopen the file.
1 
1 ‘Current Cursor Position’
1      The output of the "Display Cursor Position" command (‘^C’) displays
1      not only the current line and character position of the cursor, but
1      also (between the two) the current column position.
1 
1 ‘Hard-Wrapping’
1      By default, ‘nano’ hard-wraps lines at screen width minus eight
1      columns, whereas Pico does it at screen width minus six columns.
1      You can make ‘nano’ do the same as Pico by using ‘--fill=-6’.
1 
1 ‘Spell Checking’
1      In the internal spell checker misspelled words are sorted
1      alphabetically and trimmed for uniqueness, such that the words
1      ’apple’ and ’Apple’ will be prompted for correction separately.
1 
1 ‘Writing Selected Text to Files’
1      When using the Write-Out key (‘^O’), text that has been selected
1      using the marking key (‘^^’) can not just be written out to a new
1      (or existing) file, it can also be appended or prepended to an
1      existing file.
1 
1 ‘Reading Text from a Command’
1      When using the Read-File key (‘^R’), ‘nano’ can not just read a
1      file, it can also read the output of a command to be run (‘^X’).
1 
1 ‘Reading from Working Directory’
1      By default, Pico will read files from the user’s home directory
1      (when using ‘^R’), but it will write files to the current working
1      directory (when using ‘^O’).  ‘nano’ makes this symmetrical: always
1      reading from and writing to the current working directory — the
1      directory that ‘nano’ was started in.
1 
1 ‘File Browser’
1      In the file browser, ‘nano’ does not implement the Add, Copy,
1      Rename, and Delete commands that Pico provides.  In ‘nano’ the
1      browser is just a file browser, not a file manager.
1 
1 ‘Toggles’
1      Many options which alter the functionality of the program can be
1      "toggled" on or off using Meta key sequences, meaning the program
1      does not have to be restarted to turn a particular feature on or
1      off.  ⇒Feature Toggles for a list of options that can be
1      toggled.  Or see the list at the end of the main internal help text
1      (‘^G’) instead.
1