GNU nano 3.0 released with faster file reads, new shortcuts and usability improvements

GNU nano 3.0 was released this Sunday. Linux Terminal nano is a popular text based editor. While veteran users may prefer vim, nano is simpler to use and beginner friendly. It is also easier to save and exit from a file on nano, unlike Vim.

Termed as “Water Flowing Underground”, nano 3.0 sees improvements in speed, usability, and improvements. The major improvements include:

• Faster file reading by upto 70 percent
• Roughly twice the speed for ASCII text handling
• New shortcuts; Ctrl+Delete deletes the previous word and Ctrl+Shift+Delete deletes the previous word
• Various key bindings like M-Q to find previous, tabs to spaces toggle is placed on M-O, the toggle for more space is removed completely
• On opening multiple files, the correct number of lines are shown on the status bar
• The formatter command and searchagain function is removed, M-W is now bound to findnext by default
• The No-Convert toggle is now under the Insert menu
• The Backup and New-Buffer toggles are removed from the main menu, but remain on the Write-Out and Insert menus
• Higher precision in accepting a rebindable key name
• Any Esc key pressed before a valid command keystroke is ignored
• More escape sequences are recognized
• rcfile error messages on a Linux console are not hidden now
• The ‘copytext’ function is now ‘copy’ and ‘uncut’ is now ‘paste’
• There are also improvements made to avoid a hang while performing a full-justify on text

Nano is the default text editor on many popular Linux distributions and is preinstalled.

For nano 3.0 your Linux distribution will update it. It will take some time before you’ll see this in your system updates.

These are the major changes in GNU nano 3.0. For a full list and a changelog and bug fixes, visit the GNU website.

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