Why nano gets used

2026-08-09 15:42 UTC

Nano has already supplanted the great EMacs and Vim as the most popular text editor of all linux distros, for though it has many omissions in functionality it scores over the older, more complete programs in two important respects. First, it is slightly simpler; and secondly it has the text “^ Exit” inscribed in highlighted text on its footer EDIT : This sees to be going over some people’s heads. It’s a hitchiker’s guide to the galaxy reference. The Hitchhiker’s Guide has already supplanted the great Encyclopaedia Galactica as the standard repository of all knowledge and wisdom, for though it has many omissions . . . it scores over the older, more pedestrian work in two important respects. First, it is slightly cheaper; and secondly it has the words DON’T PANIC inscribed in large friendly letters on its cover.

Replies (14)

@Solemarc@lemmy.world 2026-08-10 01:44

I use helix for all my developer work and nano for "I need to edit this config file buried somewhere in /usr/…

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@shellington@piefed.zip 2026-08-09 15:44

I like Nano; it lets me do what I need to do quickly, simply and efficiently.

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@rumschlumpel@feddit.org 2026-08-09 16:57

Big fan of micro. Like nano, it’s non-modal, but unlike nano, it doesn’t need to print its shortcuts on the bottom because everyone already knows most of the shortcuts from almost every GUI editor. And it has inbuilt LSP support (TBH it’s a bit much at times, the UI is a bit too intrusive to (by default) complain every time you violate some style guideline). Though that’s moot if you don’t have admin privileges on the box you’re working on.

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@floquant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2026-08-09 19:05

The Venn diagram of nano users and Debian/Ubuntu users is a circle

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@heartSagan5@lemmy.zip 2026-08-10 03:29

That’s because Ubuntu, honestly.

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@ArsonButCute@programming.dev 2026-08-09 16:06

I’m a vim stan. I love my vim. I still end up installing nano on all my machines. It’s honestly not even for me anymore, it’s for anyone else who happens to use it. Vim is great but it’s got a learning curve. Often times I’ll just use vi, since it’s always there.

Open ##4476407
@owenfromcanada@lemmy.ca 2026-08-09 15:47

Nano is to EMacs/Vim as Notepad is to Notepad++ or VSCode (Nano has features Notepad doesn’t, but you get the point). I don’t do a ton of code editing directly on the CLI. I do things like change parameters in config files or open a file to read it quickly. If I’m doing more heavy editing, I’ll use a GUI editor (with an SFTP extension if I’m working on a headless server). So programs like Vim and EMacs have never been useful for me. To each their own (and I have all the respect for anyone who knows how to exit Vim without looking it up) but I’m guessing the majority of people have a similar experience.

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@edinbruh@feddit.it 2026-08-09 19:56

It’s there and it’s easy. Most people don’t use terminal text editors unless they are SSHing in a server, and they would only do that sporadically, so it makes no sense to become proficient in a complex text editor like vim or Emacs for that little use case. Sidenote: personally, I learned vim once, and used it extensively every day for two years. I stopped using it for one year and was back to square one. Now I use vscode for everything… Even when I’m using SSH, because vscode supports SSH

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@TaterTot@piefed.social 2026-08-10 05:33

I’m ashamed to admit that, despite having read Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy several times, my Vim elitist mindset made me miss the reference. Sometimes you need a real good slice of humble pie to remember what’s important in life.

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@jxk@sh.itjust.works 2026-08-10 06:18

ed is the standard text editor

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@esc@piefed.social 2026-08-10 06:37

Both nano and emacs suffer from the same problem - bad defaults. You need to pass like ten options to nano for it to work as expected to edit configuration files and small scripts.

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@cannedtuna@piefed.world 2026-08-09 18:53

People don’t have to look up “how to exit nano”

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@heliotrope@retrofed.com 2026-08-10 00:40

I’ve used Vim, NeoVim, Micro, mg(1), JOE, and even MS Edit (both the original DOS version and the recent Rust clone). No matter how complex and tailored I wrote my config, though, the features I actually used were included in GNU nano and/or my command shell without any of the bugs, bloat, learning curve, or slop. Using it as my default just makes sense.

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@Marija_@programming.dev 2026-08-10 11:57

Example of optimocracy

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