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MCEDIT(1) GNU Midnight Commander MCEDIT(1)

NAME
mcedit - Internal file editor of GNU Midnight Commander.

SYNOPSIS
mcedit [-bcCdfhstVx?] [+lineno] [file1] [file2] ...

mcedit [-bcCdfhstVx?] file1:lineno[:] file2:lineno[:] ...

DESCRIPTION
mcedit is a link to mc, the main GNU Midnight Commander executable. Executing GNU Midnight
Commander under this name runs the internal editor and opens files specified on the command
line. The editor is based on the terminal version of cooledit - standalone editor for X Win‐
dow System.

OPTIONS
+lineno
Go to the line specified by number (do not put a space between the + sign and the num‐
ber). Several line numbers are allowed but only the last one will be used, and it will
be applied to the first file only.

-b Force black and white display.

-c Force ANSI color mode on terminals that don't seem to have color support.

-C <keyword>=<fgcolor>,<bgcolor>,<attributes>:<keyword>= ...
Specify a different color set. See the Colors section in mc(1) for more information.

-d Disable mouse support.

-f Display the compiled-in search path for GNU Midnight Commander data files.

-t Force using termcap database instead of terminfo. This option is only applicable if
GNU Midnight Commander was compiled with S-Lang library with terminfo support.

-V Display the version of the program.

-x Force xterm mode. Used when running on xterm-capable terminals (two screen modes, and
able to send mouse escape sequences).

FEATURES
The internal file editor is a full-featured windowed editor. It can edit several files at
the same time. Maximum size of each file is 64 megabytes. It is possible to edit binary
files. The features it presently supports are: block copy, move, delete, cut, paste; key for
key undo; pull-down menus; file insertion; macro commands; regular expression search and re‐
place; shift-arrow text highlighting (if supported by the terminal); insert-overwrite toggle;
autoindent; tunable tab size; syntax highlighting for various file types; and an option to
pipe text blocks through shell commands like indent and ispell.

Each file is opened in its own window in full-screen mode. Window control in mcedit is simi‐
lar to the window control in other multi-window program: double click on window title maxi‐
mizes the window to full-screen or restores window size and position; left-click on window
title and mouse drag moves the window in editor area; left-click on low-right frame corner
and mouse drag resizes the window. These actions can be made using "Window" menu.

KEYS
The editor is easy to use and can be used without learning. The pull-down menu is invoked by
pressing F9. You can learn other keys from the menu and from the button bar labels.

In addition to that, Shift combined with arrows does text highlighting (if supported by the
terminal): Ctrl-Ins copies to the file ~/.cache/mc/mcedit/mcedit.clip, Shift-Ins pastes from
~/.cache/mc/mcedit/mcedit.clip, Shift-Del cuts to ~/.cache/mc/mcedit/mcedit.clip, and
Ctrl-Del deletes highlighted text. Mouse highlighting also works on some terminals. To use
the standard mouse support provided by your terminal, hold the Shift key. Please note that
the mouse support in the terminal doesn't share the clipboard with mcedit.

The completion key (usually Meta-Tab or Escape Tab) completes the word under the cursor using
the words used in the file.

MACRO
To define a macro, press Ctrl-R and then type out the keys you want to be executed. Press
Ctrl-R again when finished. The macro can be assigned to any key by pressing that key. The
macro is executed when you press the assigned key.

The macro commands are stored in section [editor] it the file ~/.local/share/mc/mc.macros.

External scripts (filters) can be assigned into the any hotkey by edit mc.macros like follow‐
ing:

[editor]
ctrl-W=ExecuteScript:25;

This means that ctrl-W hotkey initiates the ExecuteScript(25) action, then editor handler
translates this into execution of ~/.local/share/mc/mcedit/macros.d/macro.25.sh shell script.

External scripts are stored in ~/.local/share/mc/mcedit/macros.d/ directory and must be named
as macro.XXXX.sh where XXXX is the number from 0 to 9999. See Edit Menu File for more detail
about format of the script.

Following macro definition and directives can be used:

#silent
If this directive is set, then script starts without interactive subshell.

%c The cursor column position number.

%i The indent of blank space, equal the cursor column.

%y The syntax type of current file.

%b The block file name.

%f The current file name.

%n Only the current file name without extension.

%x The extension of current file name.

%d The current directory name.

%F The current file in the unselected panel.

%D The directory name of the unselected panel.

%t The currently tagged files.

%T The tagged files in the unselected panel.

%u and %U
Similar to the %t and %T macros, but in addition the files are untagged. You can use
this macro only once per menu file entry or extension file entry, because next time
there will be no tagged files.

%s and %S
The selected files: The tagged files if there are any. Otherwise the current file.

Feel free to edit this files, if you need. Here is a sample external script:

l comment selection
TMPFILE=`mktemp ${MC_TMPDIR:-/tmp}/up.XXXXXX` || exit 1
echo #if 0 > $TMPFILE
cat %b >> $TMPFILE
echo #endif >> $TMPFILE
cat $TMPFILE > %b
rm -f $TMPFILE

If some keys don't work, you can use Learn Keys in the Options menu.

CODE NAVIGATION
mcedit can be used for navigation through code with tags files created by etags or ctags com‐
mands. If there is no TAGS file code navigation will not work. For example, in case of exu‐
berant-ctags for C language command will be:

ctags -e --language-force=C -R ./

Meta-Enter shows list box to select item under cursor (cursor should stand at the end of the
word).

Meta-Minus where minus is symbol "-" goes to previous function in navigation list (like
browser's Back button).

Meta-Equal where equal is symbol "=" goes to next function in navigation list (like browser's
Forward button).

SYNTAX HIGHLIGHTING
mcedit supports syntax highlighting. This means that keywords and contexts (like C comments,
string constants, etc) are highlighted in different colors. The following section explains
the format of the file ~/.config/mc/mcedit/Syntax. If this file is missing, system-wide
/usr/share/mc/syntax/Syntax is used. The file ~/.config/mc/mcedit/Syntax is rescanned on
opening of every new editor file. The file contains rules for highlighting, each of which is
given on a separate line, and define which keywords will be highlighted with what color.

The file is divided into sections, each beginning with a line with the file command. The
sections are normally put into separate files using the include command.

The file command has three arguments. The first argument is a regular expression that is ap‐
plied to the file name to determine if the following section applies to the file. The second
argument is the description of the file type. It is used in cooledit; future versions of
mcedit may use it as well. The third optional argument is a regular expression to match the
first line of text of the file. The rules in the following section apply if either the file
name or the first line of text matches.

A section ends with the start of another section. Each section is divided into contexts, and
each context contains rules. A context is a scope within the text that a particular set of
rules belongs to. For instance, the text within a C style comment (i.e. between /* and */)
has its own color. This is a context, although it has no further rules inside it because
there is probably nothing that we want highlighted within a C comment.

A trivial C programming section might look like this:

file .\*\\.c C\sProgram\sFile (#include|/\\\*)

wholechars abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyzABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ_

# default colors
define comment brown
context default
keyword whole if yellow
keyword whole else yellow
keyword whole for yellow
keyword whole while yellow
keyword whole do yellow
keyword whole switch yellow
keyword whole case yellow
keyword whole static yellow
keyword whole extern yellow
keyword { brightcyan
keyword } brightcyan
keyword '*' green

# C comments
context /\* \*/ comment

# C preprocessor directives
context linestart # \n red
keyword \\\n brightred

# C string constants
context " " green
keyword %d brightgreen
keyword %s brightgreen
keyword %c brightgreen
keyword \\" brightgreen

Each context starts with a line of the form:

context [exclusive] [whole|wholeright|wholeleft] [linestart] delim [linestart] delim [fore‐
ground] [background] [attributes]

The first context is an exception. It must start with the command

context default [foreground] [background] [attributes]

otherwise mcedit will report an error. The linestart option specifies that delim must start
at the beginning of a line. The whole option tells that delim must be a whole word. To
specify that a word must begin on the word boundary only on the left side, you can use the
wholeleft option, and similarly a word that must end on the word boundary is specified by
wholeright.

The set of characters that constitute a whole word can be changed at any point in the file
with the wholechars command. The left and right set of characters can be set separately with

wholechars [left|right] characters

The exclusive option causes the text between the delimiters to be highlighted, but not the
delimiters themselves.

Each rule is a line of the form:

keyword [whole|wholeright|wholeleft] [linestart] string foreground [background] [attributes]

Context or keyword strings are interpreted, so that you can include tabs and spaces with the
sequences \t and \s. Newlines and backslashes are specified with \n and \\ respectively.
Since whitespace is used as a separator, it may not be used as is. Also, \* must be used to
specify an asterisk. The * itself is a wildcard that matches any length of characters. For
example,

keyword '*' green

colors all C single character constants green. You also could use

keyword "*" green

to color string constants, but the matched string would not be allowed to span across multi‐
ple newlines. The wildcard may be used within context delimiters as well, but you cannot
have a wildcard as the last or first character.

Important to note is the line

keyword \\\n brightgreen

This line defines a keyword containing the backslash and newline characters. Since the key‐
words are matched before the context delimiters, this keyword prevents the context from end‐
ing at the end of the lines that end in a backslash, thus allowing C preprocessor directive
to continue across multiple lines.

The possible colors are: black, gray, red, brightred, green, brightgreen, brown, yellow,
blue, brightblue, magenta, brightmagenta, cyan, brightcyan, lightgray and white. The special
keyword "default" means the terminal's default. Another special keyword "base" means mc's
main colors, it is useful as a placeholder if you want to specify attributes without modify‐
ing the background color. When 256 colors are available, they can be specified either as
color16 to color255, or as rgb000 to rgb555 and gray0 to gray23.

If the syntax file is shared with cooledit, it is possible to specify different colors for
mcedit and cooledit by separating them with a slash, e.g.

keyword #include red/Orange

mcedit uses the color before the slash. See cooledit(1) for supported cooledit colors.

Attributes can be any of bold, italic, underline, reverse and blink, appended by a plus sign
if more than one are desired.

Comments may be put on a separate line starting with the hash sign (#).

If you are describing case insensitive language you need to use caseinsensitive directive. It
should be specified at the beginning of syntax file.

Because of the simplicity of the implementation, there are a few intricacies that will not be
dealt with correctly but these are a minor irritation. On the whole, a broad spectrum of
quite complicated situations are handled with these simple rules. It is a good idea to take
a look at the syntax file to see some of the nifty tricks you can do with a little imagina‐
tion. If you cannot get by with the rules I have coded, and you think you have a rule that
would be useful, please email me with your request. However, do not ask for regular expres‐
sion support, because this is flatly impossible.

A useful hint is to work with as much as possible with the things you can do rather than try
to do things that this implementation cannot deal with. Also remember that the aim of syntax
highlighting is to make programming less prone to error, not to make code look pretty.

The syntax highlighting can be toggled using Ctrl-s shortcut.

COLORS
The default colors may be changed by appending to the MC_COLOR_TABLE environment variable.
Foreground and background colors pairs may be specified for example with:

MC_COLOR_TABLE="$MC_COLOR_TABLE:\
editnormal=lightgray,black:\
editbold=yellow,black:\
editmarked=black,cyan"

OPTIONS
Most options can be set from Options dialog box. See the Options menu. The following op‐
tions are defined in ~/.config/mc/ini and have obvious counterparts in the dialog box. You
can modify them to change the editor behavior, by editing the file. Unless specified, a 1
sets the option to on, and a 0 sets it to off, as usual.

use_internal_edit
This option is ignored when invoking mcedit.

editor_tab_spacing
Interpret the tab character as being of this length. Default is 8. You should avoid
using other than 8 since most other editors and text viewers assume a tab spacing of
8. Use editor_fake_half_tabs to simulate a smaller tab spacing.

editor_fill_tabs_with_spaces
Never insert a tab character. Rather insert spaces (ascii 32) to fill to the desired
tab size.

editor_return_does_auto_indent
Pressing return will tab across to match the indentation of the first line above that
has text on it.

editor_backspace_through_tabs
Make a single backspace delete all the space to the left margin if there is no text
between the cursor and the left margin.

editor_fake_half_tabs
This will emulate a half tab for those who want to program with a tab spacing of 4,
but do not want the tab size changed from 8 (so that the code will be formatted the
same when displayed by other programs). When editing between text and the left margin,
moving and tabbing will be as though a tab space were 4, while actually using spaces
and normal tabs for an optimal fill. When editing anywhere else, a normal tab is in‐
serted.

editor_option_save_mode
Possible values 0, 1 and 2. The save mode (see the options menu also) allows you to
change the method of saving a file. Quick save (0) saves the file immediately, trun‐
cating the disk file to zero length (i.e. erasing it) and then writing the editor
contents to the file. This method is fast, but dangerous, since a system error during
a file save will leave the file only partially written, possibly rendering the data
irretrievable. When saving, the safe save (1) option enables creation of a temporary
file into which the file contents are first written. In the event of a problem, the
original file is untouched. When the temporary file is successfully written, it is
renamed to the name of the original file, thus replacing it. The safest method is
create backups (2): a backup file is created before any changes are made. You can
specify your own backup file extension in the dialog. Note that saving twice will re‐
place your backup as well as your original file.

editor_word_wrap_line_length
Line length to wrap at. Default is 72.

editor_backup_extension
Symbol to add to name of backup files. Default is "~".

editor_line_state
Show state line of editor. Currently it shows current line number (in the future it
might show things like folding, breakpoints, etc.). M-n toggles this option.

editor_visible_spaces
Toggle "show visible trailing spaces". If editor_visible_spaces=1, they are shown as
'.'

editor_visible_tabs
Toggle "show visible tabs". If editor_visible_tabs=1, tabs are shown as '<---->'

editor_persistent_selections
Do not remove block selection after cursor movement.

editor_drop_selection_on_copy
Reset selection after copy to clipboard.

editor_cursor_beyond_eol
Allow moving cursor beyond the end of line.

editor_cursor_after_inserted_block
Allow moving cursor after inserted block.

editor_syntax_highlighting
enable syntax highlighting.

editor_edit_confirm_save
Show confirmation dialog on save.

editor_option_typewriter_wrap
to be described

editor_option_auto_para_formatting
to be described

editor_option_save_position
Save file position on exit.

source_codepage
Symbol representation of codepage name for file (i.e. CP1251, ~ - default).

editor_group_undo
Combine UNDO actions for several of the same type of action (inserting/overwriting,
deleting, navigating, typing)

editor_wordcompletion_collect_entire_file
Search autocomplete candidates in entire file (1) or just from beginning of file to
cursor position (0).

editor_wordcompletion_collect_all_files
Search autocomplete candidates from all loaded files (1, default), not only from the
currently edited one (0).

spell_language
Spelling language (en, en-variant_0, ru, etc) installed with aspell package (a full
list can be obtained using 'aspell' utility). Use spell_language = NONE to disable
aspell support. Default value is 'en'. Option must be located in the [Misc] section.

editor_stop_format_chars
Set of characters to stop paragraph formatting. If one of those characters is found in
the beginning of line, that line and all following lines of paragraph will be un‐
touched. Default value is "-+*\,.;:&>".

editor_state_full_filename
Show full path name in the status line. If disabled, only base name of the file is
shown.

MISCELLANEOUS
The editor also displays non-us characters (160+). When editing binary files, you should set
display bits to 7 bits in Midnight Commander's options menu to keep the spacing clean.

FILES
/usr/share/mc/help/mc.hlp

The help file for the program.

/usr/share/mc/mc.ini

The default system-wide setup for GNU Midnight Commander, used only if the user's own
~/.config/mc/ini file is missing.

/usr/share/mc/mc.lib

Global settings for Midnight Commander. Settings in this file affect all users,
whether they have ~/.config/mc/ini or not.

/usr/share/mc/syntax/*

The default system-wide syntax files for mcedit, used only if the corresponding user's
own ~/.local/share/mc/mcedit/ file is missing.

~/.config/mc/ini

User's own setup. If this file is present then the setup is loaded from here instead
of the system-wide setup file.

~/.local/share/mc/mcedit/

User's own directory where block commands are processed and saved and user's own syn‐
tax files are located.

LICENSE
This program is distributed under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
the Free Software Foundation. See the built-in help of Midnight Commander for details on the
License and the lack of warranty.

AVAILABILITY
The latest version of this program can be found at http://ftp.midnight-commander.org/.

SEE ALSO
cooledit(1), mc(1), gpm(1), terminfo(1), scanf(3).

AUTHORS
Paul Sheer (psheer AT obsidian.za) is the original author of Midnight Commander's internal
editor.

BUGS
Bugs should be reported to http://www.midnight-commander.org/.

MC Version 4.8.27 October 2021 MCEDIT(1)