I have come to know quite a few Pico die-hards over the years. Their primary reason for sticking with Pico is usually its simplicity. For this, I also think that Pico is hard to beat.
But it’s possible to match that simplicity while adding new features. Enter GNU Nano.
Among the many added features such as case-sensitive search, regexp search and replace, auto-indent and multiple file buffers, Nano also supports syntax highlighting. I guess even some Pico die-hards would agree that some of these are useful features. In fact I myself is a big fan of syntax highlighting (as you can see here).
Really, next time before you use Pico, give Nano a try. It may very well increase your productivity (which is why I am writing this). For starters, put these four lines into your ~/.nanorc and go:
set autoindent
set historylog
set multibuffer
set tabsize 4
Have fun!
17:46 on June 30th, 2005
Hehe.
OMG, I am a TOTAL pico die hard.
On Windows its Notepad and on UNIX its PICO.
I tried all these other fancy editors(emacs, vi) and they were just too complicated. Macros and Meta-X and input mode and Command mode and all kinds of stuff.
Basically, PICO foreverrrr!
19:22 on July 1st, 2005
Heh, looks like I should write a post about Notepad replacements on Windows later.
Let me note that many Linux installations have both Pico and Nano installed and so it’s very easy to switch to Nano. The same cannot be said for any Notepad replacement and that’s why Notepad is so prominently difficult to swtich away from.