Midnight Commander tutorial

Midnight Commander tutorialMidnight Commander is a great free file manager but the problem is people are overwhelmed by the interface. Here is a quickie Midnight Commander tutorial so you can navigate and get to the files you want.
All files and directories can be moved, copied or deleted and their contents viewed by using the F keys on your keyboard. Make reference to the options list on your screen. Use a combination of F key, cursor and mouse to navigate around the screen.

 

Midnight Commander Select Files

In the directory panes, select single files simply by using your cursor keys to get to them.  Select multiple files by using your Insert key to highlight and press Insert again on any file to deselect.
You can filter for groups of files: the + key will bring up a selection box into which you can enter wildcards. A wildcard selects all files of a certain type, for example:

*.doc

would select all files that have the ending “.doc” in a given directory.

 

Midnight Commander File Operations

You can view contents or edit files using the F keys on your keyboard and press Enter (or double-click) on a file to execute or open it with an external program if you have this installed in the environment you are running in.  Since most people will be using this from a boot CD then you may not be able to open any file. If using Linux then you need to have the program installed in your distro to open the corresponding file.

There are two ‘file’ menus. F9 is for accessing operations such as changing permissions or ownership. F2 deals mostly with zipping and extracting files and subdirectories.

Note: In Midnight Commander if you are moving or copying files, it will first assume you are doing this to the opposing directory, but gives you the option to change the destination.

 

Hope this helps!

 

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