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Midnight Commander Keyboard Shortcuts (DRAFT) by

Midnight commander keyboard shortcuts

This is a draft cheat sheet. It is a work in progress and is not finished yet.

Navigation

↑↓ PgUp PgDown Pos1 End
Move through filelist
Tab
Switch between the two windows
F9
Select main menu on top of the screen.
F1 .. F10 or Esc+1 .. Esc+0
Run actions shown on the bottom of the screen
Enter
Only if no command was entered: Open folder from filelist or start executable file.
Ctrl+S
Start quicks­earch in current windows
Esc Esc
Exit from a menu or function. Esc has to be pushed in quick succession

Running commands

a-z,0-­9,S­pac­e,...
Enter comman­dline (while a windows is selected)
← →
Move in the comman­dline
Ctrl+←, Ctrl+→
Move in the comman­dline one word at a time
Enter
Run the comman­dline
Alt+Enter, Ctrl+Enter
Add the focused item (file,­fol­de,..) in the current windows at the cursor position.
Ctrl+x t
Add all selected items from the current window
Ctrl+A, Ctrl+E
Go to the beginn­ing/end of the comman­dline
Ctrl+O
Hide Interface, show command output

Selecting Files&Di­rec­tories

Ins (Insert key)
Toggle selection of the focus item and move down
+ (*)
For entering a pattern to select items by (i.e. *.txt)
- (*)
For entering a pattern to unselect items by
* (*)
Reverse file selections in (folders are unaffe­cted)
All selection commands affect the current window only.
(*) Only if no comman­dline was entered.
  

Comman­dline placeh­olders

%s
The selected item in the current windows. The focused item, if there are no selected ones.
%d, %D
The director yshown in the curren­t(%d) or other(%D) window
%D/%S
Complete filenames of the other window.
%%
A single %-char­acter
Example: unzip %D/%S (Extracts selected zip file from the other window into the current one)

Important file actions

F5
Copy selected files/­folders (other window's path is pre-se­lected)
F6
Move selected files/­folders (other window's path is pre-se­lected)
Shift+F6
Rename focused file (current name can be edited)
Ctrl+X Ctrl+A
Edit target of focused symbolic link
F8
Delete selected or focused item(s). There's no virtual trashbin .
F3
Show text content of focused file.
Ctrl+Space
If folders are selected: Calculate subtree size
If not: Calculate subtree size of focused folder and move down