I’ve never got to grips with using ‘vi’ to edit files from the command line. I come from a Cobalt Linux/Red Hat Linux background where the pico text editor was always the default command-line editing application of choice. So one of the first things I need to do is configure the nano/pico text editor so I can properly edit and save out files.
Thankfully FreeBSD has a very useful ports collection system that makes installing applications quick and easy from any remote location. Here is a quick and easy step-by-step guide how to get Nano editing capabilities running on your FreeBSD powered server. I’ve even included a useful symlink for those who cannot stop using pico as a prefix to files they want to edit.
Sudo to root and then execute the following command:
cd /usr/ports/editors/nano && make install clean
That’s it.
If you have people who can’t stop themselves typing ‘pico’ to bring up the text editor then you can symlink to the new nano binary as follows:
- ln -s /usr/local/bin/nano /usr/local/bin/pico
- rehash
- pico
Job done!
