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Midnight Commander
Questions and Answers
The newest version of this document is available at
http://mc.blackdown.org/mc/answers0.html
* 1 Getting started
+ 1.1 What is Midnight Commander?
+ 1.2 [UPDATED] Does it run on my machine?
+ 1.3 Does it work with my terminal?
+ 1.4 What else do I need to run MC?
+ 1.5 Is Midnight Commander PD? Copyrighted?
+ 1.6 Where can I get Midnight Commander?
+ 1.7 I don't have FTP access. Where can I get MC?
* 2 Keyboard
+ 2.1 What does documentation mean with the C-?, M-? and F?
keys?
+ 2.2 [UPDATED] Why don't function keys (or some other key)
work?
+ 2.3 How do I use function keys F11 to F20?
+ 2.4 Why does the ESC key behave funny?
+ 2.5 How can I add the plus sign (+) on the command line?
* 3 Mouse
+ 3.1 How do I enable mouse support?
+ 3.2 How do I cut and paste text with mouse?
* 4 Display
+ 4.1 Why do I keep getting "Terminal not powerful enough for
SLang"?
+ 4.2 [UPDATED] Why don't line drawing characters work?
+ 4.3 Can one use latin-1 characters without losing the lines?
+ 4.4 I have problems with entering/viewing national
characters!
+ 4.5 How can I get colors?
+ 4.6 My color_xterm goes completely (or partially) black!
+ 4.7 Where can I get color_xterm?
+ 4.8 I got colors working with MC but the other programs don't
work at all anymore!
+ 4.9 Why are there both terminfo and termcap? Wouldn't one
database be enough?
* 5 Graphical user interface
+ 5.1 Xview and Tk editions?
* 6 Command line problems
+ 6.1 How do I stay in the last directory when I exit Midnight
Commander?
+ 6.2 How can I access command line history?
+ 6.3 How can I complete commands, file names, variable names
and so on?
+ 6.4 [NEW] I am using ksh. Can I use functions defined in the
.kshrc within MC?
+ 6.5 [NEW] Is there any way to include additional options or
hot keys to MC?
* 7 Virtual file systems
+ 7.1 How can I see the contents of a tar archive?
+ 7.2 How do I get out of a tar archive?
+ 7.3 How do I do anonymous ftp with MC?
+ 7.4 How do I do non-anonymous ftp with MC?
+ 7.5 How do I close an ftp connection?
+ 7.6 Why aren't the contents of ftp panel updated?
+ 7.7 [NEW] What kind of proxy server works with Midnight
Commander?
* 8 Other common problems
+ 8.1 [UPDATED] How do I get the internal editor to work?
+ 8.2 Why doesn't "mcedit newfile" work?
+ 8.3 [UPDATED] Is there any way to 'bookmark' favourite ftp-fs
links?
+ 8.4 When copying the directories lose their original date,
uid and gid!
+ 8.5 [UPDATED] Why I keep getting: "There is no disk in the
drive. Please insert a disk into drive D:"?
+ 8.6 [NEW] When I start Midnight Commander, nothing happens!
+ 8.7 [NEW] When I try to view a file MC hangs!
* 9 Development
+ 9.1 Who has written Midnight Commander?
+ 9.2 Do I dare to use a development version?
+ 9.3 How can I report a bug/request for a feature?
+ 9.4 How can I join the development?
* 10 More information
+ 10.1 [UPDATED] This document didn't answer my question. Where
else can I look for an answer?
+ 10.2 What mailing lists are there for Midnight Commander?
+ 10.3 Where should I look on the World Wide Web for MC stuff?
+ 10.4 Are the mailing lists archived anywhere?
* 11 Administrivia
+ 11.1 Authorship
+ 11.2 [UPDATED] File formats
+ 11.3 Feedback is invited
+ 11.4 Disclaimer and copyright
1 Getting started
1.1 What is Midnight Commander?
The Midnight Commander is a user-friendly yet powerful file manager
and visual shell, useful to novice and guru alike. It provides a
clear, user-friendly, and somewhat protected interface to a Unix
system while making many frequent file operations more efficient and
preserving the full power of the command prompt. You will wonder how
you could ever live without it.
For more thorough description take a look at the announcement of
Midnight Commander 4.0.
1.2 [UPDATED] Does it run on my machine?
Yes, Midnight Commander can run on almost any machine, including Unix
clones, Windows 95/NT and OS/2. Midnight Commander does not run on
Macintosh.
Midnight Commander uses GNU autoconfigure which can automatically
configure Midnight Commander for use on almost any (if not every) Unix
clone. Following configurations have been tested:
* i386-*-linux1.x, 2.x
* alpha-linux-linux2
* sparc-linux-linux2.x
* sparc64-linux-linux2.1
* mips-sgi-irix5.x, 6.x
* mips-dec-ultrix4.3
* rs6000-ibm-aix3.2.5
* sparc-sun-sunos4.1
* sparc-sun-solaris2.3, 2.4, 2.5
* sparc-sun-netbsd1.0
* hppa-hp-hpux9
* hppa-hp-hpux7
* m68k-apple-aux
* unixware
* mc88110-aviion-dgux5.4R2.01
* i386-*-sco3.2v4.2
* i386-*-sco3.2v5
* i386-*-windows-nt-3.51, 4.0
* i386-*-windows95
* i386-*-os2
See http://mc.blackdown.org/mc/download.html.
There is also a preliminary Ms-Dos port at
http://mc.blackdown.org/cgi-mc/download/DOS/.html (but no Ms-Dos
binary).
Windows 95/NT port is compiled with Microsoft Visual C++ but it might
be possible to use cygwin32 or djgpp instead.
1.3 Does it work with my terminal?
Yes, it does.
Because Midnight Commander is a full screen program it doesn't run on
dummy terminals but anything more advanced will do (like vt100). If
your terminal works with vi, emacs, elm or pine it will work with
Midnight Commander.
The XView and Tk editions currently under development will require an
X terminal.
1.4 What else do I need to run MC?
You need an Unix compatible operating system or Windows 95/NT or OS/2.
If you want to use mouse on the Linux console you need General Purpose
Mouse server from iride.unipv.it: /pub/gpm/. You need nothing extra to
use mouse on xterm.
To compile the XView edition (currently under development) you need
XView library. Xpm library and X11 non-rectangular shape extensions
are recommended.
To compile the Tk edition (currently under development) you need
Tk-4.0 libraries. Compilation of the Tk version won't be easy. Contact
Miguel for details.
If you do not want to use the slang library you could try using
ncurses (we recommend only version 4.1 and above).
You can get it along with other curses libraries, too, but results may
not be pretty or even usable.
1.5 Is Midnight Commander PD? Copyrighted?
Midnight Commander is under GNU Public License which basically means
that you may freely copy, change and distribute it, but that you may
not impose any restrictions on further distribution, and that you must
make the source code available. This is not the same as Public Domain.
For details, the GNU license is included in the Midnight Commander
source distribution (the COPYING file).
Midnight Commander is nowadays officially a part of GNU project. All
the authors of the Midnight Commander have given all their rights on
the program to the Free Software Foundation.
1.6 Where can I get Midnight Commander?
See http://mc.blackdown.org/mc/download.html. There are about seventy
download sites. Note that the newest files might not be present on all
the download sites yet.
In short: the main site is ftp://ftp.nuclecu.unam.mx/linux/local/ and
the sunsite.unc.edu mirrors have MC in the
/pub/Linux/utils/file/managers/mc directory.
1.7 I don't have FTP access. Where can I get MC?
Most Linux CD-ROMs include Midnight Commander. For example, Slackware,
Yggdrasil, S.U.S.E., Jurix, RedHat, Caldera and Debian.
2 Keyboard
2.1 What does documentation mean with the C-?, M-? and F? keys?
Midnight Commander documentation uses emacs style names for keyboard
keys.
C stands for the Ctrl key. For example, C-f means that you should hold
down the Ctrl key and press the f key.
M stands for the Meta key. Your terminal might call it Alt or Compose
instead of Meta. For example, M-f means that you should hold down the
Meta/Alt/Compose key and press the f key. If your terminal doesn't
have Meta, Alt or Compose or they don't work you can use Esc. For M-f
press the Esc key and then press the f key.
F? stands for a function key. If your terminal doesn't have function
keys or they don't work you can use Esc. For example, for F3 press the
Esc key and then press the 3 key.
2.2 [UPDATED] Why don't function keys (or some other key) work?
Your terminfo or termcap database has missing or incorrect definations
for function keys. Type "mc -V" to see what terminal database is being
used. If the result is "using the S-Lang library with terminfo
database" you should install one of the enhanced terminfo databases
included in the Midnight Commander source distribution. For example,
if you are using xterm type "tic xterm.ti".
If the result is "using the S-Lang library with termcap database" you
should fix your /etc/termcap database.
Best terminfo database is bundled with ncurses 4.2
You can select whether Midnight Commander will use terminfo or termcap
database by giving --with-terminfo or --with-termcap option to the
configure. Default is terminfo if found, otherwise termcap.
If you don't have permissions to edit terminal databases you can use
Learn keys feature of Midnight Commander instead. Press Esc 9 o k and
follow instructions.
If all else fails you can emulate function keys by first pressing the
ESC key and then one of the number keys. For example, if you want to
produce F9, press ESC, then 9. If you don't have a ESC key on your
keyboard you can try alt-9 or meta-9.
2.3 How do I use function keys F11 to F20?
These can mapped to function keys F1 to F10 with Shift held. eg.
function key F13 can be activated by pressing Shift-F3. You can define
the keys this way in the Options menu. The convention for PC keyboards
is that F11-20 always means Shift with F1-10
Note! Windows 95/NT and OS/2 ports use F11 and F12 keys to change the
current disk drive. In this case F11 and F12 mean the real F11 and F12
keys, not shift-F1 and shift-F2.
2.4 Why does the ESC key behave funny?
Midnight Commander uses the ESC key as a prefix for simulating the
Meta and Alt keys (for terminals which don't have Meta or Alt, see the
three previous questions). For example, pressing ESC-a is the same as
pressing Meta-a. In addition most terminals use ESC for internal
representation of arrow keys, function keys and other enhanced keys.
If you want to use ESC to cancel things you have to press it twice i.
e. ESC-ESC. If you find this cumbersome you can generally use F10 to
cancel. Alternatively turn on the old_esc_mode setting in the
~/.mc.ini file. The old_esc_mode setting makes ESC work as a prefix
only if another key is pressed within 0.5 seconds. After 0.5 seconds
the ESC key cancels. There is no way to make ESC cancel immediately
(if we want to be able to use arrows keys and function keys).
X terminals allow more control over keyboard, so these ESC limitations
might not concern the forthcoming XView and Tk editions of the
Midnight Commander.
2.5 How can I add the plus sign (+) on the command line?
Press C-q first, then press the + sign.
The plus key is the hotkey for the select files command. If you want
to add a literal plus on to the command line you must quote it by
pressing C-q first.
Another common key which needs the C-q prefix is backslash "\".
3 Mouse
3.1 How do I enable mouse support?
Invoke mc like this (without quotes): "mc -x". If this doesn't work
upgrade to a terminal which compatible with the Xterm mouse sequences.
Alternatively, on Linux console you can use GPM.
3.2 How do I cut and paste text with mouse?
Hold down shift key while using mouse to cut'n'paste.
4 Display
4.1 Why do I keep getting "Terminal not powerful enough for SLang"?
This means that your terminfo databases do not contain the correct
definitions for your terminal.
You could try using a different terminal setting. If you use csh or
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