Useful tips

How do I edit a file in Mac command line?

How do I edit a file in Mac command line?

In the Terminal app on your Mac, invoke a command-line editor by typing the name of the editor, followed by a space and then the name of the file you want to open. If you want to create a new file, type the editor name, followed by a space and the pathname of the file.

How do I edit documents on a Mac?

Click the insertion cursor anywhere in the file and begin typing. To edit existing text, drag the insertion cursor across the characters to highlight them and type the replacement text. TextEdit automatically replaces the existing characters with those that you type.

Which command is used to edit a file?

Using the Nano editor To edit the file, just start typing your changes. To navigate around the file, you can use the arrow keys on your keyboard. If the file’s contents are too long to fit on the screen, you can press Ctrl+V to move forward a page, and Ctrl+Y to move back a page.

How to use a command line editor on a Mac?

In the Terminal app on your Mac, invoke a command-line editor by typing the name of the editor, followed by a space and then the name of the file you want to open. If you want to create a new file, type the editor name, followed by a space and the pathname of the file.

How to edit a file from the command line?

I need to edit a lot of text and use nano or vim is not very convenient. I suspect this is because the permission elevation is for the open command, not TextEdit itself. You should use a different editor that can have its binary run properly from the command line like SublimeText ( sudo subl /path/to/file) or TextMate ( sudo mate /path/to/file ).

Can you use a text editor in a Mac?

To edit a plain text file in Terminal, you can use a command-line text editor. For general-purpose work, it’s easiest to use one of the text editors included with macOS. If you want to use a graphical text editor, use TextEdit (in Launchpad). Otherwise, use one of the command-line editors included with macOS:

Do you need to edit files on a Mac?

The majority of these files will never be directly accessed by the average Mac user and will be called upon by the OS to perform their designated task when required to do so. There are, however, some files that you may need to access and even edit in order to modify your computer or recover from a virus or malware attack.