[EE84M3i]

>I just don't understand how this is possible

I use nano as my daily driver, and here is how:

- I have a nanorc I copy around but am quite comfortable without. Here it is. You can use it under WTFPL-1. Feel free to fork it, but I'm not accepting pull requests.

  set multibuffer
  set nohelp
  # Defaults for older versions
  set nowrap
  set smooth
  set morespace
  unset boldtext

- I use ^K and ^U to cut and paste lines of text.

- If I need to edit multiple files, I use ^R

- If I need to find and/or replace, I use ^W (find), optionally with ^R (replace) and/or M-R (Regexp).

- Sometimes I need to go to a specific line/col, so I use ^_

Basically there's nothing else I want my text editor to do. I want minimal magic.

[innocenat]

I know it's not the point you were answering too, but this is exactly why I don't think I will be comfortable in nano, ever. I already know vim, and I don't really bother to remember another set of shortcut just for nano.

When vi/vim aren't available, I usually just end up using sed.

[magicalhippo]

The only thing you need to remember with Nano is that ^ means Ctrl. The rest you can find by reading the menus or the built-in help.

Which is why I prefer Nano over vim, I don't edit _that_ much from the console so I only have one easy thing to remember.

[EE84M3i]

That's reasonable, but all the things a I listed are on the standard help bar, so the learning curve is minimal.

If there's no nano available like on busybox, I'll default to vi, but I don't prefer it.