micro Text Editor

Micro exposes its internal functionality through Lua packages. You can import these packages using the import function. Once imported, you can access values and call methods using Lua syntax.

Note on Syntax: While Go uses the dot (.) syntax for method calls, Lua plugins must use the colon (:) syntax to call methods on an object.

Example: micro.InfoBar().Message() in Go becomes micro.InfoBar():Message() in Lua.

local micro = import("micro")
micro.Log("Hello")

The Linter plugin runs a compiler or linter on your source code and parses the output to display error messages and line numbers directly within micro.

Triggering the linter:

• Automatic: The linter runs in the background every time the current buffer is saved, provided the filetype is supported.
• Manual: You can manually trigger a linting pass by executing the > lint command within micro.

By default, the plugin supports a wide range of languages including C (gcc), Go (go build, go vet), Python (flake8, mypy, pyflakes, pylint, ruff), Rust (cargo clippy), and many others.

Settings in micro can be applied in two ways:

1. Global Settings: The default behavior. Settings applied globally affect all buffers.
2. Local Settings: Settings that only apply to the current buffer. Use the setlocal command instead of set to apply an option locally.

Important Exceptions:

• The colorscheme option is global only.
• The filetype option is local only.

In the settings.json file, you can also define local settings for specific file types or file patterns (see 'Configure filetype and glob-specific settings' for details).

To ensure Micro correctly identifies a file, use the detect block in your syntax file. You can use one or more of the following mechanisms:

• filename: A regex matched against the filename. This takes precedence over header.
• header: A regex matched against the first line of the file. Useful when extensions are missing (e.g., detecting YAML via a %YAML directive).
• signature: An optional regex used to resolve ambiguities when multiple syntax files match a file (e.g., distinguishing C++ from C headers). Micro matches this against the first few lines (up to the detectlimit option).

Precedence Order: filename > header. If both match, filename wins. If multiple files match, the one with a matching signature is preferred.

detect:
    filename: "\\.ya?ml$"
    header: "%YAML"

You can scope keybindings to specific types of panes. This allows you to have different behavior when interacting with a text buffer versus the command bar or a terminal pane.

Supported pane types:

• buffer: The standard text editing pane.
• command: The command bar used for entering commands.
• terminal: A terminal pane.

To apply a binding only to the command bar, wrap the binding in a command object within your configuration.

{
    "command": {
        "Ctrl-w": "WordLeft"
    }
}

Micro supports various ways to specify modifier keys in configuration:

1. Alt Keys: Use Alt-key (e.g., Alt-a) or AltUp.
2. Optional Hyphen: Micro supports an optional - between modifiers. Alt-ShiftLeft is equivalent to AltShiftLeft. Note that case matters for Alt bindings.
3. Backspace Compatibility: On some older terminal emulators or Windows machines, use Ctrl-h for backspace if the standard Backspace key does not work as expected.

Micro uses YAML files to define syntax highlighting. Each file contains instructions for:

1. Detection: Identifying the filetype via file extensions or the file header (the first line).
2. Ambiguity Resolution: Using a signature to prioritize a specific filetype when multiple patterns match.
3. Highlighting: Defining patterns and regions that are mapped to specific highlight groups.

Note: When creating or porting syntax files, avoid using Nano's icolor syntax. Instead, use the case-insensitive flag (?i) within your regular expressions.

Micro provides a command prompt for executing internal editor commands and running external shell commands.

• Open Command Prompt: Use Ctrl-e to open the prompt. You can then type commands (e.g., vsplit or hsplit to create splits).
• Autocomplete: Press Tab within the command prompt to autocomplete commands.
• Run Shell Command: Use Ctrl-b to run a shell command. Note that this will close micro while your command executes.

Ctrl-e  # Open command prompt
Tab      # Autocomplete in prompt
Ctrl-b   # Run shell command

To add new syntax highlighting support to micro, place the desired .yaml syntax files into the following directory:

~/.config/micro/syntax