nnn (type less, do more, way faster)

nnn is a full-featured file manager for low-end devices and the regular desktop. It’s extremely light and fast (performance).

nnn is also a disk usage analyzer, a fuzzy app launcher, a batch file renamer and a file picker. 26 plugins are available to extend its power. Custom plugins are easy to add. There’s an independent (neo)vim picker plugin project.

It runs on Linux, macOS, Raspberry Pi, BSD, Cygwin, Linux subsystem for Windows and Termux on Android.

nnn works seamlessly with DEs and GUI utilities. It’s nearly zero-config (with sensible defaults) and can be setup in less than 5 minutes. Quickstart and see how nnn simplifies workflows.

Demo videos: i. nnn on Termux (Android), ii. features overview

3 modes of nnn (light with filter, detail, du analyzer) with memory usage

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• Features
• Installation
  • Library dependencies
  • Utility dependencies
  • From a package manager
  • Release packages
  • From source
  • Shell completion
• Quickstart
• Usage
  • Configuration
  • Cmdline options
  • Keyboard and mouse
    • Leader key
  • Contexts
    • Context-specific color
  • Selection
  • Filters
  • Navigate-as-you-type
  • File indicators
  • Hot-plugged drives
  • SSHFS mounts
  • Help
• Troubleshooting
  • Tmux configuration
  • BSD terminal issue
  • 100% CPU usage
• Why fork?
• Mentions
• Developers

FEATURES

• Modes
  • Detail (default), light
  • Disk usage analyzer (block/apparent)
  • File picker, (neo)vim plugin
• Navigation
  • Navigate-as-you-type with dir auto-select, wild load
  • 4 contexts (aka tabs/workspaces)
  • Bookmarks; pin and visit a directory
  • Familiar, easy shortcuts (arrows, ~, -, @)
• Sorting
  • Ordered pure numeric names by default (visit /proc)
  • Case-insensitive version (aka natural) sort
  • Sort by file name, modification time, size
• Search
  • Instant filtering with search-as-you-type
  • Regex and substring match
  • Subtree search to open or edit files (using plugin)
• Mimes
  • Open with desktop opener or specify a custom app
  • Create, list, extract archive (needs (p)atool/bsdtar)
  • Option to open all text files in EDITOR
• Information
  • Detailed file information
  • Media information (needs mediainfo/exiftool)
• Plugins
  • (Un)mount external drives
  • File and directory diff
  • Play selection in MOC
  • View PDF as text
  • View images/thumbnails in terminal
  • Upload image to Imgur
  • Paste text to Ubuntu pastebin
  • Upload file to transfer.sh
  • Split and join files
  • Create MP3 ringtones
  • Calculate and verify checksums
  • Read a text file
  • Hex viewer
  • and more...
• Convenience
  • Needs minimal configuration
  • Select files across dirs; all/range selection
  • Copy, move, delete, archive, link selection
  • Batch rename selection or dir entries
  • FreeDesktop compliant trash (needs trash-cli)
  • SSHFS mounts (needs sshfs)
  • Mouse support
  • Create, rename files and directories
  • Show copy, move progress on Linux (needs avdcpmv)
  • Per-context directory color (default: blue)
  • Spawn a shell in the current directory
  • Launch applications, run a command
  • Run current file as executable
  • Change directory at exit (easy shell integration)
  • Edit file in EDITOR or open in PAGER
  • Take quick notes
  • Lock the terminal (needs a locker)
  • Shortcut reference a keypress away
• Unicode support
• Follows Linux kernel coding style
• Highly optimized, static analysis integrated code
• Minimal library dependencies
• Available on many distros

INSTALLATION

Library dependencies

nnn needs a curses library with wide character support (like ncursesw), libreadline and standard libc. It’s possible to drop libreadline using the Makefile target norl.

Utility dependencies

Dependency	Installation	Operation
xdg-open (Linux), open(1) (macOS), cygstart (Cygwin)	base	desktop opener
file, coreutils (cp, mv, rm), findutils (xargs)	base	file type, copy, move and remove
atool / bsdtar	needed	create, list and extract archives
mediainfo / exiftool	if needed	multimedia file details
sshfs, fusermount(3)	if needed	mount, unmount over SSHFS
trash-cli	optional	trash files (default action: delete)
vlock (Linux), bashlock (macOS), lock(1) (BSD)	optional	terminal locker (fallback: cmatrix)
advcpmv (Linux) (integration)	optional	copy, move progress
$VISUAL (else $EDITOR), $PAGER, $SHELL	optional	fallback vi, less, sh

From a package manager

There’s a good chance nnn is already available in the default repos of your distro. Find a list of known packagers here.

Release packages

Packages for Arch Linux, CentOS, Debian, Fedora and Ubuntu are available with the latest stable release.

From source

To cook yourself, download the latest stable release or clone this repository (risky). Then install the dependencies and compile (e.g. on Ubuntu 16.04):

$ sudo apt-get install pkg-config libncursesw5-dev libreadline6-dev
$ make
$ sudo make strip install

PREFIX is supported, in case you want to install to a different location.

• Compilation notes for Raspberry Pi
• Instructions for Cygwin

Shell completion

Option completion scripts for Bash, Fish and Zsh can be found in respective subdirectories of misc/auto-completion/. Please refer to your shell’s manual for installation instructions.

QUICKSTART

1. Install the utilities you may need based on your regular workflows.
2. Configure cd on quit.
3. Optionally open all text files in $EDITOR (fallback vi): export NNN_USE_EDITOR=1
4. For additional functionality install plugins and the GUI app launcher nlaunch.

• Don’t memorize keys. Arrows, / and q suffice. Press ? for help on keyboard shortcuts anytime.
• When you are ready for more, start hacking nnn.
• To set nnn as the default file manager, follow these instructions.

USAGE

Configuration

nnn supports the following environment variables for configuration. All of them are optional (set if you need). There is no config file. Any associated files are stored under ${XDG_CONFIG_HOME:-$HOME/.config}/nnn/.

Example export	Description
NNN_BMS='d:~/Documents;D:~/Docs archive/'	specify bookmarks (max 10)
NNN_USE_EDITOR=1	open text files in $VISUAL (else $EDITOR, fallback vi)
NNN_CONTEXT_COLORS='1234'	specify per context color [default: ‘4444’ (all blue)]
NNN_SSHFS_OPTS='sshfs -o reconnect,idmap=user'	specify SSHFS options
NNN_NOTE=/home/user/Dropbox/notes	path to note file [default: none]
NNN_OPENER=mimeopen	custom file opener
NNN_IDLE_TIMEOUT=300	idle seconds before locking terminal [default: disabled]
NNN_COPIER='/absolute/path/to/copier'	system clipboard copier script [default: none]
NNN_NO_AUTOSELECT=1	do not auto-select matching dir in nav-as-you-type mode
NNN_RESTRICT_NAV_OPEN=1	open files on ↵, not → or l
NNN_TRASH=1	trash files to the desktop Trash [default: delete]
NNN_OPS_PROG=1	show copy, move progress on Linux

Cmdline options

usage: nnn [-b key] [-d] [-e] [-i] [-l] [-n]
           [-p file] [-s] [-S] [-v] [-w] [-h] [PATH]

The missing terminal file manager for X.

positional args:
  PATH   start dir [default: current dir]

optional args:
 -b key  open bookmark key
 -d      show hidden files
 -e      use exiftool for media info
 -i      nav-as-you-type mode
 -l      light mode
 -n      version sort
 -p file selection file (stdout if '-')
 -s      string filters [default: regex]
 -S      du mode
 -v      show version
 -w      wild load
 -h      show help

Keyboard and mouse

Press ? in nnn to see the list anytime.

 NAVIGATION
          ↑ k  Up          PgUp ^U  Scroll up
          ↓ j  Down        PgDn ^D  Scroll down
          ← h  Parent dir  ~ ` @ -  HOME, /, start, last
        ↵ → l  Open file/dir     .  Toggle show hidden
    Home g ^A  First entry    G ^E  Last entry
            /  Filter       Ins ^T  Toggle nav-as-you-type
            b  Pin current dir  ^B  Go to pinned dir
       Tab ^I  Next context      d  Toggle detail view
         , ^/  Leader key  N LeadN  Context N
          Esc  Exit prompt      ^L  Redraw/clear prompt
           ^G  Quit and cd       q  Quit context
         Q ^Q  Quit              ?  Help, config
 FILES
           ^O  Open with...      n  Create new/link
            D  File details     ^R  Rename entry
     ⎵ ^K / Y  Select entry/all  r  Batch rename
         K ^Y  Toggle selection  y  List selection
            P  Copy selection    X  Delete selection
            V  Move selection   ^X  Delete entry
            f  Create archive  m M  Brief/full mediainfo
           ^F  Extract archive   F  List archive
            e  Edit in EDITOR    p  Open in PAGER
 ORDER TOGGLES
           ^J  Disk usage        S  Apparent du
           ^W  Random  s  Size   t  Time modified
 MISC
         ! ^]  Spawn SHELL       C  Execute entry
         R ^V  Pick plugin       L  Lock terminal
            c  SSHFS mount       u  Unmount
           ^P  Prompt  ^N  Note  =  Launcher

Note: Help & settings, file details, media info and archive listing are shown in the PAGER. Use the PAGER-specific keys in these screens.

Mouse click	Function
Left single on context number	Visit context
Left single on top row after context numbers	Visit parent
Left single/double after last entry	Toggle nav-as-you-type
Left single	Select context or entry
Left double	Select context or open entry

Leader key

The Leader key provides a powerful multi-functional navigation mechanism. It is case-sensitive and understands contexts, bookmarks and location shortcuts.

Key	Function
1-4	Go to/create selected context
>, .	Go to next active context
«/kbd>, ,	Go to previous active context
key	Go to bookmarked location
~ </kbd> <kbd>@</kbd> <kbd>-</kbd> | Go to HOME, /`, start, last visited dir |
q	Quit context

Contexts

Contexts serve the purpose of exploring multiple directories simultaneously. 4 contexts are available. The status of the contexts are shown in the top left corner:

• the current context is in reverse
• other active contexts are underlined
• rest are inactive

To switch to a context press the Leader key followed by the context number (1-4).

The first time a context is entered, it copies the state of the last visited context. Each context remembers its last visited directory.

When a context is quit, the next active context is selected. If the last active context is quit, the program quits.

Context-specific color

Each context can have its own directory color specified:

export NNN_CONTEXT_COLORS='1234'

colors: 0-black, 1-red, 2-green, 3-yellow, 4-blue (default), 5-magenta, 6-cyan, 7-white

Selection

Use ^K to select the file under the cursor.

To select multiple files:

• press ^Y to enter selection mode. In this mode it’s possible to
  • cherry-pick individual files one by one by pressing ^K on each entry (works across directories and contexts); or,
  • navigate to another file in the same directory to select a range of files
• press ^Y again to save the selection and exit selection mode.

NOTE: If you are on BSD/macOS, please check the BSD terminal issue with ^Y for workaround.

Selected files are visually indicated by a + before the entries.

The selection can now be listed, copied, moved, removed, archived or linked.

Navigate to a target directory then use V (move) or P (copy) to have the selected files moved or copied.

Absolute paths of the selected files are copied to the temporary file .selection in the config directory. The path is shown in the help and configuration screen. If $NNN_COPIER is set the file paths are also copied to the system clipboard.

Filters

Filters support regexes (default) to instantly (search-as-you-type) list the matching entries in the current directory.

Common use cases:

• to list all matches starting with the filter expression, start the expression with a ^ (caret) symbol
• type \.mkv to list all MKV files
• use .* to match any character (sort of fuzzy search)

There is a program option to filter entries by substring match instead of regex.

Navigate-as-you-type

In this mode directories are opened in filter mode, allowing continuous navigation. Works best with the arrow keys.

When there’s a unique match and it’s a directory, nnn auto selects the directory and enters it in this mode. To disable this behaviour,

export NNN_NO_AUTOSELECT=1

This mode takes navigation to the next level when short, unique keypress sequences are possible. For example, to reach nnn development directory (located at ~/GitHub/nnn) from my $HOME (which is the default directory the terminal starts in), I use the sequence gn.

The wild load option can be extremely handy for users who use this mode constantly. The entries are unsorted when the directory loads. Applying filters sorts the entries (with directories on top). Directory color is disabled in this mode.

File indicators

The following indicators are used in the detail view:

Indicator	File Type
/	Directory
*	Executable
|	Fifo
=	Socket
@	Symbolic Link
@/	Symbolic Link to directory
b	Block Device
c	Character Device
?	Unknown

Hot-plugged drives

External storage devices can be (un)mounted using the plugin nmount.

For auto-mounting external storage drives use udev rules or udisks wrappers.

SSHFS mounts

To connect to and mount remote shares using SSHFS, nnn requires the ssh configuration file ~/.ssh/config to have the host entries. sshfs reads this file.

Example host entry for a Termux environment on Android device:

Host phone
    HostName 192.168.0.102
    User u0_a117
    Port 8022

The above host phone will be mounted at ${XDG_CONFIG_HOME:-$HOME/.config}/nnn/phone. nnn creates the directory phone if it doesn’t exist.

If you need to pass options to the sshfs command, you can do so:

export NNN_SSHFS_OPTS='sshfs -o reconnect,idmap=user,cache_timeout=3600'

The options must be preceded by sshfs and comma-separated without any space between them.

Notes:

1. nnn takes you to the mount point after successful mounts. To jump back to the last directory, press the usual -.
2. nnn doesn’t delete the mount point on unmount to prevent accidental data loss. Please ensure the mount point is not mounted if you are deleting it manually.
3. More information on SSHFS.

Help

$ nnn -h
$ man nnn

To lookup keyboard shortcuts at runtime, press ?.

TROUBLESHOOTING

Tmux configuration

nnn might not handle keypresses correctly when used with tmux (see issue #104 for more details). Set TERM=xterm-256color to address it.

BSD terminal issue

TLDR: Use the keybind K to toggle selection if you are having issues with ^Y.

By default in OpenBSD & FreeBSD (and probably on macOS as well), stty maps ^Y to DSUSP. This means that typing ^Y will suspend nnn as if you typed ^Z (you can bring nnn back to the foreground by issuing fg) instead of entering multi-selection mode. You can check this with stty -a. If it includes the text dsusp = ^Y, issuing stty dsusp undef will disable this DSUSP and let nnn receive the ^Y instead.

100% CPU usage

There is a known issue where if you close the terminal directly with nnn waiting for a spawned process, a deadlock occurs and nnn uses 100% CPU. Please see issue #225 for more details. Make sure you quit the spawned process before closing the terminal. It’s not a problem if there is no spawned process (nnn isn’t blocked) as nnn checks if the parent process has exited.

WHY FORK?

nnn was initially forked from noice but is significantly different today. I chose to fork because:

• one can argue my approach deviates from the goal of the original project - keep the utility suckless. noice was rudimentary. In my opinion evolution is the taste of time.
• I would like to have a bit of control on what features are added in the name of desktop integration. A feature-bloat is the last thing in my mind. Check out the design considerations for more details.

Trivia: The name nnn is a recursive acronym for the initial words from Noice is Not Noice, a noicer fork..., suggested by a longtime friend.

MENTIONS

• FOSSMint
• Hacker News 1
• Hacker News 2
• It’s FOSS
• LinuxLinks1
• LinuxLinks2
• Suckless Rocks
• Ubuntu Full Circle Magazine - Issue 135

DEVELOPERS

1. Copyright © 2014-2016 Lazaros Koromilas
2. Copyright © 2014-2016 Dimitris Papastamos
3. Copyright © 2016-2019 Arun Prakash Jana

Contributions are welcome. Please visit the ToDo list.