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Text files

In Linux files that are human readable are often referred to as text files, and files that are machine readable are referred to as binary files. All programs are binary files and so programs are often referred to as binaries.

If you want to look at the contents of a text file there are several commands you might want to use.

One common task we use computers for is to create or edit text files. There are many text editors available under Linux, but probably the most common are vi, emacs and pico.

Please note that these are text editors, not word processors or typesetting programs - they don't have any founts or different sizes of text, and the output will not look pretty. However they are quick to load, reasonably quick to run over a network, and will not insert any nasty command characters into your document.


next up previous
Next: Text files and editors: Up: Introduction to the Linux Previous: Full-stops, Wildcards and Tab-Completion
Phil Hasnip 2007-08-23