Actions and default shortcuts

Fundamentals of Midnight Commander shortcuts

Explanation to the description of key combinations

Keyboard combinations are selected by modifiers. Following modifiers are used in mc:

• Ctrl - "Control" key or "Ctrl";
• Meta - "Alternate" key, or "Alt", or "Meta", also can be replaced with a single "Esc" or "Escape";
• Esc - "Escape" key or "Esc";
• Shift - "Shift" key. It may also appear on the keyboard as a pointer showing up below the keys "Caps Lock" or below the key "Enter".

The simultaneous pressing of several keys

If you need to press multiple keys simultaneously, then that pressing is described as the summation. For example, if you need to press "Control" and "r", it would be described as:

Ctrl+r

If you need to press the keyboard combination with uppercase letters (for example Ctrl and R):

Ctrl+Shift+r

keyboard key combination with Meta modificator described similarly:

Meta+r
Meta+Shift+r

Simultaneous pressing does not mean literally the same time - you must press the modifier, then the required key, then release the key modifier. For example, to enter the combination of Meta+r:

• Push Alt key and not released it;
• Push the r key and immediately released it;
• Release Alt key.

In the case of adding a Shift modifier (Meta + Shift + R, for example), the steps that:

• Push Alt key and not released it;
• Push Shift key and not released it;
• Push r key and immediately released it;
• Release Shift key;
• Release Alt key.

Successive pressing of several keys

If you need to press a first key (or keyboard combination) and then the second such action is recorded as a sequence, separated by commas. For example, press a Ctrl+p a combination, and then further to press "p", it would be described as follows:

Ctrl+p,p

Or, if you need to click twice Ctrl+p:

Ctrl+p,Ctrl+p

Several shortcuts on one action

Each keyboard combination for some one action is described with a new line. Below are tables of keyboard combinations, and actions to which they are linked

File manager actions

File panel actions

Action	Default shortcut	Description
Up	Up, C-p	move the selection bar to the previous entry in the panel
Down	Down, C-n	move the selection bar to the next entry in the panel
Left	Left	move the selection bar to the left
Right	Right	move the selection bar to the right
PageUp	PgUp, Alt-v	move the selection bar one page up
PageDown	PgDn, Alt-p	move the selection bar one page down
Top	Home, a1, Alt-<	move the selection bar to the first entry in the panel
Bottom	End, c1, Alt->	move the selection bar to the last entry in the panel
TopOnScreen	Alt-g	move the selection bar to the first visible entry in the panel
MiddleOnScreen	Alt-r	move the selection bar to the middle visible entry in the panel
BottomOnScreen	Alt-j	move the selection bar to the last visible entry in the panel
CopySingle	Shift-F5
MoveSingle	Shift-F6
DeleteSingle	Shift-F8
Search	Ctrl-s, Alt-s	start a quick filename search in the directory listing
SelectCodepage	Alt-e	change charset of current panel
History	Alt-H	show the directory history
HistoryNext	Alt-u	move to the next directory in the history
HistoryPrev	Alt-y	move to the previous directory in the history
EditNew	Shift-F4, F14
ViewRaw	Shift-F3, F13
Select	key plus '+'	select (tag) a group of files
Unselect	key back slash '\'	unselect a group of files
SelectInvert	Alt-*	invert selection on the current panel
PanelOtherSync	Alt-i	make the current directory of the current panel also the current directory of the other panel
PanelOtherCd	Alt-o	If the currently selected file is a directory, load that directory on the other panel and moves the selection to the next file. If the currently selected file is not a directory, load the parent directory on the other panel and moves the selection to the next file.
PanelOtherCdLink	Alt-l	If the currently selected file is a link to the directory, load that directory on the other panel and moves the selection to the next file.
CdChild	Ctrl-PgDn	move to the child directory
CdParent	Ctrl-PgUp	move to the parent directory
CdParentSmart	move to the parent directory only if command line is empty, else erase the previous character in the command line
Mark	Ins, Ctrl-t	tag or untag files. To untag files, just retag a tagged file.
MarkDown	Shift-Down	tag file and move the selection bar to the next entry
MarkUp	Shift-Up	tag file and move the selection bar to the previous entry
Enter	enter
Sort
SortReverse
SortPrev
SortNext
SortByName
SortByExt
SortBySize
ScrollLeft	scroll long file names in panel to the left
ScrollRight	scroll long file names in panel to the right

Common dialog actions

Input line actions

Listbox actions

Help viewer actions

Internal viewer actions

Internal editor actions

Internal diffviewer actions