For new users, the following topics may be of interest:

Programmers should also read:

If you get into trouble, the Edit → Undo command can reverse any modifications that you make. NEdit-ng does not change the file you are editing until you tell it to save.

Editing an Existing File

To open an existing file, choose File → Open.... Select the file that you want to open in the pop-up dialog that appears and click on Open. You may open any number of files at the same time. Depending on your settings (see Tabbed Editing) each file can appear in its own editor window, or it can appear under a tab in the same editor window. Using File → Open... rather than re-typing the NEdit-ng command and running additional copies of NEdit-ng, will give you quick access to all of the files you have open via the Windows menu, and ensure that you don't accidentally open the same file twice. NEdit-ng has no "main" window. It remains running as long as at least one editor window is open.

Creating a New File

If you already have an empty (Untitled) window displayed, just begin typing in the window. To create a new Untitled window, choose File → New Window or File → New Tab. To give the file a name and save its contents to the disk, choose File → Save or File → Save As....

Backup Files

NEdit-ng maintains periodic backups of the file you are editing so that you can recover the file in the event of a problem such as a system crash or network failure. These files are saved under the name ~filename (on Unix), where filename is the name of the file you were editing. If an NEdit-ng process is killed, some of these backup files may remain in your directory. (To remove one of these files on Unix, you may have to prefix the ~ (tilde) character with a \ (backslash) or with ./ (dot slash) to prevent the shell from interpreting it as a special character.)

Shortcuts

As you become more familiar with NEdit-ng, substitute the control and function keys shown on the right side of the menus for pulling down menus with the mouse.

Dialogs are also streamlined so you can enter information quickly and without using the mouse1. To move the keyboard focus around a dialog, use Tab and the arrow keys. The default button a dialog is usually drawn with a highlighted, outline. This button can be activated by pressing Return or Enter. The dialog's Cancel or Close button can be activated by pressing Escape. For example, to replace the string "thing" with "things" type:

Ctrl+R thing Tab things Return

1Users who have set their keyboard focus mode to "pointer" should check Preferences → Default Settings → Popups Under Pointer to avoid the additional step of moving the mouse into the dialog.