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pico homepage
 


 
who
 
pico is a shortened form of pine composer, a UNIX-based text editor originally designed for use within the UNIX and Windows-based email client program called pine. It was developed at the University of Washington.
 
what
 
pico is a very basic text editor. It supports the basic functions and little else: edit, save, search, cut-and-paste, and spell-check. It is "text-only"; that is, all commands are issued from the keyboard -- you cannot use a mouse with it (X-windows users may be able to).
 
why
 
At first look, pico may not seem very useful. This is partially true: compared with other text editors, its abilities are severely limited. But this is actually a good thing because it reduces the number of commands necessary to work the program -- that is, there are only a handful of commands you need to memorize. If you happen to forget anyway, there is a "help bar" along the bottom of the screen that lists all of the commands!
 
The reason to use pico is its simplicity. Pico is not very suitable for applications that require a lot of complex manipulations, such as advanced programming. Of course, text editors in general are not very suitable for such applications, given the ready availability and relative low cost of a variety of "visual" tools!
 
how
 
So you've launched pico? No turning back now! Find out how to use it here.
 
more
 
Here are some nice pico banners to grace your website.
 
man pico -- the pico man page
 
Indiana University's University Information Technology Services has put together a nice guide to Pico: A Unix text editor. They also have an Adobe Acrobat/PDF version available.
 
The University of Pittsburgh's Online Help Sheet for Pico is also available as a PDF file.
 
Sven Guckes has a great pico page that includes some Q & A on the editor as well as links to other pico sites (some of which seem to be down...).
 
Additional pico links will be listed here as I come across them.
 

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