Edit a File When You Are Viewing It Using more / less Command Pager

I can use less or more pagers to view a file. How do I start an editor (such as vi or other text editor) to edit the current file without leaving the less or more pager command?

Tutorial details
Difficulty	Easy (rss)
Root privileges	No
Requirements	vi/vim

You can always start up an editor immediately to edit the current file being viewed. This will save some time and command typing. The editor is taken from the environment variable VISUAL if defined, or EDITOR if VISUAL is not defined, or defaults to "vi" if neither VISUAL nor EDITOR is defined. I suggest you define your EDITOR first, enter:
$ export EDITOR=vim
OR

$ echo 'export EDITOR=vim' >> ~/.bash_profile
 export EDITOR=vim

Open any text file using more or less pager, type:
$ less myfile.txt
OR
$ more ~/some.conf
To edit a file, hit v key from keyboard. This will start up an editor at current line and file.

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{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }

1 pradeep December 20, 2008 at 6:12 am: when you use less for more to view at that time you want edit first press ‘v’ then ‘i’
2 Iain Cheyne February 3, 2009 at 4:52 pm: Great tip thank you. I heard about this on the Lottalinuxlinks podcast.
3 Shawn @ apprenticeships in australia June 23, 2011 at 3:05 pm: Hullo, just love your writing :) Sorry if this is a stupid comment, I didn’t find a “like” button :(
4 jeff June 30, 2012 at 3:34 pm: I use TextWrangler which comes with the ‘edit’ command line tool. I have always detested vim and preferred nano’s simplicity. I just tried this hint with nano and then with the TW edit command and both worked great. This is a simple, yet very helpful hint.
Thanks!
5 Nir March 4, 2013 at 8:56 am: Thanks!!
i was looking for the EDITOR env-var tip!
6 Philippe Petrinko April 15, 2013 at 1:25 pm: Useful, thanks,
– Philippe

Edit a File When You Are Viewing It Using more / less Command Pager

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