noble (1) lesskey.1.gz

Provided by: less_590-2ubuntu2.1_amd64 bug

NAME

       lesskey - specify key bindings for less

SYNOPSIS (deprecated)

       lesskey [-o output] [--] [input]
       lesskey [--output=output] [--] [input]
       lesskey -V
       lesskey --version

SCOPE

       This  document  describes  the  format  of the lesskey source file, which is used by less version 582 and
       later.  In previous versions of less, a separate program called lesskey was used to compile  the  lesskey
       source  file  into  a  format  understood  by  less.  This compilation step is no longer required and the
       lesskey program is therefore deprecated although the file format remains supported by less itself.

FILE FORMAT

       The input file consists of one or more sections.  Each section starts with a  line  that  identifies  the
       type of section.  Possible sections are:

       #command
              Defines new command keys.

       #line-edit
              Defines new line-editing keys.

       #env   Defines environment variables.

       Blank  lines  and  lines  which  start  with a pound sign (#) are ignored, except for the special section
       header lines.

COMMAND SECTION

       The command section begins with the line

       #command

       If the command section is the first section in the file, this line may be omitted.  The  command  section
       consists of lines of the form:

            string <whitespace> action [extra-string] <newline>

       Whitespace  is  any  sequence  of one or more spaces and/or tabs.  The string is the command key(s) which
       invoke the action.  The string may be a single command key, or a sequence of up to 15 keys.   The  action
       is  the name of the less action, from the list below.  The characters in the string may appear literally,
       or be prefixed by a caret to indicate a control key.  A backslash followed by one to three  octal  digits
       may  be  used  to  specify  a  character  by its octal value.  A backslash followed by certain characters
       specifies input characters as follows:

       \b     BACKSPACE

       \e     ESCAPE

       \n     NEWLINE

       \r     RETURN

       \t     TAB

       \ku    UP ARROW

       \kd    DOWN ARROW

       \kr    RIGHT ARROW

       \kl    LEFT ARROW

       \kU    PAGE UP

       \kD    PAGE DOWN

       \kh    HOME

       \ke    END

       \kx    DELETE

       A backslash followed by  any  other  character  indicates  that  character  is  to  be  taken  literally.
       Characters which must be preceded by backslash include caret, space, tab and the backslash itself.

       An  action  may be followed by an "extra" string.  When such a command is entered while running less, the
       action is performed, and then the extra string is parsed, just as if it were  typed  in  to  less.   This
       feature  can be used in certain cases to extend the functionality of a command.  For example, see the "{"
       and ":t" commands in the example below.  The extra string has a special meaning for  the  "quit"  action:
       when less quits, the first character of the extra string is used as its exit status.

EXAMPLE

       The following input file describes the set of default command keys used by less:

            #command
            \r         forw-line
            \n         forw-line
            e          forw-line
            j          forw-line
            \kd        forw-line
            ^E         forw-line
            ^N         forw-line
            k          back-line
            y          back-line
            ^Y         back-line
            ^K         back-line
            ^P         back-line
            J          forw-line-force
            K          back-line-force
            Y          back-line-force
            d          forw-scroll
            ^D         forw-scroll
            u          back-scroll
            ^U         back-scroll
            \40        forw-screen
            f          forw-screen
            ^F         forw-screen
            ^V         forw-screen
            \kD        forw-screen
            b          back-screen
            ^B         back-screen
            \ev        back-screen
            \kU        back-screen
            z          forw-window
            w          back-window
            \e\40      forw-screen-force
            F          forw-forever
            \eF        forw-until-hilite
            R          repaint-flush
            r          repaint
            ^R         repaint
            ^L         repaint
            \eu        undo-hilite
            \eU        clear-search
            g          goto-line

            \kh        goto-line
            <          goto-line
            \e<        goto-line
            p          percent
            %          percent
            \e[        left-scroll
            \e]        right-scroll
            \e(        left-scroll
            \e)        right-scroll
            \kl        left-scroll
            \kr        right-scroll
            \e{        no-scroll
            \e}        end-scroll
            {          forw-bracket {}
            }          back-bracket {}
            (          forw-bracket ()
            )          back-bracket ()
            [          forw-bracket []
            ]          back-bracket []
            \e^F       forw-bracket
            \e^B       back-bracket
            G          goto-end
            \e>        goto-end
            >          goto-end
            \ke        goto-end
            \eG        goto-end-buffered
            =          status
            ^G         status
            :f         status
            /          forw-search
            ?          back-search
            \e/        forw-search *
            \e?        back-search *
            n          repeat-search
            \en        repeat-search-all
            N          reverse-search
            \eN        reverse-search-all
            &          filter
            m          set-mark
            M          set-mark-bottom
            \em        clear-mark
            '          goto-mark
            ^X^X       goto-mark
            E          examine
            :e         examine
            ^X^V       examine
            :n         next-file
            :p         prev-file
            t          next-tag
            T          prev-tag
            :x         index-file
            :d         remove-file
            -          toggle-option
            :t         toggle-option t
            s          toggle-option o
            _          display-option
            |          pipe
            v          visual
            !          shell
            +          firstcmd
            H          help
            h          help
            V          version
            0          digit
            1          digit
            2          digit

            3          digit
            4          digit
            5          digit
            6          digit
            7          digit
            8          digit
            9          digit
            q          quit
            Q          quit
            :q         quit
            :Q         quit
            ZZ         quit

PRECEDENCE

       Commands  specified  by  lesskey take precedence over the default commands.  A default command key may be
       disabled by including it in the input file with the  action  "invalid".   Alternatively,  a  key  may  be
       defined  to do nothing by using the action "noaction".  "noaction" is similar to "invalid", but less will
       give an error beep for an "invalid" command, but not for a "noaction" command.  In addition, ALL  default
       commands may be disabled by adding this control line to the input file:

       #stop

       This  will  cause  all  default  commands  to be ignored.  The #stop line should be the last line in that
       section of the file.

       Be aware that #stop can be dangerous.   Since  all  default  commands  are  disabled,  you  must  provide
       sufficient  commands  before  the  #stop  line  to enable all necessary actions.  For example, failure to
       provide a "quit" command can lead to frustration.

LINE EDITING SECTION

       The line-editing section begins with the line:

       #line-edit

       This section specifies new key bindings for the line editing commands, in a manner similar to the way key
       bindings  for ordinary commands are specified in the #command section.  The line-editing section consists
       of a list of keys and actions, one per line as in the example below.

EXAMPLE

       The following input file describes the set of default line-editing keys used by less:

            #line-edit
            \t           forw-complete
            \17          back-complete
            \e\t         back-complete
            ^L           expand
            ^V           literal
            ^A           literal
            \el          right
            \kr          right
            \eh          left
            \kl          left
            \eb          word-left
            \e\kl        word-left
            \ew          word-right
            \e\kr        word-right
            \ei          insert
            \ex          delete
            \kx          delete
            \eX          word-delete
            \ekx         word-delete
            \e\b         word-backspace
            \e0          home
            \kh          home

            \e$          end
            \ke          end
            \ek          up
            \ku          up
            \ej          down
            ^G           abort

LESS ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES

       The environment variable section begins with the line

       #env

       Following this line is a list of environment variable assignments.  Each line consists of an  environment
       variable  name, an equals sign (=) and the value to be assigned to the environment variable.  White space
       before and after the equals sign is ignored.  Variables assigned in this way are visible  only  to  less.
       If a variable is specified in the system environment and also in a lesskey file, the value in the lesskey
       file takes precedence.  Although the  lesskey  file  can  be  used  to  override  variables  set  in  the
       environment,  the  main  purpose  of  assigning  variables in the lesskey file is simply to have all less
       configuration information stored in one file.

EXAMPLE

       The following input file sets the -i option whenever less is run, and specifies the character set  to  be
       "latin1":

                 #env
                 LESS = -i
                 LESSCHARSET = latin1

SEE ALSO

       less(1)

WARNINGS

       On  MS-DOS  and OS/2 systems, certain keys send a sequence of characters which start with a NUL character
       (0).  This NUL character should be represented as \340 in a lesskey file.

       Copyright (C) 1984-2021  Mark Nudelman

       less is part of the GNU project and is free software.  You can redistribute it and/or modify it under the
       terms  of  either (1) the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; or (2)
       the  Less  License.   See  the  file  README  in  the  less  distribution  for  more  details   regarding
       redistribution.   You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with the source
       for less; see the file COPYING.  If not, write to the Free Software Foundation, 59  Temple  Place,  Suite
       330, Boston, MA  02111-1307, USA.  You should also have received a copy of the Less License; see the file
       LICENSE.

       less is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,  but  WITHOUT  ANY  WARRANTY;  without  even  the
       implied  warranty  of  MERCHANTABILITY  or  FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the GNU General Public
       License for more details.

AUTHOR

       Mark Nudelman
       Report bugs at https://github.com/gwsw/less/issues.

                                            Version 590: 03 Jun 2021                                  LESSKEY(1)