1MOST(1) General Commands Manual MOST(1)
2
6 most - browse or page through a text file
7
9 most [-1bCckMstvwz] [+lineno] [+c] [+d] [+s] [+/string] [filename...]
10
12 most is a paging program that displays, one windowful at a time, the
13 contents of a file on a terminal. It pauses after each windowful and
14 prints on the window status line the screen the file name, current line
15 number, and the percentage of the file so far displayed.
16 Unlike other paging programs, most is capable of displaying an arbi‐
18 trary number of windows as long as each window occupies at least two
19 screen lines. Each window may contain the same file or a different
20 file. In addition, each window has its own mode. For example, one
21 window may display a file with its lines wrapped while another may be
22 truncating the lines. Windows may be `locked' together in the sense
23 that if one of the locked windows scrolls, all locked windows will
24 scroll. most is also capable of ignoring lines that are indented
25 beyond a user specified value. This is useful when viewing computer
26 programs to pick out gross features of the code. See the `:o' command
27 for a description of this feature.
28 In addition to displaying ordinary text files, most can also display
30 binary files as well as files with arbitrary ascii characters. When a
31 file is read into a buffer, most examines the first 32 bytes of the
32 file to determine if the file is a binary file and then switches to the
33 appropriate mode. However, this feature may be disabled with the -k
34 option. See the description of the -b, -k, -v, and -t options for fur‐
35 ther details.
36 Text files may contain combinations of underscore and backspace charac‐
38 ters causing a printer to underline or overstrike. When most recog‐
39 nizes this, it inserts the appropriate escape sequences to achieve the
40 desired effect. In addition, some files cause the printer to over‐
41 strike some characters by embedding carriage return characters in the
42 middle of a line. When this occurs, most displays the overstruck char‐
43 acter with a bold attribute. This feature facilitates the reading of
44 UNIX man pages or a document produced by runoff. In particular, view‐
45 ing this document with most should illustrate this behavior provided
46 that the underline characters have not been stripped. This may be
47 turned off with the -v option.
48 By default, lines with more characters than the terminal width are not
50 wrapped but are instead truncated. When truncation occurs, this is
51 indicated by a `$' in the far right column of the terminal screen. The
52 RIGHT and LEFT arrow keys may be used to view lines which extend past
53 the margins of the screen. The -w option may be used to override this
54 feature. When a window is wrapped, the character `\' will appear at
55 the right edge of the window.
56 Commands are listed below.
58
60 -1 VT100 mode. This is meaningful only on VMS systems. This
61 option should be used if the terminal is strictly a VT100. This
62 implies that the terminal does not have the ability to delete
63 and insert multiple lines. VT102s and above have this ability.
64 -b Binary mode. Use this switch when you want to view files con‐
66 taining 8 bit characters. most will display the file 16 bytes
67 per line in hexidecimal notation. A typical line looks like:
68 01000000 40001575 9C23A020 4000168D ....@..u.#. @...
70 When used with the -v option, the same line looks like:
72 ^A^@^@^@ @^@^U u 9C #A0 @^@^V8D ....@..u.#. @...
74 -k `Kanji' option. Ordinarily, most will go into binary mode if
76 the file consists of non-ascii characters. Sometimes this fea‐
77 ture is not desirable since some terminals have a special inter‐
78 pretation for eight bit characters. The -k option turns off the
79 automatic sensing.
80 -C Disable color support.
82 -M Disable the use of mmap.
84 -s Squeeze. Replace multiple blank lines with a single blank line.
86 -z option turns off gunzip-on-the-fly.
88 -v Display control characters as in `^A' for control A. Normally
90 most does not interpret control characters.
91 -t Display tabs as `^I'. This option is meaningful only when used
93 with the -v option. +lineno Start up at lineno.
94 +c Make search case sensitive. By default, they are not.
96 +d This switch should only be used if you want the option to delete
98 a file while viewing it. This makes it easier to clean unwanted
99 files out of a directory. The file is deleted with the interac‐
100 tive key sequence `:D' and then confirming with `y'.
101 +/string
103 Start up at the line containing the first occurrence of string.
104
106 The commands take effect immediately; it is not necessary to type a
107 carriage return.
108 In the following commands, i is a numerical argument (1 by default).
110 SPACE, CTRL-D, NEXT_SCREEN
112 Display another windowful, or jump i windowfuls if i is speci‐
113 fied.
114 RETURN, DOWN_ARROW, V, CTRL-N
116 Display another line, or i more lines, if specified.
117 UP_ARROW, ^, CTRL-P
119 Display previous line, or i previous lines, if specified.
120 T, ESCAPE<
122 Move to top of buffer.
123 B, ESCAPE>
125 Move to bottom of buffer.
126 RIGHT_ARROW, TAB, >
128 Scroll window left 60i columns to view lines that are beyond the
129 right margin of the window.
130 LEFT_ARROW, CTRL-B, <
132 Scroll window right 60i columns to view lines that are beyond
133 the left margin of the window.
134 U, CTRL-U, DELETE, PREV_SCREEN
136 Skip back i windowfuls and then print a windowful.
137 R, CTRL-R
139 Redraw the window.
140 J, G If i is not specified, then prompt for a line number then jump
142 to that line otherwise just jump to line i.
143 % If i is not specified, then prompt for a percent number then
145 jump to that percent of the file otherwise just jump to i per‐
146 cent of the file.
147 W, w If the current screen width is 80, make it 132 and vice-versa.
149 For other values, this command is ignored.
150 Q, CTRL-X CTRL-C, CTRL-K E
152 Exit from most. On VMS, ^Z also exits.
153 h, CTRL-H, HELP, PF2
155 Help. Give a description of all the most commands. The most
156 environment variable MOST_HELP must be set for this to be mean‐
157 ingful.
158 f, /, CTRL-F, FIND, GOLD PF3
160 Prompt for a string and search forward from the current line for
161 ith distinct line containing the string. CTRL-G aborts.
162 ? Prompt for a string and search backward for the ith distinct
164 line containing the string. CTRL-G aborts.
165 n Search for the next i lines containing an occurrence of the last
167 search string in the direction of the previous search.
168 m, SELECT, CTRL-@, CTRL-K M, PERIOD
170 Set a mark on the current line for later reference.
171 INSERT_HERE, CTRL-X CTRL-X, COMMA, CTRL-K RETURN, GOLD PERIOD
173 Set a mark on the current line but return to previous mark.
174 This allows the user to toggle back and forth between two posi‐
175 tions in the file.
176 l, L Toggle locking for this window. The window is locked if there
178 is a `*' at the left edge of the status line. Windows locked
179 together, scroll together.
180 CTRL-X 2, CTRL-W 2, GOLD X
182 Split this window in half.
183 CTRL-X o, CTRL-W o, o, GOLDUP, GOLDDOWN
185 Move to other window.
186 CTRL-X 0, CTRL-W 0, GOLD V
188 Delete this window.
189 CTRL-X 1, CTRL-W 1, GOLD O
191 Delete all other windows, leaving only one window.
192 E, e Edit this file.
194 $, ESC $
196 This is system dependent. On VMS, this causes most to spawn a
197 subprocess. When the user exits the process, most is resumed.
198 On UNIX systems, most simply suspends itself.
199 :n Skip to the next filename given in the command line. Use the
201 arrow keys to scroll forward or backward through the file list.
202 `Q' quits most and any other key selects the given file.
203 :c Toggle case sensitive search.
205 :D Delete current file. This command is only meaningful with the
207 +d switch.
208 :o, :O Toggle various options. With this key sequence, most displays a
210 prompt asking the user to hit one of: bdtvw. The `b', `t', `v',
211 and `w' options have the same meaning as the command line
212 switches. For example, the `w' option will toggle wrapping on
213 and off for the current window.
214 The `d' option must be used with a prefix integer i. All lines
216 indented beyond i columns will not be displayed. For example,
217 consider the fragment:
218 int main(int argc, char **argv)
220 {
221 int i;
222 for (i = 0; i < argc, i++)
224 {
225 fprintf(stdout,"%i: %s\n",i,argv[i]);
226 }
227 return 0;
228 }
229 The key sequence `1:od' will cause most to display the file
231 ignoring all lines indented beyond the first column. So for the
232 example above, most would display:
233 int main(int argc, char **argv)...
235 }
236 where the `...' indicates lines follow are not displayed.
238
240 CTRL-G aborts the commands requiring the user to type something in at a
241 prompt. The backquote key has a special meaning here. It is used to
242 quote certain characters. This is useful when search for the occur‐
243 rence of a string with a control character or a string at the beginning
244 of a line. In the latter case, to find the occurrence of `The' at the
245 beginning of a line, enter `^JThe where ` quotes the CTRL-J.
246
248 most uses the following environment variables:
249 MOST_SWITCHES
251 This variable sets commonly used switches. For example, some
252 people prefer to use most with the -s option so that excess
253 blank lines are not displayed. On VMS this is normally done
254 done in the login.com through the line:
255 $ define MOST_SWITCHES "-s"
257 MOST_EDITOR, SLANG_EDITOR
259 Either of these environment variables specify an editor for most
260 to invoke to edit a file. The value can contain %s and %d for‐
261 matting descriptors that represent the file name and line num‐
262 ber, respectively. For example, if JED is your editor, then set
263 MOST_EDITOR to 'jed %s -g %d'.
264 MOST_HELP
266 This variable may be used to specify an alternate help file.
267 MOST_INITFILE
269 Set this variable to specify the initialization file to load
270 during startup. The default action is to load the system con‐
271 figuration file and then a personal configuration file called
272 .mostrc on Unix, and most.rc on other systems.
273
275 When most starts up, it tries to read a system confiuration file and
276 then a personal configuration file. These files may be used to specify
277 keybindings and colors.
278 To bind a key to a particular function use the syntax:
280 setkey function-name key-sequence
282 The setkey command requires two arguments. The function-name argument
284 specifies the function that is to be executed as a response to the keys
285 specified by the key-sequence argument are pressed. For example,
286 setkey "up" "^P"
288 indicates that when Ctrl-P is pressed then the function up is to be
290 executed.
291 Sometimes, it is necessary to first unbind a key-sequence before
293 rebinding it in order via the unsetkey function:
294 unsetkey "^F"
296 Colors may be defined through the use of the color keyword in the the
298 configuration file using the syntax:
299 color OBJECT-NAME FOREGROUND-COLOR BACKGROUND-COLOR
301 Here, OBJECT-NAME can be any one of the following items:
303 status -- the status line
305 underline -- underlined text
306 overstrike -- overstriked text
307 normal -- anything else
308 See the sample configuration files for more information.
310
312 Almost all of the known bugs or limitations of most are due to a desire
313 to read and interpret control characters in files. One problem con‐
314 cerns the use of backspace characters to underscore or overstrike other
315 characters. most makes an attempt to use terminal escape sequences to
316 simulate this behavior. One side effect is the one does not always get
317 what one expects when scrolling right and left through a file. When in
318 doubt, use the -v and -b options of most.
319
321 John E. Davis
322 davis@space.mit.edu
323
325 I would like to thank the users of most for valuable comments and crit‐
326 icisms. I would especially like to thank those individuals who have
327 contributed code to most.
328 Mats Akerberg, Henk D. Davids, Rex O. Livingston, and Mark Pizzolato
330 contributed to the early VMS versions of most. In particular, Mark
331 worked on it to get it ready for DECUS.
332 Foteos Macrides <MACRIDES@SCI.WFEB.EDU> adapted most for use in cswing
334 and gopher. A few features of the present version of most was inspired
335 from his work.
336 I am grateful to Robert Mills <robert@jna.com.au> for re-writing the
338 search routines to use regular expressions.
339 Sven Oliver Moll <smol0075@rz.uni-hildesheim.de> came up with the idea
341 of automatic detection of zipped files.
342 I would also like to thank Shinichi Hama for his valuable criticisms of
344 most.
345 Thanks to David W. Sanderson (dws@cs.wisc.edu) for adapting the docu‐
347 mentation to nroff man page source format.
348 May 1999 MOST(1)