KO | EN

GitLite

Minimalist Open Source Repository Search Engine

gitlite — search

#dsh #dsh-plugin #ai-agent #developer-tools #codex #typescript #cli #deepseek-harness #claude-code #ai-agents #mcp #rust

zee

★ 1,800 Open GitHub ↗

A modern text editor for the terminal written in Rust

// repository documentation

Was this content helpful?

★ 0 (0 ratings)

Zee is a modern editor for the terminal, _in the spirit of Emacs_. It is written in Rust and it is
somewhat experimental.

In the old tradition of text editor demos, here's what it currently looks like editing its own
source code

![Peek 2020-03-09 00-16](https://user-images.githubusercontent.com/797170/76173969-0bdc4980-619c-11ea-9f24-7899e2722910.gif)

## features

- The 100 FPS editor. Cursor movement and edits render under 10ms. Everything else happens asynchronously (syntax parsing and highlighting, IO to/from disk, file pickers).
- Buffers are backed by a fast B-tree implementation of a [rope](<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rope_(data_structure)>) (via cessen's [ropey](https://github.com/cessen/ropey)).
- Edit tree history, aka. undo/redo tree
- Uses [Tree-sitter](https://tree-sitter.github.io/tree-sitter/) for generating a parse tree from your code. This AST is used for syntax highlighting and on the fly validation. As it is an incremental parsing library, it scales to files with 1 million lines of code.
- multi-buffer, multi-pane -- shared state _beats_ tmux with multiple editors
- fast recursive file search with fuzzy matching and aware of _ignore_ files (using BurntSushi's ripgrep crates [walkdir](https://github.com/BurntSushi/walkdir), [ignore](https://github.com/BurntSushi/ripgrep))
- local file picker with directory navigation
- a pragmatic editor, not a research endeavour into CRDTs

## getting started

The recommended way to install zee is using [cargo](https://crates.io/)

```
cargo install --locked zee
```

To start the editor run `zee`. As expected, you can pass in one or multiple files to be opened, e.g. `zee file1 file2`.

### install options

To enable integration with your system's clipboard, install zee with the `system-clipboard` feature

```
cargo install --locked --features system-clipboard zee
```

To build with clipboard support, you'll additionally need x11 bindings on Linux. On a _Debian-y_ distribution, you can install them like this

```
sudo apt install xorg-dev libxcb-shape0-dev libxcb-xfixes0-dev
```

#### nightly version

To install the latest version directly from the official repository, just run
the following command:

```
cargo install --git https://github.com/zee-editor/zee
```

**Important:** please note that the code base state fetched by this instruction
could contain work-in-progress features which might need some further
maintenance before being included in the release of the next stable version.

### configuration

Zee is customised using a [`config.ron`](zee/config/config.ron) file inside the configuration directory.

To create the default configuration file, use the `--init` command line argument.

```
zee --init
```

If `config.ron` doesn't already exist, `zee --init` will create a fresh configuration file with comments, ready to be edited.

The exact location of the configuration directory is system specific, e.g. `~/.config/zee` on Linux or macOS
and `%AppData%/zee` on Windows. The location of the configuration directory can be overwritten by setting the environment variable `ZEE_CONFIG_DIR`.

```
ZEE_CONFIG_DIR=/home/user/.zee zee --init --build
```

This command will initialise a configuration directory at `/home/user/.zee` and immediately download and build the configured tree sitter parsers. See below details on the `--build` command line argument.

### syntax highlighting

Zee uses [Tree-sitter](https://tree-sitter.github.io/tree-sitter/) parsers for
syntax highlighting and on the fly validation of source code. Each tree sitter
parser is compiled to a shared object which is linked dynamically. To download
and build the parsers, simply run

```
zee --build
```

The parsers are downloaded, compiled and placed in a `grammars` directory inside the config
directory. The exact location is system specific, e.g. `~/.config/zee/grammars` on Linux or macOS
and `%AppData%/zee/grammars` on Windows.

The parsers are either the ones configured in the `config.ron` file or the
default ones if no configuration file is found.

If you change the parsers in the `config.ron` file, you'll have to re-run the build command.

## building from source

Zee is written in Rust and it requires the latest stable compiler to build. You can use cargo to
build it as you'd expect

```
git clone https://github.com/zee-editor/zee.git && cd zee
cargo run -- zee/src/main.rs
```

The editor also depends on tree sitter parsers, one for each supported language,
see [configuration](#configuration). Each tree sitter parser is compiled to a
shared object which is linked dynamically.

Running `cargo build` downloads and builds this parsers just to ensure
everything works correctly. You can skip this step by setting
`ZEE_DISABLE_GRAMMAR_BUILD`, e.g.

```
ZEE_DISABLE_GRAMMAR_BUILD=t cargo run -- zee/src/main.rs
```

## usage

To start the editor run `zee`. As expected, you can pass in one or multiple files to be opened,
e.g. `zee file1 file2`.

Zee uses Emacs-y keybindings. Feeling at home with the default Emacs bindings is a goal of the
project.

Below, `C-` means `Ctrl` + the specified key, e.g. `C-k` is `Ctrl + k`. Similarly `A-` means
`Alt` + the specified key. Empty spaces denote a sequence of key presses, e.g. `C-x C-c` means
first pressing `C-x` followed by `C-c`.

The following keybindings are available

### movement

- `C-f`, `Right` move forward
- `C-b`, `Left` move backward
- `C-n`, `Down` move down
- `C-p`, `Up` move up
- `A-f` move forward by one word
- `A-b` move backward by one word
- `A-n` move forward by one paragraph
- `A-p` move backward by one paragraph
- `C-a`, `Home` move to start of line
- `C-e`, `End` move to end of line
- `C-v`, `PageDown` move down one page
- `A-v`, `PageUp` move up one page
- `A-<` move to the beginning of the buffer
- `A->` move to the end of the buffer
- `C-l` centre the cursor visually

### editing

- `C-d` delete forwards
- `Backspace` delete backwards
- `C-k` delete the current line
- `C-SPC` enter selection mode at the current cursor position
- `C-w` cut selection
- `A-w` copy selection
- `C-x h` select the entire buffer and move the cursor to the beginning
- `C-y` paste selection (yank in Emacs)
- `C-g` clear the current selection
- `C-_`, `C-z`, `C-/` undo previous command
- `C-q` redo previous command
- `C-x u` open the edit tree viewer
- `Enter` insert a new line, moving the cursor
- `C-o` insert a new line after the cursor, without moving it
- `C-x C-s` save the current buffer

### file navigation

- `C-x C-f` choose a file to open using a directory-level picker
- `C-x C-v` search recursively for a file to open from the selected directory
- `C-l` while opening a file, go to the parent directory
- `Tab` while opening a file, fills in the currently selected path

### edit tree viewer

- `C-p`, `Up` move up the tree to an older revision, undoing the command
- `C-n`, `Down` move down the tree to a newer revision, redoing the command
- `C-b`, `Left` select the left child of current revision
- `C-f`, `Right` select the right child of current revision

### global

- `C-g` cancel the current operation
- `C-x k` choose a buffer to close
- `C-x b` switch the current window to another buffer
- `C-x 0`, `C-x C-0` close the focused window
- `C-x 1`, `C-x C-1` make the focused window fullscreen
- `C-x 2`, `C-x C-2` split the focused window below
- `C-x 3`, `C-x C-3` split the focused window to the right
- `C-x o`, `C-x C-o` switch focus to the next buffer
- `C-x C-t` cycle through the available themes
- `C-x C-c` quit

## license

This project is licensed under either of

- Apache License, Version 2.0, ([LICENSE-APACHE](LICENSE-APACHE) or
  http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0)
- MIT license ([LICENSE-MIT](LICENSE-MIT) or
  http://opensource.org/licenses/MIT)

at your discretion.

### contribution

Unless you explicitly state otherwise, any contribution intentionally submitted
for inclusion by you, as defined in the Apache-2.0 license, shall be dual
licensed as above, without any additional terms or conditions.

zee

Explore Similar Repositories

Was this content helpful?

Recent Feedback

Download README