Larry - The Text Editor

A minimalist, high-performance TUI text editor written in Go.

Features

• Optimized File Loader: Custom rendering engine optimizing performance for large files (O(1) input, O(H) rendering).
• Core Functionality:
  • Navigate through your files fast like a cat with Larry Movements (more info in the key bindings section).
  • Standard commands like copy, cut, paste, undo, redo, select all, etc. No need to learn new commands.
  • File Loading/Saving using modern file picker
  • Very easy to use and navigate.
• Search & Navigation: Efficient text search using Boyer-Moore algorithm with visual highlighting and result navigation.
• Global Finder: Powerful multi-purpose search tool (Leader+P) supporting both fuzzy file searching and live text grep across the entire project. It automatically ignores binary/compiled files for a cleaner search experience.
• Syntax Highlighting: Supports 200+ languages via chroma, automatically detected by file extension.
• UI:
  • Clean, distraction-free interface
  • Absolute line numbers
  • Visual cursor, selection, and search result highlighting
  • Status reporting with automatic text wrapping
  • Fully responsive design that handles terminal resizing elegantly

Why should I use Larry?

Larry offers a perfect balance for users who need more power than Nano without the steep learning curve of Vim. It delivers robust features in a simple, intuitive interface. It's very fast and it runs in your terminal.

Installation

1. Ensure Go 1.18+ is installed.

2. Clone the repository.

3. Install dependencies:

   go mod tidy

4. Build:

   go build ./cmd/larry

5. Also create the config file. If you are using macOS see "Note for macOS users" down below.

   touch ~/.config/larry/config.json && echo '{"theme": "monokai", "tab_width": 4, "line_numbers": true, "leader_key": "ctrl"}' > ~/.config/larry/config.json

6. Run:

   ./larry [OPTIONS] [FILE]

   Use ./larry --help for detailed usage information.

7. Add Larry to your PATH if you want:

   export PATH="<path_to_larry_bin/:$PATH"

Command Line Usage

Larry supports several command line options for enhanced usage:

Arguments

• FILE: Optional file to open on startup

Options

• -config <path>: Load a specific configuration file (overrides default ~/.config/larry/config.json)
• -help: Display help information and exit

Examples

# Start Larry (loads ~/.config/larry/config.json automatically if present)
larry

# Open a specific file
larry myfile.txt

# Override the default configuration with a specific file
larry -config ./custom_config.json myfile.txt

# Show help
larry --help

Key Bindings

Leader key is ctrl by default.

General

Action	Shortcut
Quit	Leader+Q
Save	Leader+S
Open File	Leader+O
Search	Leader+F
Replace	Leader+T
Global Larry Finder	Leader+P
Undo	Leader+Z
Redo	Leader+R
Copy	Leader+C
Cut	Leader+X
Paste	Leader+V
Go to Line	Leader+G
Toggle Help	Leader+H
Select All	Leader+A
Indent	TAB
Dedent	Shift+Tab

Navigation

Action	Shortcut
Move Cursor	Arrow Keys
Jump Word Left/Right	Leader+←/→
Jump 5 Lines Up/Down	Leader+↑/↓
Line Start	Home
Line End	End
File Start	Leader+Home
File End	Leader+End

Selection

Action	Shortcut
Select Text	Shift+Arrow
Select Word Left/Right	Leader+Shift+←/→
Select 5 Lines Up/Down	Leader+Shift+↑/↓
Select to Line Start	Shift+Home
Select to Line End	Shift+End

Search & Find

Larry includes an efficient text search feature powered by the Boyer-Moore algorithm, providing fast and responsive search capabilities across your files. This makes Larry's search extremely fast, even for large files with complex search patterns.

Search Features

• FAST like a cat.

Global Finder

The Global Finder is a powerful tool for navigating your project. Trigger it with Leader+P.

• Fuzzy Search: Search for files by name with fuzzy matching.
• Live Grep: Search for text patterns across all files in your project in real-time.
• Switch Modes: Use Tab to seamlessly switch between Fuzzy Search and Live Grep modes.
• Smart Filtering: Automatically ignores binary and compiled files to ensure a clean search experience.
• Navigate Results: Use Up/Down arrows to navigate through the results and press Enter to open the selection.

Configuration

Larry is designed to be easily customizable via a JSON configuration file.

Automatic Loading

Larry automatically looks for its configuration in the following locations:

1. Standard: ~/.config/larry/config.json (on Linux) or ~/Library/Application Support/larry/config.json (on macOS).
2. Fallback: ~/.config/larry/config.json (common fallback for macOS users).

Custom Configuration Override

To use a different configuration file, use the -config flag:

larry -config path/to/your/config.json

Configuration Options (config.json)

{
  "theme": "dracula",
  "tab_width": 4,
  "line_numbers": true,
  "leader_key": "ctrl"
}

Field	Description	Default
theme	Syntax highlighting theme (e.g., dracula, monokai, nord, github)	dracula
tab_width	Number of spaces for a tab character	4
line_numbers	Show or hide line numbers	true
leader_key	Base key for shortcuts (e.g., ctrl, alt).	ctrl

Note for macOS users: The cmd key is generally not natively supported as a modifier by terminal emulators. We recommend setting leader_key to alt (which corresponds to the Option key) by mapping option to alt in your terminal's settings (e.g., iTerm2, Ghostty, Kitty etc).

Roadmap

• Line numbers
• Selecting text
• File picker
• Optimized file loading
• File loading and saving
• Syntax highlighting
• Undo/redo functionality
• Search
• Global Finder (Fuzzy & Live Grep)
• Leader Key config for cross-platform support
• Replace
• Go to line
• Global Replace
• Markdown instant visualization
• LSP support
• Config file support
• Plugin system
• Theme support
• Add Help Menu and Docs
• Add to a remote package manager
• Improve resizing and responsiveness
• Agile navigation movements (Leader+arrows for word/line jumping)
• Let Larry be more hackable, allowing users to add their own features, color schemes, etc
• Debugger