CliFM

Non-curses, KISS file-manager for the terminal

Fast, extensible, lightweight | Written in C

Linux, FreeBSD | x86, ARM

Report bug · Request feature · Browse the documentation

[…] I think I had been looking for something like this for a long time, and had never put it in words. I used [other file-managers] occasionally, but frequently just found myself doing most of my file administration from the CLI. I think this hits a nice sort of sweet spot right between the two. It feels less like a separate program and more like just putting your shell into "file-management mode".

Tuerda

Halfway between a shell and a TUI file-manager […] Nice tool, fluid, intuitive.

Orduval

Did I say it's fast?

Music: "Quad Machine", by Sonic Mayhem

Table of contents

Why another file manager? I can.
In the free world, a free community finds alternatives central to freedom, and moreover, a place to learn.

Whatever needs to be done, do it in the simplest possible way: KISS is a desired trait of a file-manager for the terminal. No GUI, no curses, but just a command-line, shell-like file manager: 5 MiB RAM and 500 KiB disk space.

Willingness to try something different is all you need.

Unlike most terminal file-managers out there, CliFM replaces the traditional curses interface by a simple command-line interface. It is a file-manager, but also a shell extension.

Search for files, copy, rename, and trash some of them, but, at the same time, update/upgrade your system, add some cronjob, stop a service, and run nano (or vi, or emacs, if you like).

Those familiar with the command-line will find in a file-manager based on it a desirable addition to its functionality.
The command-line is still there, never hidden.

Should all terminal file-managers be curses-based file-managers? No.

Description

CliFM's interface

Features beyond copy, move, remove, etc:

• Really CLI-based. No GUI nor TUI or curses at all, just a command-line. Since no GUI is needed, it can run on the kernel built-in console and even on a SSH or any other remote session.
• Memory footprint below 5 MiB and a disk usage of 500 KiB. Incredibly lightweight and fast even on really old hardware.
• The use of short (and even one-character) commands, and list numbers (ELN's) for filenames.
• Bookmarks.
• Files selection (supports both glob and regular expressions and works even across multiple instances of the program).
• Lira, a built-in resource opener (supports regular expressions).
• Files search (supports both glob and regular expressions).
• A built-in Freedesktop-compliant trash system.
• Extended color codes for file-types and -extensions.
• Files counter for directories and symlinks to directories.
• Directory history map to keep in sight previous, current, and next entries in the directory history list.
• Plugins.
• Files preview (via BFG, a native file previewer, but including support for Ranger's scope.sh and pistol as well).
• Stealth mode: Leave no trace on the host system. No file is read, no file is written.
• Kangaroo, a built-in directory jumper function similar to autojump, z.lua, and zoxide.
• Batch links.
• Icons support .
• Unicode suppport.
• Tab-completion.
• Bash-like quoting system.
• History function.
• Shell commands execution.
• Glob and regular expressions (including inverse matching).
• Aliases.
• Logs.
• Prompt and profile commands (run commands with each new prompt or at program startup).
• Bash-like prompt customization.
• Sequential and conditional commands execution .
• User profiles.
• Customizable keyboard shortcuts.
• Mas, a built-in pager for files listing.
• 11 sorting methods.
• Bulk renaming.
• Archiving and compression support (including Zstandard and ISO 9660).
• Auto-cd and auto-open.
• Symlinks editor.
• Disk usage.
• CD on quit and file picker functions.
• Read and list files form standard input.
• Files filter.
• Up to eight workspaces.
• Fused parameters for ELN's.
• Advanced Copy support (just cp and mv with a nice progress bar).
• Light mode (just in case it is not fast enough for you).
• Color schemes.
• Four customizable keybindings for custom plugins.
• Fastback function.
• Git integration.

For a detailed explanation of each of these features, follow the corresponding links or consult the wiki.

Installing CliFM

Dependencies

glibc and coreutils, of course, but also libcap, acl, and readline.
For Arch Linux users, all these dependenciess are part of the core repository.
In Debian/Ubuntu systems three packages must be installed before compilation: libcap-dev, libacl1-dev, and libreadline-dev. In Fedora based systems you need libcap-devel, libacl-devel, and readline-devel.

Optional dependencies: file (to automatically open files via Lira), sshfs, curlftpfs, and cifs-utils (for remote-filesystem support); atool, archivemount, genisoimage, p7zip, and cdrtools (for archiving and compression support), and icons-in-terminal to turn on icons.

Arch Linux

• You'll find the corresponding packages on the AUR: the stable and the development version.

• A binary package is now available on the chaotic-aur repository. Follow the official installation instructions.

• Of course, you can also clone, build, and install the package using the PKGBUILD file:

$ git clone https://github.com/leo-arch/clifm.git
$ cd clifm/misc
$ makepkg -si

Debian-based systems

A .deb package (for x86_64) is available on the Releases page.

Other Linux distributions or FreeBSD:

1. Clone the repository

$ git clone https://github.com/leo-arch/clifm.git
$ cd clifm

1. Run make as follows:

$ sudo make install

You should find the binary file in /usr/bin, so that you can run it as any other program:

$ clifm

To uninstall clifm, issue this command where the makefile is located:

$ sudo make uninstall

First steps

The help command teaches you about CliFM.
Once in the CliFM prompt, type help or ?.
To jump into the COMMANDS section in the manpage, simply enter cmd or press F2.
Press F1 to access the full manpage and F3 to access the keybindings help-page.

You can also take a look at some of these basic usage-examples to get you started.

Support

CliFM is C99 and POSIX-1.2008 compliant (if compiled with the _BE_POSIX flag).
It works on Linux and FreeBSD, on x86 and ARM architectures.

License

This project is licensed GPL version 2 (or later).
See the LICENSE file for details.

Contributing

Yes. Please see our contribution guidelines for details. at Hosted Weblate.

Community

Join our Gitter discussion room and let us know what you think: ideas, comments, observations and questions are always welcome.
The Discussions section of this repo is also open to input.