Talk:Midnight Commander

Which Version?
Midnight Commander seems to have become a terrible mess by 2006. It seems to have thousands of reported bugs, and lack serious ongoing maintenance. There are so many forks and versions it is impossible for casual user to know which one to try. The main article needs a serious version history/discussion, highlighting recommendations from someone knowledgeable about the best stable current version.

One easy-access path is gnu mc 4.6.1-pre4 included in Knoppix 4.0.2CD (Utilities>Tools>mc).

What is the best easiest most stable simple version for Windows users to try? 69.87.193.48 23:48, 22 May 2006 (UTC)


 * It's not good, but it's not that bad. It might be worth mentioning mc snapshots in the article. It's not vigorously maintained, but it's not dead. And, regarding the forks, those are basically dead. The only real mc is at ibiblio. And, as most (all?) distros come with it already, it's easy enough to get. True, though, this isn't going to be a featured article any time soon.


 * (Oh, and as far as Windows, I don't know of a version other than the one you get with cygwin.) 216.77.227.14 07:54, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Directory Sizes
4.6.1 does have a "show directory sIzes" command (in the Command pull-down menu). Not convenient, no short-cut available, doesn't seem to be any way to map one either. No mode availble to turn on the display of directory sizes. And when you ask for the sizes of something big, it seems to lock up the computer while it does the calculation! 69.87.193.48 23:48, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Inaccuracy
I'm deleting 'mcedit is a separate executable, which can also be used independently of Midnight Commander'. Also read the man page. There is a 'cooledit' which is supposedly the original codebase for the mcedit code of mc, but mcedit is builtin. 216.77.227.14 07:48, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Color Screenshot?
Or at least mc in a white-on-black terminal. But really, you almost never see it without color. 216.77.227.14 07:48, 21 August 2007 (UTC)


 * Following up on my own earlier observation: you also never see it with a brown color. When I mentioned the b&w issue, the screenshot was changed to a default one but now it's been changed again to this brown one. Could all screenshots of all applications use their vanilla configuration as a representative portrayal? 74.162.149.181 (talk) 17:24, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

Graphical program of the same name?
I remember before Nautilus existed, there was a program for GNOME called GNU Midnight Commander which was a graphical file manager, seemingly unrelated to the curses application. Some other articles, like the one for Nautilus, mention this, linking here. But I don't see it in this article. 174.21.17.91 (talk) 16:25, 8 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Yea, in the GNOME 1.0 timeframe there was a GNOME file manager built around mc called gmc (GNOME Midnight Commander). I'll try to dig up some info on this to add to the page. BrianRandal (talk) 14:00, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

History and versions
The article does not have any information when did MC project started and when was first version released and when 1.0 version got released. Who started to develop it and it would be nice to have screenshots from the first versions as well. Now the article is more like a marketing trick than article in a enclycopedia. Golftheman (talk) 17:38, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

Developer(s)
It's fair to list Miguel as the originator, but it's been quite a while since he was involved with the development TEDickey (talk) 20:49, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I presume this is in response to my recent edit to the infobox? Do you have a proposed solution? If not, I might suggest adding something along the lines of "and the Midnight Commander maintainers" or some such in the developer field. Sound good? BrianRandal (talk) 21:11, 6 September 2010 (UTC)


 * something like that (seems that there is a mailing list for the developers, but the set of developers has changed a couple of times in the past ten years). TEDickey (talk) 21:57, 6 September 2010 (UTC)


 * Fixed. BrianRandal (talk) 13:58, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Notability
The tags added by 77.120.52.136 point out that these programs have no WP:RS other than primary sources. It's likely that someone can provide reliable secondary sources discussing Midnight Commander TEDickey (talk) 13:04, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Some sources might include: CLI magic: Midnight Commander, An Introduction to the Midnight Commander, or Midnight Commander wakes from deep sleep. BrianRandal (talk) 14:01, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Additional source: Midnight Commander tutorial. Also, note the fact that Google returns 359,000 hits for "midnight commander". While not an official measure of notability, I think it puts weight on the 'need more examples' side rather than the 'delete this' side of notability review.slaurel (talk) 14:40, 12 Apr 2011 (UTC)

Italicization needed?
As a non-OS computer program, oughtn't Midnight Commander be italicized, in the same manner as Norton Commander?—catsmoke talk 03:26, 23 June 2022 (UTC)