Dietline

Radare2 comes with the lean readline-like input capability through the lean library to handle the command edition and history navigation. It allows users to perform cursor movements, search the history, and implements autocompletion. Moreover, due to the radare2 portability, dietline provides the uniform experience among all supported platforms. It is used in all radare2 subshells - main prompt, SDB shell, visual prompt, and offsets prompt. It also implements the most common features and keybindings compatible with the GNU Readline.

Dietline supports two major configuration modes : Emacs-mode and Vi-mode.

It also supports the famous Ctrl-R reverse history search. Using TAB key it allows to scroll through the autocompletion options.

Autocompletion

In the every shell and radare2 command autocompletion is supported. There are multiple modes of it - files, flags, and SDB keys/namespaces. To provide the easy way to select possible completion options the scrollable popup widget is available. It can be enabled with scr.prompt.popup, just set it to the true.

Emacs (default) mode

By default dietline mode is compatible with readline Emacs-like mode key bindings. Thus active are:

Moving

  • Ctrl-a - move to the beginning of the line
  • Ctrl-e - move to the end of the line
  • Ctrl-b - move one character backward
  • Ctrl-f - move one character forward

Deleting

  • Ctrl-w - delete the previous word
  • Ctrl-u - delete the whole line
  • Ctrl-h - delete a character to the left
  • Ctrl-d - delete a character to the right
  • Alt-d - cuts the character after the cursor

Killing and Yanking

  • Ctrl-k - kill the text from point to the end of the line.
  • Ctrl-x - kill backward from the cursor to the beginning of the current line.
  • Ctrl-t - kill from point to the end of the current word, or if between words, to the end of the next word. Word boundaries are the same as forward-word.
  • Ctrl-w - kill the word behind point, using white space as a word boundary. The killed text is saved on the kill-ring.
  • Ctrl-y - yank the top of the kill ring into the buffer at point.
  • Ctrl-] - rotate the kill-ring, and yank the new top. You can only do this if the prior command is yank or yank-pop.

History

  • Ctrl-r - the reverse search in the command history

Vi mode

Radare2 also comes with in vi mode that can be enabled by toggling scr.prompt.vi. The various keybindings available in this mode are:

Entering command modes

  • ESC - enter into the control mode
  • i - enter into the insert mode

Moving

  • j - acts like up arrow key
  • k - acts like down arrow key
  • a - move cursor forward and enter into insert mode
  • I - move to the beginning of the line and enter into insert mode
  • A - move to the end of the line and enter into insert mode
  • ^ - move to the beginning of the line
  • 0 - move to the beginning of the line
  • $ - move to the end of the line
  • h - move one character backward
  • l - move one character forward
  • b - move cursor to the beginning of the current word, of if between word boundaries, to the beginning of the previous word.
  • B - same as b, but only counting white-space as word boundary
  • e - move cursor the end of the current word, or if between boundaries, to the end of the next word
  • E - same as e, but only counting white-space as word boundary
  • w - move cursor to the beginning of the next word
  • W - same as w, but only counting white-space as word boundary
  • f<char> - move cursor forward to the first <char> found. For example fj will move the cursor to the first j character found (if it found one)
  • F<char> - same as f<char>, but search backwards
  • t<char> - same as f<char> but stop before <char>. For example tj will move the cursor forward to the character just before j
  • T<char> - same as t<char>, but search backwards

Deleting and Yanking

  • x - cuts the character
  • dw - delete the current word from the current position
  • diw - delete inside the current word
  • db - delete the previous word
  • D - delete from the current cursor position to the end of line
  • C - same as D, but enter insert mode after
  • dd - delete the whole line (from any position)
  • cc - same as dd, but enter insert mode after
  • dh - delete a character to the left
  • dl - delete a character to the right
  • d$ - same as D
  • d^ - delete from the current cursor position to the beginning of line
  • de - kill from point to the end of the current word, or if between words, to the end of the next word. Word boundaries are the same as forward-word.
  • df<char> - delete from current position to the position of the first <char> encountered
  • dF<char> - same as df<char>, but delete backwards
  • dt<char> - delete from current position to the position of the character right before the first <char> encountered
  • dT<char> - same as dt<char>, but delete backwards
  • di" - delete everything between two " characters
  • di' - delete everything between two ' characters
  • di( - delete everything between ( and ) characters
  • di[ - delete everything between [ and ] characters
  • di{ - delete everything between { and } characters
  • di< - delete everything between < and > characters
  • p - yank the top of the kill ring into the buffer at point.
  • c - all d commands have their c counterpart which enters insert mode after deleting

Other

  • ~ - swap the case of the current character and move one character forward

If you are finding it hard to keep track of which mode you are in, just set scr.prompt.mode=true to update the color of the prompt based on the vi-mode.