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I have installed Debian recently (without a GUI) to learn the CLI and C using the LearnCodeTheHardWay tutorials. Its going well, and I feel at this stage I do not need any GUI.

However, one thing I might need is to view, and edit in a right to left language, specifically Arabic using say... nano. Or with sqlite. Is that possible?

EDIT: VIM or EMACS will be fine also. I do not mind the text editor. Also I would like to do this without install X, or any GUI stuff of any sort.

EDIT: By Terminal what I understand is the black window with the $ symbol, which is what you get with the default Debian install. Its using Bash, and I use SSH to remote into it.

Rui F Ribeiro
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sprocket12
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    The `nano` editor is by definition minimalistic so I would be really surprised if you could configure it this way. The only editors I'm aware of that can display and edit text from right to left are `emacs` and `vim`. – jimmij Nov 13 '14 at 22:44
  • By “terminal”, do you mean the Linux console (i.e. outside X)? I don't think it supports right-to-left. It's an interface to repair the system, not for doing regular work. An editor such as Vim or Emacs should be able to cope, but the available Arabic fonts may be limited. X has advantages even if you only use it to run terminal emulators — and even Vim and Emacs are more comfortable in their own X window. – Gilles 'SO- stop being evil' Nov 13 '14 at 23:52
  • @Gilles any kind of support, even limited would be good. I am a windows user, so all I do is add a new keyboard (AR) and away I go typing... what would be the steps in debian do at least type an arabic character in vim or emacs? – sprocket12 Nov 14 '14 at 09:06
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    @Gilles whatever gave you the idea that the console is not for doing regular work? – Wouter Verhelst Mar 22 '17 at 07:23

2 Answers2

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see comparison of text editors , do an intersection between "right-to-left and bidirectional text" and "text shell integration" .

:set lefttoright

for vim . see documentation and this question .

--

emacs generally can autodetect language and do the corresponding layout , on a per paragraph basis . see documentation .

把友情留在无盐
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    this won't fix right to left support through ssh. also @لَا إِلٰهَ إِلَّا الله is clearly asking for character support, and not switching the cursor to the right. –  Feb 26 '15 at 02:38
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This worked for me on Ubuntu

sudo apt-get install language-pack-en-base
sudo apt-get install language-pack-ar-base
sudo locale-gen en
sudo locale-gen ar

Then edit (i used vim) /etc/default/locale or /etc/environment to contain just the following

LC_ALL=en_US.UTF-8  
LANG=en_US.UTF-8

Finally

sudo dpkg-reconfigure locales

These steps will give you arabic over an ssh terminal.