Text (Rust, Unicode, Basic) Operator

trubo is an EXPERIMENTAL retro TUI text editor and file manager in Rust.

It's originally based on TRUST ( https://github.com/wojtczyk/trust ) from which this was forked.

In the meantime, it was extended step by step using guidance by Viktor Kuncak and using LLMs, primarily GPT 5.4.

See CONTRIBUTORS for the current contributor list.

Highlights:

• Dual pane with file operations and preview
• Space-saving editor-only mode
• Style using more colors and less boundary boxes
• Editor supporting undo, regex search, keyword highlighting

cargo run -- /path/to/file-or-directory

If no path is supplied, trubo opens the current directory. If a file path is supplied, trubo opens that file directly and uses its parent directory for the browser pane.

User-facing usage is documented in doc/GUIDE.md.

Architecture and module structure are documented in doc/ARCHITECTURE.md.

That documentation is the source of truth for:

• operating modes: editor-only, single-pane, dual-pane
• current keyboard and mouse controls
• browser file operations
• the (rudimentary!) run/build behavior
• editor features and limitations

GitHub Actions is configured to run cargo test --all-targets on Linux and macOS for pushes to main, pull requests, and manual runs.

For public repositories, this is generally free within GitHub's hosted Actions offering. If the repository is private, GitHub applies monthly runner-minute limits, so this setup keeps CI intentionally lightweight.

The most important keys are:

• F1: in-app help
• Ctrl+Q: quit the editor
• Ctrl+B: toggle editor-only mode
• `: toggle dual-pane mode
• F4 or Tab: cycle pane focus
• F2 or Ctrl+S: save
• Ctrl+F: regex search

For the full guide, see doc/GUIDE.md.

Only one file can be edited at a time.

File backups are saved using the ~ suffix.

The file pane lists directories and all regular files. trubo opens files as lossy text regardless of extension.