I have files ending in ~ in my home directory, and I want to delete them. How do I do that? How do I prevent this backup functionality?
You can simply run rm *~ if you're sure there is no other file that you need which ends in ~
If it is gedit that is creating the backup files, you can open gedit and select Edit->Preferences->Editor and uncheck the option "Create a backup copy of files before saving"
And for nano, look in /etc/nanorc for:
## Backup files to filename~.
set backup
and change that to
## Backup files to filename~.
# set backup
