-The \fBbkgdset\fR and \fBwbkgdset\fR routines manipulate the
-background of the named window.
-The window background is a \fBchtype\fR consisting of
-any combination of attributes (i.e., rendition) and a character.
-The attribute part of the background is combined (OR'ed) with all non-blank
-characters that are written into the window with \fBwaddch\fR. Both
-the character and attribute parts of the background are combined with
-the blank characters. The background becomes a property of the
-character and moves with the character through any scrolling and
-insert/delete line/character operations.
-
-To the extent possible on a particular terminal,
-the attribute part of the background is displayed
-as the graphic rendition of the character put on the screen.
-
-The \fBbkgd\fR and \fBwbkgd\fR functions
-set the background property of the current or specified window
-and then apply this setting to every character position in that window:
-
-.RS
-The rendition of every character on the screen is changed to
-the new background rendition.
-
-Wherever the former background character
-appears, it is changed to the new background character.
-.RE
-
-The \fBgetbkgd\fR function returns the given window's current background
-character/attribute pair.
+The
+.I background
+of a
+.I curses
+window
+(in the library's non-\*(``wide\*('' configuration)
+is a
+.I \%chtype
+combining a set of attributes
+(see \fB\%curs_attr\fP(3X))
+with a character called the
+.I "blank character."
+.PP
+The blank character is a spacing character that populates a window's
+character cells when their contents are erased without replacement.
+The background's attributes are combined with all non-blank characters
+written to the window,
+as with the \fB\%waddch\fP(3X) and \fB\%winsch\fP(3X) families of
+functions.
+.PP
+The blank character and attributes of the background combine with
+characters written to the window as described below.
+The background becomes a property of the character and moves with it
+through any scrolling and insert/delete line/character operations.
+.PP
+To the extent possible on a given terminal,
+the attribute part of the background is displayed as the graphic
+rendition of the character put on the screen.
+.SS "bkgd, wbkgd"
+\fB\%bkgd\fP and \fB\%wbkgd\fP set the background property of
+\fB\%stdscr\fP or the specified window and then apply this setting to
+every character cell in that window.
+.bP
+The rendition of every character in the window changes to the new
+background rendition.
+.bP
+Wherever the former background character appears,
+it changes to the new background character.
+.PP
+.I \%ncurses
+updates the rendition of each character cell by comparing the character,
+non-color attributes,
+and colors.
+The library applies to following procedure to each cell in the window,
+whether or not it is blank.
+.bP
+.I \%ncurses
+first compares the cell's character to the previously specified blank
+character;
+if they match,
+.I \%ncurses
+writes the new blank character to the cell.
+.bP
+.I \%ncurses
+then checks if the cell uses color,
+that is,
+its color pair value is nonzero.
+If not,
+it simply replaces the attributes and color pair in the cell with those
+from the new background character.
+.bP
+If the cell uses color,
+and its background color matches that of the current window background,
+.I \%ncurses
+removes attributes that may have come from the current background and
+adds those from the new background.
+It finishes by setting the cell's background to use the new window
+background color.
+.bP
+If the cell uses color,
+and its background color does not match that of the current window
+background,
+.I \%ncurses
+updates only the non-color attributes,
+first removing those that may have come from the current background,
+and then adding attributes from the new background.
+.PP
+.I \%ncurses
+treats a background character value of zero (0) as a blank character.
+.PP
+If the terminal does not support color,
+or if color has not been initialized with \fB\%start_color\fP(3X),
+.I \%ncurses
+ignores the new background character's color attribute.
+.SS "bkgdset, wbkgdset"
+\fB\%bkgdset\fP and \fB\%wbkgdset\fP manipulate the background of
+the applicable window,
+without updating the character cells as \fB\%bkgd\fP and
+\fB\%wbkgd\fP do;
+only future writes reflect the updated background.
+.SS getbkgd
+\fB\%getbkgd\fP obtains the given window's background character and
+attribute combination.