- Announcing ncurses 5.8
+ Announcing ncurses 6.3
+
+Overview
The ncurses (new curses) library is a free software emulation of
- curses in System V Release 4.0, and more. It uses terminfo format,
- supports pads and color and multiple highlights and forms characters
- and function-key mapping, and has all the other SYSV-curses
- enhancements over BSD curses.
+ curses in System V Release 4.0 (SVr4), and more. It uses terminfo
+ format, supports pads and color and multiple highlights and forms
+ characters and function-key mapping, and has all the other SVr4-curses
+ enhancements over BSD curses. SVr4 curses became the basis of X/Open
+ Curses.
In mid-June 1995, the maintainer of 4.4BSD curses declared that he
- considered 4.4BSD curses obsolete, and encouraged the keepers of Unix
+ considered 4.4BSD curses obsolete, and encouraged the keepers of unix
releases such as BSD/OS, FreeBSD and NetBSD to switch over to ncurses.
- The ncurses code was developed under GNU/Linux. It has been in use for
- some time with OpenBSD as the system curses library, and on FreeBSD
- and NetBSD as an external package. It should port easily to any
- ANSI/POSIX-conforming UNIX. It has even been ported to OS/2 Warp!
+ Since 1995, ncurses has been ported to many systems:
+ * It is used in almost every system based on the Linux kernel (aside
+ from some embedded applications).
+ * It is used as the system curses library on OpenBSD, FreeBSD and
+ MacOS.
+ * It is used in environments such as Cygwin and MinGW. The first of
+ these was EMX on OS/2 Warp.
+ * It is used (though usually not as the system curses) on all of the
+ vendor unix systems, e.g., AIX, HP-UX, IRIX64, SCO, Solaris,
+ Tru64.
+ * It should work readily on any ANSI/POSIX-conforming unix.
The distribution includes the library and support utilities, including
- a terminfo compiler tic(1), a decompiler infocmp(1), clear(1),
- tput(1), tset(1), and a termcap conversion tool captoinfo(1). Full
- manual pages are provided for the library and tools.
-
- The ncurses distribution is available via anonymous FTP at the GNU
- distribution site [1]ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/ncurses/ .
- It is also available at [2]ftp://invisible-island.net/ncurses/ .
-
- Release Notes
-
- This release is designed to be upward compatible from ncurses 5.0
- through 5.7; very few applications will require recompilation,
- depending on the platform. These are the highlights from the
- change-log since ncurses 5.7 release.
-
-Interface changes
-
- * turn on _XOPEN_CURSES definition in curses.h.
- * change _nc_has_mouse to has_mouse, reflect its use in C++ and
- Ada95.
- * add is_pad and is_subwin functions for opaque access to the WINDOW
- structure.
- * add tiparm, based on review of X/Open Curses Issue 7.
-
-New features and improvements
-
- Library Improvements
-
- * add a terminal driver for Windows console, which supports a MinGW
- port to Windows.
- * add extended functions which specify the SCREEN pointer for
- several curses functions which use the global SP.
- * improve the NCURSES_NO_UTF8_ACS feature by adding a check for an
- extended terminfo capability U8.
- * improve performance of tigetstr, etc., by using hashing code from
- tic.
- * add WACS_xxx definitions to wide-character configuration for
- thick- and double-lines.
- * modify init_pair to allow caller to create extra color pairs
- beyond the color_pairs limit, which use default colors.
-
- Improvements to Programs
-
- * add tabs program.
- * modify tic's -I/-C dump to reformat acsc strings into canonical
- form (sorted, unique mapping).
- * add checks in tic for inconsistent cursor-movement controls, and
- for inconsistent printer-controls.
- * add special case to _nc_infotocap (used by tic and infocmp) to
- recognize the setaf/setab strings from xterm+256color and
- xterm+88color, and provide a reduced version which works with
- termcap.
-
- Terminal Database
-
- * added entries:
- + bterm terminfo entry, based on bogl 0.1.18
- + cons25-debian entry
- + eterm-color entry
- + linux-16color
- + mlterm+256color entry, for mlterm 3.0.0
- + several screen-bce.xxx entries
- + screen.Eterm terminfo entry
- + vwmterm entry
- + xterm-utf8 entry as a demo of the U8 feature
- * updated/improved entries:
- + use extended capabilities:
- o add U8 feature to denote entries for terminal emulators
- which do not support VT100 SI/SO when processing UTF-8
- encoding
- o add XT capability to entries for terminals that support
- both xterm-style mouse- and title-controls, for screen
- which special-cases TERM beginning with xterm or rxvt
- + improvements based on new checks in tic:
- +
- o fill in no-parameter forms of cursor-movement where a
- parameterized form is available
- o fill in missing cursor controls where the form of the
- controls is ANSI
- o add parameterized cursor-controls to linux-basic
- o modify nsterm, xnuppc and tek4115 to make sgr/sgr0
- consistent
- o change several terminfo entries to make consistent use
- of ANSI clear-all-tabs
- + extend ansi.sys pfkey capability from kf1-kf10 to kf1-kf48,
- moving function key definitions from emx-base for
- consistency.
- + correct missing final 'p' in pfkey capability of
- ansi.sys-old.
- + rename atari and st52 terminfo entries to atari-old,
- st52-old, use newer entries from FreeMiNT.
- + repurpose gnome terminfo entries as vte, retaining gnome
- variants for compatibility, but generally deprecating those
- since the VTE library is what actually defines the behavior
- of "gnome", etc., since 2003.
- + improve interix smso terminfo capability by using reverse
- rather than bold.
- + correct initc capability of linux-c-nc end-of-range, make
- similar change for dg+ccc and dgunix+ccc.
- + update minix terminfo entry.
- + updated nsterm* entries.
- + remove unnecessary kcan assignment to ^C from putty.
- + suppress ncv in screen and konsole-base entries, allowing
- underline.
- + change ncv and op capabilities in sun-color terminfo entry to
- match Sun's entry for this.
- + fix typo in rmso for tek4106 entry.
- + improve acsc string for vt52, show arrow keys.
- + add hard-reset for rs2 to wsvt25 to help ensure that reset
- ends the alternate character set.
- + add ccc and initc capabilities to xterm-16color.
-
-Major bug fixes
-
- * ncurses library
- + wide character support
- o modify length returned by getcchar to count the trailing
- null which is documented in X/Open.
- o fix an infinite recursion when adding a legacy-coding
- 8-bit value using insch.
- o improve a workaround in adding wide-characters, when a
- control character is found. The library uses unctrl to
- obtain a printable version of the control character, but
- was not passing color or video attributes.
- o modify waddch_literal, updating line-pointer after a
- multicolumn character is found to not fit on the current
- row, and wrapping is done. Since the line-pointer was
- not updated, the wrapped multicolumn character was
- written to the beginning of the current row.
- o fixes in wins_nwstr and related functions to ensure that
- special characters, i.e., control characters are handled
- properly with the wide-character configuration.
- o correct internal _nc_insert_ch to use _nc_insert_wch
- when inserting wide characters, since the wins_wch
- function that it used did not update the cursor
- position.
- + mouse
- o add check if Gpm_Open returns a -2, e.g., for "xterm".
- This is normally suppressed but can be overridden using
- $NCURSES_GPM_TERMS. Ensure that Gpm_Close is called in
- this case.
- o add check in mouse-driver to disable connection if GPM
- returns a zero, indicating that the connection is
- closed.
- o modify getmouse to act as its documentation implied,
- returning on each call the preceding event until none
- are left. When no more events remain, it will return
- ERR.
- + miscellaneous
- o improve handling of color-pairs embedded in attributes
- for the extended-colors configuration.
- o add check for failure to open hashed-database needed for
- db4.6.
- o modify use of $CC environment variable which is defined
- by X/Open as a curses feature, to ignore it if it is not
- a single character.
- o modify declaration of cur_term when broken-linker is
- used, but enable-reentrant is not, to match pre-5.7.
- o correct limit-checks in derwin.
- o remove old check in mvderwin which prevented moving a
- derived window whose origin happened to coincide with
- its parent's origin.
- o correct limit-checks in newwin, to ensure that windows
- have nonzero size.
- o modify set_curterm to make broken-linker configuration
- work with changes from 20090228.
- o modify wgetch to ensure it checks SIGWINCH when it gets
- an error in non-blocking mode.
- o correct limit-check in wredrawln, accounting for
- begy/begx values.
- o fix a null-pointer check in _nc_format_slks in
- lib_slk.c, from 20070704 changes.
- o correct translation of "^" in _nc_infotocap, used to
- transform terminfo to termcap strings.
- o modify _nc_wgetch to check for a -1 in the fifo, e.g.,
- after a SIGWINCH, and discard that value, to avoid
- confusing application.
- * other libraries
- + correct transfer of multicolumn characters in multirow
- field_buffer, which stopped at the end of the first row due
- to filling of unused entries in a cchar_t array with nulls.
- + correct buffer-size after internal resizing of wide-character
- set_field_buffer, broken in 20081018 changes.
- + correct layout of working window used to extract data in
- wide-character configured by set_field_buffer
-
-Portability
-
- * configure script:
- + new options:
-
- --disable-libtool-version
- use the "-version-number" feature which was added
- in libtool 1.5. The default value for the option
- uses the newer feature, which makes libraries
- generated using libtool compatible with the
- standard builds of ncurses.
-
- --disable-rpath-hack
- disable a feature which adds rpath options for
- libraries in unusual places.
-
- --enable-interop
- integrate changes for generic/interop support to
- form-library.
-
- --enable-pc-files
- generate ".pc" files for each of the libraries, and
- install them in pkg-config's library directory.
-
- --enable-pthreads-eintr
- control whether to allow EINTR to interrupt a read
- operation in wgetch. This applies only to the
- pthread configuration
-
- --enable-sp-funcs
- compile-in support for extended functions which
- accept a SCREEN pointer, reducing the need for
- juggling the global SP value with set_term and
- delscreen.
-
- --enable-term-driver
- compile with terminal-driver. That is used in the
- MinGW port, and (being somewhat more complicated)
- is an experimental alternative to the conventional
- termlib internals. Currently, it requires the
- sp-funcs feature to be enabled.
-
- --with-ncurses-wrap-prefix
- allows setting the prefix for functions used to
- wrap global variables to something other than
- "_nc_".
-
- --with-pkg-config=[DIR]
- check for pkg-config, optionally specifying its
- path.
-
- --without-manpages
- tells the configure script to suppress the install
- of ncurses' manpages.
-
- --without-tests
- suppress building test programs.
-
- + improved options:
- o correct logic for --with-database, which was coded as an
- enable-type switch.
- o omit the opaque-functions from lib_gen.o when
- --disable-ext-funcs is used.
- * packaging:
- + *-config scripts:
- o modify adacurses-config to look for ".ali" files in the
- adalib directory.
- o correct install for the Ada95 tree, which omitted
- libAdaCurses.a used in adacurses-config.
- o change install for adacurses-config to provide
- additional flavors such as adacursesw-config, for
- ncursesw.
- o modify scripts to generate ncurses*-config and pc-files
- to add dependency for tinfo library.
- o use ncurses*-config scripts if available for
- test/configure.
- o correct name for termlib in ncurses*-config, e.g., if it
- is renamed to provide a single file for ncurses/ncursesw
- libraries.
- o generate manpages for the *-config scripts, adapted from
- help2man.
- o modify install-rule for manpages so that *-config
- manpages will install when building with --srcdir.
- o build-fixes for OpenSolaris aka Solaris 11, for
- wide-character configuration as well as for rpath
- feature in *-config scripts.
- o use $includedir symbol in misc/ncurses-config.in, add
- --includedir option.
- o improve install-rules for pc-files.
- o create the pkg-config library directory if needed.
- o fix typo "==" where "=" is needed in ncurses-config.in
- and gen-pkgconfig.in files.
- o modify gen-pkgconfig.in to eliminate a dependency on
- rpath when deciding whether to add $LIBS to --libs
- output; that should be shown for the ncurses and tinfo
- libraries without taking rpath into account.
- o modify handling of $PKG_CONFIG_LIBDIR to use only the
- first item in a possibly colon-separated list.
- + other packaging issues
- o add make-tar.sh scripts to Ada95 and test subdirectories
- to help with making those separately distributable.
- o add Ada95/configure script, to use in tar-file created
- by Ada95/make-tar.sh.
- o remove tar-copy.sh and related configure/Makefile
- chunks, since the Ada95 binding is now installed using
- rules in Ada95/src.
- * cross-compiling:
- + improve configure checks for location of tic and infocmp
- programs used for installing database and for generating
- fallback data, e.g., for cross-compiling.
- + modify #define's for build-compiler to suppress cchar_t
- symbol from compile of make_hash and make_keys, improving
- cross-compilation of ncursesw.
- + simplify include-dependencies of make_hash and make_keys, to
- reduce the need for setting BUILD_CPPFLAGS in cross-compiling
- when the build- and target-machines differ.
- + correct cross-compiling configure check for CF_MKSTEMP macro,
- by adding a check cache variable set by AC_CHECK_FUNC.
- * library dependencies:
- + revise wadd_wch and wecho_wchar to eliminate dependency on
- unctrl.
- + adjust configure script so that "t" is not added to library
- suffix when weak-symbols are used, allowing the pthread
- configuration to more closely match the non-thread naming.
- * building the Ada95 tree:
- + changes to use gnatmake project files in the Ada95 tree.
- + add/use configure check to turn on project rules for
- Ada95/src.
- + old gnatmake (3.15) does not produce libraries using
- project-file; work around by adding script to generate
- alternate makefile.
- + add configure --with-ada-sharedlib option, for the test_make
- rule.
- + move Ada95-related logic into aclocal.m4, since additional
- checks will be needed to distinguish old/new implementations
- of gnat.
- + add test_make / test_clean / test_install rules in Ada95/src
- + change install-path for adainclude directory to
- /usr/share/ada (was /usr/lib/ada).
- * other configure/build issues:
- + make CCHARW_MAX value configurable, noting that changing this
- would change the size of cchar_t, and would be
- ABI-incompatible.
- + improve comparison of program-names when checking for linked
- flavors such as "reset" by ignoring the executable suffix.
- + drop mkdirs.sh, use "mkdir -p".
- + drop misc/ncu-indent and misc/jpf-indent; they are provided
- by an external package [3]cindent.
- + change makefiles to use $ARFLAGS rather than $AR_OPTS,
- provide a configure check to detect whether a "-" is needed
- before "ar" options.
- + modify CF_DISABLE_LEAKS configure macro so that the
- --enable-leaks option is not the same as --disable-leaks.
- + improve configure script macros CF_HEADER_PATH and
- CF_LIBRARY_PATH by adding CFLAGS, CPPFLAGS and LDFLAGS, LIBS
- values to the search-lists.
- + improve configure macros CF_GCC_VERSION and CF_GCC_WARNINGS
- to work with gcc 4.x's c89 alias, which gives warning
- messages for cases where older versions would produce an
- error.
- + modify CF_WITH_LIBTOOL configure check to allow unreleased
- libtool version numbers (e.g. which include alphabetic chars,
- as well as digits, after the final '.').
- + improve use of symbolic links in makefiles by using "-f"
- option if it is supported, to eliminate temporary removal of
- the target
- + add a configure-time check to pick a suitable value for
- CC_SHARED_OPTS for Solaris.
- + add -shared option to MK_SHARED_LIB when -Bsharable is used,
- for *BSD's, without which "main" might be one of the shared
- library's dependencies.
- + modify configure script to allow building shared libraries
- with gcc on AIX 5 or 6.
- + suppress configure check for static/dynamic linker flags for
- gcc on Solaris 10, since gcc is confused by absence of static
- libc, and does not switch back to dynamic mode before
- finishing the libraries.
- + suppress configure check for static/dynamic linker flags for
- gcc on Darwin.
- + modify misc/run_tic.in to create parent directory, in case
- this is a new install of hashed database.
- + modify configure check for tic program, used for fallbacks,
- to a warning if not found. This makes it simpler to use
- additonal scripts to bootstrap the fallbacks code using tic
- from the build tree.
- * test programs:
- + add test/demo_terminfo, for comparison with demo_termcap.
- + improve test/ncurses.c 'F' test, show combining characters in
- color.
- + fix logic for 'V' in test/ncurses.c tests f/F.
- + improve test/ncurses.c 'a test to put mouse droppings in the
- proper window.
- + modify ncurses 'F' test to demo wborder_set with colored
- lines.
- + modify ncurses 'f' test to demo wborder with colored lines.
- + improve test/ncurses.c 'a' test, using unctrl more
- consistently to display meta-characters.
- + correct use of key_name in test/ncurses.c 'A' test, which
- only displays wide-characters, not key-codes since 20070612.
- + add test/clip_printw.c to illustrate how to use printw
- without wrapping.
- + modify test-programs, e.g,. test/view.c, to address subtle
- differences between Tru64/Solaris and HPUX/AIX getcchar
- return values.
- + add some test programs (and make these use the same special
- keys by sharing linedata.h functions): test/test_addstr.c
- test/test_addwstr.c test/test_addchstr.c
- test/test_add_wchstr.c
- + add test/xterm-256color.dat
- + modify test programs to allow them to be built with NetBSD
+ * captoinfo, a termcap conversion tool
+ * clear, utility for clearing the screen
+ * infocmp, the terminfo decompiler
+ * tabs, set tabs on a terminal
+ * tic, the terminfo compiler
+ * toe, list (table of) terminfo entries
+ * tput, utility for retrieving terminal capabilities in shell
+ scripts
+ * tset, to initialize the terminal
+
+ Full manual pages are provided for the library and tools.
+
+ The ncurses distribution is available at ncurses' homepage:
+
+ ftp://ftp.invisible-island.net/ncurses/ or
+ https://invisible-mirror.net/archives/ncurses/ .
+
+ It is also available via anonymous FTP at the GNU distribution site
+
+ ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/ncurses/ .
+
+Release Notes
+
+ These notes are for ncurses 6.3, released October 21, 2021.
+
+ This release is designed to be source-compatible with ncurses 5.0
+ through 6.2; providing extensions to the application binary interface
+ (ABI). Although the source can still be configured to support the
+ ncurses 5 ABI, the reason for the release is to reflect improvements
+ to the ncurses 6 ABI and the supporting utility programs.
+
+ There are, of course, numerous other improvements, listed in this
+ announcement.
+
+ The most important bug-fixes/improvements dealt with portability
+ issues. The release notes also mention some other bug-fixes, but are
+ focused on new features and improvements to existing features since
+ ncurses 6.2 release.
+
+ Library improvements
+
+ New features
+
+ There are a few new features:
+ * A new (experimental) driver, for the Windows Terminal
+ configuration is provided.
+ * A script is provided which enables OpenBSD users to upgrade their
+ system to use ncurses 6.3 (OpenBSD developers are also invited to
+ do this).
+
+ Additionally, to improve performance other changes (and extensions)
+ are provided in this release:
+ * modify lib_mouse.c to check for out-of-range button numbers,
+ convert those to position reports.
+ * add sp-funcs for erasewchar, killwchar.
+
+ Other improvements
+
+ These are revised features:
+ * modify wgetnstr, wgetn_wstr to improve compatibility with SVr4
+ curses in its treatment of interrupt and quit characters
+
+ These were done to limit or ultimately deprecate features:
+ * mark wgetch-events feature as deprecated.
+ + prevent KEY_EVENT from appearing in curses.h unless the
+ configure option --enable-wgetch-events is used.
+ + modify MKkey_defs.sh to hide ncurses' definition of
+ KEY_EVENTS to reduce Visual Studio C++ redefinition warnings.
+ * reduce build-warnings by excluding ncurses-internals from
+ deprecation warnings.
+
+ These are improvements to existing features:
+ * drop symbols GCC_PRINTF and GCC_SCANF from <curses.h>, to simplify
+ use.
+ * apply gcc format attribute to prototypes which use a va_list
+ parameter rather than a "..." variable-length parameter list.
+ * modify <term.h> so that it is not necessary to include <curses.h>
+ before <term.h>.
+ * provide for wide-characters as background character in wbkgrnd
+ * improve parameter-checking for tparm, adding function _nc_tiparm()
+ to handle the most-used case, which accepts only numeric
+ parameters.
+ * use return-value from vsnprintf to reallocate as needed to allow
+ for buffers larger than the screen size.
+ * add another fflush(stdout) in _nc_flush to handle time-delays in
+ the middle of strings such as flash when the application uses
+ low-level calls rather than curses.
+
+ These are corrections to existing features:
+ * add a check to guard against repeat_char emitting digits which
+ could be interpreted as BSD-style padding when --enable-bsdpad is
+ configured.
+ * check for screen size-change in scr_init and scr_restore, in case
+ a screen dump does not match the current screen dimensions
+
+ Program improvements
+
+ Several improvements were made to the utility programs:
+
+ tabs
+
+ + implement "+m" option
+
+ tic
+
+ + add check for duplicate "use=" clauses.
+ + add check to report instances where tparm would detect an
+ error in an expression.
+ + add user-defined capabilities from mintty to Caps-ncurses,
+ for checking consistency.
+ + improve warning when oc/op do not mention SGR 39/49 for xterm
+ compatible XT flag.
+ + improve checks for number of parameters of smglp, smgrp,
+ smgtp, and smgbp.
+ + improve "-c" option to validate the number and type of
+ parameters and compare against expected number/type before
+ deciding which set of parameter-lists to use in tparm calls.
+ + improve check for errors detected in tparm.
+ + improve format of output, to ensure that the messages contain
+ only printable text.
+ + modify to eliminate unnecessary "\" to escape ":" in terminfo
+ format.
+ + remove check that assumes that none or both parameterized and
+ non-parameterized margin-setting capabilities are present.
+
+ toe
+
+ + modify output of "toe -as" to show first description found
+ rather than the last.
+ + add a check to ensure that a "termcap file" is text rather
+ than binary.
+
+ tput
+
+ + modify to allow multiple commands per line.
+ + improve parameter-checking by analyzing all extended string
+ capabilities, e.g., as used in the Cs and Ms capabilities of
+ the tmux description.
+ + make warning messages consistently using alias names when
+ those are used, rather than the underlying program's name.
+ + improve usage message for aliases such as clear, by
+ eliminating tput-specific portions.
+ + modify initialization to avoid opening /dev/tty for cases
+ other than reset/init, e.g., for clear.
+
+ Examples
+
+ Along with the library and utilities, improvements were made to the
+ ncurses-examples. Most of this activity aimed at improving the
+ test-packages. A few changes are more generally useful, e.g., for the
+ main ncurses test-program, and for analyzing traces using the
+ tracemunch script:
+ * add "-r" option to the dots test-programs, to help with scripting
+ a performance comparison.
+ * build-fix for test_opaque, for configurations without opaque
+ curses structs, e.g., ncurses 5.7.
+ * improve tracemunch logic for "RUN" compaction.
+ * improve tracemunch's coverage of form/menu/panel libraries.
+ * improve tracemunch's checking/reporting the type for the first
+ parameter, e.g., "WINDOW*" rather than "#1".
+ * modify tracemunch and the panel library to show readable traces
+ for panel- and user-pointers.
+
+ There are other new demo/test programs and reusable examples:
+
+ back_ground
+ to exercise the wide-character background functions.
+
+ move_field
+ to demonstrate move_field, and a stub for a corresponding demo
+ of dup_field.
+
+ test_tparm
+ for checking tparm changes.
+
+ Terminal database
+
+ There are several new terminal descriptions:
+
+ absolute, att610+cvis, foot, foot-direct, hp98550-color,
+ hpterm-color2, hterm, hterm-256color, linux-s, putty+keypad,
+ putty+screen, putty-screen, screen.linux-s, scrt/securecrt,
+ tmux-direct, vt220+cvis, vt220+cvis8, vt220+pcedit, vt220+vtedit,
+ vt220-base, vt52+keypad, xterm+256color2, xterm+88color2,
+ xterm-direct16, xterm-direct256, xterm+nofkeys, and
+ xterm+nopcfkeys.
+
+ There are many changes to existing terminal descriptions. Some were
+ updates to several descriptions:
+ * correct use-ordering in some xterm-direct flavors
+ * fix some sgr inconsistencies in d230c, ibm6153, ibm6154,
+ ncrvt100an
+ * improve vt50h and vt52 based on DECScope manual
+ * use hp+arrows in a few places
+ * use hp+pfk-cr in a few places
+ * use vt220+cvis in st, terminology, termite since they ignore
+ blinking-cursor detail in att610+cvis
+
+ while others affected specific descriptions. These were retested, to
+ take into account changes by their developers:
+
+ kitty+common, mlterm3, ms-terminal
+
+ while these are specific fixes based on reviewing documentation, user
+ reports, or warnings from tic:
+
+ aaa+dec, aaa+rv
+ correct rmacs/smacs
+
+ aaa+rv
+ correct sgr
+
+ icl6404
+ correct csr
+
+ kitty
+ use att610+cvis, xterm+tmux and ansi+enq
+
+ konsole-base
+ re-enable "bel"
+
+ linux2.6
+ fix pound-sign mapping in acsc
+
+ linux3.0
+ modify to reflect default mapping of shift-tab by kbd 1.14
+
+ pccons
+ fill in some missing pieces, to make it comparable to the vt220
+ entry
+
+ putty
+ use vt100+fnkeys, add rep
+
+ screen
+ use vt100+enq
+
+ terminator
+ corrected tsl capability
+
+ ti916
+ correct cup
+
+ tmux
+ change kbs to ^?
+
+ vt220
+ use vt220+cvis
+
+ vt420+lrmm
+ add smglp and smgrp
+
+ vt420
+ use vt420+lrmm
+
+ xterm-new
+ add nel
+
+ xterm-vt52
+ use vt52+keypad
+
+ A few entries use extensions (user-defined terminal capabilities):
+ * add shifted Linux console keys in linux+sfkeys entry for
+ screen.linux
+ * add Smulx to alacritty
+ * add kbeg to xterm+keypad to accommodate termcap applications
+ * add extensions in xterm+tmux and ecma+strikeout to ms-terminal,
+ but cancel the non-working Cr and Ms capabilities
+
+ Documentation
+
+ As usual, this release
+ * improves documentation by describing new features,
+ * attempts to improve the description of features which users have
+ found confusing
+ * fills in overlooked descriptions of features which were described
+ in the NEWS file but treated sketchily in manual pages.
+
+ In addition to providing background information to explain these
+ features and show how they evolved, there are corrections,
+ clarifications, etc.:
+ * Corrections:
+ + make opts extension for getcchar work as documented for
+ ncurses 6.1, adding "-g" flag to demo_new_pair to illustrate.
+ + modify tset "-q" option to refrain from modifying terminal
+ modes, to match the documentation.
+ * New/improved history and portability sections:
+ + improve documentation for tparm and static/dynamic variables.
+ + add history note to curs_scanw.3x for <stdarg.h> and
+ <varargs.h>
+ + add history note to curs_printw.3x for <stdarg.h> and
+ <varargs.h>
+ + add portability note to ncurses.3x regarding <stdarg.h>
+ + add historical notes to tput, curses-terminfo and
+ curses-color manpages based on source-code for SVr2, SVr3 and
+ SVr4.
+ + improve history section for tset manpage based on the 1BSD
+ tarball, which preceded BSD's SCCS checkins by more than
+ three years.
+ * Other improvements:
+ + explain in ncurses.3x that functions in the tinfo library do
+ not rely upon wide-characters.
+ + improve manual page for panel library, extending the
+ portability section as well as documenting error-returns.
+ + add section on margins to terminfo.5, adapted from X/Open
+ Curses.
+ + improve man/term.5 section on legacy storage format.
+ + add a note in terminfo.5 explaining that no-parameter strings
+ such as sgr0 or cnorm should not be used with tparm.
+ + improve description of BSD-style padding in curs_termcap.3x
+ + improve discussion of padding versus tparm and tputs in
+ man/curs_terminfo.3x
+ + add a note in manual page to explain ungetch vs unget_wch.
+ + improve description of error-returns in waddch and waddnstr
+ manual pages.
+
+ There are no new manual pages (all of the manual page updates are to
+ existing pages).
+
+ Some of the improvements are more subtle, relating to the way the
+ information is presented. For instance, hyphenation is suppressed in
+ the HTML files generated from manual pages because an upgrade to groff
+ gave noticeably poorer results, interfering with the process of
+ creating links between the resulting webpages.
+
+ Interesting bug-fixes
+
+ While there were many bugs fixed during development of ncurses 6.3,
+ only a few (the reason for this release) were both important and
+ interesting. Most of the bug-fixes were for local issues which did not
+ affect compatibility across releases. Since those are detailed in the
+ NEWS file no elaboration is needed here.
+
+ The interesting bugs were:
+ * modify wbkgd and wbkgrnd to avoid storing a null in the background
+ character, because it may be used in cases where the corresponding
+ 0x80 is not treated as a null.
+ This was a regression introduced in ncurses 6.2 (reported on the
+ mailing list), for which the workaround was to specify a blank for
+ the background character.
+ * remove output-related checks for nl/nonl (also reported on the
+ mailing list).
+ * improve tparm implementation of %P and %g, more closely matching
+ SVr4 terminfo. Those denote static and dynamic variables in
+ terminfo expressions.
+ Exactly what those terms meant was never documented before in any
+ implementation of curses, aside from source code. Unlike the other
+ two fixes, the problem was discovered while studying OpenBSD's
+ version of tset.
+
+ Configuration changes
+
+ Major changes
+
+ There are no major changes. Several new options were added to ease
+ integration of packages with systems using different versions of GNAT
+ and ncurses. Also, improvements were made to configure checks.
+
+ Configuration options
+
+ There are a few new/modified configure options:
+
+ --enable-fvisibility
+ new configure option and check for gcc -fvisibility=hidden
+ feature
+
+ --enable-leaks
+ corrected to allow turning leak-checking off later in a set of
+ options.
+
+ --enable-stdnoreturn
+ new configure option makes the _Noreturn keyword optional to
+ ease transition.
+
+ --disable-pkg-ldflags
+ revised option also controls whether $LDFLAGS from the build is
+ provided in "-config" and ".pc" files.
+
+ --disable-root-access
+ add configure option which tells ncurses to disallow most
+ file-opens by setuid processes.
+
+ --disable-wattr-macros
+ changed default to help packagers who reuse wide ncursesw
+ header file with non-wide ncurses library.
+
+ --with-pkg-config-libdir
+ revised option uses the actual search path from pkg-config or
+ pkgconf using the output from --debug.
+
+ --with-ada-libname
+ --with-form-libname
+ --with-menu-libname
+ --with-panel-libname
+ new several --with-xxx-libname options, to help with pkgsrc
+
+ Portability
+
+ Many of the portability changes are implemented via the configure
+ script:
+ * add a special case in the configure script to work around one of
+ the build-time breakages reported for OpenBSD 6 here:
+
+ https://www.mail-archive.com/bugs@openbsd.org/msg13200.html
+ * modify configure check for libtool to prevent accidental use of an
+ OpenBSD program which uses the same name.
+ * modify configuration checks for build-time tic/infocmp to use
+ AC_CHECK_TOOL. That can still be overridden by --with-tic-path and
+ --with-infocmp-path when fallbacks are used, but even if not using
+ fallbacks, the improved check may help with cross-compiling.
+ * relax modification-time comparison in CF_LINK_FUNCS to allow it to
+ accept link() function with NFS filesystems which change the mtime
+ on the link target, e.g., several BSD systems.
+ * modify configure check for c89/c99 aliases of clang to use its
+ -std option instead, because some platforms, in particular macOS,
+ do not provide workable c89/c99 aliases.
+ * modify CF_NCURSES_CONFIG to work around Xcode's c99 "-W" option,
+ which conflicts with conventional use for passing linker options.
+ * modify configure scripts to filter out redefinitions of
+ _XOPEN_SOURCE, e.g., for NetBSD which generally supports 500, but
+ 600 is needed for ncursesw.
+
+ Here are some of the other portability fixes:
+ * change configure-check and source-code for gcc's noreturn
+ attribute to assume it is a prefix rather than suffix, matching
+ c11's _Noreturn convention.
+ * modify mk-1st.awk to account for extra-suffix configure option.
+ * build-fix for termsort module when configured with termcap.
+ * modify configure script and makefiles to support ".PHONY" make
+ program feature.
+ * amend libtool configuration to add dependency for install.tic,
+ etc., in ncurses/Makefile on the lower-level libraries.
+ * modify Ada95 source-generation utility to write to a file given as
+ parameter rather than to the standard output, allowing builds with
+ MinGW.
+ * amend tic/infocmp check to allow for the respective tool's
+ absence.
+ * build-fixes for gnat 10.1.1, whose gnatmake drops integration with
+ gprbuild.
+ * correct configure version-check/warning for g++ to allow for 10.x
+ _________________________________________________________________
+
+Features of ncurses
+
+ The ncurses package is fully upward-compatible with SVr4 (System V
+ Release 4) curses:
+ * All of the SVr4 calls have been implemented (and are documented).
+ * ncurses supports all of the for SVr4 curses features including
+ keyboard mapping, color, forms-drawing with ACS characters, and
+ automatic recognition of keypad and function keys.
+ * ncurses provides these SVr4 add-on libraries (not part of X/Open
+ Curses):
+ + the panels library, supporting a stack of windows with
+ backing store.
+ + the menus library, supporting a uniform but flexible
+ interface for menu programming.
+ + the form library, supporting data collection through
+ on-screen forms.
+ * ncurses's terminal database is fully compatible with that used by
+ SVr4 curses.
+ + ncurses supports user-defined capabilities which it can see,
+ but which are hidden from SVr4 curses applications using the
+ same terminal database.
+ + It can be optionally configured to match the format used in
+ related systems such as AIX and Tru64.
+ + Alternatively, ncurses can be configured to use hashed
+ databases rather than the directory of files used by SVr4
curses.
- + fixes for test programs to build/work on HPUX and AIX, etc.
-
- Features of Ncurses
-
- The ncurses package is fully compatible with SVr4 (System V Release 4)
- curses:
- * All 257 of the SVr4 calls have been implemented (and are
- documented).
- * Full support for SVr4 curses features including keyboard mapping,
- color, forms-drawing with ACS characters, and automatic
- recognition of keypad and function keys.
- * An emulation of the SVr4 panels library, supporting a stack of
- windows with backing store, is included.
- * An emulation of the SVr4 menus library, supporting a uniform but
- flexible interface for menu programming, is included.
- * An emulation of the SVr4 form library, supporting data collection
- through on-screen forms, is included.
- * Binary terminfo entries generated by the ncurses tic(1)
- implementation are bit-for-bit-compatible with the entry format
- SVr4 curses uses.
- * The utilities have options to allow you to filter terminfo entries
- for use with less capable curses/terminfo versions such as the
- HP/UX and AIX ports.
+ * The ncurses utilities have options to allow you to filter terminfo
+ entries for use with less capable curses/terminfo versions such as
+ the HP-UX and AIX ports.
The ncurses package also has many useful extensions over SVr4:
* The API is 8-bit clean and base-level conformant with the X/OPEN
use of function keys, e.g., disabling the ncurses KEY_MOUSE, or by
defining more than one control sequence to map to a given key
code.
- * Support for 256-color terminals, such as modern xterm, when
- configured using the --enable-ext-colors option.
+ * Support for direct-color terminals, such as modern xterm.
+ * Support for 256-color terminals, such as modern xterm.
* Support for 16-color terminals, such as aixterm and modern xterm.
* Better cursor-movement optimization. The package now features a
cursor-local-movement computation more efficient than either BSD's
types even when no terminfo tree or termcap file is accessible
(this may be useful for support of screen-oriented programs that
must run in single-user mode).
- * The tic(1)/captoinfo utility provided with ncurses has the ability
- to translate many termcaps from the XENIX, IBM and AT&T extension
+ * The tic/captoinfo utility provided with ncurses has the ability to
+ translate many termcaps from the XENIX, IBM and AT&T extension
sets.
- * A BSD-like tset(1) utility is provided.
+ * A BSD-like tset utility is provided.
* The ncurses library and utilities will automatically read terminfo
entries from $HOME/.terminfo if it exists, and compile to that
directory if it exists and the user has no write access to the
other entries in the same source file (as in System V) but also to
compiled entries in either the system terminfo directory or the
user's $HOME/.terminfo directory.
- * A script (capconvert) is provided to help BSD users transition
- from termcap to terminfo. It gathers the information in a TERMCAP
- environment variable and/or a ~/.termcap local entries file and
- converts it to an equivalent local terminfo tree under
- $HOME/.terminfo.
- * Automatic fallback to the /etc/termcap file can be compiled in
- when it is not possible to build a terminfo tree. This feature is
- neither fast nor cheap, you don't want to use it unless you have
- to, but it's there.
* The table-of-entries utility toe makes it easy for users to see
exactly what terminal types are available on the system.
* The library meets the XSI requirement that every macro entry point
- have a corresponding function which may be linked (and will be
+ has a corresponding function which may be linked (and will be
prototype-checked) if the macro definition is disabled with
#undef.
- * An HTML "Introduction to Programming with NCURSES" document
- provides a narrative introduction to the curses programming
- interface.
+ * Extensive documentation is provided (see the Additional Reading
+ section of the ncurses FAQ for online documentation).
+
+Applications using ncurses
+
+ The ncurses distribution includes a selection of test programs
+ (including a few games). These are available separately as
+ ncurses-examples
- State of the Package
+ The ncurses library has been tested with a wide variety of
+ applications including:
- Numerous bugs present in earlier versions have been fixed; the library
- is far more reliable than it used to be. Bounds checking in many
- `dangerous' entry points has been improved. The code is now type-safe
- according to gcc -Wall. The library has been checked for malloc leaks
- and arena corruption by the Purify memory-allocation tester.
+ aptitude
+ FrontEnd to Apt, the debian package manager
- The ncurses code has been tested with a wide variety of applications
- including (versions starting with those noted):
+ https://wiki.debian.org/Aptitude
cdk
Curses Development Kit
- [4]http://invisible-island.net/cdk/
- [5]http://www.vexus.ca/products/CDK/
+
+ https://invisible-island.net/cdk/
ded
directory-editor
- [6]http://invisible-island.net/ded/
+
+ https://invisible-island.net/ded/
dialog
the underlying application used in Slackware's setup, and the
- basis for similar applications on GNU/Linux.
- [7]http://invisible-island.net/dialog/
+ basis for similar install/configure applications on many
+ systems.
+
+ https://invisible-island.net/dialog/
lynx
- the character-screen WWW browser
- [8]http://lynx.isc.org/release/
+ the text WWW browser
- Midnight Commander
- file manager
- [9]http://www.midnight-commander.org/
+ https://lynx.invisible-island.net/
mutt
mail utility
- [10]http://www.mutt.org/
+
+ http://www.mutt.org/
ncftp
file-transfer utility
- [11]http://www.ncftp.com/
+
+ https://www.ncftp.com/
nvi
- New vi versions 1.50 are able to use ncurses versions 1.9.7 and
- later.
- [12]https://sites.google.com/a/bostic.com/keithbostic/nvi
+ New vi uses ncurses.
+
+ https://sites.google.com/a/bostic.com/keithbostic/vi
+
+ ranger
+ A console file manager with VI key bindings in Python.
- pinfo
- Lynx-like info browser.
- [13]https://alioth.debian.org/projects/pinfo/
+ https://ranger.github.io/
tin
- newsreader, supporting color, MIME [14]http://www.tin.org/
+ newsreader, supporting color, MIME
+
+ http://www.tin.org/
+
+ vifm
+ File manager with vi like keybindings
+
+ https://vifm.info/
as well as some that use ncurses for the terminfo support alone:
minicom
- terminal emulator
- [15]http://alioth.debian.org/projects/minicom/
+ terminal emulator for serial modem connections
+
+ https://alioth.debian.org/projects/minicom/
+
+ mosh
+ a replacement for ssh.
+
+ https://mosh.org/
+
+ tack
+ terminfo action checker
+
+ https://invisible-island.net/ncurses/tack.html
+
+ tmux
+ terminal multiplexor
+
+ https://github.com/tmux/tmux/wiki
vile
- vi-like-emacs
- [16]http://invisible-island.net/vile/
+ vi-like-emacs may be built to use the terminfo, termcap or
+ curses interfaces.
- The ncurses distribution includes a selection of test programs
- (including a few games).
+ https://invisible-island.net/vile/
+
+ and finally, those which use only the termcap interface:
+
+ emacs
+ text editor
+
+ https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/
+
+ less
+ The most commonly used pager (a program that displays text
+ files).
+
+ http://www.greenwoodsoftware.com/less/
+
+ screen
+ terminal multiplexor
+
+ https://www.gnu.org/software/screen/
+
+ vim
+ text editor
+
+ https://www.vim.org/
-Who's Who and What's What
+Development activities
- Zeyd Ben-Halim started it from a previous package pcurses, written by
- Pavel Curtis. Eric S. Raymond continued development. Juergen Pfeifer
- wrote most of the form and menu libraries. Ongoing work is being done
- by [17]Thomas Dickey. Thomas Dickey acts as the maintainer for the
- Free Software Foundation, which holds the copyright on ncurses.
- Contact the current maintainers at [18]bug-ncurses@gnu.org.
+ Zeyd Ben-Halim started ncurses from a previous package pcurses,
+ written by Pavel Curtis. Eric S. Raymond continued development.
+ Juergen Pfeifer wrote most of the form and menu libraries.
- To join the ncurses mailing list, please write email to
- bug-ncurses-request@gnu.org containing the line:
- subscribe <name>@<host.domain>
+ Ongoing development work is done by Thomas E. Dickey. Thomas E. Dickey
+ has acted as the maintainer for the Free Software Foundation, which
+ held a copyright on ncurses for releases 4.2 through 6.1. Following
+ the release of ncurses 6.1, effective as of release 6.2, copyright for
+ ncurses reverted to Thomas E. Dickey (see the ncurses FAQ for
+ additional information).
+
+ Contact the current maintainers at
+
+ bug-ncurses@gnu.org
+
+ To join the ncurses mailing list, please write email to
+
+ bug-ncurses-request@gnu.org
+
+ containing the line:
+
+ subscribe <name>@<host.domain>
This list is open to anyone interested in helping with the development
and testing of this package.
- Beta versions of ncurses and patches to the current release are made
- available at [19]ftp://invisible-island.net/ncurses/ .
+ Beta versions of ncurses are made available at
+
+ ftp://ftp.invisible-island.net/ncurses/current/ and
+ https://invisible-mirror.net/archives/ncurses/current/ .
+
+ Patches to the current release are made available at
+
+ ftp://ftp.invisible-island.net/ncurses/6.2/ and
+ https://invisible-mirror.net/archives/ncurses/6.2/ .
+
+ There is an archive of the mailing list here:
-Future Plans
+ http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-ncurses (also https)
- * Extended-level XPG4 conformance, with internationalization
- support.
- * Ports to more systems, including DOS and Windows.
+Related resources
- We need people to help with these projects. If you are interested in
- working on them, please join the ncurses list.
+ The release notes make scattered references to these pages, which may
+ be interesting by themselves:
+ * ncurses licensing
+ * Symbol versioning in ncurses
+ * Comments on ncurses versus slang (S-Lang)
+ * Comments on OpenBSD
+ * tack - terminfo action checker
+ * tctest - termcap library checker
+ * Terminal Database
-Other Related Resources
+Other resources
The distribution provides a newer version of the terminfo-format
- terminal description file once maintained by [20]Eric Raymond . Unlike
- the older version, the termcap and terminfo data are provided in the
- same file, and provides several user-definable extensions beyond the
+ terminal description file once maintained by Eric Raymond . Unlike the
+ older version, the termcap and terminfo data are provided in the same
+ file, which also provides several user-definable extensions beyond the
X/Open specification.
You can find lots of information on terminal-related topics not
- covered in the terminfo file at [21]Richard Shuford's archive .
-
-References
-
- 1. ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/ncurses/
- 2. ftp://invisible-island.net/ncurses/
- 3. http://invisible-island.net/cindent/cindent.html
- 4. http://invisible-island.net/cdk/
- 5. http://www.vexus.ca/products/CDK/
- 6. http://invisible-island.net/ded/
- 7. http://invisible-island.net/dialog/
- 8. http://lynx.isc.org/release/
- 9. http://www.midnight-commander.org/
- 10. http://www.mutt.org/
- 11. http://www.ncftp.com/
- 12. https://sites.google.com/a/bostic.com/keithbostic/nvi
- 13. https://alioth.debian.org/projects/pinfo/
- 14. http://www.tin.org/
- 15. http://alioth.debian.org/projects/minicom/
- 16. http://invisible-island.net/vile/
- 17. mailto:dickey@invisible-island.net
- 18. mailto:bug-ncurses@gnu.org
- 19. ftp://invisible-island.net/ncurses/
- 20. http://www.catb.org/~esr/terminfo/
- 21. http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.cs.utk.edu/~shuford/terminal
+ covered in the terminfo file at Richard Shuford's archive . The
+ collection of computer manuals at bitsavers.org has also been useful.
+
+ * Overview
+ * Release Notes
+ + Library improvements
+ o New features
+ o Other improvements
+ + Program improvements
+ o Utilities
+ o Examples
+ + Terminal database
+ + Documentation
+ + Interesting bug-fixes
+ + Configuration changes
+ o Major changes
+ o Configuration options
+ + Portability
+ * Features of ncurses
+ * Applications using ncurses
+ * Development activities
+ * Related resources
+ * Other resources