1 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2 -- Copyright 2018-2022,2023 Thomas E. Dickey --
3 -- Copyright 1998-2017,2018 Free Software Foundation, Inc. --
5 -- Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a --
6 -- copy of this software and associated documentation files (the --
7 -- "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including --
8 -- without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, --
9 -- distribute, distribute with modifications, sublicense, and/or sell copies --
10 -- of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished --
11 -- to do so, subject to the following conditions: --
13 -- The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included --
14 -- in all copies or substantial portions of the Software. --
16 -- THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS --
17 -- OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF --
18 -- MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN --
19 -- NO EVENT SHALL THE ABOVE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, --
20 -- DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR --
21 -- OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE --
22 -- USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE. --
24 -- Except as contained in this notice, the name(s) of the above copyright --
25 -- holders shall not be used in advertising or otherwise to promote the --
26 -- sale, use or other dealings in this Software without prior written --
28 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
29 -- $Id: INSTALL,v 1.246 2023/06/17 17:18:20 tom Exp $
30 ---------------------------------------------------------------------
31 How to install Ncurses/Terminfo on your system
32 ---------------------------------------------------------------------
34 ************************************************************
35 * READ ALL OF THIS FILE BEFORE YOU TRY TO INSTALL NCURSES. *
36 ************************************************************
38 You should be reading the file INSTALL in a directory called ncurses-d.d, where
39 d.d is the current version number. There should be several subdirectories,
40 including `c++', `form', `man', `menu', 'misc', `ncurses', `panel', `progs',
41 and `test'. See the README file for a roadmap to the package.
43 If you are a distribution integrator or packager, please read and act on the
44 section titled FOR SYSTEM INTEGRATORS below.
46 If you are converting from BSD curses and do not have root access, be sure
47 to read the BSD CONVERSION NOTES section below.
49 If you are trying to build applications using gpm with ncurses,
50 read the USING NCURSES WITH GPM section below.
52 If you are cross-compiling, see the note below on BUILDING WITH A CROSS-COMPILER.
54 If you want to build the Ada95 binding, go to the Ada95 directory and
55 follow the instructions there. The Ada95 binding is not covered below.
61 You will need the following to build and install ncurses under UNIX:
63 * ANSI C compiler (gcc, for instance)
65 * awk (mawk or gawk will do)
67 * BSD or System V style install (a script is enclosed)
69 Ncurses has been also built in the OS/2 EMX environment.
72 INSTALLATION PROCEDURE:
73 ----------------------
75 1. First, decide whether you want ncurses to replace your existing library (in
76 which case you'll need super-user privileges) or be installed in parallel
79 The --prefix option to configure changes the root directory for installing
80 ncurses. The default is normally in subdirectories of /usr/local, except
81 for systems where ncurses is normally installed as a system library (see
82 "IF YOU ARE A SYSTEM INTEGRATOR"). Use --prefix=/usr to replace your
83 default curses distribution.
85 The package gets installed beneath the --prefix directory as follows:
87 In $(prefix)/bin: tic, infocmp, captoinfo, tset,
88 reset, clear, tput, toe, tabs
89 In $(prefix)/lib: libncurses*.* libcurses.a
90 In $(prefix)/share/terminfo: compiled terminal descriptions
91 In $(prefix)/include: C header files
92 Under $(prefix)/man: the manual pages
94 Note that the configure script attempts to locate previous installation of
95 ncurses, and will set the default prefix according to where it finds the
98 Do not use commands such as
100 make install prefix=XXX
102 to change the prefix after configuration, since the prefix value is used
103 for some absolute pathnames such as TERMINFO. Instead do this
105 make install DESTDIR=XXX
107 See also the discussion of --with-install-prefix.
109 2. Type `./configure' in the top-level directory of the distribution to
110 configure ncurses for your operating system and create the Makefiles.
111 Besides --prefix, various configuration options are available to customize
112 the installation; use `./configure --help' to list the available options.
114 If your operating system is not supported, read the PORTABILITY section in
115 the file ncurses/README for information on how to create a configuration
116 file for your system.
118 The `configure' script generates makefile rules for one or more object
119 models and their associated libraries:
121 libncurses.a (normal)
123 libcurses.a (normal, a link to libncurses.a)
124 This gets left out if you configure with --disable-overwrite.
126 libncurses.so (shared)
128 libncurses_g.a (debug)
130 libncurses_p.a (profile)
132 libncurses.la (libtool)
134 If you configure using the --enable-widec option, a "w" is appended to the
135 library names (e.g., libncursesw.a), and the resulting libraries support
136 wide-characters, e.g., via a UTF-8 locale. The corresponding header files
137 are compatible with the non-wide-character configuration; wide-character
138 features are provided by ifdef's in the header files. The wide-character
139 library interfaces are not binary-compatible with the non-wide-character
140 version. Building and running the wide-character code relies on a fairly
141 recent implementation of libiconv. We have built this configuration on
142 various systems using libiconv, sometimes requiring libutf8.
144 If you configure using the --with-pthread option, a "t" is appended to
145 the library names (e.g., libncursest.a, libncursestw.a).
147 If you do not specify any models, the normal and debug libraries will be
148 configured. Typing `configure' with no arguments is equivalent to:
150 ./configure --with-normal --with-debug --enable-overwrite
154 ./configure --with-shared
156 makes the shared libraries the default, resulting in
158 ./configure --with-shared --with-normal --with-debug --enable-overwrite
160 If you want only shared libraries, type
162 ./configure --with-shared --without-normal --without-debug
164 Rules for generating shared libraries are highly dependent upon the choice
165 of host system and compiler. We've been testing shared libraries on
166 several systems, but more work needs to be done to make shared libraries
167 work on other systems.
169 If you have libtool installed, you can type
171 ./configure --with-libtool
173 to generate the appropriate static and/or shared libraries for your
174 platform using libtool.
176 You can make curses and terminfo fall back to an existing file of termcap
177 definitions by configuring with --enable-termcap. If you do this, the
178 library will search /etc/termcap before the terminfo database, and will
179 also interpret the contents of the TERM environment variable. See the
180 section BSD CONVERSION NOTES below.
182 3. Type `make'. Ignore any warnings, no error messages should be produced.
183 This should compile the ncurses library, the terminfo compiler tic(1),
184 captoinfo(1), infocmp(1), toe(1), clear(1) tset(1), reset(1), and tput(1)
185 programs (see the manual pages for explanation of what they do), some test
186 programs, and the panels, menus, and forms libraries.
188 4. Run ncurses and several other test programs in the test directory to
189 verify that ncurses functions correctly before doing an install that
190 may overwrite system files. Read the file test/README for details on
193 NOTE: You must have installed the terminfo database, or set the
194 environment variable $TERMINFO to point to a SVr4-compatible terminfo
195 database before running the test programs. Not all vendors' terminfo
196 databases are SVr4-compatible, but most seem to be.
198 It is possible to configure ncurses to use other terminfo database formats.
199 A few are provided as examples in the include-directory (see --with-caps).
201 If you run the test programs WITHOUT installing terminfo, ncurses may
202 read the termcap file and cache that in $HOME/.terminfo, which will
203 thereafter be used instead of the terminfo database. See the comments
204 on "--enable-getcap-cache", to see why this is a Bad Thing.
206 The ncurses program is designed specifically to test the ncurses library.
207 You can use it to verify that the screen highlights work correctly, that
208 cursor addressing and window scrolling works OK, etc.
210 5. Once you've tested, you can type `make install' to install libraries,
211 the programs, the terminfo database and the manual pages. Alternately, you
212 can type `make install' in each directory you want to install. In the
213 top-level directory, you can do a partial install using these commands:
215 'make install.progs' installs tic, infocmp, etc...
216 'make install.includes' installs the headers.
217 'make install.libs' installs the libraries (and the headers).
218 'make install.data' installs the terminfo data. (Note: `tic' must
219 be installed before the terminfo data can be
221 'make install.man' installs the manual pages.
223 ############################################################################
224 # CAVEAT EMPTOR: `install.data' run as root will NUKE any existing #
225 # terminfo database. If you have any custom or unusual entries SAVE them #
226 # before you install ncurses. #
227 ############################################################################
229 The terminfo(5) manual page must be preprocessed with tbl(1) before
230 being formatted by nroff(1). Modern man(1) implementations tend to do
231 this by default, but you may want to look at your version's manual page
232 to be sure. You may also install the manual pages after preprocessing
233 with tbl(1) by specifying the configure option --with-manpage-tbl.
235 If the system already has a curses library that you need to keep using
236 you'll need to distinguish between it and ncurses. See the discussion of
237 --disable-overwrite. If ncurses is installed outside the standard
238 directories (/usr/include and /usr/lib) then all your users will need to
239 use the -I option to compile programs and -L to link them.
241 If you have another curses installed in your system and you accidentally
242 compile using its curses.h you'll end up with a large number of
243 undefined symbols at link time.
245 IF YOU DO NOT HAVE ROOT: Change directory to the `progs' subdirectory
246 and run the `capconvert' script. This script will deduce various things
247 about your environment and use them to build you a private terminfo tree,
248 so you can use ncurses applications.
250 If more than one user at your site does this, the space for the duplicate
251 trees is wasted. Try to get your site administrators to install a system-
252 wide terminfo tree instead.
254 See the BSD CONVERSION NOTES section below for a few more details.
256 6. The c++ directory has C++ classes that are built on top of ncurses and
257 panels. You must have c++ (and its libraries) installed before you can
258 compile and run the demo.
260 Use --without-cxx-binding to tell configure to not build the C++ bindings
263 If you do not have C++, you must use the --without-cxx option to tell
264 the configure script to not attempt to determine the type of 'bool'
265 which may be supported by C++. IF YOU USE THIS OPTION, BE ADVISED THAT
266 YOU MAY NOT BE ABLE TO COMPILE (OR RUN) NCURSES APPLICATIONS WITH C++.
272 The configure script provides a short list of its options when you type
276 The --help and several options are common to all configure scripts that are
277 generated with autoconf. Those are all listed before the line
279 --enable and --with options recognized:
281 The other options are specific to this package. We list them in alphabetic
284 --disable-assumed-color
285 With ncurses 5.1, we introduced a new function, assume_default_colors()
286 which allows applications to specify what the default foreground and
287 background color are assumed to be. Most color applications use
288 full-screen color; but a few do not color the background. While the
289 assumed values can be overridden by invoking assume_default_colors(),
290 you may find it useful to set the assumed values to the pre-5.1
291 convention, using this configure option.
294 Assume machine has little memory. The configure script attempts to
295 determine if your machine has enough memory (about 6Mb) to compile the
296 terminfo database without writing portions to disk. Some allocators
297 return deceptive results, so you may have to override the configure
298 script. Or you may be building tic for a smaller machine.
300 --disable-big-strings
301 Disable compile-time optimization of predefined tables which puts
302 all of their strings into a very long string, to reduce relocation
306 Use only built-in data. The ncurses libraries normally read terminfo
307 and termcap data from disk. You can configure ncurses to have a
308 built-in database, aka "fallback" entries. Embedded applications may
309 have no need for an external database. Some, but not all of the
310 programs are useful in this configuration, e.g., tset and tput versus
314 Do not install the terminal database. This is used to omit features
315 for packages, as done with --without-progs.
318 Use the option --disable-echo to make the build-log less verbose by
319 suppressing the display of the compile and link commands. This makes
320 it easier to see the compiler warnings. (You can always use "make -n"
321 to see the options that are used).
324 Disable function-extensions. Configure ncurses without the functions
325 that are not specified by XSI. See ncurses/modules for the exact
326 list of library modules that would be suppressed.
328 --disable-gnat-projects
329 Disable GNAT projects even if usable, for testing old makefile rules.
332 Compile without hashmap scrolling-optimization code. This algorithm is
335 --disable-home-terminfo
336 The $HOME/.terminfo directory is normally added to ncurses' search
337 list for reading/writing terminfo entries, since that directory is
338 more likely writable than the system terminfo database. Use this
339 option to disable the feature altogether.
342 Disable compiler flags needed to use large-file interfaces.
345 For testing, compile-in code that frees memory that normally would not
346 be freed, to simplify analysis of memory-leaks.
348 Any implementation of curses must not free the memory associated with
349 a screen, since (even after calling endwin()), it must be available
350 for use in the next call to refresh(). There are also chunks of
351 memory held for performance reasons. That makes it hard to analyze
352 curses applications for memory leaks. To work around this, build a
353 debugging version of the ncurses library which frees those chunks
354 which it can, and provides the _nc_free_and_exit() function to free
355 the remainder and then exit. The ncurses utility and test programs
356 use this feature, e.g., via the ExitProgram() macro.
358 Because this lies outside of the library's intended usage, it is not
359 normally considered part of the ABI. If there were some (as yet
360 unplanned) extension which frees memory in a manner that would let the
361 library resume and reallocate memory, then that would not use a "_nc_"
364 --disable-lib-suffixes
365 Suppress the "w", "t" or "tw" suffixes which normally would be added
366 to the library names for the --enable-widec and --with-pthread options.
368 --disable-libtool-version
369 when using --with-libtool, control how the major/minor version numbers
370 are used for constructing the library name.
372 The default uses the -version-number feature of libtool, which makes
373 the library names compatible (though not identical) with the standard
374 build using --with-shared.
376 Use --disable-libtool-version to use the libtool -version-info feature.
377 This corresponds to the setting used before patch 20100515.
379 Starting with patch 20141115, using this option causes the configure
380 script to apply the top-level VERSION file to the ABI version used
384 The header files will ignore use of the _LP64 symbol to make chtype
385 and mmask_t types 32 bits (they may be long on 64-bit hosts, for
386 compatibility with older releases).
388 NOTE: this is potentially an ABI change, depending on existing
389 packages. The default for this option is "disabled" for ncurses
390 ABI 5, and "enabled" for ABI 6.
393 For testing, use functions rather than macros. The program will run
394 more slowly, but it is simpler to debug. This defines NCURSES_NOMACROS
395 at build time. See also the --enable-expanded option.
398 If you are installing ncurses on a system which contains another
399 development version of curses, or which could be confused by the loader
400 for another version, we recommend that you leave out the link to
401 -lcurses. The ncurses library is always available as -lncurses.
402 Disabling overwrite also causes the ncurses header files to be
403 installed into a subdirectory, e.g., /usr/local/include/ncurses,
404 rather than the include directory. This makes it simpler to avoid
405 compile-time conflicts with other versions of curses.h
407 Putting the header files into a subdirectory assumes that applications
408 will follow the (standard) practice of including the headers with
409 reference to the subdirectory name. For instance, the normal ncurses
410 header would be included using
412 #include <ncurses/curses.h>
413 #include <ncurses/term.h>
415 while the ncursesw headers would be found this way:
417 #include <ncursesw/curses.h>
418 #include <ncursesw/term.h>
420 In either case (with or without the --disable-overwrite option),
421 almost all applications are designed to include a related set of
422 curses header files from the same directory.
424 Manipulating the --includedir configure option to put header files
425 directly in a subdirectory of the normal include-directory defeats
426 this, and breaks builds of portable applications. Likewise, putting
427 some headers in /usr/include, and others in a subdirectory is a good
430 When configured with --disable-overwrite, the installed header files'
431 embedded #include's are adjusted to use the same style of includes
432 noted above. In particular, the unctrl.h header is included from
433 curses.h, which means that a makefile which tells the compiler to
434 include directly from the subdirectory will fail to compile correctly.
435 Without some special effort, it will either fail to compile at all,
436 or the compiler may find a different unctrl.h file.
438 In addition to the curses library, a system may provide its own
439 versions of the add-on libraries (form, menu, panel), which would
440 not be compatible with ncurses. These options allow you to rename
441 ncurses' add-on libraries to avoid conflicts when linking:
443 --with-form-libname=XXX
444 --with-menu-libname=XXX
445 --with-panel-libname=XXX
447 Rather than renaming them arbitrarily, a prefix or suffix is
448 recommended. An "n" prefix provides consistency with ncurses versus
451 --with-form-libname=nform
452 --with-menu-libname=nmenu
453 --with-panel-libname=npanel
455 --disable-pkg-ldflags
456 Omit options in $LDFLAGS and $EXTRA_LDFLAGS from the pkg-config ".pc"
457 and corresponding ncurses*-config script which normally are listed via
458 the "--libs" option. These options are normally used to facilitate
459 linking to ncurses when it was configured to use the rpath feature.
461 See also --enable-rpath and --disable-rpath-hack.
464 If --enable-rpath is given, the generated makefiles normally will
465 rebuild shared libraries during install. Use this option to simply
466 copy whatever the linker produced.
468 Static libraries cannot simply be copied because tools use timestamps
469 to determine if the library's symbol table is up to date. If your
470 install program supports the "-p" (preserve timestamp) option, that
471 is used when --disable-relink is given, to avoid rebuilding the symbol
474 Finally, some tools ignore the subsecond timestamps supported by some
475 filesystems. This option adds a 1-second sleep to help those tools
476 avoid unnecessary relinking during the install process.
478 --disable-root-access
479 Compile with environment restriction, so most file-access is limited
480 when running as root, or via a setuid/setgid application.
482 --disable-root-environ
483 Compile with environment restriction, so certain environment variables
484 are not available when running as root. These are (for example
485 $TERMINFO) those that allow the search path for the terminfo or termcap
486 entry to be customized.
488 Disabling the root environment variables also disables the setuid
489 environment variables by default. Use the --disable-setuid-environ
490 option to modify this behavior.
493 Normally the configure script helps link libraries found in unusual
494 places by adding an rpath option to the link command. If you are
495 building packages, this feature may be redundant. Use this option
496 to suppress the feature.
498 --disable-scroll-hints
499 Compile without scroll-hints code. This option is ignored when
500 hashmap scrolling is configured, which is the default.
503 Do not strip installed executables.
505 --disable-setuid-environ
506 Compile with environment restriction, so certain environment variables
507 are not available when running via a setuid/setgid application. These
508 are (for example $TERMINFO) those that allow the search path for the
509 terminfo or termcap entry to be customized.
511 A setuid/setgid application inherits its environment variables from
512 the current user, in contrast to sudo which may limit the environment
513 variables that ncurses uses.
515 --disable-tic-depends
516 When building shared libraries, normally the tic library is linked to
517 depend upon the ncurses library (or equivalently, on the tinfo-library
518 if the --with-termlib option was given). The tic- and tinfo-library
519 ABIs do not depend on the --enable-widec option. Some packagers have
520 used this to reduce the number of library files which are packaged by
521 using only one copy of those libraries. To make this work properly,
522 the tic library must be built without an explicit dependency on the
523 underlying library (ncurses vs ncursesw, tinfo vs tinfow). Use this
524 configure option to do that.
526 configure --with-ticlib --with-shared --disable-tic-depends
528 --disable-tparm-varargs
529 Portable programs should call tparm() using the fixed-length parameter
530 list documented in X/Open. ncurses provides varargs support for this
531 function. Use --disable-tparm-varargs to disable this support.
534 For testing, compile-in assertion code. This is used only for a few
535 places where ncurses cannot easily recover by returning an error code.
537 --enable-broken_linker
538 A few platforms have what we consider a broken linker: it cannot link
539 objects from an archive solely by referring to data objects in those
540 files, but requires a function reference. This configure option
541 changes several data references to functions to work around this
544 NOTE: With ncurses 5.1, this may not be necessary, since we are
545 told that some linkers interpret uninitialized global data as a
546 different type of reference which behaves as described above. We have
547 explicitly initialized all of the global data to work around the
551 Recognize BSD-style prefix padding. Some ancient BSD programs (such as
552 nethack) call tputs("50") to implement delays.
555 Compile with experimental $COLORFGBG code. That environment variable
556 is set by some terminal emulators as a hint to applications, by
557 advertising the default foreground and background colors. During
558 initialization, ncurses sets color pair 0 to match this.
561 The curses interface as documented in XSI is rather old, in fact
562 including features that precede ANSI C. The prototypes generally do
563 not make effective use of "const". When using stricter compilers (or
564 gcc with appropriate warnings), you may see warnings about the mismatch
565 between const and non-const data. We provide a configure option which
566 changes the interfaces to use const - quieting these warnings and
567 reflecting the actual use of the parameters more closely. The ncurses
568 library uses the symbol NCURSES_CONST for these instances of const,
569 and if you have asked for compiler warnings, will add gcc's const-qual
570 warning. There will still be warnings due to subtle inconsistencies
571 in the interface, but at a lower level.
573 NOTE: configuring ncurses with this option may detract from the
574 portability of your applications by encouraging you to use const in
575 places where the XSI curses interface would not allow them. Similar
576 issues arise when porting to SVr4 curses, which uses const in even
580 For testing, generate functions for certain macros to make them visible
581 as such to the debugger. See also the --disable-macros option.
584 When configuring for MinGW, use the experimental Windows 10 driver.
587 Extend the cchar_t structure to allow more than 16 colors to be
588 encoded. This applies only to the wide-character (--enable-widec)
591 NOTE: using this option will make libraries which are not binary-
592 compatible with libncursesw 5.4. None of the interfaces change, but
593 applications which have an array of cchar_t's must be recompiled.
596 Modify the encoding of mouse state to make room for a 5th mouse button.
597 That allows one to use ncurses with a wheel mouse with xterm or
598 similar X terminal emulators.
600 NOTE: using this option will make libraries which are not binary-
601 compatible with libncursesw 5.4. None of the interfaces change, but
602 applications which have mouse mask mmask_t's must be recompiled.
605 Modify the file-format written by putwin() to use printable text rather
606 than binary files, allowing getwin() to read screen dumps written by
607 differently-configured ncurses libraries. The extended getwin() can
608 still read binary screen dumps from the "same" configuration of
609 ncurses. This does not change the ABI (the binary interface seen by
610 calling applications).
613 Use the gcc "-fvisibility=hidden" option to make symbols which are not
614 explicitly exported, "hidden". Doing this may reduce the number of
615 symbols exported in the C++ binding; it should have less effect on the
616 C libraries when symbol-versioning is used.
619 Use the 4.4BSD getcap code if available, or a bundled version of it to
620 fetch termcap entries. Entries read in this way cannot use (make
621 cross-references to) the terminfo tree, but it is faster than reading
624 If configured for one of the *BSD systems, this automatically uses
625 the hashed database system produced using cap_mkdb or similar tools.
626 In that case, there is no advantage in using the --enable-getcap-cache
629 See also the --with-hashed-db option.
631 --enable-getcap-cache
632 Cache translated termcaps under the directory $HOME/.terminfo
634 NOTE: this sounds good - it makes ncurses run faster the second time.
635 But look where the data comes from - an /etc/termcap containing lots of
636 entries that are not up to date. If you configure with this option and
637 forget to install the terminfo database before running an ncurses
638 application, you will end up with a hidden terminfo database that
639 generally does not support color and will miss some function keys.
642 Compile-in cursor-optimization code that uses hard-tabs. We would make
643 this a standard feature except for the concern that the terminfo entry
644 may not be accurate, or that your stty settings have disabled the use
648 Compile-in experimental interop bindings. These provide generic types
649 for the form-library.
652 Controls whether the filesystem on which the terminfo database resides
653 supports mixed-case filenames (normal for UNIX, but not on other
654 systems). If you do not specify this option, the configure script
655 checks the current filesystem.
658 Compile-in support for the $NCURSES_NO_PADDING environment variable,
659 which allows you to suppress the effect of non-mandatory padding in
660 terminfo entries. This is the default, unless you have disabled the
663 --enable-opaque-curses
666 --enable-opaque-panel
667 Define symbol in curses.h which controls whether some library
668 structures are treated as "opaque". The --enable-opaque-curses option
669 is overridden by the --enable-reentrant option.
672 If pkg-config is found (see --with-pkg-config), generate ".pc" files
673 for each of the libraries, and install them in pkg-config's library
676 --enable-pthreads-eintr
677 add logic in threaded configuration to ensure that a read(2) system
678 call can be interrupted for SIGWINCH.
681 Compile configuration which improves reentrant use of the library by
682 reducing global and static variables. This option is also set if
683 --with-pthread is used.
685 Enabling this option adds a "t" to the library names, except for the
686 special case when --enable-weak-symbols is also used.
689 Use rpath option when generating shared libraries, and (with some
690 restrictions) when linking the corresponding programs. This originally
691 (in 1997) applied mainly to systems using the GNU linker (read the
694 More recently it is useful for systems that require special treatment
695 shared libraries in "unusual" locations. The "system" libraries reside
696 in directories which are on the loader's default search-path. While
697 you may be able to use workarounds such as the $LD_LIBRARY_PATH
698 environment variable, they do not work with setuid applications since
699 the LD_LIBRARY_PATH variable would be unset in that situation.
701 This option does not apply to --with-libtool, since libtool makes
702 extra assumptions about rpath.
704 --enable-safe-sprintf
705 Compile with experimental safe-sprintf code. You may consider using
706 this if you are building ncurses for a system that has neither
707 vsnprintf() or vsprintf(). It is slow, however, and is used only on
708 very old systems which lack vsnprintf().
711 The term.h header declares a Booleans[] array typed "char". But it
712 stores signed values there and "char" is not necessarily signed.
713 Some packagers choose to alter the type of Booleans[] though this
714 is not strictly compatible. This option allows one to implement this
715 alteration without patching the source code.
718 Compile support for ncurses' SIGWINCH handler. If your application has
719 its own SIGWINCH handler, ncurses will not use its own. The ncurses
720 handler causes wgetch() to return KEY_RESIZE when the screen-size
721 changes. This option is the default, unless you have disabled the
725 Compile-in support for extended functions which accept a SCREEN pointer,
726 reducing the need for juggling the global SP value with set_term() and
730 When enabled, check if the <stdnoreturn.h> header exists, and if found
731 define GCC_NORETURN to _Noreturn rather than either the gcc-specific
732 __attribute__((noreturn)) or an empty token. Doing this may require
733 calling programs which use GCC_NORETURN in their own function
734 definitions to be modified, because _Noreturn is only accepted as
735 the first token in a declaration.
737 --enable-string-hacks
738 Controls whether strlcat and strlcpy may be used. The same issue
739 applies to OpenBSD's warnings about snprintf, noting that this function
740 is weakly standardized.
742 Aside from stifling these warnings, there is no functional improvement
746 If your system supports symbolic links, make tic use symbolic links
747 rather than hard links to save diskspace when writing aliases in the
751 Compile-in support for user-definable terminal capabilities. Use the
752 -x option of tic and infocmp to treat unrecognized terminal
753 capabilities as user-defined strings. This option is the default,
754 unless you have disabled the extended functions.
757 Enable experimental terminal-driver. This is currently used for the
758 MinGW port, by providing a way to substitute the low-level terminfo
759 library with different terminal drivers.
762 Compile in support for reading terminal descriptions from termcap if no
763 match is found in the terminfo database. See also the --enable-getcap
764 and --enable-getcap-cache options.
766 Termcap support requires run-time parsing rather than loading
767 predigested data. If you have specified --with-ticlib, then you
768 cannot have termcap support since run-time parsing is done in the
769 tic library, which is intentionally not part of normal linkage
773 Turn on GCC compiler warnings. There should be only a few.
775 --enable-wattr-macros
776 The 6.0 ABI adds support for extended colors and for extended mouse.
777 The former is a noticeable problem when developers inadvertently
778 compile using the ncurses6 header files and link with an ncurses5
779 library, because the wattr* macros use a new field in the WINDOW
780 structure. These macros are used in several applications.
782 Since ncurses provides an actual function for each of these macros,
783 suppressing them from the curses.h header allows the ncurses5 libraries
784 to be used in most applications.
786 NOTE: The extended colors also are used in the cchar_t structure, but
787 fewer applications use that.
789 NOTE: This workaround does not help with mismatches in the ncurses
790 mouse version. The extended mouse feature uses one less fewer bit for
791 each button, so that only the first button will work as expected with
792 a mismatch between header and library. Again, most applications will
793 work, since most use only the first button.
795 --enable-weak-symbols
796 If the --with-pthread option is set, check if the compiler supports
797 weak-symbols. If it does, then name the thread-capable library without
798 the "t" (libncurses rather than libncursest), and provide for
799 dynamically loading the pthreads entrypoints at runtime. This allows
800 one to reduce the number of library files for ncurses.
802 --enable-wgetch-events
803 Compile with experimental wgetch-events code. See ncurses/README.IZ
806 Compile with wide-character code. This makes a different version of
807 the libraries (e.g., libncursesw.so), which stores characters as
810 NOTE: applications compiled with this configuration are not compatible
811 with those built for 8-bit characters. You cannot simply make a
812 symbolic link to equate libncurses.so with libncursesw.so
814 NOTE: the Ada95 binding may be built against either version of the the
815 ncurses library, but you must decide which: the binding installs the
816 same set of files for either version. Currently (2002/6/22) it does
817 not use the extended features from the wide-character code, so it is
818 probably better to not install the binding for that configuration.
821 Compile-in support experimental xmc (magic cookie) code.
823 --with-abi-altered=NUM
824 Override the displayed (rather than compiled-in) ABI. Only packagers
825 who have created configurations where the ABI differs from ncurses
826 should be interested in this option.
828 --with-abi-version=NUM
829 Override the ABI version, which is used in shared library filenames.
830 Normally this is the same as the release version; some ports have
831 special requirements for compatibility.
833 This option does not affect linking with libtool, which uses the
834 release major/minor numbers.
836 --with-ada-compiler=CMD
837 Specify the Ada95 compiler command (default "gnatmake")
839 --with-ada-include=DIR
840 Tell where to install the Ada includes (default:
841 PREFIX/lib/ada/adainclude)
843 --with-ada-libname=NAME
844 Override the name of the Ada binding (default: "AdaCurses")
846 --with-ada-objects=DIR
847 Tell where to install the Ada objects (default: PREFIX/lib/ada/adalib)
850 Build a shared library for Ada95 binding, if the compiler permits.
852 NOTE: You must also set the --with-shared option on some platforms
853 for a successful build. You need not use this option when you set
854 --with-shared, unless you want to use the Ada shared library.
857 If --without-cxx is specified, override the type used for the "bool"
858 declared in curses.h (normally the type is automatically chosen to
859 correspond with that in <stdbool.h>, or defaults to platform-specific
863 If cross-compiling, specify a host C compiler, which is needed to
864 compile a few utilities which generate source modules for ncurses.
865 If you do not give this option, the configure script checks if the
866 $BUILD_CC variable is set, and otherwise defaults to gcc or cc.
868 --with-build-cflags=XXX
869 If cross-compiling, specify the host C compiler-flags. You might need
870 to do this if the target compiler has unusual flags which confuse the
873 You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_CFLAGS rather than
877 This option is provided by the same macro used for $BUILD_CC, etc.,
878 but is not directly used by ncurses.
880 --with-build-cppflags=XXX
881 If cross-compiling, specify the host C preprocessor-flags. You might
882 need to do this if the target compiler has unusual flags which confuse
885 You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_CPPFLAGS rather than
888 --with-build-ldflags=XXX
889 If cross-compiling, specify the host linker-flags. You might need to
890 do this if the target linker has unusual flags which confuse the host
893 You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_LDFLAGS rather than
896 --with-build-libs=XXX
897 If cross-compiling, the host libraries. You might need to do this if
898 the target environment requires unusual libraries.
900 You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_LIBS rather than
904 Specify an alternate terminfo capabilities file, which makes the
905 configure script look for "include/Caps.XXX". A few systems, e.g.,
906 AIX 4.x use the same overall file-format as ncurses for terminfo
907 data, but use different alignments within the tables to support
908 legacy applications. For those systems, you can configure ncurses
909 to use a terminfo database which is compatible with the native
912 --with-ccharw-max=XXX
913 Override the size of the wide-character array in cchar_t structures.
914 Changing this will alter the binary interface. This defaults to 5.
917 Override type of chtype, which stores the video attributes and (if
918 --enable-widec is not given) a character. Prior to ncurses 5.5, this
919 was always unsigned long, but with ncurses 5.5, it may be unsigned.
920 Use this option if you need to preserve compatibility with 64-bit
921 executables, e.g., by setting "--with-chtype=long" (the configure
922 script supplies "unsigned").
924 --with-config-suffix=XXX
925 Specify a suffix for the ncursesw6-config file, etc., used to work
926 around conflicts with packages.
928 --with-cxx-libname=NAME
929 Override the basename of the ncurses++ library (default: "ncurses++")
932 When --with-shared is set, build libncurses++ as a shared library.
933 This implicitly relies upon building with gcc/g++, since other
934 compiler suites may have differences in the way shared libraries are
935 built. libtool by the way has similar limitations.
938 Specify the terminfo source file to install. Usually you will wish
939 to install ncurses' default (misc/terminfo.src). Certain systems
940 have special requirements, e.g, OS/2 EMX has a customized terminfo
944 For testing, compile and link with Conor Cahill's dbmalloc library.
945 This also sets the --disable-leaks option.
948 Generate debug-libraries (default). These are named by adding "_g"
949 to the root, e.g., libncurses_g.a
951 --with-default-terminfo-dir=XXX
952 Specify the default terminfo database directory. This is normally
953 DATADIR/terminfo, e.g., /usr/share/terminfo.
956 For testing, compile and link with Gray Watson's dmalloc library.
957 This also sets the --disable-leaks option.
959 --with-export-syms[=XXX]
960 Limit exported symbols using libtool. The configure script
961 automatically chooses an appropriate ".sym" file, which lists the
962 symbols which are part of the ABI.
964 --with-extra-suffix[=XXX]
965 Add the given suffix to header- and library-names to simplify
966 installing incompatible ncurses libraries, e.g., those using a
967 different ABI. The renaming affects the name of the
968 include-subdirectory if --disable-overwrite is given.
971 Specify a list of fallback terminal descriptions which will be
972 compiled into the ncurses library. See CONFIGURING FALLBACK ENTRIES.
974 See also "--with-tic-path" and "--with-infocmp-path".
976 --with-form-libname=NAME
977 Override the basename of the form library (default: "form")
980 use Alessandro Rubini's GPM library to provide mouse support on the
981 Linux console. Prior to ncurses 5.5, this introduced a dependency on
984 Currently ncurses uses the dlsym() function to bind to the library at
985 runtime, so it is only necessary that the library be present when
986 ncurses is built, to obtain the filename (or soname) used in the
987 corresponding dlopen() call. If you give a value for this option,
990 --with-gpm=$HOME/tmp/test-gpm.so
992 that overrides the configure check for the soname.
994 See also --without-dlsym
996 --with-hashed-db[=XXX]
997 Use a hashed database for storing terminfo data rather than storing
998 each compiled entry in a separate binary file within a directory
1001 In particular, this uses the Berkeley database 1.8.5 interface, as
1002 provided by that and its successors db 2, 3, and 4. The actual
1003 interface is slightly different in the successor versions of the
1004 Berkeley database. The database should have been configured using
1005 "--enable-compat185".
1007 If you use this option for configuring ncurses, tic will only be able
1008 to write entries in the hashed database. infocmp can still read
1009 entries from a directory tree as well as reading entries from the
1010 hashed database. To do this, infocmp determines whether the $TERMINFO
1011 variable points to a directory or a file, and reads the directory-tree
1012 or hashed database respectively.
1014 You cannot have a directory containing both hashed-database and
1015 filesystem-based terminfo entries.
1017 Use the parameter value to give the install-prefix used for the
1019 --with-hashed-db=/usr/local/BigBase
1020 to find the corresponding include- and lib-directories under the
1021 given directory. Alternatively, you can specify a directory leaf
1023 --with-hashed-db=db4
1024 to make the configure script look for files in a subdirectory such as
1025 /usr/include/db4/db.h
1026 /usr/lib/db4/libdb.so
1028 See also the --enable-getcap option.
1030 --with-infocmp-path[=XXX]
1031 Use this option to override the automatic detection of infocmp in your
1032 $PATH when building fallbacks (see "--with-fallbacks").
1034 --with-install-prefix=XXX
1035 Allows you to specify an alternate location for installing ncurses
1036 after building it. The value you specify is prepended to the "real"
1037 install location. This simplifies making binary packages. The
1038 makefile variable DESTDIR is set by this option. It is also possible
1040 make install DESTDIR=XXX
1041 since the makefiles pass that variable to subordinate makes.
1043 NOTE: a few systems build shared libraries with fixed pathnames; this
1044 option probably will not work for those configurations.
1046 --with-lib-prefix=XXX
1047 OS/2 EMX used a different naming convention from most Unix-like
1048 platforms. It required that the "lib" part of a library name was
1049 omitted. Newer EMX as part of eComStation does not follow that
1050 convention. Use this option to override the configure script's
1051 assumptions about the library-prefix. If this option is omitted, it
1052 uses the original OS/2 EMX convention for that platform. Use
1053 "--with-lib-prefix=lib" for the newer EMX in eComStation. Use
1054 "--without-lib-prefix" to suppress it for other odd platforms.
1056 --with-libtool[=XXX]
1057 Generate libraries with libtool. If this option is selected, then it
1058 overrides all other library model specifications. Note that libtool
1059 must already be installed, uses makefile rules dependent on GNU make,
1060 and does not promise to follow the version numbering convention of
1061 other shared libraries on your system. However, if the --with-shared
1062 option does not succeed, you may get better results with this option.
1064 If a parameter value is given, it must be the full pathname of the
1065 particular version of libtool, e.g.,
1066 /usr/bin/libtool-1.2.3
1068 It is possible to rebuild the configure script to use the automake
1069 macros for libtool, e.g., AC_PROG_LIBTOOL. See the comments in
1070 aclocal.m4 for CF_PROG_LIBTOOL, and ensure that you build configure
1071 using the appropriate patch for autoconf from
1072 https://invisible-island.net/autoconf/
1074 --with-libtool-opts=XXX
1075 Allow user to pass additional libtool options into the library creation
1076 and link steps. The main use for this is to do something like
1077 ./configure --with-libtool-opts=-static
1078 to get the same behavior as automake-flavored
1079 ./configure --enable-static
1081 --with-manpage-aliases
1082 Tell the configure script you wish to create entries in the
1083 man-directory for aliases to manpages which list them, e.g., the
1084 functions in the panel manpage. This is the default. You can disable
1085 it if your man program does this. You can also disable
1086 --with-manpage-symlinks to install files containing a ".so" command
1087 rather than symbolic links.
1089 --with-manpage-format=XXX
1090 Tell the configure script how you would like to install man-pages. The
1091 option value must be one of these: gzip, compress, BSDI, normal,
1092 formatted. If you do not give this option, the configure script
1093 attempts to determine which is the case.
1095 --with-manpage-renames=XXX
1096 Tell the configure script that you wish to rename the manpages while
1097 installing. Currently the only distribution which does this is Debian.
1098 The option value specifies the name of a file that lists the renamed
1099 files, e.g., $srcdir/man/man_db.renames
1101 --with-manpage-symlinks
1102 Tell the configure script that you wish to make symbolic links in the
1103 man-directory for aliases to the man-pages. This is the default, but
1104 can be disabled for systems that provide this automatically. Doing
1105 this on systems that do not support symbolic links will result in
1106 copying the man-page for each alias.
1109 Tell the configure script that you wish to preprocess the manpages
1110 by running them through tbl to generate tables understandable by
1113 --with-menu-libname=NAME
1114 Override the basename of the menu library (default: "menu")
1117 Override type of mmask_t, which stores the mouse mask. Prior to
1118 ncurses 5.5, this was always unsigned long, but with ncurses 5.5, it
1119 may be unsigned. Use this option if you need to preserve compatibility
1120 with 64-bit executables.
1123 Generate normal (i.e., static) libraries (default).
1125 Note: on Linux, the configure script will attempt to use the GPM
1126 library via the dlsym() function call. Use --without-dlsym to disable
1127 this feature, or --without-gpm, depending on whether you wish to use
1131 Override type of ospeed variable, which is part of the termcap
1132 compatibility interface. In termcap, this is a 'short', which works
1133 for a wide range of baudrates because ospeed is not the actual speed
1134 but the encoded value, e.g., B9600 would be a small number such as 13.
1135 However the encoding scheme originally allowed for values "only" up to
1136 38400bd. A newer set of definitions past 38400bd is not encoded as
1137 compactly, and is not guaranteed to fit into a short (see the function
1138 cfgetospeed(), which returns a speed_t for this reason). In practice,
1139 applications that required knowledge of the ospeed variable, i.e.,
1140 those using termcap, do not use the higher speeds. Your application
1141 (or system, in general) may or may not.
1143 --with-panel-libname=NAME
1144 Override the basename of the panel library (default: "panel")
1146 --with-pc-suffix=SUFFIX
1147 If ".pc" files are installed, optionally add a suffix to the files
1148 and corresponding package names to separate unusual configurations.
1149 If no option value is given (or if it is "none"), no suffix is added.
1152 Add PCRE2 (Perl-compatible regular expressions v2) to the build if it
1153 is available and the user requests it. Assume the application will
1154 otherwise use the POSIX interface.
1156 This is useful for MinGW builds because the usual POSIX interface is
1157 not supplied by the development environment, while ncurses' form
1158 library uses a regular expression feature for one of the field types.
1160 --with-pkg-config=[DIR]
1161 Check for pkg-config, optionally specifying its path.
1163 --with-pkg-config-libdir=[DIR]
1164 If pkg-config was found, override the automatic check for its library
1165 path. The configure script allows only a single directory, because
1166 that is used as the directory in which to install ".pc" files.
1168 The automatic check for the library path prefers the first directory
1169 which currently exists. If none of the directories listed by
1170 pkg-config exist, the check prefers a pkgconfig directory under the
1171 "libdir" set by the configure script (which may not be the system
1172 default), or if pkg-config lists nothing suitable, the first one which
1173 is listed by pkg-config is used.
1175 Automatic selection is overridden by providing an option-value
1178 If this option is omitted, the default directory for installing
1179 ".pc" files is ${libdir}/pkgconfig
1182 Generate profile-libraries These are named by adding "_p" to the root,
1183 e.g., libncurses_p.a
1186 Link with POSIX threads, set --enable-reentrant. The use_window() and
1187 use_screen() functions will use mutex's, allowing rudimentary support
1188 for multithreaded applications.
1191 Compile-in RCS identifiers. Most of the C files have an identifier.
1193 --with-rel-version=NUM
1194 Override the release version, which may be used in shared library
1195 filenames. This consists of a major and minor version number separated
1196 by ".". Normally the major version number is the same as the ABI
1197 version; some ports have special requirements for compatibility.
1200 Generate shared-libraries. The names given depend on the system for
1201 which you are building, typically using a ".so" suffix, along with
1202 symbolic links that refer to the release version.
1204 NOTE: Unless you override the configure script by setting the $CFLAGS
1205 environment variable, these will not be built with the -g debugging
1208 NOTE: For some configurations, e.g., installing a new version of
1209 ncurses shared libraries on a machine which already has ncurses
1210 shared libraries, you may encounter problems with the linker.
1211 For example, it may prevent you from running the build tree's
1212 copy of tic (for installing the terminfo database) because it
1213 loads the system's copy of the ncurses shared libraries.
1215 In that case, using the misc/shlib script may be helpful, since it
1216 sets $LD_LIBRARY_PATH to point to the build tree, e.g.,
1218 ./misc/shlib make install
1220 Alternatively, for most platforms, the linker accepts a list of
1221 directories which will be searched for libraries at run-time. The
1222 configure script allows you to modify this list using the
1223 RPATH_LIST environment variable. It is a colon-separated list of
1224 directories (default: the "libdir" set via the configure script).
1225 If you set that to put "../lib" first in the list, the linker will
1226 look first at the build-directory, and avoid conflict with libraries
1227 already installed. One drawback to this approach is that libraries
1228 can be accidentally searched in any "../lib" directory.
1230 NOTE: If you use the --with-ada-sharedlib option, you should also
1231 set this option, to ensure that C-language modules needed for the
1232 Ada binding use appropriate compiler options.
1234 --with-shlib-version=XXX
1235 Specify whether to use the release or ABI version for shared libraries.
1236 This is normally chosen automatically based on the type of system
1237 which you are building on. We use it for testing the configure script.
1239 --with-strip-program=XXX
1240 When stripping executables during install, use the specified program
1241 rather than "strip".
1244 use FreeBSD sysmouse interface provide mouse support on the console.
1246 --with-system-type=XXX
1247 For testing, override the derived host system-type which is used to
1248 decide things such as the linker commands used to build shared
1249 libraries. This is normally chosen automatically based on the type of
1250 system which you are building on. We use it for testing the configure
1253 --with-terminfo-dirs=XXX
1254 Specify a search-list of terminfo directories which will be compiled
1255 into the ncurses library (default: DATADIR/terminfo)
1257 This is a colon-separated list, like the TERMINFO_DIRS environment
1260 --with-termlib[=XXX]
1261 When building the ncurses library, organize this as two parts: the
1262 curses library (libncurses) and the low-level terminfo library
1263 (libtinfo). This is done to accommodate applications that use only
1264 the latter. The terminfo library is about half the size of the total.
1266 If an option value is given, that overrides the name of the terminfo
1267 library. For instance, if the wide-character version is built, the
1268 terminfo library would be named libtinfow. But the libtinfow interface
1269 is upward compatible from libtinfo, so it would be possible to overlay
1270 libtinfo.so with a "wide" version of libtinfow.so by renaming it with
1274 Specify a search-list of termcap files which will be compiled into the
1275 ncurses library (default: /etc/termcap:/usr/share/misc/termcap)
1277 --with-tic-path[=XXX]
1278 Use this option to override the automatic detection of tic in your
1279 $PATH when building fallbacks (see "--with-fallbacks").
1282 When building the ncurses library, build a separate library for
1283 the modules that are used only by the utility programs. Normally
1284 those would be bundled with the termlib or ncurses libraries.
1286 If an option value is given, that overrides the name of the tic
1287 library. As in termlib, there is no ABI difference between the
1288 "wide" libticw.so and libtic.so
1290 NOTE: Overriding the name of the tic library may be useful if you are
1291 also using the --with-termlib option to rename libtinfo. If you are
1292 not doing that, renaming the tic library can result in conflicting
1293 library dependencies for tic and other programs built with the tic
1296 --with-tparm-arg[=XXX]
1297 Override the type used for tparm() arguments, which normally is a
1298 "long". However the function must assume that its arguments can hold a
1299 pointer to char's which is not always workable for 64-bit platforms. A
1300 better choice would be intptr_t, which was not available at the time
1301 tparm's interface was defined.
1303 If the option is not given, this defaults to "long".
1306 Configure the trace() function as part of the all models of the ncurses
1307 library. Normally it is part of the debug (libncurses_g) library only.
1310 For testing, compile with debug option.
1311 This also sets the --disable-leaks option.
1313 --with-versioned-syms[=XXX]
1314 The Solaris, GNU and reportedly some other linkers (ld) accept a
1315 "--version-script" option which tells the linker to annotate the
1316 resulting objects with version identifiers.
1318 Use "objdump -T" on a library to see the annotations.
1320 The configure script attempts to automatically apply a suitable ".map"
1321 file to provide this information for Linux. Solaris mapfiles differ:
1323 a) comments are not accepted
1324 b) wildcards are not accepted, except for a special case of "_*".
1325 c) each symbol listed in the map file must exist in the library
1327 The Solaris limitations conflict with the development goal of providing
1328 a small set of ".map" files as examples, which cover the most common
1329 configurations. Because that coverage is done by merging together
1330 several builds, some symbols will be listed in the the ".map" files
1331 that do not happen to be present in one configuration or another.
1333 The sample ".map" (and ".sym") files are generated using a set of
1334 scripts which build several configurations for each release version,
1335 checking to see which of the "_nc_" symbols can be made local. In
1336 addition to the ncurses libraries and programs, the symbols used
1337 by the "tack" program before version 1.08 are made global.
1339 These sample ".map" files will not cover all possible combinations.
1340 In some cases, e.g., when using the --with-weak-symbols option, you
1341 may prefer to use a different ".map" file by setting this option's
1344 --with-wrap-prefix=XXX
1345 When using the --enable-reentrant option, ncurses redefines variables
1346 that would be global in curses, e.g., LINES, as a macro that calls a
1347 "wrapping" function which fetches the data from the current SCREEN
1348 structure. Normally that function is named by prepending "_nc_" to the
1349 variable's name. The function is technically private (since portable
1350 applications would not refer directly to it). But according to one
1351 line of reasoning, it is not the same type of "private" as functions
1352 which applications should not call even via a macro. This configure
1353 option lets you choose the prefix for these wrapped variables.
1356 Provide a pathname for the X11 rgb file, used by the picsmap program.
1357 This overrides a configure check which usually works, but is needed
1358 due to the lack of standardization for X11's files.
1360 --with-xterm-kbs=XXX
1361 Configure xterm's terminfo entries to use either BS (^H, i.e., ASCII
1362 backspace) or DEL (^?, or 127). XXX can be BS (or bs, 8) or DEL
1365 During installation, the makefile and scripts modifies the "xterm+kbs"
1366 terminfo entry to use this setting.
1369 Suppress the configure script's check for Ada95, do not build the
1370 Ada95 binding and related demo.
1373 Don't install the ncurses header with the name "curses.h". Rather,
1374 install as "ncurses.h" and modify the installed headers and manpages
1377 Likewise, do not install an alias "curses" for the ncurses manpage.
1380 XSI curses declares "bool" as part of the interface. C++ also declares
1381 "bool". Neither specifies the size and type of booleans, but both
1382 insist on the same name. We chose to accommodate this by making the
1383 configure script check for the size and type (e.g., unsigned or signed)
1384 that your C++ compiler uses for booleans. If you do not wish to use
1385 ncurses with C++, use this option to tell the configure script to not
1386 adjust ncurses bool to match C++.
1388 --without-cxx-binding
1389 Suppress the configure script's check for C++, do not build the
1390 C++ binding and related demo.
1393 Disable development options. This does not include those that change
1394 the interface, such as --enable-widec.
1397 Do not use dlsym() to load GPM dynamically.
1400 Tell the configure script to suppress the install of ncurses' manpages.
1403 Tell the configure script to suppress the build of ncurses' application
1404 programs (e.g., tic). The test applications will still be built if you
1405 type "make", though not if you simply do "make install".
1408 Tell the configure script to suppress the build of ncurses' test
1412 Tell the configure script to use "xterm-old" for the entry used in
1413 the terminfo database. This will work with variations such as
1414 X11R5 and X11R6 xterm.
1417 COMPATIBILITY WITH OLDER RELEASES:
1418 ---------------------------------
1420 Because ncurses implements X/Open Curses, its interface is fairly stable.
1421 That does not mean the interface does not change. Changes are made to the
1422 documented interfaces when we find differences between ncurses and X/Open
1423 or implementations which largely correspond to X/Open (such as Solaris).
1424 We add extensions to those interfaces to solve problems not addressed by
1425 the original curses design, but those must not conflict with the X/Open
1428 Here are some of the major interface changes, and related problems which
1429 you may encounter when building a system with different versions of
1441 Added internal functions (other than "_sp" variants):
1443 + add _nc_free_termtype1 and _nc_free_tparm, for memory-leaks
1445 Removed internal functions:
1449 Modified internal functions:
1456 + the definition of TERMTYPE2 is now internal, not visible in the ABI,
1457 like the enclosing TERMINAL which was previously made opaque. This
1458 was done to provide SCREEN-specific "static" variables in terminfo.
1462 + add sp-funcs for erasewchar, killwchar.
1464 Added internal functions (other than "_sp" variants):
1466 + _nc_safe_fopen and _nc_safe_open3 limit privileges if possible when
1467 opening a file; otherwise disallow access for updating files.
1469 + _nc_tiparm is a variant of tiparm which is used when all of the
1470 parameters are known to be numbers rather than possibly strings.
1472 + _nc_reset_tparm improves tic's checks by resetting the terminfo
1473 "static variables" before calling functions which may update them.
1475 Removed internal functions:
1479 Modified internal functions:
1481 + _nc_trace_ttymode passes pointer to const data
1483 + _nc_tparm_analyze passes pointer to int*, not int[]
1488 + the terminal database must be compiled with ncurses 6.2 tic;
1489 older versions of tic/infocmp will not work. Aside from that,
1490 the compiled database will work with older applications.
1492 + "*.pc" and "ncurses*-config" files give the same information.
1494 + vwprintw and vwscanw are deprecated.
1498 + These make it simpler to substitute a debug-configuration of the
1499 library for non-debug:
1504 Added internal functions (other than "_sp" variants):
1506 + These provide fast-lookup of common user-defined capabilities:
1508 _nc_get_userdefs_table
1511 + This is added to work around compiler-warnings:
1514 Removed internal functions:
1516 + _nc_import_termtype
1518 Modified internal functions:
1520 + _nc_reserve_pairs no longer returns a value
1525 + X/Open Curses specifies a "reserved" void* parameter in several
1526 functions, saying that it must be NULL. In this release, if the
1527 parameter is non-NULL, it is interpreted as a point to an integer
1528 containing a color pair. In previous releases, a non-NULL parameter
1529 caused an error return. Portable applications are unaffected. Here
1530 are the functions which have been extended:
1549 + the TERMINAL structure declared in <term.h> has been made opaque,
1550 and its size increased to handle the increased size of color pair
1551 and color value, as well as other numeric capabilities.
1553 A few applications required change, e.g., to use def_prog_mode;
1554 only one application (tack) is known to have a valid reason for
1555 accessing these internal details, and that was addressed by the
1556 release of tack 1.08 in 2017. Internal functions marked as used
1557 by tack will be deprecated in future releases.
1561 + Several new functions were added to manipulate extended color pairs
1562 and color values. These include:
1564 extended_color_content
1565 extended_pair_content
1573 as well as corresponding sp-functions.
1575 + A new terminfo capability "RGB" tells the ncurses library that the
1576 color values are red/green/blue, to eliminate the need for palettes
1577 in that special case for the color_content function.
1579 Added internal functions (other than "_sp" variants):
1581 _nc_export_termtype2
1589 Removed internal functions:
1593 Modified internal functions:
1595 + symbols are used by tic/infocmp/toe:
1596 _nc_align_termtype - change parameters to TERMTYPE2*
1597 _nc_check_termtype2 - change parameter to TERMTYPE2*
1598 _nc_read_file_entry - change parameter to TERMTYPE2*
1599 _nc_read_termtype - change parameter to TERMTYPE2*
1600 _nc_trim_sgr0 - change parameter to TERMTYPE2*
1601 _nc_write_entry - change parameter to TERMTYPE2*
1603 + symbols used only within the library:
1604 _nc_fallback - change return type to TERMTYPE2*
1605 _nc_init_termtype - change parameter to TERMTYPE2*
1610 + The 6.0 ABI modifies the defaults for these configure options:
1618 --with-chtype=uint32_t
1619 --with-mmask_t=uint32_t
1620 --with-tparm-arg=intptr_t
1622 + ncurses supports symbol versioning. If you use this feature, about
1623 half of the "_nc_" private symbols are changed to local symbols.
1625 + a few applications may need to explicitly flush the standard output
1626 when switching between printf's and (curses) printw.
1630 + use_tioctl is an improvement over use_env
1632 + added wgetdelay to support the NCURSES_OPAQUE feature.
1634 Added internal functions (other than "_sp" variants):
1641 Removed internal functions:
1644 Modified internal functions:
1645 _nc_do_color - change parameters from short/bool to int
1646 _nc_keypad - change parameter from bool to int
1647 _nc_setupscreen - change parameter from bool to int
1648 _nc_signal_handler - change parameter from bool to int
1654 + add an alternate library configuration, i.e., "terminal driver" to
1655 support port to Windows, built with MinGW. There are two drivers
1656 (terminfo and Windows console). The terminfo driver works on other
1659 + add a new set of functions which accept a SCREEN* parameter, in
1660 contrast with the original set which use the global value "sp".
1661 By default, these names end with "_sp", and are otherwise
1662 functionally identical with the originals.
1664 In addition to the "_sp" functions, there are a few new functions
1665 associated with this feature: ceiling_panel, ground_panel,
1668 If the library is not built with the sp-funcs extension, there
1669 are no related interface changes.
1671 + add tiparm function based on review of X/Open Curses Issue 7.
1673 + change internal _nc_has_mouse function to public has_mouse function
1677 + add a few more functions to support the NCURSES_OPAQUE feature:
1678 get_escdelay, is_pad, is_subwin
1680 Added internal functions (other than "_sp" variants):
1689 _nc_retrace_int_attr_t
1695 Removed internal functions:
1696 _nc_makenew (some configurations replace by _nc_makenew_sp)
1698 Modified internal functions:
1705 5.7 (November 2, 2008)
1708 + generate linkable stubs for some macros:
1711 + Add new library configuration for tic-library (the non-curses portion
1712 of the ncurses library used for the tic program as well as some
1713 others such as tack. There is no API change, but makefiles would be
1714 changed to use the tic-library built separately.
1716 tack, distributed separately from ncurses, uses some of the internal
1717 _nc_XXX functions, which are declared in the tic.h header file.
1719 The reason for providing this separate library is that none of the
1720 functions in it are suitable for threaded applications.
1722 + Add new library configuration (ncursest, ncurseswt) which provides
1723 rudimentary support for POSIX threads. This introduces opaque
1724 access functions to the WINDOW structure and adds a parameter to
1725 several internal functions.
1727 + move most internal variables (except tic-library) into data blocks
1728 _nc_globals and _nc_prescreen to simplify analysis. Those were
1729 globally accessible, but since they were not part of the documented
1730 API, there is no ABI change.
1732 + changed static tables of strings to be indices into long strings, to
1733 improve startup performance. This changes parameter lists for some
1734 of the internal functions.
1738 + add NCURSES_OPAQUE definition in curses.h to control whether internal
1739 details of the WINDOW structure are visible to an application. This
1740 is always defined when the threaded library is built, and is optional
1741 otherwise. New functions for this: is_cleared, is_idcok, is_idlok,
1742 is_immedok, is_keypad, is_leaveok, is_nodelay, is_notimeout,
1743 is_scrollok, is_syncok, wgetparent and wgetscrreg.
1745 + the threaded library (ncursest) also disallows direct updating of
1746 global curses-level variables, providing functions (via macros) for
1747 obtaining their value. A few of those variables can be modified by
1748 the application, using new functions: set_escdelay, set_tabsize
1750 + added functions use_window() and use_screen() which wrap a mutex
1751 (if threading is configured) around a call to a user-supplied
1754 Added internal functions:
1765 These are used for leak-testing, and are stubs for
1766 ABI compatibility when ncurses is not configured for that
1767 using the --disable-leaks configure script option:
1772 Removed internal functions:
1775 Modified internal functions:
1781 _nc_locale_breaks_acs
1783 _nc_update_screensize
1785 Use new typedef TRIES to replace "struct tries":
1793 5.6 (December 17, 2006)
1796 + generate linkable stubs for some macros:
1798 getbegx, getbegy, getcurx, getcury, getmaxx, getmaxy, getparx,
1801 and (for libncursesw)
1809 Added internal functions:
1823 Also (if using the hashed database configuration):
1838 Removed internal functions:
1841 Modified internal functions:
1848 5.5 (October 10, 2005)
1851 + terminfo installs "xterm-new" as "xterm" entry rather than
1852 "xterm-old" (aka xterm-r6).
1854 + terminfo data is installed using the tic -x option (few systems
1855 still use ncurses 4.2).
1857 + modify C++ binding to work with newer C++ compilers by providing
1858 initializers and using modern casts. Old-style header names are
1859 still used in this release to allow compiling with not-so-old
1862 + form and menu libraries now work with wide-character data.
1863 Applications which bypassed the form library and manipulated the
1864 FIELD.buf data directly will not work properly with libformw, since
1865 that no longer points to an array of char. The set_field_buffer()
1866 and field_buffer() functions translate to/from the actual field
1869 + change SP->_current_attr to a pointer, adjust ifdef's to ensure that
1870 libtinfo.so and libtinfow.so have the same ABI. The reason for this
1871 is that the corresponding data which belongs to the upper-level
1872 ncurses library has a different size in each model.
1874 + winnstr() now returns multibyte character strings for the
1875 wide-character configuration.
1877 + assume_default_colors() no longer requires that use_default_colors()
1880 + data_ahead() now works with wide-characters.
1882 + slk_set() and slk_wset() now accept and store multibyte or
1883 multicolumn characters.
1885 + start_color() now returns OK if colors have already been started.
1886 start_color() also returns ERR if it cannot allocate memory.
1888 + pair_content() now returns -1 for consistency with init_pair() if it
1889 corresponds to the default-color.
1891 + unctrl() now returns null if its parameter does not correspond
1892 to an unsigned char.
1895 Experimental mouse version 2 supports wheel mice with buttons
1896 4 and 5. This requires ABI 6 because it modifies the encoding
1899 Experimental extended colors allows encoding of 256 foreground
1900 and background colors, e.g., with the xterm-256color or
1901 xterm-88color terminfo entries. This requires ABI 6 because
1902 it changes the size of cchar_t.
1904 Added internal functions:
1908 _nc_retrace_cvoid_ptr
1909 _nc_retrace_void_ptr
1912 Removed internal functions:
1915 Modified internal functions:
1920 5.4 (February 8, 2004)
1923 + add the remaining functions for X/Open curses wide-character support.
1924 These are only available if the library is configured using the
1925 --enable-widec option.
1929 + write getyx() and related 2-return macros in terms of getcury(),
1932 + simplify ifdef for bool declaration in curses.h
1934 + modify ifdef's in curses.h that disabled use of __attribute__() for
1935 g++, since recent versions implement the cases which ncurses uses.
1937 + change some interfaces to use const:
1949 Added internal functions:
1952 _nc_is_charable() wide
1953 _nc_locale_breaks_acs()
1956 _nc_to_widechar() wide
1958 _nc_trace_bufcat() debug
1959 _nc_unicode_locale()
1961 Removed internal functions:
1965 Modified internal functions:
1967 _nc_retrace_chtype()
1969 5.3 (October 12, 2002)
1972 + change type for bool used in headers to NCURSES_BOOL, which usually
1973 is the same as the compiler's definition for 'bool'.
1975 + add all but two functions for X/Open curses wide-character support.
1976 These are only available if the library is configured using the
1977 --enable-widec option. Missing functions are
1981 + add environment variable $NCURSES_ASSUMED_COLORS to modify the
1982 assume_default_colors() extension.
1988 Added internal functions:
1989 _nc_altcharset_name() debug
1991 _nc_retrace_bool() debug
1992 _nc_retrace_unsigned() debug
1994 _nc_trace_ttymode() debug
1999 Removed internal functions:
2002 Modified internal functions:
2005 5.2 (October 21, 2000)
2008 + revert termcap ospeed variable to 'short' (see discussion of the
2009 --with-ospeed configure option).
2014 + made the extended terminal capabilities
2015 (configure --enable-tcap-names) a standard feature. This should
2016 be transparent to applications that do not require it.
2018 + removed the trace() function and related trace support from the
2021 + modified curses.h.in, undef'ing some symbols to avoid conflict
2024 Added extensions: assume_default_colors().
2026 5.0 (October 23, 1999)
2029 + implemented the wcolor_set() and slk_color() functions.
2031 + move macro winch to a function, to hide details of struct ldat
2033 + corrected prototypes for slk_* functions, using chtype rather than
2036 + the slk_attr_{set,off,on} functions need an additional void*
2037 parameter according to XSI.
2039 + modified several prototypes to correspond with 1997 version of X/Open
2040 Curses: [w]attr_get(), [w]attr_set(), border_set() have different
2041 parameters. Some functions were renamed or misspelled:
2042 erase_wchar(), in_wchntr(), mvin_wchntr(). Some developers have used
2045 Added extensions: keybound(), curses_version().
2047 Terminfo database changes:
2049 + change translation for termcap 'rs' to terminfo 'rs2', which is
2050 the documented equivalent, rather than 'rs1'.
2052 The problems are subtler in recent releases.
2054 a) This release provides users with the ability to define their own
2055 terminal capability extensions, like termcap. To accomplish this,
2056 we redesigned the TERMTYPE struct (in term.h). Very few
2057 applications use this struct. They must be recompiled to work with
2060 a) If you use the extended terminfo names (i.e., you used configure
2061 --enable-tcap-names), the resulting terminfo database can have some
2062 entries which are not readable by older versions of ncurses. This
2063 is a bug in the older versions:
2065 + the terminfo database stores booleans, numbers and strings in
2066 arrays. The capabilities that are listed in the arrays are
2067 specified by X/Open. ncurses recognizes a number of obsolete and
2068 extended names which are stored past the end of the specified
2071 + a change to read_entry.c in 951001 made the library do an lseek()
2072 call incorrectly skipping data which is already read from the
2073 string array. This happens when the number of strings in the
2074 terminfo data file is greater than STRCOUNT, the number of
2075 specified and obsolete or extended strings.
2077 + as part of alignment with the X/Open final specification, in the
2078 990109 patch we added two new terminfo capabilities:
2079 set_a_attributes and set_pglen_inch). This makes the indices for
2080 the obsolete and extended capabilities shift up by 2.
2082 + the last two capabilities in the obsolete/extended list are memu
2083 and meml, which are found in most terminfo descriptions for xterm.
2085 When trying to read this terminfo entry, the spurious lseek()
2086 causes the library to attempt to read the final portion of the
2087 terminfo data (the text of the string capabilities) 4 characters
2088 past its starting point, and reads 4 characters too few. The
2089 library rejects the data, and applications are unable to
2090 initialize that terminal type.
2092 FIX: remove memu and meml from the xterm description. They are
2093 obsolete, not used by ncurses. (It appears that the feature was
2094 added to xterm to make it more like hpterm).
2096 This is not a problem if you do not use the -x option of tic to
2097 create a terminfo database with extended names. Note that the
2098 user-defined terminal capabilities are not affected by this bug,
2099 since they are stored in a table after the older terminfo data ends,
2100 and are invisible to the older libraries.
2102 c) Some developers did not wish to use the C++ binding, and used the
2103 configure --without-cxx option. This causes problems if someone
2104 uses the ncurses library from C++ because that configure test
2105 determines the type for C++'s bool and makes ncurses match it, since
2106 both C++ and curses are specified to declare bool. Calling ncurses
2107 functions with the incorrect type for bool will cause execution
2108 errors. In 5.0 we added a configure option "--without-cxx-binding"
2109 which controls whether the binding itself is built and installed.
2114 + correct prototype for termattrs() as per XPG4 version 2.
2116 + add placeholder prototypes for color_set(), erasewchar(),
2117 term_attrs(), wcolor_set() as per XPG4 version 2.
2119 + add macros getcur[xy] getbeg[xy] getpar[xy], which are defined in
2122 New extensions: keyok() and define_key().
2124 Terminfo database changes:
2126 + corrected definition in curses.h for ACS_LANTERN, which was 'I'
2131 We added these extensions: use_default_colors(). Also added
2132 configure option --enable-const, to support the use of const where
2133 X/Open should have, but did not, specify.
2135 The terminfo database content changed the representation of color for
2136 most entries that use ANSI colors. SVr4 curses treats the setaf/setab
2137 and setf/setb capabilities differently, interchanging the red/blue
2138 colors in the latter.
2140 4.0 (December 24, 1996)
2142 We bumped to version 4.0 because the newly released Linux dynamic
2143 loader (ld.so.1.8.5) did not load shared libraries whose ABI and REL
2144 versions were inconsistent. At that point, ncurses ABI was 3.4 and the
2145 REL was 1.9.9g, so we made them consistent.
2147 1.9.9g (December 1, 1996)
2149 This fixed most of the problems with 1.9.9e, and made these interface
2152 + remove tparam(), which had been provided for compatibility with
2153 some termcap. tparm() is standard, and does not conflict with
2154 application's fallback for missing tparam().
2156 + turn off hardware echo in initscr(). This changes the sense of the
2157 echo() function, which was initialized to echoing rather than
2158 nonechoing (the latter is specified). There were several other
2159 corrections to the terminal I/O settings which cause applications to
2162 + implemented several functions (such as attr_on()) which were
2163 available only as macros.
2165 + corrected several typos in curses.h.in (i.e., the mvXXXX macros).
2167 + corrected prototypes for delay_output(),
2168 has_color, immedok() and idcok().
2170 + corrected misspelled getbkgd(). Some applications used the
2173 + added _yoffset to WINDOW. The size of WINDOW does not impact
2174 applications, since they use only pointers to WINDOW structs.
2176 These changes were made to the terminfo database:
2178 + removed boolean 'getm' which was available as an extended name.
2180 We added these extensions: wresize(), resizeterm(), has_key() and
2183 1.9.9e (March 24, 1996)
2185 not recommended (a last-minute/untested change left the forms and
2186 menus libraries unusable since they do not repaint the screen).
2187 Foreground/background colors are combined incorrectly, working properly
2188 only on a black background. When this was released, the X/Open
2189 specification was available only in draft form.
2191 Some applications (such as lxdialog) were "fixed" to work with the
2192 incorrect color scheme.
2195 FOR SYSTEM INTEGRATORS:
2196 ----------------------
2198 Configuration and Installation:
2200 On platforms where ncurses is assumed to be installed in /usr/lib,
2201 the configure script uses "/usr" as a default. These include any
2202 that use the Linux kernel, as well as these special cases:
2204 FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, Cygwin, MinGW
2206 For other platforms, the default is "/usr/local". See the discussion
2207 of the "--disable-overwrite" option.
2209 The location of the terminfo is set indirectly by the "--datadir"
2210 configure option, e.g., /usr/share/terminfo, given a datadir of
2211 /usr/share. You may want to override this if you are installing
2212 ncurses libraries in nonstandard locations, but wish to share the
2215 Normally the ncurses library is configured in a pure-terminfo mode;
2216 that is, with the --disable-termcap option. This makes the ncurses
2217 library smaller and faster. The ncurses library includes a termcap
2218 emulation that queries the terminfo database, so even applications that
2219 use raw termcap to query terminal characteristics will win (providing
2220 you recompile and relink them!).
2222 If you must configure with termcap fallback enabled, you may also wish
2223 to use the --enable-getcap option. This speeds up termcap-based
2224 startups, at the expense of not allowing personal termcap entries to
2225 reference the terminfo tree. See comments in
2226 ncurses/tinfo/read_termcap.c for further details.
2228 Note that if you have $TERMCAP set, ncurses will use that value
2229 to locate termcap data. In particular, running from xterm will
2230 set $TERMCAP to the contents of the xterm's termcap entry.
2231 If ncurses sees that, it will not examine /etc/termcap.
2235 The terminfo file assumes that Shift-Tab generates \E[Z (the ECMA-48
2236 reverse-tabulation sequence) rather than ^I. Here are the loadkeys -d
2237 mappings that will set this up:
2239 keycode 15 = Tab Tab
2240 alt keycode 15 = Meta_Tab
2241 shift keycode 15 = F26
2242 string F26 ="\033[Z"
2244 Naming the Console Terminal
2246 In various systems there has been a practice of designating the system
2247 console driver type as `console'. Please do not do this! It
2248 complicates peoples' lives, because it can mean that several different
2249 terminfo entries from different operating systems all logically want to
2250 be called `console'.
2252 Please pick a name unique to your console driver and set that up
2253 in the /etc/inittab table or local equivalent. Send the entry to the
2254 terminfo maintainer (listed in the misc/terminfo file) to be included
2255 in the terminfo file, if it is not already there. See the
2256 term(7) manual page included with this distribution for more on
2257 conventions for choosing type names.
2259 Here are some recommended primary console names:
2261 linux -- Linux console driver
2266 If you are responsible for integrating ncurses for one of these
2267 distributions, please either use the recommended name or get back
2268 to us explaining why you don't want to, so we can work out nomenclature
2269 that will make users' lives easier rather than harder.
2272 MODERN XTERM VERSIONS:
2273 ---------------------
2275 The terminfo database file included with this distribution assumes you
2276 are running a modern xterm based on XFree86 (i.e., xterm-new). The
2277 earlier X11R6 entry (xterm-r6) and X11R5 entry (xterm-r5) is provided
2278 as well. See the --without-xterm-new configure script option if you
2279 are unable to update your system.
2282 CONFIGURING FALLBACK ENTRIES:
2283 ----------------------------
2285 In order to support operation of ncurses programs before the terminfo
2286 tree is accessible (that is, in single-user mode or at OS installation
2287 time) the ncurses library can be compiled to include an array of
2288 pre-fetched fallback entries.
2290 NOTE: This must be done on a machine which has ncurses' infocmp and
2291 terminfo database installed (as well as ncurses' tic and infocmp
2292 programs). That is because the fallback sources are generated and
2293 compiled into the library before the build-tree's copy of infocmp is
2296 These entries are checked by setupterm() only when the conventional
2297 fetches from the terminfo tree and the termcap fallback (if configured)
2298 have been tried and failed. Thus, the presence of a fallback will not
2299 shadow modifications to the on-disk entry for the same type, when that
2300 entry is accessible.
2302 By default, there are no entries on the fallback list. After you have
2303 built the ncurses suite for the first time, you can change the list
2304 (the process needs infocmp(1)). To do so, use the script
2305 ncurses/tinfo/MKfallback.sh. The configure script option
2306 --with-fallbacks does this (it accepts a comma-separated list of the
2307 names you wish, and does not require a rebuild).
2309 If you wanted (say) to have linux, vt100, and xterm fallbacks, you
2310 might use the commands
2313 tinfo/MKfallback.sh \
2315 ../misc/terminfo.src \
2318 linux vt100 xterm >fallback.c
2320 The first four parameters of the script are normally supplied by
2321 the configured makefiles via the "--with-fallbacks" option. They
2324 1) the location of the terminfo database
2325 2) the source for the terminfo entries
2326 3) the location of the tic program, used to create a terminfo
2328 4) the location of the infocmp program, used to print a terminfo
2331 Then just rebuild and reinstall the library as you would normally.
2332 You can restore the default empty fallback list with
2334 tinfo/MKfallback.sh \
2336 ../misc/terminfo.src \
2341 The overhead for an empty fallback list is one trivial stub function.
2342 Any non-empty fallback list is const'd and therefore lives in shareable
2343 text space. You can look at the comment trailing each initializer in
2344 the generated ncurses/fallback.c file to see the core cost of the
2345 fallbacks. A good rule of thumb for modern vt100-like entries is that
2346 each one will cost about 2.5K of text space.
2349 BSD CONVERSION NOTES:
2350 --------------------
2352 If you need to support really ancient BSD programs, you probably
2353 want to configure with the --enable-bsdpad option. What this does
2354 is enable code in tputs() that recognizes a numeric prefix on a
2355 capability as a request for that much trailing padding in milliseconds.
2356 There are old BSD programs that do things like tputs("50").
2358 (If you are distributing ncurses as a support-library component of
2359 an application you probably want to put the remainder of this section
2360 in the package README file.)
2362 The following note applies only if you have configured ncurses with
2365 ------------------------------- CUT HERE --------------------------------
2367 If you are installing this application privately (either because you
2368 have no root access or want to experiment with it before doing a root
2369 installation), there are a couple of details you need to be aware of.
2370 They have to do with the ncurses library, which uses terminfo rather
2371 than termcap for describing terminal characteristics.
2373 Though the ncurses library is terminfo-based, it can interpret your
2374 TERMCAP variable (if present), any local termcap files you reference
2375 through it, and the system termcap file. However, to avoid slowing
2376 down your application startup, it does this only once per terminal type!
2378 The first time you load a given terminal type from your termcap
2379 database, the library initialization code will automatically write it
2380 in terminfo format to a subdirectory under $HOME/.terminfo. After
2381 that, the initialization code will find it there and do a (much
2382 faster) terminfo fetch.
2384 Usually, all this means is that your home directory will silently grow
2385 an invisible .terminfo subdirectory which will get filled in with
2386 terminfo descriptions of terminal types as you invoke them. If anyone
2387 ever installs a global terminfo tree on your system, this will quietly
2388 stop happening and your $HOME/.terminfo will become redundant.
2390 The objective of all this logic is to make converting from BSD termcap
2391 as painless as possible without slowing down your application (termcap
2392 compilation is expensive).
2394 If you don't have a TERMCAP variable or custom personal termcap file,
2395 you can skip the rest of this dissertation.
2397 If you *do* have a TERMCAP variable and/or a custom personal termcap file
2398 that defines a terminal type, that definition will stop being visible
2399 to this application after the first time you run it, because it will
2400 instead see the terminfo entry that it wrote to $HOME/terminfo the
2403 Subsequently, editing the TERMCAP variable or personal TERMCAP file
2404 will have no effect unless you explicitly remove the terminfo entry
2405 under $HOME/terminfo. If you do that, the entry will be recompiled
2406 from your termcap resources the next time it is invoked.
2408 To avoid these complications, use infocmp(1) and tic(1) to edit the
2409 terminfo directory directly.
2411 ------------------------------- CUT HERE --------------------------------
2415 Ncurses 4.1 and up can be configured to use GPM (General Purpose Mouse)
2416 which is used with Linux console. Be aware that GPM is commonly
2417 installed as a shared library which contains a wrapper for the curses
2418 wgetch() function (libcurses.o). Some integrators have simplified
2419 linking applications by combining all or part of libcurses.so into the
2420 libgpm.so file, producing symbol conflicts with ncurses (specifically
2421 the wgetch function). This was originally the BSD curses, but
2422 generally whatever curses library exists on the system.
2424 You may be able to work around this problem by linking as follows:
2426 cc -o foo foo.o -lncurses -lgpm -lncurses
2428 but the linker may not cooperate, producing mysterious errors.
2429 See the FAQ, as well as the discussion under the --with-gpm option:
2431 https://invisible-island.net/ncurses/ncurses.faq.html#using_gpm_lib
2434 BUILDING WITH A CROSS-COMPILER:
2435 ------------------------------
2436 Ncurses can be built with a cross-compiler. Some parts must be built
2437 with the host's compiler since they are used for building programs
2438 (e.g., ncurses/make_hash and ncurses/make_keys) that generate tables
2439 that are compiled into the ncurses library. The essential thing to do
2440 is set the BUILD_CC environment variable to your host's compiler, and
2441 run the configure script configuring for the cross-compiler.
2443 The configure options --with-build-cc, etc., are provided to make this
2444 simpler. Since make_hash and make_keys use only ANSI C features, it
2445 is normally not necessary to provide the other options such as
2446 --with-build-libs, but they are provided for completeness.
2448 Note that all of the generated source-files which are part of ncurses
2449 will be made if you use
2453 This would be useful in porting to an environment which has little
2454 support for the tools used to generate the sources, e.g., sed, awk and
2457 When ncurses has been successfully cross-compiled, you may want to use
2458 "make install" (with a suitable target directory) to construct an
2459 install tree. Note that in this case (as with the --with-fallbacks
2460 option), ncurses uses the development platform's tic to do the "make
2461 install.data" portion.
2463 The system's tic program is used to install the terminal database,
2464 even for cross-compiles. For best results, the tic program should be
2465 from the most current version of ncurses.
2467 NOTE: the system's tic program may use a different terminfo database
2468 format than the target system. For instance, as described in term(5),
2469 the conventional terminfo layout uses a directory hierarchy with one
2470 letter names, while some platforms use two-letter names to work with
2471 case-insensitive filesystems. The configure script searches for a tic
2472 program using the AC_CHECK_TOOL macro, which will prefer programs
2473 using the canonical host prefix in their name. You can use this fact
2474 to provide a cross-compiler support utility tic, otherwise you can
2475 override the configure script's choice using --with-tic-path
2480 Send any feedback to the ncurses mailing list at
2481 bug-ncurses@gnu.org. To subscribe send mail to
2482 bug-ncurses-request@gnu.org with body that reads:
2483 subscribe ncurses <your-email-address-here>
2485 The Hacker's Guide in the doc directory includes some guidelines
2486 on how to report bugs in ways that will get them fixed most quickly.