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28 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
29 -- $Id: INSTALL,v 1.253 2023/11/03 20:55:47 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,
39 where d.d is the current version number. There should be several
40 subdirectories, including 'c++', 'form', 'man', 'menu', 'misc', 'ncurses',
41 'panel', 'progs', and 'test'. See 'README' 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 GPM section below.
52 If you are cross-compiling, see the note below on
53 BUILDING WITH A CROSS-COMPILER.
55 If you want to build the Ada95 binding, go to the Ada95 directory and
56 follow the instructions there. The Ada95 binding is not covered below.
62 You will need the following to build and install ncurses under UNIX:
64 * ANSI C compiler (gcc, for instance)
66 * awk (mawk or gawk will do)
68 * BSD or System V style install (a script is enclosed)
70 Ncurses has been also built in the OS/2 EMX environment.
73 INSTALLATION PROCEDURE:
74 ----------------------
76 1. First, decide whether you want ncurses to replace your existing library
77 (in which case you'll need super-user privileges) or be installed in
80 The --prefix option to configure changes the root directory for installing
81 ncurses. The default is normally in subdirectories of /usr/local, except
82 for systems where ncurses is normally installed as a system library (see
83 "FOR SYSTEM INTEGRATORS"). Use --prefix=/usr to replace your
84 default curses distribution.
86 The package gets installed beneath the --prefix directory as follows:
88 In $(prefix)/bin: tic, infocmp, captoinfo, tset,
89 reset, clear, tput, toe, tabs
90 In $(prefix)/lib: libncurses*.* libcurses.a
91 In $(prefix)/share/terminfo: compiled terminal descriptions
92 In $(prefix)/include: C header files
93 Under $(prefix)/man: the manual pages
95 Note that the configure script attempts to locate previous installation of
96 ncurses, and will set the default prefix according to where it finds the
99 Do not use commands such as
101 make install prefix=XXX
103 to change the prefix after configuration, since the prefix value is used
104 for some absolute pathnames such as TERMINFO. Instead do this
106 make install DESTDIR=XXX
108 See also the discussion of --with-install-prefix.
110 2. Type './configure' in the top-level directory of the distribution to
111 configure ncurses for your operating system and create the Makefiles.
112 Besides --prefix, various configuration options are available to customize
113 the installation; use './configure --help' to list the available options.
115 If your operating system is not supported, read the PORTABILITY section in
116 the file ncurses/README for information on how to create a configuration
117 file for your system.
119 The 'configure' script generates makefile rules for one or more object
120 models and their associated libraries:
122 libncurses.a (normal)
124 libcurses.a (normal, a link to libncurses.a)
125 This gets left out if you configure with --disable-overwrite.
127 libncurses.so (shared)
129 libncurses_g.a (debug)
131 libncurses_p.a (profile)
133 libncurses.la (libtool)
135 If you configure using the --enable-widec option, a "w" is appended to the
136 library names (e.g., libncursesw.a), and the resulting libraries support
137 wide-characters, e.g., via a UTF-8 locale. The corresponding header files
138 are compatible with the non-wide-character configuration; wide-character
139 features are provided by ifdef's in the header files. The wide-character
140 library interfaces are not binary-compatible with the non-wide-character
141 version. Building and running the wide-character code relies on a fairly
142 recent implementation of libiconv. We have built this configuration on
143 various systems using libiconv, sometimes requiring libutf8.
145 If you configure using the --with-pthread option, a "t" is appended to
146 the library names (e.g., libncursest.a, libncursestw.a).
148 If you do not specify any models, the normal and debug libraries will be
149 configured. Typing 'configure' with no arguments is equivalent to:
151 ./configure --with-normal --with-debug --enable-overwrite
155 ./configure --with-shared
157 makes the shared libraries the default, resulting in
159 ./configure --with-shared --with-normal --with-debug --enable-overwrite
161 If you want only shared libraries, type
163 ./configure --with-shared --without-normal --without-debug
165 Rules for generating shared libraries are highly dependent upon the choice
166 of host system and compiler. We've been testing shared libraries on
167 several systems, but more work needs to be done to make shared libraries
168 work on other systems.
170 If you have libtool installed, you can type
172 ./configure --with-libtool
174 to generate the appropriate static and/or shared libraries for your
175 platform using libtool.
177 You can make curses and terminfo fall back to an existing file of termcap
178 definitions by configuring with --enable-termcap. If you do this, the
179 library will search /etc/termcap before the terminfo database, and will
180 also interpret the contents of the $TERM environment variable. See the
181 section BSD CONVERSION NOTES below.
183 3. Type 'make'. Ignore any warnings; no error messages should be produced.
184 This should compile the ncurses library, the terminfo compiler tic(1),
185 captoinfo(1), infocmp(1), toe(1), clear(1) tset(1), reset(1), and tput(1)
186 programs (see the manual pages for explanation of what they do), some test
187 programs, and the panels, menus, and forms libraries.
189 4. Run ncurses and several other test programs in the test directory to
190 verify that ncurses functions correctly before doing an install that
191 may overwrite system files. Read the file test/README for details on
194 NOTE: You must have installed the terminfo database, or set the
195 environment variable $TERMINFO to point to a SVr4-compatible terminfo
196 database before running the test programs. Not all vendors' terminfo
197 databases are SVr4-compatible, but most seem to be.
199 It is possible to configure ncurses to use other terminfo database
200 formats. A few are provided as examples in the include-directory (see
203 If you run the test programs WITHOUT installing terminfo, ncurses may
204 read the termcap file and cache that in $HOME/.terminfo, which will
205 thereafter be used instead of the terminfo database. See the comments
206 on "--enable-getcap-cache", to see why this is a Bad Thing.
208 The ncurses program is designed specifically to test the ncurses library.
209 You can use it to verify that the screen highlights work correctly, that
210 cursor addressing and window scrolling works OK, etc.
212 5. Once you've tested, you can type 'make install' to install libraries,
213 the programs, the terminfo database and the manual pages. Alternately,
214 you can type 'make install' in each directory you want to install. In the
215 top-level directory, you can do a partial install using these commands:
217 'make install.progs' installs tic, infocmp, etc...
218 'make install.includes' installs the headers.
219 'make install.libs' installs the libraries (and the headers).
220 'make install.data' installs the terminfo data. (Note: 'tic' must
221 be installed before the terminfo data can be
223 'make install.man' installs the manual pages.
225 ############################################################################
226 # CAVEAT EMPTOR: 'install.data' run as root will NUKE any existing #
227 # terminfo database. If you have any custom or unusual entries SAVE them #
228 # before you install ncurses. #
229 ############################################################################
231 The terminfo(5) manual page must be preprocessed with tbl(1) before
232 being formatted by nroff(1). Modern man(1) implementations tend to do
233 this by default, but you may want to look at your version's manual page
234 to be sure. You may also install the manual pages after preprocessing
235 with tbl(1) by specifying the configure option --with-manpage-tbl.
237 If the system already has a curses library that you need to keep using
238 you'll need to distinguish between it and ncurses. See the discussion of
239 --disable-overwrite. If ncurses is installed outside the standard
240 directories (/usr/include and /usr/lib) then all your users will need to
241 use the -I option to compile programs and -L to link them.
243 If you have another curses installed in your system and you accidentally
244 compile using its curses.h you'll end up with a large number of
245 undefined symbols at link time.
247 IF YOU DO NOT HAVE ROOT: Change directory to the 'progs' subdirectory
248 and run the 'capconvert' script. This script will deduce various things
249 about your environment and use them to build you a private terminfo tree,
250 so you can use ncurses applications.
252 If more than one user at your site does this, the space for the duplicate
253 trees is wasted. Try to get your site administrators to install a system-
254 wide terminfo tree instead.
256 See the BSD CONVERSION NOTES section below for a few more details.
258 6. The c++ directory has C++ classes that are built on top of ncurses and
259 panels. You must have c++ (and its libraries) installed before you can
260 compile and run the demo.
262 Use --without-cxx-binding to tell configure to not build the C++ bindings
265 If you do not have C++, you must use the --without-cxx option to tell
266 the configure script to not attempt to determine the type of 'bool'
267 which may be supported by C++. IF YOU USE THIS OPTION, BE ADVISED THAT
268 YOU MAY NOT BE ABLE TO COMPILE (OR RUN) NCURSES APPLICATIONS WITH C++.
274 The configure script provides a short list of its options when you type
278 The --help and several options are common to all configure scripts that
279 are generated with autoconf. Those are all listed before the line
281 --enable and --with options recognized:
283 The other options are specific to this package. We list them in
286 --disable-assumed-color
287 With ncurses 5.1, we introduced a new function, assume_default_colors()
288 which allows applications to specify what the default foreground and
289 background color are assumed to be. Most color applications use
290 full-screen color; but a few do not color the background. While the
291 assumed values can be overridden by invoking assume_default_colors(),
292 you may find it useful to set the assumed values to the pre-5.1
293 convention, using this configure option.
296 Assume machine has little memory. The configure script attempts to
297 determine if your machine has enough memory (about 6Mb) to compile the
298 terminfo database without writing portions to disk. Some allocators
299 return deceptive results, so you may have to override the configure
300 script. Or you may be building tic for a smaller machine.
302 --disable-big-strings
303 Disable compile-time optimization of predefined tables which puts
304 all of their strings into a very long string, to reduce relocation
308 Use only built-in data. The ncurses libraries normally read terminfo
309 and termcap data from disk. You can configure ncurses to have a
310 built-in database, aka "fallback" entries. Embedded applications may
311 have no need for an external database. Some, but not all of the
312 programs are useful in this configuration, e.g., tset and tput versus
316 Do not install the terminal database. This is used to omit features
317 for packages, as done with --without-progs.
320 Use the option --disable-echo to make the build-log less verbose by
321 suppressing the display of the compile and link commands. This makes
322 it easier to see the compiler warnings. (You can always use "make -n"
323 to see the options that are used).
326 Disable function-extensions. Configure ncurses without the functions
327 that are not specified by XSI. See ncurses/modules for the exact
328 list of library modules that would be suppressed.
330 --disable-gnat-projects
331 Disable GNAT projects even if usable, for testing old makefile rules.
334 Compile without hashmap scrolling-optimization code. This algorithm is
337 --disable-home-terminfo
338 The $HOME/.terminfo directory is normally added to ncurses' search
339 list for reading/writing terminfo entries, since that directory is
340 more likely writable than the system terminfo database. Use this
341 option to disable the feature altogether.
344 Disable compiler flags needed to use large-file interfaces.
347 For testing, compile-in code that frees memory that normally would not
348 be freed, to simplify analysis of memory-leaks.
350 Any implementation of curses must not free the memory associated with
351 a screen, since (even after calling endwin()), it must be available
352 for use in the next call to refresh(). There are also chunks of
353 memory held for performance reasons. That makes it hard to analyze
354 curses applications for memory leaks. To work around this, build a
355 debugging version of the ncurses library which frees those chunks
356 which it can, and provides the _nc_free_and_exit() function to free
357 the remainder and then exit. The ncurses utility and test programs
358 use this feature, e.g., via the ExitProgram() macro.
360 Because this lies outside of the library's intended usage, it is not
361 normally considered part of the ABI. If there were some (as yet
362 unplanned) extension which frees memory in a manner that would let the
363 library resume and reallocate memory, then that would not use a "_nc_"
366 --disable-lib-suffixes
367 Suppress the "w", "t" or "tw" suffixes which normally would be added
368 to the library names for the --enable-widec and --with-pthread options.
370 --disable-libtool-version
371 when using --with-libtool, control how the major/minor version numbers
372 are used for constructing the library name.
374 The default uses the -version-number feature of libtool, which makes
375 the library names compatible (though not identical) with the standard
376 build using --with-shared.
378 Use --disable-libtool-version to use the libtool -version-info feature.
379 This corresponds to the setting used before patch 20100515.
381 Starting with patch 20141115, using this option causes the configure
382 script to apply the top-level VERSION file to the ABI version used
386 The header files will ignore use of the _LP64 symbol to make chtype
387 and mmask_t types 32 bits (they may be long on 64-bit hosts, for
388 compatibility with older releases).
390 NOTE: this is potentially an ABI change, depending on existing
391 packages. The default for this option is "disabled" for ncurses
392 ABI 5, and "enabled" for ABI 6.
395 For testing, use functions rather than macros. The program will run
396 more slowly, but it is simpler to debug. This defines NCURSES_NOMACROS
397 at build time. See also the --enable-expanded option.
400 If you are installing ncurses on a system which contains another
401 development version of curses, or which could be confused by the loader
402 for another version, we recommend that you leave out the link to
403 -lcurses. The ncurses library is always available as -lncurses.
404 Disabling overwrite also causes the ncurses header files to be
405 installed into a subdirectory, e.g., /usr/local/include/ncurses,
406 rather than the include directory. This makes it simpler to avoid
407 compile-time conflicts with other versions of curses.h
409 Putting the header files into a subdirectory assumes that applications
410 will follow the (standard) practice of including the headers with
411 reference to the subdirectory name. For instance, the normal ncurses
412 header would be included using
414 #include <ncurses/curses.h>
415 #include <ncurses/term.h>
417 while the ncursesw headers would be found this way:
419 #include <ncursesw/curses.h>
420 #include <ncursesw/term.h>
422 In either case (with or without the --disable-overwrite option),
423 almost all applications are designed to include a related set of
424 curses header files from the same directory.
426 Manipulating the --includedir configure option to put header files
427 directly in a subdirectory of the normal include-directory defeats
428 this, and breaks builds of portable applications. Likewise, putting
429 some headers in /usr/include, and others in a subdirectory is a good
432 When configured with --disable-overwrite, the installed header files'
433 embedded #include's are adjusted to use the same style of includes
434 noted above. In particular, the unctrl.h header is included from
435 curses.h, which means that a makefile which tells the compiler to
436 include directly from the subdirectory will fail to compile correctly.
437 Without some special effort, it will either fail to compile at all,
438 or the compiler may find a different unctrl.h file.
440 In addition to the curses library, a system may provide its own
441 versions of the add-on libraries (form, menu, panel), which would
442 not be compatible with ncurses. These options allow you to rename
443 ncurses' add-on libraries to avoid conflicts when linking:
445 --with-form-libname=XXX
446 --with-menu-libname=XXX
447 --with-panel-libname=XXX
449 Rather than renaming them arbitrarily, a prefix or suffix is
450 recommended. An "n" prefix provides consistency with ncurses versus
453 --with-form-libname=nform
454 --with-menu-libname=nmenu
455 --with-panel-libname=npanel
457 --disable-pkg-ldflags
458 Omit options in $LDFLAGS and $EXTRA_LDFLAGS from the pkg-config ".pc"
459 and corresponding ncurses*-config script which normally are listed via
460 the "--libs" option. These options are normally used to facilitate
461 linking to ncurses when it was configured to use the rpath feature.
463 See also --enable-rpath and --disable-rpath-hack.
466 If --enable-rpath is given, the generated makefiles normally will
467 rebuild shared libraries during install. Use this option to simply
468 copy whatever the linker produced.
470 Static libraries cannot simply be copied because tools use timestamps
471 to determine if the library's symbol table is up to date. If your
472 install program supports the "-p" (preserve timestamp) option, that
473 is used when --disable-relink is given, to avoid rebuilding the symbol
476 Finally, some tools ignore the subsecond timestamps supported by some
477 filesystems. This option adds a 1-second sleep to help those tools
478 avoid unnecessary relinking during the install process.
480 --disable-root-access
481 Compile with environment restriction, so most file-access is limited
482 when running as root, or via a setuid/setgid application.
484 --disable-root-environ
485 Compile with environment restriction, so certain environment variables
486 are not available when running as root. These are (for example
487 $TERMINFO) those that allow the search path for the terminfo or termcap
488 entry to be customized.
490 Disabling the root environment variables also disables the setuid
491 environment variables by default. Use the --disable-setuid-environ
492 option to modify this behavior.
495 Normally the configure script helps link libraries found in unusual
496 places by adding an rpath option to the link command. If you are
497 building packages, this feature may be redundant. Use this option
498 to suppress the feature.
500 --disable-scroll-hints
501 Compile without scroll-hints code. This option is ignored when
502 hashmap scrolling is configured, which is the default.
505 Do not strip installed executables.
507 --disable-setuid-environ
508 Compile with environment restriction, so certain environment variables
509 are not available when running via a setuid/setgid application. These
510 are (for example $TERMINFO) those that allow the search path for the
511 terminfo or termcap entry to be customized.
513 A setuid/setgid application inherits its environment variables from
514 the current user, in contrast to sudo which may limit the environment
515 variables that ncurses uses.
517 --disable-tic-depends
518 When building shared libraries, normally the tic library is linked to
519 depend upon the ncurses library (or equivalently, on the tinfo-library
520 if the --with-termlib option was given). The tic- and tinfo-library
521 ABIs do not depend on the --enable-widec option. Some packagers have
522 used this to reduce the number of library files which are packaged by
523 using only one copy of those libraries. To make this work properly,
524 the tic library must be built without an explicit dependency on the
525 underlying library (ncurses vs ncursesw, tinfo vs tinfow). Use this
526 configure option to do that.
528 configure --with-ticlib --with-shared --disable-tic-depends
530 --disable-tparm-varargs
531 Portable programs should call tparm() using the fixed-length parameter
532 list documented in X/Open. ncurses provides varargs support for this
533 function. Use --disable-tparm-varargs to disable this support.
536 For testing, compile-in assertion code. This is used only for a few
537 places where ncurses cannot easily recover by returning an error code.
539 --enable-broken_linker
540 A few platforms have what we consider a broken linker: it cannot link
541 objects from an archive solely by referring to data objects in those
542 files, but requires a function reference. This configure option
543 changes several data references to functions to work around this
546 NOTE: With ncurses 5.1, this may not be necessary, since we are
547 told that some linkers interpret uninitialized global data as a
548 different type of reference which behaves as described above. We have
549 explicitly initialized all of the global data to work around the
553 Recognize BSD-style prefix padding. Some ancient BSD programs (such as
554 nethack) call tputs("50") to implement delays.
557 Compile-in feature to detect screensize for terminals which do not
558 advertise their screensize, e.g., serial terminals.
561 Compile with experimental $COLORFGBG code. That environment variable
562 is set by some terminal emulators as a hint to applications, by
563 advertising the default foreground and background colors. During
564 initialization, ncurses sets color pair 0 to match this.
567 The curses interface as documented in XSI is rather old, in fact
568 including features that precede ANSI C. The prototypes generally do
569 not make effective use of "const". When using stricter compilers (or
570 gcc with appropriate warnings), you may see warnings about the mismatch
571 between const and non-const data. We provide a configure option which
572 changes the interfaces to use const - quieting these warnings and
573 reflecting the actual use of the parameters more closely. The ncurses
574 library uses the symbol NCURSES_CONST for these instances of const,
575 and if you have asked for compiler warnings, will add gcc's const-qual
576 warning. There will still be warnings due to subtle inconsistencies
577 in the interface, but at a lower level.
579 NOTE: configuring ncurses with this option may detract from the
580 portability of your applications by encouraging you to use const in
581 places where the XSI curses interface would not allow them. Similar
582 issues arise when porting to SVr4 curses, which uses const in even
586 For testing, generate functions for certain macros to make them visible
587 as such to the debugger. See also the --disable-macros option.
590 When configuring for MinGW, use the experimental Windows 10 driver.
593 Extend the cchar_t structure to allow more than 16 colors to be
594 encoded. This applies only to the wide-character (--enable-widec)
597 NOTE: using this option will make libraries which are not binary-
598 compatible with libncursesw 5.4. None of the interfaces change, but
599 applications which have an array of cchar_t's must be recompiled.
602 Modify the encoding of mouse state to make room for a 5th mouse button.
603 That allows one to use ncurses with a wheel mouse with xterm or
604 similar X terminal emulators.
606 NOTE: using this option will make libraries which are not binary-
607 compatible with libncursesw 5.4. None of the interfaces change, but
608 applications which have mouse mask mmask_t's must be recompiled.
611 Modify the file-format written by putwin() to use printable text rather
612 than binary files, allowing getwin() to read screen dumps written by
613 differently-configured ncurses libraries. The extended getwin() can
614 still read binary screen dumps from the "same" configuration of
615 ncurses. This does not change the ABI (the binary interface seen by
616 calling applications).
619 Use the gcc "-fvisibility=hidden" option to make symbols which are not
620 explicitly exported, "hidden". Doing this may reduce the number of
621 symbols exported in the C++ binding; it should have less effect on the
622 C libraries when symbol-versioning is used.
625 Use the 4.4BSD getcap code if available, or a bundled version of it to
626 fetch termcap entries. Entries read in this way cannot use (make
627 cross-references to) the terminfo tree, but it is faster than reading
630 If configured for one of the *BSD systems, this automatically uses
631 the hashed database system produced using cap_mkdb or similar tools.
632 In that case, there is no advantage in using the --enable-getcap-cache
635 See also the --with-hashed-db option.
637 --enable-getcap-cache
638 Cache translated termcaps under the directory $HOME/.terminfo
640 NOTE: this sounds good - it makes ncurses run faster the second time.
641 But look where the data comes from - an /etc/termcap containing lots of
642 entries that are not up to date. If you configure with this option and
643 forget to install the terminfo database before running an ncurses
644 application, you will end up with a hidden terminfo database that
645 generally does not support color and will miss some function keys.
648 Compile-in cursor-optimization code that uses hard-tabs. We would make
649 this a standard feature except for the concern that the terminfo entry
650 may not be accurate, or that your stty settings have disabled the use
654 Compile-in experimental interop bindings. These provide generic types
655 for the form-library.
658 Controls whether the filesystem on which the terminfo database resides
659 supports mixed-case filenames (normal for UNIX, but not on other
660 systems). If you do not specify this option, the configure script
661 checks the current filesystem.
664 Compile-in support for the $NCURSES_NO_PADDING environment variable,
665 which allows you to suppress the effect of non-mandatory padding in
666 terminfo entries. This is the default, unless you have disabled the
669 --enable-opaque-curses
672 --enable-opaque-panel
673 Define symbol in curses.h controlling whether some library structures
674 are opaque, meaning that their members are accessible only via the
675 documented API. The --enable-opaque-curses option may be overridden
676 by the --enable-reentrant option.
678 Enabling opaque-curses enables opaque for the form, menu, and panel
679 libraries. Use their corresponding options to disable the feature
682 NOTE: beginning with ncurses 6.5 this option is enabled by default;
683 older versions disable it by default.
686 If pkg-config is found (see --with-pkg-config), generate ".pc" files
687 for each of the libraries, and install them in pkg-config's library
690 --enable-pthreads-eintr
691 add logic in threaded configuration to ensure that a read(2) system
692 call can be interrupted for SIGWINCH.
695 Compile configuration which improves reentrant use of the library by
696 reducing global and static variables. This option is also set if
697 --with-pthread is used.
699 Enabling this option adds a "t" to the library names, except for the
700 special case when --enable-weak-symbols is also used.
703 Use rpath option when generating shared libraries, and (with some
704 restrictions) when linking the corresponding programs. This originally
705 (in 1997) applied mainly to systems using the GNU linker (read the
708 More recently it is useful for systems that require special treatment
709 shared libraries in "unusual" locations. The "system" libraries reside
710 in directories which are on the loader's default search-path. While
711 you may be able to use workarounds such as the $LD_LIBRARY_PATH
712 environment variable, they do not work with setuid applications since
713 the LD_LIBRARY_PATH variable would be unset in that situation.
715 This option does not apply to --with-libtool, since libtool makes
716 extra assumptions about rpath.
718 --enable-safe-sprintf
719 Compile with experimental safe-sprintf code. You may consider using
720 this if you are building ncurses for a system that has neither
721 vsnprintf() or vsprintf(). It is slow, however, and is used only on
722 very old systems which lack vsnprintf().
725 The term.h header declares a Booleans[] array typed "char". But it
726 stores signed values there and "char" is not necessarily signed.
727 Some packagers choose to alter the type of Booleans[] though this
728 is not strictly compatible. This option allows one to implement this
729 alteration without patching the source code.
732 Compile support for ncurses' SIGWINCH handler. If your application has
733 its own SIGWINCH handler, ncurses will not use its own. The ncurses
734 handler causes wgetch() to return KEY_RESIZE when the screen-size
735 changes. This option is the default, unless you have disabled the
739 Compile-in support for extended functions which accept a SCREEN pointer,
740 reducing the need for juggling the global SP value with set_term() and
744 When enabled, check if the <stdnoreturn.h> header exists, and if found
745 define GCC_NORETURN to _Noreturn rather than either the gcc-specific
746 __attribute__((noreturn)) or an empty token. Doing this may require
747 calling programs which use GCC_NORETURN in their own function
748 definitions to be modified, because _Noreturn is only accepted as
749 the first token in a declaration.
751 --enable-string-hacks
752 Controls whether strlcat and strlcpy may be used. The same issue
753 applies to OpenBSD's warnings about snprintf, noting that this function
754 is weakly standardized.
756 Aside from stifling these warnings, there is no functional improvement
760 If your system supports symbolic links, make tic use symbolic links
761 rather than hard links to save diskspace when writing aliases in the
765 Compile-in support for user-definable terminal capabilities. Use the
766 -x option of tic and infocmp to treat unrecognized terminal
767 capabilities as user-defined strings. This option is the default,
768 unless you have disabled the extended functions.
771 Enable experimental terminal-driver. This is currently used for the
772 MinGW port, by providing a way to substitute the low-level terminfo
773 library with different terminal drivers.
776 Compile in support for reading terminal descriptions from termcap if no
777 match is found in the terminfo database. See also the --enable-getcap
778 and --enable-getcap-cache options.
780 Termcap support requires run-time parsing rather than loading
781 predigested data. If you have specified --with-ticlib, then you
782 cannot have termcap support since run-time parsing is done in the
783 tic library, which is intentionally not part of normal linkage
787 Turn on GCC compiler warnings. There should be only a few.
789 --enable-wattr-macros
790 The 6.0 ABI adds support for extended colors and for extended mouse.
791 The former is a noticeable problem when developers inadvertently
792 compile using the ncurses6 header files and link with an ncurses5
793 library, because the wattr* macros use a new field in the WINDOW
794 structure. These macros are used in several applications.
796 Since ncurses provides an actual function for each of these macros,
797 suppressing them from the curses.h header allows the ncurses5 libraries
798 to be used in most applications.
800 NOTE: The extended colors also are used in the cchar_t structure, but
801 fewer applications use that.
803 NOTE: This workaround does not help with mismatches in the ncurses
804 mouse version. The extended mouse feature uses one less fewer bit for
805 each button, so that only the first button will work as expected with
806 a mismatch between header and library. Again, most applications will
807 work, since most use only the first button.
809 --enable-weak-symbols
810 If the --with-pthread option is set, check if the compiler supports
811 weak-symbols. If it does, then name the thread-capable library without
812 the "t" (libncurses rather than libncursest), and provide for
813 dynamically loading the pthreads entrypoints at runtime. This allows
814 one to reduce the number of library files for ncurses.
816 --enable-wgetch-events
817 Compile with experimental wgetch-events code. See ncurses/README.IZ
820 Compile with wide-character code. This makes a different version of
821 the libraries (e.g., libncursesw.so), which stores characters as
824 NOTE: applications compiled with this configuration are not compatible
825 with those built for 8-bit characters. You cannot simply make a
826 symbolic link to equate libncurses.so with libncursesw.so
828 NOTE: the Ada95 binding may be built against either version of the the
829 ncurses library, but you must decide which: the binding installs the
830 same set of files for either version. Currently (2023/10/21) it does
831 not use the extended features from the wide-character code, so it is
832 probably better to not install the binding for that configuration.
834 NOTE: beginning with ncurses 6.5 this option is enabled by default;
835 older versions disable it by default.
838 Compile-in support experimental xmc (magic cookie) code.
840 --with-abi-altered=NUM
841 Override the displayed (rather than compiled-in) ABI. Only packagers
842 who have created configurations where the ABI differs from ncurses
843 should be interested in this option.
845 --with-abi-version=NUM
846 Override the ABI version, which is used in shared library filenames.
847 Normally this is the same as the release version; some ports have
848 special requirements for compatibility.
850 This option does not affect linking with libtool, which uses the
851 release major/minor numbers.
853 --with-ada-compiler=CMD
854 Specify the Ada95 compiler command (default "gnatmake")
856 --with-ada-include=DIR
857 Tell where to install the Ada includes (default:
858 PREFIX/lib/ada/adainclude)
860 --with-ada-libname=NAME
861 Override the name of the Ada binding (default: "AdaCurses")
863 --with-ada-objects=DIR
864 Tell where to install the Ada objects (default: PREFIX/lib/ada/adalib)
867 Build a shared library for Ada95 binding, if the compiler permits.
869 NOTE: You must also set the --with-shared option on some platforms
870 for a successful build. You need not use this option when you set
871 --with-shared, unless you want to use the Ada shared library.
874 If --without-cxx is specified, override the type used for the "bool"
875 declared in curses.h (normally the type is automatically chosen to
876 correspond with that in <stdbool.h>, or defaults to platform-specific
880 If cross-compiling, specify a host C compiler, which is needed to
881 compile a few utilities which generate source modules for ncurses.
882 If you do not give this option, the configure script checks if the
883 $BUILD_CC variable is set, and otherwise defaults to gcc or cc.
885 --with-build-cflags=XXX
886 If cross-compiling, specify the host C compiler-flags. You might need
887 to do this if the target compiler has unusual flags which confuse the
890 You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_CFLAGS rather than
894 This option is provided by the same macro used for $BUILD_CC, etc.,
895 but is not directly used by ncurses.
897 --with-build-cppflags=XXX
898 If cross-compiling, specify the host C preprocessor-flags. You might
899 need to do this if the target compiler has unusual flags which confuse
902 You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_CPPFLAGS rather than
905 --with-build-ldflags=XXX
906 If cross-compiling, specify the host linker-flags. You might need to
907 do this if the target linker has unusual flags which confuse the host
910 You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_LDFLAGS rather than
913 --with-build-libs=XXX
914 If cross-compiling, the host libraries. You might need to do this if
915 the target environment requires unusual libraries.
917 You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_LIBS rather than
921 Specify an alternate terminfo capabilities file, which makes the
922 configure script look for "include/Caps.XXX". A few systems, e.g.,
923 AIX 4.x use the same overall file-format as ncurses for terminfo
924 data, but use different alignments within the tables to support
925 legacy applications. For those systems, you can configure ncurses
926 to use a terminfo database which is compatible with the native
929 --with-ccharw-max=XXX
930 Override the size of the wide-character array in cchar_t structures.
931 Changing this will alter the binary interface. This defaults to 5.
934 Override type of chtype, which stores the video attributes and (if
935 --enable-widec is not given) a character. Prior to ncurses 5.5, this
936 was always unsigned long, but with ncurses 5.5, it may be unsigned.
937 Use this option if you need to preserve compatibility with 64-bit
938 executables, e.g., by setting "--with-chtype=long" (the configure
939 script supplies "unsigned").
941 --with-config-suffix=XXX
942 Specify an suffix for "ncurses*" in the ncurses*-config filename to
943 work around conflicts with packages. The suffix is placed before the
946 --with-cxx-libname=NAME
947 Override the basename of the ncurses++ library (default: "ncurses++")
950 When --with-shared is set, build libncurses++ as a shared library.
951 This implicitly relies upon building with gcc/g++, since other
952 compiler suites may have differences in the way shared libraries are
953 built. libtool by the way has similar limitations.
956 Specify the terminfo source file to install. Usually you will wish
957 to install ncurses' default (misc/terminfo.src). Certain systems
958 have special requirements, e.g, OS/2 EMX has a customized terminfo
962 For testing, compile and link with Conor Cahill's dbmalloc library.
963 This also sets the --disable-leaks option.
966 Generate debug-libraries (default). These are named by adding "_g"
967 to the root, e.g., libncurses_g.a
969 --with-default-terminfo-dir=XXX
970 Specify the default terminfo database directory. This is normally
971 DATADIR/terminfo, e.g., /usr/share/terminfo.
974 For testing, compile and link with Gray Watson's dmalloc library.
975 This also sets the --disable-leaks option.
977 --with-export-syms[=XXX]
978 Limit exported symbols using libtool. The configure script
979 automatically chooses an appropriate ".sym" file, which lists the
980 symbols which are part of the ABI.
982 --with-extra-suffix[=XXX]
983 Add the given suffix to header- and library-names to simplify
984 installing incompatible ncurses libraries, e.g., those using a
985 different ABI. The renaming affects the name of the
986 include-subdirectory if --disable-overwrite is given.
989 Specify a list of fallback terminal descriptions which will be
990 compiled into the ncurses library. See CONFIGURING FALLBACK ENTRIES.
992 See also "--with-tic-path" and "--with-infocmp-path".
994 --with-form-libname=NAME
995 Override the basename of the form library (default: "form")
998 use Alessandro Rubini's GPM library to provide mouse support on the
999 Linux console. Prior to ncurses 5.5, this introduced a dependency on
1002 Currently ncurses uses the dlsym() function to bind to the library at
1003 runtime, so it is only necessary that the library be present when
1004 ncurses is built, to obtain the filename (or soname) used in the
1005 corresponding dlopen() call. If you give a value for this option,
1008 --with-gpm=$HOME/tmp/test-gpm.so
1010 that overrides the configure check for the soname.
1012 See also --without-dlsym
1014 --with-hashed-db[=XXX]
1015 Use a hashed database for storing terminfo data rather than storing
1016 each compiled entry in a separate binary file within a directory
1019 In particular, this uses the Berkeley database 1.8.5 interface, as
1020 provided by that and its successors db 2, 3, and 4. The actual
1021 interface is slightly different in the successor versions of the
1022 Berkeley database. The database should have been configured using
1023 "--enable-compat185".
1025 If you use this option for configuring ncurses, tic will only be able
1026 to write entries in the hashed database. infocmp can still read
1027 entries from a directory tree as well as reading entries from the
1028 hashed database. To do this, infocmp determines whether the $TERMINFO
1029 variable points to a directory or a file, and reads the directory-tree
1030 or hashed database respectively.
1032 You cannot have a directory containing both hashed-database and
1033 filesystem-based terminfo entries.
1035 Use the parameter value to give the install-prefix used for the
1037 --with-hashed-db=/usr/local/BigBase
1038 to find the corresponding include- and lib-directories under the
1039 given directory. Alternatively, you can specify a directory leaf
1041 --with-hashed-db=db4
1042 to make the configure script look for files in a subdirectory such as
1043 /usr/include/db4/db.h
1044 /usr/lib/db4/libdb.so
1046 See also the --enable-getcap option.
1048 --with-infocmp-path[=XXX]
1049 Use this option to override the automatic detection of infocmp in your
1050 $PATH when building fallbacks (see "--with-fallbacks").
1052 --with-install-prefix=XXX
1053 Allows you to specify an alternate location for installing ncurses
1054 after building it. The value you specify is prepended to the "real"
1055 install location. This simplifies making binary packages. The
1056 makefile variable DESTDIR is set by this option. It is also possible
1058 make install DESTDIR=XXX
1059 since the makefiles pass that variable to subordinate makes.
1061 NOTE: a few systems build shared libraries with fixed pathnames; this
1062 option probably will not work for those configurations.
1064 --with-lib-prefix=XXX
1065 OS/2 EMX used a different naming convention from most Unix-like
1066 platforms. It required that the "lib" part of a library name was
1067 omitted. Newer EMX as part of eComStation does not follow that
1068 convention. Use this option to override the configure script's
1069 assumptions about the library-prefix. If this option is omitted, it
1070 uses the original OS/2 EMX convention for that platform. Use
1071 "--with-lib-prefix=lib" for the newer EMX in eComStation. Use
1072 "--without-lib-prefix" to suppress it for other odd platforms.
1074 --with-libtool[=XXX]
1075 Generate libraries with libtool. If this option is selected, then it
1076 overrides all other library model specifications. Note that libtool
1077 must already be installed, uses makefile rules dependent on GNU make,
1078 and does not promise to follow the version numbering convention of
1079 other shared libraries on your system. However, if the --with-shared
1080 option does not succeed, you may get better results with this option.
1082 If a parameter value is given, it must be the full pathname of the
1083 particular version of libtool, e.g.,
1084 /usr/bin/libtool-1.2.3
1086 It is possible to rebuild the configure script to use the automake
1087 macros for libtool, e.g., AC_PROG_LIBTOOL. See the comments in
1088 aclocal.m4 for CF_PROG_LIBTOOL, and ensure that you build configure
1089 using the appropriate patch for autoconf from
1090 https://invisible-island.net/autoconf/
1092 --with-libtool-opts=XXX
1093 Allow user to pass additional libtool options into the library creation
1094 and link steps. The main use for this is to do something like
1095 ./configure --with-libtool-opts=-static
1096 to get the same behavior as automake-flavored
1097 ./configure --enable-static
1099 --with-manpage-aliases
1100 Tell the configure script you wish to create entries in the
1101 man-directory for aliases to manpages which list them, e.g., the
1102 functions in the panel manpage. This is the default. You can disable
1103 it if your man program does this. You can also disable
1104 --with-manpage-symlinks to install files containing a ".so" command
1105 rather than symbolic links.
1107 --with-manpage-format=XXX
1108 Tell the configure script how you would like to install man-pages. The
1109 option value must be one of these: gzip, compress, BSDI, normal,
1110 formatted. If you do not give this option, the configure script
1111 attempts to determine which is the case.
1113 --with-manpage-renames=XXX
1114 Tell the configure script that you wish to rename the manpages while
1115 installing. Currently the only distribution which does this is Debian.
1116 The option value specifies the name of a file that lists the renamed
1117 files, e.g., $srcdir/man/man_db.renames
1119 --with-manpage-symlinks
1120 Tell the configure script that you wish to make symbolic links in the
1121 man-directory for aliases to the man-pages. This is the default, but
1122 can be disabled for systems that provide this automatically. Doing
1123 this on systems that do not support symbolic links will result in
1124 copying the man-page for each alias.
1127 Tell the configure script that you wish to preprocess the manpages
1128 by running them through tbl to generate tables understandable by
1131 --with-menu-libname=NAME
1132 Override the basename of the menu library (default: "menu")
1135 Override type of mmask_t, which stores the mouse mask. Prior to
1136 ncurses 5.5, this was always unsigned long, but with ncurses 5.5, it
1137 may be unsigned. Use this option if you need to preserve compatibility
1138 with 64-bit executables.
1141 Generate normal (i.e., static) libraries (default).
1143 Note: on Linux, the configure script will attempt to use the GPM
1144 library via the dlsym() function call. Use --without-dlsym to disable
1145 this feature, or --without-gpm, depending on whether you wish to use
1149 Override type of ospeed variable, which is part of the termcap
1150 compatibility interface. In termcap, this is a 'short', which works
1151 for a wide range of baudrates because ospeed is not the actual speed
1152 but the encoded value, e.g., B9600 would be a small number such as 13.
1153 However the encoding scheme originally allowed for values "only" up to
1154 38400bd. A newer set of definitions past 38400bd is not encoded as
1155 compactly, and is not guaranteed to fit into a short (see the function
1156 cfgetospeed(), which returns a speed_t for this reason). In practice,
1157 applications that required knowledge of the ospeed variable, i.e.,
1158 those using termcap, do not use the higher speeds. Your application
1159 (or system, in general) may or may not.
1161 --with-panel-libname=NAME
1162 Override the basename of the panel library (default: "panel")
1164 --with-pc-suffix=SUFFIX
1165 If ".pc" files are installed (see --enable-pc-files), optionally add a
1166 suffix to the files and corresponding package names to separate
1167 unusual configurations. If no option value is given (or if it is
1168 "none"), no suffix is added.
1171 Add PCRE2 (Perl-compatible regular expressions v2) to the build if it
1172 is available and the user requests it. Assume the application will
1173 otherwise use the POSIX interface.
1175 This is useful for MinGW builds because the usual POSIX interface is
1176 not supplied by the development environment, while ncurses' form
1177 library uses a regular expression feature for one of the field types.
1179 --with-pkg-config[=CMD]
1180 Check for pkg-config, optionally specifying its pathname.
1182 --with-pkg-config-libdir[=DIR]
1183 If pkg-config was found, override the automatic check for its library
1184 path. The optional DIR value can be
1186 "auto", automatically use pkg-config's library directory, or
1188 "libdir", use a ${libdir}/pkgconfig (based on the configuration), or
1190 a directory path, i.e., beginning with "/".
1192 The configure script allows only a single directory, because
1193 that is used as the directory in which to install ".pc" files.
1195 The automatic check for the library path prefers the first directory
1196 which currently exists. If none of the directories listed by
1197 pkg-config exist, the check prefers a pkgconfig directory under the
1198 "libdir" set by the configure script (which may not be the system
1199 default), or if pkg-config lists nothing suitable, the first one which
1200 is listed by pkg-config is used.
1203 Generate profile-libraries These are named by adding "_p" to the root,
1204 e.g., libncurses_p.a
1207 Link with POSIX threads, set --enable-reentrant. The use_window() and
1208 use_screen() functions will use mutex's, allowing rudimentary support
1209 for multithreaded applications.
1212 Compile-in RCS identifiers. Most of the C files have an identifier.
1214 --with-rel-version=NUM
1215 Override the release version, which may be used in shared library
1216 filenames. This consists of a major and minor version number separated
1217 by ".". Normally the major version number is the same as the ABI
1218 version; some ports have special requirements for compatibility.
1221 Generate shared-libraries. The names given depend on the system for
1222 which you are building, typically using a ".so" suffix, along with
1223 symbolic links that refer to the release version.
1225 NOTE: Unless you override the configure script by setting the $CFLAGS
1226 environment variable, these will not be built with the -g debugging
1229 NOTE: For some configurations, e.g., installing a new version of
1230 ncurses shared libraries on a machine which already has ncurses
1231 shared libraries, you may encounter problems with the linker.
1232 For example, it may prevent you from running the build tree's
1233 copy of tic (for installing the terminfo database) because it
1234 loads the system's copy of the ncurses shared libraries.
1236 In that case, using the misc/shlib script may be helpful, since it
1237 sets $LD_LIBRARY_PATH to point to the build tree, e.g.,
1239 ./misc/shlib make install
1241 Alternatively, for most platforms, the linker accepts a list of
1242 directories which will be searched for libraries at run-time. The
1243 configure script allows you to modify this list using the
1244 RPATH_LIST environment variable. It is a colon-separated list of
1245 directories (default: the "libdir" set via the configure script).
1246 If you set that to put "../lib" first in the list, the linker will
1247 look first at the build-directory, and avoid conflict with libraries
1248 already installed. One drawback to this approach is that libraries
1249 can be accidentally searched in any "../lib" directory.
1251 NOTE: If you use the --with-ada-sharedlib option, you should also
1252 set this option, to ensure that C-language modules needed for the
1253 Ada binding use appropriate compiler options.
1255 --with-shlib-version=XXX
1256 Specify whether to use the release or ABI version for shared libraries.
1257 This is normally chosen automatically based on the type of system
1258 which you are building on. We use it for testing the configure script.
1260 --with-strip-program=XXX
1261 When stripping executables during install, use the specified program
1262 rather than "strip".
1265 use FreeBSD sysmouse interface provide mouse support on the console.
1267 --with-system-type=XXX
1268 For testing, override the derived host system-type which is used to
1269 decide things such as the linker commands used to build shared
1270 libraries. This is normally chosen automatically based on the type of
1271 system which you are building on. We use it for testing the configure
1274 --with-terminfo-dirs=XXX
1275 Specify a search-list of terminfo directories which will be compiled
1276 into the ncurses library (default: DATADIR/terminfo)
1278 This is a colon-separated list, like the $TERMINFO_DIRS environment
1281 --with-termlib[=XXX]
1282 When building the ncurses library, organize this as two parts: the
1283 curses library (libncurses) and the low-level terminfo library
1284 (libtinfo). This is done to accommodate applications that use only
1285 the latter. The terminfo library is about half the size of the total.
1287 If an option value is given, that overrides the name of the terminfo
1288 library. For instance, if the wide-character version is built, the
1289 terminfo library would be named libtinfow. But the libtinfow interface
1290 is upward compatible from libtinfo, so it would be possible to overlay
1291 libtinfo.so with a "wide" version of libtinfow.so by renaming it with
1295 Specify a search-list of termcap files which will be compiled into the
1296 ncurses library (default: /etc/termcap:/usr/share/misc/termcap)
1298 --with-tic-path[=XXX]
1299 Use this option to override the automatic detection of tic in your
1300 $PATH when building fallbacks (see "--with-fallbacks").
1303 When building the ncurses library, build a separate library for
1304 the modules that are used only by the utility programs. Normally
1305 those would be bundled with the termlib or ncurses libraries.
1307 If an option value is given, that overrides the name of the tic
1308 library. As in termlib, there is no ABI difference between the
1309 "wide" libticw.so and libtic.so
1311 NOTE: Overriding the name of the tic library may be useful if you are
1312 also using the --with-termlib option to rename libtinfo. If you are
1313 not doing that, renaming the tic library can result in conflicting
1314 library dependencies for tic and other programs built with the tic
1317 --with-tparm-arg[=XXX]
1318 Override the type used for tparm() arguments, which normally is a
1319 "long". However the function must assume that its arguments can hold a
1320 pointer to char's which is not always workable for 64-bit platforms. A
1321 better choice would be intptr_t, which was not available at the time
1322 tparm's interface was defined.
1324 If the option is not given, this defaults to "long".
1327 Configure the trace() function as part of the all models of the ncurses
1328 library. Normally it is part of the debug (libncurses_g) library only.
1331 For testing, compile with debug option.
1332 This also sets the --disable-leaks option.
1334 --with-versioned-syms[=XXX]
1335 The Solaris, GNU and reportedly some other linkers (ld) accept a
1336 "--version-script" option which tells the linker to annotate the
1337 resulting objects with version identifiers.
1339 Use "objdump -T" on a library to see the annotations.
1341 The configure script attempts to automatically apply a suitable ".map"
1342 file to provide this information for Linux. Solaris mapfiles differ:
1344 a) comments are not accepted
1345 b) wildcards are not accepted, except for a special case of "_*".
1346 c) each symbol listed in the map file must exist in the library
1348 The Solaris limitations conflict with the development goal of providing
1349 a small set of ".map" files as examples, which cover the most common
1350 configurations. Because that coverage is done by merging together
1351 several builds, some symbols will be listed in the the ".map" files
1352 that do not happen to be present in one configuration or another.
1354 The sample ".map" (and ".sym") files are generated using a set of
1355 scripts which build several configurations for each release version,
1356 checking to see which of the "_nc_" symbols can be made local. In
1357 addition to the ncurses libraries and programs, the symbols used
1358 by the "tack" program before version 1.08 are made global.
1360 These sample ".map" files will not cover all possible combinations.
1361 In some cases, e.g., when using the --with-weak-symbols option, you
1362 may prefer to use a different ".map" file by setting this option's
1365 --with-wrap-prefix=XXX
1366 When using the --enable-reentrant option, ncurses redefines variables
1367 that would be global in curses, e.g., LINES, as a macro that calls a
1368 "wrapping" function which fetches the data from the current SCREEN
1369 structure. Normally that function is named by prepending "_nc_" to the
1370 variable's name. The function is technically private (since portable
1371 applications would not refer directly to it). But according to one
1372 line of reasoning, it is not the same type of "private" as functions
1373 which applications should not call even via a macro. This configure
1374 option lets you choose the prefix for these wrapped variables.
1377 Provide a pathname for the X11 rgb file, used by the picsmap program.
1378 This overrides a configure check which usually works, but is needed
1379 due to the lack of standardization for X11's files.
1381 --with-xterm-kbs=XXX
1382 Configure xterm's terminfo entries to use either BS (^H, i.e., ASCII
1383 backspace) or DEL (^?, or 127). XXX can be BS (or bs, 8) or DEL
1384 (or del, 127). If XXX is "auto", the configure script chooses BS or
1385 DEL according to platform defaults.
1387 During installation, the makefile and scripts modifies the "xterm+kbs"
1388 terminfo entry to use this setting.
1391 Suppress the configure script's check for Ada95, do not build the
1392 Ada95 binding and related demo.
1395 Don't install the ncurses header with the name "curses.h". Rather,
1396 install as "ncurses.h" and modify the installed headers and manpages
1399 Likewise, do not install an alias "curses" for the ncurses manpage.
1402 XSI curses declares "bool" as part of the interface. C++ also declares
1403 "bool". Neither specifies the size and type of booleans, but both
1404 insist on the same name. We chose to accommodate this by making the
1405 configure script check for the size and type (e.g., unsigned or signed)
1406 that your C++ compiler uses for booleans. If you do not wish to use
1407 ncurses with C++, use this option to tell the configure script to not
1408 adjust ncurses bool to match C++.
1410 --without-cxx-binding
1411 Suppress the configure script's check for C++, do not build the
1412 C++ binding and related demo.
1415 Disable development options. This does not include those that change
1416 the interface, such as --enable-widec.
1419 Do not use dlsym() to load GPM dynamically.
1422 Tell the configure script to suppress the install of ncurses' manpages.
1425 Tell the configure script to suppress the build of ncurses' application
1426 programs (e.g., tic). The test applications will still be built if you
1427 type "make", though not if you simply do "make install".
1430 Tell the configure script to suppress the build of ncurses' test
1434 Tell the configure script to use "xterm-old" for the entry used in
1435 the terminfo database. This will work with variations such as
1436 X11R5 and X11R6 xterm.
1439 COMPATIBILITY WITH OLDER RELEASES:
1440 ---------------------------------
1442 Because ncurses implements X/Open Curses, its interface is fairly stable.
1443 That does not mean the interface does not change. Changes are made to the
1444 documented interfaces when we find differences between ncurses and X/Open
1445 or implementations which largely correspond to X/Open (such as Solaris).
1446 We add extensions to those interfaces to solve problems not addressed by
1447 the original curses design, but those must not conflict with the X/Open
1450 Here are some of the major interface changes, and related problems which
1451 you may encounter when building a system with different versions of
1454 6.5 (TBD; not stable; in development)
1457 + the WINDOW structure and some related internal data types declared
1458 in <curses.h> have been made opaque by default;
1459 + the FORM, MENU, and PANEL structures and related internal data types
1460 from their corresponding header files have been made opqaue by
1462 + support for wide characters is now enabled by default.
1473 Added internal functions (other than "_sp" variants):
1475 + add _nc_free_termtype1 and _nc_free_tparm, for memory-leaks
1477 Removed internal functions:
1481 Modified internal functions:
1488 + the definition of TERMTYPE2 is now internal, not visible in the ABI,
1489 like the enclosing TERMINAL which was previously made opaque. This
1490 was done to provide SCREEN-specific "static" variables in terminfo.
1494 + add sp-funcs for erasewchar, killwchar.
1496 Added internal functions (other than "_sp" variants):
1498 + _nc_safe_fopen and _nc_safe_open3 limit privileges if possible when
1499 opening a file; otherwise disallow access for updating files.
1501 + _nc_tiparm is a variant of tiparm which is used when all of the
1502 parameters are known to be numbers rather than possibly strings.
1504 + _nc_reset_tparm improves tic's checks by resetting the terminfo
1505 "static variables" before calling functions which may update them.
1507 Removed internal functions:
1511 Modified internal functions:
1513 + _nc_trace_ttymode passes pointer to const data
1515 + _nc_tparm_analyze passes pointer to int*, not int[]
1520 + the terminal database must be compiled with ncurses 6.2 tic;
1521 older versions of tic/infocmp will not work. Aside from that,
1522 the compiled database will work with older applications.
1524 + "*.pc" and "ncurses*-config" files give the same information.
1526 + vwprintw and vwscanw are deprecated.
1530 + These make it simpler to substitute a debug-configuration of the
1531 library for non-debug:
1536 Added internal functions (other than "_sp" variants):
1538 + These provide fast-lookup of common user-defined capabilities:
1540 _nc_get_userdefs_table
1543 + This is added to work around compiler-warnings:
1546 Removed internal functions:
1548 + _nc_import_termtype
1550 Modified internal functions:
1552 + _nc_reserve_pairs no longer returns a value
1557 + X/Open Curses specifies a "reserved" void* parameter in several
1558 functions, saying that it must be NULL. In this release, if the
1559 parameter is non-NULL, it is interpreted as a point to an integer
1560 containing a color pair. In previous releases, a non-NULL parameter
1561 caused an error return. Portable applications are unaffected. Here
1562 are the functions which have been extended:
1581 + the TERMINAL structure declared in <term.h> has been made opaque,
1582 and its size increased to handle the increased size of color pair
1583 and color value, as well as other numeric capabilities.
1585 A few applications required change, e.g., to use def_prog_mode;
1586 only one application (tack) is known to have a valid reason for
1587 accessing these internal details, and that was addressed by the
1588 release of tack 1.08 in 2017. Internal functions marked as used
1589 by tack will be deprecated in future releases.
1593 + Several new functions were added to manipulate extended color pairs
1594 and color values. These include:
1596 extended_color_content
1597 extended_pair_content
1605 as well as corresponding sp-functions.
1607 + A new terminfo capability "RGB" tells the ncurses library that the
1608 color values are red/green/blue, to eliminate the need for palettes
1609 in that special case for the color_content function.
1611 Added internal functions (other than "_sp" variants):
1613 _nc_export_termtype2
1621 Removed internal functions:
1625 Modified internal functions:
1627 + symbols are used by tic/infocmp/toe:
1628 _nc_align_termtype - change parameters to TERMTYPE2*
1629 _nc_check_termtype2 - change parameter to TERMTYPE2*
1630 _nc_read_file_entry - change parameter to TERMTYPE2*
1631 _nc_read_termtype - change parameter to TERMTYPE2*
1632 _nc_trim_sgr0 - change parameter to TERMTYPE2*
1633 _nc_write_entry - change parameter to TERMTYPE2*
1635 + symbols used only within the library:
1636 _nc_fallback - change return type to TERMTYPE2*
1637 _nc_init_termtype - change parameter to TERMTYPE2*
1642 + The 6.0 ABI modifies the defaults for these configure options:
1650 --with-chtype=uint32_t
1651 --with-mmask_t=uint32_t
1652 --with-tparm-arg=intptr_t
1654 + ncurses supports symbol versioning. If you use this feature, about
1655 half of the "_nc_" private symbols are changed to local symbols.
1657 + a few applications may need to explicitly flush the standard output
1658 when switching between printf's and (curses) printw.
1662 + use_tioctl is an improvement over use_env
1664 + added wgetdelay to support the NCURSES_OPAQUE feature.
1666 Added internal functions (other than "_sp" variants):
1673 Removed internal functions:
1676 Modified internal functions:
1677 _nc_do_color - change parameters from short/bool to int
1678 _nc_keypad - change parameter from bool to int
1679 _nc_setupscreen - change parameter from bool to int
1680 _nc_signal_handler - change parameter from bool to int
1686 + add an alternate library configuration, i.e., "terminal driver" to
1687 support port to Windows, built with MinGW. There are two drivers
1688 (terminfo and Windows console). The terminfo driver works on other
1691 + add a new set of functions which accept a SCREEN* parameter, in
1692 contrast with the original set which use the global value "sp".
1693 By default, these names end with "_sp", and are otherwise
1694 functionally identical with the originals.
1696 In addition to the "_sp" functions, there are a few new functions
1697 associated with this feature: ceiling_panel, ground_panel,
1700 If the library is not built with the sp-funcs extension, there
1701 are no related interface changes.
1703 + add tiparm function based on review of X/Open Curses Issue 7.
1705 + change internal _nc_has_mouse function to public has_mouse function
1709 + add a few more functions to support the NCURSES_OPAQUE feature:
1710 get_escdelay, is_pad, is_subwin
1712 Added internal functions (other than "_sp" variants):
1721 _nc_retrace_int_attr_t
1727 Removed internal functions:
1728 _nc_makenew (some configurations replace by _nc_makenew_sp)
1730 Modified internal functions:
1737 5.7 (November 2, 2008)
1740 + generate linkable stubs for some macros:
1743 + Add new library configuration for tic-library (the non-curses portion
1744 of the ncurses library used for the tic program as well as some
1745 others such as tack. There is no API change, but makefiles would be
1746 changed to use the tic-library built separately.
1748 tack, distributed separately from ncurses, uses some of the internal
1749 _nc_XXX functions, which are declared in the tic.h header file.
1751 The reason for providing this separate library is that none of the
1752 functions in it are suitable for threaded applications.
1754 + Add new library configuration (ncursest, ncurseswt) which provides
1755 rudimentary support for POSIX threads. This introduces opaque
1756 access functions to the WINDOW structure and adds a parameter to
1757 several internal functions.
1759 + move most internal variables (except tic-library) into data blocks
1760 _nc_globals and _nc_prescreen to simplify analysis. Those were
1761 globally accessible, but since they were not part of the documented
1762 API, there is no ABI change.
1764 + changed static tables of strings to be indices into long strings, to
1765 improve startup performance. This changes parameter lists for some
1766 of the internal functions.
1770 + add NCURSES_OPAQUE definition in curses.h to control whether internal
1771 details of the WINDOW structure are visible to an application. This
1772 is always defined when the threaded library is built, and is optional
1773 otherwise. New functions for this: is_cleared, is_idcok, is_idlok,
1774 is_immedok, is_keypad, is_leaveok, is_nodelay, is_notimeout,
1775 is_scrollok, is_syncok, wgetparent and wgetscrreg.
1777 + the threaded library (ncursest) also disallows direct updating of
1778 global curses-level variables, providing functions (via macros) for
1779 obtaining their value. A few of those variables can be modified by
1780 the application, using new functions: set_escdelay, set_tabsize
1782 + added functions use_window() and use_screen() which wrap a mutex
1783 (if threading is configured) around a call to a user-supplied
1786 Added internal functions:
1797 These are used for leak-testing, and are stubs for
1798 ABI compatibility when ncurses is not configured for that
1799 using the --disable-leaks configure script option:
1804 Removed internal functions:
1807 Modified internal functions:
1813 _nc_locale_breaks_acs
1815 _nc_update_screensize
1817 Use new typedef TRIES to replace "struct tries":
1825 5.6 (December 17, 2006)
1828 + generate linkable stubs for some macros:
1830 getbegx, getbegy, getcurx, getcury, getmaxx, getmaxy, getparx,
1833 and (for libncursesw)
1841 Added internal functions:
1855 Also (if using the hashed database configuration):
1870 Removed internal functions:
1873 Modified internal functions:
1880 5.5 (October 10, 2005)
1883 + terminfo installs "xterm-new" as "xterm" entry rather than
1884 "xterm-old" (aka xterm-r6).
1886 + terminfo data is installed using the tic -x option (few systems
1887 still use ncurses 4.2).
1889 + modify C++ binding to work with newer C++ compilers by providing
1890 initializers and using modern casts. Old-style header names are
1891 still used in this release to allow compiling with not-so-old
1894 + form and menu libraries now work with wide-character data.
1895 Applications which bypassed the form library and manipulated the
1896 FIELD.buf data directly will not work properly with libformw, since
1897 that no longer points to an array of char. The set_field_buffer()
1898 and field_buffer() functions translate to/from the actual field
1901 + change SP->_current_attr to a pointer, adjust ifdef's to ensure that
1902 libtinfo.so and libtinfow.so have the same ABI. The reason for this
1903 is that the corresponding data which belongs to the upper-level
1904 ncurses library has a different size in each model.
1906 + winnstr() now returns multibyte character strings for the
1907 wide-character configuration.
1909 + assume_default_colors() no longer requires that use_default_colors()
1912 + data_ahead() now works with wide-characters.
1914 + slk_set() and slk_wset() now accept and store multibyte or
1915 multicolumn characters.
1917 + start_color() now returns OK if colors have already been started.
1918 start_color() also returns ERR if it cannot allocate memory.
1920 + pair_content() now returns -1 for consistency with init_pair() if it
1921 corresponds to the default-color.
1923 + unctrl() now returns null if its parameter does not correspond
1924 to an unsigned char.
1927 Experimental mouse version 2 supports wheel mice with buttons
1928 4 and 5. This requires ABI 6 because it modifies the encoding
1931 Experimental extended colors allows encoding of 256 foreground
1932 and background colors, e.g., with the xterm-256color or
1933 xterm-88color terminfo entries. This requires ABI 6 because
1934 it changes the size of cchar_t.
1936 Added internal functions:
1940 _nc_retrace_cvoid_ptr
1941 _nc_retrace_void_ptr
1944 Removed internal functions:
1947 Modified internal functions:
1952 5.4 (February 8, 2004)
1955 + add the remaining functions for X/Open curses wide-character support.
1956 These are only available if the library is configured using the
1957 --enable-widec option.
1961 + write getyx() and related 2-return macros in terms of getcury(),
1964 + simplify ifdef for bool declaration in curses.h
1966 + modify ifdef's in curses.h that disabled use of __attribute__() for
1967 g++, since recent versions implement the cases which ncurses uses.
1969 + change some interfaces to use const:
1981 Added internal functions:
1984 _nc_is_charable() wide
1985 _nc_locale_breaks_acs()
1988 _nc_to_widechar() wide
1990 _nc_trace_bufcat() debug
1991 _nc_unicode_locale()
1993 Removed internal functions:
1997 Modified internal functions:
1999 _nc_retrace_chtype()
2001 5.3 (October 12, 2002)
2004 + change type for bool used in headers to NCURSES_BOOL, which usually
2005 is the same as the compiler's definition for 'bool'.
2007 + add all but two functions for X/Open curses wide-character support.
2008 These are only available if the library is configured using the
2009 --enable-widec option. Missing functions are
2013 + add environment variable $NCURSES_ASSUMED_COLORS to modify the
2014 assume_default_colors() extension.
2020 Added internal functions:
2021 _nc_altcharset_name() debug
2023 _nc_retrace_bool() debug
2024 _nc_retrace_unsigned() debug
2026 _nc_trace_ttymode() debug
2031 Removed internal functions:
2034 Modified internal functions:
2037 5.2 (October 21, 2000)
2040 + revert termcap ospeed variable to 'short' (see discussion of the
2041 --with-ospeed configure option).
2046 + made the extended terminal capabilities
2047 (configure --enable-tcap-names) a standard feature. This should
2048 be transparent to applications that do not require it.
2050 + removed the trace() function and related trace support from the
2053 + modified curses.h.in, undef'ing some symbols to avoid conflict
2056 Added extensions: assume_default_colors().
2058 5.0 (October 23, 1999)
2061 + implemented the wcolor_set() and slk_color() functions.
2063 + move macro winch to a function, to hide details of struct ldat
2065 + corrected prototypes for slk_* functions, using chtype rather than
2068 + the slk_attr_{set,off,on} functions need an additional void*
2069 parameter according to XSI.
2071 + modified several prototypes to correspond with 1997 version of X/Open
2072 Curses: [w]attr_get(), [w]attr_set(), border_set() have different
2073 parameters. Some functions were renamed or misspelled:
2074 erase_wchar(), in_wchntr(), mvin_wchntr(). Some developers have used
2077 Added extensions: keybound(), curses_version().
2079 Terminfo database changes:
2081 + change translation for termcap 'rs' to terminfo 'rs2', which is
2082 the documented equivalent, rather than 'rs1'.
2084 The problems are subtler in recent releases.
2086 a) This release provides users with the ability to define their own
2087 terminal capability extensions, like termcap. To accomplish this,
2088 we redesigned the TERMTYPE struct (in term.h). Very few
2089 applications use this struct. They must be recompiled to work with
2092 a) If you use the extended terminfo names (i.e., you used configure
2093 --enable-tcap-names), the resulting terminfo database can have some
2094 entries which are not readable by older versions of ncurses. This
2095 is a bug in the older versions:
2097 + the terminfo database stores booleans, numbers and strings in
2098 arrays. The capabilities that are listed in the arrays are
2099 specified by X/Open. ncurses recognizes a number of obsolete and
2100 extended names which are stored past the end of the specified
2103 + a change to read_entry.c in 951001 made the library do an lseek()
2104 call incorrectly skipping data which is already read from the
2105 string array. This happens when the number of strings in the
2106 terminfo data file is greater than STRCOUNT, the number of
2107 specified and obsolete or extended strings.
2109 + as part of alignment with the X/Open final specification, in the
2110 990109 patch we added two new terminfo capabilities:
2111 set_a_attributes and set_pglen_inch). This makes the indices for
2112 the obsolete and extended capabilities shift up by 2.
2114 + the last two capabilities in the obsolete/extended list are memu
2115 and meml, which are found in most terminfo descriptions for xterm.
2117 When trying to read this terminfo entry, the spurious lseek()
2118 causes the library to attempt to read the final portion of the
2119 terminfo data (the text of the string capabilities) 4 characters
2120 past its starting point, and reads 4 characters too few. The
2121 library rejects the data, and applications are unable to
2122 initialize that terminal type.
2124 FIX: remove memu and meml from the xterm description. They are
2125 obsolete, not used by ncurses. (It appears that the feature was
2126 added to xterm to make it more like hpterm).
2128 This is not a problem if you do not use the -x option of tic to
2129 create a terminfo database with extended names. Note that the
2130 user-defined terminal capabilities are not affected by this bug,
2131 since they are stored in a table after the older terminfo data ends,
2132 and are invisible to the older libraries.
2134 c) Some developers did not wish to use the C++ binding, and used the
2135 configure --without-cxx option. This causes problems if someone
2136 uses the ncurses library from C++ because that configure test
2137 determines the type for C++'s bool and makes ncurses match it, since
2138 both C++ and curses are specified to declare bool. Calling ncurses
2139 functions with the incorrect type for bool will cause execution
2140 errors. In 5.0 we added a configure option "--without-cxx-binding"
2141 which controls whether the binding itself is built and installed.
2146 + correct prototype for termattrs() as per XPG4 version 2.
2148 + add placeholder prototypes for color_set(), erasewchar(),
2149 term_attrs(), wcolor_set() as per XPG4 version 2.
2151 + add macros getcur[xy] getbeg[xy] getpar[xy], which are defined in
2154 New extensions: keyok() and define_key().
2156 Terminfo database changes:
2158 + corrected definition in curses.h for ACS_LANTERN, which was 'I'
2163 We added these extensions: use_default_colors(). Also added
2164 configure option --enable-const, to support the use of const where
2165 X/Open should have, but did not, specify.
2167 The terminfo database content changed the representation of color for
2168 most entries that use ANSI colors. SVr4 curses treats the setaf/setab
2169 and setf/setb capabilities differently, interchanging the red/blue
2170 colors in the latter.
2172 4.0 (December 24, 1996)
2174 We bumped to version 4.0 because the newly released Linux dynamic
2175 loader (ld.so.1.8.5) did not load shared libraries whose ABI and REL
2176 versions were inconsistent. At that point, ncurses ABI was 3.4 and the
2177 REL was 1.9.9g, so we made them consistent.
2179 1.9.9g (December 1, 1996)
2181 This fixed most of the problems with 1.9.9e, and made these interface
2184 + remove tparam(), which had been provided for compatibility with
2185 some termcap. tparm() is standard, and does not conflict with
2186 application's fallback for missing tparam().
2188 + turn off hardware echo in initscr(). This changes the sense of the
2189 echo() function, which was initialized to echoing rather than
2190 nonechoing (the latter is specified). There were several other
2191 corrections to the terminal I/O settings which cause applications to
2194 + implemented several functions (such as attr_on()) which were
2195 available only as macros.
2197 + corrected several typos in curses.h.in (i.e., the mvXXXX macros).
2199 + corrected prototypes for delay_output(),
2200 has_color, immedok() and idcok().
2202 + corrected misspelled getbkgd(). Some applications used the
2205 + added _yoffset to WINDOW. The size of WINDOW does not impact
2206 applications, since they use only pointers to WINDOW structs.
2208 These changes were made to the terminfo database:
2210 + removed boolean 'getm' which was available as an extended name.
2212 We added these extensions: wresize(), resizeterm(), has_key() and
2215 1.9.9e (March 24, 1996)
2217 not recommended (a last-minute/untested change left the forms and
2218 menus libraries unusable since they do not repaint the screen).
2219 Foreground/background colors are combined incorrectly, working properly
2220 only on a black background. When this was released, the X/Open
2221 specification was available only in draft form.
2223 Some applications (such as lxdialog) were "fixed" to work with the
2224 incorrect color scheme.
2227 FOR SYSTEM INTEGRATORS:
2228 ----------------------
2230 Configuration and Installation:
2232 On platforms where ncurses is assumed to be installed in /usr/lib,
2233 the configure script uses "/usr" as a default. These include any
2234 that use the Linux kernel, as well as these special cases:
2236 FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, Cygwin, MinGW
2238 For other platforms, the default is "/usr/local". See the discussion
2239 of the "--disable-overwrite" option.
2241 The location of the terminfo is set indirectly by the "--datadir"
2242 configure option, e.g., /usr/share/terminfo, given a datadir of
2243 /usr/share. You may want to override this if you are installing
2244 ncurses libraries in nonstandard locations, but wish to share the
2247 Normally the ncurses library is configured in a pure-terminfo mode;
2248 that is, with the --disable-termcap option. This makes the ncurses
2249 library smaller and faster. The ncurses library includes a termcap
2250 emulation that queries the terminfo database, so even applications that
2251 use raw termcap to query terminal characteristics will win (providing
2252 you recompile and relink them!).
2254 If you must configure with termcap fallback enabled, you may also wish
2255 to use the --enable-getcap option. This speeds up termcap-based
2256 startups, at the expense of not allowing personal termcap entries to
2257 reference the terminfo tree. See comments in
2258 ncurses/tinfo/read_termcap.c for further details.
2260 Note that if you have $TERMCAP set, ncurses will use that value
2261 to locate termcap data. In particular, running from xterm will
2262 set $TERMCAP to the contents of the xterm's termcap entry.
2263 If ncurses sees that, it will not examine /etc/termcap.
2267 The terminfo file assumes that Shift-Tab generates \E[Z (the ECMA-48
2268 reverse-tabulation sequence) rather than ^I. Here are the loadkeys -d
2269 mappings that will set this up:
2271 keycode 15 = Tab Tab
2272 alt keycode 15 = Meta_Tab
2273 shift keycode 15 = F26
2274 string F26 ="\033[Z"
2276 Naming the Console Terminal
2278 In various systems there has been a practice of designating the system
2279 console driver type as 'console'. Please do not do this! It
2280 complicates peoples' lives, because it can mean that several different
2281 terminfo entries from different operating systems all logically want to
2282 be called 'console'.
2284 Please pick a name unique to your console driver and set that up
2285 in the /etc/inittab table or local equivalent. Send the entry to the
2286 terminfo maintainer (listed in the misc/terminfo file) to be included
2287 in the terminfo file, if it is not already there. See the
2288 term(7) manual page included with this distribution for more on
2289 conventions for choosing type names.
2291 Here are some recommended primary console names:
2293 linux -- Linux console driver
2298 If you are responsible for integrating ncurses for one of these
2299 distributions, please either use the recommended name or get back
2300 to us explaining why you don't want to, so we can work out nomenclature
2301 that will make users' lives easier rather than harder.
2304 MODERN XTERM VERSIONS:
2305 ---------------------
2307 The terminfo database file included with this distribution assumes you
2308 are running a modern xterm based on XFree86 (i.e., xterm-new). The
2309 earlier X11R6 entry (xterm-r6) and X11R5 entry (xterm-r5) is provided
2310 as well. See the --without-xterm-new configure script option if you
2311 are unable to update your system.
2314 CONFIGURING FALLBACK ENTRIES:
2315 ----------------------------
2317 In order to support operation of ncurses programs before the terminfo
2318 tree is accessible (that is, in single-user mode or at OS installation
2319 time) the ncurses library can be compiled to include an array of
2320 pre-fetched fallback entries.
2322 NOTE: This must be done on a machine which has ncurses' infocmp and
2323 terminfo database installed (as well as ncurses' tic and infocmp
2324 programs). That is because the fallback sources are generated and
2325 compiled into the library before the build-tree's copy of infocmp is
2328 These entries are checked by setupterm() only when the conventional
2329 fetches from the terminfo tree and the termcap fallback (if configured)
2330 have been tried and failed. Thus, the presence of a fallback will not
2331 shadow modifications to the on-disk entry for the same type, when that
2332 entry is accessible.
2334 By default, there are no entries on the fallback list. After you have
2335 built the ncurses suite for the first time, you can change the list
2336 (the process needs infocmp(1)). To do so, use the script
2337 ncurses/tinfo/MKfallback.sh. The configure script option
2338 --with-fallbacks does this (it accepts a comma-separated list of the
2339 names you wish, and does not require a rebuild).
2341 If you wanted (say) to have linux, vt100, and xterm fallbacks, you
2342 might use the commands
2345 tinfo/MKfallback.sh \
2347 ../misc/terminfo.src \
2350 linux vt100 xterm >fallback.c
2352 The first four parameters of the script are normally supplied by
2353 the configured makefiles via the "--with-fallbacks" option. They
2356 1) the location of the terminfo database
2357 2) the source for the terminfo entries
2358 3) the location of the tic program, used to create a terminfo
2360 4) the location of the infocmp program, used to print a terminfo
2363 Then just rebuild and reinstall the library as you would normally.
2364 You can restore the default empty fallback list with
2366 tinfo/MKfallback.sh \
2368 ../misc/terminfo.src \
2373 The overhead for an empty fallback list is one trivial stub function.
2374 Any non-empty fallback list is const'd and therefore lives in shareable
2375 text space. You can look at the comment trailing each initializer in
2376 the generated ncurses/fallback.c file to see the core cost of the
2377 fallbacks. A good rule of thumb for modern vt100-like entries is that
2378 each one will cost about 2.5K of text space.
2381 BSD CONVERSION NOTES:
2382 --------------------
2384 If you need to support really ancient BSD programs, you probably
2385 want to configure with the --enable-bsdpad option. What this does
2386 is enable code in tputs() that recognizes a numeric prefix on a
2387 capability as a request for that much trailing padding in milliseconds.
2388 There are old BSD programs that do things like tputs("50").
2390 (If you are distributing ncurses as a support-library component of
2391 an application you probably want to put the remainder of this section
2392 in the package README file.)
2394 The following note applies only if you have configured ncurses with
2397 ------------------------------- CUT HERE --------------------------------
2399 If you are installing this application privately (either because you
2400 have no root access or want to experiment with it before doing a root
2401 installation), there are a couple of details you need to be aware of.
2402 They have to do with the ncurses library, which uses terminfo rather
2403 than termcap for describing terminal characteristics.
2405 Though the ncurses library is terminfo-based, it can interpret your
2406 TERMCAP variable (if present), any local termcap files you reference
2407 through it, and the system termcap file. However, to avoid slowing
2408 down your application startup, it does this only once per terminal type!
2410 The first time you load a given terminal type from your termcap
2411 database, the library initialization code will automatically write it
2412 in terminfo format to a subdirectory under $HOME/.terminfo. After
2413 that, the initialization code will find it there and do a (much
2414 faster) terminfo fetch.
2416 Usually, all this means is that your home directory will silently grow
2417 an invisible .terminfo subdirectory which will get filled in with
2418 terminfo descriptions of terminal types as you invoke them. If anyone
2419 ever installs a global terminfo tree on your system, this will quietly
2420 stop happening and your $HOME/.terminfo will become redundant.
2422 The objective of all this logic is to make converting from BSD termcap
2423 as painless as possible without slowing down your application (termcap
2424 compilation is expensive).
2426 If you don't have a TERMCAP variable or custom personal termcap file,
2427 you can skip the rest of this dissertation.
2429 If you *do* have a TERMCAP variable and/or a custom personal termcap file
2430 that defines a terminal type, that definition will stop being visible
2431 to this application after the first time you run it, because it will
2432 instead see the terminfo entry that it wrote to $HOME/terminfo the
2435 Subsequently, editing the TERMCAP variable or personal TERMCAP file
2436 will have no effect unless you explicitly remove the terminfo entry
2437 under $HOME/terminfo. If you do that, the entry will be recompiled
2438 from your termcap resources the next time it is invoked.
2440 To avoid these complications, use infocmp(1) and tic(1) to edit the
2441 terminfo directory directly.
2443 ------------------------------- CUT HERE --------------------------------
2447 Ncurses 4.1 and up can be configured to use GPM (General Purpose Mouse)
2448 which is used with Linux console. Be aware that GPM is commonly
2449 installed as a shared library which contains a wrapper for the curses
2450 wgetch() function (libcurses.o). Some integrators have simplified
2451 linking applications by combining all or part of libcurses.so into the
2452 libgpm.so file, producing symbol conflicts with ncurses (specifically
2453 the wgetch function). This was originally the BSD curses, but
2454 generally whatever curses library exists on the system.
2456 You may be able to work around this problem by linking as follows:
2458 cc -o foo foo.o -lncurses -lgpm -lncurses
2460 but the linker may not cooperate, producing mysterious errors.
2461 See the FAQ, as well as the discussion under the --with-gpm option:
2463 https://invisible-island.net/ncurses/ncurses.faq.html#using_gpm_lib
2466 BUILDING WITH A CROSS-COMPILER:
2467 ------------------------------
2468 Ncurses can be built with a cross-compiler. Some parts must be built
2469 with the host's compiler since they are used for building programs
2470 (e.g., ncurses/make_hash and ncurses/make_keys) that generate tables
2471 that are compiled into the ncurses library. The essential thing to do
2472 is set the BUILD_CC environment variable to your host's compiler, and
2473 run the configure script configuring for the cross-compiler.
2475 The configure options --with-build-cc, etc., are provided to make this
2476 simpler. Since make_hash and make_keys use only ANSI C features, it
2477 is normally not necessary to provide the other options such as
2478 --with-build-libs, but they are provided for completeness.
2480 Note that all of the generated source-files which are part of ncurses
2481 will be made if you use
2485 This would be useful in porting to an environment which has little
2486 support for the tools used to generate the sources, e.g., sed, awk and
2489 When ncurses has been successfully cross-compiled, you may want to use
2490 "make install" (with a suitable target directory) to construct an
2491 install tree. Note that in this case (as with the --with-fallbacks
2492 option), ncurses uses the development platform's tic to do the "make
2493 install.data" portion.
2495 The system's tic program is used to install the terminal database,
2496 even for cross-compiles. For best results, the tic program should be
2497 from the most current version of ncurses.
2499 NOTE: the system's tic program may use a different terminfo database
2500 format than the target system. For instance, as described in term(5),
2501 the conventional terminfo layout uses a directory hierarchy with one
2502 letter names, while some platforms use two-letter names to work with
2503 case-insensitive filesystems. The configure script searches for a tic
2504 program using the AC_CHECK_TOOL macro, which will prefer programs
2505 using the canonical host prefix in their name. You can use this fact
2506 to provide a cross-compiler support utility tic, otherwise you can
2507 override the configure script's choice using --with-tic-path
2512 Send any feedback to the ncurses mailing list at
2513 bug-ncurses@gnu.org. To subscribe send mail to
2514 bug-ncurses-request@gnu.org with body that reads:
2515 subscribe ncurses <your-email-address-here>
2517 The Hacker's Guide in the doc directory includes some guidelines
2518 on how to report bugs in ways that will get them fixed most quickly.
2520 -- vile:txtmode fc=78