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30 * @Id: curs_getstr.3x,v 1.29 2020/02/02 23:34:34 tom Exp @
31 * X/Open says also until EOf
32 * X/Open says then an EOS is added to the result
33 * X/Open doesn't mention n<0
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45 <H1 class="no-header">curs_getstr 3x</H1>
47 <STRONG><A HREF="curs_getstr.3x.html">curs_getstr(3x)</A></STRONG> <STRONG><A HREF="curs_getstr.3x.html">curs_getstr(3x)</A></STRONG>
52 </PRE><H2><a name="h2-NAME">NAME</a></H2><PRE>
53 <STRONG>getstr</STRONG>, <STRONG>getnstr</STRONG>, <STRONG>wgetstr</STRONG>, <STRONG>wgetnstr</STRONG>, <STRONG>mvgetstr</STRONG>, <STRONG>mvgetnstr</STRONG>, <STRONG>mvwgetstr</STRONG>,
54 <STRONG>mvwgetnstr</STRONG> - accept character strings from <STRONG>curses</STRONG> terminal keyboard
57 </PRE><H2><a name="h2-SYNOPSIS">SYNOPSIS</a></H2><PRE>
58 <STRONG>#include</STRONG> <STRONG><curses.h></STRONG>
60 <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>getstr(char</STRONG> <STRONG>*str);</STRONG>
61 <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>getnstr(char</STRONG> <STRONG>*str,</STRONG> <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>n);</STRONG>
62 <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>wgetstr(WINDOW</STRONG> <STRONG>*win,</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*str);</STRONG>
63 <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>wgetnstr(WINDOW</STRONG> <STRONG>*win,</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*str,</STRONG> <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>n);</STRONG>
64 <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>mvgetstr(int</STRONG> <STRONG>y,</STRONG> <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>x,</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*str);</STRONG>
65 <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>mvwgetstr(WINDOW</STRONG> <STRONG>*win,</STRONG> <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>y,</STRONG> <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>x,</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*str);</STRONG>
66 <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>mvgetnstr(int</STRONG> <STRONG>y,</STRONG> <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>x,</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*str,</STRONG> <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>n);</STRONG>
67 <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>mvwgetnstr(WINDOW</STRONG> <STRONG>*,</STRONG> <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>y,</STRONG> <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>x,</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*str,</STRONG> <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>n);</STRONG>
70 </PRE><H2><a name="h2-DESCRIPTION">DESCRIPTION</a></H2><PRE>
71 The function <STRONG>getstr</STRONG> is equivalent to a series of calls to <STRONG>getch</STRONG>, until
72 a newline or carriage return is received (the terminating character is
73 not included in the returned string). The resulting value is placed in
74 the area pointed to by the character pointer <EM>str</EM>, followed by a NUL.
76 <STRONG>wgetnstr</STRONG> reads at most <EM>n</EM> characters, thus preventing a possible over-
77 flow of the input buffer. Any attempt to enter more characters (other
78 than the terminating newline or carriage return) causes a beep. Func-
79 tion keys also cause a beep and are ignored. The <STRONG>getnstr</STRONG> function
80 reads from the <EM>stdscr</EM> default window.
82 The user's erase and kill characters are interpreted. If keypad mode
83 is on for the window, <STRONG>KEY_LEFT</STRONG> and <STRONG>KEY_BACKSPACE</STRONG> are both considered
84 equivalent to the user's kill character.
86 Characters input are echoed only if <STRONG>echo</STRONG> is currently on. In that
87 case, backspace is echoed as deletion of the previous character (typi-
91 </PRE><H2><a name="h2-RETURN-VALUE">RETURN VALUE</a></H2><PRE>
92 All routines return the integer <STRONG>ERR</STRONG> upon failure and an <STRONG>OK</STRONG> (SVr4 speci-
93 fies only "an integer value other than <STRONG>ERR</STRONG>") upon successful comple-
96 X/Open defines no error conditions.
98 In this implementation, these functions return an error if the window
99 pointer is null, or if its timeout expires without having any data.
101 This implementation provides an extension as well. If a <STRONG>SIGWINCH</STRONG> in-
102 terrupts the function, it will return <STRONG>KEY_RESIZE</STRONG> rather than <STRONG>OK</STRONG> or <STRONG>ERR</STRONG>.
104 Functions with a "mv" prefix first perform a cursor movement using
105 <STRONG>wmove</STRONG>, and return an error if the position is outside the window, or if
106 the window pointer is null.
109 </PRE><H2><a name="h2-NOTES">NOTES</a></H2><PRE>
110 Note that <STRONG>getstr</STRONG>, <STRONG>mvgetstr</STRONG>, and <STRONG>mvwgetstr</STRONG> may be macros.
113 </PRE><H2><a name="h2-PORTABILITY">PORTABILITY</a></H2><PRE>
114 These functions are described in the XSI Curses standard, Issue 4.
115 They read single-byte characters only. The standard does not define
116 any error conditions. This implementation returns <STRONG>ERR</STRONG> if the window
117 pointer is null, or if the lower-level <STRONG><A HREF="curs_getch.3x.html">wgetch(3x)</A></STRONG> call returns an <STRONG>ERR</STRONG>.
119 SVr3 and early SVr4 curses implementations did not reject function
120 keys; the SVr4.0 documentation claimed that "special keys" (such as
121 function keys, "home" key, "clear" key, <EM>etc</EM>.) are "interpreted", with-
122 out giving details. It lied. In fact, the "character" value appended
123 to the string by those implementations was predictable but not useful
124 (being, in fact, the low-order eight bits of the key's KEY_ value).
126 The functions <STRONG>getnstr</STRONG>, <STRONG>mvgetnstr</STRONG>, and <STRONG>mvwgetnstr</STRONG> were present but not
129 X/Open Curses, Issue 5 (2007) stated that these functions "read at most
130 <EM>n</EM> bytes" but did not state whether the terminating NUL is counted in
131 that limit. X/Open Curses, Issue 7 (2009) changed that to say they
132 "read at most <EM>n</EM>-1 bytes" to allow for the terminating NUL. As of 2018,
133 some implementations do, some do not count it:
135 <STRONG>o</STRONG> ncurses 6.1 and PDCurses do not count the NUL in the given limit,
138 <STRONG>o</STRONG> Solaris SVr4 and NetBSD curses count the NUL as part of the limit.
140 <STRONG>o</STRONG> Solaris xcurses provides both: its wide-character <STRONG>wget_nstr</STRONG> re-
141 serves a NUL, but its <STRONG>wgetnstr</STRONG> does not count the NUL consistently.
143 In SVr4 curses, a negative value of <EM>n</EM> tells <STRONG>wgetnstr</STRONG> to assume that the
144 caller's buffer is large enough to hold the result, i.e., to act like
145 <STRONG>wgetstr</STRONG>. X/Open Curses does not mention this (or anything related to
146 negative or zero values of <EM>n</EM>), however most implementations use the
147 feature, with different limits:
149 <STRONG>o</STRONG> Solaris SVr4 curses and PDCurses limit the result to 255 bytes.
150 Other Unix systems than Solaris are likely to use the same limit.
152 <STRONG>o</STRONG> Solaris xcurses limits the result to <STRONG>LINE_MAX</STRONG> bytes.
154 <STRONG>o</STRONG> NetBSD 7 assumes no particular limit for the result from <STRONG>wgetstr</STRONG>.
155 However, it limits the <STRONG>wgetnstr</STRONG> parameter <EM>n</EM> to ensure that it is
158 A comment in NetBSD's source code states that this is specified in
161 <STRONG>o</STRONG> ncurses (before 6.2) assumes no particular limit for the result
162 from <STRONG>wgetstr</STRONG>, and treats the <EM>n</EM> parameter of <STRONG>wgetnstr</STRONG> like SVr4
165 <STRONG>o</STRONG> ncurses 6.2 uses <STRONG>LINE_MAX</STRONG>, or a larger (system-dependent) value
166 which the <STRONG>sysconf</STRONG> function may provide. If neither <STRONG>LINE_MAX</STRONG> or
167 <STRONG>sysconf</STRONG> is available, ncurses uses the POSIX value for <STRONG>LINE_MAX</STRONG> (a
168 2048 byte limit). In either case, it reserves a byte for the ter-
172 </PRE><H2><a name="h2-SEE-ALSO">SEE ALSO</a></H2><PRE>
173 <STRONG><A HREF="ncurses.3x.html">curses(3x)</A></STRONG>, <STRONG><A HREF="curs_getch.3x.html">curs_getch(3x)</A></STRONG>, <STRONG><A HREF="curs_variables.3x.html">curs_variables(3x)</A></STRONG>.
177 <STRONG><A HREF="curs_getstr.3x.html">curs_getstr(3x)</A></STRONG>
181 <li><a href="#h2-NAME">NAME</a></li>
182 <li><a href="#h2-SYNOPSIS">SYNOPSIS</a></li>
183 <li><a href="#h2-DESCRIPTION">DESCRIPTION</a></li>
184 <li><a href="#h2-RETURN-VALUE">RETURN VALUE</a></li>
185 <li><a href="#h2-NOTES">NOTES</a></li>
186 <li><a href="#h2-PORTABILITY">PORTABILITY</a></li>
187 <li><a href="#h2-SEE-ALSO">SEE ALSO</a></li>