+
+</PRE><H3><a name="h3-Character-Set">Character Set</a></H3><PRE>
+ X/Open Curses assumes that the parameter passed to <STRONG>waddch</STRONG> contains a
+ single character. As discussed in <STRONG>curs_attr(3x)</STRONG>, that character may
+ have been more than eight bits in an SVr3 or SVr4 implementation, but
+ in the X/Open Curses model, the details are not given. The important
+ distinction between SVr4 curses and X/Open Curses is that the non-char-
+ acter information (attributes and color) was separated from the charac-
+ ter information which is packed in a <STRONG>chtype</STRONG> to pass to <STRONG>waddch</STRONG>.
+
+ In this implementation, <STRONG>chtype</STRONG> holds eight bits. But ncurses allows
+ multibyte characters to be passed in a succession of calls to <STRONG>waddch</STRONG>.
+ The other implementations do not do this; a call to <STRONG>waddch</STRONG> passes
+ exactly one character which may be rendered as one or more cells on the
+ screen depending on whether it is printable.
+
+ Depending on the locale settings, ncurses will inspect the byte passed
+ in each call to <STRONG>waddch</STRONG>, and check if the latest call will continue a
+ multibyte sequence. When a character is <EM>complete</EM>, ncurses displays the
+ character and moves to the next position in the screen.
+
+ If the calling application interrupts the succession of bytes in a
+ multibyte character by moving the current location (e.g., using <STRONG>wmove</STRONG>),
+ ncurses discards the partially built character, starting over again.
+
+ For portability to other implementations, do not rely upon this behav-
+ ior:
+
+ <STRONG>o</STRONG> check if a character can be represented as a single byte in the
+ current locale before attempting call <STRONG>waddch</STRONG>, and
+
+ <STRONG>o</STRONG> call <STRONG>wadd_wch</STRONG> for characters which cannot be handled by <STRONG>waddch</STRONG>.
+
+
+</PRE><H3><a name="h3-TABSIZE">TABSIZE</a></H3><PRE>
+ The <STRONG>TABSIZE</STRONG> variable is implemented in some versions of curses, but is