curs_termcap(3x) Library calls curs_termcap(3x)
@@ -122,7 +94,7 @@
implementations conforming to portions of X/Open Curses now
withdrawn. The BSD termcap library would store a copy of the
terminal type description in the area referenced by this
- pointer. ncurses stores terminal type descriptions in compiled
+ pointer. terminfo stores terminal type descriptions in compiled
form, which is not the same thing.
o The meanings of the return values differ. The BSD termcap
@@ -315,33 +287,34 @@
program. The library remained much the same though 4.3BSD (June 1986).
4.4BSD-Lite (June 1994) refactored it, leaving the API unchanged.
- Function prototypes were a feature of ANSI C (1989). Thus the library
- itself provided no header file declaring them. Nevertheless, the BSD
- sources included two different termcap.h header files over time.
+ Function prototypes were a feature of ANSI C (1989). The library long
+ antedated the standard and thus provided no header file declaring them.
+ Nevertheless, the BSD sources included two different termcap.h header
+ files over time.
- o One was used internally by jove(1) from 4.3BSD onward. It delcared
+ o One was used internally by jove(1) from 4.3BSD onward. It declared
global symbols for the termcap variables that it used.
- o The other appeared in 4.4BSD-Lite Release 2 (June 1995) as part of
- libedit (also known as the editline library). CSRG source history
+ o The other appeared in 4.4BSD-Lite Release 2 (June 1995) as part of
+ libedit (also known as the editline library). CSRG source history
shows that this was added in mid-1992. The libedit header file was
used internally as a convenience for compiling the editline
library. It declared function prototypes, but no global variables.
This header file was added to NetBSD's termcap library in mid-1994.
- Meanwhile, GNU termcap began development in 1990. Its first release
- (1.0) in 1991 included a termcap.h header. Its second (1.1) in
- September 1992 modified the header to use const for the function
- prototypes in the header where one would expect the parameters to be
+ Meanwhile, GNU termcap began development in 1990. Its first release
+ (1.0) in 1991 included a termcap.h header. Its second (1.1) in
+ September 1992 modified the header to use const for the function
+ prototypes in the header where one would expect the parameters to be
read-only. BSD termcap did not. The prototype for tputs also
- differed, but in that instance, it was libedit that differed from BSD
+ differed, but in that instance, it was libedit that differed from BSD
termcap.
- GNU termcap 1.3 was bundled with bash(1) in mid-1993 to support the
+ GNU termcap 1.3 was bundled with bash(1) in mid-1993 to support the
readline(3) library.
- ncurses 1.8.1 (November 1993) provided a termcap.h file. It reflected
- influence from GNU termcap and emacs(1) (rather than jove(1)),
+ ncurses 1.8.1 (November 1993) provided a termcap.h file. It reflected
+ influence from GNU termcap and emacs(1) (rather than jove(1)),
providing the following interface:
o global symbols used by emacs,
@@ -350,41 +323,41 @@
o a prototype for tparam, a GNU termcap feature.
- Later (in mid-1996) the tparam function was removed from ncurses. Any
- two of the four implementations thus differ, and programs that intend
+ Later (in mid-1996) the tparam function was removed from ncurses. Any
+ two of the four implementations thus differ, and programs that intend
to work with all termcap library interfaces must account for that fact.
If you call tgetstr to fetch column_address (ch) or any other
- parameterized string capability, be aware that it is returned in term-
+ parameterized string capability, be aware that it is returned in term-info notation, not the older and not-quite-compatible termcap notation.
- This does not cause problems if all you do with it is call tgoto or
- tparm, which both expand terminfo-style strings as terminfo does. (If
- ncurses is configured to support termcap,tgoto checks whether the
- string is terminfo-style by looking for "%p" parameters or "<...>"
- delays, and invokes a termcap-style parser if the string appears not to
- use terminfo syntax.)
-
- Because terminfo's syntax for padding in string capabilities differs
+ This does not cause problems if all you do with it is call tgoto or
+ tparm, which both parametrically expand terminfo-style string
+ capabilities as terminfo does. (If ncurses is configured to support
+ termcap,tgoto checks whether the string is terminfo-style by looking
+ for "%p" parameters or "<...>" delays, and invokes a termcap-style
+ parser if the string appears not to use terminfo syntax.)
+
+ Because terminfo's syntax for padding in string capabilities differs
from termcap's, users can be surprised.
- otputs("50") in a terminfo system transmits "50" rather than busy-
+ otputs("50") in a terminfo system transmits "50" rather than busy-
waiting for 50 milliseconds.
- o However, if ncurses is configured to support termcap, it may also
+ o However, if ncurses is configured to support termcap, it may also
have been configured to support BSD-style padding.
- In that case, tputs inspects strings passed to it, looking for
+ In that case, tputs inspects strings passed to it, looking for
digits at the beginning of the string.
- tputs("50") in a termcap system may busy-wait for 50 milliseconds
+ tputs("50") in a termcap system may busy-wait for 50 milliseconds
rather than transmitting "50".
termcap has nothing analogous to terminfo's set_attributes (sgr)
- capability. One consequence is that termcap applications assume that
- "me" (equivalent to terminfo's exit_attribute_mode (sgr0) capability)
- does not reset the alternate character set. ncurses checks for, and
+ capability. One consequence is that termcap applications assume that
+ "me" (equivalent to terminfo's exit_attribute_mode (sgr0) capability)
+ does not reset the alternate character set. ncurses checks for, and
modifies the data shared with, the termcap interface to accommodate the
latter's limitation in this respect.
@@ -396,7 +369,7 @@
-ncurses 6.4 2023-12-23 curs_termcap(3x)
+ncurses 6.5 2024-04-20 curs_termcap(3x)