+
The ncurses library routines give the user a terminal-
independent method of updating character screens with rea-
sonable optimization. This implementation is "new curses"
(ncurses) and is the approved replacement for 4.4BSD clas-
sic curses, which has been discontinued. This describes
- ncurses version 5.9 (patch 20131221).
+ ncurses version 5.9 (patch 20150215).
The ncurses library emulates the curses library of System
V Release 4 UNIX, and XPG4 (X/Open Portability Guide)
@@ -214,7 +215,9 @@
clearing and redrawing a screen containing garbage. The
curscr can be used in only a few routines.
- Routine and Argument Names
+
+
+
Many curses routines have two or more versions. The rou-
tines prefixed with w require a window argument. The rou-
tines prefixed with p require a pad argument. Those with-
@@ -297,7 +300,9 @@
ants: a "_w" is inserted into the name. For
example, waddch becomes wadd_wch.
- Routine Name Index
+
+
+
The following table lists each curses routine and the name
of the manual page on which it is described. Routines
flagged with `*' are ncurses-specific, not described by
@@ -750,7 +755,7 @@
-RETURN VALUE
+
Routines that return an integer return ERR upon failure
and an integer value other than ERR upon successful com-
pletion, unless otherwise noted in the routine descrip-
@@ -769,20 +774,11 @@
-ENVIRONMENT
+
The following environment symbols are useful for customiz-
ing the runtime behavior of the ncurses library. The most
important ones have been already discussed in detail.
- BAUDRATE
- The debugging library checks this environment vari-
- able when the application has redirected output to a
- file. The variable's numeric value is used for the
- baudrate. If no value is found, ncurses uses 9600.
- This allows testers to construct repeatable test-
- cases that take into account costs that depend on
- baudrate.
-
CC When set, change occurrences of the command_character
(i.e., the cmdch capability) of the loaded terminfo
entries to the value of this variable. Very few ter-
@@ -793,6 +789,15 @@
ignores it if it does not happen to be a single char-
acter.
+ BAUDRATE
+ The debugging library checks this environment vari-
+ able when the application has redirected output to a
+ file. The variable's numeric value is used for the
+ baudrate. If no value is found, ncurses uses 9600.
+ This allows testers to construct repeatable test-
+ cases that take into account costs that depend on
+ baudrate.
+
COLUMNS
Specify the width of the screen in characters.
Applications running in a windowing environment usu-
@@ -892,6 +897,17 @@
tive value from zero to the terminfo max_colors value
is allowed.
+ NCURSES_CONSOLE2
+ This applies only to the MinGW port of ncurses.
+
+ The Console2 program's handling of the Microsoft Con-
+ sole API call CreateConsoleScreenBuffer is defective.
+ Applications which use this will hang. However, it
+ is possible to simulate the action of this call by
+ mapping coordinates, explicitly saving and restoring
+ the original screen contents. Setting the environ-
+ ment variable NCGDB has the same effect.
+
NCURSES_GPM_TERMS
This applies only to ncurses configured to use the
GPM interface.
@@ -912,7 +928,7 @@
variable to disable the feature. You can also adjust
your stty settings to avoid the problem.
- NCURSES_NO_MAGIC_COOKIES
+ NCURSES_NO_MAGIC_COOKIE
Some terminals use a magic-cookie feature which
requires special handling to make highlighting and
other video attributes display properly. You can
@@ -1030,6 +1046,22 @@
TERM Denotes your terminal type. Each terminal type is
distinct, though many are similar.
+ TERM is commonly set by terminal emulators to help
+ applications find a workable terminal description.
+ Some of those choose a popular approximation, e.g.,
+ "ansi", "vt100", "xterm" rather than an exact fit.
+ Not infrequently, your application will have problems
+ with that approach, e.g., incorrect function-key def-
+ initions.
+
+ If you set TERM in your environment, it has no effect
+ on the operation of the terminal emulator. It only
+ affects the way applications work within the termi-
+ nal. Likewise, as a general rule (xterm being a rare
+ exception), terminal emulators which allow you to
+ specify TERM as a parameter or configuration value do
+ not change their behavior to match that setting.
+
TERMCAP
If the ncurses library has been configured with term-
cap support, ncurses will check for a terminal's
@@ -1108,7 +1140,7 @@
-ALTERNATE CONFIGURATIONS
+
Several different configurations are possible, depending
on the configure script options used when building
ncurses. There are a few main options whose effects are
@@ -1157,6 +1189,17 @@
applications to be built using either library from
the same set of headers.
+ --with-pthread
+ The configure script renames the library. All of the
+ library names have a "t" appended to them (before any
+ "w" added by --enable-widec).
+
+ The global variables such as LINES are replaced by
+ macros to allow read-only access. At the same time,
+ setter-functions are provided to set these values.
+ Some applications (very few) may require changes to
+ work with this convention.
+
--with-shared
--with-normal
@@ -1179,7 +1222,7 @@
-FILES
+
/usr/share/tabset
directory containing initialization files for the
terminal capability database /usr/share/terminfo ter-
@@ -1187,14 +1230,14 @@
-SEE ALSO
+
terminfo(5) and related pages whose names begin "curs_"
for detailed routine descriptions.
curs_variables(3x)
-EXTENSIONS
+
The ncurses library can be compiled with an option
(-DUSE_GETCAP) that falls back to the old-style /etc/term-
cap file if the terminal setup code cannot find a terminfo
@@ -1234,7 +1277,7 @@
-PORTABILITY
+
The ncurses library is intended to be BASE-level confor-
mant with XSI Curses. The EXTENDED XSI Curses functional-
ity (including color support) is supported.
@@ -1298,7 +1341,7 @@
-NOTES
+
The header file <curses.h> automatically includes the
header files <stdio.h> and <unctrl.h>.
@@ -1309,7 +1352,7 @@
-AUTHORS
+
Zeyd M. Ben-Halim, Eric S. Raymond, Thomas E. Dickey.
Based on pcurses by Pavel Curtis.
@@ -1317,10 +1360,26 @@
ncurses(3x)
-
-
-Man(1) output converted with
-man2html
-
+