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30 * @Id: curs_termcap.3x,v 1.27 2011/10/15 21:11:24 tom Exp @
34 <TITLE>curs_termcap 3x</TITLE>
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39 <H1>curs_termcap 3x</H1>
42 <!-- Manpage converted by man2html 3.0.1 -->
43 <STRONG><A HREF="curs_termcap.3x.html">curs_termcap(3x)</A></STRONG> <STRONG><A HREF="curs_termcap.3x.html">curs_termcap(3x)</A></STRONG>
50 <STRONG>PC</STRONG>, <STRONG>UP</STRONG>, <STRONG>BC</STRONG>, <STRONG>ospeed</STRONG>, <STRONG>tgetent</STRONG>, <STRONG>tgetflag</STRONG>, <STRONG>tgetnum</STRONG>, <STRONG>tgetstr</STRONG>,
51 <STRONG>tgoto</STRONG>, <STRONG>tputs</STRONG> - direct <STRONG>curses</STRONG> interface to the terminfo
56 <H2>SYNOPSIS</H2><PRE>
57 <STRONG>#include</STRONG> <STRONG><curses.h></STRONG>
58 <STRONG>#include</STRONG> <STRONG><term.h></STRONG>
60 <STRONG>extern</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>PC;</STRONG>
61 <STRONG>extern</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*</STRONG> <STRONG>UP;</STRONG>
62 <STRONG>extern</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*</STRONG> <STRONG>BC;</STRONG>
63 <STRONG>extern</STRONG> <STRONG>short</STRONG> <STRONG>ospeed;</STRONG>
65 <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>tgetent(char</STRONG> <STRONG>*bp,</STRONG> <STRONG>const</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*name);</STRONG>
66 <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>tgetflag(char</STRONG> <STRONG>*id);</STRONG>
67 <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>tgetnum(char</STRONG> <STRONG>*id);</STRONG>
68 <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*tgetstr(char</STRONG> <STRONG>*id,</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>**area);</STRONG>
69 <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*tgoto(const</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*cap,</STRONG> <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>col,</STRONG> <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>row);</STRONG>
70 <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>tputs(const</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*str,</STRONG> <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>affcnt,</STRONG> <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>(*putc)(int));</STRONG>
74 <H2>DESCRIPTION</H2><PRE>
75 These routines are included as a conversion aid for pro-
76 grams that use the <EM>termcap</EM> library. Their parameters are
77 the same and the routines are emulated using the <EM>terminfo</EM>
78 database. Thus, they can only be used to query the capa-
79 bilities of entries for which a terminfo entry has been
82 The <STRONG>tgetent</STRONG> routine loads the entry for <EM>name</EM>. It returns:
86 0 if there is no such entry (or that it is a generic
87 type, having too little information for curses ap-
88 plications to run), and
90 -1 if the terminfo database could not be found.
92 This differs from the <EM>termcap</EM> library in two ways:
94 - The emulation ignores the buffer pointer <EM>bp</EM>. The
95 <EM>termcap</EM> library would store a copy of the terminal
96 description in the area referenced by this pointer.
97 However, ncurses stores its terminal descriptions in
98 compiled binary form, which is not the same thing.
100 - There is a difference in return codes. The <EM>termcap</EM>
101 library does not check if the terminal description
102 is marked with the <EM>generic</EM> capability, or if the
103 terminal description has cursor-addressing.
105 The <STRONG>tgetflag</STRONG> routine gets the boolean entry for <EM>id</EM>, or ze-
106 ro if it is not available.
108 The <STRONG>tgetnum</STRONG> routine gets the numeric entry for <EM>id</EM>, or -1
109 if it is not available.
111 The <STRONG>tgetstr</STRONG> routine returns the string entry for <EM>id</EM>, or
112 zero if it is not available. Use <STRONG>tputs</STRONG> to output the re-
113 turned string. The return value will also be copied to
114 the buffer pointed to by <EM>area</EM>, and the <EM>area</EM> value will be
115 updated to point past the null ending this value.
117 Only the first two characters of the <STRONG>id</STRONG> parameter of <STRONG>tget-</STRONG>
118 <STRONG>flag</STRONG>, <STRONG>tgetnum</STRONG> and <STRONG>tgetstr</STRONG> are compared in lookups.
120 The <STRONG>tgoto</STRONG> routine instantiates the parameters into the
121 given capability. The output from this routine is to be
122 passed to <STRONG>tputs</STRONG>.
124 The <STRONG>tputs</STRONG> routine is described on the <STRONG><A HREF="curs_terminfo.3x.html">curs_terminfo(3x)</A></STRONG>
125 manual page. It can retrieve capabilities by either term-
126 cap or terminfo name.
128 The variables <STRONG>PC</STRONG>, <STRONG>UP</STRONG> and <STRONG>BC</STRONG> are set by <STRONG>tgetent</STRONG> to the ter-
129 minfo entry's data for <STRONG>pad_char</STRONG>, <STRONG>cursor_up</STRONG> and
130 <STRONG>backspace_if_not_bs</STRONG>, respectively. <STRONG>UP</STRONG> is not used by
131 ncurses. <STRONG>PC</STRONG> is used in the <STRONG>tdelay_output</STRONG> function. <STRONG>BC</STRONG> is
132 used in the <STRONG>tgoto</STRONG> emulation. The variable <STRONG>ospeed</STRONG> is set
133 by ncurses in a system-specific coding to reflect the ter-
138 <H2>RETURN VALUE</H2><PRE>
139 Except where explicitly noted, routines that return an in-
140 teger return <STRONG>ERR</STRONG> upon failure and <STRONG>OK</STRONG> (SVr4 only specifies
141 "an integer value other than <STRONG>ERR</STRONG>") upon successful comple-
144 Routines that return pointers return <STRONG>NULL</STRONG> on error.
149 If you call <STRONG>tgetstr</STRONG> to fetch <STRONG>ca</STRONG> or any other parameterized
150 string, be aware that it will be returned in terminfo no-
151 tation, not the older and not-quite-compatible termcap no-
152 tation. This will not cause problems if all you do with
153 it is call <STRONG>tgoto</STRONG> or <STRONG>tparm</STRONG>, which both expand terminfo-
154 style strings as terminfo. (The <STRONG>tgoto</STRONG> function, if con-
155 figured to support termcap, will check if the string is
156 indeed terminfo-style by looking for "%p" parameters or
157 "$<..>" delays, and invoke a termcap-style parser if the
158 string does not appear to be terminfo).
160 Because terminfo conventions for representing padding in
161 string capabilities differ from termcap's, <STRONG>tputs("50");</STRONG>
162 will put out a literal "50" rather than busy-waiting for
163 50 milliseconds. Cope with it.
165 Note that termcap has nothing analogous to terminfo's <STRONG>sgr</STRONG>
166 string. One consequence of this is that termcap applica-
167 tions assume me (terminfo <STRONG>sgr0</STRONG>) does not reset the alter-
168 nate character set. This implementation checks for, and
169 modifies the data shown to the termcap interface to accom-
170 modate termcap's limitation in this respect.
174 <H2>PORTABILITY</H2><PRE>
175 The XSI Curses standard, Issue 4 describes these func-
176 tions. However, they are marked TO BE WITHDRAWN and may
177 be removed in future versions.
179 Neither the XSI Curses standard nor the SVr4 man pages
180 documented the return values of <STRONG>tgetent</STRONG> correctly, though
181 all three were in fact returned ever since SVr1. In par-
182 ticular, an omission in the XSI Curses documentation has
183 been misinterpreted to mean that <STRONG>tgetent</STRONG> returns <STRONG>OK</STRONG> or
184 <STRONG>ERR</STRONG>. Because the purpose of these functions is to provide
185 compatibility with the <EM>termcap</EM> library, that is a defect
186 in XCurses, Issue 4, Version 2 rather than in ncurses.
188 External variables are provided for support of certain
189 termcap applications. However, termcap applications' use
190 of those variables is poorly documented, e.g., not distin-
191 guishing between input and output. In particular, some
192 applications are reported to declare and/or modify <STRONG>ospeed</STRONG>.
196 <H2>SEE ALSO</H2><PRE>
197 <STRONG><A HREF="ncurses.3x.html">curses(3x)</A></STRONG>, <STRONG><A HREF="terminfo.5.html">terminfo(5)</A></STRONG>, <STRONG><A HREF="term_variables.3x.html">term_variables(3x)</A></STRONG>, <STRONG><A HREF="putc.3.html">putc(3)</A></STRONG>.
201 <STRONG><A HREF="curs_termcap.3x.html">curs_termcap(3x)</A></STRONG>
205 Man(1) output converted with
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