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41 <H1 class="no-header">term 7</H1>
43 <STRONG><A HREF="term.7.html">term(7)</A></STRONG> Miscellaneous Information Manual <STRONG><A HREF="term.7.html">term(7)</A></STRONG>
48 </PRE><H2><a name="h2-NAME">NAME</a></H2><PRE>
49 term - conventions for naming terminal types
52 </PRE><H2><a name="h2-DESCRIPTION">DESCRIPTION</a></H2><PRE>
53 The environment variable <STRONG>TERM</STRONG> should normally contain the type name of
54 the terminal, console or display-device type you are using. This
55 information is critical for all screen-oriented programs, including
56 your editor and mailer.
58 A default <STRONG>TERM</STRONG> value will be set on a per-line basis by either
59 <STRONG>/etc/inittab</STRONG> (e.g., System-V-like UNIXes) or <STRONG>/etc/ttys</STRONG> (BSD UNIXes).
60 This will nearly always suffice for workstation and microcomputer con-
63 If you use a dialup line, the type of device attached to it may vary.
64 Older UNIX systems pre-set a very dumb terminal type like "dumb" or
65 "dialup" on dialup lines. Newer ones may pre-set "vt100", reflecting
66 the prevalence of DEC VT100-compatible terminals and personal-computer
69 Modern telnets pass your <STRONG>TERM</STRONG> environment variable from the local side
70 to the remote one. There can be problems if the remote terminfo or
71 termcap entry for your type is not compatible with yours, but this sit-
72 uation is rare and can almost always be avoided by explicitly exporting
73 "vt100" (assuming you are in fact using a VT100-superset console, ter-
74 minal, or terminal emulator.)
76 In any case, you are free to override the system <STRONG>TERM</STRONG> setting to your
77 taste in your shell profile. The <STRONG><A HREF="tset.1.html">tset(1)</A></STRONG> utility may be of assistance;
78 you can give it a set of rules for deducing or requesting a terminal
79 type based on the tty device and baud rate.
81 Setting your own <STRONG>TERM</STRONG> value may also be useful if you have created a
82 custom entry incorporating options (such as visual bell or reverse-
83 video) which you wish to override the system default type for your
86 Terminal type descriptions are stored as files of capability data
87 underneath /usr/share/terminfo. To browse a list of all terminal names
88 recognized by the system, do
92 from your shell. These capability files are in a binary format opti-
93 mized for retrieval speed (unlike the old text-based <STRONG>termcap</STRONG> format
94 they replace); to examine an entry, you must use the <STRONG><A HREF="infocmp.1m.html">infocmp(1m)</A></STRONG> com-
95 mand. Invoke it as follows:
97 infocmp <EM>entry</EM><STRONG>_</STRONG><EM>name</EM>
99 where <EM>entry</EM><STRONG>_</STRONG><EM>name</EM> is the name of the type you wish to examine (and the
100 name of its capability file the subdirectory of /usr/share/terminfo
101 named for its first letter). This command dumps a capability file in
102 the text format described by <STRONG><A HREF="terminfo.5.html">terminfo(5)</A></STRONG>.
104 The first line of a <STRONG><A HREF="terminfo.5.html">terminfo(5)</A></STRONG> description gives the names by which
105 terminfo knows a terminal, separated by "|" (pipe-bar) characters with
106 the last name field terminated by a comma. The first name field is the
107 type's <EM>primary</EM> <EM>name</EM>, and is the one to use when setting <STRONG>TERM</STRONG>. The last
108 name field (if distinct from the first) is actually a description of
109 the terminal type (it may contain blanks; the others must be single
110 words). Name fields between the first and last (if present) are
111 aliases for the terminal, usually historical names retained for compat-
114 There are some conventions for how to choose terminal primary names
115 that help keep them informative and unique. Here is a step-by-step
116 guide to naming terminals that also explains how to parse them:
118 First, choose a root name. The root will consist of a lower-case let-
119 ter followed by up to seven lower-case letters or digits. You need to
120 avoid using punctuation characters in root names, because they are used
121 and interpreted as filenames and shell meta-characters (such as !, $,
122 *, ?, etc.) embedded in them may cause odd and unhelpful behavior. The
123 slash (/), or any other character that may be interpreted by anyone's
124 file system (\, $, [, ]), is especially dangerous (terminfo is plat-
125 form-independent, and choosing names with special characters could
126 someday make life difficult for users of a future port). The dot (.)
127 character is relatively safe as long as there is at most one per root
128 name; some historical terminfo names use it.
130 The root name for a terminal or workstation console type should almost
131 always begin with a vendor prefix (such as <STRONG>hp</STRONG> for Hewlett-Packard, <STRONG>wy</STRONG>
132 for Wyse, or <STRONG>att</STRONG> for AT&T terminals), or a common name of the terminal
133 line (<STRONG>vt</STRONG> for the VT series of terminals from DEC, or <STRONG>sun</STRONG> for Sun
134 Microsystems workstation consoles, or <STRONG>regent</STRONG> for the ADDS Regent
135 series. You can list the terminfo tree to see what prefixes are
136 already in common use. The root name prefix should be followed when
137 appropriate by a model number; thus <STRONG>vt100</STRONG>, <STRONG>hp2621</STRONG>, <STRONG>wy50</STRONG>.
139 The root name for a PC-Unix console type should be the OS name, i.e.,
140 <STRONG>linux</STRONG>, <STRONG>bsdos</STRONG>, <STRONG>freebsd</STRONG>, <STRONG>netbsd</STRONG>. It should <EM>not</EM> be <STRONG>console</STRONG> or any other
141 generic that might cause confusion in a multi-platform environment! If
142 a model number follows, it should indicate either the OS release level
143 or the console driver release level.
145 The root name for a terminal emulator (assuming it does not fit one of
146 the standard ANSI or vt100 types) should be the program name or a read-
147 ily recognizable abbreviation of it (i.e., <STRONG>versaterm</STRONG>, <STRONG>ctrm</STRONG>).
149 Following the root name, you may add any reasonable number of hyphen-
150 separated feature suffixes.
152 2p Has two pages of memory. Likewise 4p, 8p, etc.
154 mc Magic-cookie. Some terminals (notably older Wyses) can only sup-
155 port one attribute without magic-cookie lossage. Their base entry
156 is usually paired with another that has this suffix and uses magic
157 cookies to support multiple attributes.
159 -am Enable auto-margin (right-margin wraparound).
161 -m Mono mode - suppress color support.
163 -na No arrow keys - termcap ignores arrow keys which are actually
164 there on the terminal, so the user can use the arrow keys locally.
166 -nam No auto-margin - suppress am capability.
168 -nl No labels - suppress soft labels.
170 -nsl No status line - suppress status line.
172 -pp Has a printer port which is used.
174 -rv Terminal in reverse video mode (black on white).
176 -s Enable status line.
178 -vb Use visible bell (flash) rather than beep.
180 -w Wide; terminal is in 132-column mode.
182 Conventionally, if your terminal type is a variant intended to specify
183 a line height, that suffix should go first. So, for a hypothetical
184 FuBarCo model 2317 terminal in 30-line mode with reverse video, best
185 form would be <STRONG>fubar-30-rv</STRONG> (rather than, say, "fubar-rv-30").
187 Terminal types that are written not as standalone entries, but rather
188 as components to be plugged into other entries via <STRONG>use</STRONG> capabilities,
189 are distinguished by using embedded plus signs rather than dashes.
191 Commands which use a terminal type to control display often accept a -T
192 option that accepts a terminal name argument. Such programs should
193 fall back on the <STRONG>TERM</STRONG> environment variable when no -T option is speci-
197 </PRE><H2><a name="h2-PORTABILITY">PORTABILITY</a></H2><PRE>
198 For maximum compatibility with older System V UNIXes, names and aliases
199 should be unique within the first 14 characters.
202 </PRE><H2><a name="h2-FILES">FILES</a></H2><PRE>
203 /usr/share/terminfo/?/*
204 compiled terminal capability data base
207 tty line initialization (AT&T-like UNIXes)
210 tty line initialization (BSD-like UNIXes)
213 </PRE><H2><a name="h2-SEE-ALSO">SEE ALSO</a></H2><PRE>
214 <STRONG><A HREF="ncurses.3x.html">curses(3x)</A></STRONG>, <STRONG><A HREF="terminfo.5.html">terminfo(5)</A></STRONG>, <STRONG><A HREF="term.5.html">term(5)</A></STRONG>.
218 <STRONG><A HREF="term.7.html">term(7)</A></STRONG>
222 <li><a href="#h2-NAME">NAME</a></li>
223 <li><a href="#h2-DESCRIPTION">DESCRIPTION</a></li>
224 <li><a href="#h2-PORTABILITY">PORTABILITY</a></li>
225 <li><a href="#h2-FILES">FILES</a></li>
226 <li><a href="#h2-SEE-ALSO">SEE ALSO</a></li>