+Very old systems (before standardization) provide a different function
+with the same name:
+.bP
+The \fBwinch\fP function was part of the original BSD curses library,
+which stored a 7-bit character combined with the \fIstandout\fP attribute.
+.IP
+In BSD curses, \fBwinch\fP returned only the character (as an integer)
+with the \fIstandout\fP attribute removed.
+.bP
+System V curses added support for several video attributes which
+could be combined with characters in the window.
+.IP
+Reflecting this improvement, the function was altered to return the
+character combined with all video attributes in a \fBchtype\fP value.
+.PP
+X/Open Curses does not specify
+the size and layout of attributes, color and character values in
+\fBchtype\fP; it is implementation-dependent.
+This implementation uses 8 bits for character values.
+An application using more bits, e.g., a Unicode value,
+should use the wide-character equivalents to these functions.
+.SH SEE ALSO
+.TP 5
+\fBcurses\fR(3X)
+gives an overview of the WINDOW and \fBchtype\fP data types.
+.TP 5
+\fBcurs_attr\fR(3X)
+goes into more detail, pointing out portability problems and
+constraints on the use of \fBchtype\fP for returning window information.
+.TP 5
+\fBcurs_in_wch\fR(3X)
+describes comparable functions for the wide-character (ncursesw) library.