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28 -- $Id: INSTALL,v 1.147 2010/09/04 20:57:46 tom Exp $
29 ---------------------------------------------------------------------
30 How to install Ncurses/Terminfo on your system
31 ---------------------------------------------------------------------
33 ************************************************************
34 * READ ALL OF THIS FILE BEFORE YOU TRY TO INSTALL NCURSES. *
35 ************************************************************
37 You should be reading the file INSTALL in a directory called ncurses-d.d, where
38 d.d is the current version number. There should be several subdirectories,
39 including `c++', `form', `man', `menu', 'misc', `ncurses', `panel', `progs',
40 and `test'. See the README file for a roadmap to the package.
42 If you are a distribution integrator or packager, please read and act on the
43 section titled IF YOU ARE A SYSTEM INTEGRATOR below.
45 If you are converting from BSD curses and do not have root access, be sure
46 to read the BSD CONVERSION NOTES section below.
48 If you are trying to build applications using gpm with ncurses,
49 read the USING NCURSES WITH GPM section below.
51 If you are running over the Andrew File System see the note below on
52 USING NCURSES WITH AFS.
54 If you are cross-compiling, see the note below on BUILDING NCURSES WITH A
57 If you want to build the Ada95 binding, go to the Ada95 directory and
58 follow the instructions there. The Ada95 binding is not covered below.
64 You will need the following to build and install ncurses under UNIX:
66 * ANSI C compiler (gcc, for instance)
68 * awk (mawk or gawk will do)
70 * BSD or System V style install (a script is enclosed)
72 Ncurses has been also built in the OS/2 EMX environment.
75 INSTALLATION PROCEDURE:
76 ----------------------
78 1. First, decide whether you want ncurses to replace your existing library (in
79 which case you'll need super-user privileges) or be installed in parallel
82 The --prefix option to configure changes the root directory for installing
83 ncurses. The default is normally in subdirectories of /usr/local, except
84 for systems where ncurses is normally installed as a system library (see
85 "IF YOU ARE A SYSTEM INTEGRATOR"). Use --prefix=/usr to replace your
86 default curses distribution.
88 The package gets installed beneath the --prefix directory as follows:
90 In $(prefix)/bin: tic, infocmp, captoinfo, tset,
91 reset, clear, tput, toe, tabs
92 In $(prefix)/lib: libncurses*.* libcurses.a
93 In $(prefix)/share/terminfo: compiled terminal descriptions
94 In $(prefix)/include: C header files
95 Under $(prefix)/man: the manual pages
97 Note that the configure script attempts to locate previous installation of
98 ncurses, and will set the default prefix according to where it finds the
101 Do not use commands such as
103 make install prefix=XXX
105 to change the prefix after configuration, since the prefix value is used
106 for some absolute pathnames such as TERMINFO. Instead do this
108 make install DESTDIR=XXX
110 See also the discussion of --with-install-prefix.
112 2. Type `./configure' in the top-level directory of the distribution to
113 configure ncurses for your operating system and create the Makefiles.
114 Besides --prefix, various configuration options are available to customize
115 the installation; use `./configure --help' to list the available options.
117 If your operating system is not supported, read the PORTABILITY section in
118 the file ncurses/README for information on how to create a configuration
119 file for your system.
121 The `configure' script generates makefile rules for one or more object
122 models and their associated libraries:
124 libncurses.a (normal)
126 libcurses.a (normal, a link to libncurses.a)
127 This gets left out if you configure with --disable-overwrite.
129 libncurses.so (shared)
131 libncurses_g.a (debug)
133 libncurses_p.a (profile)
135 libncurses.la (libtool)
137 If you configure using the --enable-widec option, a "w" is appended to the
138 library names (e.g., libncursesw.a), and the resulting libraries support
139 wide-characters, e.g., via a UTF-8 locale. The corresponding header files
140 are compatible with the non-wide-character configuration; wide-character
141 features are provided by ifdef's in the header files. The wide-character
142 library interfaces are not binary-compatible with the non-wide-character
143 version. Building and running the wide-character code relies on a fairly
144 recent implementation of libiconv. We have built this configuration on
145 various systems using libiconv, sometimes requiring libutf8.
147 If you configure using the --with-pthread option, a "t" is appended to
148 the library names (e.g., libncursest.a, libncursestw.a).
150 If you do not specify any models, the normal and debug libraries will be
151 configured. Typing `configure' with no arguments is equivalent to:
153 ./configure --with-normal --with-debug --enable-overwrite
157 ./configure --with-shared
159 makes the shared libraries the default, resulting in
161 ./configure --with-shared --with-normal --with-debug --enable-overwrite
163 If you want only shared libraries, type
165 ./configure --with-shared --without-normal --without-debug
167 Rules for generating shared libraries are highly dependent upon the choice
168 of host system and compiler. We've been testing shared libraries on
169 several systems, but more work needs to be done to make shared libraries
170 work on other systems.
172 If you have libtool installed, you can type
174 ./configure --with-libtool
176 to generate the appropriate static and/or shared libraries for your
177 platform using libtool.
179 You can make curses and terminfo fall back to an existing file of termcap
180 definitions by configuring with --enable-termcap. If you do this, the
181 library will search /etc/termcap before the terminfo database, and will
182 also interpret the contents of the TERM environment variable. See the
183 section BSD CONVERSION NOTES below.
185 3. Type `make'. Ignore any warnings, no error messages should be produced.
186 This should compile the ncurses library, the terminfo compiler tic(1),
187 captoinfo(1), infocmp(1), toe(1), clear(1) tset(1), reset(1), and tput(1)
188 programs (see the manual pages for explanation of what they do), some test
189 programs, and the panels, menus, and forms libraries.
191 4. Run ncurses and several other test programs in the test directory to
192 verify that ncurses functions correctly before doing an install that
193 may overwrite system files. Read the file test/README for details on
196 NOTE: You must have installed the terminfo database, or set the
197 environment variable $TERMINFO to point to a SVr4-compatible terminfo
198 database before running the test programs. Not all vendors' terminfo
199 databases are SVr4-compatible, but most seem to be. Exceptions include
200 DEC's Digital Unix (formerly known as OSF/1).
202 If you run the test programs WITHOUT installing terminfo, ncurses may
203 read the termcap file and cache that in $HOME/.terminfo, which will
204 thereafter be used instead of the terminfo database. See the comments
205 on "--enable-getcap-cache", to see why this is a Bad Thing.
207 It is possible to configure ncurses to use other terminfo database formats.
208 A few are provided as examples in the include-directory (see --with-caps).
210 The ncurses program is designed specifically to test the ncurses library.
211 You can use it to verify that the screen highlights work correctly, that
212 cursor addressing and window scrolling works OK, etc.
214 5. Once you've tested, you can type `make install' to install libraries,
215 the programs, the terminfo database and the manual pages. Alternately, you
216 can type `make install' in each directory you want to install. In the
217 top-level directory, you can do a partial install using these commands:
219 'make install.progs' installs tic, infocmp, etc...
220 'make install.includes' installs the headers.
221 'make install.libs' installs the libraries (and the headers).
222 'make install.data' installs the terminfo data. (Note: `tic' must
223 be installed before the terminfo data can be
225 'make install.man' installs the manual pages.
227 ############################################################################
228 # CAVEAT EMPTOR: `install.data' run as root will NUKE any existing #
229 # terminfo database. If you have any custom or unusual entries SAVE them #
230 # before you install ncurses. I have a file called terminfo.custom for #
231 # this purpose. Don't forget to run tic on the file once you're done. #
232 ############################################################################
234 The terminfo(5) manual page must be preprocessed with tbl(1) before
235 being formatted by nroff(1). Modern man(1) implementations tend to do
236 this by default, but you may want to look at your version's manual page
237 to be sure. You may also install the manual pages after preprocessing
238 with tbl(1) by specifying the configure option --with-manpage-tbl.
240 If the system already has a curses library that you need to keep using
241 you'll need to distinguish between it and ncurses. See the discussion of
242 --disable-overwrite. If ncurses is installed outside the standard
243 directories (/usr/include and /usr/lib) then all your users will need to
244 use the -I option to compile programs and -L to link them.
246 If you have another curses installed in your system and you accidentally
247 compile using its curses.h you'll end up with a large number of
248 undefined symbols at link time.
250 IF YOU DO NOT HAVE ROOT: Change directory to the `progs' subdirectory
251 and run the `capconvert' script. This script will deduce various things
252 about your environment and use them to build you a private terminfo tree,
253 so you can use ncurses applications.
255 If more than one user at your site does this, the space for the duplicate
256 trees is wasted. Try to get your site administrators to install a system-
257 wide terminfo tree instead.
259 See the BSD CONVERSION NOTES section below for a few more details.
261 6. The c++ directory has C++ classes that are built on top of ncurses and
262 panels. You must have c++ (and its libraries) installed before you can
263 compile and run the demo.
265 Use --without-cxx-binding to tell configure to not build the C++ bindings
268 If you do not have C++, you must use the --without-cxx option to tell
269 the configure script to not attempt to determine the type of 'bool'
270 which may be supported by C++. IF YOU USE THIS OPTION, BE ADVISED THAT
271 YOU MAY NOT BE ABLE TO COMPILE (OR RUN) NCURSES APPLICATIONS WITH C++.
274 SUMMARY OF CONFIGURE OPTIONS:
275 ----------------------------
277 The configure script provides a short list of its options when you type
281 The --help and several options are common to all configure scripts that are
282 generated with autoconf. Those are all listed before the line
284 --enable and --with options recognized:
286 The other options are specific to this package. We list them in alphabetic
289 --disable-assumed-color
290 With ncurses 5.1, we introduced a new function, assume_default_colors()
291 which allows applications to specify what the default foreground and
292 background color are assumed to be. Most color applications use
293 full-screen color; but a few do not color the background. While the
294 assumed values can be overridden by invoking assume_default_colors(),
295 you may find it useful to set the assumed values to the pre-5.1
296 convention, using this configure option.
299 Assume machine has little memory. The configure script attempts to
300 determine if your machine has enough memory (about 6Mb) to compile the
301 terminfo database without writing portions to disk. Some allocators
302 return deceptive results, so you may have to override the configure
303 script. Or you may be building tic for a smaller machine.
305 --disable-big-strings
306 Disable compile-time optimization of predefined tables which puts
307 all of their strings into a very long string, to reduce relocation
311 Use only built-in data. The ncurses libraries normally read terminfo
312 and termcap data from disk. You can configure ncurses to have a
313 built-in database, aka "fallback" entries. Embedded applications may
314 have no need for an external database. Some, but not all of the
315 programs are useful in this configuration, e.g., reset and tput versus
319 Disable function-extensions. Configure ncurses without the functions
320 that are not specified by XSI. See ncurses/modules for the exact
321 list of library modules that would be suppressed.
324 Compile without hashmap scrolling-optimization code. This algorithm is
327 --disable-home-terminfo
328 The $HOME/.terminfo directory is normally added to ncurses' search
329 list for reading/writing terminfo entries, since that directory is
330 more likely writable than the system terminfo database. Use this
331 option to disable the feature altogether.
334 Disable compiler flags needed to use large-file interfaces.
336 --disable-libtool-version
337 when using --with-libtool, control how the major/minor version numbers
338 are used for constructing the library name.
340 The default uses the -version-number feature of libtool, which makes
341 the library names compatible (though not identical) with the standard
342 build using --with-shared.
344 Use --disable-libtool-version to use the libtool -version-info feature.
345 This corresponds to the setting used before patch 20100515.
348 For testing, compile-in code that frees memory that normally would not
349 be freed, to simplify analysis of memory-leaks.
351 Any implementation of curses must not free the memory associated with
352 a screen, since (even after calling endwin()), it must be available
353 for use in the next call to refresh(). There are also chunks of
354 memory held for performance reasons. That makes it hard to analyze
355 curses applications for memory leaks. To work around this, build
356 a debugging version of the ncurses library which frees those chunks
357 which it can, and provides the _nc_free_and_exit() function to free
358 the remainder on exit. The ncurses utility and test programs use this
359 feature, e.g., via the ExitProgram() macro.
362 The header files will ignore use of the _LP64 symbol to make chtype
363 and mmask_t types 32 bits (they may be long on 64-bit hosts, for
364 compatibility with older releases).
366 NOTE: this is potentially an ABI change, depending on existing
367 packages. The default for this option is "disabled" for ncurses
368 ABI 5, and "enabled" for ABI 6.
371 For testing, use functions rather than macros. The program will run
372 more slowly, but it is simpler to debug. This defines NCURSES_NOMACROS
373 at build time. See also the --enable-expanded option.
376 If you are installing ncurses on a system which contains another
377 development version of curses, or which could be confused by the loader
378 for another version, we recommend that you leave out the link to
379 -lcurses. The ncurses library is always available as -lncurses.
380 Disabling overwrite also causes the ncurses header files to be
381 installed into a subdirectory, e.g., /usr/local/include/ncurses,
382 rather than the include directory. This makes it simpler to avoid
383 compile-time conflicts with other versions of curses.h
386 If --enable-rpath is given, the generated makefiles normally will
387 rebuild the libraries during install. Use this option to simply
388 copy whatever the linked produced.
390 This option is ignored if --enable-rpath is not given.
392 --disable-root-environ
393 Compile with environment restriction, so certain environment variables
394 are not available when running as root, or via a setuid/setgid
395 application. These are (for example $TERMINFO) those that allow the
396 search path for the terminfo or termcap entry to be customized.
399 Normally the configure script helps link libraries found in unusual
400 places by adding an rpath option to the link command. If you are
401 building packages, this feature may be redundant. Use this option
402 to suppress the feature.
404 --disable-scroll-hints
405 Compile without scroll-hints code. This option is ignored when
406 hashmap scrolling is configured, which is the default.
408 --disable-tic-depends
409 When building shared libraries, normally the tic library is linked to
410 depend upon the ncurses library (and in turn, on the term-library if
411 the --with-termlib option was given). The tic- and term-libraries
412 ABI does not depend on the --enable-widec option. Some packagers have
413 used this to reduce the number of library files which are packaged
414 by using only one copy of those libraries. To make this work properly,
415 the tic library must be built without an explicit dependency on the
416 ncurses (or ncursesw) library. Use this configure option to do that.
418 configure --with-ticlib --with-shared --disable-tic-depends
420 --disable-tparm-varargs
421 Portable programs should call tparm() using the fixed-length parameter
422 list documented in X/Open. ncurses provides varargs support for this
423 function. Use --disable-tparm-varargs to disable this support.
426 For testing, compile-in assertion code. This is used only for a few
427 places where ncurses cannot easily recover by returning an error code.
429 --enable-broken_linker
430 A few platforms have what we consider a broken linker: it cannot link
431 objects from an archive solely by referring to data objects in those
432 files, but requires a function reference. This configure option
433 changes several data references to functions to work around this
436 NOTE: With ncurses 5.1, this may not be necessary, since we are
437 told that some linkers interpret uninitialized global data as a
438 different type of reference which behaves as described above. We have
439 explicitly initialized all of the global data to work around the
443 Recognize BSD-style prefix padding. Some ancient BSD programs (such as
444 nethack) call tputs("50") to implement delays.
447 Compile with experimental $COLORFGBG code. That environment variable
448 is set by some terminal emulators as a hint to applications, by
449 advertising the default foreground and background colors. During
450 initialization, ncurses sets color pair 0 to match this.
453 The curses interface as documented in XSI is rather old, in fact
454 including features that precede ANSI C. The prototypes generally do
455 not make effective use of "const". When using stricter compilers (or
456 gcc with appropriate warnings), you may see warnings about the mismatch
457 between const and non-const data. We provide a configure option which
458 changes the interfaces to use const - quieting these warnings and
459 reflecting the actual use of the parameters more closely. The ncurses
460 library uses the symbol NCURSES_CONST for these instances of const,
461 and if you have asked for compiler warnings, will add gcc's const-qual
462 warning. There will still be warnings due to subtle inconsistencies
463 in the interface, but at a lower level.
465 NOTE: configuring ncurses with this option may detract from the
466 portability of your applications by encouraging you to use const in
467 places where the XSI curses interface would not allow them. Similar
468 issues arise when porting to SVr4 curses, which uses const in even
472 Use the option --disable-echo to make the build-log less verbose by
473 suppressing the display of the compile and link commands. This makes
474 it easier to see the compiler warnings. (You can always use "make -n"
475 to see the options that are used).
478 For testing, generate functions for certain macros to make them visible
479 as such to the debugger. See also the --disable-macros option.
482 Extend the cchar_t structure to allow more than 16 colors to be
483 encoded. This applies only to the wide-character (--enable-widec)
486 NOTE: using this option will make libraries which are not binary-
487 compatible with libncursesw 5.4. None of the interfaces change, but
488 applications which have an array of cchar_t's must be recompiled.
491 Modify the encoding of mouse state to make room for a 5th mouse button.
492 That allows one to use ncurses with a wheel mouse with xterm or
493 similar X terminal emulators.
495 NOTE: using this option will make libraries which are not binary-
496 compatible with libncursesw 5.4. None of the interfaces change, but
497 applications which have mouse mask mmask_t's must be recompiled.
500 Use the 4.4BSD getcap code if available, or a bundled version of it to
501 fetch termcap entries. Entries read in this way cannot use (make
502 cross-references to) the terminfo tree, but it is faster than reading
505 If configured for one of the *BSD systems, this automatically uses
506 the hashed database system produced using cap_mkdb or similar tools.
507 In that case, there is no advantage in using the --enable-getcap-cache
510 See also the --with-hashed-db option.
512 --enable-getcap-cache
513 Cache translated termcaps under the directory $HOME/.terminfo
515 NOTE: this sounds good - it makes ncurses run faster the second time.
516 But look where the data comes from - an /etc/termcap containing lots of
517 entries that are not up to date. If you configure with this option and
518 forget to install the terminfo database before running an ncurses
519 application, you will end up with a hidden terminfo database that
520 generally does not support color and will miss some function keys.
523 Compile-in cursor-optimization code that uses hard-tabs. We would make
524 this a standard feature except for the concern that the terminfo entry
525 may not be accurate, or that your stty settings have disabled the use
529 Controls whether the filesystem on which the terminfo database resides
530 supports mixed-case filenames (normal for UNIX, but not on other
531 systems). If you do not specify this option, the configure script
532 checks the current filesystem.
535 Compile-in support for the $NCURSES_NO_PADDING environment variable,
536 which allows you to suppress the effect of non-mandatory padding in
537 terminfo entries. This is the default, unless you have disabled the
541 If pkg-config is found (see --with-pkg-config), generate ".pc" files
542 for each of the libraries, and install them in pkg-config's library
545 --enable-pthreads-eintr
546 add logic in threaded configuration to ensure that a read(2) system
547 call can be interrupted for SIGWINCH.
550 Compile experimental configuration which improves reentrant use of the
551 library by reducing global and static variables. This option is also
552 set if --with-pthread is used.
555 Use rpath option when generating shared libraries, and (with some
556 restrictions) when linking the corresponding programs. This originally
557 (in 1997) applied mainly to systems using the GNU linker (read the
560 More recently it is useful for systems that require special treatment
561 shared libraries in "unusual" locations. The "system" libraries reside
562 in directories which are on the loader's default search-path. While
563 you may be able to use workarounds such as the $LD_LIBRARY_PATH
564 environment variable, they do not work with setuid applications since
565 the LD_LIBRARY_PATH variable would be unset in that situation.
567 This option does not apply to --with-libtool, since libtool makes
568 extra assumptions about rpath.
570 --enable-safe-sprintf
571 Compile with experimental safe-sprintf code. You may consider using
572 this if you are building ncurses for a system that has neither
573 vsnprintf() or vsprintf(). It is slow, however.
576 Compile support for ncurses' SIGWINCH handler. If your application has
577 its own SIGWINCH handler, ncurses will not use its own. The ncurses
578 handler causes wgetch() to return KEY_RESIZE when the screen-size
579 changes. This option is the default, unless you have disabled the
583 The term.h header declares a Booleans[] array typed "char". But it
584 stores signed values there and "char" is not necessarily signed.
585 Some packagers choose to alter the type of Booleans[] though this
586 is not strictly compatible. This option allows one to implement this
587 alteration without patching the source code.
590 If your system supports symbolic links, make tic use symbolic links
591 rather than hard links to save diskspace when writing aliases in the
595 Compile-in support for user-definable terminal capabilities. Use the
596 -x option of tic and infocmp to treat unrecognized terminal
597 capabilities as user-defined strings. This option is the default,
598 unless you have disabled the extended functions.
601 Compile in support for reading terminal descriptions from termcap if no
602 match is found in the terminfo database. See also the --enable-getcap
603 and --enable-getcap-cache options.
606 Turn on GCC compiler warnings. There should be only a few.
608 --enable-weak-symbols
609 If the --with-pthread option is set, check if the compiler supports
610 weak-symbols. If it does, then name the thread-capable library without
611 the "t" (libncurses rather than libncursest), and provide for
612 dynamically loading the pthreads entrypoints at runtime. This allows
613 one to reduce the number of library files for ncurses.
615 --enable-wgetch-events
616 Compile with experimental wgetch-events code. See ncurses/README.IZ
619 Compile with wide-character code. This makes a different version of
620 the libraries (e.g., libncursesw.so), which stores characters as
623 NOTE: applications compiled with this configuration are not compatible
624 with those built for 8-bit characters. You cannot simply make a
625 symbolic link to equate libncurses.so with libncursesw.so
627 NOTE: the Ada95 binding may be built against either version of the the
628 ncurses library, but you must decide which: the binding installs the
629 same set of files for either version. Currently (2002/6/22) it does
630 not use the extended features from the wide-character code, so it is
631 probably better to not install the binding for that configuration.
634 Compile-in support experimental xmc (magic cookie) code.
636 --with-abi-version=NUM
637 Override the ABI version, which is used in shared library filenames.
638 Normally this is the same as the release version; some ports have
639 special requirements for compatibility.
641 This option does not affect linking with libtool, which uses the
642 release major/minor numbers.
644 --with-ada-compiler=CMD
645 Specify the Ada95 compiler command (default "gnatmake")
647 --with-ada-include=DIR
648 Tell where to install the Ada includes (default:
649 PREFIX/lib/ada/adainclude)
651 --with-ada-objects=DIR
652 Tell where to install the Ada objects (default: PREFIX/lib/ada/adalib)
655 Build a shared library for Ada95 binding, if the compiler permits.
658 If --without-cxx is specified, override the type used for the "bool"
659 declared in curses.h (normally the type is automatically chosen to
660 correspond with that in <stdbool.h>, or defaults to platform-specific
664 If cross-compiling, specify a host C compiler, which is needed to
665 compile a few utilities which generate source modules for ncurses.
666 If you do not give this option, the configure script checks if the
667 $BUILD_CC variable is set, and otherwise defaults to gcc or cc.
669 --with-build-cflags=XXX
670 If cross-compiling, specify the host C compiler-flags. You might need
671 to do this if the target compiler has unusual flags which confuse the
674 You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_CFLAGS rather than
677 --with-build-cppflags=XXX
678 If cross-compiling, specify the host C preprocessor-flags. You might
679 need to do this if the target compiler has unusual flags which confuse
682 You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_CPPFLAGS rather than
685 --with-build-ldflags=XXX
686 If cross-compiling, specify the host linker-flags. You might need to
687 do this if the target linker has unusual flags which confuse the host
690 You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_LDFLAGS rather than
693 --with-build-libs=XXX
694 If cross-compiling, the host libraries. You might need to do this if
695 the target environment requires unusual libraries.
697 You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_LIBS rather than
701 Specify an alternate terminfo capabilities file, which makes the
702 configure script look for "include/Caps.XXX". A few systems, e.g.,
703 AIX 4.x use the same overall file-format as ncurses for terminfo
704 data, but use different alignments within the tables to support
705 legacy applications. For those systems, you can configure ncurses
706 to use a terminfo database which is compatible with the native
709 --with-ccharw-max=XXX
710 Override the size of the wide-character array in cchar_t structures.
711 Changing this will alter the binary interface. This defaults to 5.
714 Override type of chtype, which stores the video attributes and (if
715 --enable-widec is not given) a character. Prior to ncurses 5.5, this
716 was always unsigned long, but with ncurses 5.5, it may be unsigned.
717 Use this option if you need to preserve compatibility with 64-bit
721 Specify the terminfo source file to install. Usually you will wish
722 to install ncurses' default (misc/terminfo.src). Certain systems
723 have special requirements, e.g, OS/2 EMX has a customized terminfo
727 For testing, compile and link with Conor Cahill's dbmalloc library.
728 This also sets the --disable-leaks option.
731 Generate debug-libraries (default). These are named by adding "_g"
732 to the root, e.g., libncurses_g.a
734 --with-default-terminfo-dir=XXX
735 Specify the default terminfo database directory. This is normally
736 DATADIR/terminfo, e.g., /usr/share/terminfo.
739 For testing, compile and link with Gray Watson's dmalloc library.
740 This also sets the --disable-leaks option.
743 Specify a list of fallback terminal descriptions which will be
744 compiled into the ncurses library. See CONFIGURING FALLBACK ENTRIES.
747 use Alessandro Rubini's GPM library to provide mouse support on the
748 Linux console. Prior to ncurses 5.5, this introduced a dependency on
751 Currently ncurses uses the dlsym() function to bind to the library at
752 runtime, so it is only necessary that the library be present when
753 ncurses is built, to obtain the filename (or soname) used in the
754 corresponding dlopen() call. If you give a value for this option,
757 --with-gpm=$HOME/tmp/test-gpm.so
759 that overrides the configure check for the soname.
761 See also --without-dlsym
763 --with-hashed-db[=XXX]
764 Use a hashed database for storing terminfo data rather than storing
765 each compiled entry in a separate binary file within a directory
768 In particular, this uses the Berkeley database 1.8.5 interface, as
769 provided by that and its successors db 2, 3, and 4. The actual
770 interface is slightly different in the successor versions of the
771 Berkeley database. The database should have been configured using
772 "--enable-compat185".
774 If you use this option for configuring ncurses, tic will only be able
775 to write entries in the hashed database. infocmp can still read
776 entries from a directory tree as well as reading entries from the
777 hashed database. To do this, infocmp determines whether the $TERMINFO
778 variable points to a directory or a file, and reads the directory-tree
779 or hashed database respectively.
781 You cannot have a directory containing both hashed-database and
782 filesystem-based terminfo entries.
784 Use the parameter value to give the install-prefix used for the
786 --with-hashed-db=/usr/local/BigBase
787 to find the corresponding include- and lib-directories under the
790 See also the --enable-getcap option.
792 --with-install-prefix=XXX
793 Allows you to specify an alternate location for installing ncurses
794 after building it. The value you specify is prepended to the "real"
795 install location. This simplifies making binary packages. The
796 makefile variable DESTDIR is set by this option. It is also possible
798 make install DESTDIR=XXX
799 since the makefiles pass that variable to subordinate makes.
801 NOTE: a few systems build shared libraries with fixed pathnames; this
802 option probably will not work for those configurations.
805 Generate libraries with libtool. If this option is selected, then it
806 overrides all other library model specifications. Note that libtool
807 must already be installed, uses makefile rules dependent on GNU make,
808 and does not promise to follow the version numbering convention of
809 other shared libraries on your system. However, if the --with-shared
810 option does not succeed, you may get better results with this option.
812 If a parameter value is given, it must be the full pathname of the
813 particular version of libtool, e.g.,
814 /usr/bin/libtool-1.2.3
816 It is possible to rebuild the configure script to use the automake
817 macros for libtool, e.g., AC_PROG_LIBTOOL. See the comments in
818 aclocal.m4 for CF_PROG_LIBTOOL, and ensure that you build configure
819 using the appropriate patch for autoconf from
820 http://invisible-island.net/autoconf/
822 --with-manpage-aliases
823 Tell the configure script you wish to create entries in the
824 man-directory for aliases to manpages which list them, e.g., the
825 functions in the panel manpage. This is the default. You can disable
826 it if your man program does this. You can also disable
827 --with-manpage-symlinks to install files containing a ".so" command
828 rather than symbolic links.
830 --with-manpage-format=XXX
831 Tell the configure script how you would like to install man-pages. The
832 option value must be one of these: gzip, compress, BSDI, normal,
833 formatted. If you do not give this option, the configure script
834 attempts to determine which is the case.
836 --with-manpage-renames=XXX
837 Tell the configure script that you wish to rename the manpages while
838 installing. Currently the only distribution which does this is Debian.
839 The option value specifies the name of a file that lists the renamed
840 files, e.g., $srcdir/man/man_db.renames
842 --with-manpage-symlinks
843 Tell the configure script that you wish to make symbolic links in the
844 man-directory for aliases to the man-pages. This is the default, but
845 can be disabled for systems that provide this automatically. Doing
846 this on systems that do not support symbolic links will result in
847 copying the man-page for each alias.
850 Tell the configure script that you with to preprocess the manpages
851 by running them through tbl to generate tables understandable by
855 Override type of mmask_t, which stores the mouse mask. Prior to
856 ncurses 5.5, this was always unsigned long, but with ncurses 5.5, it
857 may be unsigned. Use this option if you need to preserve compatibility
858 with 64-bit executables.
861 Generate normal (i.e., static) libraries (default).
863 Note: on Linux, the configure script will attempt to use the GPM
864 library via the dlsym() function call. Use --without-dlsym to disable
865 this feature, or --without-gpm, depending on whether you wish to use
869 Override type of ospeed variable, which is part of the termcap
870 compatibility interface. In termcap, this is a 'short', which works
871 for a wide range of baudrates because ospeed is not the actual speed
872 but the encoded value, e.g., B9600 would be a small number such as 13.
873 However the encoding scheme originally allowed for values "only" up to
874 38400bd. A newer set of definitions past 38400bd is not encoded as
875 compactly, and is not guaranteed to fit into a short (see the function
876 cfgetospeed(), which returns a speed_t for this reason). In practice,
877 applications that required knowledge of the ospeed variable, i.e.,
878 those using termcap, do not use the higher speeds. Your application
879 (or system, in general) may or may not.
881 --with-pkg-config=[DIR]
882 Check for pkg-config, optionally specifying its path.
885 Generate profile-libraries These are named by adding "_p" to the root,
889 Link with POSIX threads, set --enable-reentrant. The use_window() and
890 use_screen() functions will use mutex's, allowing rudimentary support
891 for multithreaded applications.
894 Compile-in RCS identifiers. Most of the C files have an identifier.
896 --with-rel-version=NUM
897 Override the release version, which may be used in shared library
898 filenames. This consists of a major and minor version number separated
899 by ".". Normally the major version number is the same as the ABI
900 version; some ports have special requirements for compatibility.
903 Generate shared-libraries. The names given depend on the system for
904 which you are building, typically using a ".so" suffix, along with
905 symbolic links that refer to the release version.
907 NOTE: Unless you override the configure script by setting the $CFLAGS
908 environment variable, these will not be built with the -g debugging
911 NOTE: For some configurations, e.g., installing a new version of
912 ncurses shared libraries on a machine which already has ncurses
913 shared libraries, you may encounter problems with the linker.
914 For example, it may prevent you from running the build tree's
915 copy of tic (for installing the terminfo database) because it
916 loads the system's copy of the ncurses shared libraries. In that
917 case, using the misc/shlib script may be helpful, since it sets
918 $LD_LIBRARY_PATH to point to the build tree, e.g.,
919 ./misc/shlib make install
921 --with-shlib-version=XXX
922 Specify whether to use the release or ABI version for shared libraries.
923 This is normally chosen automatically based on the type of system
924 which you are building on. We use it for testing the configure script.
927 use FreeBSD sysmouse interface provide mouse support on the console.
929 --with-system-type=XXX
930 For testing, override the derived host system-type which is used to
931 decide things such as the linker commands used to build shared
932 libraries. This is normally chosen automatically based on the type of
933 system which you are building on. We use it for testing the configure
936 --with-terminfo-dirs=XXX
937 Specify a search-list of terminfo directories which will be compiled
938 into the ncurses library (default: DATADIR/terminfo)
941 When building the ncurses library, organize this as two parts: the
942 curses library (libncurses) and the low-level terminfo library
943 (libtinfo). This is done to accommodate applications that use only
944 the latter. The terminfo library is about half the size of the total.
946 If an option value is given, that overrides the name of the terminfo
947 library. For instance, if the wide-character version is built, the
948 terminfo library would be named libtinfow. But the libtinfow interface
949 is upward compatible from libtinfo, so it would be possible to overlay
950 libtinfo.so with a "wide" version of libtinfow.so by renaming it with
954 Specify a search-list of termcap files which will be compiled into the
955 ncurses library (default: /etc/termcap:/usr/share/misc/termcap)
958 When building the ncurses library, build a separate library for
959 the modules that are used only by the utility programs. Normally
960 those would be bundled with the termlib or ncurses libraries.
962 If an option value is given, that overrides the name of the tic
963 library. As in termlib, there is no ABI difference between the
964 "wide" libticw.so and libtic.so
966 NOTE: Overriding the name of the tic library may be useful if you are
967 also using the --with-termlib option to rename libtinfo. If you are
968 not doing that, renaming the tic library can result in conflicting
969 library dependencies for tic and other programs built with the tic
973 Configure the trace() function as part of the all models of the ncurses
974 library. Normally it is part of the debug (libncurses_g) library only.
977 For testing, compile with debug option.
978 This also sets the --disable-leaks option.
980 --with-wrap-prefix=XXX
981 When using the --enable-reentrant option, ncurses redefines variables
982 that would be global in curses, e.g., LINES, as a macro that calls a
983 "wrapping" function which fetches the data from the current SCREEN
984 structure. Normally that function is named by prepending "_nc_" to the
985 variable's name. The function is technically private (since portable
986 applications would not refer directly to it). But according to one
987 line of reasoning, it is not the same type of "private" as functions
988 which applications should not call even via a macro. This configure
989 option lets you choose the prefix for these wrapped variables.
992 Suppress the configure script's check for Ada95, do not build the
993 Ada95 binding and related demo.
996 Don't install the ncurses header with the name "curses.h". Rather,
997 install as "ncurses.h" and modify the installed headers and manpages
1001 XSI curses declares "bool" as part of the interface. C++ also declares
1002 "bool". Neither specifies the size and type of booleans, but both
1003 insist on the same name. We chose to accommodate this by making the
1004 configure script check for the size and type (e.g., unsigned or signed)
1005 that your C++ compiler uses for booleans. If you do not wish to use
1006 ncurses with C++, use this option to tell the configure script to not
1007 adjust ncurses bool to match C++.
1009 --without-cxx-binding
1010 Suppress the configure script's check for C++, do not build the
1011 C++ binding and related demo.
1014 Disable development options. This does not include those that change
1015 the interface, such as --enable-widec.
1018 Do not use dlsym() to load GPM dynamically.
1021 Tell the configure script to suppress the install of ncurses' manpages.
1024 Tell the configure script to suppress the build of ncurses' application
1025 programs (e.g., tic). The test applications will still be built if you
1026 type "make", though not if you simply do "make install".
1029 Tell the configure script to suppress the build of ncurses' test
1033 Tell the configure script to use "xterm-old" for the entry used in
1034 the terminfo database. This will work with variations such as
1035 X11R5 and X11R6 xterm.
1038 COMPATIBILITY WITH OLDER VERSIONS OF NCURSES:
1039 --------------------------------------------
1041 Because ncurses implements the X/Open Curses Specification, its interface
1042 is fairly stable. That does not mean the interface does not change.
1043 Changes are made to the documented interfaces when we find differences
1044 between ncurses and X/Open or implementations which they certify (such as
1045 Solaris). We add extensions to those interfaces to solve problems not
1046 addressed by the original curses design, but those must not conflict with
1047 the X/Open documentation.
1049 Here are some of the major interface changes, and related problems which
1050 you may encounter when building a system with different versions of
1053 5.7 (November 2, 2008)
1056 + generate linkable stubs for some macros:
1059 + Add new library configuration for tic-library (the non-curses portion
1060 of the ncurses library used for the tic program as well as some
1061 others such as tack. There is no API change, but makefiles would be
1062 changed to use the tic-library built separately.
1064 tack, distributed separately from ncurses, uses some of the internal
1065 _nc_XXX functions, which are declared in the tic.h header file.
1067 The reason for providing this separate library is that none of the
1068 functions in it are suitable for threaded applications.
1070 + Add new library configuration (ncursest, ncurseswt) which provides
1071 rudimentary support for POSIX threads. This introduces opaque
1072 access functions to the WINDOW structure and adds a parameter to
1073 several internal functions.
1075 + move most internal variables (except tic-library) into data blocks
1076 _nc_globals and _nc_prescreen to simplify analysis. Those were
1077 globally accessible, but since they were not part of the documented
1078 API, there is no ABI change.
1080 + changed static tables of strings to be indices into long strings, to
1081 improve startup performance. This changes parameter lists for some
1082 of the internal functions.
1086 + add NCURSES_OPAQUE definition in curses.h to control whether internal
1087 details of the WINDOW structure are visible to an application. This
1088 is always defined when the threaded library is built, and is optional
1089 otherwise. New functions for this: is_cleared, is_idcok, is_idlok,
1090 is_immedok, is_keypad, is_leaveok, is_nodelay, is_notimeout,
1091 is_scrollok, is_syncok, wgetparent and wgetscrreg.
1093 + the threaded library (ncursest) also disallows direct updating of
1094 global curses-level variables, providing functions (via macros) for
1095 obtaining their value. A few of those variables can be modified by
1096 the application, using new functions: set_escdelay, set_tabsize
1098 + added functions use_window() and use_screen() which wrap a mutex
1099 (if threading is configured) around a call to a user-supplied
1102 Added internal functions:
1113 These are used for leak-testing, and are stubs for
1114 ABI compatibility when ncurses is not configured for that
1115 using the --disable-leaks configure script option:
1120 Removed internal functions:
1123 Modified internal functions:
1129 _nc_locale_breaks_acs
1131 _nc_update_screensize
1133 Use new typedef TRIES to replace "struct tries":
1141 5.6 (December 17, 2006)
1144 + generate linkable stubs for some macros:
1146 getbegx, getbegy, getcurx, getcury, getmaxx, getmaxy, getparx,
1149 and (for libncursesw)
1157 Added internal functions:
1171 Also (if using the hashed database configuration):
1186 Removed internal functions:
1189 Modified internal functions:
1196 5.5 (October 10, 2005)
1199 + terminfo installs "xterm-new" as "xterm" entry rather than
1200 "xterm-old" (aka xterm-r6).
1202 + terminfo data is installed using the tic -x option (few systems
1203 still use ncurses 4.2).
1205 + modify C++ binding to work with newer C++ compilers by providing
1206 initializers and using modern casts. Old-style header names are
1207 still used in this release to allow compiling with not-so-old
1210 + form and menu libraries now work with wide-character data.
1211 Applications which bypassed the form library and manipulated the
1212 FIELD.buf data directly will not work properly with libformw, since
1213 that no longer points to an array of char. The set_field_buffer()
1214 and field_buffer() functions translate to/from the actual field
1217 + change SP->_current_attr to a pointer, adjust ifdef's to ensure that
1218 libtinfo.so and libtinfow.so have the same ABI. The reason for this
1219 is that the corresponding data which belongs to the upper-level
1220 ncurses library has a different size in each model.
1222 + winnstr() now returns multibyte character strings for the
1223 wide-character configuration.
1225 + assume_default_colors() no longer requires that use_default_colors()
1228 + data_ahead() now works with wide-characters.
1230 + slk_set() and slk_wset() now accept and store multibyte or
1231 multicolumn characters.
1233 + start_color() now returns OK if colors have already been started.
1234 start_color() also returns ERR if it cannot allocate memory.
1236 + pair_content() now returns -1 for consistency with init_pair() if it
1237 corresponds to the default-color.
1239 + unctrl() now returns null if its parameter does not correspond
1240 to an unsigned char.
1243 Experimental mouse version 2 supports wheel mice with buttons
1244 4 and 5. This requires ABI 6 because it modifies the encoding
1247 Experimental extended colors allows encoding of 256 foreground
1248 and background colors, e.g., with the xterm-256color or
1249 xterm-88color terminfo entries. This requires ABI 6 because
1250 it changes the size of cchar_t.
1252 Added internal functions:
1256 _nc_retrace_cvoid_ptr
1257 _nc_retrace_void_ptr
1260 Removed internal functions:
1263 Modified internal functions:
1268 5.4 (February 8, 2004)
1271 + add the remaining functions for X/Open curses wide-character support.
1272 These are only available if the library is configured using the
1273 --enable-widec option.
1277 + write getyx() and related 2-return macros in terms of getcury(),
1280 + simplify ifdef for bool declaration in curses.h
1282 + modify ifdef's in curses.h that disabled use of __attribute__() for
1283 g++, since recent versions implement the cases which ncurses uses.
1285 + change some interfaces to use const:
1297 Added internal functions:
1300 _nc_is_charable() wide
1301 _nc_locale_breaks_acs()
1304 _nc_to_widechar() wide
1306 _nc_trace_bufcat() debug
1307 _nc_unicode_locale()
1309 Removed internal functions:
1313 Modified internal functions:
1315 _nc_retrace_chtype()
1317 5.3 (October 12, 2002)
1320 + change type for bool used in headers to NCURSES_BOOL, which usually
1321 is the same as the compiler's definition for 'bool'.
1323 + add all but two functions for X/Open curses wide-character support.
1324 These are only available if the library is configured using the
1325 --enable-widec option. Missing functions are
1329 + add environment variable $NCURSES_ASSUMED_COLORS to modify the
1330 assume_default_colors() extension.
1336 Added internal functions:
1337 _nc_altcharset_name() debug
1339 _nc_retrace_bool() debug
1340 _nc_retrace_unsigned() debug
1342 _nc_trace_ttymode() debug
1347 Removed internal functions:
1350 Modified internal functions:
1353 5.2 (October 21, 2000)
1356 + revert termcap ospeed variable to 'short' (see discussion of the
1357 --with-ospeed configure option).
1362 + made the extended terminal capabilities
1363 (configure --enable-tcap-names) a standard feature. This should
1364 be transparent to applications that do not require it.
1366 + removed the trace() function and related trace support from the
1369 + modified curses.h.in, undef'ing some symbols to avoid conflict
1372 Added extensions: assume_default_colors().
1374 5.0 (October 23, 1999)
1377 + implemented the wcolor_set() and slk_color() functions.
1379 + move macro winch to a function, to hide details of struct ldat
1381 + corrected prototypes for slk_* functions, using chtype rather than
1384 + the slk_attr_{set,off,on} functions need an additional void*
1385 parameter according to XSI.
1387 + modified several prototypes to correspond with 1997 version of X/Open
1388 Curses: [w]attr_get(), [w]attr_set(), border_set() have different
1389 parameters. Some functions were renamed or misspelled:
1390 erase_wchar(), in_wchntr(), mvin_wchntr(). Some developers have used
1393 Added extensions: keybound(), curses_version().
1395 Terminfo database changes:
1397 + change translation for termcap 'rs' to terminfo 'rs2', which is
1398 the documented equivalent, rather than 'rs1'.
1400 The problems are subtler in recent releases.
1402 a) This release provides users with the ability to define their own
1403 terminal capability extensions, like termcap. To accomplish this,
1404 we redesigned the TERMTYPE struct (in term.h). Very few
1405 applications use this struct. They must be recompiled to work with
1408 a) If you use the extended terminfo names (i.e., you used configure
1409 --enable-tcap-names), the resulting terminfo database can have some
1410 entries which are not readable by older versions of ncurses. This
1411 is a bug in the older versions:
1413 + the terminfo database stores booleans, numbers and strings in
1414 arrays. The capabilities that are listed in the arrays are
1415 specified by X/Open. ncurses recognizes a number of obsolete and
1416 extended names which are stored past the end of the specified
1419 + a change to read_entry.c in 951001 made the library do an lseek()
1420 call incorrectly skipping data which is already read from the
1421 string array. This happens when the number of strings in the
1422 terminfo data file is greater than STRCOUNT, the number of
1423 specified and obsolete or extended strings.
1425 + as part of alignment with the X/Open final specification, in the
1426 990109 patch we added two new terminfo capabilities:
1427 set_a_attributes and set_pglen_inch). This makes the indices for
1428 the obsolete and extended capabilities shift up by 2.
1430 + the last two capabilities in the obsolete/extended list are memu
1431 and meml, which are found in most terminfo descriptions for xterm.
1433 When trying to read this terminfo entry, the spurious lseek()
1434 causes the library to attempt to read the final portion of the
1435 terminfo data (the text of the string capabilities) 4 characters
1436 past its starting point, and reads 4 characters too few. The
1437 library rejects the data, and applications are unable to
1438 initialize that terminal type.
1440 FIX: remove memu and meml from the xterm description. They are
1441 obsolete, not used by ncurses. (It appears that the feature was
1442 added to xterm to make it more like hpterm).
1444 This is not a problem if you do not use the -x option of tic to
1445 create a terminfo database with extended names. Note that the
1446 user-defined terminal capabilities are not affected by this bug,
1447 since they are stored in a table after the older terminfo data ends,
1448 and are invisible to the older libraries.
1450 c) Some developers did not wish to use the C++ binding, and used the
1451 configure --without-cxx option. This causes problems if someone
1452 uses the ncurses library from C++ because that configure test
1453 determines the type for C++'s bool and makes ncurses match it, since
1454 both C++ and curses are specified to declare bool. Calling ncurses
1455 functions with the incorrect type for bool will cause execution
1456 errors. In 5.0 we added a configure option "--without-cxx-binding"
1457 which controls whether the binding itself is built and installed.
1462 + correct prototype for termattrs() as per XPG4 version 2.
1464 + add placeholder prototypes for color_set(), erasewchar(),
1465 term_attrs(), wcolor_set() as per XPG4 version 2.
1467 + add macros getcur[xy] getbeg[xy] getpar[xy], which are defined in
1470 New extensions: keyok() and define_key().
1472 Terminfo database changes:
1474 + corrected definition in curses.h for ACS_LANTERN, which was 'I'
1479 We added these extensions: use_default_colors(). Also added
1480 configure option --enable-const, to support the use of const where
1481 X/Open should have, but did not, specify.
1483 The terminfo database content changed the representation of color for
1484 most entries that use ANSI colors. SVr4 curses treats the setaf/setab
1485 and setf/setb capabilities differently, interchanging the red/blue
1486 colors in the latter.
1488 4.0 (December 24, 1996)
1490 We bumped to version 4.0 because the newly released Linux dynamic
1491 loader (ld.so.1.8.5) did not load shared libraries whose ABI and REL
1492 versions were inconsistent. At that point, ncurses ABI was 3.4 and the
1493 REL was 1.9.9g, so we made them consistent.
1495 1.9.9g (December 1, 1996)
1497 This fixed most of the problems with 1.9.9e, and made these interface
1500 + remove tparam(), which had been provided for compatibility with
1501 some termcap. tparm() is standard, and does not conflict with
1502 application's fallback for missing tparam().
1504 + turn off hardware echo in initscr(). This changes the sense of the
1505 echo() function, which was initialized to echoing rather than
1506 nonechoing (the latter is specified). There were several other
1507 corrections to the terminal I/O settings which cause applications to
1510 + implemented several functions (such as attr_on()) which were
1511 available only as macros.
1513 + corrected several typos in curses.h.in (i.e., the mvXXXX macros).
1515 + corrected prototypes for delay_output(),
1516 has_color, immedok() and idcok().
1518 + corrected misspelled getbkgd(). Some applications used the
1521 + added _yoffset to WINDOW. The size of WINDOW does not impact
1522 applications, since they use only pointers to WINDOW structs.
1524 These changes were made to the terminfo database:
1526 + removed boolean 'getm' which was available as an extended name.
1528 We added these extensions: wresize(), resizeterm(), has_key() and
1531 1.9.9e (March 24, 1996)
1533 not recommended (a last-minute/untested change left the forms and
1534 menus libraries unusable since they do not repaint the screen).
1535 Foreground/background colors are combined incorrectly, working properly
1536 only on a black background. When this was released, the X/Open
1537 specification was available only in draft form.
1539 Some applications (such as lxdialog) were "fixed" to work with the
1540 incorrect color scheme.
1543 IF YOU ARE A SYSTEM INTEGRATOR:
1544 ------------------------------
1546 Configuration and Installation:
1548 On platforms where ncurses is assumed to be installed in /usr/lib,
1549 the configure script uses "/usr" as a default:
1551 GNU/Linux, FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, Cygwin
1553 For other platforms, the default is "/usr/local". See the discussion
1554 of the "--disable-overwrite" option.
1556 The location of the terminfo is set indirectly by the "--datadir"
1557 configure option, e.g., /usr/share/terminfo, given a datadir of
1558 /usr/share. You may want to override this if you are installing
1559 ncurses libraries in nonstandard locations, but wish to share the
1562 Normally the ncurses library is configured in a pure-terminfo mode;
1563 that is, with the --disable-termcap option. This makes the ncurses
1564 library smaller and faster. The ncurses library includes a termcap
1565 emulation that queries the terminfo database, so even applications that
1566 use raw termcap to query terminal characteristics will win (providing
1567 you recompile and relink them!).
1569 If you must configure with termcap fallback enabled, you may also wish
1570 to use the --enable-getcap option. This speeds up termcap-based
1571 startups, at the expense of not allowing personal termcap entries to
1572 reference the terminfo tree. See comments in
1573 ncurses/tinfo/read_termcap.c for further details.
1575 Note that if you have $TERMCAP set, ncurses will use that value
1576 to locate termcap data. In particular, running from xterm will
1577 set $TERMCAP to the contents of the xterm's termcap entry.
1578 If ncurses sees that, it will not examine /etc/termcap.
1582 The terminfo file assumes that Shift-Tab generates \E[Z (the ECMA-48
1583 reverse-tabulation sequence) rather than ^I. Here are the loadkeys -d
1584 mappings that will set this up:
1586 keycode 15 = Tab Tab
1587 alt keycode 15 = Meta_Tab
1588 shift keycode 15 = F26
1589 string F26 ="\033[Z"
1591 Naming the Console Terminal
1593 In various systems there has been a practice of designating the system
1594 console driver type as `console'. Please do not do this! It
1595 complicates peoples' lives, because it can mean that several different
1596 terminfo entries from different operating systems all logically want to
1597 be called `console'.
1599 Please pick a name unique to your console driver and set that up
1600 in the /etc/inittab table or local equivalent. Send the entry to the
1601 terminfo maintainer (listed in the misc/terminfo file) to be included
1602 in the terminfo file, if it's not already there. See the
1603 term(7) manual page included with this distribution for more on
1604 conventions for choosing type names.
1606 Here are some recommended primary console names:
1608 linux -- Linux console driver
1613 If you are responsible for integrating ncurses for one of these
1614 distributions, please either use the recommended name or get back
1615 to us explaining why you don't want to, so we can work out nomenclature
1616 that will make users' lives easier rather than harder.
1619 RECENT XTERM VERSIONS:
1620 ---------------------
1622 The terminfo database file included with this distribution assumes you
1623 are running a modern xterm based on XFree86 (i.e., xterm-new). The
1624 earlier X11R6 entry (xterm-r6) and X11R5 entry (xterm-r5) is provided
1625 as well. See the --without-xterm-new configure script option if you
1626 are unable to update your system.
1629 CONFIGURING FALLBACK ENTRIES:
1630 ----------------------------
1632 In order to support operation of ncurses programs before the terminfo
1633 tree is accessible (that is, in single-user mode or at OS installation
1634 time) the ncurses library can be compiled to include an array of
1635 pre-fetched fallback entries. This must be done on a machine which
1636 has ncurses' infocmp and terminfo database installed (as well as
1637 ncurses' tic and infocmp programs).
1639 These entries are checked by setupterm() only when the conventional
1640 fetches from the terminfo tree and the termcap fallback (if configured)
1641 have been tried and failed. Thus, the presence of a fallback will not
1642 shadow modifications to the on-disk entry for the same type, when that
1643 entry is accessible.
1645 By default, there are no entries on the fallback list. After you have
1646 built the ncurses suite for the first time, you can change the list
1647 (the process needs infocmp(1)). To do so, use the script
1648 ncurses/tinfo/MKfallback.sh. A configure script option
1649 --with-fallbacks does this (it accepts a comma-separated list of the
1650 names you wish, and does not require a rebuild).
1652 If you wanted (say) to have linux, vt100, and xterm fallbacks, you
1653 would use the commands
1656 tinfo/MKfallback.sh linux vt100 xterm >fallback.c
1658 Then just rebuild and reinstall the library as you would normally.
1659 You can restore the default empty fallback list with
1661 tinfo/MKfallback.sh >fallback.c
1663 The overhead for an empty fallback list is one trivial stub function.
1664 Any non-empty fallback list is const-ed and therefore lives in sharable
1665 text space. You can look at the comment trailing each initializer in
1666 the generated ncurses/fallback.c file to see the core cost of the
1667 fallbacks. A good rule of thumb for modern vt100-like entries is that
1668 each one will cost about 2.5K of text space.
1671 BSD CONVERSION NOTES:
1672 --------------------
1674 If you need to support really ancient BSD programs, you probably
1675 want to configure with the --enable-bsdpad option. What this does
1676 is enable code in tputs() that recognizes a numeric prefix on a
1677 capability as a request for that much trailing padding in milliseconds.
1678 There are old BSD programs that do things like tputs("50").
1680 (If you are distributing ncurses as a support-library component of
1681 an application you probably want to put the remainder of this section
1682 in the package README file.)
1684 The following note applies only if you have configured ncurses with
1687 ------------------------------- CUT HERE --------------------------------
1689 If you are installing this application privately (either because you
1690 have no root access or want to experiment with it before doing a root
1691 installation), there are a couple of details you need to be aware of.
1692 They have to do with the ncurses library, which uses terminfo rather
1693 than termcap for describing terminal characteristics.
1695 Though the ncurses library is terminfo-based, it will interpret your
1696 TERMCAP variable (if present), any local termcap files you reference
1697 through it, and the system termcap file. However, in order to avoid
1698 slowing down your application startup, it will only do this once per
1701 The first time you load a given terminal type from your termcap
1702 database, the library initialization code will automatically write it
1703 in terminfo format to a subdirectory under $HOME/.terminfo. After
1704 that, the initialization code will find it there and do a (much
1705 faster) terminfo fetch.
1707 Usually, all this means is that your home directory will silently grow
1708 an invisible .terminfo subdirectory which will get filled in with
1709 terminfo descriptions of terminal types as you invoke them. If anyone
1710 ever installs a global terminfo tree on your system, this will quietly
1711 stop happening and your $HOME/.terminfo will become redundant.
1713 The objective of all this logic is to make converting from BSD termcap
1714 as painless as possible without slowing down your application (termcap
1715 compilation is expensive).
1717 If you don't have a TERMCAP variable or custom personal termcap file,
1718 you can skip the rest of this dissertation.
1720 If you *do* have a TERMCAP variable and/or a custom personal termcap file
1721 that defines a terminal type, that definition will stop being visible
1722 to this application after the first time you run it, because it will
1723 instead see the terminfo entry that it wrote to $HOME/terminfo the
1726 Subsequently, editing the TERMCAP variable or personal TERMCAP file
1727 will have no effect unless you explicitly remove the terminfo entry
1728 under $HOME/terminfo. If you do that, the entry will be recompiled
1729 from your termcap resources the next time it is invoked.
1731 To avoid these complications, use infocmp(1) and tic(1) to edit the
1732 terminfo directory directly.
1734 ------------------------------- CUT HERE --------------------------------
1736 USING NCURSES WITH AFS:
1737 AFS treats each directory as a separate logical filesystem, you
1738 can't hard-link across them. The --enable-symlinks option copes
1739 with this by making tic use symbolic links.
1741 USING NCURSES WITH GPM:
1742 Ncurses 4.1 and up can be configured to use GPM (General Purpose Mouse)
1743 which is used with Linux console. Be aware that GPM is commonly
1744 installed as a shared library which contains a wrapper for the curses
1745 wgetch() function (libcurses.o). Some integrators have simplified
1746 linking applications by combining all or part of libcurses.so into the
1747 libgpm.so file, producing symbol conflicts with ncurses (specifically
1748 the wgetch function). This was originally the BSD curses, but
1749 generally whatever curses library exists on the system.
1751 You may be able to work around this problem by linking as follows:
1753 cc -o foo foo.o -lncurses -lgpm -lncurses
1755 but the linker may not cooperate, producing mysterious errors.
1756 See the FAQ, as well as the discussion under the --with-gpm option:
1758 http://invisible-island.net/ncurses/ncurses.faq.html#using_gpm_lib
1760 BUILDING NCURSES WITH A CROSS-COMPILER
1761 Ncurses can be built with a cross-compiler. Some parts must be built
1762 with the host's compiler since they are used for building programs
1763 (e.g., ncurses/make_hash and ncurses/make_keys) that generate tables
1764 that are compiled into the ncurses library. The essential thing to do
1765 is set the BUILD_CC environment variable to your host's compiler, and
1766 run the configure script configuring for the cross-compiler.
1768 The configure options --with-build-cc, etc., are provided to make this
1769 simpler. Since make_hash and make_keys use only ANSI C features, it
1770 is normally not necessary to provide the other options such as
1771 --with-build-libs, but they are provided for completeness.
1773 Note that all of the generated source-files which are part of ncurses
1774 will be made if you use
1778 This would be useful in porting to an environment which has little
1779 support for the tools used to generate the sources, e.g., sed, awk and
1782 When ncurses has been successfully cross-compiled, you may want to use
1783 "make install" (with a suitable target directory) to construct an
1784 install tree. Note that in this case (as with the --with-fallbacks
1785 option), ncurses uses the development platform's tic to do the
1786 "make install.data" portion.
1788 The system's tic program is used to install the terminal database,
1789 even for cross-compiles. For best results, the tic program should
1790 be from the most current version of ncurses.
1793 Send any feedback to the ncurses mailing list at
1794 bug-ncurses@gnu.org. To subscribe send mail to
1795 bug-ncurses-request@gnu.org with body that reads:
1796 subscribe ncurses <your-email-address-here>
1798 The Hacker's Guide in the doc directory includes some guidelines
1799 on how to report bugs in ways that will get them fixed most quickly.