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30 .\" $Id: curs_printw.3x,v 1.53 2024/04/20 19:18:18 tom Exp $
31 .TH curs_printw 3X 2024-04-20 "ncurses @NCURSES_MAJOR@.@NCURSES_MINOR@" "Library calls"
54 write formatted output to a \fIcurses\fR window
57 \fB#include <curses.h>
59 \fBint printw(const char *\fIfmt\fP, ...);
60 \fBint wprintw(WINDOW *\fIwin\fP, const char *\fIfmt\fP, ...);
61 \fBint mvprintw(int \fIy\fP, int \fIx\fP, const char *\fIfmt\fP, ...);
62 \fBint mvwprintw(WINDOW *\fIwin\fP, int \fIy\fP, int \fIx\fP, const char *\fIfmt\fP, ...);
64 \fBint vw_printw(WINDOW *\fIwin\fP, const char *\fIfmt\fP, va_list \fIvarglist\fP);
67 \fBint vwprintw(WINDOW *\fIwin\fP, const char *\fIfmt\fP, va_list \fIvarglist\fP);
75 are analogous to \fI\%printf\fP(3).
77 the string that would be output by \fI\%printf\fP(3) is instead output
78 as though \fB\%waddstr\fP(3X) were used with
82 as its first argument.
86 \fB\%vw_printw\fP are analogous to \fI\%vprintf\fP(3),
87 and perform a \fB\%wprintw\fP using a variable argument list.
88 The third argument is a \fI\%va_list\fP,
89 a pointer to a list of arguments,
90 as defined in \fI\%stdarg.h\fP.
92 These functions return
100 failure occurs if the library cannot allocate enough memory for the
101 buffer into which the output is formatted,
102 or if the window pointer
106 Functions prefixed with \*(``mv\*('' first perform cursor movement and
110 is outside the window boundaries.
112 No wide character counterpart functions are defined by the
115 configuration nor by any standard.
116 To format and write a wide-character string to a
119 consider using \fI\%swprintf\fP(3) and \fB\%waddwstr\fP(3X) or similar.
122 Issue 4 describes these functions.
123 It specifies no error conditions for them.
126 defines \fB\%vw_printw\fP and \fB\%vwprintw\fP identically to support
129 the latter is obsolete.
132 Issue 4 Version 2 (1996),
133 marked \fB\%vwprintw\fP as requiring \fI\%varargs.h\fP and
134 \*(``TO BE WITHDRAWN\*('',
135 and specified \fB\%vw_printw\fP using the \fI\%stdarg.h\fP interface.
137 X/Open Curses, Issue 5, Draft 2
138 (December 2007) marked \fBvwprintw\fP (along with
139 \fBvwscanw\fP and the \fItermcap\fP interface) as withdrawn.
140 After incorporating review comments,
142 X/Open Curses, Issue 7 (2009).
145 provides \fB\%vwprintw\fP,
146 but marks it as deprecated.
148 While \fB\%printw\fP was implemented in 4BSD
150 .\" https://minnie.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/utree.pl?file=4BSD/usr/src/lib/\
151 .\" libcurses/printw.c
152 it was unused until 4.2BSD
154 which employed it for games.
155 That early version of
157 preceded the ANSI C standard of 1989.
158 It did not use \fI\%varargs.h\fP,
159 though that had been available since Seventh Edition Unix (1979).
160 .\" https://minnie.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/utree.pl?file=V7/usr/include/\
163 (a couple of years after SVr4 was generally available,
164 and after the C standard was published),
165 other developers updated the library,
166 using \fI\%stdarg.h\fP internally in 4.4BSD
168 Even with this improvement,
171 did not use function prototypes
172 (nor even declare functions)
173 in \fI\%curses.h\fP until 1992.
175 SVr2 (1984) documented \fB\%printw\fP and \fB\%wprintw\fP tersely as
176 \*(``printf on \fB\%stdscr\fP\*('' and
177 \*(``printf on \fIwin\fP\*('',
180 SVr3 (1987) added \fB\%mvprintw\fP and \fB\%mvwprintw\fP,
181 with a three-line summary asserting that they were analogous to
183 explaining that the string that \fI\%printf\fP(3) would write to the
184 standard output stream would instead be output using \fB\%waddstr\fP to
186 SVr3 also implemented \fB\%vwprintw\fP,
187 describing its third parameter as a \fI\%va_list\fP,
188 defined in \fI\%varargs.h\fP,
189 and referred the reader to the manual pages for \fI\%varargs\fP and
190 \fI\%vprintf\fP for detailed descriptions.
192 SVr4 (1989) introduced no new variations of \fI\%printw\fP,
193 but provided for using either \fI\%varargs.h\fP or \fI\%stdarg.h\fP to
194 define the \fI\%va_list\fP type.
195 .\" either header declares "va_list", but only one can be used
197 X/Open Curses, Issue 4 (1995),
198 defined \fB\%vw_printw\fP to replace \fB\%vwprintw\fP,
199 stating that its \fI\%va_list\fP type is defined in \fI\%stdarg.h\fP.
202 \fB\%curs_addstr\fP(3X),
203 \fB\%curs_scanw\fP(3X),