- Announcing ncurses 5.5
+ Announcing ncurses 6.3
+
+Overview
The ncurses (new curses) library is a free software emulation of
- curses in System V Release 4.0, and more. It uses terminfo format,
- supports pads and color and multiple highlights and forms characters
- and function-key mapping, and has all the other SYSV-curses
- enhancements over BSD curses.
+ curses in System V Release 4.0 (SVr4), and more. It uses terminfo
+ format, supports pads and color and multiple highlights and forms
+ characters and function-key mapping, and has all the other SVr4-curses
+ enhancements over BSD curses. SVr4 curses became the basis of X/Open
+ Curses.
In mid-June 1995, the maintainer of 4.4BSD curses declared that he
- considered 4.4BSD curses obsolete, and encouraged the keepers of Unix
+ considered 4.4BSD curses obsolete, and encouraged the keepers of unix
releases such as BSD/OS, FreeBSD and NetBSD to switch over to ncurses.
- The ncurses code was developed under GNU/Linux. It has been in use for
- some time with OpenBSD as the system curses library, and on FreeBSD
- and NetBSD as an external package. It should port easily to any
- ANSI/POSIX-conforming UNIX. It has even been ported to OS/2 Warp!
+ Since 1995, ncurses has been ported to many systems:
+ * It is used in almost every system based on the Linux kernel (aside
+ from some embedded applications).
+ * It is used as the system curses library on OpenBSD, FreeBSD and
+ MacOS.
+ * It is used in environments such as Cygwin and MinGW. The first of
+ these was EMX on OS/2 Warp.
+ * It is used (though usually not as the system curses) on all of the
+ vendor unix systems, e.g., AIX, HP-UX, IRIX64, SCO, Solaris,
+ Tru64.
+ * It should work readily on any ANSI/POSIX-conforming unix.
The distribution includes the library and support utilities, including
- a terminfo compiler tic(1), a decompiler infocmp(1), clear(1),
- tput(1), tset(1), and a termcap conversion tool captoinfo(1). Full
- manual pages are provided for the library and tools.
-
- The ncurses distribution is available via anonymous FTP at the GNU
- distribution site [1]ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/ncurses/ .
- It is also available at [2]ftp://invisible-island.net/ncurses/ .
-
- Release Notes
-
- This release is designed to be upward compatible from ncurses 5.0
- through 5.4; very few applications will require recompilation,
- depending on the platform. These are the highlights from the
- change-log since ncurses 5.4 release.
-
- Interface changes:
- * terminfo installs "xterm-new" as "xterm" entry rather than
- "xterm-old" (aka xterm-r6).
- * terminfo data is installed using the tic -x option (few systems
- still use ncurses 4.2).
- * modify C++ binding to work with newer C++ compilers by providing
- initializers and using modern casts. Old-style header names are
- still used in this release to allow compiling with not-so-old
- compilers.
- * modify parameter type in c++ binding for insch() and mvwinsch() to
- be consistent with underlying ncurses library (was char, is
- chtype).
- * change NCursesWindow::err_handler() to a virtual function.
- * form and menu libraries now work with wide-character data.
- Applications which bypassed the form library and manipulated the
- FIELD.buf data directly will not work properly with libformw,
- since that no longer points to an array of char. The
- set_field_buffer() and field_buffer() functions translate to/from
- the actual field data.
- * add symbol to curses.h which can be used to suppress include of
- stdbool.h, e.g.,
- #define NCURSES_ENABLE_STDBOOL_H 0
- #include <curses.h>
-
- * change SP->_current_attr to a pointer, adjust ifdef's to ensure
- that libtinfo.so and libtinfow.so have the same ABI. The reason
- for this is that the corresponding data which belongs to the
- upper-level ncurses library has a different size in each model.
- * winnstr() now returns multibyte character strings for the
- wide-character configuration.
- * assume_default_colors() no longer requires that
- use_default_colors() be called first.
- * data_ahead() now works with wide-characters.
- * slk_set() and slk_wset() now accept and store multibyte or
- multicolumn characters.
- * start_color() now returns OK if colors have already been started.
- start_color() also returns ERR if it cannot allocate memory.
- * pair_content() now returns -1 for consistency with init_pair() if
- it corresponds to the default-color.
- * unctrl() now returns null if its parameter does not correspond to
- an unsigned char.
-
- New features and improvements:
- * library
- + environment variable NCURSES_NO_UTF8_ACS supports
- miscellaneous terminal emulators which ignore alternate
- character set escape sequences when in UTF-8 mode.
- + modify initialization of key lookup table so that if an
- extended capability (tic -x) string is defined, and its name
- begins with 'k', ncurses will automatically treat it as a
- key.
- + change GPM initialization, using dl library to load it
- dynamically at runtime.
- + form, menu and panel libraries support debug-tracing.
- * add NCURSES-Programming-HOWTO.html by Pradeep Padala (see
- http://tldp.org/HOWTO/NCURSES-Programming-HOWTO/).
- * programs:
- * infocmp:
- + The -i option now matches 8-bit controls against its table
- entries, e.g., so it can analyze the xterm-8bit entry.
- + add "-x" option to infocmp like tic's "-x", for use in "-F"
- comparisons. This modifies infocmp to only report extended
- capabilities if the -x option is given, making this more
- consistent with tic. Some scripts may break, since infocmp
- previous gave this information without an option.
- * tic:
- + modify termcap-parsing to retain 2-character aliases at the
- beginning of an entry if the "-x" option is used in tic.
- + filter out long extended names when translating to termcap
- format. Only two characters are permissible for termcap
- capability names.
- + correct translation of "%%" in terminfo format to termcap,
- e.g., using "tic -C".
- + modify the "-c -v" options to ignore delays when comparing
- strings. Also modify it to ignore a canceled sgr string,
- e.g., for terminals which cannot properly combine attributes
- in one control sequence.
- + add a check for improperly ended strings, i.e., where a
- following line begins in column 1.
- + add a check in tic for terminfo entries having an sgr0 but no
- sgr string. This confuses Tru64 and HPUX curses when combined
- with color, e.g., making them leave line-drawing characters
- in odd places.
- + add check (with debug configuration) that provides about the
- runtime changes that would be made to sgr0 for termcap
- applications.
- * tset:
- + add -c and -w options to allow user to suppress ncurses'
- resizing of the terminal emulator window in the special case
- where it is not able to detect the true size.
-
- Major bug fixes:
- * improve logic in tgetent() which adjusts the termcap "me" string
- to work with ISO-2022 string used in xterm-new. This is a feature
- that was incompletely implemented in ncurses 5.3. ncurses attempts
- to provide termcap clients with the portion of the sgr0 (termcap
- "me") string that does not reset line-drawing.
- * cells in the WINDOW which are continuations of a multicolumn
- character are encoded differently, making repainting more
- reliable.
- * amend change to setupterm() in ncurses 5.4 (20030405) which would
- reuse the value of cur_term if the same output was selected. This
- now reuses it only when setupterm() is called from tgetent(),
- which has no notion of separate SCREENs. Note that tgetent() must
- be called after initscr() or newterm() to use this feature.
- * make setcchar() now works when its wchar_t* parameter is pointing
- to a string which contains more data than can be converted.
- * win_wchnstr() now works for more than one cell.
- * resizeterm() now processes all levels of window hierarchy.
- * disable GPM mouse support when $TERM happens to be prefixed with
- "xterm". Gpm_Open() would otherwise assert that it can deal with
- mouse events in this case.
- * add SP->_screen_acs_map[], used to ensure that mapping of missing
- line-drawing characters is handled properly. For example,
- ACS_DARROW is absent from xterm-new, and it was coincidentally
- displayed the same as ACS_BTEE.
-
- Portability:
- * configure script:
- + new options:
-
- --enable-largefile
- set compiler and linker flags to use largefile
- support.
-
- --enable-ext-colors
- Allow encoding of 256 foreground and background
- colors, e.g., with the xterm-256color or
- xterm-88color terminfo entries. This requires ABI 6
- because it changes the size of cchar_t.
-
- --enable-ext-mouse
- This defines NCURSES_MOUSE_VERSION 2, and modifies
- the encoding of mouse events to support wheel mice,
- which may transmit buttons 4 and 5. This works with
- xterm and similar terminal emulators. This requires
- ABI 6 because it changes the encoding of mouse
- events.
-
- --with-chtype
- overriding of the non-LP64 model's use of chtype
-
- --with-mmask-t
- overriding of the non-LP64 model's use of mmask_t
-
- --without-xterm-new
- Installs "xterm-old" as the "xterm" entry of the
- terminfo database.
-
- + The --with-termlib option now accepts a value which sets the
- name of the terminfo library. This would allow a packager to
- build libtinfow.so renamed to coincide with libtinfo.so
- + fixes/improvements for cross-compiling:
- o suppress $suffix in misc/run_tic.sh when
- cross-compiling. This allows cross-compiles to use the
- host's tic program to handle the "make install.data"
- step.
- o correct BUILD_CPPFLAGS substitution in
- ncurses/Makefile.in, to allow cross-compiling from a
- separate directory tree.
- * library:
- + add ifdef's for _LP64 in curses.h to avoid using wasteful
- 64-bits for chtype and mmask_t, but add configure option
- --disable-lp64 in case anyone used that configuration.
- + modify C++ binding to use some C internal functions to make
- it compile properly on Solaris (and other platforms).
- + remove check in newwin() that prevents allocating windows
- that extend beyond the screen (Solaris does this).
- + check for nl_langinfo(CODESET), use it if available. This
- replaces ad hoc tests of environment variables to check if
- the terminal is setup for UTF-8 encoding. Applications which
- do not call setlocale() should be corrected, to make them
- work properly with UTF-8 encoding.
- In particular, applications which assume (and do not call
- setlocale()) that Latin-1 codes are printable will no longer
- work in a UTF-8 locale since the ad hoc check of environment
- variables to see if the locale was UTF-8 is not used when
- nl_langinfo(CODESET) is available.
- + use setlocale() to query the program's current locale rather
- than using getenv(). This supports applications which rely
- upon legacy treatment of 8-bit characters when the locale is
- not initialized.
-
- Features of Ncurses
-
- The ncurses package is fully compatible with SVr4 (System V Release 4)
- curses:
- * All 257 of the SVr4 calls have been implemented (and are
- documented).
- * Full support for SVr4 curses features including keyboard mapping,
- color, forms-drawing with ACS characters, and automatic
- recognition of keypad and function keys.
- * An emulation of the SVr4 panels library, supporting a stack of
- windows with backing store, is included.
- * An emulation of the SVr4 menus library, supporting a uniform but
- flexible interface for menu programming, is included.
- * An emulation of the SVr4 form library, supporting data collection
- through on-screen forms, is included.
- * Binary terminfo entries generated by the ncurses tic(1)
- implementation are bit-for-bit-compatible with the entry format
- SVr4 curses uses.
- * The utilities have options to allow you to filter terminfo entries
- for use with less capable curses/terminfo versions such as the
- HP/UX and AIX ports.
+ * captoinfo, a termcap conversion tool
+ * clear, utility for clearing the screen
+ * infocmp, the terminfo decompiler
+ * tabs, set tabs on a terminal
+ * tic, the terminfo compiler
+ * toe, list (table of) terminfo entries
+ * tput, utility for retrieving terminal capabilities in shell
+ scripts
+ * tset, to initialize the terminal
+
+ Full manual pages are provided for the library and tools.
+
+ The ncurses distribution is available at ncurses' homepage:
+
+ ftp://ftp.invisible-island.net/ncurses/ or
+ https://invisible-mirror.net/archives/ncurses/ .
+
+ It is also available via anonymous FTP at the GNU distribution site
+
+ ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/ncurses/ .
+
+Release Notes
+
+ These notes are for ncurses 6.3, released October 21, 2021.
+
+ This release is designed to be source-compatible with ncurses 5.0
+ through 6.2; providing extensions to the application binary interface
+ (ABI). Although the source can still be configured to support the
+ ncurses 5 ABI, the reason for the release is to reflect improvements
+ to the ncurses 6 ABI and the supporting utility programs.
+
+ There are, of course, numerous other improvements, listed in this
+ announcement.
+
+ The most important bug-fixes/improvements dealt with portability
+ issues. The release notes also mention some other bug-fixes, but are
+ focused on new features and improvements to existing features since
+ ncurses 6.2 release.
+
+ Library improvements
+
+ New features
+
+ There are a few new features:
+ * A new (experimental) driver, for the Windows Terminal
+ configuration is provided.
+ * A script is provided which enables OpenBSD users to upgrade their
+ system to use ncurses 6.3 (OpenBSD developers are also invited to
+ do this).
+
+ Additionally, to improve performance other changes (and extensions)
+ are provided in this release:
+ * modify lib_mouse.c to check for out-of-range button numbers,
+ convert those to position reports.
+ * add sp-funcs for erasewchar, killwchar.
+
+ Other improvements
+
+ These are revised features:
+ * modify wgetnstr, wgetn_wstr to improve compatibility with SVr4
+ curses in its treatment of interrupt and quit characters
+
+ These were done to limit or ultimately deprecate features:
+ * mark wgetch-events feature as deprecated.
+ + prevent KEY_EVENT from appearing in curses.h unless the
+ configure option --enable-wgetch-events is used.
+ + modify MKkey_defs.sh to hide ncurses' definition of
+ KEY_EVENTS to reduce Visual Studio C++ redefinition warnings.
+ * reduce build-warnings by excluding ncurses-internals from
+ deprecation warnings.
+
+ These are improvements to existing features:
+ * drop symbols GCC_PRINTF and GCC_SCANF from <curses.h>, to simplify
+ use.
+ * apply gcc format attribute to prototypes which use a va_list
+ parameter rather than a "..." variable-length parameter list.
+ * modify <term.h> so that it is not necessary to include <curses.h>
+ before <term.h>.
+ * provide for wide-characters as background character in wbkgrnd
+ * improve parameter-checking for tparm, adding function _nc_tiparm()
+ to handle the most-used case, which accepts only numeric
+ parameters.
+ * use return-value from vsnprintf to reallocate as needed to allow
+ for buffers larger than the screen size.
+ * add another fflush(stdout) in _nc_flush to handle time-delays in
+ the middle of strings such as flash when the application uses
+ low-level calls rather than curses.
+
+ These are corrections to existing features:
+ * add a check to guard against repeat_char emitting digits which
+ could be interpreted as BSD-style padding when --enable-bsdpad is
+ configured.
+ * check for screen size-change in scr_init and scr_restore, in case
+ a screen dump does not match the current screen dimensions
+
+ Program improvements
+
+ Several improvements were made to the utility programs:
+
+ tabs
+
+ + implement "+m" option
+
+ tic
+
+ + add check for duplicate "use=" clauses.
+ + add check to report instances where tparm would detect an
+ error in an expression.
+ + add user-defined capabilities from mintty to Caps-ncurses,
+ for checking consistency.
+ + improve warning when oc/op do not mention SGR 39/49 for xterm
+ compatible XT flag.
+ + improve checks for number of parameters of smglp, smgrp,
+ smgtp, and smgbp.
+ + improve "-c" option to validate the number and type of
+ parameters and compare against expected number/type before
+ deciding which set of parameter-lists to use in tparm calls.
+ + improve check for errors detected in tparm.
+ + improve format of output, to ensure that the messages contain
+ only printable text.
+ + modify to eliminate unnecessary "\" to escape ":" in terminfo
+ format.
+ + remove check that assumes that none or both parameterized and
+ non-parameterized margin-setting capabilities are present.
+
+ toe
+
+ + modify output of "toe -as" to show first description found
+ rather than the last.
+ + add a check to ensure that a "termcap file" is text rather
+ than binary.
+
+ tput
+
+ + modify to allow multiple commands per line.
+ + improve parameter-checking by analyzing all extended string
+ capabilities, e.g., as used in the Cs and Ms capabilities of
+ the tmux description.
+ + make warning messages consistently using alias names when
+ those are used, rather than the underlying program's name.
+ + improve usage message for aliases such as clear, by
+ eliminating tput-specific portions.
+ + modify initialization to avoid opening /dev/tty for cases
+ other than reset/init, e.g., for clear.
+
+ Examples
+
+ Along with the library and utilities, improvements were made to the
+ ncurses-examples. Most of this activity aimed at improving the
+ test-packages. A few changes are more generally useful, e.g., for the
+ main ncurses test-program, and for analyzing traces using the
+ tracemunch script:
+ * add "-r" option to the dots test-programs, to help with scripting
+ a performance comparison.
+ * build-fix for test_opaque, for configurations without opaque
+ curses structs, e.g., ncurses 5.7.
+ * improve tracemunch logic for "RUN" compaction.
+ * improve tracemunch's coverage of form/menu/panel libraries.
+ * improve tracemunch's checking/reporting the type for the first
+ parameter, e.g., "WINDOW*" rather than "#1".
+ * modify tracemunch and the panel library to show readable traces
+ for panel- and user-pointers.
+
+ There are other new demo/test programs and reusable examples:
+
+ back_ground
+ to exercise the wide-character background functions.
+
+ move_field
+ to demonstrate move_field, and a stub for a corresponding demo
+ of dup_field.
+
+ test_tparm
+ for checking tparm changes.
+
+ Terminal database
+
+ There are several new terminal descriptions:
+
+ absolute, att610+cvis, foot, foot-direct, hp98550-color,
+ hpterm-color2, hterm, hterm-256color, linux-s, putty+keypad,
+ putty+screen, putty-screen, screen.linux-s, scrt/securecrt,
+ tmux-direct, vt220+cvis, vt220+cvis8, vt220+pcedit, vt220+vtedit,
+ vt220-base, vt52+keypad, xterm+256color2, xterm+88color2,
+ xterm-direct16, xterm-direct256, xterm+nofkeys, and
+ xterm+nopcfkeys.
+
+ There are many changes to existing terminal descriptions. Some were
+ updates to several descriptions:
+ * correct use-ordering in some xterm-direct flavors
+ * fix some sgr inconsistencies in d230c, ibm6153, ibm6154,
+ ncrvt100an
+ * improve vt50h and vt52 based on DECScope manual
+ * use hp+arrows in a few places
+ * use hp+pfk-cr in a few places
+ * use vt220+cvis in st, terminology, termite since they ignore
+ blinking-cursor detail in att610+cvis
+
+ while others affected specific descriptions. These were retested, to
+ take into account changes by their developers:
+
+ kitty+common, mlterm3, ms-terminal
+
+ while these are specific fixes based on reviewing documentation, user
+ reports, or warnings from tic:
+
+ aaa+dec, aaa+rv
+ correct rmacs/smacs
+
+ aaa+rv
+ correct sgr
+
+ icl6404
+ correct csr
+
+ kitty
+ use att610+cvis, xterm+tmux and ansi+enq
+
+ konsole-base
+ re-enable "bel"
+
+ linux2.6
+ fix pound-sign mapping in acsc
+
+ linux3.0
+ modify to reflect default mapping of shift-tab by kbd 1.14
+
+ pccons
+ fill in some missing pieces, to make it comparable to the vt220
+ entry
+
+ putty
+ use vt100+fnkeys, add rep
+
+ screen
+ use vt100+enq
+
+ terminator
+ corrected tsl capability
+
+ ti916
+ correct cup
+
+ tmux
+ change kbs to ^?
+
+ vt220
+ use vt220+cvis
+
+ vt420+lrmm
+ add smglp and smgrp
+
+ vt420
+ use vt420+lrmm
+
+ xterm-new
+ add nel
+
+ xterm-vt52
+ use vt52+keypad
+
+ A few entries use extensions (user-defined terminal capabilities):
+ * add shifted Linux console keys in linux+sfkeys entry for
+ screen.linux
+ * add Smulx to alacritty
+ * add kbeg to xterm+keypad to accommodate termcap applications
+ * add extensions in xterm+tmux and ecma+strikeout to ms-terminal,
+ but cancel the non-working Cr and Ms capabilities
+
+ Documentation
+
+ As usual, this release
+ * improves documentation by describing new features,
+ * attempts to improve the description of features which users have
+ found confusing
+ * fills in overlooked descriptions of features which were described
+ in the NEWS file but treated sketchily in manual pages.
+
+ In addition to providing background information to explain these
+ features and show how they evolved, there are corrections,
+ clarifications, etc.:
+ * Corrections:
+ + make opts extension for getcchar work as documented for
+ ncurses 6.1, adding "-g" flag to demo_new_pair to illustrate.
+ + modify tset "-q" option to refrain from modifying terminal
+ modes, to match the documentation.
+ * New/improved history and portability sections:
+ + improve documentation for tparm and static/dynamic variables.
+ + add history note to curs_scanw.3x for <stdarg.h> and
+ <varargs.h>
+ + add history note to curs_printw.3x for <stdarg.h> and
+ <varargs.h>
+ + add portability note to ncurses.3x regarding <stdarg.h>
+ + add historical notes to tput, curses-terminfo and
+ curses-color manpages based on source-code for SVr2, SVr3 and
+ SVr4.
+ + improve history section for tset manpage based on the 1BSD
+ tarball, which preceded BSD's SCCS checkins by more than
+ three years.
+ * Other improvements:
+ + explain in ncurses.3x that functions in the tinfo library do
+ not rely upon wide-characters.
+ + improve manual page for panel library, extending the
+ portability section as well as documenting error-returns.
+ + add section on margins to terminfo.5, adapted from X/Open
+ Curses.
+ + improve man/term.5 section on legacy storage format.
+ + add a note in terminfo.5 explaining that no-parameter strings
+ such as sgr0 or cnorm should not be used with tparm.
+ + improve description of BSD-style padding in curs_termcap.3x
+ + improve discussion of padding versus tparm and tputs in
+ man/curs_terminfo.3x
+ + add a note in manual page to explain ungetch vs unget_wch.
+ + improve description of error-returns in waddch and waddnstr
+ manual pages.
+
+ There are no new manual pages (all of the manual page updates are to
+ existing pages).
+
+ Some of the improvements are more subtle, relating to the way the
+ information is presented. For instance, hyphenation is suppressed in
+ the HTML files generated from manual pages because an upgrade to groff
+ gave noticeably poorer results, interfering with the process of
+ creating links between the resulting webpages.
+
+ Interesting bug-fixes
+
+ While there were many bugs fixed during development of ncurses 6.3,
+ only a few (the reason for this release) were both important and
+ interesting. Most of the bug-fixes were for local issues which did not
+ affect compatibility across releases. Since those are detailed in the
+ NEWS file no elaboration is needed here.
+
+ The interesting bugs were:
+ * modify wbkgd and wbkgrnd to avoid storing a null in the background
+ character, because it may be used in cases where the corresponding
+ 0x80 is not treated as a null.
+ This was a regression introduced in ncurses 6.2 (reported on the
+ mailing list), for which the workaround was to specify a blank for
+ the background character.
+ * remove output-related checks for nl/nonl (also reported on the
+ mailing list).
+ * improve tparm implementation of %P and %g, more closely matching
+ SVr4 terminfo. Those denote static and dynamic variables in
+ terminfo expressions.
+ Exactly what those terms meant was never documented before in any
+ implementation of curses, aside from source code. Unlike the other
+ two fixes, the problem was discovered while studying OpenBSD's
+ version of tset.
+
+ Configuration changes
+
+ Major changes
+
+ There are no major changes. Several new options were added to ease
+ integration of packages with systems using different versions of GNAT
+ and ncurses. Also, improvements were made to configure checks.
+
+ Configuration options
+
+ There are a few new/modified configure options:
+
+ --enable-fvisibility
+ new configure option and check for gcc -fvisibility=hidden
+ feature
+
+ --enable-leaks
+ corrected to allow turning leak-checking off later in a set of
+ options.
+
+ --enable-stdnoreturn
+ new configure option makes the _Noreturn keyword optional to
+ ease transition.
+
+ --disable-pkg-ldflags
+ revised option also controls whether $LDFLAGS from the build is
+ provided in "-config" and ".pc" files.
+
+ --disable-root-access
+ add configure option which tells ncurses to disallow most
+ file-opens by setuid processes.
+
+ --disable-wattr-macros
+ changed default to help packagers who reuse wide ncursesw
+ header file with non-wide ncurses library.
+
+ --with-pkg-config-libdir
+ revised option uses the actual search path from pkg-config or
+ pkgconf using the output from --debug.
+
+ --with-ada-libname
+ --with-form-libname
+ --with-menu-libname
+ --with-panel-libname
+ new several --with-xxx-libname options, to help with pkgsrc
+
+ Portability
+
+ Many of the portability changes are implemented via the configure
+ script:
+ * add a special case in the configure script to work around one of
+ the build-time breakages reported for OpenBSD 6 here:
+
+ https://www.mail-archive.com/bugs@openbsd.org/msg13200.html
+ * modify configure check for libtool to prevent accidental use of an
+ OpenBSD program which uses the same name.
+ * modify configuration checks for build-time tic/infocmp to use
+ AC_CHECK_TOOL. That can still be overridden by --with-tic-path and
+ --with-infocmp-path when fallbacks are used, but even if not using
+ fallbacks, the improved check may help with cross-compiling.
+ * relax modification-time comparison in CF_LINK_FUNCS to allow it to
+ accept link() function with NFS filesystems which change the mtime
+ on the link target, e.g., several BSD systems.
+ * modify configure check for c89/c99 aliases of clang to use its
+ -std option instead, because some platforms, in particular macOS,
+ do not provide workable c89/c99 aliases.
+ * modify CF_NCURSES_CONFIG to work around Xcode's c99 "-W" option,
+ which conflicts with conventional use for passing linker options.
+ * modify configure scripts to filter out redefinitions of
+ _XOPEN_SOURCE, e.g., for NetBSD which generally supports 500, but
+ 600 is needed for ncursesw.
+
+ Here are some of the other portability fixes:
+ * change configure-check and source-code for gcc's noreturn
+ attribute to assume it is a prefix rather than suffix, matching
+ c11's _Noreturn convention.
+ * modify mk-1st.awk to account for extra-suffix configure option.
+ * build-fix for termsort module when configured with termcap.
+ * modify configure script and makefiles to support ".PHONY" make
+ program feature.
+ * amend libtool configuration to add dependency for install.tic,
+ etc., in ncurses/Makefile on the lower-level libraries.
+ * modify Ada95 source-generation utility to write to a file given as
+ parameter rather than to the standard output, allowing builds with
+ MinGW.
+ * amend tic/infocmp check to allow for the respective tool's
+ absence.
+ * build-fixes for gnat 10.1.1, whose gnatmake drops integration with
+ gprbuild.
+ * correct configure version-check/warning for g++ to allow for 10.x
+ _________________________________________________________________
+
+Features of ncurses
+
+ The ncurses package is fully upward-compatible with SVr4 (System V
+ Release 4) curses:
+ * All of the SVr4 calls have been implemented (and are documented).
+ * ncurses supports all of the for SVr4 curses features including
+ keyboard mapping, color, forms-drawing with ACS characters, and
+ automatic recognition of keypad and function keys.
+ * ncurses provides these SVr4 add-on libraries (not part of X/Open
+ Curses):
+ + the panels library, supporting a stack of windows with
+ backing store.
+ + the menus library, supporting a uniform but flexible
+ interface for menu programming.
+ + the form library, supporting data collection through
+ on-screen forms.
+ * ncurses's terminal database is fully compatible with that used by
+ SVr4 curses.
+ + ncurses supports user-defined capabilities which it can see,
+ but which are hidden from SVr4 curses applications using the
+ same terminal database.
+ + It can be optionally configured to match the format used in
+ related systems such as AIX and Tru64.
+ + Alternatively, ncurses can be configured to use hashed
+ databases rather than the directory of files used by SVr4
+ curses.
+ * The ncurses utilities have options to allow you to filter terminfo
+ entries for use with less capable curses/terminfo versions such as
+ the HP-UX and AIX ports.
The ncurses package also has many useful extensions over SVr4:
* The API is 8-bit clean and base-level conformant with the X/OPEN
curses specification, XSI curses (that is, it implements all BASE
- level features, but not all EXTENDED features). Most
- EXTENDED-level features not directly concerned with wide-character
- support are implemented, including many function calls not
- supported under SVr4 curses (but portability of all calls is
- documented so you can use the SVr4 subset only).
+ level features, and most EXTENDED features). It includes many
+ function calls not supported under SVr4 curses (but portability of
+ all calls is documented so you can use the SVr4 subset only).
* Unlike SVr3 curses, ncurses can write to the rightmost-bottommost
corner of the screen if your terminal has an insert-character
capability.
* Ada95 and C++ bindings.
- * Support for mouse event reporting with X Window xterm and OS/2
- console windows.
+ * Support for mouse event reporting with X Window xterm and FreeBSD
+ and OS/2 console windows.
* Extended mouse support via Alessandro Rubini's gpm package.
- * The function wresize() allows you to resize windows, preserving
+ * The function wresize allows you to resize windows, preserving
their data.
- * The function use_default_colors() allows you to use the terminal's
+ * The function use_default_colors allows you to use the terminal's
default colors for the default color pair, achieving the effect of
transparent colors.
- * The functions keyok() and define_key() allow you to better control
- the use of function keys, e.g., disabling the ncurses KEY_MOUSE,
- or by defining more than one control sequence to map to a given
- key code.
- * Support for 16-color terminals, such as aixterm and XFree86 xterm.
+ * The functions keyok and define_key allow you to better control the
+ use of function keys, e.g., disabling the ncurses KEY_MOUSE, or by
+ defining more than one control sequence to map to a given key
+ code.
+ * Support for direct-color terminals, such as modern xterm.
+ * Support for 256-color terminals, such as modern xterm.
+ * Support for 16-color terminals, such as aixterm and modern xterm.
* Better cursor-movement optimization. The package now features a
cursor-local-movement computation more efficient than either BSD's
or System V's.
incorporates a novel, simple, and cheap algorithm that enables it
to make optimal use of hardware scrolling, line-insertion, and
line-deletion for screen-line movements. This algorithm is more
- powerful than the 4.4BSD curses quickch() routine.
+ powerful than the 4.4BSD curses quickch routine.
* Real support for terminals with the magic-cookie glitch. The
screen-update code will refrain from drawing a highlight if the
magic- cookie unattributed spaces required just before the
types even when no terminfo tree or termcap file is accessible
(this may be useful for support of screen-oriented programs that
must run in single-user mode).
- * The tic(1)/captoinfo utility provided with ncurses has the ability
- to translate many termcaps from the XENIX, IBM and AT&T extension
+ * The tic/captoinfo utility provided with ncurses has the ability to
+ translate many termcaps from the XENIX, IBM and AT&T extension
sets.
- * A BSD-like tset(1) utility is provided.
+ * A BSD-like tset utility is provided.
* The ncurses library and utilities will automatically read terminfo
entries from $HOME/.terminfo if it exists, and compile to that
directory if it exists and the user has no write access to the
other entries in the same source file (as in System V) but also to
compiled entries in either the system terminfo directory or the
user's $HOME/.terminfo directory.
- * A script (capconvert) is provided to help BSD users transition
- from termcap to terminfo. It gathers the information in a TERMCAP
- environment variable and/or a ~/.termcap local entries file and
- converts it to an equivalent local terminfo tree under
- $HOME/.terminfo.
- * Automatic fallback to the /etc/termcap file can be compiled in
- when it is not possible to build a terminfo tree. This feature is
- neither fast nor cheap, you don't want to use it unless you have
- to, but it's there.
* The table-of-entries utility toe makes it easy for users to see
exactly what terminal types are available on the system.
* The library meets the XSI requirement that every macro entry point
- have a corresponding function which may be linked (and will be
+ has a corresponding function which may be linked (and will be
prototype-checked) if the macro definition is disabled with
#undef.
- * An HTML "Introduction to Programming with NCURSES" document
- provides a narrative introduction to the curses programming
- interface.
+ * Extensive documentation is provided (see the Additional Reading
+ section of the ncurses FAQ for online documentation).
+
+Applications using ncurses
- State of the Package
+ The ncurses distribution includes a selection of test programs
+ (including a few games). These are available separately as
+ ncurses-examples
- Numerous bugs present in earlier versions have been fixed; the library
- is far more reliable than it used to be. Bounds checking in many
- `dangerous' entry points has been improved. The code is now type-safe
- according to gcc -Wall. The library has been checked for malloc leaks
- and arena corruption by the Purify memory-allocation tester.
+ The ncurses library has been tested with a wide variety of
+ applications including:
- The ncurses code has been tested with a wide variety of applications
- including (versions starting with those noted):
+ aptitude
+ FrontEnd to Apt, the debian package manager
+
+ https://wiki.debian.org/Aptitude
cdk
Curses Development Kit
- [3]http://invisible-island.net/cdk/
- [4]http://www.vexus.ca/products/CDK/
+
+ https://invisible-island.net/cdk/
ded
directory-editor
- [5]http://invisible-island.net/ded/
+
+ https://invisible-island.net/ded/
dialog
the underlying application used in Slackware's setup, and the
- basis for similar applications on GNU/Linux.
- [6]http://invisible-island.net/dialog/
+ basis for similar install/configure applications on many
+ systems.
+
+ https://invisible-island.net/dialog/
lynx
- the character-screen WWW browser
- [7]http://lynx.isc.org/release/
+ the text WWW browser
- Midnight Commander
- file manager
- [8]http://www.ibiblio.org/mc/
+ https://lynx.invisible-island.net/
mutt
mail utility
- [9]http://www.mutt.org/
+
+ http://www.mutt.org/
ncftp
file-transfer utility
- [10]http://www.ncftp.com/
+
+ https://www.ncftp.com/
nvi
- New vi versions 1.50 are able to use ncurses versions 1.9.7 and
- later.
- [11]http://www.bostic.com/vi/
+ New vi uses ncurses.
+
+ https://sites.google.com/a/bostic.com/keithbostic/vi
- pinfo
- Lynx-like info browser.
- [12]http://dione.ids.pl/~pborys/software/pinfo/
+ ranger
+ A console file manager with VI key bindings in Python.
+
+ https://ranger.github.io/
tin
- newsreader, supporting color, MIME [13]http://www.tin.org/
+ newsreader, supporting color, MIME
+
+ http://www.tin.org/
+
+ vifm
+ File manager with vi like keybindings
- vh-1.6
- Volks-Hypertext browser for the Jargon File
- [14]http://www.debian.org/Packages/unstable/text/vh.html
+ https://vifm.info/
as well as some that use ncurses for the terminfo support alone:
minicom
- terminal emulator
- [15]http://www.netsonic.fi/~walker/minicom.html
+ terminal emulator for serial modem connections
+
+ https://alioth.debian.org/projects/minicom/
+
+ mosh
+ a replacement for ssh.
+
+ https://mosh.org/
+
+ tack
+ terminfo action checker
+
+ https://invisible-island.net/ncurses/tack.html
+
+ tmux
+ terminal multiplexor
+
+ https://github.com/tmux/tmux/wiki
vile
- vi-like-emacs
- [16]http://invisible-island.net/vile/
+ vi-like-emacs may be built to use the terminfo, termcap or
+ curses interfaces.
- The ncurses distribution includes a selection of test programs
- (including a few games).
+ https://invisible-island.net/vile/
+
+ and finally, those which use only the termcap interface:
+
+ emacs
+ text editor
+
+ https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/
+
+ less
+ The most commonly used pager (a program that displays text
+ files).
+
+ http://www.greenwoodsoftware.com/less/
+
+ screen
+ terminal multiplexor
+
+ https://www.gnu.org/software/screen/
+
+ vim
+ text editor
+
+ https://www.vim.org/
-Who's Who and What's What
+Development activities
- Zeyd Ben-Halim started it from a previous package pcurses, written by
- Pavel Curtis. Eric S. Raymond continued development. Jürgen Pfeifer
- wrote most of the form and menu libraries. Ongoing work is being done
- by [17]Thomas Dickey. Thomas Dickey acts as the maintainer for the
- Free Software Foundation, which holds the copyright on ncurses.
- Contact the current maintainers at [18]bug-ncurses@gnu.org.
+ Zeyd Ben-Halim started ncurses from a previous package pcurses,
+ written by Pavel Curtis. Eric S. Raymond continued development.
+ Juergen Pfeifer wrote most of the form and menu libraries.
- To join the ncurses mailing list, please write email to
- bug-ncurses-request@gnu.org containing the line:
- subscribe <name>@<host.domain>
+ Ongoing development work is done by Thomas E. Dickey. Thomas E. Dickey
+ has acted as the maintainer for the Free Software Foundation, which
+ held a copyright on ncurses for releases 4.2 through 6.1. Following
+ the release of ncurses 6.1, effective as of release 6.2, copyright for
+ ncurses reverted to Thomas E. Dickey (see the ncurses FAQ for
+ additional information).
+
+ Contact the current maintainers at
+
+ bug-ncurses@gnu.org
+
+ To join the ncurses mailing list, please write email to
+
+ bug-ncurses-request@gnu.org
+
+ containing the line:
+
+ subscribe <name>@<host.domain>
This list is open to anyone interested in helping with the development
and testing of this package.
- Beta versions of ncurses and patches to the current release are made
- available at [19]ftp://invisible-island.net/ncurses/ .
+ Beta versions of ncurses are made available at
+
+ ftp://ftp.invisible-island.net/ncurses/current/ and
+ https://invisible-mirror.net/archives/ncurses/current/ .
+
+ Patches to the current release are made available at
+
+ ftp://ftp.invisible-island.net/ncurses/6.2/ and
+ https://invisible-mirror.net/archives/ncurses/6.2/ .
+
+ There is an archive of the mailing list here:
-Future Plans
+ http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-ncurses (also https)
- * Extended-level XPG4 conformance, with internationalization
- support.
- * Ports to more systems, including DOS and Windows.
+Related resources
- We need people to help with these projects. If you are interested in
- working on them, please join the ncurses list.
+ The release notes make scattered references to these pages, which may
+ be interesting by themselves:
+ * ncurses licensing
+ * Symbol versioning in ncurses
+ * Comments on ncurses versus slang (S-Lang)
+ * Comments on OpenBSD
+ * tack - terminfo action checker
+ * tctest - termcap library checker
+ * Terminal Database
-Other Related Resources
+Other resources
The distribution provides a newer version of the terminfo-format
- terminal description file maintained by [20]Eric Raymond . Unlike the
+ terminal description file once maintained by Eric Raymond . Unlike the
older version, the termcap and terminfo data are provided in the same
- file.
+ file, which also provides several user-definable extensions beyond the
+ X/Open specification.
You can find lots of information on terminal-related topics not
- covered in the terminfo file at [21]Richard Shuford's archive .
-
-References
-
- 1. ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/ncurses/
- 2. ftp://invisible-island.net/ncurses/
- 3. http://invisible-island.net/cdk/
- 4. http://www.vexus.ca/products/CDK/
- 5. http://invisible-island.net/ded/
- 6. http://invisible-island.net/dialog/
- 7. http://lynx.isc.org/release/
- 8. http://www.ibiblio.org/mc/
- 9. http://www.mutt.org/
- 10. http://www.ncftp.com/
- 11. http://www.bostic.com/vi/
- 12. http://dione.ids.pl/~pborys/software/pinfo/
- 13. http://www.tin.org/
- 14. http://www.debian.org/Packages/unstable/text/vh.html
- 15. http://www.netsonic.fi/~walker/minicom.html
- 16. http://invisible-island.net/vile/
- 17. mailto:dickey@invisible-island.net
- 18. mailto:bug-ncurses@gnu.org
- 19. ftp://invisible-island.net/ncurses/
- 20. http://www.catb.org/~esr/terminfo/
- 21. http://www.cs.utk.edu/~shuford/terminal_index.html
+ covered in the terminfo file at Richard Shuford's archive . The
+ collection of computer manuals at bitsavers.org has also been useful.
+
+ * Overview
+ * Release Notes
+ + Library improvements
+ o New features
+ o Other improvements
+ + Program improvements
+ o Utilities
+ o Examples
+ + Terminal database
+ + Documentation
+ + Interesting bug-fixes
+ + Configuration changes
+ o Major changes
+ o Configuration options
+ + Portability
+ * Features of ncurses
+ * Applications using ncurses
+ * Development activities
+ * Related resources
+ * Other resources
projects / ncurses.git / blobdiff