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<H3><A NAME="xterm">Using NCURSES under XTERM</A></H3>
-A resize operation in X sends SIGWINCH to the application running under xterm.
-The <CODE>ncurses</CODE> library provides an experimental signal
-handler, but in general does not catch this signal, because it cannot
-know how you want the screen re-painted. You will usually have to write the
-SIGWINCH handler yourself. Ncurses can give you some help. <P>
+A resize operation in X sends <CODE>SIGWINCH</CODE> to the application running
+under xterm.
-The easiest way to code your SIGWINCH handler is to have it do an
-<CODE>endwin</CODE>, followed by an <CODE>refresh</CODE> and a screen repaint you code
-yourself. The <CODE>refresh</CODE> will pick up the new screen size from the
+The easiest way to handle <CODE>SIGWINCH</CODE>
+is to do an <CODE>endwin</CODE>,
+followed by an <CODE>refresh</CODE> and a screen repaint you code
+yourself.
+The <CODE>refresh</CODE> will pick up the new screen size from the
xterm's environment. <P>
That is the standard way, of course (it even works with some vendor's curses
are limited to the new screen dimensions, and pads <CODE>stdscr</CODE>
with blanks if the screen is larger. <P>
-Finally, ncurses can be configured to provide its own SIGWINCH handler,
-based on <CODE>resizeterm</CODE>.
+The <CODE>ncurses</CODE> library provides a SIGWINCH signal handler,
+which pushes a <CODE>KEY_RESIZE</CODE> via the wgetch() calls.
+When <CODE>ncurses</CODE> returns that code,
+it calls <code>resizeterm</CODE>
+to update the size of the standard screen's window, repainting that
+(filling with blanks or truncating as needed).
+It also resizes other windows,
+but its effect may be less satisfactory because it cannot
+know how you want the screen re-painted.
+You will usually have to write special-purpose code to handle
+<CODE>KEY_RESIZE</CODE> yourself.
<H3><A NAME="screens">Handling Multiple Terminal Screens</A></H3>
projects / ncurses.git / blobdiff