-
Writing Programs with NCURSES
by Eric S. Raymond and Zeyd M. Ben-Halim
Eric S. Raymond <esr@snark.thyrsus.com> wrote many of the new features
in versions after 1.8.1 and wrote most of this introduction. Jürgen
Pfeifer wrote all of the menu and forms code as well as the Ada95
- binding. Ongoing work is being done by Thomas Dickey and Jürgen
- Pfeifer. Florian La Roche acts as the maintainer for the Free Software
- Foundation, which holds the copyright on ncurses. Contact the current
- maintainers at bug-ncurses@gnu.org.
+ binding. Ongoing work is being done by Thomas Dickey (maintainer).
+ Contact the current maintainers at bug-ncurses@gnu.org.
This document also describes the panels extension library, similarly
modeled on the SVr4 panels facility. This library allows you to
* xterm and similar programs such as rxvt.
* Linux console, when configured with gpm(1), Alessandro Rubini's
mouse server.
+ * FreeBSD sysmouse (console)
* OS/2 EMX
The mouse interface is very simple. To activate it, you use the
refresh() will clear the screen. If an error occurs a message
is written to standard error and the program exits. Otherwise
it returns a pointer to stdscr. A few functions may be called
- before initscr (slk_init(), filter(), ripofflines(), use_env(),
+ before initscr (slk_init(), filter(), ripoffline(), use_env(),
and, if you are using multiple terminals, newterm().)
endwin()
the terminal, as other routines merely manipulate data
structures. wrefresh() copies the named window to the physical
terminal screen, taking into account what is already there in
- order to do optimizations. refresh() does a refresh of
- stdscr(). Unless leaveok() has been enabled, the physical
- cursor of the terminal is left at the location of the window's
- cursor.
+ order to do optimizations. refresh() does a refresh of stdscr.
+ Unless leaveok() has been enabled, the physical cursor of the
+ terminal is left at the location of the window's cursor.
doupdate() and wnoutrefresh(win)
These two functions allow multiple updates with more efficiency
To understand why this is a problem, remember that screen updates are
calculated between two representations of the entire display. The
documentation says that when you refresh a window, it is first copied
- to to the virtual screen, and then changes are calculated to update
+ to the virtual screen, and then changes are calculated to update
the physical screen (and applied to the terminal). But "copied to" is
not very specific, and subtle differences in how copying works can
produce different behaviors in the case where two overlapping windows
The really clean way to handle this is to use the panels library. If,
when you want a screen update, you do update_panels(), it will do all
- the necessary wnoutrfresh() calls for whatever panel stacking order
+ the necessary wnoutrefresh() calls for whatever panel stacking order
you have defined. Then you can do one doupdate() and there will be a
single burst of physical I/O that will do all your updates.
1. Initialize curses.
2. Create the menu items, using new_item().
3. Create the menu using new_menu().
- 4. Post the menu using menu_post().
+ 4. Post the menu using post_menu().
5. Refresh the screen.
6. Process user requests via an input loop.
- 7. Unpost the menu using menu_unpost().
+ 7. Unpost the menu using unpost_menu().
8. Free the menu, using free_menu().
9. Free the items using free_item().
10. Terminate curses.
By default, both windows are stdscr. You can set them with the
functions in menu_win(3x).
- When you call menu_post(), you write the menu to its subwindow. When
- you call menu_unpost(), you erase the subwindow, However, neither of
+ When you call post_menu(), you write the menu to its subwindow. When
+ you call unpost_menu(), you erase the subwindow, However, neither of
these actually modifies the screen. To do that, call wrefresh() or
some equivalent.
1. Initialize curses.
2. Create the form fields, using new_field().
3. Create the form using new_form().
- 4. Post the form using form_post().
+ 4. Post the form using post_form().
5. Refresh the screen.
6. Process user requests via an input loop.
- 7. Unpost the form using form_unpost().
+ 7. Unpost the form using unpost_form().
8. Free the form, using free_form().
9. Free the fields using free_field().
10. Terminate curses.
the screen (the third and fourth arguments, which must be zero or
greater). Note that these coordinates are relative to the form
subwindow, which will coincide with stdscr by default but need not be
- stdscr if you've done an explicit set_form_window() call.
+ stdscr if you've done an explicit set_form_win() call.
The fifth argument allows you to specify a number of off-screen rows.
If this is zero, the entire field will always be displayed. If it is
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