In mid-June 1995, the maintainer of 4.4BSD curses declared that he -considered 4.4BSD curses obsolete, and is encouraging the keepers of -Unix releases such as BSD/OS, freeBSD and netBSD to switch over to +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 should port easily to -any ANSI/POSIX-conforming UNIX. It has even been ported to OS/2 Warp!
+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!
The distribution includes the library and support utilities, including a terminfo compiler tic(1), a decompiler infocmp(1), clear(1), tput(1), tset(1), @@ -32,333 +63,305 @@ the library and tools.
The ncurses distribution is available via anonymous FTP at
the GNU distribution site
-ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu/ncurses.
+ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/ncurses/ .
It is also available at
-ftp://dickey.his.com/ncurses.
+ftp://invisible-island.net/ncurses/ .
Interface changes:
ospeed variable back to
- short to match its use in legacy applications. It was
- altered after ncurses 4.2 to speed_t to repair a type
- mismatch which was introduced after 1.9.4 in 1995. The principal
- users of termcap continued to use short, which is
- not the same size.
-
- NOTE: A few applications will have to be recompiled
- (about 1% of the programs in a typical Linux distribution,
- 10% of the programs that use ncurses). These are easy to
- identify with nm or strings.
-
-
_nc_can_clear_with(), which
- was built with the configure --enable-expanded option but not used.
-
- chtype values in the debug library, and for better
- access and buffer limit checking.
+ tgoto() to make it better support existing
- termcap applications which use hardcoded strings rather than obtain
- all of their information from the termcap file. If the string does
- not appear to be a terminfo string (i.e., does not refer to a "%p"
- parameter, or terminfo-style padding), and termcap support is configured, tgoto()
- will interpret it as termcap. Otherwise, as before, it will use
- tparm().
-
- tgoto() changes work properly,
- added checks to tic which report capabilities that do
- not reference the expected number of parameters.
-
- --disable-root-environ adds runtime checks
- which tell ncurses to disregard $TERMINFO and similar environment
- variables if the current user is root, or running setuid/setgid.
-
- --disable-assumed-color allows you to use the
- pre-5.1 convention of default colors used for color-pair 0 to be
- configured (see assume_default_colors()).
+ use_legacy_coding() function to support
+ lynx's font-switching feature.
+
+ nofilter(), to cancel a prior
+ filter() call.
+
+ ncurses5-config or
+ ncursesw5-config, according to
+ configuration options.
+
+ NCURSES_NOMACROS which
+ suppresses most macro definitions from curses.h, i.e.,
+ where a macro is defined to override a function to improve
+ performance.
+
+ curses.h for the
+ extended colors so the header file can be used for the
+ normal curses library. The header file installed for
+ extended colors is a variation of the wide-character
+ configuration.
+
+ tgetstr() by making the return value
+ point into the user's buffer, if provided.
+
+ tparm() using either varargs (the existing
+ status), or using a fixed-parameter list (to match X/Open).
+
+ kmous a little to
+ allow for other
+ strings than "\E[M", e.g., for xterm-sco
+ functionality in xterm.
+
+ wgetnstr() to return
+ KEY_RESIZE if a sigwinch occurs.
+
+ _XOPEN_SOURCE_EXTENDED is defined
+ without ensuring that <wchar.h> is included.
+
+ --with-rpath option work except with
+ $(DESTDIR).
+
+ --enable-xmc-glitch.
+
+ NCURSES_NO_HARD_TABS and
+ NCURSES_NO_MAGIC_COOKIE environment variables
+ to allow runtime suppression of the related hard-tabs and
+ xmc-glitch features.
+ --program-prefix, including the
- manpage names and cross references.
+ --with-database allows you to specify a
- different terminfo source-file to install. On OS/2 EMX, the
- default is misc/emx.src, otherwise misc/terminfo.src
+ --with-default-terminfo-dir allows you to
- specify the default terminfo database directory.
+ cgetent()
+ functions, or as a text file if those are not available.
- --with-libtool allows you to build with
- libtool. NOTE: libtool
- uses a different notation for numbering shared library versions
- from the existing ncurses configuration.
+
-f option formatting.
- --with-manpage-tbl causes the manpages to be
- preprocessed by tbl(1) prior to installation,
+ toe -a option, to show all databases.
+ This uses new private interfaces in the ncurses library for
+ iterating through the list of databases.
- --without-curses-h causes the installation
- process to install curses.h as ncurses.h and make appropriate
- changes to headers and manpages.
+ MKfallback.sh to use
+ tic -x when constructing fallback tables to
+ allow extended capabilities to be retrieved from a fallback entry.
--install-prefix configure
- option from INSTALL_PREFIX to DESTDIR
- (the latter has become common usage although the name is
- misleading).
-
- ld -rpath options (e.g., Linux, and Solaris)
- to use an absolute pathname for the build tree's lib directory,
- avoiding confusion with directories relative to the current one
- with the installed programs.
-
- misc/run_tic.in to use
- tic -o, to eliminate dependency on
- $TERMINFO variable for installs.
+ --with-bool option for the
+ case where --without-cxx is used.
- ESCDELAY
+ from initscr() down to newterm() so the
+ environment variable affects timeouts for terminals opened with
+ newterm() as well.
- werase to clear multicolumn characters that
+ extend into a derived window.
- wchgat() to mark updated cells as changed so a
+ refresh will repaint those cells.
- screen's terminfo entry
- since otherwise the FreeBSD port makes it pass termcap equivalents
- to tgoto, which would be misinterpreted by older
- versions of ncurses.
- wadd_wch() and
+ wecho_wch(), which did not guard against passing the
+ multi-column attribute into a call on waddch(), e.g.,
+ using data returned by win_wch()
- curses_version() string to
- report the version of ncurses with which they are compiled rather
- than the NCURSES_VERSION string. The function returns the patch
- level in addition to the major and minor version numbers.
+ stdscr using
+ wredrawln() by touching the corresponding rows in
+ curscr.
- tput program so it can be renamed or invoked via a link as
- 'reset' or 'init', producing the same effect as tput reset or tput init.
+ tgetent() by
+ remembering the last TERMINAL* value allocated to hold
+ the corresponding data and freeing that if the
+ tgetent() result buffer is the same as the previous
+ call.
- read_termtype() so the term_names
+ data is always allocated as part of the str_table, a
+ better fix for a memory leak.
- no_color_video with a logic expression which is faster.
- wins_nwstr(), which did not handle single-column
+ non-8bit codes.
+
+ wbkgrnd() to avoid clearing the
+ A_CHARTEXT attribute bits since those record the state
+ of multicolumn characters.
+
+ SIGWINCH handling by postponing its effect
+ during newterm(), etc., when allocating screens.
+
+ mvwin().
+ waddchnstr() and
+ wadd_wchnstr() to stop copying when a null character
+ is found.
+
+ manlinks.sed script introduced in ncurses 5.1
- to avoid using ERE "\+", which is not understood by standard versions
- of sed. This happens to work with GNU sed,
- but is not portable, and was the initial motivation for this release.
-
- tparm() to disallow arithmetic on strings,
- analyze the varargs list to read strings as strings and numbers as
- numbers.
-
- tparm()'s internal function
- spop() to treat a null pointer as an empty string.
-
- parse_format() in lib_tparm.c to ignore
- precision if it is longer than 10000.
-
- _nc_safe_strcat(), etc. Made other related changes to
- check lengths used for strcat() and
- strcpy().
- non_dest_scroll_region in
- tty_update.c to clear text after it is shifted in rather than before
- shifting out. Also correct row computation.
-
- rs2 capability in xterm-r6 and similar entries
- where cursor save/restore bracketed the sequence for resetting video
- attributes. The cursor restore would undo that.
- _nc_utf8_outch() to avoid sign-extension when
- checking for out-of-range value.
- dlsym() to load GPM dynamically.
- $HOME environment
- variable, to avoid retrieving terminfo descriptions from
- ./.terminfo .
+ _nc_parse_entry() and
- postprocess_termcap() to avoid using
- strtok(), because it is non-reentrant.
+ fds[] array to 0's in
- _nc_timed_wait(); apparently poll() only
- sets the revents members of that array when there is
- activity corresponding to the related file.
+ Make_Enum_Type().
+
- -fno-builtin option.
- fgets() in
- comp_scan.c next_char() function, in case
- tic is run on a non-text file (fixes a core dump).
-
- tic to verify that its inputs are really files,
- in case someone tries to read a directory (or
- /dev/zero).
-
- open_tempfile()
- in tic.c which made "tic -I" give an ambiguous error message about
- tmpnam.
-
- adjust_cancels(), which did not check
- both alternatives when reclassifying an extended name between
- boolean, number and string, causing an infinite loop in
- tic.
- tic for parameter counts in
- capability strings, found/fixed several errors both in the
- terminfo database and in the include/Caps file.
- --srcdir and --with-install-prefix.
-
- dlopen()
-Portability:
-symlink() in tic even when
+ link() does not work.
+
+
+
+ CF_XOPEN_SOURCE configure macro.
- $GCC and
- $GXX consistently compare against 'yes' rather than
- test if they are nonnull, since either may be set to the
- corresponding name of the C or C++ compiler.
+ SIGWINCH is
+ defined on platforms such as OS X which exclude that when
+ _XOPEN_SOURCE, etc., are defined
- configure --target
- will set a default program-prefix.
+ -search_paths_first option on Darwin
+ to work around odd search rules on that platform.
- _POSIX_VDISABLE in tset to
+ work with Mac OS X.
- tcgetattr() to allow for
- old implementations, e.g., on BeOS, which only defined it as a
- macro.
+ $(CFLAGS) variable is also used.
- ${CC} rather than ${LD} in
+ shared library rules for IRIX64, Solaris to help ensure
+ that initialization sections are provided for extra linkage
+ requirements, e.g., of C++ applications.
- --with-shlib-version work.
- test in
- configure script to use quotes, for instance fixing a problem in the
- --disable-database option.
+ names.c and
+ codes.c in ncurses/Makefile to
+ work with parallel make.
- MKlib_gen.sh to change
+ preprocessor-expanded _Bool back to bool.
- progs/Makefile.in to make
+ tput init work properly with cygwin,
+ i.e., do not pass a .exe in the reference
+ string used in check_aliases.
_nc_tracebits() for CSIZE
- with a table to simplify working around implementations that define
- random combinations of the related macros to zero.
+ wcwidth() claims are not one-column. This is
+ a workaround for Solaris' broken locale support.
- term.h by removing
+ #define's for HAVE_xxx symbols.
- _nc_basename(), used to
- consolidate related code in progs, as well as accommodating OS/2 EMX
- pathnames.
+ #ifdef in c++/internal.h for
+ QNX 6.1
+ test/configure script
+ to allow building test programs with PDCurses/X11.
- test/configure to build test/ncurses
+ on HPUX 11 using the vendor curses.
+ test/Makefile from data file.
+ wresize() allows you to resize windows, preserving
their data.
@@ -406,7 +410,7 @@ 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.
-@@ -537,16 +541,16 @@ a few games).
@@ -561,7 +565,7 @@ 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 -ftp://dickey.his.com/ncurses. +ftp://invisible-island.net/ncurses/ .
+The distribution provides a newer version of the terminfo-format +terminal description file once maintained by +Eric Raymond . +Unlike the older version, the termcap and terminfo data are provided +in the same file, and 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 Richard Shuford's -archive. +archive .