infocmp can be used to compare a binary terminfo entry
with other terminfo entries, rewrite a terminfo descrip-
tion to take advantage of the use= terminfo field, or
@@ -69,79 +66,97 @@
fields will be printed first, followed by the numeric
fields, followed by the string fields.
- DefaultOptions
+
+
If no options are specified and zero or one termnames are
specified, the -I option will be assumed. If more than
- one termname is specified, the -d option will be assumed.
-
- ComparisonOptions[-d][-c][-n]
- infocmp compares the terminfo description of the first
- terminal termname with each of the descriptions given by
- the entries for the other terminal's termnames. If a
- capability is defined for only one of the terminals, the
- value returned will depend on the type of the capability:
- F for boolean variables, -1 for integer variables, and
+ one termname is specified, the -d option will be assumed.
+
+
+
+ infocmp compares the terminfo description of the first
+ terminal termname with each of the descriptions given by
+ the entries for the other terminal's termnames. If a
+ capability is defined for only one of the terminals, the
+ value returned will depend on the type of the capability:
+ F for boolean variables, -1 for integer variables, and
NULL for string variables.
- The -d option produces a list of each capability that is
- different between two entries. This option is useful to
- show the difference between two entries, created by dif-
+ The -d option produces a list of each capability that is
+ different between two entries. This option is useful to
+ show the difference between two entries, created by dif-
ferent people, for the same or similar terminals.
- The -c option produces a list of each capability that is
- common between two entries. Capabilities that are not set
- are ignored. This option can be used as a quick check to
- see if the -u option is worth using.
+ The -c option produces a list of each capability that is
+ common between two or more entries. Capabilities that are
+ not set are ignored. This option can be used as a quick
+ check to see if the -u option is worth using.
- The -n option produces a list of each capability that is
- in neither entry. If no termnames are given, the environ-
- ment variable TERM will be used for both of the termnames.
- This can be used as a quick check to see if anything was
- left out of a description.
+ The -n option produces a list of each capability that is
+ in none of the given entries. If no termnames are given,
+ the environment variable TERM will be used for both of the
+ termnames. This can be used as a quick check to see if
+ anything was left out of a description.
- SourceListingOptions[-I][-L][-C][-r]
- The -I, -L, and -C options will produce a source listing
+
+
+ The -I, -L, and -C options will produce a source listing
for each terminal named.
-I use the terminfo names
-L use the long C variable name listed in <term.h>
-C use the termcap names
-r when using -C, put out all capabilities in termcap form
+ -K modifies the -C option, improving BSD-compatibility.
- If no termnames are given, the environment variable TERM
+ If no termnames are given, the environment variable TERM
will be used for the terminal name.
- The source produced by the -C option may be used directly
- as a termcap entry, but not all parameterized strings can
+ The source produced by the -C option may be used directly
+ as a termcap entry, but not all parameterized strings can
be changed to the termcap format. infocmp will attempt to
- convert most of the parameterized information, and any-
- thing not converted will be plainly marked in the output
+ convert most of the parameterized information, and any-
+ thing not converted will be plainly marked in the output
and commented out. These should be edited by hand.
- All padding information for strings will be collected
- together and placed at the beginning of the string where
- termcap expects it. Mandatory padding (padding informa-
+ For best results when converting to termcap format, you
+ should use both -C and -r. Normally a termcap description
+ is limited to 1023 bytes. infocmp trims away less essen-
+ tial parts to make it fit. If you are converting to one
+ of the (rare) termcap implementations which accept an
+ unlimited size of termcap, you may want to add the -T
+ option. More often however, you must help the termcap
+ implementation, and trim excess whitespace (use the -0
+ option for that).
+
+ All padding information for strings will be collected
+ together and placed at the beginning of the string where
+ termcap expects it. Mandatory padding (padding informa-
tion with a trailing '/') will become optional.
All termcap variables no longer supported by terminfo, but
which are derivable from other terminfo variables, will be
output. Not all terminfo capabilities will be translated;
- only those variables which were part of termcap will nor-
- mally be output. Specifying the -r option will take off
- this restriction, allowing all capabilities to be output
- in termcap form.
+ only those variables which were part of termcap will nor-
+ mally be output. Specifying the -r option will take off
+ this restriction, allowing all capabilities to be output
+ in termcap form. Normally you would use both the -C and
+ -r options. The actual format used incorporates some
+ improvements for escaped characters from terminfo format.
+ For a stricter BSD-compatible translation, use the -K
+ option rather than -C.
Note that because padding is collected to the beginning of
- the capability, not all capabilities are output. Manda-
- tory padding is not supported. Because termcap strings
- are not as flexible, it is not always possible to convert
- a terminfo string capability into an equivalent termcap
- format. A subsequent conversion of the termcap file back
- into terminfo format will not necessarily reproduce the
+ the capability, not all capabilities are output. Manda-
+ tory padding is not supported. Because termcap strings
+ are not as flexible, it is not always possible to convert
+ a terminfo string capability into an equivalent termcap
+ format. A subsequent conversion of the termcap file back
+ into terminfo format will not necessarily reproduce the
original terminfo source.
- Some common terminfo parameter sequences, their termcap
- equivalents, and some terminal types which commonly have
+ Some common terminfo parameter sequences, their termcap
+ equivalents, and some terminal types which commonly have
such sequences, are:
terminfotermcap Representative Terminals
@@ -153,67 +168,80 @@
%p1%?%'x'%>%t%p1%'y'%+%;%>xy concept
%p2 is printed before %p1%r hp
- Use=Option[-u]
- The -u option produces a terminfo source description of
- the first terminal termname which is relative to the sum
- of the descriptions given by the entries for the other
- terminals termnames. It does this by analyzing the dif-
- ferences between the first termname and the other
+
+
+ The -u option produces a terminfo source description of
+ the first terminal termname which is relative to the sum
+ of the descriptions given by the entries for the other
+ terminals termnames. It does this by analyzing the dif-
+ ferences between the first termname and the other
termnames and producing a description with use= fields for
- the other terminals. In this manner, it is possible to
- retrofit generic terminfo entries into a terminal's
+ the other terminals. In this manner, it is possible to
+ retrofit generic terminfo entries into a terminal's
description. Or, if two similar terminals exist, but were
- coded at different times or by different people so that
+ coded at different times or by different people so that
each description is a full description, using infocmp will
show what can be done to change one description to be rel-
ative to the other.
A capability will get printed with an at-sign (@) if it no
- longer exists in the first termname, but one of the other
- termname entries contains a value for it. A capability's
- value gets printed if the value in the first termname is
- not found in any of the other termname entries, or if the
+ longer exists in the first termname, but one of the other
+ termname entries contains a value for it. A capability's
+ value gets printed if the value in the first termname is
+ not found in any of the other termname entries, or if the
first of the other termname entries that has this capabil-
- ity gives a different value for the capability than that
+ ity gives a different value for the capability than that
in the first termname.
- The order of the other termname entries is significant.
- Since the terminfo compiler tic does a left-to-right scan
+ The order of the other termname entries is significant.
+ Since the terminfo compiler tic does a left-to-right scan
of the capabilities, specifying two use= entries that con-
tain differing entries for the same capabilities will pro-
- duce different results depending on the order that the
- entries are given in. infocmp will flag any such incon-
- sistencies between the other termname entries as they are
+ duce different results depending on the order that the
+ entries are given in. infocmp will flag any such incon-
+ sistencies between the other termname entries as they are
found.
- Alternatively, specifying a capability after a use= entry
+ Alternatively, specifying a capability after a use= entry
that contains that capability will cause the second speci-
- fication to be ignored. Using infocmp to recreate a
+ fication to be ignored. Using infocmp to recreate a
description can be a useful check to make sure that every-
- thing was specified correctly in the original source
+ thing was specified correctly in the original source
description.
- Another error that does not cause incorrect compiled
- files, but will slow down the compilation time, is speci-
- fying extra use= fields that are superfluous. infocmp
- will flag any other termnameuse= fields that were not
+ Another error that does not cause incorrect compiled
+ files, but will slow down the compilation time, is speci-
+ fying extra use= fields that are superfluous. infocmp
+ will flag any other termnameuse= fields that were not
needed.
ChangingDatabases[-Adirectory] [-B directory]
- The location of the compiled terminfo database is taken
- from the environment variable TERMINFO . If the variable
- is not defined, or the terminal is not found in that loca-
- tion, the system terminfo database, in /usr/share/ter-
- minfo, will be used. The options -A and -B may be used to
- override this location. The -A option will set TERMINFO
- for the first termname and the -B option will set TERMINFO
- for the other termnames. With this, it is possible to
- compare descriptions for a terminal with the same name
- located in two different databases. This is useful for
- comparing descriptions for the same terminal created by
- different people.
-
- OtherOptions
+ Like other ncurses utilities, infocmp looks for the termi-
+ nal descriptions in several places. You can use the TER-
+ MINFO and TERMINFO_DIRS environment variables to override
+ the compiled-in default list of places to search (see
+ curses(3x) for details).
+
+ You can also use the options -A and -B to override the
+ list of places to search when comparing terminal descrip-
+ tions:
+
+ o The -A option sets the location for the first termname
+
+ o The -B option sets the location for the other
+ termnames.
+
+ Using these options, it is possible to compare descrip-
+ tions for a terminal with the same name located in two
+ different databases. For instance, you can use this fea-
+ ture for comparing descriptions for the same terminal cre-
+ ated by different people.
+
+
+
+ -0 causes the fields to be printed on one line, without
+ wrapping.
+
-1 causes the fields to be printed out one to a line.
Otherwise, the fields will be printed several to a
line to a maximum width of 60 characters.
@@ -222,63 +250,72 @@
rather than discarding them. Capabilities are com-
mented by prefixing them with a period.
+ -D tells infocmp to print the database locations that it
+ knows about, and exit.
+
-E Dump the capabilities of the given terminal as
- tables, needed in the C initializer for a TERMTYPE
- structure (the terminal capability structure in the
- <term.h>). This option is useful for preparing ver-
- sions of the curses library hardwired for a given
- terminal type. The tables are all declared static,
- and are named according to the type and the name of
+ tables, needed in the C initializer for a TERMTYPE
+ structure (the terminal capability structure in the
+ <term.h>). This option is useful for preparing ver-
+ sions of the curses library hardwired for a given
+ terminal type. The tables are all declared static,
+ and are named according to the type and the name of
the corresponding terminal entry.
- Before ncurses 5.0, the split between the -e and -E
- options was not needed; but support for extended
+ Before ncurses 5.0, the split between the -e and -E
+ options was not needed; but support for extended
names required making the arrays of terminal capabil-
ities separate from the TERMTYPE structure.
- -e Dump the capabilities of the given terminal as a C
- initializer for a TERMTYPE structure (the terminal
- capability structure in the <term.h>). This option
+ -e Dump the capabilities of the given terminal as a C
+ initializer for a TERMTYPE structure (the terminal
+ capability structure in the <term.h>). This option
is useful for preparing versions of the curses
library hardwired for a given terminal type.
- -F compare terminfo files. This assumes that two fol-
- lowing arguments are filenames. The files are
- searched for pairwise matches between entries, with
+ -F compare terminfo files. This assumes that two fol-
+ lowing arguments are filenames. The files are
+ searched for pairwise matches between entries, with
two entries considered to match if any of their names
- do. The report printed to standard output lists
- entries with no matches in the other file, and
- entries with more than one match. For entries with
- exactly one match it includes a difference report.
- Normally, to reduce the volume of the report, use
- references are not resolved before looking for dif-
+ do. The report printed to standard output lists
+ entries with no matches in the other file, and
+ entries with more than one match. For entries with
+ exactly one match it includes a difference report.
+ Normally, to reduce the volume of the report, use
+ references are not resolved before looking for dif-
ferences, but resolution can be forced by also speci-
fying -r.
- -f Display complex terminfo strings which contain
+ -f Display complex terminfo strings which contain
if/then/else/endif expressions indented for readabil-
ity.
-G Display constant literals in decimal form rather than
their character equivalents.
- -g Display constant character literals in quoted form
+ -g Display constant character literals in quoted form
rather than their decimal equivalents.
-i Analyze the initialization (is1, is2, is3), and reset
- (rs1, rs2, rs3), strings in the entry. For each
- string, the code tries to analyze it into actions in
- terms of the other capabilities in the entry, certain
- X3.64/ISO 6429/ECMA-48 capabilities, and certain DEC
- VT-series private modes (the set of recognized spe-
- cial sequences has been selected for completeness
- over the existing terminfo database). Each report
- line consists of the capability name, followed by a
- colon and space, followed by a printable expansion of
- the capability string with sections matching recog-
- nized actions translated into {}-bracketed descrip-
- tions. Here is a list of the DEC/ANSI special
- sequences recognized: i.
+ (rs1, rs2, rs3), strings in the entry, as well as
+ those used for starting/stopping cursor-positioning
+ mode (smcup, rmcup) as well as starting/stopping
+ keymap mode (smkx, rmkx).
+
+ For each string, the code tries to analyze it into
+ actions in terms of the other capabilities in the
+ entry, certain X3.64/ISO 6429/ECMA-48 capabilities,
+ and certain DEC VT-series private modes (the set of
+ recognized special sequences has been selected for
+ completeness over the existing terminfo database).
+ Each report line consists of the capability name,
+ followed by a colon and space, followed by a print-
+ able expansion of the capability string with sections
+ matching recognized actions translated into {}-brack-
+ eted descriptions.
+
+ Here is a list of the DEC/ANSI special sequences rec-
+ ognized:
Action Meaning
-----------------------------------------
@@ -310,47 +347,63 @@
DEC[+-]CKM application cursor keys
DEC[+-]ANM set VT52 mode
DEC[+-]COLM 132-column mode
-
DEC[+-]SCLM smooth scroll
DEC[+-]SCNM reverse video mode
DEC[+-]OM origin mode
DEC[+-]AWM wraparound mode
DEC[+-]ARM auto-repeat mode
- It also recognizes a SGR action corresponding to
- ANSI/ISO 6429/ECMA Set Graphics Rendition, with the
- values NORMAL, BOLD, UNDERLINE, BLINK, and REVERSE.
- All but NORMAL may be prefixed with `+' (turn on) or
+ It also recognizes a SGR action corresponding to
+ ANSI/ISO 6429/ECMA Set Graphics Rendition, with the
+ values NORMAL, BOLD, UNDERLINE, BLINK, and REVERSE.
+ All but NORMAL may be prefixed with `+' (turn on) or
`-' (turn off).
- An SGR0 designates an empty highlight sequence (equivalent
- to {SGR:NORMAL}).
+ An SGR0 designates an empty highlight sequence
+ (equivalent to {SGR:NORMAL}).
-l Set output format to terminfo.
-p Ignore padding specifications when comparing strings.
- -q Make the comparison listing shorter by omitting sub-
- headings, and using "-" for absent capabilities, "@"
- for canceled rather than "NULL".
+ -Qn Rather than show source in terminfo (text) format,
+ print the compiled (binary) format in hexadecimal or
+ base64 form, depending on the option's value:
+
+ 1 hexadecimal
+
+ 2 base64
+
+ 3 hexadecimal and base64
+
+ -q This makes the output a little shorter:
+
+ o Make the comparison listing shorter by omitting
+ subheadings, and using "-" for absent capabili-
+ ties, "@" for canceled rather than "NULL".
+
+ o Omit the "Reconstructed from" comment for source
+ listings.
-Rsubset
- Restrict output to a given subset. This option is
- for use with archaic versions of terminfo like those
- on SVr1, Ultrix, or HP/UX that do not support the
- full set of SVR4/XSI Curses terminfo; and variants
+ Restrict output to a given subset. This option is
+ for use with archaic versions of terminfo like those
+ on SVr1, Ultrix, or HP/UX that do not support the
+ full set of SVR4/XSI Curses terminfo; and variants
such as AIX that have their own extensions incompati-
- ble with SVr4/XSI. Available terminfo subsets are
- "SVr1", "Ultrix", "HP", and "AIX"; see terminfo(5)
- for details. You can also choose the subset "BSD"
- which selects only capabilities with termcap equiva-
- lents recognized by 4.4BSD.
+ ble with SVr4/XSI.
+
+ Available terminfo subsets are "SVr1", "Ultrix",
+ "HP", and "AIX"; see terminfo(5) for details. You
+ can also choose the subset "BSD" which selects only
+ capabilities with termcap equivalents recognized by
+ 4.4BSD.
-s[d|i|l|c]
- The -s option sorts the fields within each type
+ The -s option sorts the fields within each type
according to the argument below:
- d leave fields in the order that they are stored
+ d leave fields in the order that they are stored
in the terminfo database.
i sort by terminfo name.
@@ -360,34 +413,37 @@
c sort by the termcap name.
If the -s option is not given, the fields printed out
- will be sorted alphabetically by the terminfo name
+ will be sorted alphabetically by the terminfo name
within each type, except in the case of the -C or the
-L options, which cause the sorting to be done by the
- termcap name or the long C variable name, respec-
+ termcap name or the long C variable name, respec-
tively.
- -T eliminates size-restrictions on the generated text.
+ -T eliminates size-restrictions on the generated text.
This is mainly useful for testing and analysis, since
the compiled descriptions are limited (e.g., 1023 for
termcap, 4096 for terminfo).
-t tells tic to discard commented-out capabilities.
- Normally when translating from terminfo to termcap,
+ Normally when translating from terminfo to termcap,
untranslatable capabilities are commented-out.
- -U tells infocmp to not post-process the data after
- parsing the source file. This feature helps when
- comparing the actual contents of two source files,
- since it excludes the inferences that infocmp makes
+ -U tells infocmp to not post-process the data after
+ parsing the source file. This feature helps when
+ comparing the actual contents of two source files,
+ since it excludes the inferences that infocmp makes
to fill in missing data.
-V reports the version of ncurses which was used in this
program, and exits.
- -vn prints out tracing information on standard error as
- the program runs. Higher values of n induce greater
+ -vn prints out tracing information on standard error as
+ the program runs. Higher values of n induce greater
verbosity.
+ -W By itself, the -w option will not force long strings
+ to be wrapped. Use the -W option to do this.
+
-wwidth
changes the output to width characters.
@@ -396,38 +452,36 @@
can be loaded using the -x option of tic.
-
+ The -0, -1, -E, -F, -G, -R, -T, -V, -a, -e, -f, -g, -i,
+ -l, -p, -q and -t options are not supported in SVr4
+ curses.
The -r option's notion of `termcap' capabilities is System
- V Release 4's. Actual BSD curses versions will have a
- more restricted set. To see only the 4.4BSD set, use -r
+ V Release 4's. Actual BSD curses versions will have a
+ more restricted set. To see only the 4.4BSD set, use -r-RBSD.
-