1------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2-- Copyright (c) 1998-2006,2008 Free Software Foundation, Inc. -- 3-- -- 4-- Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a -- 5-- copy of this software and associated documentation files (the -- 6-- "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including -- 7-- without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, -- 8-- distribute, distribute with modifications, sublicense, and/or sell copies -- 9-- of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished -- 10-- to do so, subject to the following conditions: -- 11-- -- 12-- The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included -- 13-- in all copies or substantial portions of the Software. -- 14-- -- 15-- THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS -- 16-- OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF -- 17-- MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN -- 18-- NO EVENT SHALL THE ABOVE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, -- 19-- DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR -- 20-- OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE -- 21-- USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE. -- 22-- -- 23-- Except as contained in this notice, the name(s) of the above copyright -- 24-- holders shall not be used in advertising or otherwise to promote the -- 25-- sale, use or other dealings in this Software without prior written -- 26-- authorization. -- 27------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 28-- $Id: INSTALL,v 1.135 2008/11/02 21:13:51 tom Exp $ 29--------------------------------------------------------------------- 30 How to install Ncurses/Terminfo on your system 31--------------------------------------------------------------------- 32 33 ************************************************************ 34 * READ ALL OF THIS FILE BEFORE YOU TRY TO INSTALL NCURSES. * 35 ************************************************************ 36 37You should be reading the file INSTALL in a directory called ncurses-d.d, where 38d.d is the current version number. There should be several subdirectories, 39including `c++', `form', `man', `menu', 'misc', `ncurses', `panel', `progs', 40and `test'. See the README file for a roadmap to the package. 41 42If you are a Linux or FreeBSD or NetBSD distribution integrator or packager, 43please read and act on the section titled IF YOU ARE A SYSTEM INTEGRATOR 44below. 45 46If you are converting from BSD curses and do not have root access, be sure 47to read the BSD CONVERSION NOTES section below. 48 49If you are trying to build applications using gpm with ncurses, 50read the USING NCURSES WITH GPM section below. 51 52If you are running over the Andrew File System see the note below on 53USING NCURSES WITH AFS. 54 55If you are cross-compiling, see the note below on BUILDING NCURSES WITH A 56CROSS-COMPILER. 57 58If you want to build the Ada95 binding, go to the Ada95 directory and 59follow the instructions there. The Ada95 binding is not covered below. 60 61If you are using anything but (a) Linux, or (b) one of the 4.4BSD-based 62i386 Unixes, go read the Portability section in the TO-DO file before you 63do anything else. 64 65 66REQUIREMENTS: 67------------ 68 69You will need the following to build and install ncurses under UNIX: 70 71 * ANSI C compiler (gcc, for instance) 72 * sh (bash will do) 73 * awk (mawk or gawk will do) 74 * sed 75 * BSD or System V style install (a script is enclosed) 76 77Ncurses has been also built in the OS/2 EMX environment. 78 79 80INSTALLATION PROCEDURE: 81---------------------- 82 831. First, decide whether you want ncurses to replace your existing library (in 84 which case you'll need super-user privileges) or be installed in parallel 85 with it. 86 87 The --prefix option to configure changes the root directory for installing 88 ncurses. The default is normally in subdirectories of /usr/local, except 89 for systems where ncurses is normally installed as a system library, e.g., 90 Linux, the various BSD systems and Cygwin. Use --prefix=/usr to replace 91 your default curses distribution. 92 93 The package gets installed beneath the --prefix directory as follows: 94 95 In $(prefix)/bin: tic, infocmp, captoinfo, tset, 96 reset, clear, tput, toe 97 In $(prefix)/lib: libncurses*.* libcurses.a 98 In $(prefix)/share/terminfo: compiled terminal descriptions 99 In $(prefix)/include: C header files 100 Under $(prefix)/man: the manual pages 101 102 Note that the configure script attempts to locate previous installation of 103 ncurses, and will set the default prefix according to where it finds the 104 ncurses headers. 105 106 Do not use commands such as 107 108 make install prefix=XXX 109 110 to change the prefix after configuration, since the prefix value is used 111 for some absolute pathnames such as TERMINFO. Instead do this 112 113 make install DESTDIR=XXX 114 115 See also the discussion of --with-install-prefix. 116 1172. Type `./configure' in the top-level directory of the distribution to 118 configure ncurses for your operating system and create the Makefiles. 119 Besides --prefix, various configuration options are available to customize 120 the installation; use `./configure --help' to list the available options. 121 122 If your operating system is not supported, read the PORTABILITY section in 123 the file ncurses/README for information on how to create a configuration 124 file for your system. 125 126 The `configure' script generates makefile rules for one or more object 127 models and their associated libraries: 128 129 libncurses.a (normal) 130 131 libcurses.a (normal, a link to libncurses.a) 132 This gets left out if you configure with --disable-overwrite. 133 134 libncurses.so (shared) 135 136 libncurses_g.a (debug) 137 138 libncurses_p.a (profile) 139 140 libncurses.la (libtool) 141 142 If you configure using the --enable-widec option, a "w" is appended to the 143 library names (e.g., libncursesw.a), and the resulting libraries support 144 wide-characters, e.g., via a UTF-8 locale. The corresponding header files 145 are compatible with the non-wide-character configuration; wide-character 146 features are provided by ifdef's in the header files. The wide-character 147 library interfaces are not binary-compatible with the non-wide-character 148 version. Building and running the wide-character code relies on a fairly 149 recent implementation of libiconv. We have built this configuration on 150 Linux using libiconv, sometimes requiring libutf8. 151 152 If you configure using the --with-pthread option, a "t" is appended to 153 the library names (e.g., libncursest.a, libncursestw.a). 154 155 If you do not specify any models, the normal and debug libraries will be 156 configured. Typing `configure' with no arguments is equivalent to: 157 158 ./configure --with-normal --with-debug --enable-overwrite 159 160 Typing 161 162 ./configure --with-shared 163 164 makes the shared libraries the default, resulting in 165 166 ./configure --with-shared --with-normal --with-debug --enable-overwrite 167 168 If you want only shared libraries, type 169 170 ./configure --with-shared --without-normal --without-debug 171 172 Rules for generating shared libraries are highly dependent upon the choice 173 of host system and compiler. We've been testing shared libraries on Linux 174 and SunOS with gcc, but more work needs to be done to make shared libraries 175 work on other systems. 176 177 If you have libtool installed, you can type 178 179 ./configure --with-libtool 180 181 to generate the appropriate static and/or shared libraries for your 182 platform using libtool. 183 184 You can make curses and terminfo fall back to an existing file of termcap 185 definitions by configuring with --enable-termcap. If you do this, the 186 library will search /etc/termcap before the terminfo database, and will 187 also interpret the contents of the TERM environment variable. See the 188 section BSD CONVERSION NOTES below. 189 1903. Type `make'. Ignore any warnings, no error messages should be produced. 191 This should compile the ncurses library, the terminfo compiler tic(1), 192 captoinfo(1), infocmp(1), toe(1), clear(1) tset(1), reset(1), and tput(1) 193 programs (see the manual pages for explanation of what they do), some test 194 programs, and the panels, menus, and forms libraries. 195 1964. Run ncurses and several other test programs in the test directory to 197 verify that ncurses functions correctly before doing an install that 198 may overwrite system files. Read the file test/README for details on 199 the test programs. 200 201 NOTE: You must have installed the terminfo database, or set the 202 environment variable $TERMINFO to point to a SVr4-compatible terminfo 203 database before running the test programs. Not all vendors' terminfo 204 databases are SVr4-compatible, but most seem to be. Exceptions include 205 DEC's Digital Unix (formerly known as OSF/1). 206 207 If you run the test programs WITHOUT installing terminfo, ncurses may 208 read the termcap file and cache that in $HOME/.terminfo, which will 209 thereafter be used instead of the terminfo database. See the comments 210 on "--enable-getcap-cache", to see why this is a Bad Thing. 211 212 It is possible to configure ncurses to use other terminfo database formats. 213 A few are provided as examples in the include-directory (see --with-caps). 214 215 The ncurses program is designed specifically to test the ncurses library. 216 You can use it to verify that the screen highlights work correctly, that 217 cursor addressing and window scrolling works OK, etc. 218 2195. Once you've tested, you can type `make install' to install libraries, 220 the programs, the terminfo database and the manual pages. Alternately, you 221 can type `make install' in each directory you want to install. In the 222 top-level directory, you can do a partial install using these commands: 223 224 'make install.progs' installs tic, infocmp, etc... 225 'make install.includes' installs the headers. 226 'make install.libs' installs the libraries (and the headers). 227 'make install.data' installs the terminfo data. (Note: `tic' must 228 be installed before the terminfo data can be 229 compiled). 230 'make install.man' installs the manual pages. 231 232 ############################################################################ 233 # CAVEAT EMPTOR: `install.data' run as root will NUKE any existing # 234 # terminfo database. If you have any custom or unusual entries SAVE them # 235 # before you install ncurses. I have a file called terminfo.custom for # 236 # this purpose. Don't forget to run tic on the file once you're done. # 237 ############################################################################ 238 239 The terminfo(5) manual page must be preprocessed with tbl(1) before 240 being formatted by nroff(1). Modern man(1) implementations tend to do 241 this by default, but you may want to look at your version's manual page 242 to be sure. You may also install the manual pages after preprocessing 243 with tbl(1) by specifying the configure option --with-manpage-tbl. 244 245 If the system already has a curses library that you need to keep using 246 you'll need to distinguish between it and ncurses. See the discussion of 247 --disable-overwrite. If ncurses is installed outside the standard 248 directories (/usr/include and /usr/lib) then all your users will need to 249 use the -I option to compile programs and -L to link them. 250 251 If you have another curses installed in your system and you accidentally 252 compile using its curses.h you'll end up with a large number of 253 undefined symbols at link time. 254 255 IF YOU DO NOT HAVE ROOT: Change directory to the `progs' subdirectory 256 and run the `capconvert' script. This script will deduce various things 257 about your environment and use them to build you a private terminfo tree, 258 so you can use ncurses applications. 259 260 If more than one user at your site does this, the space for the duplicate 261 trees is wasted. Try to get your site administrators to install a system- 262 wide terminfo tree instead. 263 264 See the BSD CONVERSION NOTES section below for a few more details. 265 2666. The c++ directory has C++ classes that are built on top of ncurses and 267 panels. You must have c++ (and its libraries) installed before you can 268 compile and run the demo. 269 270 Use --without-cxx-binding to tell configure to not build the C++ bindings 271 and demo. 272 273 If you do not have C++, you must use the --without-cxx option to tell 274 the configure script to not attempt to determine the type of 'bool' 275 which may be supported by C++. IF YOU USE THIS OPTION, BE ADVISED THAT 276 YOU MAY NOT BE ABLE TO COMPILE (OR RUN) NCURSES APPLICATIONS WITH C++. 277 278 279SUMMARY OF CONFIGURE OPTIONS: 280---------------------------- 281 282 The configure script provides a short list of its options when you type 283 284 ./configure --help 285 286 The --help and several options are common to all configure scripts that are 287 generated with autoconf. Those are all listed before the line 288 289 --enable and --with options recognized: 290 291 The other options are specific to this package. We list them in alphabetic 292 order. 293 294 --disable-assumed-color 295 With ncurses 5.1, we introduced a new function, assume_default_colors() 296 which allows applications to specify what the default foreground and 297 background color are assumed to be. Most color applications use 298 full-screen color; but a few do not color the background. While the 299 assumed values can be overridden by invoking assume_default_colors(), 300 you may find it useful to set the assumed values to the pre-5.1 301 convention, using this configure option. 302 303 --disable-big-core 304 Assume machine has little memory. The configure script attempts to 305 determine if your machine has enough memory (about 6Mb) to compile the 306 terminfo database without writing portions to disk. Some allocators 307 return deceptive results, so you may have to override the configure 308 script. Or you may be building tic for a smaller machine. 309 310 --disable-big-strings 311 Disable compile-time optimization of predefined tables which puts 312 all of their strings into a very long string, to reduce relocation 313 overhead. 314 315 --disable-database 316 Use only built-in data. The ncurses libraries normally read terminfo 317 and termcap data from disk. You can configure ncurses to have a 318 built-in database, aka "fallback" entries. Embedded applications may 319 have no need for an external database. Some, but not all of the 320 programs are useful in this configuration, e.g., reset and tput versus 321 infocmp and tic. 322 323 --disable-ext-funcs 324 Disable function-extensions. Configure ncurses without the functions 325 that are not specified by XSI. See ncurses/modules for the exact 326 list of library modules that would be suppressed. 327 328 --disable-hashmap 329 Compile without hashmap scrolling-optimization code. This algorithm is 330 the default. 331 332 --disable-home-terminfo 333 The $HOME/.terminfo directory is normally added to ncurses' search 334 list for reading/writing terminfo entries, since that directory is 335 more likely writable than the system terminfo database. Use this 336 option to disable the feature altogether. 337 338 --disable-largefile 339 Disable compiler flags needed to use large-file interfaces. 340 341 --disable-leaks 342 For testing, compile-in code that frees memory that normally would not 343 be freed, to simplify analysis of memory-leaks. 344 345 Any implementation of curses must not free the memory associated with 346 a screen, since (even after calling endwin()), it must be available 347 for use in the next call to refresh(). There are also chunks of 348 memory held for performance reasons. That makes it hard to analyze 349 curses applications for memory leaks. To work around this, build 350 a debugging version of the ncurses library which frees those chunks 351 which it can, and provides the _nc_free_and_exit() function to free 352 the remainder on exit. The ncurses utility and test programs use this 353 feature, e.g., via the ExitProgram() macro. 354 355 --disable-lp64 356 The header files will ignore use of the _LP64 symbol to make chtype 357 and mmask_t types 32 bits (they may be long on 64-bit hosts, for 358 compatibility with older releases). 359 360 NOTE: this is potentially an ABI change, depending on existing 361 packages. The default for this option is "disabled" for ncurses 362 ABI 5, and "enabled" for ABI 6. 363 364 --disable-macros 365 For testing, use functions rather than macros. The program will run 366 more slowly, but it is simpler to debug. This defines NCURSES_NOMACROS 367 at build time. See also the --enable-expanded option. 368 369 --disable-overwrite 370 If you are installing ncurses on a system which contains another 371 development version of curses, or which could be confused by the loader 372 for another version, we recommend that you leave out the link to 373 -lcurses. The ncurses library is always available as -lncurses. 374 Disabling overwrite also causes the ncurses header files to be 375 installed into a subdirectory, e.g., /usr/local/include/ncurses, 376 rather than the include directory. This makes it simpler to avoid 377 compile-time conflicts with other versions of curses.h 378 379 --disable-relink 380 If --enable-rpath is given, the generated makefiles normally will 381 rebuild the libraries during install. Use this option to simply 382 copy whatever the linked produced. 383 384 This option is ignored if --enable-rpath is not given. 385 386 --disable-root-environ 387 Compile with environment restriction, so certain environment variables 388 are not available when running as root, or via a setuid/setgid 389 application. These are (for example $TERMINFO) those that allow the 390 search path for the terminfo or termcap entry to be customized. 391 392 --disable-scroll-hints 393 Compile without scroll-hints code. This option is ignored when 394 hashmap scrolling is configured, which is the default. 395 396 --disable-tic-depends 397 When building shared libraries, normally the tic library is linked to 398 depend upon the ncurses library (and in turn, on the term-library if 399 the --with-termlib option was given). The tic- and term-libraries 400 ABI does not depend on the --enable-widec option. Some packagers have 401 used this to reduce the number of library files which are packaged 402 by using only one copy of those libraries. To make this work properly, 403 the tic library must be built without an explicit dependency on the 404 ncurses (or ncursesw) library. Use this configure option to do that. 405 For example 406 configure --with-ticlib --with-shared --disable-tic-depends 407 408 --disable-tparm-varargs 409 Portable programs should call tparm() using the fixed-length parameter 410 list documented in X/Open. ncurses provides varargs support for this 411 function. Use --disable-tparm-varargs to disable this support. 412 413 --enable-assertions 414 For testing, compile-in assertion code. This is used only for a few 415 places where ncurses cannot easily recover by returning an error code. 416 417 --enable-broken_linker 418 A few platforms have what we consider a broken linker: it cannot link 419 objects from an archive solely by referring to data objects in those 420 files, but requires a function reference. This configure option 421 changes several data references to functions to work around this 422 problem. 423 424 NOTE: With ncurses 5.1, this may not be necessary, since we are 425 told that some linkers interpret uninitialized global data as a 426 different type of reference which behaves as described above. We have 427 explicitly initialized all of the global data to work around the 428 problem. 429 430 --enable-bsdpad 431 Recognize BSD-style prefix padding. Some ancient BSD programs (such as 432 nethack) call tputs("50") to implement delays. 433 434 --enable-colorfgbg 435 Compile with experimental $COLORFGBG code. That environment variable 436 is set by some terminal emulators as a hint to applications, by 437 advertising the default foreground and background colors. During 438 initialization, ncurses sets color pair 0 to match this. 439 440 --enable-const 441 The curses interface as documented in XSI is rather old, in fact 442 including features that precede ANSI C. The prototypes generally do 443 not make effective use of "const". When using stricter compilers (or 444 gcc with appropriate warnings), you may see warnings about the mismatch 445 between const and non-const data. We provide a configure option which 446 changes the interfaces to use const - quieting these warnings and 447 reflecting the actual use of the parameters more closely. The ncurses 448 library uses the symbol NCURSES_CONST for these instances of const, 449 and if you have asked for compiler warnings, will add gcc's const-qual 450 warning. There will still be warnings due to subtle inconsistencies 451 in the interface, but at a lower level. 452 453 NOTE: configuring ncurses with this option may detract from the 454 portability of your applications by encouraging you to use const in 455 places where the XSI curses interface would not allow them. Similar 456 issues arise when porting to SVr4 curses, which uses const in even 457 fewer places. 458 459 --enable-echo 460 Use the option --disable-echo to make the build-log less verbose by 461 suppressing the display of the compile and link commands. This makes 462 it easier to see the compiler warnings. (You can always use "make -n" 463 to see the options that are used). 464 465 --enable-expanded 466 For testing, generate functions for certain macros to make them visible 467 as such to the debugger. See also the --disable-macros option. 468 469 --enable-ext-colors 470 Extend the cchar_t structure to allow more than 16 colors to be 471 encoded. This applies only to the wide-character (--enable-widec) 472 configuration. 473 474 NOTE: using this option will make libraries which are not binary- 475 compatible with libncursesw 5.4. None of the interfaces change, but 476 applications which have an array of cchar_t's must be recompiled. 477 478 --enable-ext-mouse 479 Modify the encoding of mouse state to make room for a 5th mouse button. 480 That allows one to use ncurses with a wheel mouse with xterm or 481 similar X terminal emulators. 482 483 NOTE: using this option will make libraries which are not binary- 484 compatible with libncursesw 5.4. None of the interfaces change, but 485 applications which have mouse mask mmask_t's must be recompiled. 486 487 --enable-getcap 488 Use the 4.4BSD getcap code if available, or a bundled version of it to 489 fetch termcap entries. Entries read in this way cannot use (make 490 cross-references to) the terminfo tree, but it is faster than reading 491 /etc/termcap. 492 493 If configured for one of the *BSD systems, this automatically uses 494 the hashed database system produced using cap_mkdb or similar tools. 495 In that case, there is no advantage in using the --enable-getcap-cache 496 option. 497 498 See also the --with-hashed-db option. 499 500 --enable-getcap-cache 501 Cache translated termcaps under the directory $HOME/.terminfo 502 503 NOTE: this sounds good - it makes ncurses run faster the second time. 504 But look where the data comes from - an /etc/termcap containing lots of 505 entries that are not up to date. If you configure with this option and 506 forget to install the terminfo database before running an ncurses 507 application, you will end up with a hidden terminfo database that 508 generally does not support color and will miss some function keys. 509 510 --enable-hard-tabs 511 Compile-in cursor-optimization code that uses hard-tabs. We would make 512 this a standard feature except for the concern that the terminfo entry 513 may not be accurate, or that your stty settings have disabled the use 514 of tabs. 515 516 --enable-mixed-case 517 Controls whether the filesystem on which the terminfo database resides 518 supports mixed-case filenames (normal for UNIX, but not on other 519 systems). If you do not specify this option, the configure script 520 checks the current filesystem. 521 522 --enable-no-padding 523 Compile-in support for the $NCURSES_NO_PADDING environment variable, 524 which allows you to suppress the effect of non-mandatory padding in 525 terminfo entries. This is the default, unless you have disabled the 526 extended functions. 527 528 --enable-reentrant 529 Compile experimental configuration which improves reentrant use of the 530 library by reducing global and static variables. This option is also 531 set if --with-pthread is used. 532 533 --enable-rpath 534 Use rpath option when generating shared libraries, and (with some 535 restrictions) when linking the corresponding programs. This originally 536 (in 1997) applied mainly to systems using the GNU linker (read the 537 manpage). 538 539 More recently it is useful for systems that require special treatment 540 shared libraries in "unusual" locations. The "system" libraries reside 541 in directories which are on the loader's default search-path. While 542 you may be able to use workarounds such as the $LD_LIBRARY_PATH 543 environment variable, they do not work with setuid applications since 544 the LD_LIBRARY_PATH variable would be unset in that situation. 545 546 This option does not apply to --with-libtool, since libtool makes 547 extra assumptions about rpath. 548 549 --enable-safe-sprintf 550 Compile with experimental safe-sprintf code. You may consider using 551 this if you are building ncurses for a system that has neither 552 vsnprintf() or vsprintf(). It is slow, however. 553 554 --enable-sigwinch 555 Compile support for ncurses' SIGWINCH handler. If your application has 556 its own SIGWINCH handler, ncurses will not use its own. The ncurses 557 handler causes wgetch() to return KEY_RESIZE when the screen-size 558 changes. This option is the default, unless you have disabled the 559 extended functions. 560 561 --enable-signed-char 562 The term.h header declares a Booleans[] array typed "char". But it 563 stores signed values there and "char" is not necessarily signed. 564 Some packagers choose to alter the type of Booleans[] though this 565 is not strictly compatible. This option allows one to implement this 566 alteration without patching the source code. 567 568 --enable-symlinks 569 If your system supports symbolic links, make tic use symbolic links 570 rather than hard links to save diskspace when writing aliases in the 571 terminfo database. 572 573 --enable-tcap-names 574 Compile-in support for user-definable terminal capabilities. Use the 575 -x option of tic and infocmp to treat unrecognized terminal 576 capabilities as user-defined strings. This option is the default, 577 unless you have disabled the extended functions. 578 579 --enable-termcap 580 Compile in support for reading terminal descriptions from termcap if no 581 match is found in the terminfo database. See also the --enable-getcap 582 and --enable-getcap-cache options. 583 584 --enable-warnings 585 Turn on GCC compiler warnings. There should be only a few. 586 587 --enable-weak-symbols 588 If the --with-pthread option is set, check if the compiler supports 589 weak-symbols. If it does, then name the thread-capable library without 590 the "t" (libncurses rather than libncursest), and provide for 591 dynamically loading the pthreads entrypoints at runtime. This allows 592 one to reduce the number of library files for ncurses. 593 594 --enable-wgetch-events 595 Compile with experimental wgetch-events code. See ncurses/README.IZ 596 597 --enable-widec 598 Compile with wide-character code. This makes a different version of 599 the libraries (e.g., libncursesw.so), which stores characters as 600 wide-characters, 601 602 NOTE: applications compiled with this configuration are not compatible 603 with those built for 8-bit characters. You cannot simply make a 604 symbolic link to equate libncurses.so with libncursesw.so 605 606 NOTE: the Ada95 binding may be built against either version of the the 607 ncurses library, but you must decide which: the binding installs the 608 same set of files for either version. Currently (2002/6/22) it does 609 not use the extended features from the wide-character code, so it is 610 probably better to not install the binding for that configuration. 611 612 --enable-xmc-glitch 613 Compile-in support experimental xmc (magic cookie) code. 614 615 --with-abi-version=NUM 616 Override the ABI version, which is used in shared library filenames. 617 Normally this is the same as the release version; some ports have 618 special requirements for compatibility. 619 620 This option does not affect linking with libtool, which uses the 621 release major/minor numbers. 622 623 --with-ada-compiler=CMD 624 Specify the Ada95 compiler command (default "gnatmake") 625 626 --with-ada-include=DIR 627 Tell where to install the Ada includes (default: 628 PREFIX/lib/ada/adainclude) 629 630 --with-ada-objects=DIR 631 Tell where to install the Ada objects (default: PREFIX/lib/ada/adalib) 632 633 --with-bool=TYPE 634 If --without-cxx is specified, override the type used for the "bool" 635 declared in curses.h (normally the type is automatically chosen to 636 correspond with that in <stdbool.h>, or defaults to platform-specific 637 sizes). 638 639 --with-build-cc=XXX 640 If cross-compiling, specify a host C compiler, which is needed to 641 compile a few utilities which generate source modules for ncurses. 642 If you do not give this option, the configure script checks if the 643 $BUILD_CC variable is set, and otherwise defaults to gcc or cc. 644 645 --with-build-cflags=XXX 646 If cross-compiling, specify the host C compiler-flags. You might need 647 to do this if the target compiler has unusual flags which confuse the 648 host compiler. 649 650 You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_CFLAGS rather than 651 use this option. 652 653 --with-build-cppflags=XXX 654 If cross-compiling, specify the host C preprocessor-flags. You might 655 need to do this if the target compiler has unusual flags which confuse 656 the host compiler. 657 658 You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_CPPFLAGS rather than 659 use this option. 660 661 --with-build-ldflags=XXX 662 If cross-compiling, specify the host linker-flags. You might need to 663 do this if the target linker has unusual flags which confuse the host 664 compiler. 665 666 You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_LDFLAGS rather than 667 use this option. 668 669 --with-build-libs=XXX 670 If cross-compiling, the host libraries. You might need to do this if 671 the target environment requires unusual libraries. 672 673 You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_LIBS rather than 674 use this option. 675 676 --with-caps=XXX 677 Specify an alternate terminfo capabilities file, which makes the 678 configure script look for "include/Caps.XXX". A few systems, e.g., 679 AIX 4.x use the same overall file-format as ncurses for terminfo 680 data, but use different alignments within the tables to support 681 legacy applications. For those systems, you can configure ncurses 682 to use a terminfo database which is compatible with the native 683 applications. 684 685 --with-chtype=TYPE 686 Override type of chtype, which stores the video attributes and (if 687 --enable-widec is not given) a character. Prior to ncurses 5.5, this 688 was always unsigned long, but with ncurses 5.5, it may be unsigned. 689 Use this option if you need to preserve compatibility with 64-bit 690 executables. 691 692 --with-database=XXX 693 Specify the terminfo source file to install. Usually you will wish 694 to install ncurses' default (misc/terminfo.src). Certain systems 695 have special requirements, e.g, OS/2 EMX has a customized terminfo 696 source file. 697 698 --with-dbmalloc 699 For testing, compile and link with Conor Cahill's dbmalloc library. 700 This also sets the --disable-leaks option. 701 702 --with-debug 703 Generate debug-libraries (default). These are named by adding "_g" 704 to the root, e.g., libncurses_g.a 705 706 --with-default-terminfo-dir=XXX 707 Specify the default terminfo database directory. This is normally 708 DATADIR/terminfo, e.g., /usr/share/terminfo. 709 710 --with-dmalloc 711 For testing, compile and link with Gray Watson's dmalloc library. 712 This also sets the --disable-leaks option. 713 714 --with-fallbacks=XXX 715 Specify a list of fallback terminal descriptions which will be 716 compiled into the ncurses library. See CONFIGURING FALLBACK ENTRIES. 717 718 --with-gpm 719 use Alessandro Rubini's GPM library to provide mouse support on the 720 Linux console. Prior to ncurses 5.5, this introduced a dependency on 721 the GPM library. 722 723 Currently ncurses uses the dlsym() function to bind to the library at 724 runtime, so it is only necessary that the library be present when 725 ncurses is built, to obtain the filename (or soname) used in the 726 corresponding dlopen() call. If you give a value for this option, 727 e.g., 728 729 --with-gpm=$HOME/tmp/test-gpm.so 730 731 that overrides the configure check for the soname. 732 733 See also --without-dlsym 734 735 --with-hashed-db[=XXX] 736 Use a hashed database for storing terminfo data rather than storing 737 each compiled entry in a separate binary file within a directory 738 tree. 739 740 In particular, this uses the Berkeley database 1.8.5 interface, as 741 provided by that and its successors db 2, 3, and 4. The actual 742 interface is slightly different in the successor versions of the 743 Berkeley database. The database should have been configured using 744 "--enable-compat185". 745 746 If you use this option for configuring ncurses, tic will only be able 747 to write entries in the hashed database. infocmp can still read 748 entries from a directory tree as well as reading entries from the 749 hashed database. To do this, infocmp determines whether the $TERMINFO 750 variable points to a directory or a file, and reads the directory-tree 751 or hashed database respectively. 752 753 You cannot have a directory containing both hashed-database and 754 filesystem-based terminfo entries. 755 756 Use the parameter value to give the install-prefix used for the 757 datbase, e.g., 758 --with-hashed-db=/usr/local/BigBase 759 to find the corresponding include- and lib-directories under the 760 given directory. 761 762 See also the --enable-getcap option. 763 764 --with-install-prefix=XXX 765 Allows you to specify an alternate location for installing ncurses 766 after building it. The value you specify is prepended to the "real" 767 install location. This simplifies making binary packages. The 768 makefile variable DESTDIR is set by this option. It is also possible 769 to use 770 make install DESTDIR=XXX 771 since the makefiles pass that variable to subordinate makes. 772 773 NOTE: a few systems build shared libraries with fixed pathnames; this 774 option probably will not work for those configurations. 775 776 --with-libtool[=XXX] 777 Generate libraries with libtool. If this option is selected, then it 778 overrides all other library model specifications. Note that libtool 779 must already be installed, uses makefile rules dependent on GNU make, 780 and does not promise to follow the version numbering convention of 781 other shared libraries on your system. However, if the --with-shared 782 option does not succeed, you may get better results with this option. 783 784 If a parameter value is given, it must be the full pathname of the 785 particular version of libtool, e.g., 786 /usr/bin/libtool-1.2.3 787 788 It is possible to rebuild the configure script to use the automake 789 macros for libtool, e.g., AC_PROG_LIBTOOL. See the comments in 790 aclocal.m4 for CF_PROG_LIBTOOL, and ensure that you build configure 791 using the appropriate patch for autoconf from 792 http://invisible-island.net/autoconf/ 793 794 --with-manpage-aliases 795 Tell the configure script you wish to create entries in the 796 man-directory for aliases to manpages which list them, e.g., the 797 functions in the panel manpage. This is the default. You can disable 798 it if your man program does this. You can also disable 799 --with-manpage-symlinks to install files containing a ".so" command 800 rather than symbolic links. 801 802 --with-manpage-format=XXX 803 Tell the configure script how you would like to install man-pages. The 804 option value must be one of these: gzip, compress, BSDI, normal, 805 formatted. If you do not give this option, the configure script 806 attempts to determine which is the case. 807 808 --with-manpage-renames=XXX 809 Tell the configure script that you wish to rename the manpages while 810 installing. Currently the only distribution which does this is 811 the Linux Debian. The option value specifies the name of a file 812 that lists the renamed files, e.g., $srcdir/man/man_db.renames 813 814 --with-manpage-symlinks 815 Tell the configure script that you wish to make symbolic links in the 816 man-directory for aliases to the man-pages. This is the default, but 817 can be disabled for systems that provide this automatically. Doing 818 this on systems that do not support symbolic links will result in 819 copying the man-page for each alias. 820 821 --with-manpage-tbl 822 Tell the configure script that you with to preprocess the manpages 823 by running them through tbl to generate tables understandable by 824 nroff. 825 826 --with-mmask-t=TYPE 827 Override type of mmask_t, which stores the mouse mask. Prior to 828 ncurses 5.5, this was always unsigned long, but with ncurses 5.5, it 829 may be unsigned. Use this option if you need to preserve compatibility 830 with 64-bit executables. 831 832 --with-normal 833 Generate normal (i.e., static) libraries (default). 834 835 Note: on Linux, the configure script will attempt to use the GPM 836 library via the dlsym() function call. Use --without-dlsym to disable 837 this feature, or --without-gpm, depending on whether you wish to use 838 GPM. 839 840 --with-ospeed=TYPE 841 Override type of ospeed variable, which is part of the termcap 842 compatibility interface. In termcap, this is a 'short', which works 843 for a wide range of baudrates because ospeed is not the actual speed 844 but the encoded value, e.g., B9600 would be a small number such as 13. 845 However the encoding scheme originally allowed for values "only" up to 846 38400bd. A newer set of definitions past 38400bd is not encoded as 847 compactly, and is not guaranteed to fit into a short (see the function 848 cfgetospeed(), which returns a speed_t for this reason). In practice, 849 applications that required knowledge of the ospeed variable, i.e., 850 those using termcap, do not use the higher speeds. Your application 851 (or system, in general) may or may not. 852 853 --with-profile 854 Generate profile-libraries These are named by adding "_p" to the root, 855 e.g., libncurses_p.a 856 857 --with-pthread 858 Link with POSIX threads, set --enable-reentrant. The use_window() and 859 use_screen() functions will use mutex's, allowing rudimentary support 860 for multithreaded applications. 861 862 --with-rcs-ids 863 Compile-in RCS identifiers. Most of the C files have an identifier. 864 865 --with-rel-version=NUM 866 Override the release version, which may be used in shared library 867 filenames. This consists of a major and minor version number separated 868 by ".". Normally the major version number is the same as the ABI 869 version; some ports have special requirements for compatibility. 870 871 --with-shared 872 Generate shared-libraries. The names given depend on the system for 873 which you are building, typically using a ".so" suffix, along with 874 symbolic links that refer to the release version. 875 876 NOTE: Unless you override the configure script by setting the $CFLAGS 877 environment variable, these will not be built with the -g debugging 878 option. 879 880 NOTE: For some configurations, e.g., installing a new version of 881 ncurses shared libraries on a machine which already has ncurses 882 shared libraries, you may encounter problems with the linker. 883 For example, it may prevent you from running the build tree's 884 copy of tic (for installing the terminfo database) because it 885 loads the system's copy of the ncurses shared libraries. In that 886 case, using the misc/shlib script may be helpful, since it sets 887 $LD_LIBRARY_PATH to point to the build tree, e.g., 888 ./misc/shlib make install 889 890 --with-shlib-version=XXX 891 Specify whether to use the release or ABI version for shared libraries. 892 This is normally chosen automatically based on the type of system 893 which you are building on. We use it for testing the configure script. 894 895 --with-sysmouse 896 use FreeBSD sysmouse interface provide mouse support on the console. 897 898 --with-system-type=XXX 899 For testing, override the derived host system-type which is used to 900 decide things such as the linker commands used to build shared 901 libraries. This is normally chosen automatically based on the type of 902 system which you are building on. We use it for testing the configure 903 script. 904 905 --with-terminfo-dirs=XXX 906 Specify a search-list of terminfo directories which will be compiled 907 into the ncurses library (default: DATADIR/terminfo) 908 909 --with-termlib[=XXX] 910 When building the ncurses library, organize this as two parts: the 911 curses library (libncurses) and the low-level terminfo library 912 (libtinfo). This is done to accommodate applications that use only 913 the latter. The terminfo library is about half the size of the total. 914 915 If an option value is given, that overrides the name of the terminfo 916 library. For instance, if the wide-character version is built, the 917 terminfo library would be named libtinfow. But the libtinfow interface 918 is upward compatible from libtinfo, so it would be possible to overlay 919 libtinfo.so with a "wide" version of libtinfow.so by renaming it with 920 this option. 921 922 --with-termpath=XXX 923 Specify a search-list of termcap files which will be compiled into the 924 ncurses library (default: /etc/termcap:/usr/share/misc/termcap) 925 926 --with-ticlib[=XXX] 927 When building the ncurses library, build a separate library for 928 the modules that are used only by the utility programs. Normally 929 those would be bundled with the termlib or ncurses libraries. 930 931 If an option value is given, that overrides the name of the tic 932 library. As in termlib, there is no ABI difference between the 933 "wide" libticw.so and libtic.so 934 935 NOTE: Overriding the name of the tic library may be useful if you are 936 also using the --with-termlib option to rename libtinfo. If you are 937 not doing that, renaming the tic library can result in conflicting 938 library dependencies for tic and other programs built with the tic 939 library. 940 941 --with-trace 942 Configure the trace() function as part of the all models of the ncurses 943 library. Normally it is part of the debug (libncurses_g) library only. 944 945 --with-valgrind 946 For testing, compile with debug option. 947 This also sets the --disable-leaks option. 948 949 --without-ada 950 Suppress the configure script's check for Ada95, do not build the 951 Ada95 binding and related demo. 952 953 --without-curses-h 954 Don't install the ncurses header with the name "curses.h". Rather, 955 install as "ncurses.h" and modify the installed headers and manpages 956 accordingly. 957 958 --without-cxx 959 XSI curses declares "bool" as part of the interface. C++ also declares 960 "bool". Neither specifies the size and type of booleans, but both 961 insist on the same name. We chose to accommodate this by making the 962 configure script check for the size and type (e.g., unsigned or signed) 963 that your C++ compiler uses for booleans. If you do not wish to use 964 ncurses with C++, use this option to tell the configure script to not 965 adjust ncurses bool to match C++. 966 967 --without-cxx-binding 968 Suppress the configure script's check for C++, do not build the 969 C++ binding and related demo. 970 971 --without-develop 972 Disable development options. This does not include those that change 973 the interface, such as --enable-widec. 974 975 --without-dlsym 976 Do not use dlsym() to load GPM dynamically. 977 978 --without-progs 979 Tell the configure script to suppress the build of ncurses' application 980 programs (e.g., tic). The test applications will still be built if you 981 type "make", though not if you simply do "make install". 982 983 --without-xterm-new 984 Tell the configure script to use "xterm-old" for the entry used in 985 the terminfo database. This will work with variations such as 986 X11R5 and X11R6 xterm. 987 988 989COMPATIBILITY WITH OLDER VERSIONS OF NCURSES: 990-------------------------------------------- 991 992 Because ncurses implements the X/Open Curses Specification, its interface 993 is fairly stable. That does not mean the interface does not change. 994 Changes are made to the documented interfaces when we find differences 995 between ncurses and X/Open or implementations which they certify (such as 996 Solaris). We add extensions to those interfaces to solve problems not 997 addressed by the original curses design, but those must not conflict with 998 the X/Open documentation. 999 1000 Here are some of the major interface changes, and related problems which 1001 you may encounter when building a system with different versions of 1002 ncurses: 1003 1004 5.7 (November 2, 2008) 1005 Interface changes: 1006 1007 + generate linkable stubs for some macros: 1008 getattrs 1009 1010 + Add new library configuration for tic-library (the non-curses portion 1011 of the ncurses library used for the tic program as well as some 1012 others such as tack. There is no API change, but makefiles would be 1013 changed to use the tic-library built separately. 1014 1015 tack, distributed separately from ncurses, uses some of the internal 1016 _nc_XXX functions, which are declared in the tic.h header file. 1017 1018 The reason for providing this separate library is that none of the 1019 functions in it are suitable for threaded applications. 1020 1021 + Add new library configuration (ncursest, ncurseswt) which provides 1022 rudimentary support for POSIX threads. This introduces opaque 1023 access functions to the WINDOW structure and adds a parameter to 1024 several internal functions. 1025 1026 + move most internal variables (except tic-library) into data blocks 1027 _nc_globals and _nc_prescreen to simplify analysis. Those were 1028 globally accessible, but since they were not part of the documented 1029 API, there is no ABI change. 1030 1031 + changed static tables of strings to be indices into long strings, to 1032 improve startup performance. This changes parameter lists for some 1033 of the internal functions. 1034 1035 Added extensions: 1036 1037 + add NCURSES_OPAQUE definition in curses.h to control whether internal 1038 details of the WINDOW structure are visible to an application. This 1039 is always defined when the threaded library is built, and is optional 1040 otherwise. New functions for this: is_cleared, is_idcok, is_idlok, 1041 is_immedok, is_keypad, is_leaveok, is_nodelay, is_notimeout, 1042 is_scrollok, is_syncok, wgetparent and wgetscrreg. 1043 1044 + the threaded library (ncursest) also disallows direct updating of 1045 global curses-level variables, providing functions (via macros) for 1046 obtaining their value. A few of those variables can be modified by 1047 the application, using new functions: set_escdelay, set_tabsize 1048 1049 + added functions use_window() and use_screen() which wrap a mutex 1050 (if threading is configured) around a call to a user-supplied 1051 function. 1052 1053 Added internal functions: 1054 _nc_get_alias_table 1055 _nc_get_screensize 1056 _nc_keyname 1057 _nc_screen_of 1058 _nc_set_no_padding 1059 _nc_tracechar 1060 _nc_tracemouse 1061 _nc_unctrl 1062 _nc_ungetch 1063 1064 These are used for leak-testing, and are stubs for 1065 ABI compatibility when ncurses is not configured for that 1066 using the --disable-leaks configure script option: 1067 1068 _nc_free_and_exit 1069 _nc_leaks_tinfo 1070 1071 Removed internal functions: 1072 none 1073 1074 Modified internal functions: 1075 _nc_fifo_dump 1076 _nc_find_entry 1077 _nc_handle_sigwinch 1078 _nc_init_keytry 1079 _nc_keypad 1080 _nc_locale_breaks_acs 1081 _nc_timed_wait 1082 _nc_update_screensize 1083 1084 Use new typedef TRIES to replace "struct tries": 1085 1086 _nc_add_to_try 1087 _nc_expand_try 1088 _nc_remove_key 1089 _nc_remove_string 1090 _nc_trace_tries 1091 1092 5.6 (December 17, 2006) 1093 Interface changes: 1094 1095 + generate linkable stubs for some macros: 1096 1097 getbegx, getbegy, getcurx, getcury, getmaxx, getmaxy, getparx, 1098 getpary, getpary, 1099 1100 and (for libncursesw) 1101 1102 wgetbkgrnd 1103 1104 Added extensions: 1105 nofilter() 1106 use_legacy_coding() 1107 1108 Added internal functions: 1109 _nc_first_db 1110 _nc_get_source 1111 _nc_handle_sigwinch 1112 _nc_is_abs_path 1113 _nc_is_dir_path 1114 _nc_is_file_path 1115 _nc_keep_tic_dir 1116 _nc_keep_tic_dir 1117 _nc_last_db 1118 _nc_next_db 1119 _nc_read_termtype 1120 _nc_tic_dir 1121 1122 Also (if using the hashed database configuration): 1123 1124 _nc_db_close 1125 _nc_db_first 1126 _nc_db_get 1127 _nc_db_have_data 1128 _nc_db_have_index 1129 _nc_db_next 1130 _nc_db_open 1131 _nc_db_put 1132 1133 otherwise 1134 1135 _nc_hashed_db 1136 1137 Removed internal functions: 1138 none 1139 1140 Modified internal functions: 1141 _nc_add_to_try 1142 _nc_do_color 1143 _nc_expand_try 1144 _nc_remove_key 1145 _nc_setupscreen 1146 1147 5.5 (October 10, 2005) 1148 Interface changes: 1149 1150 + terminfo installs "xterm-new" as "xterm" entry rather than 1151 "xterm-old" (aka xterm-r6). 1152 1153 + terminfo data is installed using the tic -x option (few systems 1154 still use ncurses 4.2). 1155 1156 + modify C++ binding to work with newer C++ compilers by providing 1157 initializers and using modern casts. Old-style header names are 1158 still used in this release to allow compiling with not-so-old 1159 compilers. 1160 1161 + form and menu libraries now work with wide-character data. 1162 Applications which bypassed the form library and manipulated the 1163 FIELD.buf data directly will not work properly with libformw, since 1164 that no longer points to an array of char. The set_field_buffer() 1165 and field_buffer() functions translate to/from the actual field 1166 data. 1167 1168 + change SP->_current_attr to a pointer, adjust ifdef's to ensure that 1169 libtinfo.so and libtinfow.so have the same ABI. The reason for this 1170 is that the corresponding data which belongs to the upper-level 1171 ncurses library has a different size in each model. 1172 1173 + winnstr() now returns multibyte character strings for the 1174 wide-character configuration. 1175 1176 + assume_default_colors() no longer requires that use_default_colors() 1177 be called first. 1178 1179 + data_ahead() now works with wide-characters. 1180 1181 + slk_set() and slk_wset() now accept and store multibyte or 1182 multicolumn characters. 1183 1184 + start_color() now returns OK if colors have already been started. 1185 start_color() also returns ERR if it cannot allocate memory. 1186 1187 + pair_content() now returns -1 for consistency with init_pair() if it 1188 corresponds to the default-color. 1189 1190 + unctrl() now returns null if its parameter does not correspond 1191 to an unsigned char. 1192 1193 Added extensions: 1194 Experimental mouse version 2 supports wheel mice with buttons 1195 4 and 5. This requires ABI 6 because it modifies the encoding 1196 of mouse events. 1197 1198 Experimental extended colors allows encoding of 256 foreground 1199 and background colors, e.g., with the xterm-256color or 1200 xterm-88color terminfo entries. This requires ABI 6 because 1201 it changes the size of cchar_t. 1202 1203 Added internal functions: 1204 _nc_check_termtype2 1205 _nc_resolve_uses2 1206 _nc_retrace_cptr 1207 _nc_retrace_cvoid_ptr 1208 _nc_retrace_void_ptr 1209 _nc_setup_term 1210 1211 Removed internal functions: 1212 none 1213 1214 Modified internal functions: 1215 _nc_insert_ch 1216 _nc_save_str 1217 _nc_trans_string 1218 1219 5.4 (February 8, 2004) 1220 Interface changes: 1221 1222 + add the remaining functions for X/Open curses wide-character support. 1223 These are only available if the library is configured using the 1224 --enable-widec option. 1225 pecho_wchar() 1226 slk_wset() 1227 1228 + write getyx() and related 2-return macros in terms of getcury(), 1229 getcurx(), etc. 1230 1231 + simplify ifdef for bool declaration in curses.h 1232 1233 + modify ifdef's in curses.h that disabled use of __attribute__() for 1234 g++, since recent versions implement the cases which ncurses uses. 1235 1236 + change some interfaces to use const: 1237 define_key() 1238 mvprintw() 1239 mvwprintw() 1240 printw() 1241 vw_printw() 1242 winsnstr() 1243 wprintw() 1244 1245 Added extensions: 1246 key_defined() 1247 1248 Added internal functions: 1249 _nc_get_locale() 1250 _nc_insert_ch() 1251 _nc_is_charable() wide 1252 _nc_locale_breaks_acs() 1253 _nc_pathlast() 1254 _nc_to_char() wide 1255 _nc_to_widechar() wide 1256 _nc_tparm_analyze() 1257 _nc_trace_bufcat() debug 1258 _nc_unicode_locale() 1259 1260 Removed internal functions: 1261 _nc_outstr() 1262 _nc_sigaction() 1263 1264 Modified internal functions: 1265 _nc_remove_string() 1266 _nc_retrace_chtype() 1267 1268 5.3 (October 12, 2002) 1269 Interface changes: 1270 1271 + change type for bool used in headers to NCURSES_BOOL, which usually 1272 is the same as the compiler's definition for 'bool'. 1273 1274 + add all but two functions for X/Open curses wide-character support. 1275 These are only available if the library is configured using the 1276 --enable-widec option. Missing functions are 1277 pecho_wchar() 1278 slk_wset() 1279 1280 + add environment variable $NCURSES_ASSUMED_COLORS to modify the 1281 assume_default_colors() extension. 1282 1283 Added extensions: 1284 is_term_resized() 1285 resize_term() 1286 1287 Added internal functions: 1288 _nc_altcharset_name() debug 1289 _nc_reset_colors() 1290 _nc_retrace_bool() debug 1291 _nc_retrace_unsigned() debug 1292 _nc_rootname() 1293 _nc_trace_ttymode() debug 1294 _nc_varargs() debug 1295 _nc_visbufn() debug 1296 _nc_wgetch() 1297 1298 Removed internal functions: 1299 _nc_background() 1300 1301 Modified internal functions: 1302 _nc_freeall() debug 1303 1304 5.2 (October 21, 2000) 1305 Interface changes: 1306 1307 + revert termcap ospeed variable to 'short' (see discussion of the 1308 --with-ospeed configure option). 1309 1310 5.1 (July 8, 2000) 1311 Interface changes: 1312 1313 + made the extended terminal capabilities 1314 (configure --enable-tcap-names) a standard feature. This should 1315 be transparent to applications that do not require it. 1316 1317 + removed the trace() function and related trace support from the 1318 production library. 1319 1320 + modified curses.h.in, undef'ing some symbols to avoid conflict 1321 with C++ STL. 1322 1323 Added extensions: assume_default_colors(). 1324 1325 5.0 (October 23, 1999) 1326 Interface changes: 1327 1328 + implemented the wcolor_set() and slk_color() functions. 1329 1330 + move macro winch to a function, to hide details of struct ldat 1331 1332 + corrected prototypes for slk_* functions, using chtype rather than 1333 attr_t. 1334 1335 + the slk_attr_{set,off,on} functions need an additional void* 1336 parameter according to XSI. 1337 1338 + modified several prototypes to correspond with 1997 version of X/Open 1339 Curses: [w]attr_get(), [w]attr_set(), border_set() have different 1340 parameters. Some functions were renamed or misspelled: 1341 erase_wchar(), in_wchntr(), mvin_wchntr(). Some developers have used 1342 attr_get(). 1343 1344 Added extensions: keybound(), curses_version(). 1345 1346 Terminfo database changes: 1347 1348 + change translation for termcap 'rs' to terminfo 'rs2', which is 1349 the documented equivalent, rather than 'rs1'. 1350 1351 The problems are subtler in recent releases. 1352 1353 a) This release provides users with the ability to define their own 1354 terminal capability extensions, like termcap. To accomplish this, 1355 we redesigned the TERMTYPE struct (in term.h). Very few 1356 applications use this struct. They must be recompiled to work with 1357 the 5.0 library. 1358 1359 a) If you use the extended terminfo names (i.e., you used configure 1360 --enable-tcap-names), the resulting terminfo database can have some 1361 entries which are not readable by older versions of ncurses. This 1362 is a bug in the older versions: 1363 1364 + the terminfo database stores booleans, numbers and strings in 1365 arrays. The capabilities that are listed in the arrays are 1366 specified by X/Open. ncurses recognizes a number of obsolete and 1367 extended names which are stored past the end of the specified 1368 entries. 1369 1370 + a change to read_entry.c in 951001 made the library do an lseek() 1371 call incorrectly skipping data which is already read from the 1372 string array. This happens when the number of strings in the 1373 terminfo data file is greater than STRCOUNT, the number of 1374 specified and obsolete or extended strings. 1375 1376 + as part of alignment with the X/Open final specification, in the 1377 990109 patch we added two new terminfo capabilities: 1378 set_a_attributes and set_pglen_inch). This makes the indices for 1379 the obsolete and extended capabilities shift up by 2. 1380 1381 + the last two capabilities in the obsolete/extended list are memu 1382 and meml, which are found in most terminfo descriptions for xterm. 1383 1384 When trying to read this terminfo entry, the spurious lseek() 1385 causes the library to attempt to read the final portion of the 1386 terminfo data (the text of the string capabilities) 4 characters 1387 past its starting point, and reads 4 characters too few. The 1388 library rejects the data, and applications are unable to 1389 initialize that terminal type. 1390 1391 FIX: remove memu and meml from the xterm description. They are 1392 obsolete, not used by ncurses. (It appears that the feature was 1393 added to xterm to make it more like hpterm). 1394 1395 This is not a problem if you do not use the -x option of tic to 1396 create a terminfo database with extended names. Note that the 1397 user-defined terminal capabilities are not affected by this bug, 1398 since they are stored in a table after the older terminfo data ends, 1399 and are invisible to the older libraries. 1400 1401 c) Some developers did not wish to use the C++ binding, and used the 1402 configure --without-cxx option. This causes problems if someone 1403 uses the ncurses library from C++ because that configure test 1404 determines the type for C++'s bool and makes ncurses match it, since 1405 both C++ and curses are specified to declare bool. Calling ncurses 1406 functions with the incorrect type for bool will cause execution 1407 errors. In 5.0 we added a configure option "--without-cxx-binding" 1408 which controls whether the binding itself is built and installed. 1409 1410 4.2 (March 2, 1998) 1411 Interface changes: 1412 1413 + correct prototype for termattrs() as per XPG4 version 2. 1414 1415 + add placeholder prototypes for color_set(), erasewchar(), 1416 term_attrs(), wcolor_set() as per XPG4 version 2. 1417 1418 + add macros getcur[xy] getbeg[xy] getpar[xy], which are defined in 1419 SVr4 headers. 1420 1421 New extensions: keyok() and define_key(). 1422 1423 Terminfo database changes: 1424 1425 + corrected definition in curses.h for ACS_LANTERN, which was 'I' 1426 rather than 'i'. 1427 1428 4.1 (May 15, 1997) 1429 1430 We added these extensions: use_default_colors(). Also added 1431 configure option --enable-const, to support the use of const where 1432 X/Open should have, but did not, specify. 1433 1434 The terminfo database content changed the representation of color for 1435 most entries that use ANSI colors. SVr4 curses treats the setaf/setab 1436 and setf/setb capabilities differently, interchanging the red/blue 1437 colors in the latter. 1438 1439 4.0 (December 24, 1996) 1440 1441 We bumped to version 4.0 because the newly released dynamic loader 1442 (ld.so.1.8.5) on Linux did not load shared libraries whose ABI and REL 1443 versions were inconsistent. At that point, ncurses ABI was 3.4 and the 1444 REL was 1.9.9g, so we made them consistent. 1445 1446 1.9.9g (December 1, 1996) 1447 1448 This fixed most of the problems with 1.9.9e, and made these interface 1449 changes: 1450 1451 + remove tparam(), which had been provided for compatibility with 1452 some termcap. tparm() is standard, and does not conflict with 1453 application's fallback for missing tparam(). 1454 1455 + turn off hardware echo in initscr(). This changes the sense of the 1456 echo() function, which was initialized to echoing rather than 1457 nonechoing (the latter is specified). There were several other 1458 corrections to the terminal I/O settings which cause applications to 1459 behave differently. 1460 1461 + implemented several functions (such as attr_on()) which were 1462 available only as macros. 1463 1464 + corrected several typos in curses.h.in (i.e., the mvXXXX macros). 1465 1466 + corrected prototypes for delay_output(), 1467 has_color, immedok() and idcok(). 1468 1469 + corrected misspelled getbkgd(). Some applications used the 1470 misspelled name. 1471 1472 + added _yoffset to WINDOW. The size of WINDOW does not impact 1473 applications, since they use only pointers to WINDOW structs. 1474 1475 These changes were made to the terminfo database: 1476 1477 + removed boolean 'getm' which was available as an extended name. 1478 1479 We added these extensions: wresize(), resizeterm(), has_key() and 1480 mcprint(). 1481 1482 1.9.9e (March 24, 1996) 1483 1484 not recommended (a last-minute/untested change left the forms and 1485 menus libraries unusable since they do not repaint the screen). 1486 Foreground/background colors are combined incorrectly, working properly 1487 only on a black background. When this was released, the X/Open 1488 specification was available only in draft form. 1489 1490 Some applications (such as lxdialog) were "fixed" to work with the 1491 incorrect color scheme. 1492 1493 1494IF YOU ARE A SYSTEM INTEGRATOR: 1495------------------------------ 1496 1497 Configuration and Installation: 1498 1499 On platforms where ncurses is assumed to be installed in /usr/lib, 1500 the configure script uses "/usr" as a default: 1501 1502 Linux, FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, Cygwin 1503 1504 For other platforms, the default is "/usr/local". See the discussion 1505 of the "--disable-overwrite" option. 1506 1507 The location of the terminfo is set indirectly by the "--datadir" 1508 configure option, e.g., /usr/share/terminfo, given a datadir of 1509 /usr/share. You may want to override this if you are installing 1510 ncurses libraries in nonstandard locations, but wish to share the 1511 terminfo database. 1512 1513 Normally the ncurses library is configured in a pure-terminfo mode; 1514 that is, with the --disable-termcap option. This makes the ncurses 1515 library smaller and faster. The ncurses library includes a termcap 1516 emulation that queries the terminfo database, so even applications that 1517 use raw termcap to query terminal characteristics will win (providing 1518 you recompile and relink them!). 1519 1520 If you must configure with termcap fallback enabled, you may also wish 1521 to use the --enable-getcap option. This speeds up termcap-based 1522 startups, at the expense of not allowing personal termcap entries to 1523 reference the terminfo tree. See comments in 1524 ncurses/tinfo/read_termcap.c for further details. 1525 1526 Note that if you have $TERMCAP set, ncurses will use that value 1527 to locate termcap data. In particular, running from xterm will 1528 set $TERMCAP to the contents of the xterm's termcap entry. 1529 If ncurses sees that, it will not examine /etc/termcap. 1530 1531 Keyboard Mapping: 1532 1533 The terminfo file assumes that Shift-Tab generates \E[Z (the ECMA-48 1534 reverse-tabulation sequence) rather than ^I. Here are the loadkeys -d 1535 mappings that will set this up: 1536 1537 keycode 15 = Tab Tab 1538 alt keycode 15 = Meta_Tab 1539 shift keycode 15 = F26 1540 string F26 ="\033[Z" 1541 1542 Naming the Console Terminal 1543 1544 In various systems there has been a practice of designating the system 1545 console driver type as `console'. Please do not do this! It 1546 complicates peoples' lives, because it can mean that several different 1547 terminfo entries from different operating systems all logically want to 1548 be called `console'. 1549 1550 Please pick a name unique to your console driver and set that up 1551 in the /etc/inittab table or local equivalent. Send the entry to the 1552 terminfo maintainer (listed in the misc/terminfo file) to be included 1553 in the terminfo file, if it's not already there. See the 1554 term(7) manual page included with this distribution for more on 1555 conventions for choosing type names. 1556 1557 Here are some recommended primary console names: 1558 1559 linux -- Linux console driver 1560 freebsd -- FreeBSD 1561 netbsd -- NetBSD 1562 bsdos -- BSD/OS 1563 1564 If you are responsible for integrating ncurses for one of these 1565 distribution, please either use the recommended name or get back 1566 to us explaining why you don't want to, so we can work out nomenclature 1567 that will make users' lives easier rather than harder. 1568 1569 1570RECENT XTERM VERSIONS: 1571--------------------- 1572 1573 The terminfo database file included with this distribution assumes you 1574 are running a modern xterm based on XFree86 (i.e., xterm-new). The 1575 earlier X11R6 entry (xterm-r6) and X11R5 entry (xterm-r5) is provided 1576 as well. See the --without-xterm-new configure script option if you 1577 are unable to update your system. 1578 1579 1580CONFIGURING FALLBACK ENTRIES: 1581---------------------------- 1582 1583 In order to support operation of ncurses programs before the terminfo 1584 tree is accessible (that is, in single-user mode or at OS installation 1585 time) the ncurses library can be compiled to include an array of 1586 pre-fetched fallback entries. This must be done on a machine which 1587 has ncurses' infocmp and terminfo database installed. 1588 1589 These entries are checked by setupterm() only when the conventional 1590 fetches from the terminfo tree and the termcap fallback (if configured) 1591 have been tried and failed. Thus, the presence of a fallback will not 1592 shadow modifications to the on-disk entry for the same type, when that 1593 entry is accessible. 1594 1595 By default, there are no entries on the fallback list. After you have 1596 built the ncurses suite for the first time, you can change the list 1597 (the process needs infocmp(1)). To do so, use the script 1598 ncurses/tinfo/MKfallback.sh. A configure script option 1599 --with-fallbacks does this (it accepts a comma-separated list of the 1600 names you wish, and does not require a rebuild). 1601 1602 If you wanted (say) to have linux, vt100, and xterm fallbacks, you 1603 would use the commands 1604 1605 cd ncurses; 1606 tinfo/MKfallback.sh linux vt100 xterm >fallback.c 1607 1608 Then just rebuild and reinstall the library as you would normally. 1609 You can restore the default empty fallback list with 1610 1611 tinfo/MKfallback.sh >fallback.c 1612 1613 The overhead for an empty fallback list is one trivial stub function. 1614 Any non-empty fallback list is const-ed and therefore lives in sharable 1615 text space. You can look at the comment trailing each initializer in 1616 the generated ncurses/fallback.c file to see the core cost of the 1617 fallbacks. A good rule of thumb for modern vt100-like entries is that 1618 each one will cost about 2.5K of text space. 1619 1620 1621BSD CONVERSION NOTES: 1622-------------------- 1623 1624 If you need to support really ancient BSD programs, you probably 1625 want to configure with the --enable-bsdpad option. What this does 1626 is enable code in tputs() that recognizes a numeric prefix on a 1627 capability as a request for that much trailing padding in milliseconds. 1628 There are old BSD programs that do things like tputs("50"). 1629 1630 (If you are distributing ncurses as a support-library component of 1631 an application you probably want to put the remainder of this section 1632 in the package README file.) 1633 1634 The following note applies only if you have configured ncurses with 1635 --enable-termcap. 1636 1637------------------------------- CUT HERE -------------------------------- 1638 1639If you are installing this application privately (either because you 1640have no root access or want to experiment with it before doing a root 1641installation), there are a couple of details you need to be aware of. 1642They have to do with the ncurses library, which uses terminfo rather 1643than termcap for describing terminal characteristics. 1644 1645Though the ncurses library is terminfo-based, it will interpret your 1646TERMCAP variable (if present), any local termcap files you reference 1647through it, and the system termcap file. However, in order to avoid 1648slowing down your application startup, it will only do this once per 1649terminal type! 1650 1651The first time you load a given terminal type from your termcap 1652database, the library initialization code will automatically write it 1653in terminfo format to a subdirectory under $HOME/.terminfo. After 1654that, the initialization code will find it there and do a (much 1655faster) terminfo fetch. 1656 1657Usually, all this means is that your home directory will silently grow 1658an invisible .terminfo subdirectory which will get filled in with 1659terminfo descriptions of terminal types as you invoke them. If anyone 1660ever installs a global terminfo tree on your system, this will quietly 1661stop happening and your $HOME/.terminfo will become redundant. 1662 1663The objective of all this logic is to make converting from BSD termcap 1664as painless as possible without slowing down your application (termcap 1665compilation is expensive). 1666 1667If you don't have a TERMCAP variable or custom personal termcap file, 1668you can skip the rest of this dissertation. 1669 1670If you *do* have a TERMCAP variable and/or a custom personal termcap file 1671that defines a terminal type, that definition will stop being visible 1672to this application after the first time you run it, because it will 1673instead see the terminfo entry that it wrote to $HOME/terminfo the 1674first time around. 1675 1676Subsequently, editing the TERMCAP variable or personal TERMCAP file 1677will have no effect unless you explicitly remove the terminfo entry 1678under $HOME/terminfo. If you do that, the entry will be recompiled 1679from your termcap resources the next time it is invoked. 1680 1681To avoid these complications, use infocmp(1) and tic(1) to edit the 1682terminfo directory directly. 1683 1684------------------------------- CUT HERE -------------------------------- 1685 1686USING NCURSES WITH AFS: 1687 AFS treats each directory as a separate logical filesystem, you 1688 can't hard-link across them. The --enable-symlinks option copes 1689 with this by making tic use symbolic links. 1690 1691USING NCURSES WITH GPM: 1692 Ncurses 4.1 and up can be configured to use GPM (General Purpose 1693 Mouse) which is used on Linux console. Be aware that GPM is commonly 1694 installed as a shared library which contains a wrapper for the curses 1695 wgetch() function (libcurses.o). Some integrators have simplified 1696 linking applications by combining all or part of libcurses.so into the 1697 libgpm.so file, producing symbol conflicts with ncurses (specifically 1698 the wgetch function). This was originally the BSD curses, but 1699 generally whatever curses library exists on the system. 1700 1701 You may be able to work around this problem by linking as follows: 1702 1703 cc -o foo foo.o -lncurses -lgpm -lncurses 1704 1705 but the linker may not cooperate, producing mysterious errors. 1706 See the FAQ, as well as the discussion under the --with-gpm option: 1707 1708 http://invisible-island.net/ncurses/ncurses.faq.html#using_gpm_lib 1709 1710BUILDING NCURSES WITH A CROSS-COMPILER 1711 Ncurses can be built with a cross-compiler. Some parts must be built 1712 with the host's compiler since they are used for building programs 1713 (e.g., ncurses/make_hash and ncurses/make_keys) that generate tables 1714 that are compiled into the ncurses library. The essential thing to do 1715 is set the BUILD_CC environment variable to your host's compiler, and 1716 run the configure script configuring for the cross-compiler. 1717 1718 The configure options --with-build-cc, etc., are provided to make this 1719 simpler. Since make_hash and make_keys use only ANSI C features, it 1720 is normally not necessary to provide the other options such as 1721 --with-build-libs, but they are provided for completeness. 1722 1723 Note that all of the generated source-files which are part of ncurses 1724 will be made if you use 1725 1726 make sources 1727 1728 This would be useful in porting to an environment which has little 1729 support for the tools used to generate the sources, e.g., sed, awk and 1730 Bourne-shell. 1731 1732 When ncurses has been successfully cross-compiled, you may want to use 1733 "make install" (with a suitable target directory) to construct an 1734 install tree. Note that in this case (as with the --with-fallbacks 1735 option), ncurses uses the development platform's tic to do the 1736 "make install.data" portion. 1737 1738BUGS: 1739 Send any feedback to the ncurses mailing list at 1740 bug-ncurses@gnu.org. To subscribe send mail to 1741 bug-ncurses-request@gnu.org with body that reads: 1742 subscribe ncurses <your-email-address-here> 1743 1744 The Hacker's Guide in the doc directory includes some guidelines 1745 on how to report bugs in ways that will get them fixed most quickly. 1746 1747-- vile:txtmode 1748