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<H1 class="no-header">curs_termcap 3x</H1>
<PRE>
<STRONG><A HREF="curs_termcap.3x.html">curs_termcap(3x)</A></STRONG>                                              <STRONG><A HREF="curs_termcap.3x.html">curs_termcap(3x)</A></STRONG>




</PRE><H2><a name="h2-NAME">NAME</a></H2><PRE>
       <STRONG>PC</STRONG>, <STRONG>UP</STRONG>, <STRONG>BC</STRONG>, <STRONG>ospeed</STRONG>, <STRONG>tgetent</STRONG>, <STRONG>tgetflag</STRONG>, <STRONG>tgetnum</STRONG>, <STRONG>tgetstr</STRONG>, <STRONG>tgoto</STRONG>, <STRONG>tputs</STRONG> -
       direct <STRONG>curses</STRONG> interface to the terminfo capability database


</PRE><H2><a name="h2-SYNOPSIS">SYNOPSIS</a></H2><PRE>
       <STRONG>#include</STRONG> <STRONG>&lt;curses.h&gt;</STRONG>
       <STRONG>#include</STRONG> <STRONG>&lt;term.h&gt;</STRONG>

       <STRONG>extern</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>PC;</STRONG>
       <STRONG>extern</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*</STRONG> <STRONG>UP;</STRONG>
       <STRONG>extern</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*</STRONG> <STRONG>BC;</STRONG>
       <STRONG>extern</STRONG> <STRONG>short</STRONG> <STRONG>ospeed;</STRONG>

       <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>tgetent(char</STRONG> <STRONG>*bp,</STRONG> <STRONG>const</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*name);</STRONG>
       <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>tgetflag(const</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*id);</STRONG>
       <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>tgetnum(const</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*id);</STRONG>
       <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*tgetstr(const</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*id,</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>**area);</STRONG>
       <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*tgoto(const</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*cap,</STRONG> <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>col,</STRONG> <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>row);</STRONG>
       <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>tputs(const</STRONG> <STRONG>char</STRONG> <STRONG>*str,</STRONG> <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>affcnt,</STRONG> <STRONG>int</STRONG> <STRONG>(*putc)(int));</STRONG>


</PRE><H2><a name="h2-DESCRIPTION">DESCRIPTION</a></H2><PRE>
       These routines are included as a conversion aid for programs  that  use
       the  <EM>termcap</EM>  library.   Their parameters are the same and the routines
       are emulated using the <EM>terminfo</EM> database.  Thus, they can only be  used
       to  query  the  capabilities  of entries for which a terminfo entry has
       been compiled.


</PRE><H3><a name="h3-INITIALIZATION">INITIALIZATION</a></H3><PRE>
       The <STRONG>tgetent</STRONG> routine loads the entry for <EM>name</EM>.  It returns:

          1  on success,

          0  if there is no such entry (or that it is a generic  type,  having
             too little information for curses applications to run), and

          -1 if the terminfo database could not be found.

       This differs from the <EM>termcap</EM> library in two ways:

          <STRONG>o</STRONG>   The  emulation  ignores  the buffer pointer <EM>bp</EM>.  The <EM>termcap</EM> li-
              brary would store a copy of the terminal description in the area
              referenced  by this pointer.  However, ncurses stores its termi-
              nal descriptions in compiled binary form, which is not the  same
              thing.

          <STRONG>o</STRONG>   There is a difference in return codes.  The <EM>termcap</EM> library does
              not check if the terminal description is marked with the <EM>generic</EM>
              capability,  or  if the terminal description has cursor-address-
              ing.


</PRE><H3><a name="h3-CAPABILITY-VALUES">CAPABILITY VALUES</a></H3><PRE>
       The <STRONG>tgetflag</STRONG> routine gets the boolean entry for <EM>id</EM>, or zero  if  it  is
       not available.

       The  <STRONG>tgetnum</STRONG>  routine gets the numeric entry for <EM>id</EM>, or -1 if it is not
       available.

       The <STRONG>tgetstr</STRONG> routine returns the string entry for <EM>id</EM>, or zero if  it  is
       not  available.  Use <STRONG>tputs</STRONG> to output the returned string.  The <EM>area</EM> pa-
       rameter is used as follows:

          <STRONG>o</STRONG>   It is assumed to be the address of a pointer to a buffer managed
              by the calling application.

          <STRONG>o</STRONG>   However, ncurses checks to ensure that <STRONG>area</STRONG> is not NULL, and al-
              so that the resulting buffer pointer is  not  NULL.   If  either
              check fails, the <EM>area</EM> parameter is ignored.

          <STRONG>o</STRONG>   If  the  checks succeed, ncurses also copies the return value to
              the buffer pointed to by <EM>area</EM>, and the <EM>area</EM> value will be updat-
              ed to point past the null ending this value.

          <STRONG>o</STRONG>   The  return  value itself is an address in the terminal descrip-
              tion which is loaded into memory.

       Only the first two characters of the <STRONG>id</STRONG> parameter of <STRONG>tgetflag</STRONG>,  <STRONG>tgetnum</STRONG>
       and <STRONG>tgetstr</STRONG> are compared in lookups.


</PRE><H3><a name="h3-FORMATTING-CAPABILITIES">FORMATTING CAPABILITIES</a></H3><PRE>
       The <STRONG>tgoto</STRONG> routine expands the given capability using the parameters.

       <STRONG>o</STRONG>   Because  the  capability may have padding characters, the output of
           <STRONG>tgoto</STRONG> should be passed to <STRONG>tputs</STRONG> rather than some other output func-
           tion such as <STRONG>printf</STRONG>.

       <STRONG>o</STRONG>   While  <STRONG>tgoto</STRONG> is assumed to be used for the two-parameter cursor po-
           sitioning capability, termcap applications also use it for  single-
           parameter capabilities.

           Doing this shows a quirk in <STRONG>tgoto</STRONG>: most hardware terminals use cur-
           sor addressing with <EM>row</EM> first, but the original developers  of  the
           termcap  interface  chose  to  put the <EM>column</EM> parameter first.  The
           <STRONG>tgoto</STRONG> function swaps the order of parameters.  It  does  this  also
           for  calls  requiring  only  a single parameter.  In that case, the
           first parameter is merely a placeholder.

       <STRONG>o</STRONG>   Normally the ncurses library is compiled with terminfo support.  In
           that case, <STRONG>tgoto</STRONG> uses <STRONG><A HREF="curs_terminfo.3x.html">tparm(3x)</A></STRONG> (a more capable formatter).

           However,  <STRONG>tparm</STRONG>  is not a <EM>termcap</EM> feature, and portable <EM>termcap</EM> ap-
           plications should not rely upon its availability.

       The <STRONG>tputs</STRONG> routine is described on the  <STRONG><A HREF="curs_terminfo.3x.html">curs_terminfo(3x)</A></STRONG>  manual  page.
       It can retrieve capabilities by either termcap or terminfo name.


</PRE><H3><a name="h3-GLOBAL-VARIABLES">GLOBAL VARIABLES</a></H3><PRE>
       The  variables <STRONG>PC</STRONG>, <STRONG>UP</STRONG> and <STRONG>BC</STRONG> are set by <STRONG>tgetent</STRONG> to the terminfo entry's
       data for <STRONG>pad_char</STRONG>, <STRONG>cursor_up</STRONG> and <STRONG>backspace_if_not_bs</STRONG>, respectively.  <STRONG>UP</STRONG>
       is  not used by ncurses.  <STRONG>PC</STRONG> is used in the <STRONG>tdelay_output</STRONG> function.  <STRONG>BC</STRONG>
       is used in the <STRONG>tgoto</STRONG> emulation.  The variable <STRONG>ospeed</STRONG> is set by  ncurses
       in a system-specific coding to reflect the terminal speed.


</PRE><H2><a name="h2-RETURN-VALUE">RETURN VALUE</a></H2><PRE>
       Except  where  explicitly noted, routines that return an integer return
       <STRONG>ERR</STRONG> upon failure and <STRONG>OK</STRONG> (SVr4 only specifies "an  integer  value  other
       than <STRONG>ERR</STRONG>") upon successful completion.

       Routines that return pointers return <STRONG>NULL</STRONG> on error.


</PRE><H2><a name="h2-BUGS">BUGS</a></H2><PRE>
       If  you  call <STRONG>tgetstr</STRONG> to fetch <STRONG>ca</STRONG> or any other parameterized string, be
       aware that it will be returned in terminfo notation, not the older  and
       not-quite-compatible termcap notation.  This will not cause problems if
       all you do with it is call <STRONG>tgoto</STRONG> or <STRONG>tparm</STRONG>, which both expand  terminfo-
       style  strings as terminfo.  (The <STRONG>tgoto</STRONG> function, if configured to sup-
       port termcap, will check if the  string  is  indeed  terminfo-style  by
       looking  for  "%p"  parameters or "$&lt;..&gt;" delays, and invoke a termcap-
       style parser if the string does not appear to be terminfo).

       Because terminfo conventions for representing padding in  string  capa-
       bilities  differ  from  termcap's,  <STRONG>tputs("50");</STRONG> will put out a literal
       "50" rather than busy-waiting for 50 milliseconds.  Cope with it.

       Note that termcap has nothing analogous to terminfo's <STRONG>sgr</STRONG> string.   One
       consequence  of  this  is that termcap applications assume me (terminfo
       <STRONG>sgr0</STRONG>) does not reset the alternate character set.  This  implementation
       checks for, and modifies the data shown to the termcap interface to ac-
       commodate termcap's limitation in this respect.


</PRE><H2><a name="h2-PORTABILITY">PORTABILITY</a></H2><PRE>
       These functions are provided for supporting  legacy  applications,  and
       should not be used in new programs:

       <STRONG>o</STRONG>   The XSI Curses standard, Issue 4 describes these functions.  Howev-
           er, they are marked TO BE WITHDRAWN and may be  removed  in  future
           versions.

       <STRONG>o</STRONG>   X/Open Curses, Issue 5 (December 2007) marked the termcap interface
           (along with <STRONG>vwprintw</STRONG> and <STRONG>vwscanw</STRONG>) as withdrawn.

       Neither the XSI Curses standard nor the SVr4 man pages  documented  the
       return  values  of <STRONG>tgetent</STRONG> correctly, though all three were in fact re-
       turned ever since SVr1.  In particular, an omission in the  XSI  Curses
       documentation  has  been misinterpreted to mean that <STRONG>tgetent</STRONG> returns <STRONG>OK</STRONG>
       or <STRONG>ERR</STRONG>.  Because the purpose of these functions is to provide  compati-
       bility  with the <EM>termcap</EM> library, that is a defect in XCurses, Issue 4,
       Version 2 rather than in ncurses.

       External variables are provided for support of certain termcap applica-
       tions.  However, termcap applications' use of those variables is poorly
       documented, e.g., not distinguishing between input and output.  In par-
       ticular,  some  applications  are reported to declare and/or modify <STRONG>os-</STRONG>
       <STRONG>peed</STRONG>.

       The comment that only the first two characters of the <STRONG>id</STRONG> parameter  are
       used escapes many application developers.  The original BSD 4.2 termcap
       library (and historical relics thereof) did not require a trailing null
       NUL  on  the  parameter  name  passed to <STRONG>tgetstr</STRONG>, <STRONG>tgetnum</STRONG> and <STRONG>tgetflag</STRONG>.
       Some applications assume that the termcap interface  does  not  require
       the trailing NUL for the parameter name.  Taking into account these is-
       sues:

       <STRONG>o</STRONG>   As a special case,  <STRONG>tgetflag</STRONG>  matched  against  a  single-character
           identifier  provided  that  was at the end of the terminal descrip-
           tion.  You should not rely upon this behavior in portable programs.
           This  implementation disallows matches against single-character ca-
           pability names.

       <STRONG>o</STRONG>   This implementation disallows  matches  by  the  termcap  interface
           against extended capability names which are longer than two charac-
           ters.


</PRE><H2><a name="h2-SEE-ALSO">SEE ALSO</a></H2><PRE>
       <STRONG><A HREF="ncurses.3x.html">curses(3x)</A></STRONG>, <STRONG><A HREF="terminfo.5.html">terminfo(5)</A></STRONG>, <STRONG><A HREF="term_variables.3x.html">term_variables(3x)</A></STRONG>, <STRONG>putc(3)</STRONG>.

       https://invisible-island.net/ncurses/tctest.html



                                                              <STRONG><A HREF="curs_termcap.3x.html">curs_termcap(3x)</A></STRONG>
</PRE>
<div class="nav">
<ul>
<li><a href="#h2-NAME">NAME</a></li>
<li><a href="#h2-SYNOPSIS">SYNOPSIS</a></li>
<li><a href="#h2-DESCRIPTION">DESCRIPTION</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="#h3-INITIALIZATION">INITIALIZATION</a></li>
<li><a href="#h3-CAPABILITY-VALUES">CAPABILITY VALUES</a></li>
<li><a href="#h3-FORMATTING-CAPABILITIES">FORMATTING CAPABILITIES</a></li>
<li><a href="#h3-GLOBAL-VARIABLES">GLOBAL VARIABLES</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
<li><a href="#h2-RETURN-VALUE">RETURN VALUE</a></li>
<li><a href="#h2-BUGS">BUGS</a></li>
<li><a href="#h2-PORTABILITY">PORTABILITY</a></li>
<li><a href="#h2-SEE-ALSO">SEE ALSO</a></li>
</ul>
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