d/freebsd-dev
1
0
Fork 0
Code Issues Pull Requests Packages Projects Releases Wiki Activity
4100386cb1
freebsd-dev/contrib/ncurses/ANNOUNCE

352 lines
17 KiB
Plaintext
Raw Normal View History

Import unmodified (but trimmed) ncurses 5.0 prerelease 990821. This contains the full eti (panel, form, menu) extensions. bmake glue to follow. Obtained from: ftp://ftp.clark.net/pub/dickey/ncurses
1999-08-24 01:06:48 +00:00
Announcing ncurses 5.0
The ncurses (new curses) library is a free software emulation of
curses in System V Release 4.0, and more. It uses terminfo format,
supports pads and color and multiple highlights and forms characters
and function-key mapping, and has all the other SYSV-curses
enhancements over BSD curses.
In mid-June 1995, the maintainer of 4.4BSD curses declared that he
considered 4.4BSD curses obsolete, and is encouraging the keepers of
Unix releases such as BSD/OS, freeBSD and netBSD to switch over to
ncurses.
The ncurses code was developed under GNU/Linux. It should port easily
to any ANSI/POSIX-conforming UNIX. It has even been ported to OS/2
Warp!
The distribution includes the library and support utilities, including
a terminfo compiler tic(1), a decompiler infocmp(1), clear(1),
tput(1), tset(1), and a termcap conversion tool captoinfo(1). Full
manual pages are provided for the library and tools.
The ncurses distribution is available via anonymous FTP at the GNU
distribution site [1]ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu. It is also available
at [2]ftp://ftp.clark.net/pub/dickey/ncurses.
Release Notes
We decided to release ncurses as a new whole number release (5.0)
because it incorporates several interface changes, including some that
would invalidate existing shared libraries. These are the highlights
from the change-log since ncurses 4.2 release.
Interface changes:
* The principal source of changes to the interface comes from the
release of X/Open Curses in 1997. Earlier versions of ncurses (4.0
and before) were based on a draft version of the specification.
The release version adds parameters to some functions to support
the evolving internationalization of curses. These summarize the
impact:
+ modified several prototypes to correspond with 1997 version
of X/Open Curses (affects ABI since developers have used
attr_get).
+ corrected prototypes for slk_* functions, using chtype rather
than attr_t.
+ the slk_attr_{set,off,on} functions need an additional void*
parameter according to XSI.
+ correct macros for wattr_set, wattr_get, separate wattrset
macro from these to preserve behavior that allows attributes
to be combined with color pair numbers.
+ reviewed/updated curses.h, term.h against X/Open Curses Issue
4 Version 2. This includes making some parameters
NCURSES_CONST rather than const, e.g., in termcap.h.
+ reviewed/corrected macros in curses.h as per XSI document.
+ add set_a_attributes and set_pglen_inch to terminfo
structure, as per XSI and Solaris 2.5.
* The newest version of the X/Open Curses is implemented on Solaris
and other vendor's systems. It adds new features to the terminfo
descriptions:
+ implement tparm %l format.
+ implement tparm printf-style width and precision for %s, %d,
%x, %o as per XSI.
* We made additional changes to reduce impact by future interface
changes:
+ change key_names[] array to static since it is not part of
the curses interface.
+ move macro winch to a function, to hide details of struct
ldat
* modify configure script to embed ABI in shared libraries for HP-UX
10.x (detailed request by Tim Mooney).
* modify configuration of shared libraries on Digital Unix so that
versioning is embedded in the library, rather than implied by
links (patch by Tim Mooney).
New features:
* enable sigwinch handler by default.
* turn on hashmap scrolling code by default
* improved support for termcap applications
+ modify tput to accept termcap names as an alternative to
terminfo names.
+ provide support for termcap PC variable by copying it from
terminfo data and using it as the padding character in tputs.
+ provide support for termcap ospeed variable by copying it
from the internal cur_term member, and using ospeed as the
baudrate reference for the delay_output and tputs functions.
+ change name-comparisons in lib_termcap to compare no more
than 2 characters.
+ add configure option --enable-tcap-names, which essentially
allows users to define new capabilities as in termcap.
* add mouse support to ncurses menus.
* add mouse and dll support for OS/2 EMX
* modify terminfo parsing to accept octal and hexadecimal constants
* add configure option --enable-no-padding, to allow environment
variable $NCURSES_NO_PADDING to eliminate non-mandatory padding,
thereby making terminal emulators (e.g., for vt100) a little more
efficient.
* modify lib_color.c to eliminate dependency on orig_colors and
orig_pair, since SVr4 curses does not require these either, but
uses them when they are available.
* add -f option to infocmp and tic, which formats the terminfo
if/then/else/endif so that they are readable (with newlines and
tabs).
* modify tic to compile into %'char' form in preference to
%{number}, since that is a little more efficient.
Major bug fixes:
* modify lib_tstp.c to block SIGTTOU when handling SIGTSTP, fixes a
problem where ncurses applications which were run via a shell
script would hang when given a ^Z. Also, check if the terminal's
process group is consistent, i.e., a shell has not taken ownership
of it, before deciding to save the current terminal settings in
the SIGTSTP handler.
* suppress sc/rc capabilities from terminal description if they
appear in smcup/rmcup. This affects only scrolling optimization,
to fix a problem reported by several people with xterm's alternate
screen, though the problem is more general.
* modify relative_move and tputs to avoid an interaction with the
BSD-style padding. The relative_move function could produce a
string to replace on the screen which began with a numeric
character, which was then interpreted by tputs as padding.
* modify setupterm so that cancelled strings are treated the same as
absent strings, cancelled and absent booleans false (does not
affect tic, infocmp).
* modify lib_vidattr.c to allow for terminal types (e.g.,
xterm-color) which may reset all attributes in the 'op'
capability, so that colors are set before turning on bold and
other attributes, but still after turning attributes off.
* use 'access()' to check if ncurses library should be permitted to
open or modify files with fopen/open/link/unlink/remove calls, in
case the calling application is running in setuid mode.
* correction to doupdate, for case where terminal does not support
insert/delete character. The logic did not check that there was a
difference in alignment of changes to old/new screens before
repainting the whole non-blank portion of the line. Modified to
fall through into logic that reduces by the portion which does not
differ.
Features of Ncurses
The ncurses package is fully compatible with SVr4 (System V Release 4)
curses:
* All 257 of the SVr4 calls have been implemented (and are
documented).
* Full support for SVr4 curses features including keyboard mapping,
color, forms-drawing with ACS characters, and automatic
recognition of keypad and function keys.
* An emulation of the SVr4 panels library, supporting a stack of
windows with backing store, is included.
* An emulation of the SVr4 menus library, supporting a uniform but
flexible interface for menu programming, is included.
* An emulation of the SVr4 form library, supporting data collection
through on-screen forms, is included.
* Binary terminfo entries generated by the ncurses tic(1)
implementation are bit-for-bit-compatible with the entry format
SVr4 curses uses.
* The utilities have options to allow you to filter terminfo entries
for use with less capable curses/terminfo versions such as the
HP/UX and AIX ports.
The ncurses package also has many useful extensions over SVr4:
* The API is 8-bit clean and base-level conformant with the X/OPEN
curses specification, XSI curses (that is, it implements all BASE
level features, but not all EXTENDED features). Most
EXTENDED-level features not directly concerned with wide-character
support are implemented, including many function calls not
supported under SVr4 curses (but portability of all calls is
documented so you can use the SVr4 subset only).
* Unlike SVr4 curses, ncurses can write to the rightmost-bottommost
corner of the screen if your terminal has an insert-character
capability.
* Ada95 and C++ bindings.
* Support for mouse event reporting with X Window xterm and OS/2
console windows.
* Extended mouse support via Alessandro Rubini's gpm package.
* The function wresize() allows you to resize windows, preserving
their data.
* The function use_default_colors() allows you to use the terminal's
default colors for the default color pair, achieving the effect of
transparent colors.
* The functions keyok() and define_key() allow you to better control
the use of function keys, e.g., disabling the ncurses KEY_MOUSE,
or by defining more than one control sequence to map to a given
key code.
* Support for 16-color terminals, such as aixterm and XFree86 xterm.
* Better cursor-movement optimization. The package now features a
cursor-local-movement computation more efficient than either BSD's
or System V's.
* Super hardware scrolling support. The screen-update code
incorporates a novel, simple, and cheap algorithm that enables it
to make optimal use of hardware scrolling, line-insertion, and
line-deletion for screen-line movements. This algorithm is more
powerful than the 4.4BSD curses quickch() routine.
* Real support for terminals with the magic-cookie glitch. The
screen-update code will refrain from drawing a highlight if the
magic- cookie unattributed spaces required just before the
beginning and after the end would step on a non-space character.
It will automatically shift highlight boundaries when doing so
would make it possible to draw the highlight without changing the
visual appearance of the screen.
* It is possible to generate the library with a list of pre-loaded
fallback entries linked to it so that it can serve those terminal
types even when no terminfo tree or termcap file is accessible
(this may be useful for support of screen-oriented programs that
must run in single-user mode).
* The tic(1)/captoinfo utility provided with ncurses has the ability
to translate many termcaps from the XENIX, IBM and AT&T extension
sets.
* A BSD-like tset(1) utility is provided.
* The ncurses library and utilities will automatically read terminfo
entries from $HOME/.terminfo if it exists, and compile to that
directory if it exists and the user has no write access to the
system directory. This feature makes it easier for users to have
personal terminfo entries without giving up access to the system
terminfo directory.
* You may specify a path of directories to search for compiled
descriptions with the environment variable TERMINFO_DIRS (this
generalizes the feature provided by TERMINFO under stock System
V.)
* In terminfo source files, use capabilities may refer not just to
other entries in the same source file (as in System V) but also to
compiled entries in either the system terminfo directory or the
user's $HOME/.terminfo directory.
* A script (capconvert) is provided to help BSD users transition
from termcap to terminfo. It gathers the information in a TERMCAP
environment variable and/or a ~/.termcap local entries file and
converts it to an equivalent local terminfo tree under
$HOME/.terminfo.
* Automatic fallback to the /etc/termcap file can be compiled in
when it is not possible to build a terminfo tree. This feature is
neither fast nor cheap, you don't want to use it unless you have
to, but it's there.
* The table-of-entries utility toe makes it easy for users to see
exactly what terminal types are available on the system.
* The library meets the XSI requirement that every macro entry point
have a corresponding function which may be linked (and will be
prototype-checked) if the macro definition is disabled with
#undef.
* An HTML "Introduction to Programming with NCURSES" document
provides a narrative introduction to the curses programming
interface.
State of the Package
Numerous bugs present in earlier versions have been fixed; the library
is far more reliable than it used to be. Bounds checking in many
`dangerous' entry points has been improved. The code is now type-safe
according to gcc -Wall. The library has been checked for malloc leaks
and arena corruption by the Purify memory-allocation tester.
The ncurses code has been tested with a wide variety of applications
including (versions starting with those noted):
ded
directory-editor [3]ftp://ftp.clark.net/pub/dickey/ded.
dialog
the underlying application used in Slackware's setup, and the
basis for similar applications on GNU/Linux.
lynx-2.7
the character-screen WWW browser
Midnight Commander 4.1
file manager
mutt 0.88
mail utility
ncftp 2.0
file-transfer utility
nvi
New vi versions 1.50 are able to use ncurses versions 1.9.7 and
later.
taper
tape archive utility
vh-1.6
Volks-Hypertext browser for the Jargon File
as well as some that use ncurses for the terminfo support alone:
minicom-1.75
terminal emulator
tin-unoff
tin 1.4 newsreader, supporting color, MIME
[4]ftp://ftp.akk.uni-karlsruhe.de/pub/news/clients/tin-unoff.
vile
vi-like-emacs [5]ftp://ftp.clark.net/pub/dickey/vile.
The ncurses distribution includes a selection of test programs
(including a few games).
Who's Who and What's What
The original developers of ncurses are [6]Zeyd Ben-Halim and [7]Eric
S. Raymond. Ongoing work is being done by [8]Thomas Dickey and
[9]J<>rgen Pfeifer. [10]Florian La Roche acts as the maintainer for the
Free Software Foundation, which holds the copyright on ncurses.
Contact the current maintainers at [11]bug-ncurses@gnu.org.
To join the ncurses mailing list, please write email to
bug-ncurses-request@gnu.org containing the line:
subscribe <name>@<host.domain>
This list is open to anyone interested in helping with the development
and testing of this package.
Beta versions of ncurses and patches to the current release are made
available at [12]ftp://ftp.clark.net/pub/dickey/ncurses.
Future Plans
* Extended-level XPG4 conformance, with internationalization
support.
* Ports to more systems, including DOS and Windows.
We need people to help with these projects. If you are interested in
working on them, please join the ncurses list.
Other Related Resources
The distribution includes and uses a version of the terminfo-format
terminal description file maintained by Eric Raymond.
[13]http://earthspace.net/~esr/terminfo.
You can find lots of information on terminal-related topics not
covered in the terminfo file at [14]Richard Shuford's archive.
References
1. ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu
2. ftp://ftp.clark.net/pub/dickey/ncurses
3. ftp://ftp.clark.net/pub/dickey/ded
4. ftp://ftp.akk.uni-karlsruhe.de/pub/news/clients/tin-unoff
5. ftp://ftp.clark.net/pub/dickey/vile
6. mailto:zmbenhal@netcom.com
7. http://www.ccil.org/~esr/home.html
8. mailto:dickey@clark.net
9. mailto:juergen.pfeifer@gmx.net
10. mailto:florian@gnu.org
11. mailto:bug-ncurses@gnu.org
12. ftp://ftp.clark.net/pub/dickey/ncurses
13. http://earthspace.net/~esr/terminfo
14. http://www.cs.utk.edu/~shuford/terminal_index.html
Reference in New Issue Copy Permalink