Writing Programs with NCURSES

by Eric S. Raymond and Zeyd M. Ben-Halim
updates since release 1.9.9e by Thomas Dickey

Contents

• Introduction
  • A Brief History of Curses
  • Scope of This Document
  • Terminology
• The Curses Library
  • An Overview of Curses
    • Compiling Programs using Curses
    • Updating the Screen
    • Standard Windows and Function Naming Conventions
    • Variables
  • Using the Library
    • Starting up
    • Output
    • Input
    • Using Forms Characters
    • Character Attributes and Color
    • Mouse Interfacing
    • Finishing Up
  • Function Descriptions
    • Initialization and Wrapup
    • Causing Output to the Terminal
    • Low-Level Capability Access
    • Debugging
  • Hints, Tips, and Tricks
    • Some Notes of Caution
    • Temporarily Leaving ncurses Mode
    • Using ncurses under xterm
    • Handling Multiple Terminal Screens
    • Testing for Terminal Capabilities
    • Tuning for Speed
    • Special Features of ncurses
  • Compatibility with Older Versions
    • Refresh of Overlapping Windows
    • Background Erase
  • XSI Curses Conformance
• The Panels Library
  • Compiling With the Panels Library
  • Overview of Panels
  • Panels, Input, and the Standard Screen
  • Hiding Panels
  • Miscellaneous Other Facilities
• The Menu Library
  • Compiling with the menu Library
  • Overview of Menus
  • Selecting items
  • Menu Display
  • Menu Windows
  • Processing Menu Input
  • Miscellaneous Other Features
• The Forms Library
  • Compiling with the forms Library
  • Overview of Forms
  • Creating and Freeing Fields and Forms
  • Fetching and Changing Field Attributes
    • Fetching Size and Location Data
    • Changing the Field Location
    • The Justification Attribute
    • Field Display Attributes
    • Field Option Bits
    • Field Status
    • Field User Pointer
  • Variable-Sized Fields
  • Field Validation
    • TYPE_ALPHA
    • TYPE_ALNUM
    • TYPE_ENUM
    • TYPE_INTEGER
    • TYPE_NUMERIC
    • TYPE_REGEXP
  • Direct Field Buffer Manipulation