terminfo(4) terminfo(4)
NAME
terminfo - terminal capability data base
SYNOPSIS
/usr/share/lib/terminfo/?/*
DESCRIPTION
terminfo is a database produced by tic(1M) that describes the capabil-
ities of devices such as terminals and printers. Devices are described
in terminfo source files by specifying a set of capabilities, by quan-
tifying certain aspects of the device, and by specifying character
sequences that effect particular results. This database is often used
by screen-oriented applications such as vi(1) and curses(3X) programs,
as well as by some Reliant UNIX commands such as ls(1) and more(1).
This usage allows them to work with a variety of devices without
changes to the programs.
terminfo source files consist of one or more device descriptions. Each
description consists of a header (beginning in column 1) and one or
more lines that list the features for that particular device. Every
line in a terminfo source file must end in a comma (,). Every line in
a terminfo source file except the header must be indented with one or
more white spaces (either spaces or tabs).
Entries in terminfo source files consist of a number of comma-sepa-
rated fields. White space after each comma is ignored. Embedded commas
must be escaped by using a backslash. The following example shows the
format of a terminfo source file.
alias1 | alias2 | ... | aliasn | longname,
<white space> am, lines #24,
<white space> home=\Eeh,
The first line, commonly referred to as the header line, must begin in
column one and must contain at least two aliases separated by vertical
bars. The last field in the header line must be the long name of the
device and it may contain any string. Alias names must be unique in
the terminfo database and they must conform to Reliant UNIX file nam-
ing conventions; they cannot, for example, contain white space or
slashes.
Every device must be assigned a name, such as vt100. Device names
(except the long name) should be chosen using the following conven-
tions. The name should not contain hyphens because hyphens are
reserved for use when adding suffixes that indicate special modes.
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These special modes may be modes that the hardware can be in, or user
preferences. To assign a special mode to a particular device, append a
suffix consisting of a hyphen and an indicator of the mode to the
device name. For example, the -w suffix means "wide mode"; when speci-
fied, it allows for a width of 132 columns instead of the standard 80
columns. Therefore, if you want to use a vt100 device set to wide
mode, name the device vt100-w. Use the following suffixes where possi-
ble.
_______________________________________________________________
| Suffix Meaning Example |
|______________________________________________________________|
| -w Wide mode (more than 80 columns) 5410-w |
| -am With automatic margins (usually default) vt100-am |
| -nam Without automatic margins vt100-nam|
| -n Number of lines on the screen 2300-40 |
| -na No arrow keys (leave them in local) c100-na |
| -np Number of pages of memory c100-4p |
| -rv Reverse video 4415-rv |
|______________________________________________________________|
The terminfo reference manual page is organized in the two parts
DEVICE CAPABILITIES and PRINTER CAPABILITIES.
PART 1: DEVICE CAPABILITIES
Capabilities in terminfo are of three types: Boolean capabilities
(which show that a device has or does not have a particular feature),
numeric capabilities (which quantify particular features of a device),
and string capabilities (which provide sequences that can be used to
perform particular operations on devices).
The table of capabilities has the following columns:
Variable
The name by which a C programmer accesses a capability (at the
terminfo level).
Capname (CN)
The short name for a capability specified in the terminfo source
file. It is used by a person updating the source file and by the
tput(1) command.
Termcap Code (TCC)
A two-letter sequence that corresponds to the termcap capability
name. (Note that termcap is no longer supported.)
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Booleans
Variable CN TCC Description
________________________________________________________________________________
autoleftmargin bw bw cub1 wraps from column 0 to last column
autorightmargin am am Terminal has automatic margins
backcolorerase bce be Screen erased with background color
canchange ccc cc Terminal can redefine existing color
ceolstandoutglitch xhp xs Standout not erased by overwriting (hp)
coladdrglitch xhpa YA Only positive motion for hpa/mhpa caps
cpichangesres cpix YF Changing character pitch changes resolu-
tion
crcancelsmicromode crxm YB Using cr turns off micro mode
desttabsmagicsmso xt xt Destructive tabs, magic smso char (t1061)
eatnewlineglitch xenl xn Newline ignored after 80 columns (Con-
cept)
eraseoverstrike eo eo Can erase overstrikes with a blank
generictype gn gn Generic line type (e.g. dialup, switch)
getmouse getm Gm curses should get button events
hardcopy hc hc Hardcopy terminal
hardcursor chts HC Cursor is hard to see
hasmetakey km km Has a meta key (shift, sets parity bit)
hasprintwheel daisy YC Printer needs operator to change charac-
ter set
hasstatusline hs hs Has extra "status line"
huelightnesssaturation hls hl Terminal uses only HLS color notation
(Tektronix)
insertnullglitch in in Insert mode distinguishes nulls
lpichangesres lpix YG Changing line pitch changes resolution
memoryabove da da Display may be retained above the screen
memorybelow db db Display may be retained below the screen
moveinsertmode mir mi Safe to move while in insert mode
movestandoutmode msgr ms Safe to move in standout modes
needsxonxoff nxon nx Padding won't work, xon/xoff required
nondestscrollregion ndscr ND Scrolling region is non-destructive
nonrevrmcup nrrmc NR smcup does not reverse rmcup
noescctlc xsb xb Beehive (f1=escape, f2=ctrl C)
nopadchar npc NP Pad character doesn't exist
overstrike os os Terminal overstrikes on hardcopy terminal
prtrsilent mc5i 5i Printer won't echo on screen
rowaddrglitch xvpa YD Only positive motion for vpa/mvpa caps
semiautorightmargin sam YE Printing in last column causes cr
statuslineescok eslok es Escape can be used on the status line
tildeglitch hz hz Hazeltine; can't print tilde (~)
transparentunderline ul ul Underline character overstrikes
xonxoff xon xo Terminal uses xon/xoff handshaking
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Numbers
Variable CN TCC Description
_______________________________________________________________________________
bitimageentwining bitwin Yo Number of passes for each bit-map row
bitimagetype bitype Yp Type of bit image device
buffercapacity bufsz Ya Number of bytes buffered before printing
buttons btns BT Number of buttons on the mouse
columns cols co Number of columns in a line
dothorzspacing spinh Yc Spacing of dots horizontally in dots per
inch
dotvertspacing spinv Yb Spacing of pins vertically in pins per
inch
inittabs it it Tabs initially every # spaces
labelheight lh lh Number of rows in each label
labelwidth lw lw Number of columns in each label
lines lines li Number of lines on a screen or a page
linesofmemory lm lm Lines of memory if > lines; 0 means
varies
magiccookieglitch xmc sg Number of blank characters left by smso
or rmso
maximumwindows wnum MW Maximum number of definable windows
maxattributes ma ma Maximum combined video attributes termi-
nal can display
maxcolors colors Co Maximum number of colors on the screen
maxmicroaddress maddr Yd Maximum value in micro...address
maxmicrojump mjump Ye Maximum value in parm...micro
maxpairs pairs pa Maximum number of color pairs on the
screen
microcolsize mcs Yf Character step size when in micro mode
microlinesize mls Yg Line step size when in micro mode
nocolorvideo ncv NC Video attributes that can't be used with
colors
numberofpins npins Yh Number of pins in printhead
numlabels nlab Nl Number of labels on screen (start at 1)
outputreschar orc Yi Horizontal resolution in units per char-
acter
outputreshorzinch orhi Yk Horizontal resolution in units per inch
outputresline orl Yj Vertical resolution in units per line
outputresvertinch orvi Yl Vertical resolution in units per inch
paddingbaudrate pb pb Lowest baud rate where padding needed
printrate cps Ym Print rate in characters per second
virtualterminal vt vt Virtual terminal number
widecharsize widcs Yn Character step size when in double-wide
mode
widthstatusline wsl ws Number of columns in status line
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Strings
Variable CN TCC Description
_______________________________________________________________________________
acschars acsc ac Graphic charset pairs aAbBcC
altscancodeesc scesa S8 Alternate escape for scancode emulation
(default is for vt100)
backtab cbt bt Back tab
bell bel bl Audible signal (bell)
bitimagecarriagereturn bicr Yv Move to beginning of same row
bitimagenewline binel Zz Move to next row of the bit image
bitimagerepeat birep Zy Repeat bit-image cell #1 #2 times
carriagereturn cr cr Carriage return
changecharpitch cpi ZA Change number of characters per inch
changelinepitch lpi ZB Change number of lines per inch
changereshorz chr ZC Change horizontal resolution
changeresvert cvr ZD Change vertical resolution
changescrollregion csr cs Change to lines #1 through #2 (vt100)
charpadding rmp rP Like ip but when in replace mode
charsetnames csnm Zy List of character set names
clearalltabs tbc ct Clear all tab stops
clearmargins mgc MC Clear all margins (top, bottom, and
sides)
clearscreen clear cl Clear screen and home cursor
clrbol el1 cb Clear to beginning of line, inclusive
clreol el ce Clear to end of line
clreos ed cd Clear to end of display
codesetinit csin ci Init sequence for multiple codesets
colornames colornm Yw Give name for color #1
columnaddress hpa ch Horizontal position absolute
commandcharacter cmdch CC Terminal settable cmd character in pro-
totype
createwindow cwin CW Define win #1 to go from #2,#3 to #4,#5
cursoraddress cup cm Move to row #1 column #2
cursordown cud1 do Down one line
cursorhome home ho Home cursor (if no cup)
cursorinvisible civis vi Make cursor invisible
cursorleft cub1 le Move left one space
cursormemaddress mrcup CM Memory relative cursor addressing
cursornormal cnorm ve Make cursor appear normal (undo vs/vi)
cursorright cuf1 nd Non-destructive space (cursor or car-
riage right)
cursortoll ll ll Last line, first column (if no cup)
cursorup cuu1 up Upline (cursor up)
cursorvisible cvvis vs Make cursor very visible
definebitimageregion defbi Yx Define rectangular bit-image region
definechar defc ZE Define a character in a character set
deletecharacter dch1 dc Delete character
deleteline dl1 dl Delete line
devicetype devt dv Indicate language/codeset support
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dialphone dial DI Dial phone number #1
displayclock dclk DK Display time-of-day clock
displaypcchar dispc S1 Display PC character
disstatusline dsl ds Disable status line
downhalfline hd hd Half-line down (forward ½ linefeed)
enaacs enacs eA Enable alternate character set
endbitimageregion endbi Yy End a bit-image region
enteraltcharsetmode smacs as Start alternate character set
enterammode smam SA Turn on automatic margins
enterblinkmode blink mb Turn on blinking
enterboldmode bold md Turn on bold (extra bright) mode
entercamode smcup ti String to begin programs that use cup
enterdeletemode smdc dm Delete mode (enter)
enterdimmode dim mh Turn on half-bright mode
enterdoublewidemode swidm ZF Enable double wide printing
enterdraftquality sdrfq ZG Set draft quality print
enterhorizontalhlmode ehhlm Turn on horizontal highlight mode
enterinsertmode smir im Insert mode (enter)
enteritalicsmode sitm ZH Enable italics
enterleftwardmode slm ZI Enable leftward carriage motion
enterlefthlmode elhlm Turn on left highlight mode
enterlowhlmode elohlm Turn on low highlight mode
entermicromode smicm ZJ Enable micro motion capabilities
enternearletterquality snlq ZK Set near-letter quality print
enternormalquality snrmq ZL Set normal quality print
enterpccharsetmode smpch S2 Enter PC character display mode
enterprotectedmode prot mp Turn on protected mode
enterreversemode rev mr Turn on reverse video mode
enterrighthlmode erhlm Turn on right highlight mode
enterscancodemode smsc S4 Enter PC scancode mode
entersecuremode invis mk Turn on blank mode (characters invisi-
ble)
entershadowmode sshm ZM Enable shadow printing
enterstandoutmode smso so Begin standout mode
entersubscriptmode ssubm ZN Enable subscript printing
entersuperscriptmode ssupm ZO Enable superscript printing
entertophlmode ethlm Turn on top highlight mode
enterunderlinemode smul us Start underscore mode
enterupwardmode sum ZP Enable upward carriage motion
enterverticalhlmode evhlm Turn on vertical highlight mode
enterxonmode smxon SX Turn on xon/xoff handshaking
erasechars ech ec Erase #1 characters
exitaltcharsetmode rmacs ae End alternate character set
exitammode rmam RA Turn off automatic margins
exitattributemode sgr0 me Turn off all attributes
exitcamode rmcup te String to end programs that use cup
exitdeletemode rmdc ed End delete mode
exitdoublewidemode rwidm ZQ Disable double wide printing
exitinsertmode rmir ei End insert mode
exititalicsmode ritm ZR Disable italics
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exitleftwardmode rlm ZS Enable rightward (normal) carriage
motion
exitmicromode rmicm ZT Disable micro motion capabilities
exitpccharsetmode rmpch S3 Disable PC character display mode
exitscancodemode rmsc S5 Disable PC scancode mode
exitshadowmode rshm ZU Disable shadow printing
exitstandoutmode rmso se End standout mode
exitsubscriptmode rsubm ZV Disable subscript printing
exitsuperscriptmode rsupm ZW Disable superscript printing
exitunderlinemode rmul ue End underscore mode
exitupwardmode rum ZX Enable downward (normal) carriage motion
exitxonmode rmxon RX Turn off xon/xoff handshaking
fixedpause pause PA Pause for 2-3 seconds
flashhook hook fh Flash the switch hook
flashscreen flash vb Visible bell (may not move cursor)
formfeed ff ff Hardcopy terminal page eject
fromstatusline fsl fs Return from status line
gotowindow wingo WG Go to window #1
hangup hup HU Hang-up phone
initializecolor initc Ic Initialize the definition of color
initializepair initp Ip Initialize color pair
init1string is1 i1 Terminal or printer initialization
string
init2string is2 is Terminal or printer initialization
string
init3string is3 i3 Terminal or printer initialization
string
initfile if if Name of initialization file
initprog iprog iP Path name of program for initialization
insertcharacter ich1 ic Insert character
insertline il1 al Add new blank line
insertpadding ip ip Insert pad after character inserted
The key strings are sent by specific keys. The key descriptions
include the macro, defined in curses.h [see curses(5)], for the code
returned by the curses routine getch() when the key is pressed [see
getch(3X)].
Variable CN TCC Description
_______________________________________________________________________________
keypadlocal rmkx ke Out of "keypad-transmit" mode
keypadxmit smkx ks Put terminal in "keypad-transmit" mode
keya1 ka1 K1 KEYA1, upper left of keypad
keya3 ka3 K3 KEYA3, upper right of keypad
keyb2 kb2 K2 KEYB2, center of keypad
keybackspace kbs kb KEYBACKSPACE, sent by backspace key
keybeg kbeg @1 KEYBEG, sent by beg(inning) key
keybtab kcbt kB KEYBTAB, sent by backtab key
keyc1 kc1 K4 KEYC1, lower left of keypad
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keyc3 kc3 K5 KEYC3, lower right of keypad
keycancel kcan @2 KEYCANCEL, sent by cancel key
keycatab ktbc ka KEYCATAB, sent by clear-all-tabs key
keyclear kclr kC KEYCLEAR, sent by clear-screen or erase
key
keyclose kclo @3 KEYCLOSE, sent by close key
keycommand kcmd @4 KEYCOMMAND, sent by cmd (command) key
keycopy kcpy @5 KEYCOPY, sent by copy key
keycreate kcrt @6 KEYCREATE, sent by create key
keyctab kctab kt KEYCTAB, sent by clear-tab key
keydc kdch1 kD KEYDC, sent by delete-character key
keydl kdl1 kL KEYDL, sent by delete-line key
keydown kcud1 kd KEYDOWN, sent by terminal down-arrow
key
keyeic krmir kM KEYEIC, sent by rmir or smir in insert
mode
keyend kend @7 KEYEND, sent by end key
keyenter kent @8 KEYENTER, sent by enter/send key
keyeol kel kE KEYEOL, sent by clear-to-end-of-line
key
keyeos ked kS KEYEOS, sent by clear-to-end-of-screen
key
keyexit kext @9 KEYEXIT, sent by exit key
keyf0 kf0 k0 KEYF(0), sent by function key f0
keyf1 kf1 k1 KEYF(1), sent by function key f1
. . . .
. . . .
. . . .
keyf62 kf62 Fq KEYF(62), sent by function key f62
keyf63 kf63 Fr KEYF(63), sent by function key f63
keyfind kfnd @0 KEYFIND, sent by find key
keyhelp khlp %1 KEYHELP, sent by help key
keyhome khome kh KEYHOME, sent by home key
keyic kich1 kI KEYIC, sent by ins-char/enter ins-mode
key
keyil kil1 kA KEYIL, sent by insert-line key
keyleft kcub1 kl KEYLEFT, sent by terminal left-arrow
key
keyll kll kH KEYLL, sent by home-down key
keymark kmrk %2 KEYMARK, sent by mark key
keymessage kmsg %3 KEYMESSAGE, sent by message key
keymouse kmous Km 0631, Mouse event has occurred
keymove kmov %4 KEYMOVE, sent by move key
keynext knxt %5 KEYNEXT, sent by next-object key
keynpage knp kN KEYNPAGE, sent by next-page key
keyopen kopn %6 KEYOPEN, sent by open key
keyoptions kopt %7 KEYOPTIONS, sent by options key
keyppage kpp kP KEYPPAGE, sent by previous-page key
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keyprevious kprv %8 KEYPREVIOUS, sent by previous-object
key
keyprint kprt %9 KEYPRINT, sent by print or copy key
keyredo krdo %0 KEYREDO, sent by redo key
keyreference kref &1 KEYREFERENCE, sent by ref(erence) key
keyrefresh krfr &2 KEYREFRESH, sent by refresh key
keyreplace krpl &3 KEYREPLACE, sent by replace key
keyrestart krst &4 KEYRESTART, sent by restart key
keyresume kres &5 KEYRESUME, sent by resume key
keyright kcuf1 kr KEYRIGHT, sent by terminal right-arrow
key
keysave ksav &6 KEYSAVE, sent by save key
keysbeg kBEG &9 KEYSBEG, sent by shifted beginning key
keyscancel kCAN &0 KEYSCANCEL, sent by shifted cancel key
keyscommand kCMD *1 KEYSCOMMAND, sent by shifted command
key
keyscopy kCPY *2 KEYSCOPY, sent by shifted copy key
keyscreate kCRT *3 KEYSCREATE, sent by shifted create key
keysdc kDC *4 KEYSDC, sent by shifted delete-char key
keysdl kDL *5 KEYSDL, sent by shifted delete-line key
keyselect kslt *6 KEYSELECT, sent by select key
keysend kEND *7 KEYSEND, sent by shifted end key
keyseol kEOL *8 KEYSEOL, sent by shifted clear-line key
keysexit kEXT *9 KEYSEXIT, sent by shifted exit key
keysf kind kF KEYSF, sent by scroll-forward/down key
keysfind kFND *0 KEYSFIND, sent by shifted find key
keyshelp kHLP #1 KEYSHELP, sent by shifted help key
keyshome kHOM #2 KEYSHOME, sent by shifted home key
keysic kIC #3 KEYSIC, sent by shifted input key
keysleft kLFT #4 KEYSLEFT, sent by shifted left-arrow
key
keysmessage kMSG %a KEYSMESSAGE, sent by shifted message
key
keysmove kMOV %b KEYSMOVE, sent by shifted move key
keysnext kNXT %c KEYSNEXT, sent by shifted next key
keysoptions kOPT %d KEYSOPTIONS, sent by shifted options
key
keysprevious kPRV %e KEYSPREVIOUS, sent by shifted prev key
keysprint kPRT %f KEYSPRINT, sent by shifted print key
keysr kri kR KEYSR, sent by scroll-backward/up key
keysredo kRDO %g KEYSREDO, sent by shifted redo key
keysreplace kRPL %h KEYSREPLACE, sent by shifted replace
key
keysright kRIT %i KEYSRIGHT, sent by shifted right-arrow
key
keysrsume kRES %j KEYSRSUME, sent by shifted resume key
keyssave kSAV !1 KEYSSAVE, sent by shifted save key
keyssuspend kSPD !2 KEYSSUSPEND, sent by shifted suspend
key
keystab khts kT KEYSTAB, sent by set-tab key
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keysundo kUND !3 KEYSUNDO, sent by shifted undo key
keysuspend kspd &7 KEYSUSPEND, sent by suspend key
keyundo kund &8 KEYUNDO, sent by undo key
keyup kcuu1 ku KEYUP, sent by terminal up-arrow key
labelformat fln Lf Label format
labeloff rmln LF Turn off soft labels
labelon smln LO Turn on soft labels
labf0 lf0 l0 Labels on function key f0 if not f0
labf1 lf1 l1 Labels on function key f1 if not f1
labf10 lf10 la Labels on function key f10 if not f10
labf2 lf2 l2 Labels on function key f2 if not f2
labf3 lf3 l3 Labels on function key f3 if not f3
labf4 lf4 l4 Labels on function key f4 if not f4
labf5 lf5 l5 Labels on function key f5 if not f5
labf6 lf6 l6 Labels on function key f6 if not f6
labf7 lf7 l7 Labels on function key f7 if not f7
labf8 lf8 l8 Labels on function key f8 if not f8
labf9 lf9 l9 Labels on function key f9 if not f9
metaoff rmm mo Turn off "meta mode"
metaon smm mm Turn on "meta mode" (8th bit)
microcolumnaddress mhpa ZY Like columnaddress for micro adjustment
microdown mcud1 ZZ Like cursordown for micro adjustment
microleft mcub1 Za Like cursorleft for micro adjustment
microright mcuf1 Zb Like cursorright for micro adjustment
microrowaddress mvpa Zc Like rowaddress for micro adjustment
microup mcuu1 Zd Like cursorup for micro adjustment
mouseinfo minfo Mi Mouse status information
newline nel nw Newline (behaves like cr followed by lf)
orderofpins porder Ze Matches software bits to print-head pins
origcolors oc oc Set all color(-pair)s to the original
ones
origpair op op Set default color pair to the original
one
padchar pad pc Pad character (rather than null)
parmdch dch DC Delete #1 chars
parmdeleteline dl DL Delete #1 lines
parmdowncursor cud DO Move down #1 lines
parmdownmicro mcud Zf Like parmdowncursor for micro adjust.
parmich ich IC Insert #1 blank chars
parmindex indn SF Scroll forward #1 lines
parminsertline il AL Add #1 new blank lines
parmleftcursor cub LE Move cursor left #1 spaces
parmleftmicro mcub Zg Like parmleftcursor for micro adjust.
parmrightcursor cuf RI Move right #1 spaces
parmrightmicro mcuf Zh Like parmrightcursor for micro adjust.
parmrindex rin SR Scroll backward #1 lines
parmupcursor cuu UP Move cursor up #1 lines
parmupmicro mcuu Zi Like parmupcursor for micro adjust.
pctermoptions pctrm S6 PC terminal options
pkeykey pfkey pk Prog funct key #1 to type string #2
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pkeylocal pfloc pl Prog funct key #1 to execute string #2
pkeyplab pfxl xl Prog key #1 to xmit string #2 and show
string #3
pkeyxmit pfx px Prog funct key #1 to xmit string #2
plabnorm pln pn Prog label #1 to show string #2
printscreen mc0 ps Print contents of the screen
prtrnon mc5p pO Turn on the printer for #1 bytes
prtroff mc4 pf Turn off the printer
prtron mc5 po Turn on the printer
pulse pulse PU Select pulse dialing
quickdial qdial QD Dial phone number #1, without progress
detection
removeclock rmclk RC Remove time-of-day clock
repeatchar rep rp Repeat char #1 #2 times
reqforinput rfi RF Send next input char (for ptys)
reqmousepos reqmp RQ Request mouse position report
reset1string rs1 r1 Reset terminal completely to sane modes
reset2string rs2 r2 Reset terminal completely to sane modes
reset3string rs3 r3 Reset terminal completely to sane modes
resetfile rf rf Name of file containing reset string
restorecursor rc rc Restore cursor to position of last sc
rowaddress vpa cv Vertical position absolute
savecursor sc sc Save cursor position
scancodeescape scesc S7 Escape for scancode emulation
scrollforward ind sf Scroll text up
scrollreverse ri sr Scroll text down
selectcharset scs Zj Select character set
set0desseq s0ds s0 Shift into codeset 0 (EUC set 0, ASCII)
set1desseq s1ds s1 Shift into codeset 1
set2desseq s2ds s2 Shift into codeset 2
set3desseq s3ds s3 Shift into codeset 3
setattributes sgr sa Define the video attributes #1-#9
setaattributes sgr1 Define second set of video attributes
#1-#6
setabackground setab AB Set background color using ANSI escape
setaforeground setaf AF Set foreground color using ANSI escape
setbackground setb Sb Set current background color
setbottommargin smgb Zk Set bottom margin at current line
setbottommarginparm smgbp Zl Set bottom margin at line #1 or #2 lines
from bottom
setclock sclk SC Set clock to hours (#1), minutes (#2),
seconds (#3)
setcolorband setcolor Yz Change to ribbon color #1
setcolorpair scp sp Set current color pair
setforeground setf Sf Set current foreground color1
setleftmargin smgl ML Set left margin at current line
setleftmarginparm smglp Zm Set left (right) margin at column #1
(#2)
setlrmargin smglr ML Sets both left and right margins
setpagelength slines YZ Set page length to #1 lines
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setpgleninch slength YI Set page length to #1 hundredth of an
inch
setrightmargin smgr MR Set right margin at current column
setrightmarginparm smgrp Zn Set right margin at column #1
settab hts st Set a tab in all rows, current column
settbmargin smgtb MT Sets both top and bottom margins
settopmargin smgt Zo Set top margin at current line
settopmarginparm smgtp Zp Set top (bottom) margin at line #1 (#2)
setwindow wind wi Current window is lines #1-#2 cols #3-#4
startbitimage sbim Zq Start printing bit image graphics
startcharsetdef scsd Zr Start definition of a character set
stopbitimage rbim Zs End printing bit image graphics
stopcharsetdef rcsd Zt End definition of a character set
subscriptcharacters subcs Zu List of "subscript-able" characters
superscriptcharacters supcs Zv List of "superscript-able" characters
tab ht ta Tab to next 8-space hardware tab stop
thesecausecr docr Zw Printing any of these chars causes cr
tone tone TO Select touch tone dialing
tostatusline tsl ts Go to status line, column #1
underlinechar uc uc Underscore one char and move past it
uphalfline hu hu Half-line up (reverse ½ linefeed)
user0 u0 u0 User string 0
user1 u1 u1 User string 1
user2 u2 u2 User string 2
user3 u3 u3 User string 3
user4 u4 u4 User string 4
user5 u5 u5 User string 5
user6 u6 u6 User string 6
user7 u7 u7 User string 7
user8 u8 u8 User string 8
user9 u9 u9 User string 9
waittone wait WA Wait for dial tone
xoffcharacter xoffc XF X-off character
xoncharacter xonc XN X-on character
zeromotion zerom Zx No motion for the subsequent character
Sample Entry
The following entry, which describes the AT&T 610 terminal, is among
the more complex entries in the terminfo file as of this writing.
610|610bct|ATT610|att610|AT&T610;80column;98key keyboard
am, eslok, hs, mir, msgr, xenl, xon,
cols#80, it#8, lh#2, lines#24, lw#8, nlab#8, wsl#80,
acsc=``aaffggjjkkllmmnnooppqqrrssttuuvvwwxxyyzz{{||}}~~,
bel=^G, blink=\E[5m, bold=\E[1m, cbt=\E[Z,
civis=\E[?25l, clear=\E[H\E[J, cnorm=\E[?25h\E[?12l,
cr=\r, csr=\E[%i%p1%d;%p2%dr, cub=\E[%p1%dD, cub1=\b,
cud=\E[%p1%dB, cud1=\E[B, cuf=\E[%p1%dC, cuf1=\E[C,
cup=\E[%i%p1%d;%p2%dH, cuu=\E[%p1%dA, cuu1=\E[A,
cvvis=\E[?12;25h, dch=\E[%p1%dP, dch1=\E[P, dim=\E[2m,
dl=\E[%p1%dM, dl1=\E[M, ed=\E[J, el=\E[K, el1=\E[1K,
flash=\E[?5h$<200>\E[?5l, fsl=\E8, home=\E[H, ht=\t,
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ich=\E[%p1%d@, il=\E[%p1%dL, il1=\E[L, ind=\ED, .ind=\ED$<9>,
invis=\E[8m,
is1=\E[8;0 | \E[?3;4;5;13;15l\E[13;20l\E[?7h\E[12h\E(B\E)0,
is2=\E[0m^O, is3=\E(B\E)0, kLFT=\E[\s@, kRIT=\E[\sA,
kbs=^H, kcbt=\E[Z, kclr=\E[2J, kcub1=\E[D, kcud1=\E[B,
kcuf1=\E[C, kcuu1=\E[A, kf1=\EOc, kf10=\ENp,
kf11=\ENq, kf12=\ENr, kf13=\ENs, kf14=\ENt, kf2=\EOd,
kf3=\EOe, kf4=\EOf, kf5=\EOg, kf6=\EOh, kf7=\EOi,
kf8=\EOj, kf9=\ENo, khome=\E[H, kind=\E[S, kri=\E[T,
ll=\E[24H, mc4=\E[?4i, mc5=\E[?5i, nel=\EE,
pfxl=\E[%p1%d;%p2%l%02dq%?%p1%{9}%<%t\s\s\sF%p1%1d\s\s\s\s\s
\s\s\s\s\s\s%;%p2%s,
pln=\E[%p1%d;0;0;0q%p2%:-16.16s, rc=\E8, rev=\E[7m,
ri=\EM, rmacs=^O, rmir=\E[4l, rmln=\E[2p, rmso=\E[m,
rmul=\E[m, rs2=\Ec\E[?3l, sc=\E7,
sgr=\E[0%?%p6%t;1%;%?%p5%t;2%;%?%p2%t;4%;%?%p4%t;5%;
%?%p3%p1% | %t;7%;%?%p7%t;8%;m%?%p9%t^N%e^O%;,
sgr0=\E[m^O, smacs=^N, smir=\E[4h, smln=\E[p,
smso=\E[7m, smul=\E[4m, tsl=\E7\E[25;%i%p1%dx,
Types of Capabilities in the Sample Entry
The sample entry shows the formats for the three types of terminfo
capabilities listed: Boolean, numeric, and string. All capabilities
specified in the terminfo source file must be followed by commas,
including the last capability in the source file. In terminfo source
files, capabilities are referenced by their capability names (as shown
in the previous tables).
Boolean Capabilities
Boolean capabilities are specified simply by their comma separated cap
names.
A boolean capability is true if its capname is present in the entry,
and false if its capname is not present in the entry.
The @ character following a capname is used to explicitly declare that
a boolean capability is false, in situations described in section
1-16: "Similar Terminals" (see below).
Numeric Capabilities
Numeric capabilities are followed by the character # and then a posi-
tive integer value. Thus, in the sample, cols (which shows the number
of columns available on a device) is assigned the value 80 for the
AT&T 610. (Values for numeric capabilities may be specified in
decimal, octal, or hexadecimal, using normal C programming language
conventions.)
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String Capabilities
Finally, string-valued capabilities such as el (clear to end of line
sequence) are listed by a two- to five-character capname, an =, and a
string ended by the next occurrence of a comma.
A delay in milliseconds may appear anywhere in such a capability, pre-
ceded by $ and enclosed in angle brackets, as in el=\EK$<3>. The
curses implementation achieves delays by outputting to the terminal an
appropriate number of system-defined padding characters. The tputs()
function provides delays when used to send such a capability to the
terminal.
The delay can be any of the following: a number, a number followed by
an asterisk, such as 5*, a number followed by a slash, such as 5/, or
a number followed by both, such as 5*/.
- A * shows that the padding required is proportional to the number
of lines affected by the operation, and the amount given is the
per-affected-unit padding required. (In the case of insert charac-
ters, the factor is still the number of lines affected. This is
always 1 unless the device has in and the software uses it.) When a
* is specified, it is sometimes useful to give a delay of the form
3.5 to specify a delay per unit to tenths of milliseconds. (Only
one decimal place is allowed.)
- A / indicates that the delay is mandatory and padding characters
are transmitted regardless of the setting of xon. If / is not
specified or if a device has xon defined, the delay information is
advisory and is only used for cost estimates or when the device is
in raw mode. However, any delay specified for bel or flash is
treated as mandatory.
The following notation is valid in terminfo source files for specify-
ing special characters:
Notation Represents Character
_________________________________________________________
^x Control-x (for any appropriate x)
\a Alert
\b Backspace
\E or \e An ESCAPE character
\f Form feed
\l Linefeed
\n Newline
\r Carriage return
\s Space
\t Tab
\^ Caret (^)
\\ Backslash (\)
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\, Comma (,)
\: Colon (:)
\0 Null *
\nnn Any character, specified as three octal digits
* \0 will actually produce \200, which does not terminate a string but
behaves as a null character on most devices, providing CS7 is speci-
fied [see stty(1)].
Commented-out Capabilities
Sometimes individual capabilities must be commented out. To do this,
put a period before the capability name. For example, see the second
ind in the example above. Note that capabilities are defined in a
left-to-right order and, therefore, a prior definition will override a
later definition.
Preparing Descriptions
The most effective way to prepare a device description is by imitating
the description of a similar device in terminfo and building up a
description gradually, using partial descriptions with vi to check
that they are correct. Be aware that a very unusual device may expose
deficiencies in the ability of the terminfo file to describe it or the
inability of vi to work with that device. To test a new device
description, set the environment variable TERMINFO to the pathname of
a directory containing the compiled description you are working on and
programs will look there rather than in /usr/share/lib/terminfo. To
get the padding for insert-line correct (if the device manufacturer
did not document it) a severe test is to comment out xon, edit a large
file at 9600 baud with vi, delete 16 or so lines from the middle of
the screen, and then press the u key several times quickly. If the
display is corrupted, more padding is usually needed. A similar test
can be used for insert-character.
Section 1-1: Basic Capabilities
The number of columns on each line for the device is given by the cols
numeric capability. If the device has a screen, then the number of
lines on the screen is given by the lines capability. If the device
wraps around to the beginning of the next line when it reaches the
right margin, then it should have the am capability. If the terminal
can clear its screen, leaving the cursor in the home position, then
this is given by the clear string capability. If the terminal over-
strikes (rather than clearing a position when a character is struck
over) then it should have the os capability. If the device is a print-
ing terminal, with no soft copy unit, specify both hc and os. If there
is a way to move the cursor to the left edge of the current row,
specify this as cr. (Normally this will be carriage return, <CTRL-M>.)
If there is a way to produce an audible signal (such as a bell or a
beep), specify it as bel. If, like most devices, the device uses the
xon-xoff flow-control protocol, specify xon.
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If there is a way to move the cursor one position to the left (such as
backspace), that capability should be given as cub1. Similarly,
sequences to move to the right, up, and down should be given as cuf1,
cuu1, and cud1, respectively. These local cursor motions must not
alter the text they pass over; for example, you would not normally use
cuf1=\s because the space would erase the character moved over.
A very important point here is that the local cursor motions encoded
in terminfo are undefined at the left and top edges of a screen termi-
nal. Programs should never attempt to backspace around the left edge,
unless bw is specified, and should never attempt to go up locally off
the top. To scroll text up, a program goes to the bottom left corner
of the screen and sends the ind (index) string.
To scroll text down, a program goes to the top left corner of the
screen and sends the ri (reverse index) string. The strings ind and ri
are undefined when not on their respective corners of the screen.
Parameterized versions of the scrolling sequences are indn and rin.
These versions have the same semantics as ind and ri, except that they
take one parameter and scroll the number of lines specified by that
parameter. They are also undefined except at the appropriate edge of
the screen.
The am capability tells whether the cursor sticks at the right edge of
the screen when text is output, but this does not necessarily apply to
a cuf1 from the last column. Backward motion from the left edge of the
screen is possible only when bw is specified. In this case, cub1 will
move to the right edge of the previous row. If bw is not given, the
effect is undefined. This is useful for drawing a box around the edge
of the screen, for example. If the device has switch selectable
automatic margins, am should be specified in the terminfo source file.
In this case, initialization strings should turn on this option, if
possible. If the device has a command that moves to the first column
of the next line, that command can be given as nel (newline). It does
not matter if the command clears the remainder of the current line, so
if the device has no cr and lf it may still be possible to craft a
working nel out of one or both of them.
These capabilities suffice to describe hardcopy and screen terminals.
Thus the AT&T 5320 hardcopy terminal is described as follows:
5320|att5320|AT&T 5320 hardcopy terminal,
am, hc, os,
cols#132,
bel=^G, cr=\r, cub1=\b, cnd1=\n,
dch1=\E[P, dl1=\E[M,
ind=\n,
while the Lear Siegler ADM-3 is described as
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adm3|lsi adm3,
am, bel=^G, clear=^Z, cols#80, cr=^M, cub1=^H,
cud1=^J, ind=^J, lines#24,
Section 1-2: Parameterized Strings
Cursor addressing and other strings requiring parameters are described
by a parameterized string capability, with printf-like escapes (%x) in
it. For example, to address the cursor, the cup capability is given,
using two parameters: the row and column to address to. (Rows and
columns are numbered from zero and refer to the physical screen visi-
ble to the user, not to any unseen memory.) If the terminal has memory
relative cursor addressing, that can be indicated by mrcup.
The parameter mechanism uses a stack and special % codes to manipulate
the stack in the manner of Reverse Polish Notation (postfix). Typi-
cally a sequence will push one of the parameters onto the stack and
then print it in some format. Often more complex operations are neces-
sary. Operations are in postfix form with the operands in the usual
order. That is, to subtract 5 from the first parameter, one would use
%p1%{5}%-.
The % encodings have the following meanings:
%% Outputs %
%[[:]flags][width[.precision]][doxXs]
as in printf, flags are [-+#] and space
%c Print pop gives %c
%p[1-9] Push ith argument
%P[a-z] Set dynamic variable [a-z] to pop
%g[a-z] Get dynamic variable [a-z] and push it
%P[A-Z] Set static variable [a-z] to pop
%g[A-Z] Get static variable [a-z] and push it
%'c' Push char constant c
%{nn} Push decimal constant nn
%l pop a string address and push its length
%+ %- %* %/ %m
Arithmetic (%m is modulus): push(pop integer2 op pop
integer1)
%& %| %^ Bit operations: push(pop integer2 op pop integer1)
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%= %> %< Logical operations: push(pop integer2 op pop integer1)
%A %O Logical operations: and, or
%! %~ Unary operations: push(op pop)
%i (For ANSI terminals) Add 1 to first parameter, if one
parameter present, or first two parameters, if more than
one parameter present
%? expr %t thenpart %e elsepart %;
if-then-else, %e elsepart is optional; else-if's are pos-
sible ala Algol 68: %? c1 %t b1 %e c2 %t b2 %e c3 %t b3 %e
c4 %t b4 %e b5%.
ci are conditions, bi are bodies.
If the - flag is used with %[doxXs], then a colon (:) must be placed
between the % and the - to differentiate the flag from the binary %-
operator, for example %:-16.16s.
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Consider the Hewlett-Packard 2645, which, to get to row 3 and column
12, needs to be sent \E&a12c03Y padded for 6 milliseconds. Note that
the order of the rows and columns is inverted here, and that the row
and column are zero-padded as two digits. Thus its cup capability is:
cup=\E&a%p2%2.2dc%p1%2.2dY$<6>
The Micro-Term ACT-IV needs the current row and column sent preceded
by a ^T, with the row and column simply encoded in binary,
cup=^T%p1%c%p2%c. Devices that use %c need to be able to backspace the
cursor (cub1), and to move the cursor up one line on the screen
(cuu1). This is necessary because it is not always safe to transmit
\n, ^D, and \r, as the system may change or discard them. (The library
routines dealing with terminfo set tty modes so that tabs are never
expanded, so \t is safe to send. This turns out to be essential for
the Ann Arbor 4080.)
A final example is the LSI ADM-3a, which uses row and column offset by
a blank character, thus cup=\E=%p1%'\s'%+%c%p2%'\s'%+%c. After sending
\E=, this pushes the first parameter, pushes the ASCII value for a
space (32), adds them (pushing the sum on the stack in place of the
two previous values), and outputs that value as a character. Then the
same is done for the second parameter. More complex arithmetic is pos-
sible using the stack.
Section 1-3: Cursor Motions
If the terminal has a fast way to home the cursor (to very upper left
corner of screen) then this can be given as home; similarly a fast way
of getting to the lower left-hand corner can be given as ll; this may
involve going up with cuu1 from the home position, but a program
should never do this itself (unless ll does) because it can make no
assumption about the effect of moving up from the home position. Note
that the home position is the same as addressing to (0,0): to the top
left corner of the screen, not of memory. (Thus, the \EH sequence on
Hewlett-Packard terminals cannot be used for home without losing some
of the other features on the terminal.)
If the device has row or column absolute-cursor addressing, these can
be given as single parameter capabilities hpa (horizontal position
absolute) and vpa (vertical position absolute). Sometimes these are
shorter than the more general two-parameter sequence (as with the
Hewlett-Packard 2645) and can be used in preference to cup. If there
are parameterized local motions (for example, move n spaces to the
right) these can be given as cud, cub, cuf, and cuu with a single
parameter indicating how many spaces to move. These are primarily use-
ful if the device does not have cup, such as the Tektronix 4025.
If the device needs to be in a special mode when running a program
that uses these capabilities, the codes to enter and exit this mode
can be given as smcup and rmcup. This arises, for example, from termi-
nals, such as the Concept, with more than one page of memory. If the
device has only memory relative cursor addressing and not screen
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relative cursor addressing, a one screen-sized window must be fixed
into the device for cursor addressing to work properly. This is also
used for the Tektronix 4025, where smcup sets the command character to
be the one used by terminfo. If the smcup sequence will not restore
the screen after an rmcup sequence is output (to the state prior to
outputting rmcup), specify nrrmc.
Section 1-4: Area Clears
If the terminal can clear from the current position to the end of the
line, leaving the cursor where it is, this should be given as el. If
the terminal can clear from the beginning of the line to the current
position inclusive, leaving the cursor where it is, this should be
given as el1. If the terminal can clear from the current position to
the end of the display, then this should be given as ed. ed is only
defined from the first column of a line. (Thus, it can be simulated by
a request to delete a large number of lines, if a true ed is not
available.)
Section 1-5: Insert/Delete Line
If the terminal can open a new blank line before the cursor line, this
should be given as il1; this is done only from the first position of a
line. The cursor must then appear on the newly blank line. If the ter-
minal can delete the line which the cursor is on, then this should be
given as dl1; this is done only from the first position on the line to
be deleted. Versions of il1 and dl1 which take a single parameter and
insert or delete that many lines can be given as il and dl.
If the terminal has a settable destructive scrolling region (like the
VT100) the command to set this can be described with the csr capabil-
ity, which takes two parameters: the top and bottom lines of the
scrolling region. The cursor position is, alas, undefined after using
this command. It is possible to get the effect of insert or delete
line using this command - the sc and rc (save and restore cursor) com-
mands are also useful. Inserting lines at the top or bottom of the
screen can also be done using ri or ind on many terminals without a
true insert/delete line, and is often faster even on terminals with
those features.
To determine whether a terminal has destructive scrolling regions or
non-destructive scrolling regions, create a scrolling region in the
middle of the screen, place data on the bottom line of the scrolling
region, move the cursor to the top line of the scrolling region, and
do a reverse index (ri) followed by a delete line (dl1) or index
(ind). If the data that was originally on the bottom line of the
scrolling region was restored into the scrolling region by the dl1 or
ind, then the terminal has non-destructive scrolling regions. Other-
wise, it has destructive scrolling regions. Do not specify csr if the
terminal has non-destructive scrolling regions, unless ind, ri, indn,
rin, dl, and dl1 all simulate destructive scrolling.
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If the terminal has the ability to define a window as part of memory,
which all commands affect, it should be given as the parameterized
string wind. The four parameters are the starting and ending lines in
memory and the starting and ending columns in memory, in that order.
If the terminal can retain display memory above, then the da capabil-
ity should be given; if display memory can be retained below, then db
should be given. These indicate that deleting a line or scrolling a
full screen may bring non-blank lines up from below or that scrolling
back with ri may bring down non-blank lines.
Section 1-6: Insert/Delete Character
There are two basic kinds of intelligent terminals with respect to
insert/delete character operations which can be described using
terminfo. The most common insert/delete character operations affect
only the characters on the current line and shift characters off the
end of the line rigidly. Other terminals, such as the Concept 100 and
the Perkin Elmer Owl, make a distinction between typed and untyped
blanks on the screen, shifting upon an insert or delete only to an
untyped blank on the screen which is either eliminated, or expanded to
two untyped blanks. You can determine the kind of terminal you have by
clearing the screen and then typing text separated by cursor motions.
Type abc def using local cursor motions (not spaces) between the
abc and the def. Then position the cursor before the abc and put the
terminal in insert mode. If typing characters causes the rest of the
line to shift rigidly and characters to fall off the end, then your
terminal does not distinguish between blanks and untyped positions. If
the abc shifts over to the def which then move together around the end
of the current line and onto the next as you insert, you have the
second type of terminal, and should give the capability in, which
stands for insert null. While these are two logically separate attri-
butes (one line versus multiline insert mode, and special treatment of
untyped spaces) we have seen no terminals whose insert mode cannot be
described with the single attribute.
terminfo can describe both terminals that have an insert mode and ter-
minals which send a simple sequence to open a blank position on the
current line. Give as smir the sequence to get into insert mode. Give
as rmir the sequence to leave insert mode. Now give as ich1 any
sequence needed to be sent just before sending the character to be
inserted. Most terminals with a true insert mode will not give ich1;
terminals that send a sequence to open a screen position should give
it here. (If your terminal has both, insert mode is usually preferable
to ich1. Do not give both unless the terminal actually requires both
to be used in combination.) If post-insert padding is needed, give
this as a number of milliseconds padding in ip (a string option). Any
other sequence which may need to be sent after an insert of a single
character may also be given in ip. If your terminal needs both to be
placed into an insert mode and a special code to precede each inserted
character, then both smir/rmir and ich1 can be given, and both will be
used. The ich capability, with one parameter, n, will insert n blanks.
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If padding is necessary between characters typed while not in insert
mode, give this as a number of milliseconds padding in rmp.
It is occasionally necessary to move around while in insert mode to
delete characters on the same line (for example, if there is a tab
after the insertion position). If your terminal allows motion while in
insert mode you can give the capability mir to speed up inserting in
this case. Omitting mir will affect only speed. Some terminals (not-
ably Datamedia's) must not have mir because of the way their insert
mode works.
Finally, you can specify dch1 to delete a single character, dch with
one parameter, n, to delete n characters, and delete mode by giving
smdc and rmdc to enter and exit delete mode (any mode the terminal
needs to be placed in for dch1 to work).
A command to erase n characters (equivalent to outputting n blanks
without moving the cursor) can be given as ech with one parameter.
Section 1-7: Highlighting, Underlining, and Visible Bells
Your device may have one or more kinds of display attributes that
allow you to highlight selected characters when they appear on the
screen. The following display modes (shown with the names by which
they are set) may be available: a blinking screen (blink), bold or
extra-bright characters (bold), dim or half-bright characters (dim),
blanking or invisible text (invis), protected text (prot), a reverse-
video screen (rev), and an alternate character set (smacs to enter
this mode and rmacs to exit it). (If a command is necessary before you
can enter alternate character set mode, give the sequence in enacs or
enable alternate-character-set mode.) Turning on any of these modes
singly may or may not turn off other modes.
sgr0 should be used to turn off all video enhancement capabilities. It
should always be specified because it represents the only way to turn
off some capabilities, such as dim or blink.
You should choose one display method as standout mode and use it to
highlight error messages and other kinds of text to which you want to
draw attention. Choose a form of display that provides strong contrast
but that is easy on the eyes. (We recommend reverse-video plus half-
bright or reverse-video alone.) The sequences to enter and exit stan-
dout mode are given as smso and rmso, respectively. If the code to
change into or out of standout mode leaves one or even two blank
spaces on the screen, as the TVI 912 and Teleray 1061 do, then xmc
should be given to tell how many spaces are left.
Sequences to begin underlining and end underlining can be specified as
smul and rmul, respectively. If the device has a sequence to underline
the current character and to move the cursor one space to the right
(such as the Micro-Term MIME), this sequence can be specified as uc.
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Terminals with the "magic cookie" glitch (xmc) deposit special "cook-
ies" when they receive mode-setting sequences, which affect the
display algorithm rather than having extra bits for each character.
Some terminals, such as the Hewlett-Packard 2621, automatically leave
standout mode when they move to a new line or the cursor is addressed.
Programs using standout mode should exit standout mode before moving
the cursor or sending a newline, unless the msgr capability, asserting
that it is safe to move in standout mode, is present.
If the terminal has a way of flashing the screen to indicate an error
quietly (a bell replacement), then this can be given as flash; it must
not move the cursor. A good flash can be done by changing the screen
into reverse video, pad for 200 ms, then return the screen to normal
video.
If the cursor needs to be made more visible than normal when it is not
on the bottom line (to make, for example, a non-blinking underline
into an easier to find block or blinking underline) give this sequence
as cvvis. The boolean chts should also be given. If there is a way to
make the cursor completely invisible, give that as civis. The capabil-
ity cnorm should be given which undoes the effects of either of these
modes.
If your terminal generates underlined characters by using the under-
line character (with no special sequences needed) even though it does
not otherwise overstrike characters, then you should specify the capa-
bility ul. For devices on which a character overstriking another
leaves both characters on the screen, specify the capability os. If
overstrikes are erasable with a blank, then this should be indicated
by specifying eo.
If there is a sequence to set arbitrary combinations of modes, this
should be given as sgr (set attributes), taking nine parameters. Each
parameter is either 0 or non-zero, as the corresponding attribute is
on or off. The nine parameters are shown below. Not all modes need to
be supported by sgr; only those for which corresponding separate
attribute commands exist should be supported. For example, let's
assume that the terminal in question needs the following escape
sequences to turn on various modes.
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tparm
Argument Attribute Escape Sequence
________________________________________
none \E[0m
p1 standout \E[0;4;7m
p2 underline \E[0;3m
p3 reverse \E[0;4m
p4 blink \E[0;5m
p5 dim \E[0;7m
p6 bold \E[0;3;4m
p7 invis \E[0;8m
p8 protect not available
p9 altcharset ^O (off) ^N (on)
Each escape sequence requires a 0 to turn off other modes before turn-
ing on its own mode. Also note that, as suggested above, standout is
set up to be the combination of reverse and dim. Also, because this
terminal has no bold mode, bold is set up as the combination of
reverse and underline. In addition, to allow combinations, such as
underline+blink, the sequence to use would be \E[0;3;5m. The terminal
doesn't have protect mode, either, but that cannot be simulated in any
way, so p8 is ignored. The altcharset mode is different in that it is
either ^O or ^N, depending on whether it is off or on. If all modes
were to be turned on, the sequence would be \E[0;3;4;5;7;8m^N.
Now look at when different sequences are output. For example, ;3 is
output when either p2 or p6 is true, that is, if either underline or
bold modes are turned on. Writing out the above sequences, along with
their dependencies, gives the following:
Sequence When To Output terminfo Translation
________________________________________________________
\E[0 always \E[0
;3 if p2 or p6 %?%p2%p6%|%t;3%;
;4 if p1 or p3 or p6 %?%p1%p3%|%p6%|%t;4%;
;5 if p4 %?%p4%t;5%;
;7 if p1 or p5 %?%p1%p5%|%t;7%;
;8 if p7 %?%p7%t;8%;
m always m
^N or ^O if p9 ^N, else ^O %?%p9%t^N%e^O%;
Putting this all together into the sgr sequence gives:
sgr=\E[0%?%p2%p6%|%t;3%;%?%p1%p3%|%p6%
|%t;4%;%?%p5%t;5%;%?%p1%p5%
|%t;7%;%?%p7%t;8%;m%?%p9%t^N%e^O%;,
Remember that sgr and sgr0 must always be specified.
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Section 1-8: Keypad
If the device has a keypad that transmits sequences when the keys are
pressed, this information can also be specified. It is not possible to
handle devices where the keypad only works in local (this applies, for
example, to the unshifted Hewlett-Packard 2621 keys). If the keypad
can be set to transmit or not transmit, specify these sequences as
smkx and rmkx. Otherwise the keypad is assumed to always transmit.
The sequences sent by the left arrow, right arrow, up arrow, down
arrow, and home keys can be given as kcub1, kcuf1, kcuu1, kcud1, and
khome, respectively. If there are function keys such as f0, f1, ...,
f63, the sequences they send can be specified as kf0, kf1, ..., kf63.
If the first 11 keys have labels other than the default f0 through
f10, the labels can be given as lf0, lf1, ..., lf10. The codes
transmitted by certain other special keys can be given: kll (home
down), kbs (backspace), ktbc (clear all tabs), kctab (clear the tab
stop in this column), kclr (clear screen or erase key), kdch1 (delete
character), kdl1 (delete line), krmir (exit insert mode), kel (clear
to end of line), ked (clear to end of screen), kich1 (insert character
or enter insert mode), kil1 (insert line), knp (next page), kpp (pre-
vious page), kind (scroll forward/down), kri (scroll backward/up),
khts (set a tab stop in this column). In addition, if the keypad has a
3 by 3 array of keys including the four arrow keys, the other five
keys can be given as ka1, ka3, kb2, kc1, and kc3. These keys are use-
ful when the effects of a 3 by 3 directional pad are needed. Further
keys are defined above in the capabilities list.
Strings to program function keys can be specified as pfkey, pfloc, and
pfx. A string to program screen labels should be specified as pln.
Each of these strings takes two parameters: a function key identifier
and a string to program it with. pfkey causes pressing the given key
to be the same as the user typing the given string; pfloc causes the
string to be executed by the terminal in local mode; and pfx causes
the string to be transmitted to the computer. The capabilities nlab,
lw and lh define the number of programmable screen labels and their
width and height. If there are commands to turn the labels on and off,
give them in smln and rmln. smln is normally output after one or more
pln sequences to make sure that the change becomes visible.
Section 1-9: Tabs and Initialization
If the device has hardware tabs, the command to advance to the next
tab stop can be given as ht (usually <CTRL-I>). A backtab command that
moves leftward to the next tab stop can be given as cbt. By conven-
tion, if tty modes show that tabs are being expanded by the computer
rather than being sent to the device, programs should not use ht or
cbt (even if they are present) because the user may not have the tab
stops properly set. If the device has hardware tabs that are initially
set every n spaces when the device is powered up, the numeric parame-
ter it is given, showing the number of spaces the tabs are set to.
This is normally used by tput init [see tput(1)] to determine whether
to set the mode for hardware tab expansion and whether to set the tab
stops. If the device has tab stops that can be saved in nonvolatile
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memory, the terminfo description can assume that they are properly
set. If there are commands to set and clear tab stops, they can be
given as tbc (clear all tab stops) and hts (set a tab stop in the
current column of every row).
Other capabilities include: is1, is2, and is3, initialization strings
for the device; iprog, the path name of a program to be run to ini-
tialize the device; and if, the name of a file containing long ini-
tialization strings. These strings are expected to set the device into
modes consistent with the rest of the terminfo description. They must
be sent to the device each time the user logs in and be output in the
following order: run the program iprog; output is1; output is2; set
the margins using mgc, smgl and smgr; set the tabs using tbc and hts;
print the file if; and finally output is3. This is usually done using
the init option of tput.
Most initialization is done with is2. Special device modes can be set
up without duplicating strings by putting the common sequences in is2
and special cases in is1 and is3. Sequences that do a reset from a
totally unknown state can be given as rs1, rs2, rf, and rs3, analogous
to is1, is2, is3, and if. (The method using files, if and rf, is used
for a few terminals, from /usr/share/lib/tabset/*; however, the recom-
mended method is to use the initialization and reset strings.) These
strings are output by tput reset, which is used when the terminal gets
into a wedged state. Commands are normally placed in rs1, rs2, rs3,
and rf only if they produce annoying effects on the screen and are not
necessary when logging in. For example, the command to set a terminal
into 80-column mode would normally be part of is2, but on some termi-
nals it causes an annoying glitch on the screen and is not normally
needed because the terminal is usually already in 80-column mode.
If a more complex sequence is needed to set the tabs than can be
described by using tbc and hts, the sequence can be placed in is2 or
if.
Any margin can be cleared with mgc. (For instructions on how to
specify commands to set and clear margins, refer to the section
PRINTER CAPABILITIES.)
Section 1-10: Delays
Certain capabilities control padding in the tty driver. These are pri-
marily needed by hardcopy terminals, and are used by tput init to set
tty modes appropriately. Delays embedded in the capabilities cr, ind,
cub1, ff, and tab can be used to set the appropriate delay bits to be
set in the tty driver. If pb (padding baud rate) is given, these
values can be ignored at baud rates below the value of pb.
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Section 1-11: Status Lines
If the terminal has an extra status line that is not normally used by
software, this fact can be indicated. If the status line is viewed as
an extra line below the bottom line, into which one can cursor address
normally (such as the Heathkit h19's 25th line, or the 24th line of a
VT100 which is set to a 23-line scrolling region), the capability hs
should be given. Special strings that go to a given column of the
status line and return from the status line can be given as tsl and
fsl. (fsl must leave the cursor position in the same place it was
before tsl. If necessary, the sc and rc strings can be included in tsl
and fsl to get this effect.) The capability tsl takes one parameter,
which is the column number of the status line the cursor is to be
moved to.
If escape sequences and other special commands, such as tab, work
while in the status line, the flag eslok can be given. A string which
turns off the status line (or otherwise erases its contents) should be
given as dsl. If the terminal has commands to save and restore the
position of the cursor, give them as sc and rc. The status line is
normally assumed to be the same width as the rest of the screen (for
example, cols). If the status line is a different width (possibly
because the terminal does not allow an entire line to be loaded) the
width, in columns, can be indicated with the numeric parameter wsl.
Section 1-12: Line Graphics
If the device has a line drawing alternate character set, the mapping
of glyph to character would be given in acsc. The definition of this
string is based on the alternate character set used in the DEC VT100
terminal, extended slightly with some characters from the AT&T 4410v1
terminal.
vt100+
Glyph Name Character
___________________________________
Arrow pointing right +
Arrow pointing left ,
Arrow pointing down .
Solid square block 0
Lantern symbol I
Arrow pointing up -
Diamond `
Checker board (stipple) a
Degree symbol f
Plus/minus g
Board of squares h
Lower right corner j
Upper right corner k
Upper left corner l
Lower left corner m
Plus n
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Scan line 1 o
Horizontal line q
Scan line 9 s
Left tee t
Right tee u
Bottom tee v
Top tee w
Vertical line x
Bullet ~
The best way to describe a new device's line graphics set is to add a
third column to the above table with the characters for the new device
that produce the appropriate glyph when the device is in the alternate
character set mode. For example,
vt100+ Character Used
Glyph Name Character on New Device
_______________________________________________
Upper left corner l R
Lower left corner m F
Upper right corner k T
Lower right corner j G
Horizontal line q ,
Vertical line x .
Now write down the characters left to right, as in acsc=lRmFkTjGq\,x..
In addition, terminfo allows you to define multiple character sets.
Refer to section 2-5 for details.
Section 1-13: Color Manipulation
Let us define two methods of color manipulation: the Tektronix method
and the HP method. The Tektronix method uses a set of N predefined
colors (usually 8) from which a user can select current foreground and
background colors. Thus a terminal can support up to N colors mixed
into N*N color pairs to be displayed on the screen at the same time.
When using an HP method the user cannot define the foreground indepen-
dently of the background, or vice-versa. Instead, the user must define
an entire color pair at once. Up to M color pairs, made from 2*M dif-
ferent colors, can be defined this way. Most existing color terminals
belong to one of these two classes of terminals.
The numeric variables colors and pairs define the number of colors and
color pairs that can be displayed on the screen at the same time. If a
terminal can change the definition of a color (for example, the Tek-
tronix 4100 and 4200 series terminals), this should be specified with
ccc (can change color). To change the definition of a color (Tektronix
4200 method), use initc (initialize color). It requires four argu-
ments: color number (ranging from 0 to colors-1) and three RGB (red,
green, and blue) values or three HLS colors (Hue, Lightness, Satura-
tion). Ranges of RGB and HLS values are terminal dependent.
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Tektronix 4100 series terminals only use HLS color notation. For such
terminals (or dual-mode terminals to be operated in HLS mode) one must
define a boolean variable hls; that would instruct the curses
initcolor routine to convert its RGB arguments to HLS before sending
them to the terminal. The last three arguments to the initc string
would then be HLS values.
If a terminal can change the definitions of colors, but uses a color
notation different from RGB and HLS, a mapping to either RGB or HLS
must be developed.
If the terminal supports ANSI escape sequences to set background and
foreground, they should be coded as setab and setaf, respectively. If
the terminal supports other escape sequences to set background and
foreground, they should be coded as setb and setf, respectively. The
vidputs() function and the refresh functions use setab and setaf if
they are defined. Each of these capabilities requires one argument:
the number of the color. By convention, the first eight colors (0-7)
map to, in order: black, red, green, yellow, blue, magenta, cyan,
white. However, color re-mapping may occur or the underlying hardware
may not support these colors. Mappings for any additional colors sup-
ported by the device (that is, to numbers greater than 7) are at the
discretion of the terminfo entry writer.
To initialize a color-pair (HP method), use initp (initialize pair).
It requires seven arguments: the number of a color-pair (range=0 to
pairs-1), and six RGB values: three for the foreground followed by
three for the background. (Each of these groups of three should be in
the order RGB.) When initc or initp are used, RGB or HLS arguments
should be in the order "red, green, blue" or "hue, lightness, satura-
tion"), respectively. To make a color-pair current, use scp (set
color-pair). It takes one argument, the number of a color-pair.
Some terminals (for example, most color terminal emulators for PCs)
erase areas of the screen with current background color. In such
cases, bce (background color erase) should be defined. The variable op
(original pair) contains a sequence for setting the foreground and the
background colors to what they were at the terminal start-up time.
Similarly, oc (original colors) contains a control sequence for set-
ting all colors (for the Tektronix method) or color pairs (for the HP
method) to the values they had at the terminal start-up time.
Some color terminals substitute color for video attributes. Such video
attributes should not be combined with colors. Information about these
video attributes should be packed into the ncv (no color video) vari-
able. There is a one-to-one correspondence between the nine least sig-
nificant bits of that variable and the video attributes. The following
table depicts this correspondence.
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Bit Decimal Characteristic
Attribute Position Value That Sets
______________________________________________________
WASTANDOUT 0 1 sgr, parameter 1
WAUNDERLINE 1 2 sgr, parameter 2
WAREVERSE 2 4 sgr, parameter 3
WABLINK 3 8 sgr, parameter 4
WADIM 4 16 sgr, parameter 5
WABOLD 5 32 sgr, parameter 6
WAINVIS 6 64 sgr, parameter 7
WAPROTECT 7 128 sgr, parameter 8
WAALTCHARSET 8 256 sgr, parameter 9
WAHORIZONTAL 9 512 sgr1, parameter 1
WALEFT 10 1024 sgr1, parameter 2
WALOW 11 2048 sgr1, parameter 3
WARIGHT 12 4096 sgr1, parameter 4
WATOP 13 8192 sgr1, parameter 5
WAVERTICAL 14 16384 sgr1, parameter 6
When a particular video attribute should not be used with colors, the
corresponding ncv bit should be set to 1; otherwise it should be set
to zero. To determine the information to pack into the ncv variable,
you must add together the decimal values corresponding to those attri-
butes that cannot coexist with colors. For example, if the terminal
uses colors to simulate reverse video (bit number 2 and decimal value
4) and bold (bit number 5 and decimal value 32), the resulting value
for ncv will be 36 (4 + 32).
Section 1-14: Miscellaneous
If the terminal requires other than a null (zero) character as a pad,
then this can be given as pad. Only the first character of the pad
string is used. If the terminal does not have a pad character, specify
npc.
If the terminal can move up or down half a line, this can be indicated
with hu (half-line up) and hd (half-line down). This is primarily use-
ful for superscripts and subscripts on hardcopy terminals. If a hard-
copy terminal can eject to the next page (form feed), give this as ff
(usually <CTRL-L>).
If there is a command to repeat a given character a given number of
times (to save time transmitting a large number of identical charac-
ters) this can be indicated with the parameterized string rep. The
first parameter is the character to be repeated and the second is the
number of times to repeat it. Thus, tparm(repeatchar, 'x', 10) is the
same as xxxxxxxxxx.
If the terminal has a settable command character, such as the Tek-
tronix 4025, this can be indicated with cmdch. A prototype command
character is chosen which is used in all capabilities. This character
is given in the cmdch capability to identify it. The following conven-
tion is supported on some UNIX systems: If the environment variable CC
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exists, all occurrences of the prototype character are replaced with
the character in CC.
Terminal descriptions that do not represent a specific kind of known
terminal, such as switch, dialup, patch, and network, should include
the gn (generic) capability so that programs can complain that they do
not know how to talk to the terminal. (This capability does not apply
to virtual terminal descriptions for which the escape sequences are
known.) If the terminal is one of those supported by the Reliant UNIX
system virtual terminal protocol, the terminal number can be given as
vt. A line-turn-around sequence to be transmitted before doing reads
should be specified in rfi.
If the device uses xon/xoff handshaking for flow control, give xon.
Padding information should still be included so that routines can make
better decisions about costs, but actual pad characters will not be
transmitted. Sequences to turn on and off xon/xoff handshaking may be
given in smxon and rmxon. If the characters used for handshaking are
not ^S and ^Q, they may be specified with xonc and xoffc.
If the terminal has a "meta key" which acts as a shift key, setting
the 8th bit of any character transmitted, this fact can be indicated
with km. Otherwise, software will assume that the 8th bit is parity
and it will usually be cleared. If strings exist to turn this meta
mode on and off, they can be given as smm and rmm.
If the terminal has more lines of memory than will fit on the screen
at once, the number of lines of memory can be indicated with lm. A
value of lm#0 indicates that the number of lines is not fixed, but
that there is still more memory than fits on the screen.
Media copy strings which control an auxiliary printer connected to the
terminal can be given as mc0: print the contents of the screen, mc4:
turn off the printer, and mc5: turn on the printer. When the printer
is on, all text sent to the terminal will be sent to the printer. A
variation, mc5p, takes one parameter, and leaves the printer on for as
many characters as the value of the parameter, then turns the printer
off. The parameter should not exceed 255. If the text is not displayed
on the terminal screen when the printer is on, specify mc5i (silent
printer). All text, including mc4, is transparently passed to the
printer while an mc5p is in effect.
Section 1-15: Special Cases
The working model used by terminfo fits most terminals reasonably
well. However, some terminals do not completely match that model,
requiring special support by terminfo. These are not meant to be con-
strued as deficiencies in the terminals; they are just differences
between the working model and the actual hardware. They may be unusual
devices or, for some reason, do not have all the features of the
terminfo model implemented.
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Terminals that cannot display tilde (~) characters, such as certain
Hazeltine terminals, should indicate hz.
Terminals that ignore a linefeed immediately after an am wrap, such as
the Concept 100, should indicate xenl. Those terminals whose cursor
remains on the right-most column until another character has been
received, rather than wrapping immediately upon receiving the right-
most character, such as the VT100, should also indicate xenl.
If el is required to get rid of standout (instead of writing normal
text on top of it), xhp should be given.
Those Teleray terminals whose tabs turn all characters moved over to
blanks, should indicate xt (destructive tabs). This capability is also
taken to mean that it is not possible to position the cursor on top of
a magic cookie. Therefore, to erase standout mode, it is necessary,
instead, to use delete and insert line.
Those Beehive Superbee terminals which do not transmit the escape or
<CTRL-C> characters, should specify xsb, indicating that the f1 key is
to be used for escape and the f2 key for <CTRL-C>.
Section 1-16: Similar Terminals
If there are two very similar terminals, one can be defined as being
just like the other with certain exceptions. The string capability use
can be given with the name of the similar terminal. The capabilities
given before use override those in the terminal type invoked by use. A
capability can be canceled by placing xx@ to the left of the capabil-
ity definition, where xx is the capability. For example, the entry
att4424-2|Teletype4424 in display function group ii,
rev@, sgr@, smul@, use=att4424,
defines an AT&T4424 terminal that does not have the rev, sgr, and smul
capabilities, and hence cannot do highlighting. This is useful for
different modes for a terminal, or for different user preferences.
More than one use capability may be given.
PART 2: PRINTER CAPABILITIES
The terminfo database allows you to define capabilities of printers as
well as terminals. To find out what capabilities are available for
printers as well as for terminals, see the two lists under DEVICE
CAPABILITIES that list capabilities by variable and by capability
name.
Section 2-1: Rounding Values
Because parameterized string capabilities work only with integer
values, we recommend that terminfo designers create strings that
expect numeric values that have been rounded. Application designers
should note this and should always round values to the nearest integer
before using them with a parameterized string capability.
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Section 2-2: Printer Resolution
A printer's resolution is defined to be the smallest spacing of char-
acters it can achieve. In general printers have independent resolution
horizontally and vertically. Thus the vertical resolution of a printer
can be determined by measuring the smallest achievable distance
between consecutive printing baselines, while the horizontal resolu-
tion can be determined by measuring the smallest achievable distance
between the left-most edges of consecutive printed, identical, charac-
ters.
All printers are assumed to be capable of printing with a uniform hor-
izontal and vertical resolution. The view of printing that terminfo
currently presents is one of printing inside a uniform matrix: All
characters are printed at fixed positions relative to each cell in the
matrix; furthermore, each cell has the same size given by the smallest
horizontal and vertical step sizes dictated by the resolution. (The
cell size can be changed as will be seen later.)
Many printers are capable of proportional printing, where the horizon-
tal spacing depends on the size of the character last printed.
terminfo does not make use of this capability, although it does pro-
vide enough capability definitions to allow an application to simulate
proportional printing.
A printer must not only be able to print characters as close together
as the horizontal and vertical resolutions suggest, but also of moving
to a position an integral multiple of the smallest distance away from
a previous position. Thus printed characters can be spaced apart a
distance that is an integral multiple of the smallest distance, up to
the length or width of a single page.
Some printers can have different resolutions depending on different
"modes". In normal mode, the existing terminfo capabilities are
assumed to work on columns and lines, just like a video terminal. Thus
the old lines capability would give the length of a page in lines, and
the cols capability would give the width of a page in columns. In
micro mode, many terminfo capabilities work on increments of lines and
columns. With some printers the micro mode may be concomitant with
normal mode, so that all the capabilities work at the same time.
Section 2-3: Specifying Printer Resolution
The printing resolution of a printer is given in several ways. Each
specifies the resolution as the number of smallest steps per distance:
Characteristic Number of Smallest Steps
_______________________________________
orhi Steps per inch horizontally
orvi Steps per inch vertically
orc Steps per column
orl Steps per line
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When printing in normal mode, each character printed causes movement
to the next column, except in special cases described later; the dis-
tance moved is the same as the per-column resolution. Some printers
cause an automatic movement to the next line when a character is
printed in the rightmost position; the distance moved vertically is
the same as the per-line resolution. When printing in micro mode,
these distances can be different, and may be zero for some printers.
Automatic Motion after Printing
_______________________________
Normal Mode:
orc Steps moved horizontally
orl Steps moved vertically
Micro Mode:
mcs Steps moved horizontally
mls Steps moved vertically
Some printers are capable of printing wide characters. The distance
moved when a wide character is printed in normal mode may be different
from when a regular width character is printed. The distance moved
when a wide character is printed in micro mode may also be different
from when a regular character is printed in micro mode, but the
differences are assumed to be related: If the distance moved for a
regular character is the same whether in normal mode or micro mode
(mcs=orc), then the distance moved for a wide character is also the
same whether in normal mode or micro mode. This doesn't mean the nor-
mal character distance is necessarily the same as the wide character
distance, just that the distances don't change with a change in normal
to micro mode. However, if the distance moved for a regular character
is different in micro mode from the distance moved in normal mode
(mcs<orc), the micro mode distance is assumed to be the same for a
wide character printed in micro mode, as the table below shows.
Automatic Motion after Printing Wide Character
______________________________________________
Normal Mode or Micro Mode (mcs = orc):
widcs Steps moved horizontally
Micro Mode (mcs < orc):
mcs Steps moved horizontally
There may be control sequences to change the number of columns per
inch (the character pitch) and to change the number of lines per inch
(the line pitch). If these are used, the resolution of the printer
changes, but the type of change depends on the printer:
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Changing the Character/Line Pitches
___________________________________
cpi Change character pitch
cpix If set, cpi changes orhi, otherwise changes orc
lpi Change line pitch
lpix If set, lpi changes orvi, otherwise changes orl
chr Change steps per column
cvr Change steps per line
The cpi and lpi string capabilities are each used with a single argu-
ment, the pitch in columns (or characters) and lines per inch, respec-
tively. The chr and cvr string capabilities are each used with a sin-
gle argument, the number of steps per column and line, respectively.
Using any of the control sequences in these strings will imply a
change in some of the values of orc, orhi, orl, and orvi. Also, the
distance moved when a wide character is printed, widcs, changes in
relation to orc. The distance moved when a character is printed in
micro mode, mcs, changes similarly, with one exception: if the dis-
tance is 0 or 1, then no change is assumed.
Programs that use cpi, lpi, chr, or cvr should recalculate the printer
resolution (and should recalculate other values [see below 2-7:
"Effect of Changing Printing Resolution" and 2-6: "Dot-Matrix Graph-
ics"]).
Effects of Changing the Character/Line Pitches
_______________________________________________
Before After
_______________________________________________
Using cpi with cpix clear:
orhi' orhi
orhi
orc' orc=Vcpi
Using cpi with cpix set:
orhi' orhi=orc.Vcpi
orc' orc
Using lpi with lpix clear:
orvi' orvi
orvi
orl' orl=Vlpi
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Using lpi with lpix set:
orvi' orvi=orl.Vlpi
orl' orl
Using chr:
orhi' orhi
orc' Vchr
Using cvr:
orvi' orvi
orl' Vcvr
Using cpi or chr:
orc
widcs' widcs=widcs'orc'
orc
mcs' mcs=mcs'orc'
Vcpi, Vlpi, Vchr, and Vcvr are the arguments used with cpi, lpi, chr,
and cvr, respectively. The prime marks (') indicate the old values.
Section 2-4: Capabilities that Cause Movement
In the following descriptions, "movement" refers to the motion of the
"current position". With video terminals this would be the cursor;
with some printers this is the carriage position. Other printers have
different equivalents. In general, the current position is where a
character would be displayed if printed.
terminfo has string capabilities for control sequences that cause
movement a number of full columns or lines. It also has equivalent
string capabilities for control sequences that cause movement a number
of smallest steps.
String Capabilities for Motion
__________________________________
mcub1 Move 1 step left
mcuf1 Move 1 step right
mcuu1 Move 1 step up
mcud1 Move 1 step down
mcub Move N steps left
mcuf Move N steps right
mcuu Move N steps up
mcud Move N steps down
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mhpa Move N steps from the left
mvpa Move N steps from the top
The latter six strings are each used with a single argument, N.
Sometimes the motion is limited to less than the width or length of a
page. Also, some printers don't accept absolute motion to the left of
the current position. terminfo has capabilities for specifying these
limits.
Limits to Motion
__________________________________________________
mjump Limit on use of mcub1, mcuf1, mcuu1, mcud1
maddr Limit on use of mhpa, mvpa
xhpa If set, hpa and mhpa can't move left
xvpa If set, vpa and mvpa can't move up
If a printer needs to be in a micro mode for the motion capabilities
described above to work, there are string capabilities defined to con-
tain the control sequence to enter and exit this mode. A boolean is
available for those printers where using a carriage return causes an
automatic return to normal mode.
Entering/Exiting Micro Mode
_________________________________
smicm Enter micro mode
rmicm Exit micro mode
crxm Using cr exits micro mode
The movement made when a character is printed in the rightmost posi-
tion varies among printers. Some make no movement, some move to the
beginning of the next line, others move to the beginning of the same
line. terminfo has boolean capabilities for describing all three
cases.
What Happens After Character Printed in Rightmost Position
__________________________________________________________
sam Automatic move to beginning of same line
Some printers can be put in a mode where the normal direction of
motion is reversed. This mode can be especially useful when there are
no capabilities for leftward or upward motion, because those capabili-
ties can be built from the motion reversal capability and the right-
ward or downward motion capabilities. It is best to leave it up to an
application to build the leftward or upward capabilities, though, and
not enter them in the terminfo database. This allows several reverse
motions to be strung together without intervening wasted steps that
leave and reenter reverse mode.
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Entering/Exiting Reverse Modes
___________________________________________
slm Reverse sense of horizontal motions
rlm Restore sense of horizontal motions
sum Reverse sense of vertical motions
rum Restore sense of vertical motions
While sense of horizontal motions reversed:
mcub1 Move 1 step right
mcuf1 Move 1 step left
mcub Move N steps right
mcuf Move N steps left
cub1 Move 1 column right
cuf1 Move 1 column left
cub Move N columns right
cuf Move N columns left
While sense of vertical motions reversed:
mcuu1 Move 1 step down
mcud1 Move 1 step up
mcuu Move N steps down
mcud Move N steps up
cuu1 Move 1 line down
cud1 Move 1 line up
cuu Move N lines down
cud Move N lines up
The reverse motion modes should not affect the mvpa and mhpa absolute
motion capabilities. The reverse vertical motion mode should, however,
also reverse the action of the line wrapping that occurs when a char-
acter is printed in the right-most position. Thus printers that have
the standard terminfo capability am defined should experience motion
to the beginning of the previous line when a character is printed in
the right-most position under reverse vertical motion mode.
The action when any other motion capabilities are used in reverse
motion modes is not defined; thus, programs must exit reverse motion
modes before using other motion capabilities.
Two miscellaneous capabilities complete the list of new motion capa-
bilities. One of these is needed for printers that move the current
position to the beginning of a line when certain control characters,
such as line-feed or form-feed, are used. The other is used for the
capability of suspending the motion that normally occurs after print-
ing a character.
Miscellaneous Motion Strings
________________________________________________________________
docr List of control characters causing cr
zerom Prevent auto motion after printing next single character
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Margins
terminfo provides two strings for setting margins on terminals: one
for the left and one for the right margin. Printers, however, have two
additional margins, for the top and bottom margins of each page.
Furthermore, some printers require not using motion strings to move
the current position to a margin and then fixing the margin there, but
require the specification of where a margin should be regardless of
the current position. Therefore terminfo offers six additional strings
for defining margins with printers.
Setting Margins
__________________________________________
smgl Set left margin at current column
smgr Set right margin at current column
smgb Set bottom margin at current line
smgt Set top margin at current line
smgbp Set bottom margin at line N
smglp Set left margin at column N
smgrp Set right margin at column N
smgtp Set top margin at line N
The last four strings are used with one or more arguments that give
the position of the margin or margins to set. If both of smglp and
smgrp are set, each is used with a single argument, N, that gives the
column number of the left and right margin, respectively. If both of
smgtp and smgbp are set, each is used to set the top and bottom mar-
gin, respectively: smgtp is used with a single argument, N, the line
number of the top margin; however, smgbp is used with two arguments, N
and M, that give the line number of the bottom margin, the first
counting from the top of the page and the second counting from the
bottom. This accommodates the two styles of specifying the bottom mar-
gin in different manufacturers' printers. When coding a terminfo entry
for a printer that has a settable bottom margin, only the first or
second parameter should be used, depending on the printer. When writ-
ing an application that uses smgbp to set the bottom margin, both
arguments must be given.
If only one of smglp and smgrp is set, then it is used with two argu-
ments, the column number of the left and right margins, in that order.
Likewise, if only one of smgtp and smgbp is set, then it is used with
two arguments that give the top and bottom margins, in that order,
counting from the top of the page. Thus when coding a terminfo entry
for a printer that requires setting both left and right or top and
bottom margins simultaneously, only one of smglp and smgrp or smgtp
and smgbp should be defined; the other should be left blank. When
writing an application that uses these string capabilities, the pairs
should be first checked to see if each in the pair is set or only one
is set, and should then be used accordingly.
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In counting lines or columns, line zero is the top line and column
zero is the left-most column. A zero value for the second argument
with smgbp means the bottom line of the page.
All margins can be cleared with mgc.
Shadows, Italics, Wide Characters, Superscripts, Subscripts
Five new sets of strings are used to describe the capabilities
printers have of enhancing printed text.
Enhanced Printing
____________________________________________________
sshm Enter shadow-printing mode
rshm Exit shadow-printing mode
sitm Enter italicizing mode
ritm Exit italicizing mode
swidm Enter wide character mode
rwidm Exit wide character mode
ssupm Enter superscript mode
rsupm Exit superscript mode
supcs List of characters available as superscripts
ssubm Enter subscript mode
rsubm Exit subscript mode
subcs List of characters available as subscripts
If a printer requires the sshm control sequence before every character
to be shadow-printed, the rshm string is left blank. Thus programs
that find a control sequence in sshm but none in rshm should use the
sshm control sequence before every character to be shadow-printed;
otherwise, the sshm control sequence should be used once before the
set of characters to be shadow-printed, followed by rshm. The same is
also true of each of the sitm/ritm, swidm/rwidm, ssupm/rsupm, and
ssubm/rsubm pairs.
Note that terminfo also has a capability for printing emboldened text
(bold). While shadow printing and emboldened printing are similar in
that they "darken" the text, many printers produce these two types of
print in slightly different ways. Generally, emboldened printing is
done by overstriking the same character one or more times. Shadow
printing likewise usually involves overstriking, but with a slight
movement up and/or to the side so that the character is "fatter".
It is assumed that enhanced printing modes are independent modes, so
that it would be possible, for instance, to shadow print italicized
subscripts.
As mentioned earlier, the amount of motion automatically made after
printing a wide character should be given in widcs.
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If only a subset of the printable ASCII characters can be printed as
superscripts or subscripts, they should be listed in supcs or subcs
strings, respectively. If the ssupm or ssubm strings contain control
sequences, but the corresponding supcs or subcs strings are empty, it
is assumed that all printable ASCII characters are available as super-
scripts or subscripts.
Automatic motion made after printing a superscript or subscript is
assumed to be the same as for regular characters. Thus, for example,
printing any of the following three examples will result in equivalent
motion:
Bi Bi Bi
Note that the existing msgr boolean capability describes whether
motion control sequences can be used while in standout mode. This
capability is extended to cover the enhanced printing modes added
here. msgr should be set for those printers that accept any motion
control sequences without affecting shadow, italicized, widened,
superscript, or subscript printing. Conversely, if msgr is not set, a
program should end these modes before attempting any motion.
Section 2-5: Alternate Character Sets
In addition to allowing you to define line graphics (described in sec-
tion 1-12), terminfo lets you define alternate character sets. The
following capabilities cover printers and terminals with multiple
selectable or definable character sets.
Alternate Character Sets
_________________________________________________________
scs Select character set N
scsd Start definition of character set N, M characters
defc Define character A, B dots wide, descender D
rcsd End definition of character set N
csnm List of character set names
daisy Printer has manually changed print-wheels
The scs, rcsd, and csnm strings are used with a single argument, N, a
number from 0 to 63 that identifies the character set. The scsd string
is also used with the argument N and another, M, that gives the number
of characters in the set. The defc string is used with three argu-
ments: A gives the ASCII code representation for the character, B
gives the width of the character in dots, and D is zero or one depend-
ing on whether the character is a "descender" or not. The defc string
is also followed by a string of image-data bytes that describe how the
character looks (see below).
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Character set 0 is the default character set present after the printer
has been initialized. Not every printer has 64 character sets, of
course; using scs with an argument that doesn't select an available
character set should cause a null result from tparm.
If a character set has to be defined before it can be used, the scsd
control sequence is to be used before defining the character set, and
the rcsd is to be used after. They should also cause a null result
from tparm when used with an argument N that doesn't apply. If a char-
acter set still has to be selected after being defined, the scs con-
trol sequence should follow the rcsd control sequence. By examining
the results of using each of the scs, scsd, and rcsd strings with a
character set number in a call to tparm, a program can determine which
of the three are needed.
Between use of the scsd and rcsd strings, the defc string should be
used to define each character. To print any character on printers
covered by terminfo, the ASCII code is sent to the printer. This is
true for characters in an alternate set as well as normal characters.
Thus the definition of a character includes the ASCII code that
represents it. In addition, the width of the character in dots is
given, along with an indication of whether the character should des-
cend below the print line (such as the lowercase letter g in most
character sets). The width of the character in dots also indicates the
number of image-data bytes that will follow the defc string. These
image-data bytes indicate where in a dot-matrix pattern ink should be
applied to "draw" the character; the number of these bytes and their
form are defined below under 2-6: "Dot-Matrix Graphics".
It's easiest for the creator of terminfo entries to refer to each
character set by number; however, these numbers will be meaningless to
the application developer. The csnm string alleviates this problem by
providing names for each number.
When used with a character set number in a call to tparm, the csnm
string will produce the equivalent name. These names should be used as
a reference only. No naming convention is implied, although anyone who
creates a terminfo entry for a printer should use names consistent
with the names found in user documents for the printer. Application
developers should allow a user to specify a character set by number
(leaving it up to the user to examine the csnm string to determine the
correct number), or by name, where the application examines the csnm
string to determine the corresponding character set number.
These capabilities are likely to be used only with dot-matrix
printers. If they are not available, the strings should not be
defined. For printers that have manually changed print-wheels or font
cartridges, the boolean daisy is set.
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Section 2-6: Dot-Matrix Graphics
Dot-matrix printers typically have the capability of reproducing
raster-graphics images. Three new numeric capabilities and three new
string capabilities can help a program draw raster-graphics images
independent of the type of dot-matrix printer or the number of pins or
dots the printer can handle at one time.
Dot-Matrix Graphics
_______________________________________________________
npins Number of pins, N, in print-head
spinv Spacing of pins vertically in pins per inch
spinh Spacing of dots horizontally in dots per inch
porder Matches software bits to print-head pins
sbim Start printing bit image graphics, B bits wide
rbim End printing bit image graphics
The sbim sring is used with a single argument, B, the width of the
image in dots.
The model of dot-matrix or raster-graphics that terminfo presents is
similar to the technique used for most dot-matrix printers: each pass
of the printer's print-head is assumed to produce a dot-matrix that is
N dots high and B dots wide. This is typically a wide, squat, rectan-
gle of dots. The height of this rectangle in dots will vary from one
printer to the next; this is given in the npins numeric capability.
The size of the rectangle in fractions of an inch will also vary; it
can be deduced from the spinv and spinh numeric capabilities. With
these three values an application can divide a complete raster-
graphics image into several horizontal strips, perhaps interpolating
to account for different dot spacing vertically and horizontally.
The sbim and rbim strings are used to start and end a dot-matrix
image, respectively. The sbim string is used with a single argument
that gives the width of the dot-matrix in dots. A sequence of image-
data bytes are sent to the printer after the sbim string and before
the rbim string. The number of bytes is a integral multiple of the
width of the dot-matrix; the multiple and the form of each byte is
determined by the porder string as described below.
The porder string is a comma separated list of pin numbers optionally
followed by an numerical offset. The offset, if given, is separated
from the list with a semicolon. The position of each pin number in the
list corresponds to a bit in an 8-bit data byte. The pins are numbered
consecutively from 1 to npins, with 1 being the top pin. Note that the
term "pin" is used loosely here; ink-jet dot-matrix printers don't
have pins, but can be considered to have an equivalent method of
applying a single dot of ink to paper. The bit positions in porder are
in groups of 8, with the first position in each group the most signi-
ficant bit and the last position the least significant bit. An appli-
cation produces 8-bit bytes in the order of the groups in porder.
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An application computes the image-data bytes from the internal image,
mapping vertical dot positions in each print-head pass into 8-bit
bytes, using a 1 bit where ink should be applied and 0 where no ink
should be applied. This can be reversed (0 bit for ink, 1 bit for no
ink) by giving a negative pin number. If a position is skipped in
porder, a 0 bit is used. If a position has a lowercase x instead of a
pin number, a 1 bit is used in the skipped position. For consistency,
a lowercase o can be used to represent a 0 filled, skipped bit. There
must be a multiple of 8 bit positions used or skipped in porder; if
not, 0 bits are used to fill the last byte in the least significant
bits. The offset, if given, is added to each data byte; the offset can
be negative.
Some examples may help clarify the use of the porder string. The AT&T
470, AT&T 475 and C.Itoh 8510 printers provide eight pins for graph-
ics. The pins are identified top to bottom by the 8 bits in a byte,
from least significant to most. The porder strings for these printers
would be 8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1. The AT&T 478 and AT&T 479 printers also pro-
vide eight pins for graphics. However, the pins are identified in the
reverse order. The porder strings for these printers would be
1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8. The AT&T 5310, AT&T 5320, DEC LA100, and DEC LN03
printers provide six pins for graphics. The pins are identified top to
bottom by the decimal values 1, 2, 4, 8, 16 and 32. These correspond
to the low six bits in an 8-bit byte, although the decimal values are
further offset by the value 63. The porder string for these printers
would be ,,6,5,4,3,2,1;63, or alternately o,o,6,5,4,3,2,1;63.
Section 2-7: Effect of Changing Printing Resolution
If the control sequences to change the character pitch or the line
pitch are used, the pin or dot spacing may change:
Changing the Character/Line Pitches
___________________________________
cpi Change character pitch
cpix If set, cpi changes spinh
lpi Change line pitch
lpix If set, lpi changes spinv
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Programs that use cpi or lpi should recalculate the dot spacing:
Effects of Changing the Character/Line Pitches
_________________________________________________
Before After
_________________________________________________
Using cpi with cpix clear:
spinh' spinh
Using cpi with cpix set:
orhi
spinh' spinh=spinh'.orhi'
Using lpi with lpix clear:
spinv' spinv
Using lpi with lpix set:
orhi
spinv' spinv=spinv'.orhi'
Using chr:
spinh' spinh
Using cvr:
spinv' spinv
orhi' and orhi are the values of the horizontal resolution in steps
per inch, before using cpi and after using cpi, respectively. Like-
wise, orvi' and orvi are the values of the vertical resolution in
steps per inch, before using lpi and after using lpi, respectively.
Thus, the changes in the dots per inch for dot-matrix graphics follow
the changes in steps per inch for printer resolution.
Section 2-8: Print Quality
Many dot-matrix printers can alter the dot spacing of printed text to
produce near letter quality printing or draft quality printing. Usu-
ally it is important to be able to choose one or the other because the
rate of printing generally falls off as the quality improves. There
are three new strings used to describe these capabilities.
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Print Quality
_____________________________________
snlq Set near-letter quality print
snrmq Set normal quality print
sdrfq Set draft quality print
The capabilities are listed in decreasing levels of quality. If a
printer doesn't have all three levels, one or two of the strings
should be left blank as appropriate.
Section 2-9: Printing Rate and Buffer Size
Because there is no standard protocol that can be used to keep a pro-
gram synchronized with a printer, and because modern printers can
buffer data before printing it, a program generally cannot determine
at any time what has been printed. Two new numeric capabilities can
help a program estimate what has been printed.
Print Rate/Buffer Size
___________________________________________________
cps Nominal print rate in characters per second
bufsz Buffer capacity in characters
cps is the nominal or average rate at which the printer prints charac-
ters; if this value is not given, the rate should be estimated at
one-tenth the prevailing baud rate. bufsz is the maximum number of
subsequent characters buffered before the guaranteed printing of an
earlier character, assuming proper flow control has been used. If this
value is not given it is assumed that the printer does not buffer
characters, but prints them as they are received.
As an example, if a printer has a 1000-character buffer, then sending
the letter "a" followed by 1000 additional characters is guaranteed to
cause the letter "a" to print. If the same printer prints at the rate
of 100 characters per second, then it should take 10 seconds to print
all the characters in the buffer, less if the buffer is not full. By
keeping track of the characters sent to a printer, and knowing the
print rate and buffer size, a program can synchronize itself with the
printer.
Note that most printer manufacturers advertise the maximum print rate,
not the nominal print rate. A good way to get a value to put in for
cps is to generate a few pages of text, count the number of printable
characters, and then see how long it takes to print the text.
Applications that use these values should recognize the variability in
the print rate. Straight text, in short lines, with no embedded con-
trol sequences will probably print at close to the advertised print
rate and probably faster than the rate in cps. Graphics data with a
lot of control sequences, or very long lines of text, will print at
well below the advertised rate and below the rate in cps. If the
application is using cps to decide how long it should take a printer
to print a block of text, the application should pad the estimate. If
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the application is using cps to decide how much text has already been
printed, it should shrink the estimate. The application will thus err
in favor of the user, who wants, above all, to see all the output in
its correct place.
Section 2-10: Selecting a Terminal
If the environment variable TERMINFO is defined, any program using
curses checks for a local terminal definition before checking in the
standard place. For example, if TERM is set to att4424, then the com-
piled terminal definition is found in by default the path:
a/att4424
within an implementation-specific directory.
(The a is copied from the first letter of att4424 to avoid creation of
huge directories.) However, if TERMINFO is set to $HOME/myterms,
curses first checks:
$HOME/myterms/a/att4424
If that fails, it then checks the default pathname.
This is useful for developing experimental definitions or when write
permission in the implementation-defined default database is not
available.
If the LINES and COLUMNS environment variables are set, or if the pro-
gram is executing in a window environment, line and column information
in the environment will override information read by terminfo.
NOTES
The most effective way to prepare a terminal description is by imitat-
ing the description of a similar terminal in terminfo and to build up
a description gradually, using partial descriptions with a screen
oriented editor, such as vi, to check that they are correct. To easily
test a new terminal description the environment variable TERMINFO can
be set to the pathname of a directory containing the compiled descrip-
tion, and programs will look there rather than in
/usr/share/lib/terminfo.
It is implementation-defined how the entries in terminfo may be
created.
There is more than one way to write a terminfo entry. A minimal entry
may permit applications to use curses to operate the terminal. If the
entry is enhanced to describe more of the terminal's capabilities,
applications can use curses to invoke those features, and can take
advantages of optimizations within curses and thus operate more effi-
ciently. For most terminals, an optimal terminfo entry has already
been written.
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FILES
/usr/share/lib/terminfo/?/*
Compiled terminal description database
/usr/share/lib/tabset/*
Tab settings for some terminals, in a format appropriate to be
output to the terminal (escape sequences that set margins and
tabs)
SEE ALSO
stty(1), tput(1), tty(1), tic(1M), curses(3X), term(4), curses(5),
term(5), termnames(5).
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