Provided by: ncurses-doc_6.3+20220423-2_all 
NAME
addch, waddch, mvaddch, mvwaddch, echochar, wechochar - add a character (with attributes)
to a curses window, then advance the cursor
SYNOPSIS
#include <curses.h>
int addch(const chtype ch);
int waddch(WINDOW *win, const chtype ch);
int mvaddch(int y, int x, const chtype ch);
int mvwaddch(WINDOW *win, int y, int x, const chtype ch);
int echochar(const chtype ch);
int wechochar(WINDOW *win, const chtype ch);
DESCRIPTION
Adding characters
The addch, waddch, mvaddch and mvwaddch routines put the character ch into the given
window at its current window position, which is then advanced. They are analogous to
putchar(3) in stdio(3). If the advance is at the right margin:
• The cursor automatically wraps to the beginning of the next line.
• At the bottom of the current scrolling region, and if scrollok is enabled, the
scrolling region is scrolled up one line.
• If scrollok is not enabled, writing a character at the lower right margin succeeds.
However, an error is returned because it is not possible to wrap to a new line
If ch is a tab, newline, carriage return or backspace, the cursor is moved appropriately
within the window:
• Backspace moves the cursor one character left; at the left edge of a window it does
nothing.
• Carriage return moves the cursor to the window left margin on the current line.
• Newline does a clrtoeol, then moves the cursor to the window left margin on the next
line, scrolling the window if on the last line.
• Tabs are considered to be at every eighth column. The tab interval may be altered by
setting the TABSIZE variable.
If ch is any other nonprintable character, it is drawn in printable form, i.e., the ^X
notation used by unctrl(3X). Calling winch after adding a nonprintable character does not
return the character itself, but instead returns the printable representation of the
character.
Video attributes can be combined with a character argument passed to addch or related
functions by logical-ORing them into the character. (Thus, text, including attributes,
can be copied from one place to another using inch(3X) and addch.) See the attr(3NCURSES)
page for values of predefined video attribute constants that can be usefully OR'ed into
characters.
Echoing characters
The echochar and wechochar routines are equivalent to a call to addch followed by a call
to refresh(3X), or a call to waddch followed by a call to wrefresh. The knowledge that
only a single character is being output is used and, for non-control characters, a
considerable performance gain may be seen by using these routines instead of their
equivalents.
Line Graphics
The following variables may be used to add line drawing characters to the screen with
routines of the addch family. The default character listed below is used if the acsc
capability does not define a terminal-specific replacement for it, or if the terminal and
locale configuration requires Unicode but the library is unable to use Unicode.
The names are taken from VT100 nomenclature.
ACS ACS acsc Glyph
Name Default char Name
─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
ACS_BLOCK # 0 solid square block
ACS_BOARD # h board of squares
ACS_BTEE + v bottom tee
ACS_BULLET o ~ bullet
ACS_CKBOARD : a checker board (stipple)
ACS_DARROW v . arrow pointing down
ACS_DEGREE ' f degree symbol
ACS_DIAMOND + ` diamond
ACS_GEQUAL > > greater-than-or-equal-to
ACS_HLINE - q horizontal line
ACS_LANTERN # i lantern symbol
ACS_LARROW < , arrow pointing left
ACS_LEQUAL < y less-than-or-equal-to
ACS_LLCORNER + m lower left-hand corner
ACS_LRCORNER + j lower right-hand corner
ACS_LTEE + t left tee
ACS_NEQUAL ! | not-equal
ACS_PI * { greek pi
ACS_PLMINUS # g plus/minus
ACS_PLUS + n plus
ACS_RARROW > + arrow pointing right
ACS_RTEE + u right tee
ACS_S1 - o scan line 1
ACS_S3 - p scan line 3
ACS_S7 - r scan line 7
ACS_S9 _ s scan line 9
ACS_STERLING f } pound-sterling symbol
ACS_TTEE + w top tee
ACS_UARROW ^ - arrow pointing up
ACS_ULCORNER + l upper left-hand corner
ACS_URCORNER + k upper right-hand corner
ACS_VLINE | x vertical line
RETURN VALUE
All routines return the integer ERR upon failure and OK on success (the SVr4 manuals
specify only “an integer value other than ERR”) upon successful completion, unless
otherwise noted in the preceding routine descriptions.
Functions with a “mv” prefix first perform a cursor movement using wmove, and return an
error if the position is outside the window, or if the window pointer is null.
If it is not possible to add a complete character, an error is returned:
• If scrollok is not enabled, writing a character at the lower right margin succeeds.
However, an error is returned because it is not possible to wrap to a new line
• If an error is detected when converting a multibyte character to a sequence of bytes,
or if it is not possible to add all of the resulting bytes in the window, an error is
returned.
NOTES
Note that addch, mvaddch, mvwaddch, and echochar may be macros.
PORTABILITY
All these functions are described in the XSI Curses standard, Issue 4. The defaults
specified for forms-drawing characters apply in the POSIX locale.
ACS Symbols
X/Open Curses states that the ACS_ definitions are char constants. For the wide-character
implementation (see curs_add_wch), there are analogous WACS_ definitions which are cchar_t
constants. Some implementations are problematic:
• Some implementations define the ACS symbols to a constant (such as Solaris), while
others define those to entries in an array.
This implementation uses an array acs_map, as done in SVr4 curses. NetBSD also uses
an array, actually named _acs_char, with a #define for compatibility.
• HPUX curses equates some of the ACS_ symbols to the analogous WACS_ symbols as if the
ACS_ symbols were wide characters. The misdefined symbols are the arrows and other
symbols which are not used for line-drawing.
• X/Open Curses (issues 2 through 7) has a typographical error for the ACS_LANTERN
symbol, equating its “VT100+ Character” to I (capital I), while the header files for
SVr4 curses and the various implementations use i (lowercase).
None of the terminal descriptions on Unix platforms use uppercase-I, except for
Solaris (i.e., screen's terminal description, apparently based on the X/Open
documentation around 1995). On the other hand, the terminal description gs6300 (AT&T
PC6300 with EMOTS Terminal Emulator) uses lowercase-i.
Some ACS symbols (ACS_S3, ACS_S7, ACS_LEQUAL, ACS_GEQUAL, ACS_PI, ACS_NEQUAL,
ACS_STERLING) were not documented in any publicly released System V. However, many
publicly available terminfos include acsc strings in which their key characters (pryz{|})
are embedded, and a second-hand list of their character descriptions has come to light.
The ACS-prefixed names for them were invented for ncurses(3NCURSES).
The displayed values for the ACS_ and WACS_ constants depend on
• the library configuration, i.e., ncurses versus ncursesw, where the latter is capable
of displaying Unicode while the former is not, and
• whether the locale uses UTF-8 encoding.
In certain cases, the terminal is unable to display line-drawing characters except by
using UTF-8 (see the discussion of NCURSES_NO_UTF8_ACS in ncurses(3X)).
Character Set
X/Open Curses assumes that the parameter passed to waddch contains a single character. As
discussed in attr(3NCURSES), that character may have been more than eight bits in an SVr3
or SVr4 implementation, but in the X/Open Curses model, the details are not given. The
important distinction between SVr4 curses and X/Open Curses is that the non-character
information (attributes and color) was separated from the character information which is
packed in a chtype to pass to waddch.
In this implementation, chtype holds an eight-bit character. But ncurses allows multibyte
characters to be passed in a succession of calls to waddch. The other implementations do
not do this; a call to waddch passes exactly one character which may be rendered as one or
more cells on the screen depending on whether it is printable.
Depending on the locale settings, ncurses will inspect the byte passed in each call to
waddch, and check if the latest call will continue a multibyte sequence. When a character
is complete, ncurses displays the character and moves to the next position in the screen.
If the calling application interrupts the succession of bytes in a multibyte character by
moving the current location (e.g., using wmove), ncurses discards the partially built
character, starting over again.
For portability to other implementations, do not rely upon this behavior:
• check if a character can be represented as a single byte in the current locale before
attempting call waddch, and
• call wadd_wch for characters which cannot be handled by waddch.
TABSIZE
The TABSIZE variable is implemented in SVr4 and other versions of curses, but is not part
of X/Open curses (see curses_variables(3NCURSES) for more details).
If ch is a carriage return, the cursor is moved to the beginning of the current row of the
window. This is true of other implementations, but is not documented.
SEE ALSO
ncurses(3NCURSES), attr(3NCURSES), clear(3NCURSES), inch(3NCURSES), outopts(3NCURSES),
refresh(3NCURSES), curses_variables(3NCURSES), putc(3).
Comparable functions in the wide-character (ncursesw) library are described in
add_wch(3NCURSES).
addch(3NCURSES)