Ubuntu Manpage: def_prog_mode, def_shell_mode, reset_prog_mode, reset_shell

name
synopsis
description
return value
notes
extensions
portability
see also

Provided by: ncurses-doc_6.5+20250216-1_all

NAME

       def_prog_mode,  def_shell_mode,  reset_prog_mode,  reset_shell_mode,  resetty,  savetty,  getsyx, setsyx,
       curs_set, mvcur, napms, ripoffline - low-level curses routines

SYNOPSIS

       #include <curses.h>

       int def_prog_mode(void);
       int def_shell_mode(void);

       int reset_prog_mode(void);
       int reset_shell_mode(void);

       int resetty(void);
       int savetty(void);

       void getsyx(int y, int x);
       void setsyx(int y, int x);

       int curs_set(int visibility);
       int mvcur(int oldrow, int oldcol, int newrow, int newcol);
       int napms(int ms);
       int ripoffline(int line, int (*init)(WINDOW *, int));

DESCRIPTION

The following routines give low-level access to various curses capabilities. These routines typically
are used inside library routines.

def_prog_mode, def_shell_mode
The def_prog_mode and def_shell_mode routines save the current terminal modes as the “program” (in
curses) or “shell” (not in curses) state for use by the reset_prog_mode and reset_shell_mode routines.
This is done automatically by initscr. There is one such save area for each screen context allocated by
newterm.

reset_prog_mode, reset_shell_mode
The reset_prog_mode and reset_shell_mode routines restore the terminal to “program” (in curses) or
“shell” (out of curses) state. These are done automatically by endwin(3NCURSES) and, after an endwin, by
doupdate, so they normally are not called.

resetty, savetty
The resetty and savetty routines save and restore the state of the terminal modes. savetty saves the
current state in a buffer and resetty restores the state to what it was at the last call to savetty.

getsyx
getsyx stores the coordinates of virtual screen (newscr) cursor in y and x. If newscr's
leaveok(3NCURSES) output option is TRUE, getsyx stores -1 in both y and x. If lines have been removed
from the top of the screen using ripoffline, y includes these lines; therefore, y and x populated by
getsyx should be used only as arguments for setsyx.

Few applications use this feature; most call getyx(3NCURSES) instead.

setsyx
setsyx sets the virtual screen (newscr) cursor location to (y, x). setsyx(-1, -1) is equivalent to
leaveok(newscr, TRUE).

getsyx and setsyx are designed to be used by a function that manipulates curses windows but seeks to
avoid changing the cursor position. Such a function would first call getsyx, modify its windows'
content, call wnoutrefresh(3NCURSES) on them, call setsyx, then call doupdate(3NCURSES).

Few applications use this feature; most call wmove(3NCURSES) instead.

curs_set
curs_set adjusts the cursor visibility to “invisible”, “visible”, “very visible”, as its argument is 0,
1, or 2, respectively. It returns the previous visibility if the requested one is supported, and ERR
otherwise.

mvcur
mvcur provides low-level cursor motion. It takes effect immediately, rather than at the next refresh.
Unlike the other low-level output functions, which either write to the standard output stream or are
passed a function pointer to perform output, mvcur uses a file descriptor derived from the output stream
parameter of newterm(3NCURSES).

One application of mvcur accompanies the temporary use of another program to write to the terminal
screen. For example, first call refresh(3NCURSES) to ensure that the screen and the library's model of
it is up to date; then call reset_shell_mode; write to the screen with the external application; call
reset_prog_mode; and finally call mvcur(..., ..., -1, -1) to move the terminal cursor to where curses
thinks it is, since the library has no knowledge of how the external application moved it.

napms
napms sleeps for ms milliseconds. If ms exceeds 30,000 (thirty seconds), it is capped at that value.

ripoffline
ripoffline provides access to the same facility that slk_init(3NCURSES) uses to reduce the size of the
screen. ripoffline must be called before initscr or newterm is called, to prepare these initial actions:

• If line is positive, a line is removed from the top of stdscr.

• if line is negative, a line is removed from the bottom.

When the resulting initialization is done inside initscr, the routine init (supplied by the user) is
called with two arguments:

• a window pointer to the one-line window that has been allocated and

• an integer with the number of columns in the window.

Inside this initialization routine, the integer variables LINES and COLS (defined in <curses.h>) are not
guaranteed to be accurate and wrefresh or doupdate must not be called. It is allowable to call
wnoutrefresh during the initialization routine.

ripoffline can be called up to five times before calling initscr or newterm.

RETURN VALUE

       Except for curs_set, these functions return OK on success and ERR on failure.

       curs_set returns the previous cursor visibility, and returns ERR if the terminal type  does  not  support
       the requested visibility.

       napms always succeeds.

       mvcur fails if the position (newrow, newcol) is outside the screen boundaries.

       In ncurses,

       •   def_prog_mode,  def_shell_mode,  reset_prog_mode, and reset_shell_mode return ERR if the terminal was
           not initialized, or if the operating system's function for obtaining terminal settings fails.

       •   ripoffline returns ERR if the accumulated quantity of ripped-off lines would exceed the maximum (5).

NOTES

       getsyx is a macro; use of the & operator before its arguments is unnecessary.

       The endwin function of both ncurses and SVr4 curses calls curs_set if  the  latter  has  previously  been
       called  to  set  the  cursor  visibility  to a value other than normal; that is, either invisible or very
       visible.  There is no way for ncurses to determine the initial cursor visibility to restore it.

EXTENSIONS

       In ncurses, mvcur accepts -1 for either or both old coordinates.  This value tells ncurses that  the  old
       location  is  unknown,  and  that  it  must  use  only  absolute motion, as with the cursor_address (cup)
       capability, rather than the least costly combination of absolute and relative motion.

PORTABILITY

Applications employing ncurses extensions should condition their use on the visibility of the
NCURSES_VERSION preprocessor macro.

The virtual screen functions setsyx and getsyx are not described in X/Open Curses Issue 4. SVr4
documents each of them as returning an int. This is misleading, as they are macros with no documented
semantics for returning values.

All other functions are as described in X/Open Curses. It specifies no error conditions for them, except
as described for curs_set in section “RETURN VALUE” above.

The System V Interface Definition, Version 4 (1995), specified all of these functions except curs_set as
returning OK.

Older SVr4 man pages warn that the return value of curs_set “is currently incorrect”. This
implementation gets it right, but counting on its correctness anywhere else may be unwise.

X/Open Curses specifies ripoffline as returning OK with no possibility of failure (“[c]alls to ripoffline
above this limit [five lines] have no effect but report success”).

X/Open Curses notes:

After use of mvcur(), the model Curses maintains of the state of the terminal might not match the
actual state of the terminal. An application should touch and refresh the window before resuming
conventional use of Curses.

Both ncurses and SVr4 curses implement mvcur using the SCREEN object allocated in either
initscr(3NCURSES) or newterm(3NCURSES). X/Open Curses states that the old location must be given for
mvcur to accommodate terminals that lack absolute cursor positioning.

If interrupted by a signal, ncurses restarts napms. That, and the limitation to 30 seconds, differ from
other implementations.