news

ncurses-5.4

-- $Id: NEWS,v 1.797 2004/02/08 21:15:26 tom Exp $

This is a log of changes that ncurses has gone through since Zeyd started
working with Pavel Curtis' original work, pcurses, in 1992.

Changes through 1.9.9e are recorded by Zeyd M. Ben-Halim.
Changes since 1.9.9e are recorded by Thomas Dickey.

20040208 5.4 release for upload to ftp.gnu.org
	+ update TO-DO.

20040207 pre-release
	+ minor fixes to _nc_tparm_analyze(), i.e., do not count %i as a param,
	  and do not count %d if it follows a %p.
	+ correct an inconsistency between handling of codes in the 128-255
	  range, e.g., as illustrated by test/ncurses.c f/F tests.  In POSIX
	  locale, the latter did not show printable results, while the former
	  did.
	+ modify MKlib_gen.sh to compensate for broken C preprocessor on Mac
	  OS X, which alters "%%" to "% % " (report by Robert Simms, fix
	  verified by Scott Corscadden).

20040131 pre-release
	+ modify SCREEN struct to align it between normal/wide curses flavors
	  to simplify future changes to build a single version of libtinfo
	  (patch by Stanislav Ievlev).
	+ document handling of carriage return by addch() in manpage.
	+ document special features of unctrl() in manpage.
	+ documented interface changes in INSTALL.
	+ corrected control-char test in lib_addch.c to account for locale
	  (Debian #230335, cf: 971206).
	+ updated test/configure.in to use AC_EXEEXT and AC_OBJEXT.
	+ fixes to compile Ada95 binding with Debian gnat 3.15p-4 package.
	+ minor configure-script fixes for older ports, e.g., BeOS R4.5.

20040125 pre-release
	+ amend change to PutAttrChar() from 20030614 which computed the number
	  of cells for a possibly multi-cell character.  The 20030614 change
	  forced the cell to a blank if the result from wcwidth() was not
	  greater than zero.  However, wcwidth() called for parameters in the
	  range 128-255 can give this return value.  The logic now simply
	  ensures that the number of cells is greater than zero without
	  modifying the displayed value.

20040124 pre-release
	+ looked good for 5.4 release for upload to ftp.gnu.org (but see above)
	+ modify configure script check for ranlib to use AC_CHECK_TOOL, since
	  that works better for cross-compiling.

20040117 pre-release
	+ modify lib_get_wch.c to prefer mblen/mbtowc over mbrlen/mbrtowc to
	  work around core dump in Solaris 8's locale support, e.g., for
	  zh_CN.GB18030 (report by Saravanan Bellan).
	+ add includes for <stdarg.h> and <stdio.h> in configure script macro
	  to make <wchar.h> check work with Tru64 4.0d.
	+ add terminfo entry for U/Win -TD
	+ add terminfo entries for SFU aka Interix aka OpenNT (Federico
	  Bianchi).
	+ modify tput's error messages to prefix them with the program name
	  (report by Vincent Lefevre, patch by Daniel Jacobowitz, Debian
	  #227586).
	+ correct a place in tack where exit_standout_mode was used instead of
	  exit_attribute_mode (patch by Jochen Voss, Debian #224443).
	+ modify c++/cursesf.h to use const in the Enumeration_Field method.
	+ remove an ambiguous (actually redundant) method from c++/cursesf.h
	+ make $HOME/.terminfo update optional (suggested by Stanislav Ievlev).
	+ improve sed script which extracts libtool's version in the
	  CF_WITH_LIBTOOL macro.
	+ add ifdef'd call to AC_PROG_LIBTOOL to CF_WITH_LIBTOOL macro (to
	  simplify local patch for Albert Chin-A-Young)..
	+ add $(CXXFLAGS) to link command in c++/Makefile.in (adapted from
	  patch by Albert Chin-A-Young)..
	+ fix a missing substitution in configure.in for "$target" needed for
	  HPUX .so/.sl case.
	+ resync CF_XOPEN_SOURCE configure macro with lynx; fixes IRIX64 and
	  NetBSD 1.6 conflicts with _XOPEN_SOURCE.
	+ make check for stdbool.h more specific, to ensure that including it
	  will actually define/declare bool for the configured compiler.
	+ rewrite ifdef's in curses.h relating NCURSES_BOOL and bool.  The
	  intention of that is to #define NCURSES_BOOL as bool when the
	  compiler declares bool, and to #define bool as NCURSES_BOOL when it
	  does not (reported by Jim Gifford, Sam Varshavchik, cf: 20031213).

20040110 pre-release
	+ change minor version to 4, i.e., ncurses 5.4
	+ revised/improved terminfo entries for tvi912b, tvi920b (Benjamin C W
	  Sittler).
	+ simplified ncurses/base/version.c by defining the result from the
	  configure script rather than using sprintf (suggested by Stanislav
	  Ievlev).
	+ remove obsolete casts from c++/cursesw.h (reported by Stanislav
	  Ievlev).
	+ modify configure script so that when configuring for termlib, programs
	  such as tic are not linked with the upper-level ncurses library
	  (suggested by Stanislav Ievlev).
	+ move version.c from ncurses/base to ncurses/tinfo to allow linking
	  of tic, etc., using libtinfo (suggested by Stanislav Ievlev).

20040103
	+ adjust -D's to build ncursesw on OpenBSD.
	+ modify CF_PROG_EXT to make OS/2 build with EXEEXT.
	+ add pecho_wchar().
	+ remove <wctype.h> include from lib_slk_wset.c which is not needed (or
	  available) on older platforms.

20031227
	+ add -D's to build ncursew on FreeBSD 5.1.
	+ modify shared library configuration for FreeBSD 4.x/5.x to add the
	  soname information (request by Marc Glisse).
	+ modify _nc_read_tic_entry() to not use MAX_ALIAS, but PATH_MAX only
	  for limiting the length of a filename in the terminfo database.
	+ modify termname() to return the terminal name used by setupterm()
	  rather than $TERM, without truncating to 14 characters as documented
	  by X/Open (report by Stanislav Ievlev, cf:  970719).
	+ re-add definition for _BSD_TYPES, lost in merge (cf: 20031206).

20031220
	+ add configure option --with-manpage-format=catonly to address
	  behavior of BSDI, allow install of man+cat files on NetBSD, whose
	  behavior has diverged by requiring both to be present.
	+ remove leading blanks from comment-lines in manlinks.sed script to
	  work with Tru64 4.0d.
	+ add screen.linux terminfo entry (discussion on mutt-users mailing
	  list).

20031213
	+ add a check for tic to flag missing backslashes for termcap
	  continuation lines.  ncurses reads the whole entry, but termcap
	  applications do not.
	+ add configure option "--with-manpage-aliases" extending
	  "--with-manpage-aliases" to provide the option of generating ".so"
	  files rather than symbolic links for manpage aliases.
	+ add bool definition in include/curses.h.in for configurations with no
	  usable C++ compiler (cf: 20030607).
	+ fix pathname of SigAction.h for building with --srcdir (reported by
	  Mike Castle).

20031206
	+ folded ncurses/base/sigaction.c into includes of ncurses/SigAction.h,
	  since that header is used only within ncurses/tty/lib_tstp.c, for
	  non-POSIX systems (discussion with Stanislav Ievlev).
	+ remove obsolete _nc_outstr() function (report by Stanislav Ievlev
	  <[e-mail]>).
	+ add test/background.c and test/color_set.c
	+ modify color_set() function to work with color pair 0 (report by
	  George Andreou <[e-mail]>).
	+ add configure option --with-trace, since defining TRACE seems too
	  awkward for some cases.
	+ remove a call to _nc_free_termtype() from read_termtype(), since the
	  corresponding buffer contents were already zeroed by a memset (cf:
	  20000101).
	+ improve configure check for _XOPEN_SOURCE and related definitions,
	  adding special cases for Solaris' __EXTENSIONS__ and FreeBSD's
	  __BSD_TYPES (reports by Marc Glisse <[e-mail]>).
	+ small fixes to compile on Solaris and IRIX64 using cc.
	+ correct typo in check for pre-POSIX sort options in MKkey_defs.sh
	  (cf: 20031101).

20031129
	+ modify _nc_gettime() to avoid a problem with arithmetic on unsigned
	  values (Philippe Blain).
	+ improve the nanosleep() logic in napms() by checking for EINTR and
	  restarting (Philippe Blain).
	+ correct expression for "%D" in lib_tgoto.c (Juha Jarvi
	  <[e-mail]>).

20031122
	+ add linux-vt terminfo entry (Andrey V Lukyanov <[e-mail]>).
	+ allow "\|" escape in terminfo; tic should not warn about this.
	+ save the full pathname of the trace-file the first time it is opened,
	  to avoid creating it in different directories if the application
	  opens and closes it while changing its working directory.
	+ modify configure script to provide a non-empty default for
	  $BROKEN_LINKER

20031108
	+ add DJGPP to special case of DOS-style drive letters potentially
	  appearing in TERMCAP environment variable.
	+ fix some spelling in comments (reports by jmc, Jonathon Gray).
	+ update config.guess, config.sub

20031101
	+ fix a memory leak in error-return from setupterm() (report by
	  Stanislav Ievlev <[e-mail]>).
	+ use EXEEXT and OBJEXT consistently in makefiles.
	+ amend fixes for cross-compiling to use separate executable-suffix
	  BUILD_EXEEXT (cf: 20031018).
	+ modify MKkey_defs.sh to check for sort utility that does not
	  recognize key options, e.g., busybox (report by Peter S Mazinger
	  <[e-mail]>).
	+ fix potential out-of-bounds indexing in _nc_infotocap() (found by
	  David Krause using some of the new malloc debugging features
	  under OpenBSD, patch by Ted Unangst).
	+ modify CF_LIB_SUFFIX for Itanium releases of HP-UX, which use a
	  ".so" suffix (patch by Jonathan Ward <[e-mail]>).

20031025
	+ update terminfo for xterm-xfree86 -TD
	+ add check for multiple "tc=" clauses in a termcap to tic.
	+ check for missing op/oc in tic.
	+ correct _nc_resolve_uses() and _nc_merge_entry() to allow infocmp and
	  tic to show cancelled capabilities.  These functions were ignoring
	  the state of the target entry, which should be untouched if cancelled.
	+ correct comment in tack/output.c (Debian #215806).
	+ add some null-pointer checks to lib_options.c (report by Michael
	  Bienia).
	+ regenerated html documentation.
	+ correction to tar-copy.sh, remove a trap command that resulted in
	  leaving temporary files (cf: 20030510).
	+ remove contact/maintainer addresses for Juergen Pfeifer (his request).

20031018
	+ updated test/configure to reflect changes for libtool (cf: 20030830).
	+ fix several places in tack/pad.c which tested and used the parameter-
	  and parameterless strings inconsistently, i.e., in pad_rin(),
	  pad_il(), pad_indn() and pad_dl() (Debian #215805).
	+ minor fixes for configure script and makefiles to cleanup executables
	  generated when cross-compiling for DJGPP.
	+ modify infocmp to omit check for $TERM for operations that do not
	  require it, e.g., "infocmp -e" used to build fallback list (report by
	  Koblinger Egmont).

20031004
	+ add terminfo entries for DJGPP.
	+ updated note about maintainer in ncurses-intro.html

20030927
	+ update terminfo entries for gnome terminal.
	+ modify tack to reset colors after each color test, correct a place
	  where exit_standout_mode was used instead of exit_attribute_mode.
	+ improve tack's bce test by making it set colors other than black
	  on white.
	+ plug a potential recursion between napms() and _nc_timed_wait()
	  (report by Philippe Blain).

20030920
	+ add --with-rel-version option to allow workaround to allow making
	  libtool on Darwin generate the "same" library names as with the
	  --with-shared option.  The Darwin ld program does not work well
	  with a zero as the minor-version value (request by Chris Zubrzycki).
	+ modify CF_MIXEDCASE_FILENAMES macro to work with cross-compiling.
	+ modify tack to allow it to run from fallback terminfo data.
	> Philippe Blain:
	+ improve PutRange() by adjusting call to EmitRange() and corresponding
	  return-value to not emit unchanged characters on the end of the
	  range.
	+ improve a check for changed-attribute by exiting a loop when the
	  change is found.
	+ improve logic in TransformLine(), eliminating a duplicated comparison
	  in the clr_bol logic.

20030913
	> Philippe Blain:
	+ in ncurses/tty/lib_mvcur.c,
	  move the label 'nonlocal' just before the second gettimeofday() to
	  be able to compute the diff time when 'goto nonlocal' used.
	  Rename 'msec' to 'microsec' in the debug-message.
	+ in ncurses/tty/lib_mvcur.c,
	  Use _nc_outch() in carriage return/newline movement instead of
	  putchar() which goes to stdout.  Move test for xold>0 out of loop.
	+ in ncurses/tinfo/setbuf.c,
	  Set the flag SP->_buffered at the end of operations when all has been
	  successful (typeMalloc can fail).
	+ simplify NC_BUFFERED macro by moving check inside _nc_setbuf().

20030906
	+ modify configure script to avoid using "head -1", which does not
	  work if POSIXLY_CORRECT (sic) is set.
	+ modify run_tic.in to avoid using wrong shared libraries when
	  cross-compiling (Dan Kegel).

20030830
	+ alter configure script help message to make it clearer that
	  --with-build-cc does not specify a cross-compiler (suggested by Dan
	  Kegel <[e-mail]>).
	+ modify configure script to accommodate libtool 1.5, as well as add an
	  parameter to the "--with-libtool" option which can specify the