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INSTALL
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-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-- Copyright 2018-2023,2024 Thomas E. Dickey --
-- Copyright 1998-2017,2018 Free Software Foundation, Inc. --
-- --
-- Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a --
-- copy of this software and associated documentation files (the --
-- "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including --
-- without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, --
-- distribute, distribute with modifications, sublicense, and/or sell copies --
-- of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished --
-- to do so, subject to the following conditions: --
-- --
-- The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included --
-- in all copies or substantial portions of the Software. --
-- --
-- THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS --
-- OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF --
-- MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN --
-- NO EVENT SHALL THE ABOVE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, --
-- DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR --
-- OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE --
-- USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE. --
-- --
-- Except as contained in this notice, the name(s) of the above copyright --
-- holders shall not be used in advertising or otherwise to promote the --
-- sale, use or other dealings in this Software without prior written --
-- authorization. --
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-- $Id: INSTALL,v 1.258 2024/12/28 21:37:40 Branden.Robinson Exp $
---------------------------------------------------------------------
How to install Ncurses/Terminfo on your system
---------------------------------------------------------------------
************************************************************
* READ ALL OF THIS FILE BEFORE YOU TRY TO INSTALL NCURSES. *
************************************************************
You should be reading the file INSTALL in a directory called ncurses-d.d,
where d.d is the current version number. There should be several
subdirectories, including 'c++', 'form', 'man', 'menu', 'misc', 'ncurses',
'panel', 'progs', and 'test'. See 'README' for a roadmap to the package.
If you are a distribution integrator or packager, please read and act on the
section titled FOR SYSTEM INTEGRATORS below.
If you are converting from BSD curses and do not have root access, be sure
to read the BSD CONVERSION NOTES section below.
If you are trying to build applications using gpm with ncurses,
read the USING GPM section below.
If you are cross-compiling, see the note below on
BUILDING WITH A CROSS-COMPILER.
If you want to build the Ada95 binding, go to the Ada95 directory and
follow the instructions there. The Ada95 binding is not covered below.
REQUIREMENTS:
------------
You will need the following to build and install ncurses under UNIX:
* ANSI C compiler (gcc, for instance)
* sh (bash will do)
* awk (mawk or gawk will do)
* sed
* BSD or System V style install (a script is enclosed)
Ncurses has been also built in the OS/2 EMX environment.
INSTALLATION PROCEDURE:
----------------------
1. First, decide whether you want ncurses to replace your existing library
(in which case you'll need super-user privileges) or be installed in
parallel with it.
The --prefix option to configure changes the root directory for installing
ncurses. The default is normally in subdirectories of /usr/local, except
for systems where ncurses is normally installed as a system library (see
"FOR SYSTEM INTEGRATORS"). Use --prefix=/usr to replace your
default curses distribution.
The package gets installed beneath the --prefix directory as follows:
In $(prefix)/bin: tic, infocmp, captoinfo, tset,
reset, clear, tput, toe, tabs
In $(prefix)/lib: libncurses*.* libcurses.a
In $(prefix)/share/terminfo: compiled terminal descriptions
In $(prefix)/include: C header files
Under $(prefix)/man: the manual pages
Note that the configure script attempts to locate previous installation of
ncurses, and will set the default prefix according to where it finds the
ncurses headers.
Do not use commands such as
make install prefix=XXX
to change the prefix after configuration, since the prefix value is used
for some absolute pathnames such as TERMINFO. Instead do this
make install DESTDIR=XXX
See also the discussion of --with-install-prefix.
2. Type './configure' in the top-level directory of the distribution to
configure ncurses for your operating system and create the Makefiles.
Besides --prefix, various configuration options are available to customize
the installation; use './configure --help' to list the available options.
If your operating system is not supported, read the PORTABILITY section in
the file ncurses/README for information on how to create a configuration
file for your system.
The 'configure' script generates makefile rules for one or more object
models and their associated libraries:
libncurses.a (normal)
libcurses.a (normal, a link to libncurses.a)
This gets left out if you configure with --disable-overwrite.
libncurses.so (shared)
libncurses_g.a (debug)
libncurses_p.a (profile)
libncurses.la (libtool)
If you configure using the --enable-widec option, a "w" is appended to the
library names (e.g., libncursesw.a), and the resulting libraries support
wide-characters, e.g., via a UTF-8 locale. The corresponding header files
are compatible with the non-wide-character configuration; wide-character
features are provided by ifdef's in the header files. The wide-character
library interfaces are not binary-compatible with the non-wide-character
version. Building and running the wide-character code relies on a fairly
recent implementation of libiconv. We have built this configuration on
various systems using libiconv, sometimes requiring libutf8.
If you configure using the --with-pthread option, a "t" is appended to
the library names (e.g., libncursest.a, libncursestw.a).
If you do not specify any models, the normal and debug libraries will be
configured. Typing 'configure' with no arguments is equivalent to:
./configure --with-normal --with-debug --enable-overwrite
Typing
./configure --with-shared
makes the shared libraries the default, resulting in
./configure --with-shared --with-normal --with-debug --enable-overwrite
If you want only shared libraries, type
./configure --with-shared --without-normal --without-debug
Rules for generating shared libraries are highly dependent upon the choice
of host system and compiler. We've been testing shared libraries on
several systems, but more work needs to be done to make shared libraries
work on other systems.
If you have libtool installed, you can type
./configure --with-libtool
to generate the appropriate static and/or shared libraries for your
platform using libtool.
You can make curses and terminfo fall back to an existing file of termcap
definitions by configuring with --enable-termcap. If you do this, the
library will search /etc/termcap before the terminfo database, and will
also interpret the contents of the $TERM environment variable. See the
section BSD CONVERSION NOTES below.
3. Type 'make'. Ignore any warnings; no error messages should be produced.
This should compile the ncurses library, the terminfo compiler tic(1),
captoinfo(1), infocmp(1), toe(1), clear(1) tset(1), reset(1), and tput(1)
programs (see the manual pages for explanation of what they do), some test
programs, and the panels, menus, and forms libraries.
4. Run ncurses and several other test programs in the test directory to
verify that ncurses functions correctly before doing an install that
may overwrite system files. Read the file test/README for details on
the test programs.
NOTE: You must have installed the terminfo database, or set the
environment variable $TERMINFO to point to a SVr4-compatible terminfo
database before running the test programs. Not all vendors' terminfo
databases are SVr4-compatible, but most seem to be.
It is possible to configure ncurses to use other terminfo database
formats. A few are provided as examples in the include-directory (see
--with-caps).
If you run the test programs WITHOUT installing terminfo, ncurses may
read the termcap file and cache that in $HOME/.terminfo, which will
thereafter be used instead of the terminfo database. See the comments
on "--enable-getcap-cache", to see why this is a Bad Thing.
The ncurses program is designed specifically to test the ncurses library.
You can use it to verify that the screen highlights work correctly, that
cursor addressing and window scrolling works OK, etc.
5. Once you've tested, you can type 'make install' to install libraries,
the programs, the terminfo database and the manual pages. Alternately,
you can type 'make install' in each directory you want to install. In the
top-level directory, you can do a partial install using these commands:
'make install.progs' installs tic, infocmp, etc...
'make install.includes' installs the headers.
'make install.libs' installs the libraries (and the headers).
'make install.data' installs the terminfo data. (Note: 'tic' must
be installed before the terminfo data can be
compiled).
'make install.man' installs the manual pages.
############################################################################
# CAVEAT EMPTOR: 'install.data' run as root will NUKE any existing #
# terminfo database. If you have any custom or unusual entries SAVE them #
# before you install ncurses. #
############################################################################
The terminfo(5) manual page must be preprocessed with tbl(1) before
being formatted by nroff(1). Modern man(1) implementations tend to do
this by default, but you may want to look at your version's manual page
to be sure. You may also install the manual pages after preprocessing
with tbl(1) by specifying the configure option --with-manpage-tbl.
If the system already has a curses library that you need to keep using
you'll need to distinguish between it and ncurses. See the discussion of
--disable-overwrite. If ncurses is installed outside the standard
directories (/usr/include and /usr/lib) then all your users will need to
use the -I option to compile programs and -L to link them.
If you have another curses installed in your system and you accidentally
compile using its curses.h you'll end up with a large number of
undefined symbols at link time.
IF YOU DO NOT HAVE ROOT: Change directory to the 'progs' subdirectory
and run the 'capconvert' script. This script will deduce various things
about your environment and use them to build you a private terminfo tree,
so you can use ncurses applications.
If more than one user at your site does this, the space for the duplicate
trees is wasted. Try to get your site administrators to install a system-
wide terminfo tree instead.
See the BSD CONVERSION NOTES section below for a few more details.
6. The c++ directory has C++ classes that are built on top of ncurses and
panels. You must have c++ (and its libraries) installed before you can
compile and run the demo.
Use --without-cxx-binding to tell configure to not build the C++ bindings
and demo.
If you do not have C++, you must use the --without-cxx option to tell
the configure script to not attempt to determine the type of 'bool'
which may be supported by C++. IF YOU USE THIS OPTION, BE ADVISED THAT
YOU MAY NOT BE ABLE TO COMPILE (OR RUN) NCURSES APPLICATIONS WITH C++.
CONFIGURE OPTIONS:
-----------------
The configure script provides a short list of its options when you type
./configure --help
The --help and several options are common to all configure scripts that
are generated with autoconf. Those are all listed before the line
--enable and --with options recognized:
The other options are specific to this package. We list them in
alphabetic order.
--disable-assumed-color
With ncurses 5.1, we introduced a new function, assume_default_colors()
which allows applications to specify what the default foreground and
background color are assumed to be. Most color applications use
full-screen color; but a few do not color the background. While the
assumed values can be overridden by invoking assume_default_colors(),
you may find it useful to set the assumed values to the pre-5.1
convention, using this configure option.
--disable-big-core
Assume machine has little memory. The configure script attempts to
determine if your machine has enough memory (about 6Mb) to compile the
terminfo database without writing portions to disk. Some allocators
return deceptive results, so you may have to override the configure
script. Or you may be building tic for a smaller machine.
--disable-big-strings
Disable compile-time optimization of predefined tables which puts
all of their strings into a very long string, to reduce relocation
overhead.
--disable-database
Use only built-in data. The ncurses libraries normally read terminfo
and termcap data from disk. You can configure ncurses to have a
built-in database, aka "fallback" entries. Embedded applications may
have no need for an external database. Some, but not all of the
programs are useful in this configuration, e.g., tset and tput versus
infocmp and tic.
--disable-db-install
Do not install the terminal database. This is used to omit features
for packages, as done with --without-progs.
--disable-echo
Use the option --disable-echo to make the build-log less verbose by
suppressing the display of the compile and link commands. This makes
it easier to see the compiler warnings. (You can always use "make -n"
to see the options that are used).
--disable-ext-funcs
Disable function-extensions. Configure ncurses without the functions
that are not specified by XSI. See ncurses/modules for the exact
list of library modules that would be suppressed.
--disable-gnat-projects
Disable GNAT projects even if usable, for testing old makefile rules.
--disable-hashmap
Compile without hashmap scrolling-optimization code. This algorithm is
the default.
--disable-home-terminfo
The $HOME/.terminfo directory is normally added to ncurses' search
list for reading/writing terminfo entries, since that directory is
more likely writable than the system terminfo database. Use this
option to disable the feature altogether.
--disable-largefile
Disable compiler flags needed to use large-file interfaces.
--disable-leaks
For testing, compile-in code that frees memory that normally would not
be freed, to simplify analysis of memory-leaks.
Any implementation of curses must not free the memory associated with
a screen, since (even after calling endwin()), it must be available
for use in the next call to refresh(). There are also chunks of
memory held for performance reasons. That makes it hard to analyze
curses applications for memory leaks. To work around this, build a
debugging version of the ncurses library which frees those chunks
which it can, and provides the _nc_free_and_exit() function to free
the remainder and then exit. The ncurses utility and test programs
use this feature, e.g., via the ExitProgram() macro.
Because this lies outside of the library's intended usage, it is not
normally considered part of the ABI. If there were some (as yet
unplanned) extension which frees memory in a manner that would let the
library resume and reallocate memory, then that would not use a "_nc_"
prefix.
--disable-lib-suffixes
Suppress the "w", "t" or "tw" suffixes which normally would be added
to the library names for the --enable-widec and --with-pthread options.
--disable-libtool-version
when using --with-libtool, control how the major/minor version numbers
are used for constructing the library name.
The default uses the -version-number feature of libtool, which makes
the library names compatible (though not identical) with the standard
build using --with-shared.
Use --disable-libtool-version to use the libtool -version-info feature.
This corresponds to the setting used before patch 20100515.
Starting with patch 20141115, using this option causes the configure
script to apply the top-level VERSION file to the ABI version used
for libtool.
--disable-lp64
The header files will ignore use of the _LP64 symbol to make chtype
and mmask_t types 32 bits (they may be long on 64-bit hosts, for
compatibility with older releases).
NOTE: this is potentially an ABI change, depending on existing
packages. The default for this option is "disabled" for ncurses
ABI 5, and "enabled" for ABI 6.
--disable-macros
For testing, use functions rather than macros. The program will run
more slowly, but it is simpler to debug. This defines NCURSES_NOMACROS
at build time. See also the --enable-expanded option.
--disable-overwrite
If you are installing ncurses on a system which contains another
development version of curses, or which could be confused by the loader
for another version, we recommend that you leave out the link to
-lcurses. The ncurses library is always available as -lncurses.
Disabling overwrite also causes the ncurses header files to be
installed into a subdirectory, e.g., /usr/local/include/ncurses,
rather than the include directory. This makes it simpler to avoid
compile-time conflicts with other versions of curses.h
Putting the header files into a subdirectory assumes that applications
will follow the (standard) practice of including the headers with
reference to the subdirectory name. For instance, the normal ncurses
header would be included using
#include <ncurses/curses.h>
#include <ncurses/term.h>
while the ncursesw headers would be found this way:
#include <ncursesw/curses.h>
#include <ncursesw/term.h>
In either case (with or without the --disable-overwrite option),
almost all applications are designed to include a related set of
curses header files from the same directory.
Manipulating the --includedir configure option to put header files
directly in a subdirectory of the normal include-directory defeats
this, and breaks builds of portable applications. Likewise, putting
some headers in /usr/include, and others in a subdirectory is a good
way to break builds.
When configured with --disable-overwrite, the installed header files'
embedded #include's are adjusted to use the same style of includes
noted above. In particular, the unctrl.h header is included from
curses.h, which means that a makefile which tells the compiler to
include directly from the subdirectory will fail to compile correctly.
Without some special effort, it will either fail to compile at all,
or the compiler may find a different unctrl.h file.
In addition to the curses library, a system may provide its own
versions of the add-on libraries (form, menu, panel), which would
not be compatible with ncurses. These options allow you to rename
ncurses' add-on libraries to avoid conflicts when linking:
--with-form-libname=XXX
--with-menu-libname=XXX
--with-panel-libname=XXX
Rather than renaming them arbitrarily, a prefix or suffix is
recommended. An "n" prefix provides consistency with ncurses versus
curses, i.e.,
--with-form-libname=nform
--with-menu-libname=nmenu
--with-panel-libname=npanel
--disable-pkg-ldflags
Omit options in $LDFLAGS and $EXTRA_LDFLAGS from the pkg-config ".pc"
and corresponding ncurses*-config script which normally are listed via
the "--libs" option. These options are normally used to facilitate
linking to ncurses when it was configured to use the rpath feature.
See also --enable-rpath and --disable-rpath-hack.
--disable-relink
If --enable-rpath is given, the generated makefiles normally will
rebuild shared libraries during install. Use this option to simply
copy whatever the linker produced.
Static libraries cannot simply be copied because tools use timestamps
to determine if the library's symbol table is up to date. If your
install program supports the "-p" (preserve timestamp) option, that
is used when --disable-relink is given, to avoid rebuilding the symbol
table.
Finally, some tools ignore the subsecond timestamps supported by some
filesystems. This option adds a 1-second sleep to help those tools
avoid unnecessary relinking during the install process.
--disable-root-access
Compile with environment restriction, so most file-access is limited
when running as root, or via a setuid/setgid application.
--disable-root-environ
Compile with environment restriction, so certain environment variables
are not available when running as root. These are (for example
$TERMINFO) those that allow the search path for the terminfo or termcap
entry to be customized.
Disabling the root environment variables also disables the setuid
environment variables by default. Use the --disable-setuid-environ
option to modify this behavior.
--disable-rpath-hack
Normally the configure script helps link libraries found in unusual
places by adding an rpath option to the link command. If you are
building packages, this feature may be redundant. Use this option
to suppress the feature.
--disable-scroll-hints
Compile without scroll-hints code. This option is ignored when
hashmap scrolling is configured, which is the default.
--disable-stripping
Do not strip installed executables.
--disable-setuid-environ
Compile with environment restriction, so certain environment variables
are not available when running via a setuid/setgid application. These
are (for example $TERMINFO) those that allow the search path for the
terminfo or termcap entry to be customized.
A setuid/setgid application inherits its environment variables from
the current user, in contrast to sudo which may limit the environment
variables that ncurses uses.
--disable-tic-depends
When building shared libraries, normally the tic library is linked to
depend upon the ncurses library (or equivalently, on the tinfo-library
if the --with-termlib option was given). The tic- and tinfo-library
ABIs do not depend on the --enable-widec option. Some packagers have
used this to reduce the number of library files which are packaged by
using only one copy of those libraries. To make this work properly,
the tic library must be built without an explicit dependency on the
underlying library (ncurses vs ncursesw, tinfo vs tinfow). Use this
configure option to do that.
For example
configure --with-ticlib --with-shared --disable-tic-depends
--disable-tparm-varargs
Portable programs should call tparm() using the fixed-length parameter
list documented in X/Open. ncurses provides varargs support for this
function. Use --disable-tparm-varargs to disable this support.
--enable-assertions
For testing, compile-in assertion code. This is used only for a few
places where ncurses cannot easily recover by returning an error code.
--enable-broken_linker
A few platforms have what we consider a broken linker: it cannot link
objects from an archive solely by referring to data objects in those
files, but requires a function reference. This configure option
changes several data references to functions to work around this
problem.
NOTE: With ncurses 5.1, this may not be necessary, since we are
told that some linkers interpret uninitialized global data as a
different type of reference which behaves as described above. We have
explicitly initialized all of the global data to work around the
problem.
--enable-bsdpad
Recognize BSD-style prefix padding. Some programs written using
the BSD curses API use tputs("50") to implement delays.
--enable-check-size
Compile-in feature to detect screensize for terminals which do not
advertise their screensize, e.g., serial terminals.
--enable-colorfgbg
Compile with experimental $COLORFGBG code. That environment variable
is set by some terminal emulators as a hint to applications, by
advertising the default foreground and background colors. During
initialization, ncurses sets color pair 0 to match this.
--enable-const
The curses interface as documented in XSI is rather old, in fact
including features that precede ANSI C. The prototypes generally do
not make effective use of "const". When using stricter compilers (or
gcc with appropriate warnings), you may see warnings about the mismatch
between const and non-const data. We provide a configure option which
changes the interfaces to use const - quieting these warnings and
reflecting the actual use of the parameters more closely. The ncurses
library uses the symbol NCURSES_CONST for these instances of const,
and if you have asked for compiler warnings, will add gcc's const-qual
warning. There will still be warnings due to subtle inconsistencies
in the interface, but at a lower level.
NOTE: configuring ncurses with this option may detract from the
portability of your applications by encouraging you to use const in
places where the XSI curses interface would not allow them. Similar
issues arise when porting to SVr4 curses, which uses const in even
fewer places.
--enable-expanded
For testing, generate functions for certain macros to make them visible
as such to the debugger. See also the --disable-macros option.
--enable-exp-win32
When configuring for MinGW, use the experimental Windows 10 driver.
--enable-ext-colors
Extend the cchar_t structure to allow more than 16 colors to be
encoded. This applies only to the wide-character (--enable-widec)
configuration.
NOTE: using this option will make libraries which are not binary-
compatible with libncursesw 5.4. None of the interfaces change, but
applications which have an array of cchar_t's must be recompiled.
--enable-ext-mouse
Modify the encoding of mouse state to make room for a 5th mouse button.
That allows one to use ncurses with a wheel mouse with xterm or
similar X terminal emulators.
NOTE: using this option will make libraries which are not binary-
compatible with libncursesw 5.4. None of the interfaces change, but
applications which have mouse mask mmask_t's must be recompiled.
--enable-ext-putwin
Modify the file-format written by putwin() to use printable text rather
than binary files, allowing getwin() to read screen dumps written by
differently-configured ncurses libraries. The extended getwin() can
still read binary screen dumps from the "same" configuration of
ncurses. This does not change the ABI (the binary interface seen by
calling applications).
--enable-fvisibility
Use the gcc "-fvisibility=hidden" option to make symbols which are not
explicitly exported, "hidden". Doing this may reduce the number of
symbols exported in the C++ binding; it should have less effect on the
C libraries when symbol-versioning is used.
--enable-getcap
Use the 4.4BSD getcap code if available, or a bundled version of it to
fetch termcap entries. Entries read in this way cannot use (make
cross-references to) the terminfo tree, but it is faster than reading
/etc/termcap.
If configured for one of the *BSD systems, this automatically uses
the hashed database system produced using cap_mkdb or similar tools.
In that case, there is no advantage in using the --enable-getcap-cache
option.
See also the --with-hashed-db option.
--enable-getcap-cache
Cache translated termcaps under the directory $HOME/.terminfo
NOTE: this sounds good - it makes ncurses run faster the second time.
But look where the data comes from - an /etc/termcap containing lots of
entries that are not up to date. If you configure with this option and
forget to install the terminfo database before running an ncurses
application, you will end up with a hidden terminfo database that
generally does not support color and will miss some function keys.
--enable-hard-tabs
Compile-in cursor-optimization code that uses hard-tabs. We would make
this a standard feature except for the concern that the terminfo entry
may not be accurate, or that your stty settings have disabled the use
of tabs.
--enable-install-prefix
Extend the --with-install-prefix feature to replace the prefix value
with $DESTDIR rather than simply prepending $DESTDIR to install
pathnames. This works with any "make" which supports AT&T style
variable substitution.
--enable-interop
Compile-in experimental interop bindings. These provide generic types
for the form-library.
--enable-mixed-case
Controls whether the filesystem on which the terminfo database resides
supports mixed-case filenames (normal for UNIX, but not on other
systems). If you do not specify this option, the configure script
checks the current filesystem.
--enable-no-padding
Compile-in support for the $NCURSES_NO_PADDING environment variable,
which allows you to suppress the effect of non-mandatory padding in
terminfo entries. This is the default, unless you have disabled the
extended functions.
--enable-opaque-curses
--enable-opaque-form
--enable-opaque-menu
--enable-opaque-panel
Define symbol in curses.h controlling whether some library structures
are opaque, meaning that their members are accessible only via the
documented API. The --enable-opaque-curses option may be overridden
by the --enable-reentrant option.
Enabling opaque-curses enables opaque for the form, menu, and panel
libraries. Use their corresponding options to disable the feature
individually.
NOTE: beginning with ncurses 6.5 this option is enabled by default;
older versions disable it by default.
--enable-pc-files
If pkg-config is found (see --with-pkg-config), generate ".pc" files
for each of the libraries, and install them in pkg-config's library
directory.
--enable-pthreads-eintr
add logic in threaded configuration to ensure that a read(2) system
call can be interrupted for SIGWINCH.
--enable-reentrant
Compile configuration which improves reentrant use of the library by
reducing global and static variables. This option is also set if
--with-pthread is used.
Enabling this option adds a "t" to the library names, except for the
special case when --enable-weak-symbols is also used.
--enable-rpath
Use rpath option when generating shared libraries, and (with some
restrictions) when linking the corresponding programs. This originally
(in 1997) applied mainly to systems using the GNU linker (read the
man page).
More recently it is useful for systems that require special treatment
shared libraries in "unusual" locations. The "system" libraries reside
in directories which are on the loader's default search-path. While
you may be able to use workarounds such as the $LD_LIBRARY_PATH
environment variable, they do not work with setuid applications since
the LD_LIBRARY_PATH variable would be unset in that situation.
This option does not apply to --with-libtool, since libtool makes
extra assumptions about rpath.
--enable-safe-sprintf
Compile with experimental safe-sprintf code. You may consider using
this if you are building ncurses for a system that has neither
vsnprintf() or vsprintf(). It is slow, however, and is used only on
very old systems which lack vsnprintf().
--enable-signed-char
The term.h header declares a Booleans[] array typed "char". But it
stores signed values there and "char" is not necessarily signed.
Some packagers choose to alter the type of Booleans[] though this
is not strictly compatible. This option allows one to implement this
alteration without patching the source code.
--enable-sigwinch
Compile support for ncurses' SIGWINCH handler. If your application has
its own SIGWINCH handler, ncurses will not use its own. The ncurses
handler causes wgetch() to return KEY_RESIZE when the screen-size
changes. This option is the default, unless you have disabled the
extended functions.
--enable-sp-funcs
Compile-in support for extended functions which accept a SCREEN pointer,
reducing the need for juggling the global SP value with set_term() and
delscreen().
--enable-stdnoreturn
When enabled, check if the <stdnoreturn.h> header exists, and if found
define GCC_NORETURN to _Noreturn rather than either the gcc-specific
__attribute__((noreturn)) or an empty token. Doing this may require
calling programs which use GCC_NORETURN in their own function
definitions to be modified, because _Noreturn is only accepted as
the first token in a declaration.
--enable-string-hacks
Controls whether strlcat and strlcpy may be used. The same issue
applies to OpenBSD's warnings about snprintf, noting that this function
is weakly standardized.
Aside from stifling these warnings, there is no functional improvement
in ncurses.
--enable-symlinks
If your system supports symbolic links, make tic use symbolic links
rather than hard links to save diskspace when writing aliases in the
terminfo database.
--enable-tcap-names
Compile-in support for user-definable terminal capabilities. Use the
-x option of tic and infocmp to treat unrecognized terminal
capabilities as user-defined strings. This option is the default,
unless you have disabled the extended functions.
--enable-term-driver
Enable experimental terminal-driver. This is currently used for the
MinGW port, by providing a way to substitute the low-level terminfo
library with different terminal drivers.
--enable-termcap
Compile in support for reading terminal descriptions from termcap if no
match is found in the terminfo database. See also the --enable-getcap
and --enable-getcap-cache options.
Termcap support requires run-time parsing rather than loading
predigested data. If you have specified --with-ticlib, then you
cannot have termcap support since run-time parsing is done in the
tic library, which is intentionally not part of normal linkage
dependencies.
--enable-warnings
Turn on GCC compiler warnings. There should be only a few.
--enable-wattr-macros
The 6.0 ABI adds support for extended colors and for extended mouse.
The former is a noticeable problem when developers inadvertently
compile using the ncurses6 header files and link with an ncurses5
library, because the wattr* macros use a new field in the WINDOW
structure. These macros are used in several applications.
Since ncurses provides an actual function for each of these macros,
suppressing them from the curses.h header allows the ncurses5 libraries
to be used in most applications.
NOTE: The extended colors also are used in the cchar_t structure, but
fewer applications use that.
NOTE: This workaround does not help with mismatches in the ncurses
mouse version. The extended mouse feature uses one less fewer bit for
each button, so that only the first button will work as expected with
a mismatch between header and library. Again, most applications will
work, since most use only the first button.
--enable-weak-symbols
If the --with-pthread option is set, check if the compiler supports
weak-symbols. If it does, then name the thread-capable library without
the "t" (libncurses rather than libncursest), and provide for
dynamically loading the pthreads entrypoints at runtime. This allows
one to reduce the number of library files for ncurses.
--enable-wgetch-events
Compile with experimental wgetch-events code. See ncurses/README.IZ
--enable-widec
Compile with wide-character code. This makes a different version of
the libraries (e.g., libncursesw.so), which stores characters as
wide-characters,
NOTE: applications compiled with this configuration are not compatible
with those built for 8-bit characters. You cannot simply make a
symbolic link to equate libncurses.so with libncursesw.so
NOTE: the Ada95 binding may be built against either version of the the
ncurses library, but you must decide which: the binding installs the
same set of files for either version. Currently (2023/10/21) it does
not use the extended features from the wide-character code, so it is
probably better to not install the binding for that configuration.
NOTE: beginning with ncurses 6.5 this option is enabled by default;
older versions disable it by default.
--enable-xmc-glitch
Compile-in support experimental xmc (magic cookie) code.
--with-abi-altered=NUM
Override the displayed (rather than compiled-in) ABI. Only packagers
who have created configurations where the ABI differs from ncurses
should be interested in this option.
--with-abi-version=NUM
Override the ABI version, which is used in shared library filenames.
Normally this is the same as the release version; some ports have
special requirements for compatibility.
This option does not affect linking with libtool, which uses the
release major/minor numbers.
--with-ada-compiler=CMD
Specify the Ada95 compiler command (default "gnatmake")
--with-ada-include=DIR
Tell where to install the Ada includes (default:
PREFIX/lib/ada/adainclude)
--with-ada-libname=NAME
Override the name of the Ada binding (default: "AdaCurses")
--with-ada-objects=DIR
Tell where to install the Ada objects (default: PREFIX/lib/ada/adalib)
--with-ada-sharedlib
Build a shared library for Ada95 binding, if the compiler permits.
NOTE: You must also set the --with-shared option on some platforms
for a successful build. You need not use this option when you set
--with-shared, unless you want to use the Ada shared library.
--with-bool=TYPE
If --without-cxx is specified, override the type used for the "bool"
declared in curses.h (normally the type is automatically chosen to
correspond with that in <stdbool.h>, or defaults to platform-specific
sizes).
--with-build-cc=XXX
If cross-compiling, specify a host C compiler, which is needed to
compile a few utilities which generate source modules for ncurses.
If you do not give this option, the configure script checks if the
$BUILD_CC variable is set, and otherwise defaults to gcc or cc.
--with-build-cflags=XXX
If cross-compiling, specify the host C compiler-flags. You might need
to do this if the target compiler has unusual flags which confuse the
host compiler.
You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_CFLAGS rather than
use this option.
--with-build-cpp=XXX
This option is provided by the same macro used for $BUILD_CC, etc.,
but is not directly used by ncurses.
--with-build-cppflags=XXX
If cross-compiling, specify the host C preprocessor-flags. You might
need to do this if the target compiler has unusual flags which confuse
the host compiler.
You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_CPPFLAGS rather than
use this option.
--with-build-ldflags=XXX
If cross-compiling, specify the host linker-flags. You might need to
do this if the target linker has unusual flags which confuse the host
compiler.
You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_LDFLAGS rather than
use this option.
--with-build-libs=XXX
If cross-compiling, the host libraries. You might need to do this if
the target environment requires unusual libraries.
You can also set the environment variable $BUILD_LIBS rather than
use this option.
--with-caps=XXX
Specify an alternate terminfo capabilities file, which makes the
configure script look for "include/Caps.XXX". A few systems, e.g.,
AIX 4.x use the same overall file-format as ncurses for terminfo
data, but use different alignments within the tables to support
legacy applications. For those systems, you can configure ncurses
to use a terminfo database which is compatible with the native
applications.
--with-ccharw-max=XXX
Override the size of the wide-character array in cchar_t structures.
Changing this will alter the binary interface. This defaults to 5.
--with-chtype=TYPE
Override type of chtype, which stores the video attributes and (if
--enable-widec is not given) a character. Prior to ncurses 5.5, this
was always unsigned long, but with ncurses 5.5, it may be unsigned.
Use this option if you need to preserve compatibility with 64-bit
executables, e.g., by setting "--with-chtype=long" (the configure
script supplies "unsigned").
--with-config-suffix=XXX
Specify an suffix for "ncurses*" in the ncurses*-config filename to
work around conflicts with packages. The suffix is placed before the
dash.
--with-cxx-libname=NAME
Override the basename of the ncurses++ library (default: "ncurses++")
--with-cxx-shared
When --with-shared is set, build libncurses++ as a shared library.
This implicitly relies upon building with gcc/g++, since other
compiler suites may have differences in the way shared libraries are
built. libtool by the way has similar limitations.
--with-database=XXX
Specify the terminfo source file to install. Usually you will wish
to install ncurses' default (misc/terminfo.src). Certain systems
have special requirements, e.g, OS/2 EMX has a customized terminfo
source file.
--with-dbmalloc
For testing, compile and link with Conor Cahill's dbmalloc library.
This also sets the --disable-leaks option.
--with-debug
Generate debug-libraries (default). These are named by adding "_g"
to the root, e.g., libncurses_g.a
--with-default-terminfo-dir=XXX
Specify the default terminfo database directory. This is normally
DATADIR/terminfo, e.g., /usr/share/terminfo.
--with-dmalloc
For testing, compile and link with Gray Watson's dmalloc library.
This also sets the --disable-leaks option.
--with-export-syms[=XXX]
Limit exported symbols using libtool. The configure script
automatically chooses an appropriate ".sym" file, which lists the
symbols which are part of the ABI.
--with-extra-suffix[=XXX]
Add the given suffix to header- and library-names to simplify
installing incompatible ncurses libraries, e.g., those using a
different ABI. The renaming affects the name of the
include-subdirectory if --disable-overwrite is given.
--with-fallbacks=XXX
Specify a list of fallback terminal descriptions which will be
compiled into the ncurses library. See CONFIGURING FALLBACK ENTRIES.
See also "--with-tic-path" and "--with-infocmp-path".
--with-form-libname=NAME