


infocmp(1)                                             infocmp(1)


NAME
       infocmp - compare or print out terminfo descriptions

SYNOPSIS
       infocmp [-1CEFGILTUVcdegilnpqrtux]
             [-v n] [-s d| i| l| c] [-R subset]
             [-w width] [-A directory] [-B directory]
             [termname...]

DESCRIPTION
       infocmp  can  be  used  to compare a binary terminfo entry
       with other terminfo entries, rewrite a  terminfo  descrip-
       tion  to  take  advantage  of  the use= terminfo field, or
       print out a terminfo  description  from  the  binary  file
       (term) in a variety of formats.  In all cases, the boolean
       fields will be printed  first,  followed  by  the  numeric
       fields, followed by the string fields.

   Default Options
       If  no options are specified and zero or one termnames are
       specified, the -I option will be assumed.   If  more  than
       one  termname is specified, the -d option will be assumed.

   Comparison Options [-d] [-c] [-n]
       infocmp compares the terminfo  description  of  the  first
       terminal  termname  with each of the descriptions given by
       the entries for the  other  terminal's  termnames.   If  a
       capability  is  defined for only one of the terminals, the
       value returned will depend on the type of the  capability:
       F  for  boolean  variables,  -1 for integer variables, and
       NULL for string variables.

       The -d option produces a list of each capability  that  is
       different  between  two entries.  This option is useful to
       show the difference between two entries, created  by  dif-
       ferent people, for the same or similar terminals.

       The  -c  option produces a list of each capability that is
       common between two entries.  Capabilities that are not set
       are  ignored.  This option can be used as a quick check to
       see if the -u option is worth using.

       The -n option produces a list of each capability  that  is
       in neither entry.  If no termnames are given, the environ-
       ment variable TERM will be used for both of the termnames.
       This  can  be used as a quick check to see if anything was
       left out of a description.

   Source Listing Options [-I] [-L] [-C] [-r]
       The -I, -L, and -C options will produce a  source  listing
       for each terminal named.
      -I   use the terminfo names
      -L   use the long C variable name listed in <term.h>




                                                                1





infocmp(1)                                             infocmp(1)


      -C   use the termcap names
      -r   when using -C, put out all capabilities in termcap form

       If  no  termnames are given, the environment variable TERM
       will be used for the terminal name.

       The source produced by the -C option may be used  directly
       as  a termcap entry, but not all parameterized strings can
       be changed to the termcap format.  infocmp will attempt to
       convert  most  of  the parameterized information, and any-
       thing not converted will be plainly marked in  the  output
       and commented out.  These should be edited by hand.

       All  padding  information  for  strings  will be collected
       together and placed at the beginning of the  string  where
       termcap  expects  it.  Mandatory padding (padding informa-
       tion with a trailing '/') will become optional.

       All termcap variables no longer supported by terminfo, but
       which are derivable from other terminfo variables, will be
       output.  Not all terminfo capabilities will be translated;
       only  those variables which were part of termcap will nor-
       mally be output.  Specifying the -r option will  take  off
       this  restriction,  allowing all capabilities to be output
       in termcap form.

       Note that because padding is collected to the beginning of
       the  capability,  not all capabilities are output.  Manda-
       tory padding is not supported.   Because  termcap  strings
       are  not as flexible, it is not always possible to convert
       a terminfo string capability into  an  equivalent  termcap
       format.   A subsequent conversion of the termcap file back
       into terminfo format will not  necessarily  reproduce  the
       original terminfo source.

       Some  common  terminfo  parameter sequences, their termcap
       equivalents, and some terminal types which  commonly  have
       such sequences, are:
     terminfo                    termcap   Representative Terminals
     ---------------------------------------------------------------
     %p1%c                       %.        adm
     %p1%d                       %d        hp, ANSI standard, vt100
     %p1%'x'%+%c                 %+x       concept
     %i                          %iq       ANSI standard, vt100
     %p1%?%'x'%>%t%p1%'y'%+%;    %>xy      concept
     %p2 is printed before %p1   %r        hp

   Use= Option [-u]
       The  -u  option  produces a terminfo source description of
       the first terminal termname which is relative to  the  sum
       of  the  descriptions  given  by the entries for the other
       terminals termnames.  It does this by analyzing  the  dif-
       ferences   between   the  first  termname  and  the  other
       termnames and producing a description with use= fields for



                                                                2





infocmp(1)                                             infocmp(1)


       the  other  terminals.   In this manner, it is possible to
       retrofit  generic  terminfo  entries  into  a   terminal's
       description.  Or, if two similar terminals exist, but were
       coded at different times or by different  people  so  that
       each description is a full description, using infocmp will
       show what can be done to change one description to be rel-
       ative to the other.

       A capability will get printed with an at-sign (@) if it no
       longer exists in the first termname, but one of the  other
       termname  entries contains a value for it.  A capability's
       value gets printed if the value in the first  termname  is
       not  found in any of the other termname entries, or if the
       first of the other termname entries that has this capabil-
       ity  gives  a different value for the capability than that
       in the first termname.

       The order of the other termname  entries  is  significant.
       Since  the terminfo compiler tic does a left-to-right scan
       of the capabilities, specifying two use= entries that con-
       tain differing entries for the same capabilities will pro-
       duce different results depending on  the  order  that  the
       entries  are  given in.  infocmp will flag any such incon-
       sistencies between the other termname entries as they  are
       found.

       Alternatively,  specifying a capability after a use= entry
       that contains that capability will cause the second speci-
       fication  to  be  ignored.   Using  infocmp  to recreate a
       description can be a useful check to make sure that every-
       thing  was  specified  correctly  in  the  original source
       description.

       Another error  that  does  not  cause  incorrect  compiled
       files,  but will slow down the compilation time, is speci-
       fying extra use= fields  that  are  superfluous.   infocmp
       will  flag  any  other  termname use= fields that were not
       needed.

   Changing Databases [-A directory] [-B directory]
       The location of the compiled terminfo  database  is  taken
       from  the environment variable TERMINFO .  If the variable
       is not defined, or the terminal is not found in that loca-
       tion,  the  system  terminfo  database, in /usr/share/ter-
       minfo, will be used.  The options -A and -B may be used to
       override  this  location.  The -A option will set TERMINFO
       for the first termname and the -B option will set TERMINFO
       for  the  other  termnames.   With this, it is possible to
       compare descriptions for a terminal  with  the  same  name
       located  in  two  different databases.  This is useful for
       comparing descriptions for the same  terminal  created  by
       different people.





                                                                3





infocmp(1)                                             infocmp(1)


   Other Options
       -1   causes  the  fields  to be printed out one to a line.
            Otherwise, the fields will be printed  several  to  a
            line to a maximum width of 60 characters.

       -a   tells  infocmp  to  retain commented-out capabilities
            rather than discarding them.  Capabilities  are  com-
            mented by prefixing them with a period.

       -E   Dump  the  capabilities  of  the  given  terminal  as
            tables, needed in the C initializer  for  a  TERMTYPE
            structure  (the  terminal capability structure in the
            <term.h>).  This option is useful for preparing  ver-
            sions  of  the  curses  library hardwired for a given
            terminal type.  The tables are all  declared  static,
            and  are  named according to the type and the name of
            the corresponding terminal entry.

            Before ncurses 5.0, the split between the -e  and  -E
            options  was  not  needed;  but  support for extended
            names required making the arrays of terminal capabil-
            ities separate from the TERMTYPE structure.

       -e   Dump  the  capabilities  of the given terminal as a C
            initializer for a TERMTYPE  structure  (the  terminal
            capability  structure  in the <term.h>).  This option
            is  useful  for  preparing  versions  of  the  curses
            library hardwired for a given terminal type.

       -F   compare  terminfo  files.  This assumes that two fol-
            lowing  arguments  are  filenames.   The  files   are
            searched  for  pairwise matches between entries, with
            two entries considered to match if any of their names
            do.   The  report  printed  to  standard output lists
            entries with  no  matches  in  the  other  file,  and
            entries  with  more than one match.  For entries with
            exactly one match it includes  a  difference  report.
            Normally,  to  reduce  the  volume of the report, use
            references are not resolved before looking  for  dif-
            ferences, but resolution can be forced by also speci-
            fying -r.

       -f   Display  complex  terminfo  strings   which   contain
            if/then/else/endif expressions indented for readabil-
            ity.

       -G   Display constant literals in decimal form rather than
            their character equivalents.

       -g   Display  constant  character  literals in quoted form
            rather than their decimal equivalents.

       -i   Analyze the initialization (is1, is2, is3), and reset
            (rs1,  rs2,  rs3),  strings  in  the entry.  For each



                                                                4





infocmp(1)                                             infocmp(1)


            string, the code tries to analyze it into actions  in
            terms of the other capabilities in the entry, certain
            X3.64/ISO 6429/ECMA-48 capabilities, and certain  DEC
            VT-series  private  modes (the set of recognized spe-
            cial sequences has  been  selected  for  completeness
            over  the  existing  terminfo database).  Each report
            line consists of the capability name, followed  by  a
            colon and space, followed by a printable expansion of
            the capability string with sections  matching  recog-
            nized  actions  translated into {}-bracketed descrip-
            tions.  Here  is  a  list  of  the  DEC/ANSI  special
            sequences recognized: i.
                  Action        Meaning
                  -----------------------------------------
                  RIS           full reset
                  SC            save cursor
                  RC            restore cursor
                  LL            home-down
                  RSR           reset scroll region
                  -----------------------------------------
                  DECSTR        soft reset (VT320)
                  S7C1T         7-bit controls (VT220)
                  -----------------------------------------
                  ISO DEC G0    enable DEC graphics for G0
                  ISO UK G0     enable UK chars for G0
                  ISO US G0     enable US chars for G0
                  ISO DEC G1    enable DEC graphics for G1
                  ISO UK G1     enable UK chars for G1
                  ISO US G1     enable US chars for G1
                  -----------------------------------------
                  DECPAM        application keypad mode
                  DECPNM        normal keypad mode
                  DECANSI       enter ANSI mode
                  -----------------------------------------
                  ECMA[+-]AM    keyboard action mode
                  ECMA[+-]IRM   insert replace mode
                  ECMA[+-]SRM   send receive mode
                  ECMA[+-]LNM   linefeed mode
                  -----------------------------------------
                  DEC[+-]CKM    application cursor keys
                  DEC[+-]ANM    set VT52 mode
                  DEC[+-]COLM   132-column mode
                  DEC[+-]SCLM   smooth scroll
                  DEC[+-]SCNM   reverse video mode
                  DEC[+-]OM     origin mode
                  DEC[+-]AWM    wraparound mode
                  DEC[+-]ARM    auto-repeat mode

            It  also  recognizes  a  SGR  action corresponding to
            ANSI/ISO 6429/ECMA Set Graphics Rendition,  with  the
            values  NORMAL,  BOLD, UNDERLINE, BLINK, and REVERSE.
            All but NORMAL may be prefixed with `+' (turn on)  or
            `-' (turn off).




                                                                5





infocmp(1)                                             infocmp(1)


       An SGR0 designates an empty highlight sequence (equivalent
       to {SGR:NORMAL}).

       -l   Set output format to terminfo.

       -p   Ignore padding specifications when comparing strings.

       -q   Make  the comparison listing shorter by omitting sub-
            headings, and using "-" for absent capabilities,  "@"
            for canceled rather than "NULL".

       -Rsubset
            Restrict  output  to  a given subset.  This option is
            for use with archaic versions of terminfo like  those
            on  SVr1,  Ultrix,  or  HP/UX that do not support the
            full set of SVR4/XSI Curses  terminfo;  and  variants
            such as AIX that have their own extensions incompati-
            ble with SVr4/XSI.  Available  terminfo  subsets  are
            "SVr1",  "Ultrix",  "HP",  and "AIX"; see terminfo(5)
            for details.  You can also choose  the  subset  "BSD"
            which  selects only capabilities with termcap equiva-
            lents recognized by 4.4BSD.

       -s [d|i|l|c]
            The -s option  sorts  the  fields  within  each  type
            according to the argument below:

            d    leave  fields  in the order that they are stored
                 in the terminfo database.

            i    sort by terminfo name.

            l    sort by the long C variable name.

            c    sort by the termcap name.

            If the -s option is not given, the fields printed out
            will  be  sorted  alphabetically by the terminfo name
            within each type, except in the case of the -C or the
            -L options, which cause the sorting to be done by the
            termcap name or the long  C  variable  name,  respec-
            tively.

       -T   eliminates  size-restrictions  on the generated text.
            This is mainly useful for testing and analysis, since
            the compiled descriptions are limited (e.g., 1023 for
            termcap, 4096 for terminfo).

       -t   tells  tic  to  discard  commented-out  capabilities.
            Normally  when  translating from terminfo to termcap,
            untranslatable capabilities are commented-out.

       -U   tells infocmp to  not  post-process  the  data  after
            parsing  the  source  file.   This feature helps when



                                                                6





infocmp(1)                                             infocmp(1)


            comparing the actual contents of  two  source  files,
            since  it  excludes the inferences that infocmp makes
            to fill in missing data.

       -V   reports the version of ncurses which was used in this
            program, and exits.

       -v n prints  out  tracing information on standard error as
            the program runs.  Higher values of n induce  greater
            verbosity.

       -w width
            changes the output to width characters.

       -x   print   information  for  user-defined  capabilities.
            These are extensions to the terminfo repertoire which
            can be loaded using the -x option of tic.

FILES
       /usr/share/terminfo Compiled      terminal     description
                           database.

EXTENSIONS
       The -E, -F, -G, -R, -T, -V, -a, -e, -f, -g, -i, -l, -p, -q
       and -t options are not supported in SVr4 curses.

       The -r option's notion of `termcap' capabilities is System
       V Release 4's.  Actual BSD curses  versions  will  have  a
       more  restricted  set.  To see only the 4.4BSD set, use -r
       -RBSD.

SEE ALSO
       captoinfo(1),  infotocap(1),   tic(1),   curses(3),   ter-
       minfo(5).

       This describes ncurses version 5.7.

AUTHOR
       Eric S. Raymond <esr@snark.thyrsus.com> and
       Thomas E. Dickey <dickey@invisible-island.net>

















                                                                7


