From owner-freebsd-hackers Tue Oct 6 18:40:52 1998 Return-Path: Received: (from majordom@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) id SAA26197 for freebsd-hackers-outgoing; Tue, 6 Oct 1998 18:40:52 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG) Received: from dingo.cdrom.com (dingo.cdrom.com [204.216.28.145]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id SAA26068 for ; Tue, 6 Oct 1998 18:40:21 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from mike@dingo.cdrom.com) Received: from dingo.cdrom.com (localhost.cdrom.com [127.0.0.1]) by dingo.cdrom.com (8.9.1/8.8.8) with ESMTP id SAA02548; Tue, 6 Oct 1998 18:44:54 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from mike@dingo.cdrom.com) Message-Id: <199810070144.SAA02548@dingo.cdrom.com> X-Mailer: exmh version 2.0.2 2/24/98 To: Matthew Hagerty cc: hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Direct to video memory? In-reply-to: Your message of "Tue, 06 Oct 1998 19:50:57 EDT." <3.0.5.32.19981006195057.007ccc90@firebat.wolfepub.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Date: Tue, 06 Oct 1998 18:44:54 -0700 From: Mike Smith Sender: owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG > Greetings, > > I was wondering if it is a bad practice to write directly to video memory > (i.e. B800) for client applications that are intended to run in a text mode > (no X)? Yes, extremely. It makes it impossible to use the application via eg. a telnet connection or serial terminal. > I have written several applications in DOS (text based business apps, > point-of-sale mostly) and I would like to port them to FreeBSD. I have > checked and played with ncurses and find it a little slow. Is there > another lib somewhere that handles color, full cursor control, and the > extended ACSII set (line chars)? I would like to replace my current > DOS-to-Novell system with a pure FreeBSD solution for the clients and server. It sounds like you would do best to look at why your screen output is "a little slow"; ncurses is actually pretty quick when used correctly. (The catch lies in 'correctly', of course. 8) I'm not quite (at all) a guru when it comes to curses work, but I'm sure that someone here can point you in the direction of a tutorial or book that will give you some better advice. Meantime, the biggest speed killer with curses is calling refresh() too often; you don't want to do this any more often than necessary to make the interface work. -- \\ Sometimes you're ahead, \\ Mike Smith \\ sometimes you're behind. \\ mike@smith.net.au \\ The race is long, and in the \\ msmith@freebsd.org \\ end it's only with yourself. \\ msmith@cdrom.com To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-hackers" in the body of the message