Date: 7 Apr 96 09:34:34 GMT From: peter@jhome.DIALix.COM (Peter Wemm) To: freebsd-current@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Can we upgrade ncurses? Message-ID: <peter.828869674@jhome.DIALix.COM> References: <Pine.BSI.3.92.960405220855.1169E-100000@freebsd.ki.net>, <199604060929.LAA07603@uriah.heep.sax.de>
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j@uriah.heep.sax.de (J Wunsch) writes: >As Marc G. Fournier wrote: >> Just curious (I'll work on it as termcap-only), but what exactly >> is the difference between termcap and terminfo, and pros/cons of each? >Terminfo abuses the file system as a database. >It introduces new capabilities (e.g. function keys > 9), but that's >not to say you couldn't implement them in tercap either. The thing that I *sorely* miss in termcap (after being raised on terminfo) is the more descriptive capability names. However, terminfo is not extensible. It'd compiled into a fixed format that has no standard way of extending it to add new capabilities. I personally would love to see a hybrid of the two.. specifically, terminfo's long names, termcap's extensibility, and the berkeley DB format (not the filesystem approach). The good thing about the .db format is that you could agree on a reasonable set of capabilities and have a compiled version stored in the same .db file. I can dream, can't I? ;-) Cheers, -Peter >-- >cheers, J"org >joerg_wunsch@uriah.heep.sax.de -- http://www.sax.de/~joerg/ -- NIC: JW11-RIPE >Never trust an operating system you don't have sources for. ;-)
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