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29 .\" $Id: scr_dump.5,v 1.10 2017/04/29 20:53:55 tom Exp $
52 .ds d /usr/local/share/terminfo
54 scr_dump \- format of curses screen-dumps.
59 The curses library provides applications with the ability to write the
60 contents of a window to an external file using \fBscr_dump\fP or \fBputwin\fP,
61 and read it back using \fBscr_restore\fP or \fBgetwin\fP.
63 The \fBputwin\fP and \fBgetwin\fP functions do the work;
64 while \fBscr_dump\fP and \fBscr_restore\fP conveniently save and restore
65 the whole screen, i.e., \fBstdscr\fP.
68 A longstanding implementation of screen-dump was
69 revised with ncurses6 to remedy problems with the earlier approach:
71 A \*(``magic number\*('' is written to the beginning of the dump file,
72 allowing applications (such as \fBfile\fP(1)) to recognize curses dump files.
74 Because ncurses6 uses a new format,
75 that requires a new magic number
76 was unused by other applications.
77 This 16-bit number was unused:
79 0x8888 (octal \*(``\\210\\210\*('')
82 but to be more certain, this 32-bit number was chosen:
84 0x88888888 (octal \*(``\\210\\210\\210\\210\*('')
87 This is the pattern submitted to the maintainers of the \fBfile\fP program:
90 # ncurses5 (and before) did not use a magic number,
91 # making screen dumps "data".
93 # ncurses6 (2015) uses this format, ignoring byte-order
94 0 string \\210\\210\\210\\210ncurses ncurses6 screen image
98 The screen dumps are written in textual form,
99 so that internal data sizes are not directly related to the dump-format, and
100 enabling the library to read dumps from either narrow- or wide-character-
103 The \fInarrow\fP library configuration holds characters and video attributes
104 in a 32-bit \fBchtype\fP, while the \fIwide-character\fP library stores
105 this information in the \fBcchar_t\fP structure, which is much larger than
108 It is possible to read a screen dump into a terminal with a different
110 because the library truncates or fills the screen as necessary.
112 The ncurses6 \fBgetwin\fP reads the legacy screen dumps from ncurses5.
113 .SS ncurses5 (legacy)
115 The screen-dump feature was added to ncurses in June 1995.
116 While there were fixes and improvements in succeeding years,
117 the basic scheme was unchanged:
119 The \fBWINDOW\fP structure was written in binary form.
121 The \fBWINDOW\fP structure refers to lines of data,
122 which were written as an array of binary data following the \fBWINDOW\fP.
124 When \fBgetwin\fP restored the window,
125 it would keep track of offsets into the array of line-data
126 and adjust the \fBWINDOW\fP structure which was read back into memory.
128 This is similar to Unix SystemV,
129 but does not write a \*(``magic number\*('' to identify the file format.
132 There is no standard format for \fBputwin\fP.
133 This section gives a brief description of the existing formats.
136 Refer to \fIX/Open Curses, Issue 7\fP (2009).
138 X/Open's documentation for \fIenhanced curses\fP says only:
141 The \fIgetwin(\ ) \fPfunction reads window-related data
142 stored in the file by \fIputwin(\ )\fP.
144 then creates and initializes a new window using that data.
146 The \fIputwin(\ )\fP function writes all data associated
147 with \fIwin\fP into the \fIstdio\fP stream to which \fIfilep\fP
148 points, using an \fBunspecified format\fP.
149 This information can be retrieved later using \fIgetwin(\ )\fP.
152 In the mid-1990s when the X/Open Curses document was written,
153 there were still systems using older, less capable curses libraries
154 (aside from the BSD curses library which was not relevant to X/Open
155 because it did not meet the criteria for \fIbase curses\fP).
156 The document explained the term \*(``enhanced\*('' as follows:
159 Shading is used to identify \fIX/Open Enhanced Curses\fP material, relating to interfaces
160 included to provide enhanced capabilities for applications originally written to be
161 compiled on systems based on the UNIX operating system. Therefore, the features
162 described may not be present on systems that conform to \fBXPG4 or to earlier XPG releases\fP.
163 The relevant reference pages may provide additional or more specific portability warnings
164 about use of the material.
167 In the foregoing, emphasis was added to \fBunspecified format\fP
168 and to \fBXPG4 or to earlier XPG releases\fP,
172 Unix SystemV curses identified the file format by writing a
173 \*(``magic number\*('' at the beginning of the dump.
174 The \fBWINDOW\fP data and the lines of text follow, all in binary form.
176 The Solaris curses source has these definitions:
178 /* terminfo magic number */
181 /* curses screen dump magic number */
182 #define SVR2_DUMP_MAGIC_NUMBER 0433
183 #define SVR3_DUMP_MAGIC_NUMBER 0434
186 That is, the feature was likely introduced in SVr2 (1984),
187 and improved in SVr3 (1987).
188 The Solaris curses source has no magic number for SVr4 (1989).
189 Other operating systems (AIX and HPUX) use a magic number which would
190 correspond to this definition:
192 /* curses screen dump magic number */
193 #define SVR4_DUMP_MAGIC_NUMBER 0435
196 That octal number in bytes is 001, 035.
197 Because most Unix vendors use big-endian hardware,
198 the magic number is written with the high-order byte first, e.g.,
203 After the magic number, the \fBWINDOW\fP structure and line-data are
204 written in binary format.
205 While the magic number used by the Unix systems can be seen using \fBod\fP(1),
206 none of the Unix systems documents the format used for screen-dumps.
208 The Unix systems do not use identical formats.
209 While collecting information for for this manual page,
210 the \fIsavescreen\fP test-program
211 produced dumps of different size
212 (all on 64-bit hardware, on 40x80 screens):
218 Solaris 10 (13273 bytes)
220 ncurses5 (12888 bytes)
223 As noted above, Solaris curses has no magic number corresponding
225 This is odd since Solaris was the first operating system
226 to pass the SVr4 guidelines.
227 Solaris has two versions of curses:
229 The default curses library uses the SVr3 magic number.
231 There is an alternate curses library in \fB/usr/xpg4\fP.
232 This uses a textual format with no magic number.
234 According to the copyright notice, the \fIxpg4\fP Solaris curses library was
235 developed by MKS (Mortice Kern Systems) from 1990 to 1995.
237 Like ncurses6, there is a file-header with parameters.
238 Unlike ncurses6, the contents of the window are written piecemeal,
239 with coordinates and attributes for each chunk of text rather
240 than writing the whole window from top to bottom.
243 PDCurses added support for screen dumps in version 2.7 (2005).
244 Like Unix SystemV and ncurses5,
245 it writes the \fBWINDOW\fP structure in binary,
246 but begins the file with its three-byte identifier \*(``PDC\*('',
247 followed by a one-byte version,
254 As of April 2017, NetBSD curses does
255 not support \fBscr_dump\fP and \fBscr_restore\fP
256 (or \fBscr_init\fP, \fBscr_set\fP),
257 although it has \fBputwin\fP and \fBgetwin\fP.
259 Like ncurses5, NetBSD \fBputwin\fP does not identify its dumps with a
263 the curses shared library major and minor versions
264 as the first two bytes (e.g., 7 and 1),
266 followed by a binary dump of the \fBWINDOW\fP,
268 some data for wide-characters referenced by the \fBWINDOW\fP structure, and
270 finally, lines as done by other implementations.
273 Given a simple program which writes text to the screen
274 (and for the sake of example, limiting the screen-size to 10x20):
282 putenv("COLUMNS=20");
285 init_pair(1, COLOR_WHITE, COLOR_BLUE);
286 init_pair(2, COLOR_RED, COLOR_BLACK);
293 attrset(A_REVERSE | COLOR_PAIR(2));
302 When run using ncurses6, the output looks like this:
304 \\210\\210\\210\\210ncurses 6.0.20170415
310 _attrs=\\{REVERSE|C2}
314 _bkgrnd=\\{NORMAL|C1}\\s
316 1:\\{NORMAL|C1}\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s
317 2:\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s
318 3:\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s
319 4:\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s
320 5:\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\{BOLD}Hello\\{NORMAL}\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s
321 6:\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\{REVERSE|C2}World!\\{NORMAL|C1}\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s
322 7:\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s
323 8:\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s
324 9:\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s
325 10:\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s\\s
328 The first four octal escapes are actually nonprinting characters,
329 while the remainder of the file is printable text.
332 The actual color pair values are not written to the file.
334 All characters are shown in printable form; spaces are \*(``\\s\*('' to
335 ensure they are not overlooked.
337 Attributes are written in escaped curly braces, e.g., \*(``\\{BOLD}\*('',
338 and may include a color-pair (C1 or C2 in this example).
340 The parameters in the header are written out only if they are nonzero.
341 When reading back, order does not matter.
344 Running the same program with Solaris \fIxpg4\fP curses gives this dump:
381 Solaris \fBgetwin\fP requires that all parameters are present, and
383 The \fIxpg4\fP curses library does not know about the \fBbce\fP
384 (back color erase) capability, and does not color the window background.
387 On the other hand, the SVr4 curses library does know about the background
388 color. However, its screen dumps are in binary.
389 Here is the corresponding dump (using \*(``od -t x1\*(''):
391 0000000 1c 01 c3 d6 f3 58 05 00 0b 00 0a 00 14 00 00 00
392 0000020 00 00 02 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
393 0000040 00 00 b8 1a 06 08 cc 1a 06 08 00 00 09 00 10 00
394 0000060 00 00 00 80 00 00 20 00 00 00 ff ff ff ff 00 00
395 0000100 ff ff ff ff 00 00 00 00 20 80 00 00 20 80 00 00
396 0000120 20 80 00 00 20 80 00 00 20 80 00 00 20 80 00 00
398 0000620 20 80 00 00 20 80 00 00 20 80 00 00 48 80 00 04
399 0000640 65 80 00 04 6c 80 00 04 6c 80 00 04 6f 80 00 04
400 0000660 20 80 00 00 20 80 00 00 20 80 00 00 20 80 00 00
402 0000740 20 80 00 00 20 80 00 00 20 80 00 00 57 00 81 00
403 0000760 6f 00 81 00 72 00 81 00 6c 00 81 00 64 00 81 00
404 0001000 21 00 81 00 20 80 00 00 20 80 00 00 20 80 00 00
405 0001020 20 80 00 00 20 80 00 00 20 80 00 00 20 80 00 00
407 0001540 20 80 00 00 20 80 00 00 00 00 f6 d1 01 00 f6 d1
408 0001560 08 00 00 00 40 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 07
409 0001600 00 04 00 01 00 01 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 00 00 00
410 0001620 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
416 \fBcurs_scr_dump\fR(3X),
422 extended screen-dump format for ncurses 6.0 (2015)
426 screen dump feature in ncurses 1.9.2d (1995)