Learn the UNIX/Linux command line
Home Man Pages
tic(1M) tic(1M)
NAME
tic - the terminfo entry-description compiler
SYNOPSIS
tic [-1CGILNTVacfgrstx] [-e names] [-o dir] [-R subset] [-v[n]]
[-w[n]] file
DESCRIPTION
The command tic translates a terminfo file from source format into
compiled format. The compiled format is necessary for use with the
library routines in ncurses(3X).
The results are normally placed in the system terminfo directory
/usr/share/terminfo. There are two ways to change this behavior.
First, you may override the system default by setting the variable
TERMINFO in your shell environment to a valid (existing) directory
name.
Secondly, if tic cannot get access to /usr/share/terminfo or your TER-
MINFO directory, it looks for the directory $HOME/.terminfo; if that
directory exists, the entry is placed there.
Libraries that read terminfo entries are expected to check for a TER-
MINFO directory first, look at $HOME/.terminfo if TERMINFO is not set,
and finally look in /usr/share/terminfo.
-1 restricts the output to a single column
-a tells tic to retain commented-out capabilities rather than dis-
carding them. Capabilities are commented by prefixing them
with a period. This sets the -x option, because it treats the
commented-out entries as user-defined names. If the source is
termcap, accept the 2-character names required by version 6.
Otherwise these are ignored.
-C Force source translation to termcap format. Note: this differs
from the -C option of infocmp(1M) in that it does not merely
translate capability names, but also translates terminfo
strings to termcap format. Capabilities that are not translat-
able are left in the entry under their terminfo names but com-
mented out with two preceding dots.
-c tells tic to only check file for errors, including syntax prob-
lems and bad use links. If you specify -C (-I) with this
option, the code will print warnings about entries which, after
use resolution, are more than 1023 (4096) bytes long. Due to a
fixed buffer length in older termcap libraries (and a docu-
mented limit in terminfo), these entries may cause core dumps.
-e names
Limit writes and translations to the following comma-separated
list of terminals. If any name or alias of a terminal matches
one of the names in the list, the entry will be written or
translated as normal. Otherwise no output will be generated
for it. The option value is interpreted as a file containing
the list if it contains a '/'. (Note: depending on how tic was
compiled, this option may require -I or -C.)
-f Display complex terminfo strings which contain
if/then/else/endif expressions indented for readability.
-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 Force source translation to terminfo format.
-L Force source translation to terminfo format using the long C
variable names listed in
-N Disable smart defaults. Normally, when translating from term-
cap to terminfo, the compiler makes a number of assumptions
about the defaults of string capabilities reset1_string, car-
riage_return, cursor_left, cursor_down, scroll_forward, tab,
newline, key_backspace, key_left, and key_down, then attempts
to use obsolete termcap capabilities to deduce correct values.
It also normally suppresses output of obsolete termcap capabil-
ities such as bs. This option forces a more literal transla-
tion that also preserves the obsolete capabilities.
-odir Write compiled entries to given directory. Overrides the TER-
MINFO environment variable.
-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 ter-
minfo; and outright broken ports like AIX 3.x that have their
own extensions incompatible with SVr4/XSI. Available subsets
are "SVr1", "Ultrix", "HP", "BSD" and "AIX"; see terminfo(5)
for details.
-r Force entry resolution (so there are no remaining tc capabili-
ties) even when doing translation to termcap format. This may
be needed if you are preparing a termcap file for a termcap
library (such as GNU termcap through version 1.3 or BSD termcap
through 4.3BSD) that does not handle multiple tc capabilities
per entry.
-s Summarize the compile by showing the directory into which
entries are written, and the number of entries which are com-
piled.
-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 ter-
minfo).
-t tells tic to discard commented-out capabilities. Normally when
translating from terminfo to termcap, untranslatable capabili-
ties are commented-out.
-V reports the version of ncurses which was used in this program,
and exits.
-vn specifies that (verbose) output be written to standard error
trace information showing tic's progress. The optional integer
n is a number from 1 to 10, inclusive, indicating the desired
level of detail of information. If n is omitted, the default
level is 1. If n is specified and greater than 1, the level of
detail is increased.
-wn specifies the width of the output.
-x Treat unknown capabilities as user-defined. That is, if you
supply a capability name which tic does not recognize, it will
infer its type (boolean, number or string) from the syntax and
make an extended table entry for that.
file contains one or more terminfo terminal descriptions in source
format [see terminfo(5)]. Each description in the file
describes the capabilities of a particular terminal.
The debug flag levels are as follows:
1 Names of files created and linked
2 Information related to the ''use'' facility
3 Statistics from the hashing algorithm
5 String-table memory allocations
7 Entries into the string-table
8 List of tokens encountered by scanner
9 All values computed in construction of the hash table
If the debug level n is not given, it is taken to be one.
All but one of the capabilities recognized by tic are documented in
terminfo(5). The exception is the use capability.
When a use=entry-name field is discovered in a terminal entry cur-
rently being compiled, tic reads in the binary from /usr/share/ter-
minfo to complete the entry. (Entries created from file will be used
first. If the environment variable TERMINFO is set, that directory is
searched instead of /usr/share/terminfo.) tic duplicates the capabil-
ities in entry-name for the current entry, with the exception of those
capabilities that explicitly are defined in the current entry.
When an entry, e.g., entry_name_1, contains a use=entry_name_2 field,
any canceled capabilities in entry_name_2 must also appear in
entry_name_1 before use= for these capabilities to be canceled in
entry_name_1.
If the environment variable TERMINFO is set, the compiled results are
placed there instead of /usr/share/terminfo.
Total compiled entries cannot exceed 4096 bytes. The name field can-
not exceed 512 bytes. Terminal names exceeding the maximum alias
length (32 characters on systems with long filenames, 14 characters
otherwise) will be truncated to the maximum alias length and a warning
message will be printed.
COMPATIBILITY
There is some evidence that historic tic implementations treated
description fields with no whitespace in them as additional aliases or
short names. This tic does not do that, but it does warn when
description fields may be treated that way and check them for danger-
ous characters.
EXTENSIONS
Unlike the stock SVr4 tic command, this implementation can actually
compile termcap sources. In fact, entries in terminfo and termcap
syntax can be mixed in a single source file. See terminfo(5) for the
list of termcap names taken to be equivalent to terminfo names.
The SVr4 manual pages are not clear on the resolution rules for use
capabilities. This implementation of tic will find use targets any-
where in the source file, or anywhere in the file tree rooted at TER-
MINFO (if TERMINFO is defined), or in the user's $HOME/.terminfo
directory (if it exists), or (finally) anywhere in the system's file
tree of compiled entries.
The error messages from this tic have the same format as GNU C error
messages, and can be parsed by GNU Emacs's compile facility.
The -C, -G, -I, -N, -R, -T, -V, -a, -e, -f, -g, -o, -r, -s, -t and -x
options are not supported under SVr4. The SVr4 -c mode does not
report bad use links.
System V does not compile entries to or read entries from your
$HOME/.terminfo directory unless TERMINFO is explicitly set to it.
FILES
/usr/share/terminfo/?/*
Compiled terminal description database.
SEE ALSO
infocmp(1M), captoinfo(1M), infotocap(1M), toe(1M), curses(3X), ter-
minfo(5).
tic(1M)
UNIX/Linux commands referenced on this page: