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tic(1)									tic(1)

NAME
       tic - the terminfo entry-description compiler

SYNOPSIS
       tic  [-01CDGIKLNTUVacfgrstx]  [-e  names]  [-o dir] [-R subset] [-v[n]]
       [-w[n]] file

DESCRIPTION
       The tic command translates a terminfo file from source format into com‐
       piled  format.	The  compiled  format  is  necessary  for use with the
       library routines in ncurses(3NCURSES).

       As described in term(5), the database may be either  a  directory  tree
       (one  file  per	terminal  entry)  or a hashed database (one record per
       entry).	The tic command writes only one type of	 entry,	 depending  on
       how it was built:

       ·   For directory trees, the top-level directory, e.g., /usr/share/ter‐
	   minfo, specifies the location of the database.

       ·   For hashed databases, a filename is needed.	If the given  file  is
	   not	found  by  that	 name,	but  can be found by adding the suffix
	   ".db", then that is used.

	   The default name for the hashed database is the same as the default
	   directory name (only adding a ".db" suffix).

       In either case (directory or hashed database), tic will create the con‐
       tainer if it does not exist.  For a directory, this would be the	 "ter‐
       minfo" leaf, versus a "terminfo.db" file.

       The  results  are  normally  placed  in	the  system  terminfo database
       /etc/terminfo.  The compiled terminal description can be	 placed	 in  a
       different terminfo database.  There are two ways to achieve this:

       ·   First,  you	may override the system default either by using the -o
	   option, or by setting the variable TERMINFO in your shell  environ‐
	   ment to a valid database location.

       ·   Secondly,  if  tic  cannot  write  in /etc/terminfo or the location
	   specified using your TERMINFO variable, it looks for the  directory
	   $HOME/.terminfo  (or	 hashed	 database $HOME/.terminfo.db); if that
	   location exists, the entry is placed there.

       Libraries that read terminfo entries are expected to check  in  succes‐
       sion

       ·   a location specified with the TERMINFO environment variable,

       ·   $HOME/.terminfo,

       ·   directories listed in the TERMINFO_DIRS environment variable,

       ·   a compiled-in list of directories (no default value), and

       ·   the system terminfo database (/etc/terminfo).

   OPTIONS
       -0     restricts the output to a single line

       -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 com‐
	      mented-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(1) in that it does not merely
	      translate capability names, but also translates terminfo strings
	      to  termcap  format.  Capabilities that are not translatable are
	      left in the entry under their terminfo names but	commented  out
	      with  two	 preceding  dots.  The actual format used incorporates
	      some improvements for escaped characters from  terminfo  format.
	      For a stricter BSD-compatible translation, add the -K option.

       -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, as well as buggy
	      checking for the buffer length (and a documented limit  in  ter‐
	      minfo),  these entries may cause core dumps with other implemen‐
	      tations.

       -D     tells tic to print the database locations that it	 knows	about,
	      and exit.	 The first location shown is the one to which it would
	      write compiled terminal descriptions.  If tic  is	 not  able  to
	      find  a writable database location according to the rules summa‐
	      rized above, it will print a diagnostic and exit with  an	 error
	      rather than printing a list of database locations.

       -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 com‐
	      piled, 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.

       -K     Suppress some longstanding ncurses extensions to termcap format,
	      e.g., "\s" for space.

       -L     Force  source  translation  to  terminfo format using the long C
	      variable names listed in <term.h>

       -N     Disable smart defaults.  Normally, when translating from termcap
	      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 capabilities
	      such  as bs.  This option forces a more literal translation that
	      also preserves the obsolete capabilities.

       -odir  Write compiled entries to given  database	 location.   Overrides
	      the TERMINFO 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  database	location  into
	      which  entries  are written, and the number of entries which are
	      compiled.

       -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.

       -U   tells  tic	to  not post-process the data after parsing the source
	    file.  Normally, it infers data which is commonly missing in older
	    terminfo data, or in termcaps.

       -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 parameter 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.

	    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.

       -wn  specifies the width of the output.	The parameter is optional.  If
	    it is omitted, it defaults to 60.

       -x   Treat unknown capabilities as user-defined.	 That is, if you  sup‐
	    ply	 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.  User-defined capability strings
	    whose name begins with “k” are treated as function keys.

   PARAMETERS
       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.

	      If file is “-”, then the data is read from the  standard	input.
	      The file parameter may also be the path of a character-device.

   PROCESSING
       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 currently
       being  compiled, tic reads in the binary from /etc/terminfo to complete
       the entry.  (Entries created from file will be used first.  tic	dupli‐
       cates  the  capabilities	 in entry-name for the current entry, with the
       exception of those capabilities that explicitly are defined in the cur‐
       rent 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.

       Total compiled entries cannot exceed 4096 bytes.	 The name field cannot
       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 descrip‐
       tion  fields may be treated that way and check them for dangerous char‐
       acters.

EXTENSIONS
       Unlike the 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	 data‐
       base (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  -0, -1, -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 database unless TERMINFO is explicitly set to it.

FILES
       /etc/terminfo/?/*
	    Compiled terminal description database.

SEE ALSO
       infocmp(1),  captoinfo(1),  infotocap(1),  toe(1),   ncurses(3NCURSES),
       term(5).	 terminfo(5).

       This describes ncurses version 5.9 (patch 20140118).

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

									tic(1)
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