ncurses/man/curs_getstr.3x

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.\" $Id: curs_getstr.3x,v 1.94 2025/10/21 00:09:04 tom Exp $
.TH curs_getstr 3X 2025-10-20 "ncurses @NCURSES_MAJOR@.@NCURSES_MINOR@" "Library calls"
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.SH NAME
\fB\%getstr\fP,
\fB\%getnstr\fP,
\fB\%wgetstr\fP,
\fB\%wgetnstr\fP,
\fB\%mvgetstr\fP,
\fB\%mvgetnstr\fP,
\fB\%mvwgetstr\fP,
\fB\%mvwgetnstr\fP \-
read a character string from \fIcurses\fR terminal keyboard
.SH SYNOPSIS
.nf
\fB#include <curses.h>
.PP
\fBint getstr(char * \fIstr\fP);
\fBint wgetstr(WINDOW * \fIwin\fP, char * \fIstr\fP);
\fBint mvgetstr(int \fIy\fP, int \fIx\fP, char * \fIstr\fP);
\fBint mvwgetstr(WINDOW * \fIwin\fP, int \fIy\fP, int \fIx\fP, char * \fIstr\fP);
.PP
\fBint getnstr(char * \fIstr\fP, int \fIn\fP);
\fBint wgetnstr(WINDOW * \fIwin\fP, char * \fIstr\fP, int \fIn\fP);
\fBint mvgetnstr(int \fIy\fP, int \fIx\fP, char * \fIstr\fP, int \fIn\fP);
\fBint mvwgetnstr(WINDOW * \fIwin\fP, int \fIy\fP, int \fIx\fP, char * \fIstr\fP, int \fIn\fP);
.fi
.SH DESCRIPTION
.B \%wgetstr
populates a user-supplied string buffer
.I str
by repeatedly calling \fBwgetch\fP(3X)
with the
.I win
argument
until a line feed or carriage return character is input.
.\" Of the two, because wgetnstr() calls nl(), only a line feed (\n)
.\" will ever be returned by wgetch().
The function
.bP
does not copy the terminating character to
.IR str ";"
.bP
always terminates
.I str
with a null character;
.bP
interprets the screen's erase and kill characters
(see \fB\%erasechar\fP(3X) and \fB\%killchar\fP(3X));
.bP
recognizes function keys only if the screen's keypad option is enabled
(see \fB\%keypad\fP(3X));
.bP
treats the function keys
.B \%KEY_LEFT
and
.B \%KEY_BACKSPACE
the same as the erase character;
and
.bP
discards function key inputs other than those
treated as the erase or kill characters,
calling \fBbeep\fP(3X).
.PP
If any characters have been written to the input buffer,
the erase character replaces the character
at the current position in the buffer
with a null character,
then decrements the position by one;
the kill character does the same repeatedly,
backtracking to the beginning of the buffer.
.PP
If the screen's echo option is enabled
(see \fBecho\fP(3X)),
.B \%wgetstr
updates
.I win
with \fB\%waddch\fP(3X).
Further,
.bP
the erase character
and its function key synonyms
move the cursor to the left
(if not already where it was located when
.B \%wgetstr
was called)
and
.bP
the kill character returns the cursor to where it was located when
.B \%wgetstr
was called.
.PP
.B \%wgetnstr
is similar,
but reads at most
.I n
characters,
aiding the application to avoid overrunning the buffer to which
.I str
points.
.I curses
ignores an attempt to input more than
.I n
characters
(other than the terminating line feed or carriage return),
calling \fBbeep\fP(3X).
If
.I n
is negative,
.B \%wgetn_wstr
reads up to
.I LINE_MAX
characters
(see
.IR sysconf (3)).
.PP
\fB\%ncurses\fP(3X) describes the variants of these functions.
.SH RETURN VALUE
These functions return
.B OK
on success and
.B ERR
on failure.
.PP
In
.IR \%ncurses ,
these functions fail if
.bP
the
.I curses
screen has not been initialized,
.bP
(for functions taking a
.I \%WINDOW
pointer argument)
.I win
is a null pointer,
.bP
.I str
is a null pointer,
or
.bP
an internal \fB\%wgetch\fP(3X) call fails.
.PP
Further,
in
.IR \%ncurses ","
these functions return
.B \%KEY_RESIZE
if a
.I \%SIGWINCH
event interrupts the function.
.PP
Functions prefixed with \*(``mv\*('' first perform cursor movement and
fail if the position
.RI ( y ,
.IR x )
is outside the window boundaries.
.SH NOTES
All of these functions except
.B \%wgetnstr
may be implemented as macros.
.PP
Reading input that overruns the buffer pointed to by
.I str
causes undefined results.
Use the
.BR n -infixed
functions,
and allocate sufficient storage for
.I str
\(em at least
.IR n +1
times
.BR sizeof(char) "."
.PP
While these functions conceptually implement
a series of calls to
.BR \%wgetch ","
they also temporarily change properties of the
.I curses
screen to permit simple editing of the input buffer.
Each function saves the screen's state,
calls \fBnl\fP(3X),
and,
if the screen was in canonical (\*(``cooked\*('') mode,
\fB\%cbreak\fP(3X).
Before returning,
it restores the saved screen state.
Other implementations differ in detail,
affecting which control characters they can accept in the buffer;
see section \*(``PORTABILITY\*('' below.
.SH EXTENSIONS
.BR \%getnstr ","
.BR \%wgetnstr ","
.BR \%mvgetnstr ","
and
.BR \%mvwgetnstr "'s"
handing of negative
.I n
values is an
.I \%ncurses
extension.
.PP
The return value
.B \%KEY_RESIZE
is an
.I \%ncurses
extension.
.SH PORTABILITY
Applications employing
.I \%ncurses
extensions should condition their use on the visibility of the
.B \%NCURSES_VERSION
preprocessor macro.
.PP
X/Open Curses Issue\ 4 describes these functions.
It specifies no error conditions for them,
but indicates that
.I \%wgetnstr
and its variants read
\*(``the entire multi-byte sequence associated with a character\*(''
and \*(``fail\*('' if
.I n
and
.I str
together do not describe a buffer
\*(``large enough to contain any complete characters\*(''.
In
.IR \%ncurses ","
however,
.I \%wgetch
reads only single-byte characters,
so this scenario does not arise.
.\" You can pass ncurses wgetnstr n=0 and it will beep at you with each
.\" key stroke.
.PP
SVr4 describes a successful return value only as
\*(``an integer value other than
.IR ERR \*(''. \" Courier roman in source; SVID 4, vol. 3, p. 495
.PP
SVr3 and early SVr4
.I curses
implementations did not reject function keys;
the SVr4 documentation asserted that,
like the screen's erase and kill characters,
they were
.PP
.RS
interpreted,
as well as any special keys
(such as function keys,
\*(``home\*('' key,
\*(``clear\*('' key,
.IR etc. )
.\" SVID 4, vol. 3, p. 495
.RE
.PP
without further detail.
It lied.
The \*(``character\*('' value
appended to the string
by those implementations
was predictable but not useful \(em
being,
in fact,
the low-order eight bits of the key code's
.I KEY_
constant value.
(The same language,
unchanged except for styling,
survived into X/Open Curses Issue\ 4,
Version\ 2 \" p. 94 (PDF 114)
but disappeared from Issue\ 7.) \" p. 105 (PDF 119)
.PP
A draft of X/Open Curses Issue\ 5
(which never saw final release)
stated that these functions
\*(``read at most
.I n
bytes\*(''
but did not state whether the terminating null character
counted toward that limit.
X/Open Curses Issue\ 7 changed that to say they
\*(``read at most
.IR n \-1
bytes\*(''
to allow for the terminating null character.
As of 2018,
some implementations count it,
some do not.
.bP
.I \%ncurses
6.1 and
.I \%PDCurses
do not count the null character toward the limit,
while Solaris and NetBSD
.I curses
do.
.bP
Solaris
.I xcurses
offers both behaviors:
its wide-character
.I \%wgetn_wstr
reserves room for a wide null character,
but its non-wide
.I \%wgetnstr
does not consistently count a null character toward the limit.
.PP
X/Open Curses does not specify what happens if the length
.I n
is negative.
.bP
.I \%ncurses
6.2 uses
.I LINE_MAX
or a larger (system-dependent) value
provided by \fI\%sysconf\fP(3).
If neither
.I LINE_MAX
nor
.I \%sysconf
is available,
.I \%ncurses
uses the POSIX minimum value for
.I LINE_MAX
(2048). \" _POSIX2_LINE_MAX
In either case,
it reserves a byte for the terminating null character.
.bP
In SVr4
.IR curses ","
a negative
.I n
tells
.I \%wgetnstr
to assume that the caller's buffer
is large enough to hold the result;
that is,
the function then acts like
.IR \%wgetstr "."
X/Open Curses does not mention this behavior
(or anything related to nonpositive
.I n
values),
however most
.I curses
libraries implement it.
Most implementations nevertheless enforce an upper limit
on the count of bytes they write to the destination buffer
.IR str "."
.bP
BSD
.I curses
lacked
.IR \%wgetnstr ","
and its
.I \%wgetstr
wrote to
.I str
unboundedly,
.\" https://minnie.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/utree.pl?file=4BSD/usr/src/lib/\
.\"   libcurses/getstr.c
.\" https://minnie.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/utree.pl?file=4.4BSD/usr/src/lib/\
.\"   libcurses/getstr.c
as did that in SVr2.
.\" https://github.com/ryanwoodsmall/oldsysv/blob/master/sysvr2-vax/\
.\"   src/lib/libcurses/screen/getstr.c
.bP
.IR PDCurses ","
and
SVr3 and later,
.\" https://github.com/ryanwoodsmall/oldsysv/blob/master/\
.\"   sysvr3/301/usr/src/lib/libcurses/screen/getstr.c#L21
.\"   sysvr3/31/usr/src/lib/libcurses/screen/wgetstr.c#L10
.\"   sysvr4/svr4/lib/xlibcurses/screen/wgetstr.c#L12
and
Solaris
.I curses
limit both functions to writing 256 bytes.
Other System\ V-based platforms likely use the same limit.
.bP
Solaris
.I xcurses
limits the write to
.I LINE_MAX
bytes
(see
.IR sysconf (3)).
.bP
NetBSD 7
.I curses
imposes no particular limit on the length of the write,
but does validate
.I n
to ensure that it is greater than zero.
A comment in NetBSD's source code asserts that SUSv2 specifies this.
.PP
Implementations vary in their handling of input control characters.
.bP
While they may enable the screen's echo option,
some do not take it out of raw mode,
and may take cbreak mode into account
when deciding whether to handle echoing within
.I \%wgetnstr
or to rely on it as a side effect of calling
.IR \%wgetch "."
.bP
Originally,
.IR \%ncurses ","
like its progenitor
.IR \%pcurses ","
had its
.I \%wgetnstr
call
.I \%noraw
and
.I \%cbreak
before accepting input.
That may have been done to make function keys work;
it is not necessary with modern
.IR \%ncurses "."
.IP
Since 1995,
.I \%ncurses
has provided handlers for
.I SIGINTR
and
.I SIGQUIT
events,
which are typically generated at the keyboard with
.B \*^C
and
.B \*^\e
respectively.
In cbreak mode,
those handlers catch a signal and stop the program,
whereas other implementations write those characters into the buffer.
.bP
Starting with
.I \%ncurses
6.3 (2021),
.I \%wgetnstr
preserves raw mode if the screen was already in that state,
allowing one to enter the characters the terminal interprets
as interrupt and quit events
into the buffer,
for better compatibility with SVr4
.IR curses "."
.SH HISTORY
4BSD (1980)
introduced
.I \%wgetstr
along with its variants.
.PP
SVr3.1 (1987)
added
.IR \%wgetnstr ","
but none of its variants.
.PP
X/Open Curses Issue\ 4 (1995)
specified
.IR \%getnstr ","
.IR \%mvgetnstr ","
and
.IR \%mvwgetnstr "."
.SH SEE ALSO
\fB\%curs_get_wstr\fP(3X) describes comparable functions of the
.I \%ncurses
library in its wide-character configuration
.RI \%( ncursesw ).
.PP
\fB\%curses\fP(3X),
\fB\%curs_addch\fP(3X),
\fB\%curs_getch\fP(3X),
\fB\%curs_inopts\fP(3X), \" echo(), keypad()
\fB\%curs_termattrs\fP(3X), \" erasechar(), killchar()