busybox vi doesn't use ncurses?

Paul Fox pgf at brightstareng.com
Tue Jun 13 23:03:26 UTC 2006


 > On Sunday 11 June 2006 11:01 am, Paul Fox wrote:
 > >  > I compiled a simple hexeditor (bvi) but I have to add
 > >  > libncurses on my target for it to work.  Why, instead, vi is
 > >  > working also without libncurses?
 > >
 > > busybox vi doesn't use ncurses.  it doesn't need it, because it
 > > only runs on one style of terminal device, and because it has
 > > limited functionality.
 > 
 > If you'd ever seen any of the ANSI art of the BBS days, you wouldn't call it 
 > "limited functionality". :)

sure, sure.  :-)  i was thinking of the forms and menus stuff, and the
more esoteric terminfo capabilities, mouse support, etc.

 > 
 > We use ANSI escape sequences, a standard which is over 20 years old and is 
 > loosely based on the old VT100 escape sequences from the "glass tty" style 
 > terminals DEC sold for use with its PDP computers, which is the original 
 > platform that Unix emerged from 35 years ago.  DOS 3.x could handle these 
 > just fine, and any modern OS that can't is too brain-damaged to care about.  
 > (Feel free to come up with an example; I'll stand by my statement.)

hmm.  i guess the ADM-3A terminal in my cellar won't qualify as a
"modern OS", eh? ;-)  because it sure ain't ANSI.

 > 
 > In addition, we use the basic TTY IOCTL in Unix that lets us ask "how wide's 
 > the screen, how tall's the screen".  So that's one system call and a 
 > half-dozen 20 year old console escape sequences, which is much smaller and 
 > simpler than linking to curses.

no question that things have gotten a lot easier than they used to be.
(having done my own vi rewrite, i'm well aware of the issues you're
talking about.)

paul
=---------------------
 paul fox, pgf at brightstareng.com



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