Manual Pages  — form

form - curses extension for programming forms

SYNOPSIS DESCRIPTION Current Default Values for Field Attributes Routine Name Index RETURN VALUE NOTES PORTABILITY AUTHORS SEE ALSO

#include <form.h>

The form library provides terminal-independent facilities for composing form screens on character-cell terminals. The library includes: field routines, which create and modify form fields; and form routines, which group fields into forms, display forms on the screen, and handle interaction with the user.

The form library uses the curses libraries. To use the form library, link with the options -lform -lcurses.

Your program should set up the locale, e.g.,

setlocale(LC_ALL, "");

so that input/output processing will work.

A curses initialization routine such as initscr must be called before using any of these functions.

The form library maintains a default value for field attributes. You can get or set this default by calling the appropriate set_ or retrieval routine with a NULL field pointer. Changing this default with a set_ function affects future field creations, but does not change the rendering of fields already created.

The following table lists each form routine and the name of the manual page on which it is described. Routines flagged with * are  ncurses-specific, not present in SVr4.

curses Routine Name	Manual Page Name
current_field	form_page(3X)
data_ahead	form_data(3X)
data_behind	form_data(3X)
dup_field	form_field_new(3X)
dynamic_field_info	form_field_info(3X)
field_arg	form_field_validation(3X)
field_back	form_field_attributes(3X)
field_buffer	form_field_buffer(3X)
field_count	form_field(3X)
field_fore	form_field_attributes(3X)
field_index	form_page(3X)
field_info	form_field_info(3X)
field_init	form_hook(3X)
field_just	form_field_just(3X)
field_opts	form_field_opts(3X)
field_opts_off	form_field_opts(3X)
field_opts_on	form_field_opts(3X)
field_pad	form_field_attributes(3X)
field_status	form_field_buffer(3X)
field_term	form_hook(3X)
field_type	form_field_validation(3X)
field_userptr	form_field_userptr(3X)
form_driver	form_driver(3X)
form_driver_w	form_driver(3X)*
form_fields	form_field(3X)
form_init	form_hook(3X)
form_opts	form_opts(3X)
form_opts_off	form_opts(3X)
form_opts_on	form_opts(3X)
form_page	form_page(3X)
form_request_by_name	form_requestname(3X)*
form_request_name	form_requestname(3X)*
form_sub	form_win(3X)
form_term	form_hook(3X)
form_userptr	form_userptr(3X)
form_win	form_win(3X)
free_field	form_field_new(3X)
free_fieldtype	form_fieldtype(3X)
free_form	form_new(3X)
link_field	form_field_new(3X)
link_fieldtype	form_fieldtype(3X)
move_field	form_field(3X)
new_field	form_field_new(3X)
new_fieldtype	form_fieldtype(3X)
new_form	form_new(3X)
new_page	form_new_page(3X)
pos_form_cursor	form_cursor(3X)
post_form	form_post(3X)
scale_form	form_win(3X)
set_current_field	form_page(3X)
set_field_back	form_field_attributes(3X)
set_field_buffer	form_field_buffer(3X)
set_field_fore	form_field_attributes(3X)
set_field_init	form_hook(3X)
set_field_just	form_field_just(3X)
set_field_opts	form_field_opts(3X)
set_field_pad	form_field_attributes(3X)
set_field_status	form_field_buffer(3X)
set_field_term	form_hook(3X)
set_field_type	form_field_validation(3X)
set_field_userptr	form_field_userptr(3X)
set_fieldtype_arg	form_fieldtype(3X)
set_fieldtype_choice	form_fieldtype(3X)
set_form_fields	form_field(3X)
set_form_init	form_hook(3X)
set_form_opts	form_field_opts(3X)
set_form_page	form_page(3X)
set_form_sub	form_win(3X)
set_form_term	form_hook(3X)
set_form_userptr	form_userptr(3X)
set_form_win	form_win(3X)
set_max_field	form_field_buffer(3X)
set_new_page	form_new_page(3X)
unfocus_current_field	form_page(3X)*
unpost_form	form_post(3X)

Routines that return pointers return NULL on error, and set errno to the corresponding error-code returned by functions returning an integer. Routines that return an integer return one of the following error codes:

E_OK	The routine succeeded.
E_BAD_ARGUMENT
	Routine detected an incorrect or out-of-range argument.
E_BAD_STATE
	Routine was called from an initialization or termination function.
E_CONNECTED
	The field is already connected to a form.
E_INVALID_FIELD
	Contents of a field are not valid.
E_NOT_CONNECTED
	No fields are connected to the form.
E_NOT_POSTED
	The form has not been posted.
E_NO_ROOM
	Form is too large for its window.
E_POSTED
	The form is already posted.
E_REQUEST_DENIED
	The form driver could not process the request.
E_SYSTEM_ERROR
	System error occurred (see errno(3)).
E_UNKNOWN_COMMAND
	The form driver code saw an unknown request code.

The header file  form.h itself includes  curses.h.

These routines emulate the System V forms library. They were not supported on Version 7 or BSD versions.

A form facility was documented in SVr4.2's Character User Interface Programming document.

It is not part of X/Open Curses.

Aside from  ncurses, there are few implementations:

»	systems based on SVr4 source code, e.g., Solaris.
»	NetBSD curses.

A few functions in this implementation are extensions added for  ncurses, but not provided by other implementations, e.g., form_driver_w, unfocus_current_field.

Juergen Pfeifer. Manual pages and adaptation for  ncurses by Eric S. Raymond.