# curs_inch 3x 2024-01-13 ncurses 6.4 Library calls

    curs_inch(3x)                    Library calls                   curs_inch(3x)

## NAME

           inch, winch, mvinch, mvwinch - get a curses character from a window

## SYNOPSIS

           #include <curses.h>

           chtype inch(void);
           chtype winch(WINDOW *win);

           chtype mvinch(int y, int x);
           chtype mvwinch(WINDOW *win, int y, int x);

## DESCRIPTION

           These  routines  return  the  character, of type chtype, at the current
           position in the named window.  If  any  attributes  are  set  for  that
           position,  their  values  are OR'ed into the value returned.  Constants
           defined in <curses.h> can be used with the & (logical AND) operator  to
           extract the character or attributes alone.

### Attributes

           The  following  bit  masks  may  be  AND-ed with characters returned by
           winch.

           Name           Description
           ------------------------------------------------------------------------
           A_CHARTEXT     Extract character
           A_ATTRIBUTES   Extract attributes
           A_COLOR        Extract color pair information

## RETURN VALUE

           Functions with a "mv" prefix first  perform  a  cursor  movement  using
           wmove, and return an error if the position is outside the window, or if
           the window pointer is null.

           The winch function does not return an  error  if  the  window  contains
           characters  larger than 8-bits (255).  Only the low-order 8 bits of the
           character are used by winch.

## NOTES

           Note that all of these routines may be macros.

## PORTABILITY

           These functions are described in the XSI Curses standard, Issue 4.

           Very old systems (before standardization) provide a different  function
           with the same name:

           o   The  winch  function  was  part of the original BSD curses library,
               which  stored  a  7-bit  character  combined  with   the   standout
               attribute.

               In  BSD  curses,  winch returned only the character (as an integer)
               with the standout attribute removed.

           o   System V curses added support for several  video  attributes  which
               could be combined with characters in the window.

               Reflecting this improvement, the function was altered to return the
               character combined with all video attributes in a chtype value.

           X/Open Curses does not specify the size and layout of attributes, color
           and  character  values in chtype; it is implementation-dependent.  This
           implementation uses 8 bits for character values.  An application  using
           more  bits,  e.g.,  a  Unicode  value,  should  use  the wide-character
           equivalents to these functions.

## SEE ALSO

           curses(3x)
                  gives an overview of the WINDOW and chtype data types.

           curs_attr(3x)
                  goes into more detail, pointing  out  portability  problems  and
                  constraints   on   the   use  of  chtype  for  returning  window
                  information.

           curs_in_wch(3x)
                  describes comparable functions for the wide-character (ncursesw)
                  library.

    ncurses 6.4                       2024-01-13                     curs_inch(3x)