Chawan never really used ncurses, only termcap. (ncurses just happens to implement termcap too.)
I started with termcap because I was already familiar with it through
w3m. But termcap is an obsolete interface, and cannot describe the only
useful attribute for modern terminals (true color). Its only benefit
was "maybe it accidentally works on a hardware terminal from the 80s",
which is cool but not really worth the extra failure mode.
So instead of migrating to terminfo, I ditched it completely in favor of
terminal queries (which were already necessary for other reasons).
There is still a built-in terminal database, to detect known TERM values
with XTerm incompatibilities. But a terminal that correctly responds to
queries will work out of the box, even if its TERM value is unknown.
> I started with termcap because I was already familiar with it through w3m. But termcap is an obsolete interface, and cannot describe the only useful attribute for modern terminals (true color). Its only benefit was "maybe it accidentally works on a hardware terminal from the 80s", which is cool but not really worth the extra failure mode.
Priorities, I guess. As long as I'm in a terminal, I'd rather have support for hardware terminals from the 80s than truecolor. But my only hardware terminal is a VT-420, so probably works for more or less anything that supports base XTerm (monochrome).
This is a great website—it reminds me of To Scale: The Solar System [1], a mini-documentary where people attempt to build a true-to-scale model of the Solar System. It makes me feel like a tiny speck of dust, floating in the vastness of nowhere...
Any suggestions about the history of navigation? I have always been amazed by caravels and ~1500 advances on ships and navigation technology, but never dived into the subject.
For an alternative implementation that aims to be compatible with POSIX (not necessarily compatible with GNU coreutils), see: https://github.com/GrayJack/coreutils
At a first glance, I only see advantages with this approach. What would be the caveats of using Austral instead of Rust (disregarding the ecosystem and toolchain factors)?
Matrix Docker Ansible Deploy [1] allows me to unify all chat networks that I use under one single server (and, therefore, one single client), avoiding switching windows. I do believe it saved me hundred of hours...
He also did a podcast with Linux Voice magazine and, more recently, as a guest on various other podcasts in his role as Community and Marketing coordinator at The Document Foundation.
Others have said that, but I'd like to put emphasis on getting everything in source control. If other developers don't know about source control (!) they will love it. I'd spawn my own local source control solution for my own control and after a few changes, show them the advantages.
Second: making a change without tests is like walking in the dark without a flashlight. Having tests is a very important thing.
Read Working Effectively With Legacy Code", by "Michael Feathers, one of the best books I've read that really can help in situations like that. In summary, it boils down to having tests to aid your changes you need to make.
I see you don't use termcap/ncurses anymore. Do you perform terminal handling yourself directly?
Thanks again!