man form_field_new (3): create and destroy form fields

SYNOPSIS

#include <form.h>
FIELD *new_field(int height, int width,
int toprow, int leftcol,
int offscreen, int nbuffers);
FIELD *dup_field(FIELD *field, int toprow, int leftcol);
FIELD *link_field(FIELD *field, int toprow, int leftcol);
int free_field(FIELD *field);

DESCRIPTION

The function new_field allocates a new field and initializes it from the parameters given: height, width, row of upper-left corner, column of upper-left corner, number off-screen rows, and number of additional working buffers.

The function dup_field duplicates a field at a new location. Most attributes (including current contents, size, validation type, buffer count, growth threshold, justification, foreground, background, pad character, options, and user pointer) are copied. Field status and the field page bit are not copied.

The function link_field acts like dup_field, but the new field shares buffers with its parent. Attribute data is separate.

The function free_field de-allocates storage associated with a field.

RETURN VALUE

The function, new_field, dup_field, link_field return NULL on error. They set errno according to their success:

E_OK: The routine succeeded.
E_BAD_ARGUMENT: Routine detected an incorrect or out-of-range argument.
E_SYSTEM_ERROR: System error occurred, e.g., malloc failure.

The function free_field returns one of the following:

E_OK: The routine succeeded.
E_BAD_ARGUMENT: Routine detected an incorrect or out-of-range argument.
E_CONNECTED: field is connected.

NOTES

The header file <form.h> automatically includes the header file <curses.h>.

PORTABILITY

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

It may be unwise to count on the set of attributes copied by dup_field being portable; the System V forms library documents are not very explicit about what gets copied and what does not.

AUTHORS