[ncurses] Add new port

[Hoikas]

Adds the port ncurses.

• What does your PR fix?
  Fixes [New port Request] ncurses #7110
  Fixes [New Port Request] ncurses #17167
  Closes [ncurses] new port #17164

• Which triplets are supported/not supported? Have you updated the CI baseline?
  Windows (MSVC) is not supported.

• Does your PR follow the maintainer guide?
  Yes

[electron271]

Trying to install right now..

[Neumann-A]

add testing via cmake test port in script/test_ports. The option for cmake is BUILD_CursesDialog

[electron271]

would it be possible to make it work with windows/uwp? or do I have to stick with pdcurses

[Hoikas]

add testing via cmake test port in script/test_ports. The option for cmake is BUILD_CursesDialog

I'm sorry, but I don't understand this statement.

would it be possible to make it work with windows/uwp? or do I have to stick with pdcurses

You will need to use MinGW for this to work on Windows. I do not have a functioning MinGW setup, so I cannot support that.

[Neumann-A]

I'm sorry, but I don't understand this statement.

To test if ncurses can be correctly used it is helpful to build an application with it. Since CMake supports building with some sort of Curses dependency it would be appropriate to include it in the cmake build by settting BUILD_CursesDialog=ON after

vcpkg/scripts/test_ports/cmake/portfile.cmake

Line 29 in fe112d8

-DBUILD_QtDialog=ON # Just to test Qt with CMake

and add a dependency on it in the manifest.

This way it can be checked if it actually builds a useable dialog and links correctly.

[electron271]

You will need to use MinGW for this to work on Windows. I do not have a functioning MinGW setup, so I cannot support that.

well then I guess i'm going to stick to pdcurses or some other lib

[Neumann-A]

@Hoikas You probably need to comment out:

vcpkg/scripts/test_ports/cmake/portfile.cmake

Line 51 in fe112d8

file(REMOVE_RECURSE ${CURRENT_PACKAGES_DIR}/bin)

for a CI run so that you can get the application name. Otherwise it will simply be deleted.

[Hoikas]

Will that be a permanent change, or just so we can test ccmake locally?

[Neumann-A]

Will that be a permanent change, or just so we can test ccmake locally?

temporary but since you seem to already now the application name you can add it to the copy tools section of the port. Somewhere around here:

vcpkg/scripts/test_ports/cmake/portfile.cmake

Lines 36 to 40 in fe112d8

	set(_tools cmake cmake-gui ctest cpack)
	if(VCPKG_TARGET_IS_WINDOWS)
	list(APPEND _tools cmcldeps)
	endif()
	vcpkg_copy_tools(TOOL_NAMES ${_tools} AUTO_CLEAN)

Do you know the deps of ncurses? Maybe I can make it somehow work for windows in #9966.

[Hoikas]

Very minimal deps. There's an optional pcre2 dependency (that we're not opting into) and getopt is needed to build the programs. I initially wrote the port on Windows but got nasty build errors about things like DWORD not being defined. It was more than I really wanted to investigate at the time 😅

[strega-nil-ms]

Thanks @Hoikas, this is great :)

[GitMensch]

Does it "just not compile" with MSVC or were there other reasons to not integrate it?
Years ago this was doomed to work because of the missing termcap model but as ncurses 5.8 added "added a terminal driver for Windows console" and more recent MSVC versions are not as limited as old ones I've thought that this would work - wouldn't it?

[JackBoosY]

@GitMensch Please open a new issue to request Windows support.

[Hoikas]

ncurses does not compile with MSVC; however, I suspect you may find some success with mingw or clang-cl.

[dg0yt]

Note that there is port pdcurses for windows. (However it seems to need some maintenance, in particular a port to vcpkg_build_nmake which might also fix issues with some triplets.)
Last not least there could be a curses meta-port with specific dependencies for each platform.

[GitMensch]

ncurses does not compile with MSVC; ...

Can you point to build tests / documentation for this?

... however, I suspect you may find some success with mingw or clang-cl.

mingw should definitely work as this is what is used in MSYS2.
Are there compiler specific triplets?
Do you suggest compiling ncurses with mingw, then linking against the result with msvc?

Last not least there could be a curses meta-port with specific dependencies for each platform.

That would be very reasonable, and as long as each port installs a curses.h (and/or adds -DHAVE_PDCURSES_H and similar) would really help with portability of recipes - a central place for that is much better than conditionals in every package that wants to use curses to let it compile both on Win32 and on other triplets.

[dg0yt]

ncurses does not compile with MSVC; ...

Can you point to build tests / documentation for this?

The citation you have given, complete line:

add a terminal driver for Windows console, which supports a MinGW port to Windows.

Related:
https://invisible-island.net/ncurses/ncurses.html#download_mingw

Additionally:

It should port easily to any ANSI/POSIX-conforming UNIX.

Future plans
...
Ports to more systems, including DOS and Windows.

Briefly: Not enough POSIX with MSVC.