.TH termput "" "" "/rdb Command"
.PC "Get terminal capability from /etc/termcap file"
\fBtermput \fIcapability\fR
.PP
.II termcap
.II "terminal^get capability"
The command
.B termput
reads and returns the current capabilities for your terminal, as set in file
.BR /etc/termcap .
A two-letter capability code is followed by a string of characters
that, when sent to the terminal screen, turn on or off that capability.
This assumes, of course, that your terminal is properly described in
.BR /etc/termcap .
.SH Capabilities
The capabilities are two-letter codes recognized by
.BR termcap .
Here are some examples:
.DS
\fBcl\fR	Clear the terminal screen
\fBcm\fR	Cursor movement
\fBso\fR	Start standout mode (e.g., reverse video)
\fBse\fR	End standout mode
.DE
.PP
Using most of these codes is straightforward:
just echo the appropriate code to the terminal to get the effect you want.
Cursor movement, however, is more complicated;
the cursor-movement code that
.B termput
returns must be edited to hold
the row and column to which you wish to move the cursor.
For details,
see the manual page for the command
.BR cursor .
.SH Example
You can embed
.B termput
in a shell script to
help invoke reverse video, blinking, and any other
your terminal has defined in
.BR /etc/termcap .
.PP
The first example clears the screen:
.DM
	termput cl
.DE
.PP
The next example puts the screen into reverse video:
.DM
	termput se
.DE
.PP
and the following turns off reverse video:
.DM
	termput so
.DE
.PP
You can use
.B termput
to initialize environmental variables, which you can then invoke
in a shell script.
This is much faster than making repeated calls to
.BR termput .
To set up these shell variables, insert the following commands
your file
.BR  $HOME/.profile :
.DM
.ta 2.5i
export AE=`termput ae`	# end alternate character set - graphics
export AS=`termput as`	# start alternate character set - graphics
.DE
.DM
.ta 2.5i
export CLEAR=`termput cl`	# clear the screen
export CURSOR=`termput cm`	# cursor movement - for the cursor command
export MB=`termput mb`	# start blinking mode
export ME=`termput me`	# turn off all attributes
export SE=`termput se`	# end stand out mode
export SO=`termput so`	# start stand out mode
export UE=`termput ue`	# end underline mode
export US=`termput us`	# start underline mode
.DE
.PP
Once this is set up, you can use these environmental variables in your
shell program.
For example, if you want a message to stand out, bracket it with
.B $SO
and
.BR $SE :
.DM
	echo "${SO} LOGOFF NOW ${SE}"
.DE
.SH "See Also"
.B
clear,
cursor,
screen
.R
.br
COHERENT Lexicon:
.B
console,
stty,
termcap,
terminal-independent operations
.R
.SO termput