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https://github.com/HiTECNOLOGYs/cl-charms

More up-to-date version of cl-charms. Forked it because it was, apparently, abandoned by author and I couldn't contact him.
https://github.com/HiTECNOLOGYs/cl-charms

Last synced: 4 months ago
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More up-to-date version of cl-charms. Forked it because it was, apparently, abandoned by author and I couldn't contact him.

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README 

          
[![Build Status](https://travis-ci.org/HiTECNOLOGYs/cl-charms.svg?branch=master)](https://travis-ci.org/HiTECNOLOGYs/cl-charms)



Introduction

============



`cl-charms` is an interface to `libcurses` in Common Lisp. It provides

both a raw, low-level interface to `libcurses` via CFFI, and a more

higher-level lispier interface.



It is intended to succeed `cl-ncurses`, which used the less portable

UFFI instead of CFFI for foreign bindings. Indeed, `cl-charms`

includes portions of code from `cl-ncurses`, and is largely a direct

translation of the latter's UFFI definitions to CFFI.



Currently, the low-level interface (the package `charms/ll`) is

probably feature-equivalent to `cl-ncurses` and compatible with client

code. In the future, however, `cl-charms` may break compatibility with

`cl-ncurses`.



`cl-charms` has been developed by its original author, Abhishek Reddy

(abhishek@abhishek.geek.nz), since beginning of October 2010 for quite

some time, then abandoned for unknown reason. After that, in 2014,

Mark Fedurin (hitecnologys@gmail.com) took responsibility for keeping

the library in working state. Robert Smith (quad@symbo1ics.com) began

to fix up the CFFI bindings and provide a friendlier interface.



The software is released under an MIT-style license. See the file

`COPYING` for details.



>    The imitator dooms himself to hopeless mediocrity. The

>    inventor did it because it was natural to him, and so in him

>    it has a charm. In the imitator something else is natural, and

>    he bereaves himself of his own beauty, to come short of

>    another man's.

          -- R.W. Emerson on originality.



Version

=======



Versioning roughly follows the scheme described in

[Semantic Versioning](http://semver.org/). Only "releases" will be

versioned.



Since we are still pre-`1.0.0`, the minor version will indicate API

breakage. Despite being pre-`1.0.0`, what exists in the low-level

interface as of now is quite usable for ASCII usage. We consider this

"beta" quality. The high-level functionality is considered "alpha"

quality.



Portability

===========



`cl-charms` has been tested to work to a reasonable extent (e.g.,

example code runs) on the following platforms:



* SBCL 2.3.2 on Debian 11 x86-64

* SBCL 2.3.2 on Ubuntu 22.04.2 LTS (jammy jellyfish) x86-64

* SBCL 1.1.8--1.2.9 on Gentoo Linux (3.13.6-hardened-r3--3.15.6-hardened) x86-64

* SBCL 1.2.3.15-4704124 on OS X 10.10 (Yosemite) x86-64

* SBCL 1.1.14.debian on Ubuntu 14.04.2 LTS (trusty) x86

* SBCL 1.2.11 on Windows 8.1 amd64

* CCL 1.9-r15769M on Gentoo Linux (3.13.6-hardened-r3) x86-64

* CCL 1.9-r15759 (64-bit) on OS X 10.10 (Yosemite) x86-64

* LispWorks 6.1.1 (64-bit) on OS X 10.10 (Yosemite) x86-64

* Lispworks 7.0.0 (32-bit) on OS X 10.10 (Yosemite) x86-64



It may work on other implementations and system but there's no

guarantee. More testing is really appreciated.



`cl-charms` ought to function on other implementations of Common Lisp

and `libcurses` on various distributions of UNIX and UNIX-like

systems. See the section on Bugs and Contributing below for how to

help test and realize this.



`cl-charms` is supposed to be only bindings along with a separate,

no-frills interface atop: nothing more, nothing less. For

full-featured TUI see: https://github.com/naryl/cl-tui



Windows

-------



`cl-charms` works on Windows with some limitations. Currently colours are not

supported and some other features like bold might not work correctly. In order

to use `cl-charms` on Windows, you'll need PDCurses library that is available

at http://pdcurses.sourceforge.net/. If you want to use GDI instead of console

http://www.projectpluto.com/win32a.htm would be a good option.



While the original PDCurses project offers prebuilt binaries, using project

pluto requires you to compile your own binaries.



Usage is as simple as placing the `pdcurses.dll` (optionally renaming

it `libcurses.dll`) either in `PATH` or in the directory where you're

running your `cl-charms` program. Project pluto will require

additional dependencies, namely `libgcc_s_dw2-1.dll` and `SDL.dll`.



Installation

============



If you're Quicklisp user, then simple

```lisp

(ql:quickload :cl-charms)

```

would suffice, as `cl-charms` is in Quicklisp.



If you're not, then install Quicklisp and follow to the previous

paragraph.



Usage

=====



The low-level library is contained within the package

`cl-charms/low-level`, nicknamed `charms/ll`. This is mostly a

one-to-one equivalent to standard curses functions.



The high-level library is contained within the package `cl-charms`,

nicknamed `charms`.



Examples and Tutorials

======================



There are currently two examples included with the source code, all of which you can find in the [examples](examples/) directory.



You might also want to check out the following applications written

using `cl-charms`:



* CHARMLIFE, a viewer for Conway's [Game of Life](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_Game_of_Life), exponentially accelerated with the HASHLIFE algorithm ([video](https://youtu.be/YO3KIHjcrrs), [source](https://bitbucket.org/tarballs_are_good/lisp-random/src/master/hashlife/))

* The game "Snake" ([video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gpm1K1jtwuA), [source](https://bitbucket.org/tarballs_are_good/lisp-random/src/master/snake.lisp))

* Steve Losh's Lisp Game Jam entry [silt2](https://github.com/sjl/silt2), [itch](https://itch.io/jam/august-2016-lisp-game-jam/rate/79461), ([blog post](http://stevelosh.com/blog/2016/08/lisp-jam-postmortem))



Daniel Kochmanski has written a nice tutorial about CL-CHARMS [here](http://turtleware.eu/posts/cl-charms-crash-course.html).



Timer

-----



![](timer.png)



A minimal, simple timer/stopwatch program.



```lisp

* (ql:quickload :cl-charms-timer)

* (charms-timer:main)

```



Paint

-----



![](paint.png)



A simple ASCII art drawing program.



```lisp

* (ql:quickload :cl-charms-paint)

* (charms-paint:main)

```



Marquee

-------



![](marquee.png)



A program that horizontally scrolls text across the screen.



```lisp

* (ql:quickload :cl-charms-marquee)

* (charms-marquee:main)

```



Testing

=======



As a minimum, it would be appreciated if the library was compiled and

loaded on various Lisp systems on a variety of operating systems.



[TODO]



Note about SLIME

================



The `libcurses` library handles terminal, and emacs is not a terminal

it can handle. So if you run lisp from SLIME (inside emacs),

`libcurses` functions won't work properly.



If you want to use SLIME, a possible way (to e.g. run the timer

example) is:



1. run lisp from terminal

2. `(ql:quickload '(:swank) :silent t)` ;; from terminal

3. `(swank:create-server :port 5555 :dont-close t)` ;; from terminal, too

4. `(loop (sleep 1))` ;; from terminal, prevents read-line in console REPL

5. go to emacs and M-x slime-connect RET localhost RET 5555 RET

6. `(ql:quickload :cl-charms-timer)` ;; from emacs repl

7. `(charms-timer:main)` ;; from emacs repl



Now you should see timer running on terminal.



Step 1. ~ 3. can be done as a one-liner:



- for SBCL: `sbcl --eval "(ql:quickload '(:swank) :silent t)" --eval "(swank:create-server :port 5555 :dont-close t)"`

- for CCL: `ccl -e "(ql:quickload '(:swank) :silent t)" -e "(swank:create-server :port 5555 :dont-close t)"` ;; maybe ccl64 instead of ccl

- for [Roswell](https://github.com/roswell/roswell): `ros run -e "(ql:quickload '(:swank) :silent t)" -e "(swank:create-server :port 5555 :dont-close t)"`



Bugs and Contributing

=====================



You can use GitHub project's (which is located here:

https://github.com/HiTECNOLOGYs/cl-charms) issues tracker or wiki to contribute

bug reports/patches/etc. or just send an email to one of the maintainers.



Major areas of work to be done:



* Add bindings for all the functions from ncurses

* Do more testing on different OS and architectures

* Try it with non-libncurses libraries.

* Test cases and sample applications.

* Finally write documentation



Current Maintainers

===================



* [Robert Smith](https://github.com/tarballs-are-good) (quad@symbo1ics.com)

* [Mark Fedurin](https://github.com/HiTECNOLOGYs) (me@hitecnologys.org)