Icod.DCurses

Icod.DCurses is a managed, cross-platform curses-like terminal UI library for .NET.

The library sits above Icod.TermInfo and Icod.Terminal. Icod.TermInfo remains the immutable terminal-capability authority; Icod.Terminal owns the live terminal session, host mode, dimensions, lifecycle, input decoding, and reversible presentation and input-protocol leases. Icod.DCurses owns curses-shaped events, virtual screens and windows, terminal cells and styles, rendition policy, and refresh/damage synchronization.

Status

Icod.DCurses 0.1.0 is the first stable release of the managed DCurses contract.

0.1.0-Alpha-15 established the automated Icod.Terminal T19 rich-input acceptance boundary against Icod.Terminal 0.2.0-alpha.6, and 0.1.0-Alpha-16 added the live rich-input acceptance showcase. Alpha-17 through Alpha-19 completed the focused watch, slabtop, and top application-shaped acceptance set. Alpha-20 established the three-host package-only and tag-controlled release gate. Alpha-21 completed the 0.1 public-API/documentation regret pass and required styled/updating quick-start sample. Alpha-22 then validated published Icod.Terminal 0.3.0-alpha.8 and Icod.TermInfo 1.3.0 without requiring DCurses to regain private terminal mechanics.

The stable 0.1.0 dependency freeze advances that accepted contract to Icod.Terminal 0.3.0 and Icod.TermInfo 1.4.1.

The retired DCurses backend, native mode, lifecycle-source, input-decoder, and pre-Terminal session implementations remain removed. DCurses does not add a mouse parser, paste reader, protocol escape emitter, or second input loop.

The first release is driven by the requirements of top, slabtop, and watch.

See Icod.DCurses-Development-Roadmap.md for the broader development contract through 1.0.0, docs/Icod-Terminal-T10-Integration.md for the substrate reset, docs/Icod-Terminal-T19-Rich-Input-Acceptance.md for rich-input acceptance, docs/T13B-Public-API-and-Consumer-Contract.md for the 0.1 regret review, docs/T13C-0.1.0-Stable-Release-Closure.md for the stable release closure, and docs/Public-API-Baseline-0.1.md for the release-line API baseline.

Architecture

top / slabtop / watch / other TUIs
                 |
            Icod.DCurses
     windows / cells / refresh
       rendition / curses events
                 |
            Icod.Terminal
 session / input / lifecycle / dimensions
 presentation / input-protocol leases
                 |
            Icod.TermInfo
      terminal capability model
                 |
            terminal / tty

Icod.DCurses does not hard-code one terminal family. Terminal-specific output continues to be selected through Icod.TermInfo, while live session ownership and reversible terminal state are centralized in Icod.Terminal.

Target

The initial implementation targets:

• .NET 8
• .NET 9
• .NET 10
• C# 13
• Windows
• Linux
• macOS

The stable 0.1.0 runtime dependency set is:

• Icod.Terminal 0.3.0
• Icod.TermInfo 1.4.1

Installation

dotnet add package Icod.DCurses --version 0.1.0

Quick start

using Icod.DCurses;

await using CursesSession session = await CursesSession.OpenAsync();
CursesWindow screen = session.StandardScreen;

screen.Clear();
screen.Move(
    0,
    0
);
screen.Write(
    "Hello from Icod.DCurses",
    new CursesStyle(
        CursesColor.Default,
        CursesColor.Default,
        CursesTextAttributes.Bold
    )
);
await session.RefreshAsync();

CursesEvent terminalEvent = await session.ReadEventAsync();

The session owns the presentation state it enters and restores that state when disposed. Applications should consume terminal input and lifecycle activity through CursesSession rather than adding a parallel terminal reader.

Build

From the repository root:

build.cmd

or:

./build.sh

Both scripts perform clean, restore, build, test, pack, and validate operations by default and also accept one of those phase names individually.

Authors

Timothy J. Bruce.

Copyright

Copyright (c) 2026 Timothy J. Bruce

License

Licensed under the GNU Lesser General Public License v3.0 or later. See LICENSE.

The NuGet package declares license acceptance as required. Package clients which honor NuGet's requireLicenseAcceptance metadata must obtain acceptance of the license terms before installation.