Re: Cursor problems with some applications in linux console

[Jostein Berntsen]

On 14.10.18,17:32, David Woodfall wrote:
> On Sunday 14 October 2018 17:28,
> Jostein Berntsen <address@hidden> put forth the proposition:
> > On 13.10.18,11:35, David Woodfall wrote:
> > > I'm using the 1/3 block cursor in a plain linux console, set by a
> > > control code (\e[?3c).
> > >
> > > I find that a few applications (vim, mutt, moc, finch, calcurse)
> > > reset my cursor back to the thin underline, which is very hard to
> > > see. And the cursor will affect all other screen windows too.
> > >
> > > With vim I can set a custom cursor when I start it and exit, so
> > > that's not so much of a problem. With mutt I can stop it resetting
> > > the cursor by giving it a fake TERM of xterm-color when I start it.
> > > However, I haven't managed to find a similar workaround for calcurse,
> > > moc and finch.
> > >
> > > I've tried different init and reset strings in termcapinfo, but I
> > > can't seem to find the magic setting that stops the cursor resetting.
> > >
> > > A diff between xterm-color and linux.screen terminfos has pointed at
> > > the differences, but using those hasn't helped, unless I'm setting it
> > > wrong.
> > >
> > > Is there a brute-force method of stopping cursor resets like this?
> > >
> > > I realise that applications usually look better when the cursor is
> > > hidden for drawing menus and such. Other applications like less, lynx
> > > and elinks don't seem to have this problem (although elinks uses an
> > > option to put the cursor at bottom right of the screen, out of view.)
> > >
> > > Any ideas about this would be most helpful indeed.
> > >
> >
> > Can you do something like the answer in this post?
> >
> > https://vi.stackexchange.com/questions/7306/vim-normal-and-insert-mode-cursor-not-changing-in-gnu-screen
> 
> Unfortunately those codes don't work in a plain linux console. I was
> using those before in urxvt. In a vanilla console the codes \e[?0c to
> \e[?6c give various sizes of blinking/nonblinking blocks. Using a
> number of 15+ allows it to be coloured too, but only for a full
> block.
> 
> I have found a fix for vim at least - I set TERM to ansi and made a
> convoluted function that prints the control codes for the altscreen
> before and after running vim, combined with some t_ti and t_te
> settings in vim itself. That allows me to use a block cursor, and
> 1/3, 2/3 blocks too I imagine.
> 
> But this has no effect on some applications like e.g. calcurse, finch
> and moc. I'm still looking for a solution with those. 
> 

What do you get for output when running "echo $TERM" in the plain linux 
console? 

Can you get input from this page? 

http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Text-Terminal-HOWTO-16.html

and this?

https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/220330/hide-and-unhide-cursor-with-tput



Jostein