[Pkg-mc-devel] Bug#563625: cursor disappears when visible-tabs are used in mc-edit

[Drew Parsons]

Package: mc
Version: 2:4.7.0-pre1-3
Severity: normal

Using mc inside a gnome terminal (v2.28.2), the cursor disappears when
placed over tab characters, with visible-tabs switched on.

This is a known bug, an erstwhile workaround is given in README.Debian:

 -  To prevent the disappearing cursor over tabs using the visible_tabs feature
    in gnome-terminal set this environment variable:
        export TERM="gnome-256color"

This is the result of applying that advice (adding export TERM="gnome-256color" 
to .bashrc):

$ mc
Unknown terminal: gnome-256color
Check the TERM environment variable.
Also make sure that the terminal is defined in the terminfo database.
Alternatively, set the TERMCAP environment variable to the desired
termcap entry.

... and so mc fails to run with the given workaround. There is no such
gnome-256color terminfo.

A better fix is needed.

Thanks,
Drew


-- System Information:
Debian Release: squeeze/sid
  APT prefers unstable
  APT policy: (500, 'unstable'), (1, 'experimental')
Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)

Kernel: Linux 2.6.32-trunk-amd64 (SMP w/2 CPU cores)
Locale: LANG=en_AU.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=en_AU.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/dash

Versions of packages mc depends on:
ii  libc6                         2.10.2-3   Embedded GNU C Library: Shared lib
ii  libglib2.0-0                  2.22.3-2   The GLib library of C routines
ii  libgpm2                       1.20.4-3.2 General Purpose Mouse - shared lib
ii  libslang2                     2.2.2-2    The S-Lang programming library - r

Versions of packages mc recommends:
ii  imagemagick                  7:6.5.8.3-1 image manipulation programs

Versions of packages mc suggests:
ii  arj                      3.10.22-8       archiver for .arj files
ii  bzip2                    1.0.5-3         high-quality block-sorting file co
ii  dbview                   1.0.4-1         View dBase III files
ii  file                     5.03-5          Determines file type using "magic"
ii  lynx                     2.8.8dev.2-1    Text-mode WWW Browser (transitiona
ii  mime-support             3.48-1          MIME files 'mime.types' & 'mailcap
ii  odt2txt                  0.4-1           simple converter from OpenDocument
ii  perl                     5.10.1-8        Larry Wall's Practical Extraction 
ii  unzip                    6.0-1           De-archiver for .zip files
ii  w3m                      0.5.2-2.1       WWW browsable pager with excellent
ii  xpdf                     3.02-1.4+lenny1 Portable Document Format (PDF) sui
ii  zip                      3.0-1           Archiver for .zip files

-- no debconf information