Screen: Cannot find terminfo entry for 'xterm-256color'

Question

When I run

screen

on the remote host(running Linux), I obtain the following error:

Cannot find terminfo entry for \'xterm-         


        

Answer 1

You probably need to install a package on your Linux host which provides one of the following files:

/usr/share/terminfo/x/xterm-256color
/lib/terminfo/x/xterm-256color

On Ubuntu, for example, this is provided by the ncurses-base package.

Answer 2

In the question, the user's configuration asked for a terminal description which was not the default screen. This was eventually fixed by an update from Apple. In the version cited in the question, Apple did not provide that terminal description. They do now (and have since 2015). For the record, here is a directory listing showing the related entries for MacPorts (in /opt/local), a locally built ncurses (in /usr/local) and the Apple/system files in /usr/share:

-rw-r--r--   1 root         1912 Oct  3 2015    opt/local/share/terminfo/73/screen-256color
-rw-r--r--   1 root         1924 Oct  3 2015    opt/local/share/terminfo/73/screen-256color-bce
-rw-r--r--   1 root         1954 Oct  3 2015    opt/local/share/terminfo/73/screen-256color-bce-s
-rw-r--r--   1 root         1940 Oct  3 2015    opt/local/share/terminfo/73/screen-256color-s
-rw-r--r--   1 root         1912 Apr 12 04:22   usr/local/ncurses/share/terminfo/73/screen-256color
-rw-r--r--   1 root         1924 Apr 12 04:22   usr/local/ncurses/share/terminfo/73/screen-256color-bce
-rw-r--r--   1 root         1954 Apr 12 04:22   usr/local/ncurses/share/terminfo/73/screen-256color-bce-s  
-rw-r--r--   1 root         1940 Apr 12 04:22   usr/local/ncurses/share/terminfo/73/screen-256color-s
-rw-r--r--   1 root         1828 Aug 22 2015    usr/share/terminfo/73/screen-256color
-rw-r--r--   1 root         1840 Aug 22 2015    usr/share/terminfo/73/screen-256color-bce
-rw-r--r--   1 root         1866 Aug 22 2015    usr/share/terminfo/73/screen-256color-bce-s
-rw-r--r--   1 root         1856 Aug 22 2015    usr/share/terminfo/73/screen-256color-s

You may notice a few details:

• on OSX, the default file-system ignores case, so the s is encoded in hexadecimal (to make it distinct from S)

• the entries have slightly different sizes. Apple provided an older version of the terminal database, which lacks some features.

• Using toe, I see this:

    --> /usr/local/ncurses/share/terminfo
    ----> /usr/share/terminfo
    ------> /opt/local/share/terminfo
    *-*-*-: screen-256color GNU Screen with 256 colors   
    *-*-*-: screen-256color-bce     GNU Screen with 256 colors and BCE 
    *-*-*-: screen-256color-bce-s   GNU Screen with 256 colors using BCE and status line
    *-*-*-: screen-256color-s       GNU Screen with 256 colors and status line

and comparing the system versus MacPorts:

--- macports    2017-04-26 04:38:21.000000000 -0400
+++ system      2017-04-26 04:40:08.000000000 -0400
@@ -1,19 +1,19 @@
-#      Reconstructed via infocmp from file: /opt/local/share/terminfo/73/screen-256color
+#      Reconstructed via infocmp from file: /usr/share/terminfo/73/screen-256color
 screen-256color|GNU Screen with 256 colors,
        am, km, mir, msgr, xenl,
-       colors#256, cols#80, it#8, lines#24, pairs#32767,
+       colors#256, cols#80, it#8, lines#24, ncv#3, pairs#32767,
        acsc=++\,\,--..00``aaffgghhiijjkkllmmnnooppqqrrssttuuvvwwxxyyzz{{||}}~~,
        bel=^G, blink=\E[5m, bold=\E[1m, cbt=\E[Z, civis=\E[?25l,
        clear=\E[H\E[J, cnorm=\E[34h\E[?25h, cr=^M,
        csr=\E[%i%p1%d;%p2%dr, cub=\E[%p1%dD, cub1=^H,
        cud=\E[%p1%dB, cud1=^J, cuf=\E[%p1%dC, cuf1=\E[C,
        cup=\E[%i%p1%d;%p2%dH, cuu=\E[%p1%dA, cuu1=\EM,
-       cvvis=\E[34l, dch=\E[%p1%dP, dch1=\E[P, dim=\E[2m,
-       dl=\E[%p1%dM, dl1=\E[M, ed=\E[J, el=\E[K, el1=\E[1K,
-       enacs=\E(B\E)0, flash=\Eg, home=\E[H, ht=^I, hts=\EH,
-       ich=\E[%p1%d@, il=\E[%p1%dL, il1=\E[L, ind=^J, is2=\E)0,
-       kbs=^H, kcbt=\E[Z, kcub1=\EOD, kcud1=\EOB, kcuf1=\EOC,
-       kcuu1=\EOA, kdch1=\E[3~, kend=\E[4~, kf1=\EOP, kf10=\E[21~,
+       cvvis=\E[34l, dch=\E[%p1%dP, dch1=\E[P, dl=\E[%p1%dM,
+       dl1=\E[M, ed=\E[J, el=\E[K, el1=\E[1K, enacs=\E(B\E)0,
+       flash=\Eg, home=\E[H, ht=^I, hts=\EH, ich=\E[%p1%d@,
+       il=\E[%p1%dL, il1=\E[L, ind=^J, initc@, is2=\E)0, kbs=^H,
+       kcbt=\E[Z, kcub1=\EOD, kcud1=\EOB, kcuf1=\EOC, kcuu1=\EOA,
+       kdch1=\E[3~, kend=\E[4~, kf1=\EOP, kf10=\E[21~,
        kf11=\E[23~, kf12=\E[24~, kf2=\EOQ, kf3=\EOR, kf4=\EOS,
        kf5=\E[15~, kf6=\E[17~, kf7=\E[18~, kf8=\E[19~, kf9=\E[20~,
        khome=\E[1~, kich1=\E[2~, kmous=\E[M, knp=\E[6~, kpp=\E[5~,
@@ -22,6 +22,6 @@
        rmul=\E[24m, rs2=\Ec\E[?1000l\E[?25h, sc=\E7,
        setab=\E[%?%p1%{8}%<%t4%p1%d%e%p1%{16}%<%t10%p1%{8}%-%d%e48;5;%p1%d%;m,
        setaf=\E[%?%p1%{8}%<%t3%p1%d%e%p1%{16}%<%t9%p1%{8}%-%d%e38;5;%p1%d%;m,
-       sgr=\E[0%?%p6%t;1%;%?%p1%t;3%;%?%p2%t;4%;%?%p3%t;7%;%?%p4%t;5%;%?%p5%t;2%;m%?%p9%t\016%e\017%;,
+       sgr=\E[0%?%p6%t;1%;%?%p1%t;3%;%?%p2%t;4%;%?%p3%t;7%;%?%p4%t;5%;m%?%p9%t\016%e\017%;,
        sgr0=\E[m\017, smacs=^N, smcup=\E[?1049h, smir=\E[4h,
        smkx=\E[?1h\E=, smso=\E[3m, smul=\E[4m, tbc=\E[3g,

Answer 3

You can install ncurses-term on the remote server (Debian/Ubuntu) to fix the issue.

Answer 4

Find out which TERM is supported:

ls /usr/share/terminfo/x

this will give you a list of supported TERMs i.e.

xterm
xterm-xfree86

set the environment variable:

export TERM=xterm-xfree86

and run screen:

TERMINFO='/usr/share/terminfo/' screen

Answer 5

You just need to copy /usr/share/terminfo/x/xterm-256color to the server that you're connecting to.

Answer 6

Don't forget to refresh terminal source if you export a variable...

source ~/.bashrc or just open a new terminal. May be why original poster had trouble with exporting.