Closing this task since the original feature request is still in the QA queue.

While searching for a solution to this, I found multiple reports of people that appear to be impacted by this 5 year old issue.

Btw. had to revert your unique ptr change ;-) I didn't want to raise the c++ level just for that.

ikloecker I have just added the ki18n main code to pinentry-qt as qti18n.cpp this fixes it for me. I have commented out everything but the base catalog.

OTOH, inst-qttranslations.nsi copies all .qm files needed by the qt_<language>.qm files.

For the appimage I have added a patch (backported from ki18n) that makes sure that the Qt translations for qtbase are loaded even if the (unneeded) translations for qtscript, qtmultimedia, and qtxmlpatterns are missing. See 0001-Load-Qt-translations-even-if-some-catalogs-are-missi.patch.

You'll have to talk to the people you got pinentry-mac from.

I don't know about pinentry-mac but it seems to be another name for
one our our regular pinentry variants.

We provide lots of different flavors of pinentry, but we do not provide pinentry-mac. You'll have to talk to the people you got pinentry-mac from.

That is a security feature of WIndows. We can't do much about it except for bad hacks. Checkout Kleopatra to see how you can improve this.

What would be setting those? And how do I disable it?

It does have them defined!

$ gpg-connect-agent "getinfo getenv COLUMNS" /bye
D 80
OK
$ gpg-connect-agent "getinfo getenv LINES" /bye
D 24
OK

What would be setting those? And how do I disable it?

A possibility is that gpg-agent which invokes pinentry happens have COLUMNS and LINES defined, then, pinentry misbehaves.

Thanks again for further information.

Hmm, I added that to my formula, and see ncurses 6.3 now, however the issue still occurs.

dyld[20991]: <55AFFB3D-2011-35CC-9486-B30BC1CA12F7> /opt/homebrew/Cellar/pinentry/1.2.0/bin/pinentry-curses
dyld[20991]: <AAD35EC9-FC8A-3ED4-A829-C59E710CEA8A> /opt/homebrew/Cellar/libassuan/2.5.5/lib/libassuan.0.dylib
dyld[20991]: <59683137-0511-3681-8BA6-04A78592B197> /opt/homebrew/Cellar/libgpg-error/1.43/lib/libgpg-error.0.dylib
dyld[20991]: <A9DA1A80-D101-339B-9637-85A65285E050> /opt/homebrew/Cellar/ncurses/6.3/lib/libncursesw.6.dylib
dyld[20991]: <679CDB15-D472-38E8-8840-B38874010D51> /usr/lib/libSystem.B.dylib
dyld[20991]: <BB47A721-69A7-3EEA-9D9B-82F88FFF2641> /usr/lib/system/libcache.dylib
dyld[20991]: <E6CCD148-5E91-3111-BE37-1C19402F4637> /usr/lib/system/libcommonCrypto.dylib
dyld[20991]: <92001FF7-799E-3BA8-BF46-5FA01FFB952C> /usr/lib/system/libcompiler_rt.dylib
dyld[20991]: <6BE94DC2-F363-3D76-B056-F45D4B56E152> /usr/lib/system/libcopyfile.dylib
dyld[20991]: <881973B2-0426-325F-8D1A-17D60AE0CBFA> /usr/lib/system/libcorecrypto.dylib
dyld[20991]: <9C4116F5-B8EB-3A00-B4B5-54AF6A76F66B> /usr/lib/system/libdispatch.dylib
dyld[20991]: <96ECED73-F10C-3941-91A7-00254B907499> /usr/lib/system/libdyld.dylib
dyld[20991]: <F7CDC52B-7961-3283-A30F-B06E2E6ED6AB> /usr/lib/system/libkeymgr.dylib
dyld[20991]: <8D2BECEF-1038-3F2C-B8EF-B02C03092286> /usr/lib/system/libmacho.dylib
dyld[20991]: <3D861651-91A7-3D78-B43B-ECAA41D63D9E> /usr/lib/system/libquarantine.dylib
dyld[20991]: <FA2D8F89-D9C4-316F-9FDC-BFF1A791BD4E> /usr/lib/system/libremovefile.dylib
dyld[20991]: <61963381-E322-3D0F-855D-CE1EA31FA4E1> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_asl.dylib
dyld[20991]: <770FEB1F-FE27-3670-810F-A063D281CC8D> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_blocks.dylib
dyld[20991]: <660D7866-E2A2-3651-A0A5-806E9217736B> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_c.dylib
dyld[20991]: <1F580793-A1C3-30C6-A9BC-7789C14677AE> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_collections.dylib
dyld[20991]: <8370E8A5-EADF-3A2C-9D5B-CA148723A5CA> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_configuration.dylib
dyld[20991]: <30C492F6-C9E6-3C1D-BE52-CA4F4FC824D6> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_containermanager.dylib
dyld[20991]: <F2A34B01-C264-3B7E-B3C9-1671E9E3C185> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_coreservices.dylib
dyld[20991]: <01C0D793-E5FB-3141-95D6-32A973F9FFF8> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_darwin.dylib
dyld[20991]: <AED9DAFC-7AB1-31CF-96A1-14C87B614DD3> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_dnssd.dylib
dyld[20991]: <F0456F65-B4DF-3E14-91DC-C0C2A7954233> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_featureflags.dylib
dyld[20991]: <5E36F087-5EF7-33B7-ACDA-CAE1C4A97621> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_info.dylib
dyld[20991]: <6AB180A4-1D1E-3FA1-88B7-A7866EFACFC8> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_m.dylib
dyld[20991]: <7C9F7726-62C1-3B03-8130-03E8A2A68DDF> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_malloc.dylib
dyld[20991]: <2F331637-80F6-3208-816F-618DA9081899> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_networkextension.dylib
dyld[20991]: <3701D756-7023-30C0-9A36-852971092AA9> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_notify.dylib
dyld[20991]: <4234FAEC-7D18-30E7-AEAD-E9FB6922AFE9> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_product_info_filter.dylib
dyld[20991]: <1214F568-24BF-379F-8A86-FF947EE5F18A> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_sandbox.dylib
dyld[20991]: <49553CC1-66C3-32B1-91C6-4415DE230F58> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_secinit.dylib
dyld[20991]: <17550B77-D255-389A-B779-906AF75314B6> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_kernel.dylib
dyld[20991]: <8B28F7A3-6681-3D34-92AE-3688A74F50E6> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_platform.dylib
dyld[20991]: <AA39FF66-B3F0-3777-99BC-F4A4C5CBD566> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_pthread.dylib
dyld[20991]: <73885FA5-76B6-3AA3-8D91-60B2E0078F99> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_symptoms.dylib
dyld[20991]: <362E885B-20EA-395B-BB01-6E46B864294D> /usr/lib/system/libsystem_trace.dylib
dyld[20991]: <D0A538E3-7A75-395A-993C-A3EA7947F55A> /usr/lib/system/libunwind.dylib
dyld[20991]: <A77B4CE2-0855-3C19-B4A6-47B094CF0DDA> /usr/lib/system/libxpc.dylib
dyld[20991]: <52A50407-CD9B-3A67-A0C2-2D9D6F3043BF> /usr/lib/libc++abi.dylib
dyld[20991]: <8FCA2160-F786-398A-AEAC-2B3D5BD72BB8> /usr/lib/libobjc.A.dylib
dyld[20991]: <6B0DE0DE-0EA2-3948-8B7D-8BA309414B27> /usr/lib/liboah.dylib
dyld[20991]: <20FBE382-CC21-324E-8813-C84B94CC04EF> /usr/lib/libc++.1.dylib
dyld[20991]: <A714AC09-9E2D-3608-B8C1-D6300E852308> /usr/lib/libiconv.2.dylib
dyld[20991]: <1907D41B-6D4B-3EA0-AD3B-5770431B6327> /usr/lib/libcharset.1.dylib

So, the solution is to build pinentry with newer ncurses. As I wrote in another comment, it's adding a single line to the formula.

Thank you for the info.

I ran DYLD_PRINT_LIBRARIES=1 DYLD_PRINT_LIBRARIES_POST_LAUNCH=1 DYLD_PRINT_RPATHS=1 pinentry-curses and see libncurses.5.4 (full output below).

Is there some other command I should run to check which curses it's using? I see there's a --debug flag but I'm not sure how to use it.

I think that either of following might be true:
(1) macOS has older ncurses (which doesn't support ioctl well, to get columns/lines info) in system
(2) macOS has BSD curses (with no suport for ioctl)

I installed it with brew and didn't provide any special options. This is one of the new M1 macs though, so perhaps there is some platform check deep in the install that is getting confused?

Thank you for the information. So, you don't have these environment variables set.

printenv COLUMNS LINES shows no output, however if I echo $COLUMNS $LINES I see 160 48 both before and after the password prompt.

Curses application (of pinentry) get information of screen size by:

• environment variables (COLUMNS, LINES)
• operating system using TIOCGSIZE or TIOCGWINSZ ioctl
• tinfo data base

Pinentry: pinentry-curses (pinentry) 1.2.0
OS: macOS 12.0
Terminal: xterm-256color (via zsh in the default Terminal.app)

What is your Pinentry version, which OS is that, and which terminal type?

For completeness here's a screenshot that shows the situation on a TERM=sun-console text console with the latest code :

After thinking a little more about this issue, I am of the opinion that the best option here is to provide a compile time configure option :

It would be convenient if the -c option could be easily set in the gpg-agent.conf or in some configuration file for pinentry. The workaround that I use now to create a script that I can then use as pinentry-program is extra work because it requires an additional script.

The typo is fixed now and after pulling the latest sources from the repo and configure --disable-ncurses :

Thanks for testing. I pushed a fix for my typo: rPb713f31c5b04: curses: Fix the previous commit.

My previous patch is not perfect as the screenshot in attach shows. The clear() is not really sufficient as it only redraws the portion below the frame in the new background color (black instead of white).

In the patch in attach I do a clear screen in the non-ncurses case.

Hello Tim and Yukata Iibe (gniibe),

Thank you for locating the bug!

Hi gniibe!

Thank you for your investigation.

Hi gniibe!

After testing about a dozen different term types and doing some library tracing, it appears to be that any terminfo type for which has_colors() is false (so the start_color code is never called) works correctly.

Hi gniibe!

Another link: http://hea-www.harvard.edu/~fine/opinions/xterm-problems.html

All of my testing has been done while connecting via ssh to my OpenIndiana workstation. I'm using PuTTY 0.76 as my terminal/SSH client.

It appears to you identified the problem really quickly again. If I select the entire screen and paste it, the dialog text is there:

@mooney Just in case when it's color related problem, could you try to cut&paste the text of the screen when pinentry should display a dialog box?

I found some links:
XTerm FAQ:
https://invisible-island.net/xterm/xterm.faq.html
Why not just use TERM set to "xterm"?
https://invisible-island.net/ncurses/ncurses.faq.html#xterm_generic
What $TERM should I use?
https://tools.ietf.org/doc/xterm/xterm.faq.html#xterm_terminfo

I see, I wasn't aware of this. Thanks for fixing!

Thanks for commenting. I close this bug then.

Your proposed fix (in your first comment) has actually already been applied (commit 1305baf0994059f458b1d5ca28a355c12932fab3 in master, backported to the -2.2 branch in 455ba49071dea7588c9de11785b3092e45e4560b). It is part of gnupg-2.2.31 released today. :)

The Qt upstream bug report has just been rejected. I hope something can be done here...

Package maintainer from PLD here. We still ship Qt4 and therefore provide pinentry qt4 for as long as it's supported. I have no problem with dropping it if it's no longer support, but last release still supported Qt4, there's no mention of dropping such support in NEWS and both code as well as configure.ac appear to still carry Qt4 support which is a bit confusing.

Qt4 is no longer supported. Please use the previous released version plus commit rP2859eddfb0c9: qt: Fix build against Qt4 to build pinentry for Qt4. For everything else use 1.2.0.

I have rather created D536 as IMO the timeout should be changed, not the documentation.

@fvogt I've now added a logging category. Thanks for the suggestion.

Yeah, that sounds good to me.

In T5551#148510, @werner wrote:

I would prefer to see a fix/hack in pinentry-qt instead.

I see. Thanks!

To minimize the risk of regressions.

Not to be bothersome, but why? DISPLAY seems like the universal method of selecting a display to put things on, where a lot of applications don't support --display or equivalent, especially now there's no equivalent for wayland. It's especially confusing to me when the keep-display option will pass DISPLAY instead of --display. This would also prevent other such scenarios with 3rd party qt/gtk plugins or alternative pinentry implementations.

As far as I understood, $WAYLAND_DISPLAY does not need to be set because there is a well-defined default, but I guess most of the time it's set anyway.