I have the following menu, which is supposed to update based on whether the user has typed the keys F1 or F2:
int main()
{
bool f1 = false;
bool f2 = false;
while (true)
{
std::cout << "[F1]: " << (f1 ? "ON" : "OFF") << std::endl;
std::cout << "[F2]: " << (f2 ? "ON" : "OFF") << std::endl;
std::cout << "[INS] to quit" << std::endl;
if (GetAsyncKeyState(VK_INSERT) & 0x1)
break;
if (GetAsyncKeyState(VK_F1) & 0x1)
f1 = !f1;
if (GetAsyncKeyState(VK_F2) & 0x1)
f2 = !f2;
Sleep(100);
cleanWindow();
}
return 0;
}
Now, I was using system("cls") before and it was working "fine", but I've been told that I should rather use the Win32 API for cleaning out the console, and so I created cleanWindow() as described by this MSVC article.
DWORD cleanWindow()
{
HANDLE hStdOut;
hStdOut = GetStdHandle(STD_OUTPUT_HANDLE);
// Fetch existing console mode so we correctly add a flag and not turn off others
DWORD mode = 0;
if (!GetConsoleMode(hStdOut, &mode))
{
return ::GetLastError();
}
// Hold original mode to restore on exit to be cooperative with other command-line apps.
const DWORD originalMode = mode;
mode |= ENABLE_VIRTUAL_TERMINAL_PROCESSING;
// Try to set the mode.
if (!SetConsoleMode(hStdOut, mode))
{
return ::GetLastError();
}
// Write the sequence for clearing the display.
// \x1b[2J is the code for clearing the screen and set cursor to home
DWORD written = 0;
PCWSTR sequence = L"\x1b[2J";
if (!WriteConsoleW(hStdOut, sequence, (DWORD)wcslen(sequence), &written, NULL))
{
// If we fail, try to restore the mode on the way out.
SetConsoleMode(hStdOut, originalMode);
return ::GetLastError();
}
// To also clear the scroll back, emit L"\x1b[3J" as well.
// 2J only clears the visible window and 3J only clears the scroll back.
// Restore the mode on the way out to be nice to other command-line applications.
SetConsoleMode(hStdOut, originalMode);
}
Now, the problem is that the "menu" is at the end of command prompt rather than at the start, as it was with system("cls"):
My question is, how do I do fix this? How do I bring the output back to the top of the shell?
EDIT:
I also edited the cleanWindow() function to write the sequences: \033[2J and L"\033[H" with WriteConsoleW(), which works, but I still get the "blinking" effect just like with system("cls"), which is something I was trying to avoid.
