ncurses, pthreads, and serial port

[Troy Davis]

Hello-
        I have created a program that so far has successfully utilized ncurses.
However, I have recently run into a problem.   I am trying to output some
serial input to a window.  The serial input appears on the window briefly
(i.e. it flashes) and then disappears.  I can see the cursor move, and it
flashes, but the input has disappeared.  The program is fairly long, and I
am unsure of attachments to this list.  I can send the code if someone would
like to see it.
        I start by doing initscr(), init_colors(), noecho(), cbreak(), clear(). 
 I
set up the main window (stdscr).  I then create a new window as a menu.  I
make simple list, put it on screen, with a very simple scroll handler to
arrow through the list.  Then I create a 3rd window (upon the appropriate
menu choice) using newwin.  I then call pthread_create.  This creates a
thread that initializes a serial port, and then arrives at a while(1) loop.
The while loop does a read of the serial port (non-blocking) and upon a
return of 1 (a single character), does a waddch() to the appropriate window
followed by a wrefresh().
        Does anyone know of any current bugs with serial ports?  I am using the
O_NOCTTY flag when opening.  I read something about problems with output
buffering and setvbuf.
http://dickey.his.com/ncurses/ncurses.faq.html#setvbuf_once  I don't know if
this is my problem?  If so, how and where exactly do I do this?

Troy Davis
Engineer
Airborne Data Systems, Inc.