I am new to python and teaching myself.

I downloaded and installed python 2.5 for windows from the main page, accepting all defaults. 

python is installed in c:\Python25

I am able to import everything else I have tried sucessfully. "sys", "os", self written code.

There is a "curses" subfolder in the c:\Python25\Lib folder it contains
.py versions of all of the following files
__init__
ascii
has_key
panel
textpad
wrapper

The documentation includes curses in the "Generic Operating System Services"


From what I have read this should indicate that  can uses curses in windows (even though this was not the case in previous versions of python).


When I attempt to "import curses" I get the following result.

>>> import curses

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<pyshell#0>", line 1, in <module>
    import curses
  File "C:\Python25\Lib\curses\__init__.py", line 15, in <module>
    from _curses import *
ImportError: No module named _curses


I am unsure if this is an error in documentation and curses does not in fact work with windows or if there is an error in the default windows installation.

The C curses library is not available for Windows.  (Ports are available, but I've never seen anyone build Python with them and make the resulting binary available.)

The 'curses' directory is present, but using it relies on an underlying C extension for Python called '_curses'; it's _curses that can't be built for Windows.