.\" $NetBSD: iconv.3,v 1.15 2013/01/04 01:21:45 christos Exp $ .\" .\" Copyright (c)2003 Citrus Project, .\" All rights reserved. .\" .\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without .\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions .\" are met: .\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright .\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. .\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright .\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the .\" documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. .\" .\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE AUTHOR AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND .\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE .\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE .\" ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHOR OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE .\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL .\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS .\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) .\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT .\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY .\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF .\" SUCH DAMAGE. .\" .Dd January 3, 2013 .Dt ICONV 3 .Os .\" ---------------------------------------------------------------------- .Sh NAME .Nm iconv_open , .Nm iconv_close , .Nm iconv .Nd codeset conversion functions .\" ---------------------------------------------------------------------- .Sh LIBRARY .Lb libc .\" ---------------------------------------------------------------------- .Sh SYNOPSIS .In iconv.h .Ft iconv_t .Fn iconv_open "const char *dstname" "const char *srcname" .Ft int .Fn iconv_close "iconv_t cd" .Ft size_t .Fn iconv "iconv_t cd" "const char ** restrict src" "size_t * restrict srcleft" "char ** restrict dst" "size_t * restrict dstleft" .\" ---------------------------------------------------------------------- .Sh DESCRIPTION The .Fn iconv_open function opens a converter from the codeset .Fa srcname to the codeset .Fa dstname and returns its descriptor. .Pp The .Fn iconv_close function closes the specified converter .Fa cd . .Pp The .Fn iconv function converts the string in the buffer .Fa *src of length .Fa *srcleft bytes and stores the converted string in the buffer .Fa *dst of size .Fa *dstleft bytes. After calling .Fn iconv , the values pointed to by .Fa src , .Fa srcleft , .Fa dst , and .Fa dstleft are updated as follows: .Bl -tag -width 01234567 -offset indent .It Fa *src Pointer to the byte just after the last character fetched. .It Fa *srcleft Number of remaining bytes in the source buffer. .It Fa *dst Pointer to the byte just after the last character stored. .It Fa *dstleft Number of remainder bytes in the destination buffer. .El .Pp If the string pointed to by .Fa *src contains a byte sequence which is not a valid character in the source codeset, the conversion stops just after the last successful conversion. If the output buffer is too small to store the converted character, the conversion also stops in the same way. In these cases, the values pointed to by .Fa src , .Fa srcleft , .Fa dst , and .Fa dstleft are updated to the state just after the last successful conversion. .Pp If the string pointed to by .Fa *src contains a character which is valid under the source codeset but can not be converted to the destination codeset, the character is replaced by an .Dq invalid character which depends on the destination codeset, e.g., .Sq \&? , and the conversion is continued. .Fn iconv returns the number of such .Dq invalid conversions . .Pp If the source and/or destination codesets are stateful, .Fn iconv places these into their initial state. There are two special cases of .Fn iconv : .Bl -enum -offset indent .It If both .Fa dst and .Fa *dst are .No non- Ns Dv NULL , .Fn iconv stores the shift sequence for the destination switching to the initial state in the buffer pointed to by .Fa *dst . The buffer size is specified by the value pointed to by .Fa dstleft as above. .Fn iconv will fail if the buffer is too small to store the shift sequence. .It On the other hand, .Fa dst or .Fa *dst may be .Dv NULL . In this case, the shift sequence for the destination switching to the initial state is discarded. .El .\" ---------------------------------------------------------------------- .Sh RETURN VALUES Upon successful completion of .Fn iconv_open , it returns a conversion descriptor. Otherwise, .Fn iconv_open returns (iconv_t)\-1 and sets .Va errno to indicate the error. .Pp Upon successful completion of .Fn iconv_close , it returns 0. Otherwise, .Fn iconv_close returns \-1 and sets errno to indicate the error. .Pp Upon successful completion of .Fn iconv , it returns the number of .Dq invalid conversions. Otherwise, .Fn iconv returns (size_t)\-1 and sets errno to indicate the error. .\" ---------------------------------------------------------------------- .Sh ERRORS The .Fn iconv_open function may cause an error in the following cases: .Bl -tag -width Er .It Bq Er EINVAL There is no converter specified by .Fa srcname and .Fa dstname . .It Bq Er ENOMEM Memory is exhausted. .El .Pp The .Fn iconv_close function may cause an error in the following case: .Bl -tag -width Er .It Bq Er EBADF The conversion descriptor specified by .Fa cd is invalid. .El .Pp The .Fn iconv function may cause an error in the following cases: .Bl -tag -width Er .It Bq Er E2BIG The output buffer pointed to by .Fa *dst is too small to store the result string. .It Bq Er EBADF The conversion descriptor specified by .Fa cd is invalid. .It Bq Er EILSEQ The string pointed to by .Fa *src contains a byte sequence which does not describe a valid character of the source codeset. .It Bq Er EINVAL The string pointed to by .Fa *src terminates with an incomplete character or shift sequence. .El .\" ---------------------------------------------------------------------- .Sh SEE ALSO .Xr iconv 1 .\" ---------------------------------------------------------------------- .Sh STANDARDS .Fn iconv_open , .Fn iconv_close , and .Fn iconv conform to .St -p1003.1-2001 . .Pp Unfortunately due a historical mistake (documented in .Pa https://www5.opengroup.org/sophocles2/show_mail.tpl?&source=L&listname=austin-group-l&id=7404 ), where the unix header page had the second argument of .Fn iconv as .Ft char ** and the manual page had the same as .Ft const char ** , the definition of .Ft iconv has not been consistent across operating systems. Given the committee's decicion to follow the header definition, we had to make a decision between following the committee's change or keeping our existing definition which is arguably more correct like others have ( .Pa http://www.gnu.org/savannah-checkouts/gnu/libiconv/documentation/libiconv-1.14/ ). We chose to keep our definition and we believe that this is not a problem because most packages are aware of this issue and handle it anyway during configuration. .\" ---------------------------------------------------------------------- .Sh BUGS If .Fn iconv is aborted due to the occurrence of some error, the .Dq invalid conversion count mentioned above is unfortunately lost.