LOCALE(5) Linux User Manual LOCALE(5)NAME
locale - describes a locale definition file
DESCRIPTION
The locale definition file contains all the information that the
localedef(1) command needs to convert it into the binary locale data‐
base.
The definition files consist of sections which each describe a locale
category in detail.
Syntax
The locale definition file starts with a header that may consist of the
following keywords:
<escape_char>
is followed by a character that should be used as the escape-
character for the rest of the file to mark characters that
should be interpreted in a special way. It defaults to the
backslash (\).
<comment_char>
is followed by a character that will be used as the comment-
character for the rest of the file. It defaults to the number
sign (#).
The locale definition has one part for each locale category. Each part
can be copied from another existing locale or can be defined from
scratch. If the category should be copied, the only valid keyword in
the definition is copy followed by the name of the locale which should
be copied.
Locale category sections
The following category sections are defined by POSIX:
* LC_CTYPE
* LC_COLLATE
* LC_MESSAGES
* LC_MONETARY
* LC_NUMERIC
* LC_TIME
In addition, since version 2.2, the GNU C library supports the follow‐
ing nonstandard categories:
* LC_ADDRESS
* LC_IDENTIFICATION
* LC_MEASUREMENT
* LC_NAME
* LC_PAPER
* LC_TELEPHONE
LC_ADDRESS
The definition for the LC_ADDRESS category starts with the string
LC_ADDRESS in the first column.
The following keywords are allowed:
postal_fmt
followed by a string containing field descriptors that define
the format used for postal addresses in the locale. The follow‐
ing field descriptors are recognized:
%a Care of person, or organization.
%f Firm name.
%d Department name.
%b Building name.
%s Street or block (e.g., Japanese) name.
%h House number or designation.
%N Insert an end-of-line if the previous descriptor's value
was not an empty string; otherwise ignore.
%t Insert a space if the previous descriptor's value was not
an empty string; otherwise ignore.
%r Room number, door designation.
%e Floor number.
%C Country designation, from the <country_post> keyword.
%z Zip number, postal code.
%T Town, city.
%S State, province, or prefecture.
%c Country, as taken from data record.
Each field descriptor may have an 'R' after the '%' to specify
that the information is taken from a Romanized version string of
the entity.
country_name
followed by the country name in the language of the current doc‐
ument (e.g., "Deutschland for the de_DE locale).
country_post
followed by the abbreviation of the country (see CERT_MAIL‐
CODES).
country_ab2
followed by the two-letter abbreviation of the country (ISO
3166).
country_ab3
followed by the three-letter abbreviation of the country (ISO
3166).
country_num
followed by the numeric country code (ISO 3166).
country_car
followed by the code for the country car number.
country_isbn
followed by the ISBN code (for books).
lang_name
followed by the language name in the language of the current
document.
lang_ab
followed by the two-letter abbreviation of the language (ISO
639).
lang_term
followed by the three-letter abbreviation of the language (ISO
639-2).
lang_lib
followed by the three-letter abbreviation of the language for
library use (ISO 639-2)
The LC_ADDRESS definition ends with the string END LC_ADDRESS.
LC_CTYPE
The definition for the LC_CTYPE category starts with the string
LC_CTYPE in the first column.
The following keywords are allowed:
upper followed by a list of uppercase letters. The letters A through
Z are included automatically. Characters also specified as
cntrl, digit, punct, or space are not allowed.
lower followed by a list of lowercase letters. The letters a through
z are included automatically. Characters also specified as
cntrl, digit, punct, or space are not allowed.
alpha followed by a list of letters. All character specified as
either upper or lower are automatically included. Characters
also specified as cntrl, digit, punct, or space are not allowed.
digit followed by the characters classified as numeric digits. Only
the digits 0 through 9 are allowed. They are included by
default in this class.
space followed by a list of characters defined as white-space charac‐
ters. Characters also specified as upper, lower, alpha, digit,
graph, or xdigit are not allowed. The characters <space>,
<form-feed>, <newline>, <carriage-return>, <tab>, and <vertical-
tab> are automatically included.
cntrl followed by a list of control characters. Characters also spec‐
ified as upper, lower, alpha, digit, punct, graph, print, or
xdigit are not allowed.
punct followed by a list of punctuation characters. Characters also
specified as upper, lower, alpha, digit, cntrl, xdigit, or the
<space> character are not allowed.
graph followed by a list of printable characters, not including the
<space> character. The characters defined as upper, lower,
alpha, digit, xdigit, and punct are automatically included.
Characters also specified as cntrl are not allowed.
print followed by a list of printable characters, including the
<space> character. The characters defined as upper, lower,
alpha, digit, xdigit, punct, and the <space> character are auto‐
matically included. Characters also specified as cntrl are not
allowed.
xdigit followed by a list of characters classified as hexadecimal dig‐
its. The decimal digits must be included followed by one or
more set of six characters in ascending order. The following
characters are included by default: 0 through 9, a through f, A
through F.
blank followed by a list of characters classified as blank. The char‐
acters <space> and <tab> are automatically included.
toupper
followed by a list of mappings from lowercase to uppercase let‐
ters. Each mapping is a pair of a lowercase and an uppercase
letter separated with a , and enclosed in parentheses. The mem‐
bers of the list are separated with semicolons.
tolower
followed by a list of mappings from uppercase to lowercase let‐
ters. If the keyword tolower is not present, the reverse of the
toupper list is used.
The LC_CTYPE definition ends with the string END LC_CYTPE.
LC_COLLATE
The LC_COLLATE category defines the rules for collating characters.
Due to limitations of libc not all POSIX-options are implemented.
The definition starts with the string LC_COLLATE in the first column.
The following keywords are allowed:
collating-element
collating-symbol
The order-definition starts with a line:
order_start
followed by a list of keywords chosen from forward, backward, or posi‐
tion. The order definition consists of lines that describe the order
and is terminated with the keyword
order_end.
For more details see the sources in /usr/lib/nls/src notably the exam‐
ples POSIX, Example and Example2
The LC_COLLATE definition ends with the string END LC_COLLATE.
LC_IDENTIFICATION
This category contains meta-information about the locale definition.
The definition starts with the string LC_IDENTIFICATION in the first
column.
The following keywords are allowed:
title followed by the title of ths locale document (e.g., "Maori lan‐
guage locale for New Zealand").
source followed by the name of the organization that maintains this
document.
address
followed by the address of the organization that maintains this
document.
contact
followed by the name of the contact person at the organization
that maintains this document.
email followed by the email address of the person or organization that
maintains this document.
tel followed by the telephone number (in international format) of
the organization that maintains this document.
fax followed by the FAX number (in international format) of the
organization that maintains this document.
language
followed by the name of the language to which this document
applies.
territory
followed by the name of the country/geographic extent to which
this document applies.
audience
followed by a description of the audience for which this docu‐
ment is intended.
application
followed by a description of any special application for which
this document is intended.
abbreviation
followed by the short name for this document.
revision
followed by the revision number of this document.
date followed by the revision date of this document.
In addition, for each of the categories defined by the document, there
should be a line starting with the keyword category, followed by:
* a string that identifies this locale category definition,
* a semicolon, and
* one of the LC_* identifiers.
The LC_IDENTIFICATION definition ends with the string END LC_IDENTIFI‐
CATION.
LC_MESSAGES
The definition starts with the string LC_MESSAGES in the first column.
The following keywords are allowed:
yesexpr
followed by a regular expression that describes possible yes-
responses.
noexpr followed by a regular expression that describes possible no-
responses.
yesstr followed by the output string corresponding to "yes".
nostr followed by the output string corresponding to "no".
The LC_MESSAGES definition ends with the string END LC_MESSAGES.
LC_MEASUREMENT
The definition starts with the string LC_MEASUREMENT in the first col‐
umn.
The following keywords are allowed:
measurement
folowed by number identifying the standard used for measurement.
The following values are recognized:
1 Metric.
2 US customary measurements.
The LC_MEASUREMENT definition ends with the string END LC_MEASUREMENT.
LC_MONETARY
The definition starts with the string LC_MONETARY in the first column.
The following keywords are allowed:
int_curr_symbol
followed by the international currency symbol. This must be a
4-character string containing the international currency symbol
as defined by the ISO 4217 standard (three characters) followed
by a separator.
currency_symbol
followed by the local currency symbol.
mon_decimal_point
followed by the string that will be used as the decimal delim‐
iter when formatting monetary quantities.
mon_thousands_sep
followed by the string that will be used as a group separator
when formatting monetary quantities.
mon_grouping
followed by a string that describes the formatting of numeric
quantities.
positive_sign
followed by a string that is used to indicate a positive sign
for monetary quantities.
negative_sign
followed by a string that is used to indicate a negative sign
for monetary quantities.
int_frac_digits
followed by the number of fractional digits that should be used
when formatting with the int_curr_symbol.
frac_digits
followed by the number of fractional digits that should be used
when formatting with the currency_symbol.
p_cs_precedes
followed by an integer that indicates the placement of cur‐
rency_symbol for a nonnegative formatted monetary quantity:
0 the symbol succeeds the value.
1 the symbol precedes the value.
n_cs_precedes
followed by an integer that indicates the placement of cur‐
rency_symbol for a negative formatted monetary quantity. The
same values are recognized as for p_cs_precedes.
int_p_cs_precedes
followed by an integer that indicates the placement of int_cur‐
rency_symbol for a nonnegative internationally formatted mone‐
tary quantity. The same values are recognized as for p_cs_pre‐
cedes.
int_n_cs_precedes
followed by an integer that indicates the placement of int_cur‐
rency_symbol for a negative internationally formatted monetary
quantity. The same values are recognized as for p_cs_precedes.
p_sep_by_space
followed by an integer that indicates the separation of cur‐
rency_symbol, the sign string, and the value for a nonnegative
formatted monetary quantity. The following values are recog‐
nized:
0 No space separates the currency symbol and the value.
1 If the currency symbol and the sign string are adjacent,
a space separates them from the value; otherwise a space
separates the currency symbol and the value.
2 If the currency symbol and the sign string are adjacent,
a space separates them from the value; otherwise a space
separates the sign string and the value.
n_sep_by_space
followed by an integer that indicates the separation of cur‐
rency_symbol, the sign string, and the value for a nonnegative
formatted monetary quantity. The same values are recognized as
for p_sep_by_space.
int_p_sep_by_space
followed by an integer that indicates the separation of int_cur‐
rency_symbol, the sign string, and the value for a nonnegative
internationally formatted monetary quantity. The same values
are recognized as for p_sep_by_space.
int_n_sep_by_space
followed by an integer that indicates the separation of int_cur‐
rency_symbol, the sign string, and the value for a negative
internationally formatted monetary quantity. The same values
are recognized as for p_sep_by_space.
p_sign_posn
followed by an integer that indicates where the positive_sign
should be placed for a nonnegative monetary quantity:
0 Parentheses enclose the quantity and the currency_symbol
or int_curr_symbol.
1 The sign string precedes the quantity and the cur‐
rency_symbol or the int_curr_symbol.
2 The sign string succeeds the quantity and the cur‐
rency_symbol or the int_curr_symbol.
3 The sign string precedes the currency_symbol or the
int_curr_symbol.
4 The sign string succeeds the currency_symbol or the
int_curr_symbol.
n_sign_posn
followed by an integer that indicates where the negative_sign
should be placed for a negative monetary quantity. The same
values are recognized as for p_sign_posn.
int_p_sign_posn
followed by an integer that indicates where the negative_sign
should be placed for a nonnegative internationally formatted
monetary quantity. The same values are recognized as for
p_sign_posn.
int_n_sign_posn
followed by an integer that indicates where the negative_sign
should be placed for a negative internationally formatted mone‐
tary quantity. The same values are recognized as for
p_sign_posn.
The LC_MONETARY definition ends with the string END LC_MONETARY.
LC_NAME
The definition starts with the string LC_NAME in the first column.
The following keywords are allowed:
name_fmt
followed by a string containing field descriptors that define
the format used for names in the locale. The following field
descriptors are recognized:
%f Family name(s).
%F Family names in uppercase.
%g First given name.
%G First given initial.
%l First given name with Latin letters.
%o Other shorter name.
%m Additional given name(s).
%M Initials for additional given name(s).
%p Profession.
%s Salutation, such as "Doctor".
%S Abbreviated salutation, such as "Mr." or "Dr.".
%d Salutation, using the FDCC-sets conventions.
%t If the preceding field descriptor resulted in an empty
string, then the empty string, otherwise a space charac‐
ter.
name_gen
followed by the general salutation for any gender.
name_mr
followed by the salutation for men.
name_mrs
followed by the salutation for married women.
name_miss
followed by the salutation for unmarried women.
name_ms
followed by the salutation valid for all women.
The LC_NAME definition ends with the string END LC_NAME.
LC_NUMERIC
The definition starts with the string LC_NUMERIC in the first column.
The following keywords are allowed:
decimal_point
followed by the string that will be used as the decimal delim‐
iter when formatting numeric quantities.
thousands_sep
followed by the string that will be used as a group separator
when formatting numeric quantities.
grouping
followed by a string that describes the formatting of numeric
quantities.
The LC_NUMERIC definition ends with the string END LC_NUMERIC.
LC_PAPER
The definition starts with the string LC_PAPER in the first column.
The following keywords are allowed:
height followed by the height, in millimeters, of the standard paper
format.
width followed by the width, in millimeters, of the standard paper
format.
The LC_PAPER definition ends with the string END LC_PAPER.
LC_TELEPHONE
The definition starts with the string LC_TELEPHONE in the first column.
The following keywords are allowed:
tel_int_fmt
followed by a string that contains field descriptors that iden‐
tify the format used to dial international numbers. The follow‐
ing field descriptors are recognized:
%a Area code without nationwide prefix (the prefix is often
"0").
%A Area code including nationwide prefix.
%l Local number (within area code).
%e Extension (to local number).
%c Country code.
%C Alternate carrier service code used for dialling abroad.
%t If the preceding field descriptor resulted in an empty
string, then the empty string, otherwise a space charac‐
ter.
tel_dom_fmt
followed by a string that contains field descriptors that iden‐
tify the format used to dial domestic numbers. The recognized
field descriptrs are the same as for tel_int_fmt.
int_select
followed by the prefix used to call international phone numbers.
int_prefix
followed by the prefix used from other countries to dial this
country.
The LC_TELEPHONE definition ends with the string END LC_TELEPHONE.
LC_TIME
The definition starts with the string LC_TIME in the first column.
The following keywords are allowed:
abday followed by a list of abbreviated names of the days of the week.
The list starts with the first day of the week as specified by
week (Sunday by default).
day followed by a list of names of the days of the week. The list
starts with the first day of the week as specified by week (Sun‐
day by default).
abmon followed by a list of abbreviated month names.
mon followed by a list of month names.
am_pm The appropriate representation of the am and pm strings.
d_t_fmt
The appropriate date and time format.
d_fmt The appropriate date format.
t_fmt The appropriate time format.
t_fmt_ampm
The appropriate time format when using 12h clock format.
week followed by a list of three values: The number of days in a week
(by default 7), a date of beginning of the week (by default cor‐
responds to Sunday), and the minimal length of the first week in
year (by default 4). Regarding the start of the week, 19971130
shall be used for Sunday and 19971201 shall be used for Monday.
Thus, countries using 19971130 should have local Sunday name as
the first day in the day list, while countries using 19971201
should have Monday translation as the first item in the day
list.
first_weekday (since glibc 2.2)
Number of the first day from the day list to be shown in calen‐
dar applications. The default value of 1 corresponds to either
Sunday or Monday depending on the value of the second week list
item.
first_workday (since glibc 2.2)
Number of the first working day from the day list.
cal_direction
followed by a value that indicates the direction for the display
of calendar dates, as follows:
1 left-right from top
2 top-down from left
3 right-left from top
date_fmt
followed by the appropriate date representation for date(1).
The LC_TIME definition ends with the string END LC_TIME.
FILES
/usr/lib/locale/ — database for the current locale setting of that cat‐
egory
/usr/lib/nls/charmap/* — charmap-files
CONFORMING TO
POSIX.2, ISO/IEC 14652.
BUGS
This manual page isn't complete.
SEE ALSOlocale(1), localedef(1), localeconv(3), newlocale(3), setlocale(3),
uselocale(3), charmap(5), locale(7)COLOPHON
This page is part of release 3.63 of the Linux man-pages project. A
description of the project, and information about reporting bugs, can
be found at http://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.
Linux 2014-03-18 LOCALE(5)