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ICONV(1P)		   POSIX Programmer's Manual		     ICONV(1P)

PROLOG
       This  manual  page is part of the POSIX Programmer's Manual.  The Linux
       implementation of this interface may differ (consult the	 corresponding
       Linux  manual page for details of Linux behavior), or the interface may
       not be implemented on Linux.

NAME
       iconv — codeset conversion

SYNOPSIS
       iconv [−cs] −f frommap −t tomap [file...]

       iconv −f fromcode [−cs] [−t tocode] [file...]

       iconv −t tocode [−cs] [−f fromcode] [file...]

       iconv −l

DESCRIPTION
       The iconv utility shall convert the encoding of characters in file from
       one codeset to another and write the results to standard output.

       When  the  options  indicate that charmap files are used to specify the
       codesets (see OPTIONS), the codeset conversion shall be accomplished by
       performing  a  logical  join on the symbolic character names in the two
       charmaps. The implementation need not support the use of charmap	 files
       for codeset conversion unless the POSIX2_LOCALEDEF symbol is defined on
       the system.

OPTIONS
       The iconv utility shall conform	to  the	 Base  Definitions  volume  of
       POSIX.1‐2008, Section 12.2, Utility Syntax Guidelines.

       The following options shall be supported:

       −c	 Omit  any  characters	that are invalid in the codeset of the
		 input file from the output. When −c is not used, the  results
		 of  encountering  invalid  characters	in  the	 input	stream
		 (either those that are not characters in the codeset  of  the
		 input	file  or  that	have no corresponding character in the
		 codeset of the output file) shall be specified in the	system
		 documentation. The presence or absence of −c shall not affect
		 the exit status of iconv.

       −f fromcodeset
		 Identify the codeset of the input  file.  The	implementation
		 shall	recognize  the	following two forms of the fromcodeset
		 option-argument:

		 fromcode  The fromcode option-argument	 must  not  contain  a
			   <slash>  character.	It shall be interpreted as the
			   name of one of the codeset descriptions provided by
			   the	implementation in an unspecified format. Valid
			   values of fromcode are implementation-defined.

		 frommap   The frommap option-argument must contain a  <slash>
			   character.  It shall be interpreted as the pathname
			   of a charmap file as defined in  the	 Base  Defini‐
			   tions  volume of POSIX.1‐2008, Section 6.4, Charac‐
			   ter Set Description File.  If the pathname does not
			   represent  a	 valid,	 readable  charmap  file,  the
			   results are undefined.

		 If this option is omitted, the codeset of the current	locale
		 shall be used.

       −l	 Write	all  supported	fromcode and tocode values to standard
		 output in an unspecified format.

       −s	 Suppress any messages written to  standard  error  concerning
		 invalid  characters.  When  −s	 is  not  used, the results of
		 encountering invalid characters in the input  stream  (either
		 those	that  are  not	valid characters in the codeset of the
		 input file or that have no  corresponding  character  in  the
		 codeset  of the output file) shall be specified in the system
		 documentation. The presence or absence of −s shall not affect
		 the exit status of iconv.

       −t tocodeset
		 Identify  the	codeset	 to  be	 used for the output file. The
		 implementation shall recognize the following two forms of the
		 tocodeset option-argument:

		 tocode	   The	semantics  shall be equivalent to the −f from‐
			   code option.

		 tomap	   The semantics shall be equivalent to the −f frommap
			   option.

		 If  this option is omitted, the codeset of the current locale
		 shall be used.

       If either −f or −t represents a charmap file, but the  other  does  not
       (or  is	omitted), or both −f and −t are omitted, the results are unde‐
       fined.

OPERANDS
       The following operand shall be supported:

       file	 A pathname of an input file. If no file operands  are	speci‐
		 fied,	or  if a file operand is '−', the standard input shall
		 be used.

STDIN
       The standard input shall be used only if no file	 operands  are	speci‐
       fied, or if a file operand is '−'.

INPUT FILES
       The input file shall be a text file.

ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
       The  following  environment  variables  shall  affect  the execution of
       iconv:

       LANG	 Provide a default value for  the  internationalization	 vari‐
		 ables	that are unset or null. (See the Base Definitions vol‐
		 ume of POSIX.1‐2008, Section 8.2, Internationalization	 Vari‐
		 ables	for  the  precedence of internationalization variables
		 used to determine the values of locale categories.)

       LC_ALL	 If set to a non-empty string value, override  the  values  of
		 all the other internationalization variables.

       LC_CTYPE	 Determine  the	 locale for the interpretation of sequences of
		 bytes of text data as characters (for example, single-byte as
		 opposed to multi-byte characters in arguments). During trans‐
		 lation of the file, this variable is superseded by the use of
		 the fromcode option-argument.

       LC_MESSAGES
		 Determine the locale that should be used to affect the format
		 and contents  of  diagnostic  messages	 written  to  standard
		 error.

       NLSPATH	 Determine the location of message catalogs for the processing
		 of LC_MESSAGES.

ASYNCHRONOUS EVENTS
       Default.

STDOUT
       When the −l option is used, the standard output shall contain all  sup‐
       ported fromcode and tocode values, written in an unspecified format.

       When  the  −l option is not used, the standard output shall contain the
       sequence of characters read from the input  files,  translated  to  the
       specified  codeset.  Nothing else shall be written to the standard out‐
       put.

STDERR
       The standard error shall be used only for diagnostic messages.

OUTPUT FILES
       None.

EXTENDED DESCRIPTION
       None.

EXIT STATUS
       The following exit values shall be returned:

	0    Successful completion.

       >0    An error occurred.

CONSEQUENCES OF ERRORS
       Default.

       The following sections are informative.

APPLICATION USAGE
       The user must ensure that both charmap  files  use  the	same  symbolic
       names for characters the two codesets have in common.

EXAMPLES
       The  following example converts the contents of file mail.x400 from the
       ISO/IEC 6937:2001 standard codeset to the ISO/IEC 8859‐1:1998  standard
       codeset, and stores the results in file mail.local:

	   iconv −f IS6937 −t IS8859 mail.x400 > mail.local

RATIONALE
       The  iconv utility can be used portably only when the user provides two
       charmap files as option-arguments. This is  because  a  single  charmap
       provided by the user cannot reliably be joined with the names in a sys‐
       tem-provided character set description. The valid values	 for  fromcode
       and tocode are implementation-defined and do not have to have any rela‐
       tion to the charmap mechanisms. As an aid to interactive users, the  −l
       option was adopted from the Plan 9 operating system. It writes informa‐
       tion concerning these  implementation-defined  values.  The  format  is
       unspecified  because  there are many possible useful formats that could
       be chosen, such as a matrix  of	valid  combinations  of	 fromcode  and
       tocode.	The −l option is not intended for shell script usage; conform‐
       ing applications will have to use charmaps.

       The iconv utility may support the conversion between ASCII and  EBCDIC-
       based  encodings,  but  is  not	required to do so. In an XSI-compliant
       implementation, the dd utility is the only method guaranteed to support
       conversion between these two character sets.

FUTURE DIRECTIONS
       None.

SEE ALSO
       dd, gencat

       The Base Definitions volume of POSIX.1‐2008, Section 6.4, Character Set
       Description File, Chapter 8, Environment Variables, Section 12.2, Util‐
       ity Syntax Guidelines

COPYRIGHT
       Portions	 of  this text are reprinted and reproduced in electronic form
       from IEEE Std 1003.1, 2013 Edition, Standard for Information Technology
       --  Portable  Operating	System	Interface (POSIX), The Open Group Base
       Specifications Issue 7, Copyright (C) 2013 by the Institute of Electri‐
       cal  and	 Electronics  Engineers,  Inc  and  The	 Open Group.  (This is
       POSIX.1-2008 with the 2013 Technical Corrigendum	 1  applied.)  In  the
       event of any discrepancy between this version and the original IEEE and
       The Open Group Standard, the original IEEE and The Open Group  Standard
       is  the	referee document. The original Standard can be obtained online
       at http://www.unix.org/online.html .

       Any typographical or formatting errors that appear  in  this  page  are
       most likely to have been introduced during the conversion of the source
       files to man page format. To report such errors,	 see  https://www.ker‐
       nel.org/doc/man-pages/reporting_bugs.html .

IEEE/The Open Group		     2013			     ICONV(1P)
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