numtbl(M)

numtbl -- create a numeric locale table

Syntax

numtbl [ table_file ]

Description

This utility will create a numeric locale table to be interpreted by the setlocale(S) system call.

The table_file contains information about the numeric locale in a user readable form.

At present, two pieces of information can be supplied. These are: the character to be used as a decimal place marker (radix character), and the character to be used as a thousands delimiter, for example the commas in 1,000,000. To specify these, there must be lines, in the table file, of the form:

   DECIMAL=d
   THOUSANDS=t

Where ``d'' is the character to be used as the decimal place mark and ``t'' is the character to be used as the thousands delimiter. The characters ``d'' and ``t'' may be specified in six different ways. The following lines show different formats for the letter ``b''.

98

decimal
0142

octal
0x62

hexadecimal
'b'

quoted character
'\0142'

quoted octal
'\x62'

quoted hexadecimal

Any line starting with a hash (#) is treated as a comment.

The output is a file, called numeric, which is placed in the current directory. This file is in a form which can be interpreted by the setlocale system call. For more information on where this file should be placed, please see locale(M).

If no table file is specified, the information is taken from the standard input. The format of the information is identical.

If either DECIMAL or THOUSANDS is not specified, its value will default to ``.'' or ``,'', respectively.

Diagnostics

Any lines of input which are in the wrong format will cause a warning to be issued on the terminal, but will not terminate the program.

``Character syntax error'' will be issued on the terminal if the format of the character specification does not match one of those specified above. The program will then terminate.

If the input table file cannot be opened for reading, the program will also terminate with the error message, ``Cannot open table file.''

If the output file, numeric, cannot be opened for writing, the program will terminate with the error message, ``Cannot create numeric locale file.''

Limitations

The thousands delimiter is not currently used within any of the standard UNIX libraries or utilities, although it can be accessed by application programs using the nl_langinfo(S) function.

The string RADIXCHAR may be used as an alternative to DECIMAL, and THOUSEP as an alternative to THOUSANDS, if required. These alternatives are provided for consistency with the identifiers used by nl_langinfo.

Standards conformance