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.Dd February 1, 2021
.Dt U8LOC 1
.Os
.Sh NAME
.Nm u8loc
.Nd run a program in a UTF-8-capable environment
.Sh SYNOPSIS
.Nm
.Op Fl p
.Fl r
.Ar program
.Op Ar args...
.Nm
.Op Fl p
.Fl q
.Cm LC_ALL
.Nm
.Op Fl p
.Fl q
.Cm LANGUAGE
.Nm
.Fl q
.Cm preferred
.Nm
.Fl q
.Cm list
.Nm
.Fl -features
.Sh DESCRIPTION
The
.Nm
utility prepares the environment variables so that a child process being
run will hopefully generate clean UTF-8 output.
It is designed to be run by a program that expects to be able to reliably
parse the output of another program without worrying about character set
conversions.
.Pp
The
.Nm
utility invokes the
.Xr locale 1
tool to list the names of the locales for which the current system has
valid definitions, and then filters and reorders those names based on
either a predefined list of language preferences or, if the
.Fl p
option is specified, on the language names found in the current
environment's locale-related variables
.Pq Ev LC_ALL , Ev LANG , Ev LC_MESSAGES , Ev LC_CTYPE , etc. .
.Pp
The
.Nm
utility accepts the following command-line options:
.Bl -tag -width indent
.It Fl p
Examine the current environment's locale-related variables and use
the names of languages found there as a preference list for choosing
a suitable locale.
.It Fl q
Do not execute a program; output the detected environment settings instead,
depending on the supplied argument:
.Bl -tag -width indent
.It Ev LC_ALL
Output the selected UTF-8-capable locale name that would be placed into the
.Ev LC_ALL
environment variable.
.It Ev LANGUAGE
Output the empty string that would be placed into the
.Ev LANGUAGE
environment variable.
.It Cm list
List the available parameters for the
.Fl q
option.
.It Cm preferred
Output the list of languages gathered from examining the locale-related
environment variables.
.El
.It Fl r
Set the
.Ev LC_ALL
and
.Ev LANGUAGE
variables in the environment and execute the specified program.
.El
.Sh ENVIRONMENT
If the
.Fl p
option is specified, the locale-related environment variables are examined
in order.
If any of them contains the name of a locale that specifies UTF-8 as
encoding
.Pq by either a Dq UTF-8 or Dq utf8 suffix ,
the language name is added to the list of preferences.
The variables examined are:
.Bl -tag -width indent
.It * Ev LC_ALL
.It * Ev LANG
.It * Ev LC_MESSAGES
.It * Ev LC_COLLATE
.It * Ev LC_NAME
.It * Ev LC_IDENTIFICATION
.It * Ev LC_CTYPE
.It * Ev LC_NUMERIC
.It * Ev LC_TIME
.It * Ev LC_MONETARY
.It * Ev LC_PAPER
.It * Ev LC_ADDRESS
.It * Ev LC_TELEPHONE
.It * Ev LC_MEASUREMENT
.El
.Sh EXIT STATUS
If an error occurs during the detection of a suitable UTF-8-capable locale, the
.Nm
utility will exit with a non-zero error code.
If the
.Fl r
option is specified, the specified program will be executed and replace the
.Nm
process.
.Sh EXAMPLES
Output the name of a UTF-8-capable locale:
.Pp
.Dl u8loc -q LC_ALL
.Pp
Run a program in a UTF-8-friendly environment:
.Pp
.Dl u8loc -r -- cal -3
.Pp
.Sh STANDARDS
No standards documentation was harmed in the process of creating
.Nm .
.Sh BUGS
Please report any bugs in
.Nm
to the author.
.Sh AUTHOR
The
.Nm
utility was written by
.An Peter Pentchev Aq roam@ringlet.net .