Re: setlocale.3: Wording issues

["Alejandro Colomar (man-pages)" <alx.manpages@gmail.com>]

Hi Michael,

On 1/8/21 10:26 AM, Michael Kerrisk (man-pages) wrote:
> Hi Alex,
> 
> On 1/7/21 7:32 PM, Alejandro Colomar (man-pages) wrote:
>> Hi Michael,
>>
>> I don't understand what this paragraph means, I think it needs some wfix.
>>
>> Around setlocale.3:179:
>> [
>>        On  startup  of  the main program, the portable "C" locale is
>>        selected as default.  A program may be made portable  to  all
>>        locales by calling:
>>
>>            setlocale(LC_ALL, "");
>>
>>        after  program  initialization,  by using the values returned
>>        from a localeconv(3) call for  locale-dependent  information,
>>        by  using the multibyte and wide character functions for text
>>        processing if MB_CUR_MAX > 1, and by  using  strcoll(3),  wc‐
>>        scoll(3) or strxfrm(3), wcsxfrm(3) to compare strings.
>>
>> <<<Especially these last 2 lines
>>
>> ]
> 
> I see what you mean. I had to read that a few times to parse it.
> It looks like the text was added in 1999. I think the following
> clarifies and preserves the meaning:
> 
> [[
>        On startup of the main program, the portable "C" locale is select‐
>        ed  as  default.  A program may be made portable to all locales by
>        calling:
> 
>            setlocale(LC_ALL, "");
> 
>        after program initialization, and then:
> 
>        (a) using the values returned from a localeconv(3)  call  for  lo‐
>            cale-dependent information;
> 
>        (c) using the multibyte and wide character functions for text pro‐
>            cessing if MB_CUR_MAX > 1; and
> 
>        (c) using strcoll(3), wcscoll(3) or strxfrm(3), wcsxfrm(3) to com‐
>            pare strings.
> ]]
> 
> What do you think?

Much better.

But I still don't get why [A, B or  C, D].  What does it mean?

Thanks,

Alex


> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Michael
> 

-- 
Alejandro Colomar
Linux man-pages comaintainer; https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/
http://www.alejandro-colomar.es/