NAME

       catopen, catclose - open/close a message catalog

LIBRARY

       Standard C library (libc, -lc)

SYNOPSIS

       #include <nl_types.h>

       nl_catd catopen(const char *name, int flag);
       int catclose(nl_catd catalog);

DESCRIPTION

       The  function catopen() opens a message catalog and returns a catalog descriptor.  The descriptor remains
       valid until catclose() or execve(2).  If a file descriptor is used to implement catalog descriptors, then
       the FD_CLOEXEC flag will be set.

       The argument name specifies the name of the message catalog to be opened.  If name specifies an  absolute
       path  (i.e.,  contains  a  '/'),  then name specifies a pathname for the message catalog.  Otherwise, the
       environment variable NLSPATH is used with name substituted for %N (see  locale(7)).   It  is  unspecified
       whether  NLSPATH  will  be  used  when the process has root privileges.  If NLSPATH does not exist in the
       environment, or if a message catalog cannot be opened in any of  the  paths  specified  by  it,  then  an
       implementation  defined  path  is  used.   This  latter default path may depend on the LC_MESSAGES locale
       setting when the flag argument is NL_CAT_LOCALE and on  the  LANG  environment  variable  when  the  flag
       argument is 0.  Changing the LC_MESSAGES part of the locale may invalidate open catalog descriptors.

       The  flag  argument to catopen() is used to indicate the source for the language to use.  If it is set to
       NL_CAT_LOCALE, then it will use the current locale setting for LC_MESSAGES.  Otherwise, it will  use  the
       LANG environment variable.

       The  function catclose() closes the message catalog identified by catalog.  It invalidates any subsequent
       references to the message catalog defined by catalog.

RETURN VALUE

       The function catopen() returns a message catalog descriptor of type nl_catd on success.  On  failure,  it
       returns  (nl_catd)  -1  and  sets  errno  to  indicate  the error.  The possible error values include all
       possible values for the open(2) call.

       The function catclose() returns 0 on success, or -1 on failure.

ENVIRONMENT

       LC_MESSAGES
              May be the source of the LC_MESSAGES locale setting, and thus determine the  language  to  use  if
              flag is set to NL_CAT_LOCALE.

       LANG   The language to use if flag is 0.

ATTRIBUTES

       For an explanation of the terms used in this section, see attributes(7).
       ┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┬───────────────┬─────────────┐
       │ Interface                                                               │ Attribute     │ Value       │
       ├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┼───────────────┼─────────────┤
       │ catopen()                                                               │ Thread safety │ MT-Safe env │
       ├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┼───────────────┼─────────────┤
       │ catclose()                                                              │ Thread safety │ MT-Safe     │
       └─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┴───────────────┴─────────────┘

VERSIONS

       The  above is the POSIX.1 description.  The glibc value for NL_CAT_LOCALE is 1.  The default path varies,
       but usually looks at a number of places below /usr/share/locale.

STANDARDS

       POSIX.1-2008.

HISTORY

       POSIX.1-2001.

SEE ALSO

       catgets(3), setlocale(3)

Linux man-pages 6.7                                2023-10-31                                         catopen(3)