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

NAME
       iconv - codeset conversion function

SYNOPSIS
       #include <iconv.h>

       size_t iconv(iconv_t cd, char **restrict inbuf,
	      size_t *restrict inbytesleft, char **restrict outbuf,
	      size_t *restrict outbytesleft);

DESCRIPTION
       The  iconv() function shall convert the sequence of characters from one
       codeset, in the array specified by inbuf, into  a  sequence  of	corre‐
       sponding	 characters in another codeset, in the array specified by out‐
       buf. The codesets are those specified in	 the  iconv_open()  call  that
       returned	 the conversion descriptor, cd. The inbuf argument points to a
       variable that points to the first character in  the  input  buffer  and
       inbytesleft  indicates  the number of bytes to the end of the buffer to
       be converted. The outbuf argument points to a variable that  points  to
       the  first  available  byte in the output buffer and outbytesleft indi‐
       cates the number of the available bytes to the end of the buffer.

       For state-dependent encodings, the conversion descriptor cd  is	placed
       into  its  initial  shift  state	 by  a	call for which inbuf is a null
       pointer, or for which inbuf points to a null pointer. When  iconv()  is
       called in this way, and if outbuf is not a null pointer or a pointer to
       a null pointer, and outbytesleft points to a  positive  value,  iconv()
       shall  place,  into  the output buffer, the byte sequence to change the
       output buffer to its initial shift state. If the output buffer  is  not
       large  enough to hold the entire reset sequence, iconv() shall fail and
       set errno to [E2BIG].  Subsequent calls with inbuf as other than a null
       pointer	or  a  pointer	to a null pointer cause the conversion to take
       place from the current state of the conversion descriptor.

       If a sequence of input bytes does not form a  valid  character  in  the
       specified  codeset,  conversion	shall stop after the previous success‐
       fully converted character. If the input buffer ends with an  incomplete
       character  or  shift sequence, conversion shall stop after the previous
       successfully converted bytes. If the output buffer is not large	enough
       to hold the entire converted input, conversion shall stop just prior to
       the input bytes that would cause the output  buffer  to	overflow.  The
       variable pointed to by inbuf shall be updated to point to the byte fol‐
       lowing the last byte successfully used in  the  conversion.  The	 value
       pointed to by inbytesleft shall be decremented to reflect the number of
       bytes still not converted in the input buffer. The variable pointed  to
       by outbuf shall be updated to point to the byte following the last byte
       of converted output data. The value pointed to by outbytesleft shall be
       decremented  to reflect the number of bytes still available in the out‐
       put buffer. For state-dependent encodings,  the	conversion  descriptor
       shall be updated to reflect the shift state in effect at the end of the
       last successfully converted byte sequence.

       If iconv() encounters a character in the input buffer  that  is	valid,
       but for which an identical character does not exist in the target code‐
       set, iconv() shall perform an implementation-defined conversion on this
       character.

RETURN VALUE
       The iconv() function shall update the variables pointed to by the argu‐
       ments to reflect the extent of the conversion and return the number  of
       non-identical  conversions performed. If the entire string in the input
       buffer is converted, the value pointed to by inbytesleft shall be 0. If
       the  input conversion is stopped due to any conditions mentioned above,
       the value pointed to by inbytesleft shall be non-zero and  errno	 shall
       be  set	to  indicate  the condition. If an error occurs, iconv() shall
       return (size_t)-1 and set errno to indicate the error.

ERRORS
       The iconv() function shall fail if:

       EILSEQ Input conversion stopped due to an  input	 byte  that  does  not
	      belong to the input codeset.

       E2BIG  Input conversion stopped due to lack of space in the output buf‐
	      fer.

       EINVAL Input conversion stopped due to an incomplete character or shift
	      sequence at the end of the input buffer.

       The iconv() function may fail if:

       EBADF  The cd argument is not a valid open conversion descriptor.

       The following sections are informative.

EXAMPLES
       None.

APPLICATION USAGE
       The  inbuf argument indirectly points to the memory area which contains
       the conversion input data. The outbuf argument indirectly points to the
       memory  area  which  is	to  contain  the result of the conversion. The
       objects indirectly pointed to by inbuf and outbuf are not restricted to
       containing  data	 that  is directly representable in the ISO C standard
       language char data type. The type of inbuf and outbuf,  char  **,  does
       not  imply  that	 the objects pointed to are interpreted as null-termi‐
       nated C strings or arrays of characters.	 Any interpretation of a  byte
       sequence	 that represents a character in a given character set encoding
       scheme is done internally within the codeset converters.	 For  example,
       the  area  pointed to indirectly by inbuf and/or outbuf can contain all
       zero octets that are not interpreted as string terminators but as coded
       character data according to the respective codeset encoding scheme. The
       type of the data ( char, short, long, and so on) read or stored in  the
       objects	is  not	 specified, but may be inferred for both the input and
       output data by the converters determined by  the	 fromcode  and	tocode
       arguments of iconv_open().

       Regardless  of the data type inferred by the converter, the size of the
       remaining space in both input and output objects (the intbytesleft  and
       outbytesleft arguments) is always measured in bytes.

       For  implementations  that  support  the	 conversion of state-dependent
       encodings, the conversion descriptor must be able to accurately reflect
       the shift-state in effect at the end of the last successful conversion.
       It is not required that the conversion descriptor  itself  be  updated,
       which  would require it to be a pointer type. Thus, implementations are
       free to implement the descriptor as a  handle  (other  than  a  pointer
       type) by which the conversion information can be accessed and updated.

RATIONALE
       None.

FUTURE DIRECTIONS
       None.

SEE ALSO
       iconv_open()   ,	  iconv_close()	 ,  the	 Base  Definitions  volume  of
       IEEE Std 1003.1-2001, <iconv.h>

COPYRIGHT
       Portions of this text are reprinted and reproduced in  electronic  form
       from IEEE Std 1003.1, 2003 Edition, Standard for Information Technology
       -- Portable Operating System Interface (POSIX),	The  Open  Group  Base
       Specifications  Issue  6,  Copyright  (C) 2001-2003 by the Institute of
       Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc and The Open  Group.  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.opengroup.org/unix/online.html .

IEEE/The Open Group		     2003			      ICONV(P)
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