coltbl(M)                       19 June 1992                       coltbl(M)


 Name

    coltbl - create a collation locale table

 Syntax

    coltbl [ specfile ]

 Description

    The utility coltbl is provided to allow LCCOLLATE locales to be defined.
    It reads in a specification file (or standard input if specfile is not
    defined), containing definitions for a particular locale's collation ord-
    ering, and produces a concise format table file, to be read by
    setlocale(S).

    In general, characters may be specified in one of six different ways (the
    following examples all specify the ASCII character ``A''):

       65      decimal
       0101    octal
       0x41    hexadecimal
       'A'     quoted character
       '\101'  quoted octal
       '\x41'  quoted hexadecimal

    The information in the specification file is to an extent free format. A
    particular type of definition is started by one of the following key-
    words:

       PRIM:  ZERO:  EQUIV:  DOUBLE:

    The keywords, PRIM:, ZERO: and EQUIV:, are concerned directly with the
    setting of the collation ordering of characters.

    A group of characters which are to be collated as equal, unless all other
    characters in a pair of strings are also equal, are grouped together with
    the PRIM: keyword. The position of a particular group in the specifica-
    tion file is significant as far as the collation ordering is concerned.
    Collating elements following the PRIM:  keyword are separated by white
    spaces. A two-character collating element can be specified here by (ab),
    where a and b are the two characters making up the sequence. The order of
    the collating elements defined in one group is significant in secondary
    collation ordering. It is also possible to define a range of characters,
    for example:

       PRIM: 'a' - 'z'

    Collating elements following the ZERO: keyword, are to be ignored when
    collating. The format of the definitions is the same as with PRIM:.
    Ranges of characters can also be defined, as for example:

       ZERO: 0x80 - 0x9f

    EQUIV: is used to give two collating elements identical positions in the
    collation ordering. The syntax is:

       EQUIV: a = b

    where a and b are the two equal collating elements. There can be only one
    definition for each occurrence of this keyword.

    Single characters which are to be collated as two characters, for example
    the German sharp s, are defined with the DOUBLE: keyword. The syntax is:

       DOUBLE: a = (b c)

    where a is the single character, and b and c are the two characters in
    the collating sequence. There can be only one definition for each occur-
    rence of this keyword. The single character a must not also appear after
    a PRIM:, a ZERO: or an EQUIV: keyword.

    All characters following the hash character are treated as a comment and
    ignored up to the end of the line, unless the hash is within a quoted
    string.

    The concise format locale table is placed in a file named collate in the
    current directory. This file should be copied or moved to the correct
    place in the setlocale(S) file tree (see locale(M)).  To prevent acciden-
    tal corruption of the output data, the file is created with no write per-
    mission; if the coltbl utility is run in a directory containing a write-
    protected collate file, the utility will ask if the existing file should
    be replaced - any response other than ``yes'' or ``y'' will cause coltbl
    to terminate without overwriting the existing file.

 See also

    chrtbl(M), collation(S), locale(M), mestbl(M), montbl(M), numtbl(M),
    setlocale(S), timtbl(M)

 Diagnostics

    All error messages printed are self explanatory.

 Value added

    coltbl is an extension of AT&T System V provided by The Santa Cruz Opera-
    tion, Inc.