mestbl(M)                       19 June 1992                       mestbl(M)


 Name

    mestbl - create a messages locale table

 Syntax

    mestbl [ specfile ]

 Description

    The utility mestbl is provided to allow LCMESSAGES locales to be
    defined. It reads in a specification file (or standard input if specfile
    is not defined), containing a definition for a particular locale's
    response strings to yes/no queries, and produces a concise format table
    file, to be read by setlocale(S).

    The response strings may be specified as a string held within double
    quotes or as a series of characters which are 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

    or a combination of both methods, for example:

       'y' "es"

    is identical to:

       "yes"

    To specify the response strings, the above string definitions must be
    preceded by the keyword YESSTR= for affirmative responses, and NOSTR= for
    negative responses.

    If a hash character (#) appears in any line, 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 messages 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 mestbl utility is run in a directory containing a write-
    protected messages file, the utility will ask if the existing file should
    be replaced - any response other than ``yes'' or ``y'' will cause mestbl
    to terminate without overwriting the existing file.

 See also

    chrtbl(M), coltbl(M), locale(M), montbl(M), numtbl(M), setlocale(S),
    timtbl(M)

 Diagnostics

    All error messages printed are self-explanatory.

 Value added

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