GENCAT(1)                  OpenBSD Reference Manual                  GENCAT(1)

NAME
     gencat - NLS catalog compiler

SYNOPSIS
     gencat catfile msgfile ...

DESCRIPTION
     The gencat utility merges the text NLS (National Language Support) in
     msgfile into a formatted message catalog file catfile.  The file catfile
     will be created if it does not already exist.  If catfile does exist, its
     messages will be included in the new catfile.  If set and message numbers
     collide, the new message text defined in msgfile will replace the old
     message text currently contained in catfile.

INPUT FILES
     The format of a message text source file is defined below.  Note that the
     fields of a message text source line are separated by a single space
     character; any other space characters are considered to be part of the
     field contents.

     $set n comment
             This line specifies the set identifier of the following messages
             until the next $set or end-of-file appears.  The argument n is
             the set identifier which is defined as a number in the range
             [1,NL_SETMAX].  Set identifiers must occur in ascending order
             within a single source file, but need not be contiguous.  Any
             string following a space following the set identifier is treated
             as a comment.  If no $set directive is specified in a given
             source file, all messages will be located in the default message
             set NL_SETD.

     $del n comment
             This line deletes messages from set n from a message catalog.
             The n specifies a set number.  Any string following a space fol-
             lowing the set number is treated as a comment.

     $ comment
             A line beginning with $ followed by a space is treated as a com-
             ment.

     m message-text
             A message line consists of a message identifier m in the range
             [1,NL_MSGMAX].  The message-text is stored in the message catalog
             with the set identifier specified by the last $set directive, and
             the message identifier m.  If the message-text is empty, and
             there is a space character following the message identifier, an
             empty string is stored in the message catalog.  If the message-
             text is empty, and if there is no space character following the
             message identifier, then the existing message in the current set
             with the specified message identifier is deleted from the cata-
             log.  Message identifiers must be in ascending order within a
             single set, but need not be contiguous.  The message-text length
             must be in the range [0,NL_TEXTMAX].

     $quote c
             This line specifies an optional quote character c which can be
             used to surround message-text so that trailing space or empty
             messages are visible in message source files.  By default, or if
             an empty $quote directive is specified, no quoting of message-
             text will be recognized.

     Empty lines in message source files are ignored.  The effect of lines be-
     ginning with any character other than those described above is undefined.

     Text strings can contain the following special characters and escape se-
     quences.  In addition, if a quote character is defined, it may be escaped
     as well to embed a literal quote character.

           \n      line feed
           \t      horizontal tab
           \v      vertical tab
           \b      backspace
           \r      carriage return
           \f      form feed
           \\      backslash
           \ooo    octal number in the range [000, 377]

     A backslash character immediately before the end of the line in a file is
     used to continue the line onto the next line, e.g.,

           1 This line is continued \
           on this line.

     If the character following the backslash is not one of those specified,
     the backslash is ignored.

     The gencat utility exits 0 on success, and >0 if an error occurs.

SEE ALSO
     catclose(3), catgets(3), catopen(3)

STANDARDS
     The gencat utility is compliant with the IEEE Std 1003.1-2008 (``POSIX'')
     specification.

AUTHORS
     This manual page by Ken Stailey updated and revised by Terry Lambert.

BUGS
     A message catalog file created from a blank input file can not be re-
     vised; it must be deleted and recreated.

OpenBSD 4.7                     January 2, 2010                              2
