ICONV(1)          System General Commands Manual         ICONV(1)



NAME
       iconv - character set conversion

SYNOPSIS
       iconv [OPTION...] [-f encoding] [-t encoding] [inputfile ...]
       iconv -l

DESCRIPTION
       The  iconv  program  converts  text  from  one encoding to
       another encoding.  More precisely, it  converts  from  the
       encoding given for the -f option to the encoding given for
       the -t option. Either of these encodings defaults  to  the
       encoding  of  the  current  locale. All the inputfiles are
       read and converted in turn; if no inputfile is given,  the
       standard  input  is used. The converted text is printed to
       standard output.

       The encodings permitted  are  system  dependent.  For  the
       libiconv   implementation,   they   are   listed   in  the
       iconv_open(3) manual page.

       Options controlling the input and output format:

       -f encoding, --from-code=encoding
              Specifies the encoding of the input.

       -t encoding, --to-code=encoding
              Specifies the encoding of the output.

       Options controlling conversion problems:

       -c     When this option is given, characters  that  cannot
              be  converted  are  silently  discarded, instead of
              leading to a conversion error.

       --unicode-subst=formatstring
              When this option is given, Unicode characters  that
              cannot  be  represented  in the target encoding are
              replaced with a placeholder  string  that  is  con-
              structed  from  the  given formatstring, applied to
              the Unicode code point. The formatstring must be  a
              format  string in the same format as for the printf
              command or the printf() function, taking either  no
              argument  or exactly one unsigned integer argument.

       --byte-subst=formatstring
              When this option is given, bytes in the input  that
              are  not  valid in the source encoding are replaced
              with a placeholder string that is constructed  from
              the  given  formatstring,  applied  to  the  byte's
              value. The formatstring must be a format string  in
              the  same  format  as for the printf command or the
              printf() function, taking  either  no  argument  or
              exactly one unsigned integer argument.

       --widechar-subst=formatstring
              When  this  option is given, wide characters in the
              input that are not valid in the source encoding are
              replaced  with  a  placeholder  string that is con-
              structed from the given  formatstring,  applied  to
              the byte's value. The formatstring must be a format
              string in the same format as for the printf command
              or the printf() function, taking either no argument
              or exactly one unsigned integer argument.

       Options controlling error output:

       -s, --silent
              When this option is  given,  error  messages  about
              invalid  or  unconvertible  characters are omitted,
              but the actual converted text is unaffected.

       The iconv -l or iconv --list command lists  the  names  of
       the supported encodings, in a system dependent format. For
       the libiconv implementation,  the  names  are  printed  in
       upper case, separated by whitespace, and alias names of an
       encoding are listed on  the  same  line  as  the  encoding
       itself.

EXAMPLES
       iconv -f ISO-8859-1 -t UTF-8
              converts  input from the old West-European encoding
              ISO-8859-1 to Unicode.

       iconv -f KOI8-R --byte-subst="<0x%x>"
                       --unicode-subst=""
              converts input from the old Russian encoding KOI8-R
              to  the  locale  encoding,  substituting  an  angle
              bracket  notation  with  hexadecimal  numbers   for
              invalid bytes and for valid but unconvertible char-
              acters.

       iconv --list
              lists the supported encodings.

CONFORMING TO
       POSIX:2001

SEE ALSO
       iconv_open(3), locale(7)



GNU                       March 31, 2007                 ICONV(1)