1Locale::Codes::API(3) User Contributed Perl DocumentationLocale::Codes::API(3)
2
6 Locale::Codes::API - a description of the callable function in each
7 module
8
10 Although there are several modules in the Locale-Codes distribution,
11 all of them (as of version 3.10) use exactly the same API. As a matter
12 of fact, each of the main callable modules are just wrappers around a
13 central module which does all the real work.
14
16 In order to maintain the documentation for the modules consistently,
17 the functions are all documented here, rather than in the documentation
18 for the separate modules.
19 The name of the function depends on the module. For example, every
21 module contains a function "code2XXX" where XXX refers to the type of
22 data. The values of XXX are described in the following table:
23 XXX MODULE
25 country Locale::Codes::Country
27 language Locale::Codes::Language
28 currency Locale::Codes::Currency
29 script Locale::Codes::Script
30 langext Locale::Codes::LangExt
31 langvar Locale::Codes::LangVar
32 langfam Locale::Codes::LangFAM
33 So, the Locale::Country module contains the function code2country, the
35 Locale::Language module contains the function code2language, etc.
36 In all of the functions below, CODE refers to a code for one element in
38 the code set. For example, in the two-letter country codes from ISO
39 3166-1, the code 'fi' is used to refer to the country Finland. CODE is
40 always case insensitive (though when a code is returned, it will always
41 be in the case as used in the standard), so 'fi', 'FI', and 'Fi' would
42 all be equivalent.
43 CODESET refers to a constant specified in the documentation for each
45 module to label the various code sets. For example, in the
46 Locale::Language module, CODESET could be LOCALE_CODE_ALPHA_2 or
47 LOCALE_CODE_ALPHA_3 (among others). Most functions have a default one,
48 so they do not need to be specified. So the following calls are valid:
49 code2country("fi");
51 code2country("fi",LOCALE_CODE_ALPHA_2);
52 code2country("fin",LOCALE_CODE_ALPHA_3);
53 Since LOCALE_CODE_ALPHA_2 is the default code set, the first two are
55 identical.
56 code2XXX ( CODE [,CODESET] [,'retired'] )
58 These functions take a code and returns a string which contains the
59 name of the element identified. If the code is not a valid code in
60 the CODESET specified then "undef" will be returned.
61 The name of the element is the name as specified in the standard,
63 and as a result, different variations of an element name may be
64 returned for different values of CODESET.
65 For example, the alpha-2 country code set defines the two-letter
67 code "bo" to be "Bolivia, Plurinational State of", whereas the
68 alpha-3 code set defines the code 'bol' to be the country "Bolivia
69 (Plurinational State of)". So:
70 code2country('bo',LOCALE_CODE_ALPHA_2);
72 => 'Bolivia, Plurinational State of'
73 code2country('bol',LOCALE_CODE_ALPHA_3);
75 => 'Bolivia (Plurinational State of)'
76 By default, only active codes will be used, but if the string
78 'retired' is passed in as an argument, both active and retired
79 codes will be examined.
80 XXX2code ( NAME [,CODESET] [,'retired'] )
82 These functions takes the name of an element (or any of it's
83 aliases) and returns the code that corresponds to it, if it exists.
84 If NAME could not be identified as the name of one of the elements,
85 then "undef" will be returned.
86 The name is not case sensitive. Also, any known variation of a name
88 may be passed in.
89 For example, even though the country name returned using
91 LOCALE_CODE_ALPHA_2 and LOCALE_CODE_ALPHA_3 country codes for
92 Bolivia is different, either country name may be passed in since
93 for each code set, in addition to the alias 'Bolivia'. So:
94 country2code('Bolivia, Plurinational State of',
96 LOCALE_CODE_ALPHA_2);
97 => bo
98 country2code('Bolivia (Plurinational State of)',
100 LOCALE_CODE_ALPHA_2);
101 => bo
102 country2code('Bolivia',LOCALE_CODE_ALPHA_2);
104 => bo
105 By default, only active names will be used, but if the string
107 'retired' is passed in as an argument, both active and retired
108 names will be examined.
109 XXX_code2code ( CODE ,CODESET ,CODESET2 )
111 These functions takes a code from one code set, and returns the
112 corresponding code from another code set. CODE must exists in the
113 code set specified by CODESET and must have a corresponding code in
114 the code set specified by CODESET2 or "undef" will be returned.
115 Both CODESETs must be explicitly entered.
117 country_code2code('fin', LOCALE_CODE_ALPHA_3,
119 LOCALE_CODE_ALPHA_2);
120 => 'fi'
121 Note that this function does NOT support retired codes.
123 all_XXX_codes ( [CODESET] [,'retired'] )
125 These returns a list of all code in the code set. The codes will be
126 sorted.
127 By default, only active codes will be returned, but if the string
129 'retired' is passed in as an argument, both active and retired
130 codes will be returned.
131 all_XXX_names ( [CODESET] [,'retired'] )
133 These return a list of all elements names for which there is a
134 corresponding code in the specified code set.
135 The names returned are exactly as they are specified in the
137 standard, and are sorted.
138 Since not all elements are listed in all code sets, the list of
140 elements may differ depending on the code set specified.
141 By default, only active names will be returned, but if the string
143 'retired' is passed in as an argument, both active and retired
144 names will be returned.
145
147 Additional semi-private routines which may be used to modify the
148 internal data are also available. Given their status, they aren't
149 exported, and so need to be called by prefixing the function name with
150 the package name.
151 These routines do not currently work with retired codes.
153 MODULE::rename_XXX ( CODE ,NEW_NAME [,CODESET] )
155 These routines are used to change the official name of an element.
156 At that point, the name returned by the code2XXX routine would be
157 NEW_NAME instead of the name specified in the standard.
158 The original name will remain as an alias.
160 For example, the official country name for code 'gb' is 'United
162 Kingdom'. If you want to change that, you might call:
163 Locale::Codes::Country::rename_country('gb', 'Great Britain');
165 This means that calling code2country('gb') will now return 'Great
167 Britain' instead of 'United Kingdom'.
168 If any error occurs, a warning is issued and 0 is returned. An
170 error occurs if CODE doesn't exist in the specified code set, or if
171 NEW_NAME is already in use but for a different element.
172 If the routine succeeds, 1 is returned.
174 MODULE::add_XXX ( CODE ,NAME [,CODESET] )
176 These routines are used to add a new code and name to the data.
177 Both CODE and NAME must be unused in the data set or an error
179 occurs (though NAME may be used in a different data set).
180 For example, to create the fictitious country named "Duchy of Grand
182 Fenwick" with codes "gf" and "fen", use the following:
183 Locale::Codes::Country::add_country("fe","Duchy of Grand Fenwick",
185 LOCALE_CODE_ALPHA_2);
186 Locale::Codes::Country::add_country("fen","Duchy of Grand Fenwick",
188 LOCALE_CODE_ALPHA_3);
189 The return value is 1 on success, 0 on an error.
191 MODULE::delete_XXX ( CODE [,CODESET] )
193 These routines are used to delete a code from the data.
194 CODE must refer to an existing code in the code set.
196 The return value is 1 on success, 0 on an error.
198 MODULE::add_XXX_alias ( NAME ,NEW_NAME )
200 These routines are used to add a new alias to the data. They do not
201 alter the return value of the code2XXX function.
202 NAME must be an existing element name, and NEW_NAME must be unused
204 or an error occurs.
205 The return value is 1 on success, 0 on an error.
207 MODULE::delete_XXX_alias ( NAME )
209 These routines are used to delete an alias from the data. Once
210 removed, the element may not be referred to by NAME.
211 NAME must be one of a list of at least two names that may be used
213 to specify an element. If the element may only be referred to by a
214 single name, you'll need to use the add_XXX_alias function to add a
215 new alias first, or the remove_XXX function to remove the element
216 entirely.
217 If the alias is used as the name in any code set, one of the other
219 names will be used instead. Predicting exactly which one will be
220 used requires you to know the order in which the standards were
221 read, which is not reliable, so you may want to use the rename_XXX
222 function to force one of the alternate names to be used.
223 The return value is 1 on success, 0 on an error.
225 MODULE::rename_XXX_code ( CODE ,NEW_CODE [,CODESET] )
227 These routines are used to change the official code for an element.
228 At that point, the code returned by the XXX2code routine would be
229 NEW_CODE instead of the code specified in the standard.
230 NEW_CODE may either be a code that is not in use, or it may be an
232 alias for CODE (in which case, CODE becomes and alias and NEW_CODE
233 becomes the "real" code).
234 The original code is kept as an alias, so that the code2XXX
236 routines will work with either the code from the standard or the
237 new code.
238 However, the all_XXX_codes routine will only return the codes which
240 are considered "real" (which means that the list of codes will now
241 contain NEW_CODE, but will not contain CODE).
242 MODULE::add_XXX_code_alias ( CODE ,NEW_CODE [,CODESET] )
244 These routines add an alias for the code. At that point, NEW_CODE
245 and CODE will both work in the code2XXX routines. However, the
246 XXX2code routines will still return the original code.
247 MODULE::delete_XXX_code_alias ( CODE [,CODESET] )
249 These routines delete an alias for the code.
250 These will only work if CODE is actually an alias. If it is the
252 "real" code, it will not be deleted. You will need to use the
253 rename_XXX_code function to switch the real code with one of the
254 aliases, and then delete the alias.
255
257 Relationship between code sets
258 Because each code set uses a slightly different list of elements,
259 and they are not necessarily one-to-one, there may be some
260 confusion about the relationship between codes from different code
261 sets.
262 For example, ISO 3166 assigns one code to the country "United
264 States Minor Outlying Islands", but the FIPS 10 codes give
265 different codes to different islands (Baker Island, Howland Island,
266 etc.).
267 This may cause some confusion... I've done the best that I could do
269 to minimize it.
270 Non-ASCII characters not supported
272 Currently all names must be all ASCII. I plan on relaxing that
273 limitation in the future.
274
276 Locale::Codes
277
279 See Locale::Codes for full author history.
280 Currently maintained by Sullivan Beck (sbeck@cpan.org).
282
284 Copyright (c) 1997-2001 Canon Research Centre Europe (CRE).
285 Copyright (c) 2001-2010 Neil Bowers
286 Copyright (c) 2010-2013 Sullivan Beck
287 This module is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
289 under the same terms as Perl itself.
290perl v5.16.3 2013-05-29 Locale::Codes::API(3)