1MBLEN(3)                   Linux Programmer's Manual                  MBLEN(3)
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NAME

6       mblen - determine number of bytes in next multibyte character
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SYNOPSIS

9       #include <stdlib.h>
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11       int mblen(const char *s, size_t n);
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DESCRIPTION

14       If  s  is  not  a NULL pointer, the mblen() function inspects at most n
15       bytes of the multibyte string starting at s and extracts the next  com‐
16       plete multibyte character.  It uses a static anonymous shift state only
17       known to the mblen() function.  If the multibyte character is  not  the
18       null  wide character, it returns the number of bytes that were consumed
19       from s.  If the multibyte character is  the  null  wide  character,  it
20       returns 0.
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22       If  the n bytes starting at s do not contain a complete multibyte char‐
23       acter, mblen() returns -1.  This can happen even if n is  greater  than
24       or  equal  to  MB_CUR_MAX,  if  the multibyte string contains redundant
25       shift sequences.
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27       If the multibyte string starting at s  contains  an  invalid  multibyte
28       sequence before the next complete character, mblen() also returns -1.
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30       If  s  is  a NULL pointer, the mblen() function resets the shift state,
31       only known to this function, to the initial state, and returns  nonzero
32       if  the encoding has nontrivial shift state, or zero if the encoding is
33       stateless.
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RETURN VALUE

36       The mblen() function returns the number of bytes parsed from the multi‐
37       byte  sequence  starting  at s, if a non-null wide character was recog‐
38       nized.  It returns 0, if a null  wide  character  was  recognized.   It
39       returns  -1,  if an invalid multibyte sequence was encountered or if it
40       couldn't parse a complete multibyte character.
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CONFORMING TO

43       C99.
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NOTES

46       The behavior of mblen() depends on the LC_CTYPE category of the current
47       locale.
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49       The  function  mbrlen(3)  provides a better interface to the same func‐
50       tionality.
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SEE ALSO

53       mbrlen(3)
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COLOPHON

56       This page is part of release 3.25 of the Linux  man-pages  project.   A
57       description  of  the project, and information about reporting bugs, can
58       be found at http://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.
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62GNU                               1999-07-25                          MBLEN(3)
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