LOCALE(1)                               Linux User Manual                               LOCALE(1)



NAME
       locale - get locale-specific information

SYNOPSIS
       locale [option]
       locale [option] -a
       locale [option] -m
       locale [option] name...

DESCRIPTION
       The locale command displays information about the current locale, or all locales, on stan‐
       dard output.

       When invoked without arguments, locale displays  the  current  locale  settings  for  each
       locale  category  (see locale(5)), based on the settings of the environment variables that
       control the locale (see locale(7)).

       If either the -a or the -m option (or one of their long-format equivalents) is  specified,
       the behavior is as follows:

       -a, --all-locales
              Display  a  list of all available locales.  The -v option causes the LC_IDENTIFICA‐
              TION metadata about each locale to be included in the output.

       -m, --charmaps
              Display the available charmaps (character set description files).

       The locale command can also be provided with one or more arguments, which are the names of
       locale  keywords  (for example, date_fmt, ctype-class-names, yesexpr, or decimal_point) or
       locale categories (for example, LC_CTYPE or LC_TIME).  For each argument, the following is
       displayed:

       *  For a locale keyword, the value of that keyword to be displayed.

       *  For a locale category, the values of all keywords in that category are displayed.

       When arguments are supplied, the following options are meaningful:

       -c, --category-name
              For  a  category name argument, write the name of the locale category on a separate
              line preceding the list of keyword values for that category.

              For a keyword name argument, write the name of the locale category for this keyword
              on a separate line preceding the keyword value.

              This  option  improves  readability when multiple name arguments are specified.  It
              can be combined with the -k option.

       -k, --keyword-name
              For each keyword whose value is being displayed, include also the name of that key‐
              word, so that the output has the format:

                  keyword="value"

       The locale command also knows about the following options:

       -v, --verbose
              Display  additional  information for some command-line option and argument combina‐
              tions.

       -?, --help
              Display a summary of command-line options and arguments and exit.

       --usage
              Display a short usage message and exit.

       -V, --version
              Display the program version and exit.

FILES
       /usr/lib/locale/locale-archive
              Usual default locale archive location.

       /usr/share/i18n/locales
              Usual default path for locale definition files.

CONFORMING TO
       POSIX.1-2001, POSIX.1-2008.

EXAMPLE
       $ locale
       LANG=en_US.UTF-8
       LC_CTYPE="en_US.UTF-8"
       LC_NUMERIC="en_US.UTF-8"
       LC_TIME="en_US.UTF-8"
       LC_COLLATE="en_US.UTF-8"
       LC_MONETARY="en_US.UTF-8"
       LC_MESSAGES="en_US.UTF-8"
       LC_PAPER="en_US.UTF-8"
       LC_NAME="en_US.UTF-8"
       LC_ADDRESS="en_US.UTF-8"
       LC_TELEPHONE="en_US.UTF-8"
       LC_MEASUREMENT="en_US.UTF-8"
       LC_IDENTIFICATION="en_US.UTF-8"
       LC_ALL=

       $ locale date_fmt
       %a %b %e %H:%M:%S %Z %Y

       $ locale -k date_fmt
       date_fmt="%a %b %e %H:%M:%S %Z %Y"

       $ locale -ck date_fmt
       LC_TIME
       date_fmt="%a %b %e %H:%M:%S %Z %Y"

       $ locale LC_TELEPHONE
       +%c (%a) %l
       (%a) %l
       11
       1
       UTF-8

       $ locale -k LC_TELEPHONE
       tel_int_fmt="+%c (%a) %l"
       tel_dom_fmt="(%a) %l"
       int_select="11"
       int_prefix="1"
       telephone-codeset="UTF-8"

       The following example  compiles  a  custom  locale  from  the  ./wrk  directory  with  the
       localedef(1)  utility  under  the  $HOME/.locale directory, then tests the result with the
       date(1) command, and then sets the environment variables LOCPATH and  LANG  in  the  shell
       profile file so that the custom locale will be used in the subsequent user sessions:

       $ mkdir -p $HOME/.locale
       $ I18NPATH=./wrk/ localedef -f UTF-8 -i fi_SE $HOME/.locale/fi_SE.UTF-8
       $ LOCPATH=$HOME/.locale LC_ALL=fi_SE.UTF-8 date
       $ echo "export LOCPATH=\$HOME/.locale" >> $HOME/.bashrc
       $ echo "export LANG=fi_SE.UTF-8" >> $HOME/.bashrc

SEE ALSO
       localedef(1), charmap(5), locale(5), locale(7)

COLOPHON
       This  page  is  part of release 3.74 of the Linux man-pages project.  A description of the
       project, information about reporting bugs, and the latest version of  this  page,  can  be
       found at http://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.



Linux                                       2014-05-28                                  LOCALE(1)