ICONV(1)                                                         Linux User Manual                                                        ICONV(1)

NAME

       iconv - convert text from one character encoding to another

SYNOPSIS

       iconv [options] [-f from-encoding] [-t to-encoding] [inputfile]...

DESCRIPTION

       The  iconv  program reads in text in one encoding and outputs the text in another encoding.  If no input files are given, or if it is given
       as a dash (-), iconv reads from standard input.  If no output file is given, iconv writes to standard output.

       If no from-encoding is given, the default is derived from the current locale's character encoding.  If no to-encoding is given, the default
       is derived from the current locale's character encoding.

OPTIONS

       -f from-encoding, --from-code=from-encoding
              Use from-encoding for input characters.

       -t to-encoding, --to-code=to-encoding
              Use to-encoding for output characters.

              If  the  string //IGNORE is appended to to-encoding, characters that cannot be converted are discarded and an error is printed after
              conversion.

              If the string //TRANSLIT is appended to to-encoding, characters being converted are transliterated when needed and  possible.   This
              means that when a character cannot be represented in the target character set, it can be approximated through one or several similar
              looking characters.  Characters that are outside of the target character set and cannot be transliterated are replaced with a  ques-
              tion mark (?) in the output.

       -l, --list
              List all known character set encodings.

       -c     Silently discard characters that cannot be converted instead of terminating when encountering such characters.

       -o outputfile, --output=outputfile
              Use outputfile for output.

       -s, --silent
              This option is ignored; it is provided only for compatibility.

       --verbose
              Print progress information on standard error when processing multiple files.

       -?, --help
              Print a usage summary and exit.

       --usage
              Print a short usage summary and exit.

       -V, --version
              Print the version number, license, and disclaimer of warranty for iconv.

EXIT STATUS

       Zero on success, nonzero on errors.

ENVIRONMENT

       Internally,  the iconv program uses the iconv(3) function which in turn uses gconv modules (dynamically loaded shared libraries) to convert
       to and from a character set.  Before calling iconv(3), the iconv program must first allocate a conversion descriptor  using  iconv_open(3).
       The operation of the latter function is influenced by the setting of the GCONV_PATH environment variable:

       *  If GCONV_PATH is not set, iconv_open(3) loads the system gconv module configuration cache file created by iconvconfig(8) and then, based
          on the configuration, loads the gconv modules needed to perform the conversion.  If the system gconv module configuration cache file  is
          not available then the system gconv module configuration file is used.

       *  If  GCONV_PATH  is  defined (as a colon-separated list of pathnames), the system gconv module configuration cache is not used.  Instead,
          iconv_open(3) first tries to load the configuration files by searching the directories in GCONV_PATH in order, followed  by  the  system
          default  gconv  module configuration file.  If a directory does not contain a gconv module configuration file, any gconv modules that it
          may contain are ignored.  If a directory contains a gconv module configuration file and it is determined that a module needed  for  this
          conversion  is  available  in  the  directory, then the needed module is loaded from that directory, the order being such that the first
          suitable module found in GCONV_PATH is used.  This allows users to use custom modules and even replace system-provided modules  by  pro-
          viding such modules in GCONV_PATH directories.

FILES

       /usr/lib/gconv
              Usual default gconv module path.

       /usr/lib/gconv/gconv-modules
              Usual system default gconv module configuration file.

       /usr/lib/gconv/gconv-modules.cache
              Usual system gconv module configuration cache.

CONFORMING TO

       POSIX.1-2001.

EXAMPLE

       Convert text from the ISO 8859-15 character encoding to UTF-8:

           $ iconv -f ISO-8859-15 -t UTF-8 < input.txt > output.txt

       The next example converts from UTF-8 to ASCII, transliterating when possible:

           $ echo abc B a EUR ac | iconv -f UTF-8 -t ASCII//TRANSLIT
           abc ss ? EUR abc

SEE ALSO

       locale(1), iconv(3), nl_langinfo(3), charsets(7), iconvconfig(8)

COLOPHON

       This  page is part of release 4.15 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 https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.

GNU                                                                 2018-02-02                                                            ICONV(1)