Technical data

Dense code locales use dense code for wide-character encoding to minimize
table size.
The distinction between dense code and Unicode locales is of interest to
programmers and is described in the Writing Software for the International
Market manual. For users of internationalized software on Tru64 UNIX,
dense code locales are functionally equivalent to Unicode locales and a
Unicode locale exists for each dense code locale. However, not all Unicode
locales have a dense code version.
The Unicode locales are installed in /usr/i18n/lib/nls/ucsloc/. Dense
code locales are installed in /usr/i18n/lib/nls/loc. The active default
is determined by the symbolic link, /usr/i18n/lib/nls/dloc. If you
are superuser, you can switch between Unicode and dense code locales by
changing the setting of the symbolic link, as described in l10n_intro
(5) or
you can use the Configure International Software utility from the SysMan
Menu. See the online help for Configure International Software for more
information.
To set a locale for system use, define the LANG environment variable as one
of the installed locales. For example, under the C shell:
% setenv LANG en_US.ISO8859-1
This command sets the user environment to the values defined for United
States English using the ISO8859–1 codeset. If a locale is not installed,
internationalized applications assume the POSIX (C) locale, which supports
only English.
See the discussion of internationalization in the System Administration
manual and in the Command and Shell User’s Guide for more detailed
information on using locales and defining the associated variables for system
and user setup. See i18n_intro
(5) for a discussion of locale variables such
as LANG.
For graphical applications, you need to select a language to take advantage
of the text translations and local language features available with the
Common Desktop Environment (CDE) and other Motif applications. For
Asian languages, the correct language selection is particularly important
because it enables the following features:
• Support for the appropriate input method in these applications
• Entry of file names and other parameters that use ideographic characters
• Cursor positioning on correct character and word boundaries
• Line wrapping at correct word boundaries
See the CDE Companion manual for general information about setting
language in CDE.
1–4 Working in a Multilanguage Environment