WCSTOMBS(3P)                                        POSIX Programmer's Manual                                       WCSTOMBS(3P)



PROLOG
       This  manual  page is part of the POSIX Programmer's Manual.  The Linux implementation of this interface may differ (con-
       sult the corresponding Linux manual page for details of Linux behavior), or the  interface  may  not  be  implemented  on
       Linux.

NAME
       wcstombs - convert a wide-character string to a character string

SYNOPSIS
       #include <stdlib.h>

       size_t wcstombs(char *restrict s, const wchar_t *restrict pwcs,
              size_t n);


DESCRIPTION
       The  wcstombs() function shall convert the sequence of wide-character codes that are in the array pointed to by pwcs into
       a sequence of characters that begins in the initial shift state and store these characters into the array pointed  to  by
       s,  stopping if a character would exceed the limit of n total bytes or if a null byte is stored. Each wide-character code
       shall be converted as if by a call to wctomb(), except that the shift state of wctomb() shall not be affected.

       The behavior of this function shall be affected by the LC_CTYPE category of the current locale.

       No more than n bytes shall be modified in the array pointed to by s. If copying takes place between objects that overlap,
       the  behavior  is  undefined.   If s is a null pointer, wcstombs() shall return the length required to convert the entire
       array regardless of the value of n, but no values are stored.

       The wcstombs() function need not be reentrant. A function that is not required to be reentrant  is  not  required  to  be
       thread-safe.

RETURN VALUE
       If  a  wide-character  code  is  encountered  that  does not correspond to a valid character (of one or more bytes each),
       wcstombs() shall return (size_t)-1. Otherwise, wcstombs() shall return the number of bytes stored in the character array,
       not including any terminating null byte. The array shall not be null-terminated if the value returned is n.

ERRORS
       The wcstombs() function may fail if:

       EILSEQ A wide-character code does not correspond to a valid character.


       The following sections are informative.

EXAMPLES
       None.

APPLICATION USAGE
       None.

RATIONALE
       None.

FUTURE DIRECTIONS
       None.

SEE ALSO
       mblen(), mbtowc(), mbstowcs(), wctomb(), the Base Definitions volume of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001, <stdlib.h>

COPYRIGHT
       Portions  of  this  text are reprinted and reproduced in electronic form from IEEE Std 1003.1, 2003 Edition, Standard for
       Information Technology -- Portable Operating System Interface (POSIX), The Open Group Base Specifications Issue 6,  Copy-
       right (C) 2001-2003 by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc and The Open Group. In the event of any
       discrepancy between this version and the original IEEE and The Open Group Standard, the original IEEE and The Open  Group
       Standard   is   the   referee   document.   The   original   Standard   can   be   obtained  online  at  http://www.open-
       group.org/unix/online.html .



IEEE/The Open Group                                           2003                                                  WCSTOMBS(3P)