Re: Solaris 8, gettext

[Bruno Haible]

Igor Brezac writes:

> I am trying to build gettext-0.11.1 on Solaris 8 with the native iconv().
> I developed iconv_open_wrapper() (see below) based on charset.alias and
> this combination seems to work.
> ...
> GNU libiconv may
> be a away to approach the problem, but the native iconv seem adequate.

It is a nice idea. But it doesn't address the main point: the
reliability of the iconv converters.

If the gettext tools are used with Solaris/Irix/HP-UX/OSF1/... iconv,
I wouldn't want to receive bug reports about core dumps or weird
behaviour that it causes. The PO files that are manipulated by gettext
are simply too much worth to be at the mercy of broken iconvs.

Nothing against Solaris - their iconv is probably the best among the
non-free ones. Still, if they don't put enough resources on making the
MIME names such as "ISO-8859-1" work and make iconv_open("UTF-8","UTF-8")
work, I don't trust that they will make the converters more reliable
than those that I've seen in Solaris 2.6.

> However, I am not completely satisified with this solution because the
> code is included in too many places (quick and dirty solution).  Perhaps
> libintl can provide this function.

Recognizing standard names for iconv_open should be done by iconv_open
itself, not by a wrapper around it.

Bruno