MBRTOC32(3) Library Functions Manual MBRTOC32(3)

mbrtoc32
Restartable multibyte to UTF-32 conversion

Standard C Library (libc, -lc)

#include <uchar.h>

size_t
mbrtoc32(char32_t * restrict pc32, const char * restrict s, size_t n, mbstate_t * restrict ps);

The mbrtoc32 function decodes multibyte characters in the current locale and converts them to Unicode scalar values (i.e., to UTF-32), keeping state so it can restart after incremental progress.

Each call to mbrtoc32:

  1. examines up to n bytes starting at s,
  2. yields a Unicode scalar value (i.e., a UTF-32 code unit) if available by storing it at *pc32,
  3. saves state at ps, and
  4. returns either the number of bytes consumed if any or a special return value.

Specifically:

If pc32 is a null pointer, nothing is stored, but the effects on ps and the return value are unchanged.

If s is a null pointer, the mbrtoc32 call is equivalent to:

mbrtoc32(NULL, "", 1, ps);

This always returns zero, and has the effect of resetting ps to the initial conversion state, without writing to pc32, even if it is nonnull.

If ps is a null pointer, mbrtoc32 uses an internal mbstate_t object with static storage duration, distinct from all other mbstate_t objects (including those used by mbrtoc8(3), mbrtoc16(3), c8rtomb(3), c16rtomb(3), and c32rtomb(3)), which is initialized at program startup to the initial conversion state.

The mbrtoc32 function returns:
[null] if mbrtoc32 decoded a null multibyte character.
i
[scalar value] where 0in, if mbrtoc32 consumed i bytes of input to decode the next multibyte character, yielding a Unicode scalar value.
[incomplete] if mbrtoc32 found only an incomplete multibyte sequence after all n bytes of input and any previous input, and saved its state to restart in the next call with ps.
[error] if any encoding error was detected; errno(2) is set to reflect the error.

char *s = ...;
size_t n = ...;
mbstate_t mbs = {0};    /* initial conversion state */

while (n) {
        char32_t c32;
        size_t len;

        len = mbrtoc32(&c32, s, n, &mbs);
        switch (len) {
        case 0:                 /* NUL terminator */
                assert(c32 == 0);
                goto out;
        default:                /* scalar value */
                printf("U+%04"PRIx32"\n", (uint32_t)c32);
                break;
        case (size_t)-2:        /* incomplete */
                printf("incomplete\n");
                goto readmore;
        case (size_t)-1:        /* error */
                printf("error: %d\n", errno);
                goto out;
        }
        s += len;
        n -= len;
}

[]
The multibyte sequence cannot be decoded in the current locale as a Unicode scalar value.
[]
An error occurred in loading the locale's character conversions.

c16rtomb(3), c32rtomb(3), c8rtomb(3), mbrtoc16(3), mbrtoc8(3), uchar(3)

The Unicode Standard, https://www.unicode.org/versions/Unicode15.0.0/UnicodeStandard-15.0.pdf, The Unicode Consortium, September 2022, Version 15.0 — Core Specification.

The mbrtoc32 function conforms to ISO/IEC 9899:2011 (“ISO C11”).

The mbrtoc32 function first appeared in NetBSD 11.0.
August 14, 2024 NetBSD 10.1