explicit comparison function, because it uses C<cmp> by default.
B<Note:> C<eq> and C<ne> are unaffected by locale: they always
-perform a byte-by-byte comparison of their scalar operands. What's
+perform a char-by-char comparison of their scalar operands. What's
more, if C<cmp> finds that its operands are equal according to the
collation sequence specified by the current locale, it goes on to
-perform a byte-by-byte comparison, and only returns I<0> (equal) if the
-operands are bit-for-bit identical. If you really want to know whether
+perform a char-by-char comparison, and only returns I<0> (equal) if the
+operands are char-for-char identical. If you really want to know whether
two strings--which C<eq> and C<cmp> may consider different--are equal
as far as collation in the locale is concerned, see the discussion in
L<Category LC_COLLATE: Collation>.
the full list of relevant environment variables and L<USING LOCALES>
for their effects in Perl. Effects in other programs are
easily deducible. For example, the variable LC_COLLATE may well affect
-your B<sort> program (or whatever the program that arranges `records'
+your B<sort> program (or whatever the program that arranges "records"
alphabetically in your system is called).
You can test out changing these variables temporarily, and if the
As noted in L<USING LOCALES>, C<cmp> compares according to the current
collation locale when C<use locale> is in effect, but falls back to a
-byte-by-byte comparison for strings that the locale says are equal. You
+char-by-char comparison for strings that the locale says are equal. You
can use POSIX::strcoll() if you don't want this fall-back:
use POSIX qw(strcoll);
if $xfrm_string eq strxfrm("mixed-case string");
strxfrm() takes a string and maps it into a transformed string for use
-in byte-by-byte comparisons against other transformed strings during
+in char-by-char comparisons against other transformed strings during
collation. "Under the hood", locale-affected Perl comparison operators
-call strxfrm() for both operands, then do a byte-by-byte
+call strxfrm() for both operands, then do a char-by-char
comparison of the transformed strings. By calling strxfrm() explicitly
and using a non locale-affected comparison, the example attempts to save
a couple of transformations. But in fact, it doesn't save anything: Perl
Subpatterns, either delivered as a list-context result or as $1 etc.
are tainted if C<use locale> is in effect, and the subpattern regular
expression contains C<\w> (to match an alphanumeric character), C<\W>
-(non-alphanumeric character), C<\s> (white-space character), or C<\S>
-(non white-space character). The matched-pattern variable, $&, $`
+(non-alphanumeric character), C<\s> (whitespace character), or C<\S>
+(non whitespace character). The matched-pattern variable, $&, $`
(pre-match), $' (post-match), and $+ (last match) are also tainted if
C<use locale> is in effect and the regular expression contains C<\w>,
C<\W>, C<\s>, or C<\S>.
=head2 Freely available locale definitions
There is a large collection of locale definitions at
-C<ftp://dkuug.dk/i18n/WG15-collection>. You should be aware that it is
+ftp://dkuug.dk/i18n/WG15-collection . You should be aware that it is
unsupported, and is not claimed to be fit for any purpose. If your
system allows installation of arbitrary locales, you may find the
definitions useful as they are, or as a basis for the development of
into bankers, bikers, gamers, and so on. But, for now, it's the only
standard we've got. This may be construed as a bug.
+=head1 Unicode and UTF-8
+
+The support of Unicode is new starting from Perl version 5.6, and
+more fully implemented in the version 5.8. See L<perluniintro> and
+L<perlunicode> for more details.
+
+Usually locale settings and Unicode do not affect each other, but
+there are exceptions, see L<perlunicode/Locales> for examples.
+
=head1 BUGS
=head2 Broken systems
=head1 SEE ALSO
-L<I18N::Langinfo>, L<POSIX/isalnum>, L<POSIX/isalpha>,
+L<I18N::Langinfo>, L<perluniintro>, L<perlunicode>, L<open>,
+L<POSIX/isalnum>, L<POSIX/isalpha>,
L<POSIX/isdigit>, L<POSIX/isgraph>, L<POSIX/islower>,
L<POSIX/isprint>, L<POSIX/ispunct>, L<POSIX/isspace>,
L<POSIX/isupper>, L<POSIX/isxdigit>, L<POSIX/localeconv>,