catgets(3) Library Functions Manual catgets(3)
NAME
catgets - get message from a message catalog
LIBRARY
Standard C library (libc, -lc)
SYNOPSIS
#include <nl_types.h>
char *catgets(nl_catd catalog, int set_number, int message_number,
const char *message);
DESCRIPTION
catgets() reads the message message_number, in set set_number, from the
message catalog identified by catalog, where catalog is a catalog de-
scriptor returned from an earlier call to catopen(3). The fourth argu-
ment, message, points to a default message string which will be re-
turned by catgets() if the identified message catalog is not currently
available. The message-text is contained in an internal buffer area
and should be copied by the application if it is to be saved or modi-
fied. The return string is always terminated with a null byte ('\0').
RETURN VALUE
On success, catgets() returns a pointer to an internal buffer area con-
taining the null-terminated message string. On failure, catgets() re-
turns the value message.
ATTRIBUTES
For an explanation of the terms used in this section, see attrib-
utes(7).
┌───────────────────────────────────────────┬───────────────┬─────────┐
│ Interface │ Attribute │ Value │
├───────────────────────────────────────────┼───────────────┼─────────┤
│ catgets() │ Thread safety │ MT-Safe │
└───────────────────────────────────────────┴───────────────┴─────────┘
STANDARDS
POSIX.1-2008.
HISTORY
POSIX.1-2001.
The catgets() function is available only in libc.so.4.4.4c and above.
The Jan 1987 X/Open Portability Guide specifies a more subtle error re-
turn: message is returned if the message catalog specified by catalog
is not available, while an empty string is returned when the message
catalog is available but does not contain the specified message. These
two possible error returns seem to be discarded in SUSv2 in favor of
always returning message.
SEE ALSO
catopen(3), setlocale(3)
Linux man-pages 6.7 2023-10-31 catgets(3)
Generated by dwww version 1.16 on Tue Dec 16 15:34:16 CET 2025.