MARC::Charset(3pm)

NAME

MARC::Charset - convert MARC-8 encoded strings to UTF-8

SYNOPSIS

# import the marc8_to_utf8 function
use MARC::Charset 'marc8_to_utf8';

# prepare STDOUT for utf8
binmode(STDOUT, 'utf8');

# print out some marc8 as utf8
print marc8_to_utf8($marc8_string);

DESCRIPTION

MARC::Charset allows you to turn MARC-8 encoded strings into UTF-8
strings. MARC-8 is a single byte character encoding that predates
unicode, and allows you to put non-Roman scripts in MARC bibliographic records.

http://www.loc.gov/marc/specifications/spechome.html

EXPORTS

ignore_errors()

Tells MARC::Charset whether or not to ignore all encoding errors, and
returns the current setting. This is helepfuli if you have records
that contain both MARC8 and UNICODE characters.

my $ignore = MARC::Charset->ignore_errors();

MARC::Charset->ignore_errors(1); # ignore errors
MARC::Charset->ignore_errors(0); # DO NOT ignore errors

assume_unicode()

Tells MARC::Charset whether or not to assume UNICODE when an error is
encountered in ignore_errors mode and returns the current setting.
This is helepfuli if you have records that contain both MARC8 and
UNICODE characters.

my $setting = MARC::Charset->assume_unicode();

MARC::Charset->assume_unicode(1); # assume characters are unicode (utf-8) MARC::Charset->assume_unicode(0); # DO NOT assume characters are unicode

assume_encoding()

Tells MARC::Charset whether or not to assume a specific encoding when
an error is encountered in ignore_errors mode and returns the current
setting. This is helpful if you have records that contain both MARC8
and other characters.

my $setting = MARC::Charset->assume_encoding();

MARC::Charset->assume_encoding('cp850'); # assume characters are cp850 MARC::Charset->assume_encoding(''); # DO NOT assume any encoding

marc8_to_utf8()

Converts a MARC-8 encoded string to UTF-8.

my $utf8 = marc8_to_utf8($marc8);

If you'd like to ignore errors pass in a true value as the 2nd
parameter or call MARC::Charset->ignore_errors() with a true value:

my $utf8 = marc8_to_utf8($marc8, 'ignore-errors');

or

MARC::Charset->ignore_errors(1);
my $utf8 = marc8_to_utf8($marc8);

utf8_to_marc8()

Will attempt to translate utf8 into marc8.

my $marc8 = utf8_to_marc8($utf8);

If you'd like to ignore errors, or characters that can't be converted
to marc8 then pass in a true value as the second parameter:

my $marc8 = utf8_to_marc8($utf8, 'ignore-errors');

or

MARC::Charset->ignore_errors(1);
my $utf8 = marc8_to_utf8($marc8);

DEFAULT CHARACTER SETS

If you need to alter the default character sets you can set the
$MARC::Charset::DEFAULT_G0 and $MARC::Charset::DEFAULT_G1 variables to the appropriate character set code:

use MARC::Charset::Constants qw(:all);
$MARC::Charset::DEFAULT_G0 = BASIC_ARABIC;
$MARC::Charset::DEFAULT_G1 = EXTENDED_ARABIC;

SEE ALSO

o MARC::Charset::Constant

o MARC::Charset::Table

o MARC::Charset::Code

o MARC::Charset::Compiler

o MARC::Record

o MARC::XML

AUTHOR

Ed Summers (ehs@pobox.com)

perl v5.10.1 2010-05-12 MARC::Charset(3pm)