Differences between SAA C and POSIX C locales

In fact, there are three built-in locales, S370 C, SAA C, and POSIX C. The default locale at your site depends on the system that is running the application. Issuing setlocale(LC_ALL,"") sets the default, based on the current environment. Issuing setlocale(LC_ALL,"SAA") sets the SAA C locale, even when you are running with the POSIX(ON) runtime option. Likewise, setlocale(LC_ALL,"POSIX") sets the POSIX locale.

If you are running in a C locale, one way you can determine if the SAA C or the POSIX locale is in effect is to check if the cent sign (¢ at X'4A') is defined as a punctuation character. Under the default POSIX support, the cent sign is not part of the POSIX portable character set. Figure 1 (sample CCNGDL1) shows how to perform this test.

/* this example shows how to determine whether the SAA C or POSIX */
/* locale is in effect */

#include <stdio.h>
#include <ctype.h>
int main(void)
{
    if (ispunct(0x4A)) {
        printf(" cent sign is punct\n");
        printf(" current locale is SAA- or S370-like\n");
    }
    else {
        printf(" cent sign is not punct\n");
        printf(" default locale is POSIX-like\n");
    }
return(0);
}