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The recode reference manual

3.4 Controlling how files are recoded

The following options have the purpose of giving the user some fine grain control over the recoding operation themselves.

`-c'

`--colons'

With Texte Easy French conventions, use the column : instead of the double-quote " for marking diaeresis. See section 12.7 Easy French conventions.

`-g'

`--graphics'

This option is only meaningful while getting out of the IBM-PC charset. In this charset, characters 176 to 223 are used for constructing rulers and boxes, using simple or double horizontal or vertical lines. This option forces the automatic selection of ASCII characters for approximating these rulers and boxes, at cost of making the transformation irreversible. Option `-g' implies `-f'.

`-t'

`--touch'

The touch option is meaningful only when files are recoded over themselves. Without it, the time-stamps associated with files are preserved, to reflect the fact that changing the code of a file does not really alter its informational contents. When the user wants the recoded files to be time-stamped at the recoding time, this option inhibits the automatic protection of the time-stamps.

`-v'

`--verbose'

Before doing any recoding, the program will first print on the stderr stream the list of all intermediate charsets planned for recoding, starting with the before charset and ending with the after charset. It also prints an indication of the recoding quality, as one of the word `reversible', `one to one', `one to many', `many to one' or `many to many'.

This information will appear once or twice. It is shown a second time only when the optimisation and step merging phase succeeds in replacing many single steps by a new one.

This option also has a second effect. The program will print on stderr one message per recoded file, so as to keep the user informed of the progress of its command.

An easy way to know beforehand the sequence or quality of a recoding is by using the command such as:

recode -v before..after < /dev/null

using the fact that, in recode, an empty input file produces an empty output file.

`-x charset'

`--ignore=charset'

This option tells the program to ignore any recoding path through the specified charset, so disabling any single step using this charset as a start or end point. This may be used when the user wants to force recode into using an alternate recoding path (yet using chained requests offers a finer control, see section 3.2 The request parameter).

charset may be abbreviated to any unambiguous prefix.