+@node Locale Names, Locale Information, Standard Locales, Locales
+@section Locale Names
+
+The following command prints a list of locales supported by the
+system:
+
+@pindex locale
+@smallexample
+ locale -a
+@end smallexample
+
+@strong{Portability Note:} With the notable exception of the standard
+locale names @samp{C} and @samp{POSIX}, locale names are
+system-specific.
+
+Most locale names follow XPG syntax and consist of up to four parts:
+
+@smallexample
+@var{language}[_@var{territory}[.@var{codeset}]][@@@var{modifier}]
+@end smallexample
+
+Beside the first part, all of them are allowed to be missing. If the
+full specified locale is not found, less specific ones are looked for.
+The various parts will be stripped off, in the following order:
+
+@enumerate
+@item
+codeset
+@item
+normalized codeset
+@item
+territory
+@item
+modifier
+@end enumerate
+
+For example, the locale name @samp{de_AT.iso885915@@euro} denotes a
+German-language locale for use in Austria, using the ISO-8859-15
+(Latin-9) character set, and with the Euro as the currency symbol.
+
+In addition to locale names which follow XPG syntax, systems may
+provide aliases such as @samp{german}. Both categories of names must
+not contain the slash character @samp{/}.
+
+If the locale name starts with a slash @samp{/}, it is treated as a
+path relative to the configured locale directories; see @code{LOCPATH}
+below. The specified path must not contain a component @samp{..}, or
+the name is invalid, and @code{setlocale} will fail.
+
+@strong{Portability Note:} POSIX suggests that if a locale name starts
+with a slash @samp{/}, it is resolved as an absolute path. However,
+@theglibc{} treats it as a relative path under the directories listed
+in @code{LOCPATH} (or the default locale directory if @code{LOCPATH}
+is unset).
+
+Locale names which are longer than an implementation-defined limit are
+invalid and cause @code{setlocale} to fail.
+
+As a special case, locale names used with @code{LC_ALL} can combine
+several locales, reflecting different locale settings for different
+categories. For example, you might want to use a U.S. locale with ISO
+A4 paper format, so you set @code{LANG} to @samp{en_US.UTF-8}, and
+@code{LC_PAPER} to @samp{de_DE.UTF-8}. In this case, the
+@code{LC_ALL}-style combined locale name is
+
+@smallexample
+LC_CTYPE=en_US.UTF-8;LC_TIME=en_US.UTF-8;LC_PAPER=de_DE.UTF-8;@dots{}
+@end smallexample
+
+followed by other category settings not shown here.
+
+@vindex LOCPATH
+The path used for finding locale data can be set using the
+@code{LOCPATH} environment variable. This variable lists the
+directories in which to search for locale definitions, separated by a
+colon @samp{:}.
+
+The default path for finding locale data is system specific. A typical
+value for the @code{LOCPATH} default is:
+
+@smallexample
+/usr/share/locale
+@end smallexample
+
+The value of @code{LOCPATH} is ignored by privileged programs for
+security reasons, and only the default directory is used.
+
+@node Locale Information, Formatting Numbers, Locale Names, Locales