Localeconv() should be independent of 'use locale'

localeconv() should return the values for the underlying locale of
the program regardless of whether the calling place is within the
scope of "use locale" or not.  Otherwise, it makes no sense to call it
from outside such scope, and a pure perl module that calls it on behalf
of a caller would likely get it wrong.

In earlier versions of Perl the LC_NUMERIC category was initialized to
C, but was changed by the first setlocale() anywhere in the process.  It
is rare to call localeconv() without first having done a setlocale().
But to solve other bugs, future commits will keep LC_NUMERIC in the C
locale except during such operations where it should be the underlying
locale.  localeconv() is such a place, so this commit is being done
before the later ones so it doesn't break.

1 files changed, 3 insertions, 1 deletions

diff --git a/pod/perllocale.pod b/pod/perllocale.pod
index cb36640c24..3a5c811c75 100644
--- a/pod/perllocale.pod
+++ b/pod/perllocale.pod
@@ -621,7 +621,9 @@ because these things are not that standardized.
 
 The C<POSIX::localeconv()> function allows you to get particulars of the
 locale-dependent numeric formatting information specified by the current
-C<LC_NUMERIC> and C<LC_MONETARY> locales.  (If you just want the name of
+underlying C<LC_NUMERIC> and C<LC_MONETARY> locales (regardless of
+whether called from within the scope of C<S<use locale>> or not).  (If
+you just want the name of
 the current locale for a particular category, use C<POSIX::setlocale()>
 with a single parameter--see L<The setlocale function>.)