PICONV(1)

💅 PICONV(1) 💅

okay so bestie, this is the piconv page from the Perl Programmers Reference Guide and we are gonna make it make sense, fr fr 🫶✨

🌸 NAME 🌸

piconv — iconv(1), reinvented in perl 💫

🦋 SYNOPSIS 🦋

  piconv [-f from_encoding] [-t to_encoding]
         [-p|--perlqq|--htmlcref|--xmlcref] [-C N|-c] [-D] [-S scheme]
         [-s string|file...]
  piconv -l
  piconv -r encoding_alias
  piconv -h

💖 DESCRIPTION 💖

piconv is the perl version of iconv, a character encoding converter that's widely available for various Unixen today. This script was primarily a technology demonstrator for Perl 5.8.0, but you can use piconv in the place of iconv for virtually any case. No cap. 🔥

piconv converts the character encoding of either STDIN or files specified in the argument and prints out to STDOUT. Slay. 💅

Here is the list of options. Some options can be in short format (-f) or long (--from) one. Okay bestie, let's go 😤

🍓 the options menu 🍓

• -f, --from from_encoding — tells piconv what encoding you're converting from. Unlike iconv, this option can be omitted. If you do omit it, the current locale is used. 🫶
• -t, --to to_encoding — tells piconv what encoding you're converting to. Unlike iconv, this option can be omitted. If you do omit it, the current locale is used. So when both -f and -t are omitted, piconv just acts like cat. Not me learning that and gasping 😭
• -s, --string string — uses string instead of file for the source of text. Cute, direct, no file drama. ✨
• -l, --list — lists all available encodings, one per line, in case-insensitive order. Note that only the canonical names are listed; many aliases exist. For example, the names are case-insensitive, and many standard and common aliases work, such as "latin1" for "ISO-8859-1", or "ibm850" instead of "cp850", or "winlatin1" for "cp1252". See Encode::Supported for a full discussion. 💅
• -r, --resolve encoding_alias — resolves encoding_alias to the Encode canonical encoding name. Periodt. 👑
• -C, --check N — checks the validity of the stream if N = 1. When N = -1, something interesting happens when it encounters an invalid character. Yes, that's literally what the page says — I'm not hiding the lore, bestie 😭

the original really says “something interesting happens” for -C -1, and honestly that phrase is doing main character energy all by itself 💀

• -c — same as -C 1. Easy. 🎀
• -p, --perlqq — transliterates characters missing in encoding to \x{HHHH} where HHHH is the hexadecimal Unicode code point. Cute little escape-code moment ✨
• --htmlcref — transliterates characters missing in encoding to &#NNN; where NNN is the decimal Unicode code point. HTML girlie behavior. 🌸
• --xmlcref — transliterates characters missing in encoding to &#xHHHH; where HHHH is the hexadecimal Unicode code point. XML girlie behavior. 🦋
• -h, --help — shows usage. Use it, bestie. 🫶
• -D, --debug — invokes debugging mode. Primarily for Encode hackers. Like, that's their turf 👑
• -S, --scheme scheme — selects which scheme is to be used for conversion. Available schemes are as follows:
  • from_to — uses Encode::from_to for conversion. This is the default. ⭐
  • decode_encode — input strings are decode()d then encode()d. A straight two-step implementation. 🧚
  • perlio — the new perlIO layer is used. NI-S' favorite. You should use this option if you are using UTF-16 and others which linefeed is not $/.

Like the -D option, this is also for Encode hackers. 🔥

🌈 SEE ALSO 🌈

• iconv(1)
• locale(3)
• Encode
• Encode::Supported
• Encode::Alias
• PerlIO

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okay that's the whole page, bestie. This edition is from perl v5.42.3, dated 2026-11-03, and yes it's the PICONV(1) manual page — now go convert some encodings and slay 💅💖