Wide character support?

[Jeff Johnston]

Christopher Faylor wrote:
> On Sat, May 28, 2005 at 11:23:51AM -0400, Beman Dawes wrote:
> 
>>"Artem B. Bityuckiy" <dedekind@yandex.ru> wrote in message news:42982EB2.40507@yandex.ru...
>>
>>>Beman Dawes wrote:
>>>
>>>>I'd like to be able to use the C++ standard library std::wstring with
>>>>Cygwin.
>>>>
>>>>What would be involved in adding wide character support to newlib?  In
>>>>a cgywin mailing list posting Christopher Faylor indicated that this is
>>>>what is needed.
>>>
>>>2 years ago I worked on this issue.  You need NLS support in Newlib to
>>>make use of C++ wstring stuff.
>>>
>>>What I did: 1.  Ported the Iconv library to Newlib.  Iconv is the heart
>>>of NLS.  It is currently in Newlib CVS.  Perhaps, it isn't ideal, but
>>>it worked.  2.  Implemented mblen() and friends.  3.  Implemented
>>>wc<->mb convertion functions (mbtowc(), mbstowcs(), etc).  4.  Added
>>>full wide-char support to vscanf()/vprintf() serites (%S, etc).
>>>
>>>2,3,4 is not in the Newlib repositiry.  But it worked quite stably
>>>AFAIR.
>>>
>>>I'm not involved in the area anymore and I have no energy to complete
>>>the work, sorry.  I may share what I've done with you if you wish to
>>>implement the NLS stuff for Newlib.
>>
>>I don't know yet.  I'm trying to get an idea of how much effort would
>>be involved, and if the Newlib folks are interested.
> 
> 
> I'm sure that Jeff wouldn't refuse a patch which improved newlib
> functionality.  To be safe, however, you could make the option
> configurable with a "configure --wide-char" or something.  There's
> probably an existing configure option that could be pressed into
> service, in fact.
> 
> cgf

No, I certainly wouldn't refuse such a patch as long as it didn't impact users 
who don't want widechar support.  Chris is correct that there are multi-byte and 
  configure options already in place that can be used and if necessary, a new 
one could easily be added.

-- Jeff J.