INFO: UTF8 Support

Last reviewed: January 15, 1998
Article ID: Q175392

The information in this article applies to:

Microsoft Win32 Software Development Kit (SDK)

SUMMARY

UTF8 is a code page that uses a string of bytes to represent a 16-bit Unicode string where ASCII text (<=U+007F) remains unchanged as a single byte, U+0080-07FF (including Latin, Greek, Cyrillic, Hebrew, and Arabic) is converted to a 2-byte sequence, and U+0800-FFFF (Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and others) becomes a 3-byte sequence.

The advantage is that most ASCII text remains unchanged and almost all editors can read it.

Windows NT4.0 supports Unicode<->UTF8 translation via MultiByteToWideChar()/WideCharToMultiByte(), using CP_UTF8 for the CodePage parameter, but it only works when none of the flags are set for dwFlags (therefore, you need to specify 0 for dwFlags).

Also, UTF8 is not a valid encoding for command line arguments for Windows NT 4.0 or 5.0, and it is not supported on Windows 95.

Keywords          : WinIntlDevNLS KBIntlDev
Technology        : kbIntlDev
Version           : WINNT:
Platform          : winnt
Issue type        : kbinfo

================================================================================

THE INFORMATION PROVIDED IN THE MICROSOFT KNOWLEDGE BASE IS PROVIDED "AS IS" WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND. MICROSOFT DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES, EITHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. IN NO EVENT SHALL MICROSOFT CORPORATION OR ITS SUPPLIERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DAMAGES WHATSOEVER INCLUDING DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, LOSS OF BUSINESS PROFITS OR SPECIAL DAMAGES, EVEN IF MICROSOFT CORPORATION OR ITS SUPPLIERS HAVE BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. SOME STATES DO NOT ALLOW THE EXCLUSION OR LIMITATION OF LIABILITY FOR CONSEQUENTIAL OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES SO THE FOREGOING LIMITATION MAY NOT APPLY.

Last reviewed: January 15, 1998
© 1998 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Terms of Use.