Re: bug#7948: 16-bit wchar_t on Windows and Cygwin

[Andy Koppe]

On 2 February 2011 18:57, Bruno Haible wrote:
> Hi Paul,
>
>> >   - Define a type 'wwchar_t' on all platforms, equivalent to uint32_t
>> >     on Windows platforms and to 'wchar_t' otherwise.
>>
>> As a minor point, would it be OK to call this type
>> 'xchar_t' instead?  'x' is the successor to 'w', after all,
>> and it can be thought of as an abbreviation for 'eXtended'.
>
> 'wwchar_t' means "wide wide character".
>
> In fact it's not really an "extended" character or "complex character".
> It's just what POSIX calls a 'wchar_t'.

It's extended in the sense that the original Unicode was only 16 bits
wide (which of course is why wchar_t on Windows is 16 bits). Also, I
think 'xchar_t' is less prone to typos, in particular forgetting one
of the dubyas.

Andy