Double-byte Character Sets

The double-byte character set (DBCS) is called an expanded 8-bit character set because its smallest unit is a byte. It can be thought of as the ANSI character set for some Asian versions of Windows (particularly the Japanese version). Win32 functions for the Japanese version of Windows accept DBCS strings for the ANSI versions of the functions. However, unlike the handling of Unicode, DBCS character handling requires detailed changes in the character-processing algorithms throughout an application's source code.

An application can use the IsDBCSLeadByte function to determine whether a given character is the first byte in a 2-byte character; this helps identify double-byte character sets. In addition, an application can use the MultiByteToWideChar and WideCharToMultiByte functions to map DBCS strings to Unicode and Unicode strings to DBCS strings.

Software for developers

Delphi Components
.Net Components
Software for Android Developers

More information resources

MegaDetailed.Net
Unix Manual Pages
Delphi Examples

Databases for Amazon shops developers

Amazon Categories Database
Browse Nodes Database