The Data Type and Exception Class Library
provides double-byte character set (DBCS) support and national
language support (NLS). You can use one source file for your
application code and provide DBCS and NLS support by using
separate resource files for the languages you support. The
benefits of this organization include the following:
- The application is easy to maintain,
because a single version of the application is used. This
reduces the cost of maintaining your code.
- The application is easy to upgrade because
only the source code is upgraded and then linked to the
separate language files for different languages. This
reduces the time and cost of upgrading your code because
different language versions can be generated at the same
time.
Because message strings are defined in either
resource files or message catalogs, they can be translated easily
to your local language without changes to the source code.
You should note the following when creating a
DBCS-enabled application:
- String manipulation is DBCS-enabled. The
string classes support mixed strings that contain both
SBCS and DBCS characters. Use the string testing
functions to determine if a character is single byte or
double byte.
- The IDBCSBuffer class ensures that the search functions do not
match the second or any subsequent bytes of a DBCS
character and that the bytes of a DBCS character will not
be split.

Overview of National
Language Support
Double-Byte
Character Set Support

Turning on
Internationalization Semantics
Setting the
Locale