by Michael S. Kaplan, published on 2008/12/08 03:01 -05:00, original URI: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/michkap/archive/2008/12/08/9183280.aspx
Jason's question was:
The Unicode "Lt" character category -- this is the "title case" character category. It looks like the .Net BCL exposes this but the Win32 API doesn't. Am I correct in this? Thanks.
Yes, Jason is spot on here. Like much of the Unicode General Category data that .NET's CharUnicodeInfo provides directly, the native world of Win32 and it's GetStringTypeW function doesn't provide the information.
If you really need this information then you have to carry it yourself in your code.
Now generally I think this is unfortunate, and is one of the reasons that this upcoming version of Windows (aka Windows 7) will officially (if you count server and client separately) be the fifth version in which I suggested the addition of a "C4" type to GetStringTypeW based on latest Unicode data rather than making people figure stuff out indirectly by looking at our weird POSIX-ey mapping.
I think it will also be the fifth version where it didn't make the cut as a feature, something that I generally don't get too frustrated about.
I mean, the same issues that make it "so easy to do" are the ones that make the limitation so easy to work around. There is no unique speak of anything here, as this is something anyone can do if they need it.
Why stress out if people concentrate on the stuff not so easy to build without it being in the platform? They have the mission, if you know what I mean.
In the specific scenario of TitleCase, I find myself even less motivated because every time someone tells me why they want to use it I realize that the earth might turn slightly faster and people might be slightly happier if the concept simply didn't exist.
Actual valid usages have been reported to me, but not by reliable witnesses. :-)
This blog brought to you by ʤ (U+02a4, aka LATIN SMALL LETTER DEZH DIGRAPH)