I want to convert std::string into a const wchar_t *

c++ stl wchar-t stdstring
user25749 picture user25749 · Oct 29, 2008 · Viewed 147.3k times · Source

Is there any method? My computer is AMD64.

::std::string str;
BOOL loadU(const wchar_t* lpszPathName, int flag = 0);

When I used: 

loadU(&str);

the VS2005 compiler says:

Error 7 error C2664:: cannot convert parameter 1 from 'std::string *__w64 ' to 'const wchar_t *'

How can I do it?

Answer

marijne picture marijne · Oct 29, 2008

First convert it to std::wstring:

std::wstring widestr = std::wstring(str.begin(), str.end());

Then get the C string:

const wchar_t* widecstr = widestr.c_str();

This only works for ASCII strings, but it will not work if the underlying string is UTF-8 encoded. Using a conversion routine like MultiByteToWideChar() ensures that this scenario is handled properly.

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