[Python-Dev] PyArg_ParseTuple and unicode

[Jack Jansen]

MAL wrote:
> Jack Jansen wrote:
> > 
> > I had expected the PyArg_ParseTuple() "u" specifier to automatically convert
> > string objects to unicode strings with the default encoding (just as the
> > reverse is true for "s"), but to my surprise it doesn't.
> [...]
> 
> I could imagine extending the "u" parser marker to do the same
> using an temporary Unicode object the contents of which are then
> copied into a user provided buffer (much like what "es#" does).
> Alternatively, we could extend the "e" parser marker with a
> "u" target... this has the added benefit of being able
> to define an encoding to use for dealing with non-Unicode 
> string data.

I like this second alternative, because it also provides a possible solution 
for a more complex problem I have. I'm porting the PythonWin MFC modules to 
Windows CE, and on WinCE the OS API's are completely unicode-based. In C you 
can write code that is portable between 8-bit systems and Unicode systems by 
using a set of macros and types that get expanded to char/strlen/sprintf/etc 
or wchar_t/wslen/etc.

Currently I have every PyArg_ParseTuple #ifdeffed, but using an "e" marker 
would be better.

> If you think this is needed, please upload a feature request to
> SF and assign it to me. I'll look into this after the feature
> freeze then.

As I'm doing this project with a very old Python I might as well do it myself 
(unless I can't figure out how:-), and then I'll put the patch in sourceforge, 
hand it over to you and you can turn my gibberish into real C:-)
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