How do I print UTF-8 from c++ console application

Question

For a C++ console application compiled with Visual Studio 2008 on English Windows (XP,Vista or 7). Is it possible to print out to the console and correctly display UTF-8 encoded Japanese using cout or wcout?

Answer 1

On app start console set to default OEM437 CP. I was trying to output Unicode text to stdout, where console was switch to UTF8 translation _setmode(_fileno(stdout), _O_U8TEXT); and still had no luck on the screen even with Lucida TT font. If console was redirected to file, correct UTF8 file were created.

Finally I was lucky. I have added single line "info.FontFamily = FF_DONTCARE;" and it is working now. Hope this help for you.

void SetLucidaFont()
{
    HANDLE StdOut = GetStdHandle(STD_OUTPUT_HANDLE);
    CONSOLE_FONT_INFOEX info;
    memset(&info, 0, sizeof(CONSOLE_FONT_INFOEX));
    info.cbSize = sizeof(CONSOLE_FONT_INFOEX);              // prevents err=87 below
    if (GetCurrentConsoleFontEx(StdOut, FALSE, &info))
    {
        info.FontFamily   = FF_DONTCARE;
        info.dwFontSize.X = 0;  // leave X as zero
        info.dwFontSize.Y = 14;
        info.FontWeight   = 400;
        _tcscpy_s(info.FaceName, L"Lucida Console");
        if (SetCurrentConsoleFontEx(StdOut, FALSE, &info))
        {
        }
    }
}