<s>
A	O
wide	B-Language
character	I-Language
is	O
a	O
computer	O
character	O
datatype	O
that	O
generally	O
has	O
a	O
size	O
greater	O
than	O
the	O
traditional	O
8-bit	O
character	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
The	O
increased	O
datatype	O
size	O
allows	O
for	O
the	O
use	O
of	O
larger	O
coded	B-General_Concept
character	I-General_Concept
sets	I-General_Concept
.	O
</s>
<s>
During	O
the	O
1960s	O
,	O
mainframe	O
and	O
mini-computer	O
manufacturers	O
began	O
to	O
standardize	O
around	O
the	O
8-bit	O
byte	B-Application
as	O
their	O
smallest	O
datatype	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
The	O
7-bit	B-Protocol
ASCII	I-Protocol
character	B-General_Concept
set	I-General_Concept
became	O
the	O
industry	O
standard	O
method	O
for	O
encoding	O
alphanumeric	O
characters	O
for	O
teletype	O
machines	O
and	O
computer	B-General_Concept
terminals	I-General_Concept
.	O
</s>
<s>
As	O
a	O
result	O
,	O
the	O
8-bit	O
byte	B-Application
became	O
the	O
de	O
facto	O
datatype	O
for	O
computer	O
systems	O
storing	O
ASCII	B-Protocol
characters	I-Protocol
in	O
memory	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
Later	O
,	O
computer	O
manufacturers	O
began	O
to	O
make	O
use	O
of	O
the	O
spare	O
bit	O
to	O
extend	O
the	O
ASCII	B-Protocol
character	I-Protocol
set	I-Protocol
beyond	O
its	O
limited	O
set	O
of	O
English	O
alphabet	O
characters	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
8-bit	B-Protocol
extensions	I-Protocol
such	O
as	O
IBM	O
code	O
page	O
37	O
,	O
PETSCII	B-Protocol
and	O
ISO	O
8859	O
became	O
commonplace	O
,	O
offering	O
terminal	O
support	O
for	O
Greek	O
,	O
Cyrillic	O
,	O
and	O
many	O
others	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
Special	O
conversion	O
routines	O
had	O
to	O
be	O
used	O
to	O
convert	O
from	O
one	O
character	B-General_Concept
set	I-General_Concept
to	O
another	O
,	O
often	O
resulting	O
in	O
destructive	O
translation	O
when	O
no	O
equivalent	O
character	O
existed	O
in	O
the	O
target	O
set	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
In	O
1989	O
,	O
the	O
International	O
Organization	O
for	O
Standardization	O
began	O
work	O
on	O
the	O
Universal	O
Character	B-General_Concept
Set	I-General_Concept
(	O
UCS	O
)	O
,	O
a	O
multilingual	O
character	B-General_Concept
set	I-General_Concept
that	O
could	O
be	O
encoded	O
using	O
either	O
a	O
16-bit	O
(	O
2-byte	O
)	O
or	O
32-bit	O
(	O
4-byte	O
)	O
value	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
Thus	O
the	O
term	O
wide	B-Language
character	I-Language
was	O
used	O
to	O
differentiate	O
them	O
from	O
traditional	O
8-bit	O
character	O
datatypes	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
A	O
wide	B-Language
character	I-Language
refers	O
to	O
the	O
size	O
of	O
the	O
datatype	O
in	O
memory	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
It	O
does	O
not	O
state	O
how	O
each	O
value	O
in	O
a	O
character	B-General_Concept
set	I-General_Concept
is	O
defined	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
Those	O
values	O
are	O
instead	O
defined	O
using	O
character	B-General_Concept
sets	I-General_Concept
,	O
with	O
UCS	O
and	O
Unicode	O
simply	O
being	O
two	O
common	O
character	B-General_Concept
sets	I-General_Concept
that	O
encode	O
more	O
characters	O
than	O
an	O
8-bit	O
wide	O
numeric	O
value	O
(	O
255	O
total	O
)	O
would	O
allow	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
This	O
has	O
led	O
to	O
character	B-General_Concept
encoding	I-General_Concept
systems	I-General_Concept
such	O
as	O
UTF-8	O
that	O
can	O
use	O
multiple	O
bytes	B-Application
to	O
encode	O
a	O
value	O
that	O
is	O
too	O
large	O
for	O
a	O
single	O
8-bit	O
symbol	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
The	O
C	B-Language
standard	O
distinguishes	O
between	O
multibyte	B-Language
encodings	O
of	O
characters	O
,	O
which	O
use	O
a	O
fixed	O
or	O
variable	O
number	O
of	O
bytes	B-Application
to	O
represent	O
each	O
character	O
(	O
primarily	O
used	O
in	O
source	O
code	O
and	O
external	O
files	O
)	O
,	O
from	O
wide	B-Language
characters	I-Language
,	O
which	O
are	O
run-time	B-Library
representations	O
of	O
characters	O
in	O
single	O
objects	O
(	O
typically	O
,	O
greater	O
than	O
8	O
bits	O
)	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
Early	O
adoption	O
of	O
UCS-2	O
(	O
"	O
Unicode	O
1.0	O
"	O
)	O
led	O
to	O
common	O
use	O
of	O
UTF-16	O
in	O
a	O
number	O
of	O
platforms	O
,	O
most	O
notably	O
Microsoft	B-Application
Windows	I-Application
,	O
.NET	B-Application
and	O
Java	B-Device
.	O
</s>
<s>
In	O
these	O
systems	O
,	O
it	O
is	O
common	O
to	O
have	O
a	O
"	O
wide	B-Language
character	I-Language
"	O
(	O
in	O
C/C	O
++	O
;	O
in	O
Java	B-Device
)	O
type	O
of	O
16-bits	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
Unix-like	B-Operating_System
generally	O
use	O
a	O
32-bit	O
to	O
fit	O
the	O
21-bit	O
Unicode	O
code	O
point	O
,	O
as	O
C90	O
prescribed	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
The	O
size	O
of	O
a	O
wide	B-Language
character	I-Language
type	O
does	O
not	O
dictate	O
what	O
kind	O
of	O
text	B-General_Concept
encodings	I-General_Concept
a	O
system	O
can	O
process	O
,	O
as	O
conversions	O
are	O
available	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
A	O
system	O
influenced	O
by	O
Unicode	O
1.0	O
,	O
such	O
as	O
Windows	O
,	O
tends	O
to	O
mainly	O
use	O
"	O
wide	O
strings	O
"	O
made	O
out	O
of	O
wide	B-Language
character	I-Language
units	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
Other	O
systems	O
such	O
as	O
the	O
Unix-likes	B-Operating_System
,	O
however	O
,	O
tend	O
to	O
retain	O
the	O
8-bit	O
"	O
narrow	O
string	O
"	O
convention	O
,	O
using	O
a	O
multibyte	B-Language
encoding	O
(	O
almost	O
universally	O
UTF-8	O
)	O
to	O
handle	O
"	B-Language
wide	I-Language
"	I-Language
characters	I-Language
.	O
</s>
<s>
The	O
C	B-Language
and	O
C++	B-Language
standard	I-Language
libraries	I-Language
include	O
a	B-Language
number	I-Language
of	I-Language
facilities	I-Language
for	O
dealing	O
with	O
wide	B-Language
characters	I-Language
and	O
strings	O
composed	O
of	O
them	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
Both	O
C	B-Language
and	O
C++	B-Language
introduced	O
fixed-size	O
character	O
types	O
char16_t	O
and	O
char32_t	O
in	O
the	O
2011	O
revisions	O
of	O
their	O
respective	O
standards	O
to	O
provide	O
unambiguous	O
representation	O
of	O
16-bit	O
and	O
32-bit	O
Unicode	O
transformation	O
formats	O
,	O
leaving	O
wchar_t	O
implementation-defined	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
Consequently	O
,	O
programs	O
that	O
need	O
to	O
be	O
portable	O
across	O
any	O
C	B-Language
or	O
C++	B-Language
compiler	O
should	O
not	O
use	O
wchar_t	O
for	O
storing	O
Unicode	O
text	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
The	O
wchar_t	O
type	O
is	O
intended	O
for	O
storing	O
compiler-defined	O
wide	B-Language
characters	I-Language
,	O
which	O
may	O
be	O
Unicode	O
characters	O
in	O
some	O
compilers.	O
"	O
</s>
<s>
According	O
to	O
Python	B-Language
2.7	O
'	O
s	O
documentation	O
,	O
the	O
language	O
sometimes	O
uses	O
wchar_t	O
as	O
the	O
basis	O
for	O
its	O
character	O
type	O
Py_UNICODE	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
It	O
depends	O
on	O
whether	O
wchar_t	O
is	O
"	O
compatible	O
with	O
the	O
chosen	O
Python	B-Language
Unicode	O
build	O
variant	O
"	O
on	O
that	O
system	O
.	O
</s>
<s>
This	O
distinction	O
has	O
been	O
deprecated	O
since	O
Python	B-Language
3.3	O
,	O
which	O
introduced	O
a	O
flexibly-sized	O
UCS1/2/4	O
storage	O
for	O
strings	O
and	O
formally	O
aliased	O
to	O
wchar_t	O
.	O
</s>
