Command: uni2asci

  USBDOS is a collection of different USB drivers and tools:
  UNI2ASCI attempts to convert a UniCode String (16-bit characters)
  into an ASCII String (7-bit characters).

Syntax:

  UNI2ASCI [Options]

Options:

  This program attempts to convert a UniCode String (16-bit characters)
  into an ASCII String (7-bit characters). Because UniCode and ASCII are
  so different from each other, the translation is not always accurate
  or complete. In spite of the shortcomings, this program can help
  you "see" what a UniCode String might be trying to tell you.
  The UniCode string to be converted must be terminated with a NULL
  character (0000h), and must be in memory. You must provide UNI2ASCI
  with the hexadecimal memory address (#Segment:#Offset) where
  the UniCode string is stored (for example: "UNI2ASCI 1234:5678").
  The ASCII output is normally sent to the screen, but can be redirected
  using standard DOS redirection and piping methods. If running from
  inside another program (if not running from the command-line), the
  hexadecimal memory address can be followed with a hexadecimal call-back
  address to which the output will be written.

Comments:

  UNI2ASCI is a program that converts Unicode strings into ASCII strings,
  so that they can be viewed and printed in regular DOS programs. When
  the screen of the computer is in text mode (which is the case for most
  DOS programs), each character that is viewed on the screen must be
  selected from a set of 256 possibilities (8-bit characters). The entire
  set of 256 possibilities is called a Code Page. The default Code Page
  that DOS uses is the one for United States English, and is called Code
  Page 437. There are also several other Code Pages available for DOS,
  and there are various DOS utilities related to changing and controlling
  the Code Pages (NLSFUNC, COUNTRY, CHCP, etc.).
  The ASCII character set is actually limited to 128 characters (7 bits).
  For each Code Page, the first 128 (of 256 possible) characters
  correspond directly to the ASCII characters. These include various
  control characters (escape, carriage return, form feed, etc.), upper-
  and lower-case letters (a-z), numbers (0-9), and miscellaneous
  punctuation (periods, commas, parentheses, etc.). The second 128
  characters of each Code Page are different for each Code Page, but
  generally include box-drawing characters, accented letters and numbers
  (characters with acute, grave, diereses, etc.), and miscellaneous other
  characters. For instance, Code Page 869 is specifically designed for
  the Greek language, and contains the entire upper- and lower-case Greek
  alphabet (Code Page 437 contains a few Greek characters, but not the
  entire Greek alphabet).
  The Unicode character set allows 20 bits for each character, for a total
  of 1,048,576 possibilities. This includes support for all kinds of
  languages that there are no DOS Code Pages for, such as Arabic, Chinese,
  and Cherokee. 20 bits is an unusual number in the programming world, so
  the Unicode organization has come up with three different ways of
  "encoding" Unicode characters: UTF-32, UTF-16, and UTF-8. UTF-32
  encodes a 20-bit Unicode character into a 32-bit space by simply
  ignoring the upper 12 bits (making them 0). UTF-16 encodes 20-bit
  characters into 16 bit words by making certain Unicode characters
  require 2 16-bit words instead of just one (that is, the length of a
  single Unicode character is variable). UTF-8 works in a similar
  fashion, encoding a single 20-bit Unicode character as a variable-
  length string of 8-bit bytes.
  In addition to the UTF-8, UTF-16, and UTF-32 encodings, Unicode
  characters can be encoded either Little-Endian or Big-Endian. Endian-
  ness comes about because of the way different processors store numbers.
  Intel-compatible CPU's always store things Little-Endian, while certain
  other CPU's (such as Motorola) store them Big-Endian. With UTF-8,
  Endian-ness does not matter. With UTF-16 and UTF-32, there are "sub-
  categories": UTF-16 LE, UTF-16 BE, UTF-32 LE, and UTF-32 BE.
  In order to correctly decode a Unicode string, the decoding program (in
  this case, UNI2ASCI) needs to know how the string is encoded (UTF-8,
  UTF-16 LE, UTF-16 BE, UTF-32 LE, or UTF-32 BE), or it will not be able
  to decode it properly. It is usually not possible for a decoding
  program to determine the encoding scheme automatically. However, if a
  decoding program knows the number of bits per character in the encoding
  scheme (UTF-8, UTF-16, or UTF-32), the first character in the string can
  (but does not need to) contain a special character that will tell the
  decoding program whether it is Big-Endian or Little-Endian.
  UNI2ASCI takes a Unicode string that is stored in memory somewhere,
  decodes it, and displays it on the screen as well as it can. That is,
  it will take each Unicode character, and if it is similar to a character
  that can be displayed on the screen using the current DOS Code Page,
  UNI2ASCI will display it on the screen as that character. If there is
  no Code Page character that is similar to the Unicode character,
  UNI2ASCI will display the character as "{U+####}", where the #### is the
  hexadecimal number of the Unicode character ("U+####" is a standard way
  of expressing Unicode characters in general). If the Unicode character
  is a Control Character, the hexadecimal number will be displayed along
  with the common acronym used to describe the control (for example,
  "{1B=ESC}" for the Escape character). The Unicode character set is
  divided into "regions", where certain characters (numbers) are Reserved,
  Private, Illegal, etc. When UNI2ASCI comes across one of these
  "special" characters, it will display the hexadecimal number of the
  character along with an appropriate description (e.g.,
  "{F603=Private}"). You should review the Unicode specification if you
  want further details on all of this.
  There are direct relationships between some of the Unicode characters
  and the Code Page characters. However, there are also many (in some
  cases, very many) Unicode characters that appear very similar to one of
  the Code Page characters, even though they are technically not the same.
  In such cases, UNI2ASCI will still display the character using the Code
  Page character that it is similar to, rather than simply displaying a
  "{U+####}". Of course, similarity is in the eye of the beholder, and
  characters that some people believe are "similar" other people may not.
  I have gone through all of the Unicode version 5.0 characters and found
  the Code Page characters from Code Page 437 (United States English) that
  I personally believe they are similar to. It took many, many days to go
  through all of them, so things that I thought looked similar on one day
  versus another will not necessarily be consistent (depending on how I
  felt at the time, the weather, the lighting in the room, and who knows
  what else).
  In spite of the inconsistencies, I think UNI2ASCI is a pretty good start
  to a "universal" Unicode-to-Code-Page conversion program for DOS.
  However, UNI2ASCI currently only supports UTF-16 LE (which is how all
  USB-related strings are encoded), and will only decode to Code Page 437
  (the Code Page that I use). Unless I find myself with a LOT of spare
  time on my hands (hah!), I will probably not update UNI2ASCI in any
  significant way, such as supporting other UTF encodings or Code Pages.
  I would strongly encourage someone who is interested to take UNI2ASCI
  and "run with it", updating it to include all sorts of new items, and
  enabling it to be used in all sorts of ways other than USB.
  To use UNI2ASCI, you must simply provide the memory address (hexadecimal
  Segment:Offset format) where the Unicode string (UTF-16 LE) is located.
  The string must end in Unicode character 0. For example:
    UNI2ASCI 1234:5678
  The USBSUPT1 program (page 178 above) calls UNI2ASCI to display all
  Unicode strings that are downloaded from the USB Devices.

  For more information see:
    https://gitlab.com/FreeDOS/drivers/usbdos/-/tree/master/DOC/DOSUSB
  OR:
    C:\FREEDOS\DOC\usbintro.doc (too big for edit!)
  OR:
    https://bretjohnson.us/

Examples:

  - see examples above -

Command: uni2asci

Syntax:

Options:

Comments:

Examples:

See also: