How do i construct a WideString with a diacratic in a non-unicode Delphi version?

Question

i am trying to construct a (test) WideString of:

á (U+00E1 Small Letter Latin A with acute)

but using it\'s decomp

Answer 1

This works in Delphi 5/7:

var
  test: WideString;
begin

   test := WideChar($0061);
   test := test + WideChar($0301);

   MessageBoxW(0, PWideChar(test), 'Character with diacratic', MB_ICONINFORMATION or MB_OK);
end;

In short:

• In delphi 5 and delphi 7, it does not appear that concatenating WideChars to WideString works using #$xxxx form literals.

• # doesn't seem to work as you'd expect for unicode literals.

• You can't just add two or more widechars in a single expression, like this:

  test := WideChar(a)+WideChar(b);  // won't compile in D5/D7.