The Microsoft Layer for Unicode on Windows 95/98/ME Systems" (MSLU for short) is a programmatic layer that gives you a way to write a single Unicode binary that can run on all 32-bit Windows platforms. This integral part of the Platform SDK can allow you to fully leverage Unicode on Windows 2000 and XP, rather than writing an "ANSI" application that cannot even support every language, let alone multiple languages.

This presentation will aim to explain why Microsoft considers Unicode to be so important strategically and how MSLU fits into that strategy. It will discuss how the component works, ways to override its behavior, and where to go for more information. It will also show some sample integrations of existing apps and demo some actual external products that use MSLU to provide their Unicode story. Finally, it will show the things that MSLU is not and cannot really ever be, since it is based on the (non-Unicode) Win9x platform. Attendees will walk away with a better understanding of Microsoft's position on Unicode in general, and how they have chosen to specifically encourage adoption of the Unicode functionality in Windows.