Converts text between Unicode and other character sets.

The first stage of the conversion is to specify the non-Unicode character set being converted to or from. This is done by calling one of the overloads of PrepareToConvertToOrFromL().

The second stage is to convert the text, using one of the overloads of ConvertFromUnicode() or ConvertToUnicode().

Where possible the first documented overload of PrepareToConvertToOrFromL() should be used because the second overload panics if the specified character set is not available: the first overload simply returns whether the character set is available or not available. However if the conversions are to be performed often, or if the user must select the character set for the conversion from a list, the second overload may be more appropriate.

The first overload is less efficient than the second, because it searches through the file system for the selected character set every time it is invoked. The second overload searches through an array of all available character sets. In this method, the file system need only be searched once - when CreateArrayOfCharacterSetsAvailableLC() or CreateArrayOfCharacterSetsAvailableL() is used to create the array.

The conversion functions allow users of this class to perform partial conversions on an input descriptor, handling the situation where the input descriptor is truncated mid way through a multi-byte character. This means that you do not have to guess how big to make the output descriptor for a given input descriptor, you can simply do the conversion in a loop using a small output descriptor. The ability to handle truncated descriptors also allows users of the class to convert information received in chunks from an external source.

The class also provides a number of utility functions.