C++ char spacing in console output, UTF-16 characters

Question

I'm making a game in C++ console using UTF-16 characters to make it little bit more interesting, but some characters are different size then others. So, when I print the level, things after character are moved further than others. Is there any way how to add spacing between characters with some console function, I try to google something helpful, but I have not found nothing.

I tried to change font size by CONSOLE_FONT_INFOEX, but it changed nothing, maybe i implement it in the wrong way, or it not work with UTF-16 characters.

// i tried this

CONSOLE_FONT_INFOEX cfi;
cfi.cbSize = sizeof(cfi);
cfi.dwFontSize.X= 24;
cfi.dwFontSize.Y= 24;

Answer 1

Unfortunately I expect that this will heavily depend on the particular console you're using. Some less Unicode-friendly consoles will treat all characters as the same size (possibly cutting off the right half of larger characters), and some consoles will cause larger characters to push the rest of the line to the right (which is what I see in the linked image). The most reasonable consoles I've observed have a set of characters considered "double-wide" and reserve two monospace columns for those characters instead of one, so the rest of the line still fits into the grid.

That said, you may want to experiment with different console programs. Can I assume you are on Windows? In that case, you might want to give Windows Terminal a try. If that doesn't work, there are other console programs available, such as msys's Mintty , or ConEmu .

Answer 2

So, after some intense googling i found the solution. And solution is fight fire with fire. Unicode include character Thin Space, that is 1/5 of the normal space, so if i include two of them with one normal space after my problematic character, the output is diplaying how i want. If anybody runs into some simliar issue, unicode have lot of different sized spaces. I found Website that shows them all of them, with their propperties.

fixed output picture