Windows vs Linux

[Bruce Sherwood <Bruce_Sherwood ncsu edu>]

A beta version of the VPython application (vpython.org, and sourceforge) 
is now almost pure gtkmm code across both Windows and Linux, the only 
exception being an accurate clock used on Windows for short-duration 
delays. I'm thrilled by the cross-platform compatibility that permits 
using the same C++ code in both places (and I'm hopeful that currently 
experimental work on GTK2-Quartz will make it possible to get a native 
version of VPython running on the Mac, without having to use X11). In 
the older, production version of VPython it was necessary to have 
several critical files that were different on Windows and Linux/OSX.

The main part of the window is a 3D OpenGL display. One of the graphical 
objects is a label for displaying text. On Linux a unicode string works 
fine and displays arbitrary characters correctly. The same VPython 
program running on Windows gives gibberish, possibly related to 
treatment of the header bytes, I don't know.

I don't have a simple test case to post, but my question is this: Is it 
a known bug in the gtkmm/pango world that unicode works okay on Linux 
but not on Windows? Is there some special platform-dependent thing I 
have to do to make it work on Windows?

Bruce Sherwood