Need to convert char* (pointer) to wchar_t* (pointer)

Question

I am doing some serial port communcation to a computer controlled pump and the createfile function I used to communicate requires the com port name to be parsed as a wchar_t pointer.

I am also using QT to create a form and aquire the com port name as a QString.

This QString is converted to a char array and pointed to as follows:

   char* Dialog::GetPumpSerialPortNumber(){
   QString mystring;
   mystring = ui->comboBox_2->currentText();
   char * mychar;
   mychar = mystring.toLatin1().data();
   return mychar;

I now need to set my port number which is stored as a wchar_t* in my pump object. I do this by calling the following function:

   void pump::setPortNumber(wchar_t* portNumber){
       this->portNumber = portNumber;
   }

Thus how do I change my char* (mychar) into a wchar_t* (portNumber)?

Thanks.

Answer 1

QString::toWCharArray ( wchar_t * array ) ?

Answer 2

You can use the toWCharArray function of QString to have your wchar_t* value and return a wchar_t* from your GetPumpSerialPortNumber function.

Answer 3

I'm clearly doing something wrong my code:

wchar_t* Dialog::GetPumpSerialPortNumber(){
   QString mystring;
   mystring = ui->comboBox_2->currentText();       // get mystring from form
   wchar_t * mycharPointer;                        // create pointer to return
   wchar_t mychar[mystring.size()];                // allocate space for wchar array
   mychar[mystring.size()-1] = '\n';               // null terminate wchar array
   mystring.toWCharArray(mychar);                  // put mystring in wchar array
   mycharPointer = mychar;                         // point at wchar array
   return mycharPointer;                           // return wchar array string
}

seems to return an address rather than the char array to "COM6"