Load a Windows string resource into a std::string or std::wstring

This contribution was first inspired by this thread's[^] question and Stephen Hewitt [^]answers.

It was heavily edited to address Aescleal's interesting concerns and remarks.

This (last) version compiles with VS2008 and VS2010 (native Standard C++ Library) without warning at level 4.

The two LoadString() functions are independant of the application character set and return the length of the destination string, as does ::LoadString().

template <class StringType> StringType LoadString_() is a helper class using the matching LoadString() version to build a StringType with uID string resource content.

LoadString_W() returns a std::wstring with uID string resource content (empty if no resource).
LoadString_S() returns a std::string with uID string resource content (empty if no resource).
LoadString_T() returns a UNICODE depending std::wstring or std::string, with uID string resource content (empty if no resource).

#include <string>
#include <Windows.h>
#include "resource.h"

// Assigns the uID string resource to wsDest, returns length (0 if no resource)
inline int LoadString(std::wstring& wsDest, UINT uID, HINSTANCE hInstance = ::GetModuleHandle(NULL))
{
    PWCHAR wsBuf; // no need to initialize
    wsDest.clear();
    if (size_t len = ::LoadStringW(hInstance, uID, (PWCHAR)&wsBuf, 0))
        wsDest.assign(wsBuf, len);
    return wsDest.length();
}

// Assigns the uID string resource to sDest, returns length (0 if no resource)
inline int LoadString(std::string& sDest, UINT uID, HINSTANCE hInstance = ::GetModuleHandle(NULL))
{
    PWCHAR wsBuf; // no need to initialize
    sDest.clear();
    if (size_t len = ::LoadStringW(hInstance, uID, (PWCHAR)&wsBuf, 0) * sizeof WCHAR)
    {
        sDest.resize(++len); // make room for trailing '\0' in worst case
        sDest.resize(::LoadStringA(hInstance, uID, &*sDest.begin(), len));
    }
    return sDest.length();
}

// Returns a StringType with uID string resource content (empty if no resource)
template <class StringType>
inline StringType LoadString_(UINT uID, HINSTANCE hInstance)
{
    StringType sDest;
    return LoadString(sDest, uID, hInstance) ? sDest : StringType();
}

// Returns a std::string with uID string resource content (empty if no resource)
inline std::string LoadString_S(UINT uID, HINSTANCE hInstance = ::GetModuleHandle(NULL))
{
    return LoadString_<std::string>(uID, hInstance);
}

// Returns a std::wstring with uID string resource content (empty if no resource)
inline std::wstring LoadString_W(UINT uID, HINSTANCE hInstance = ::GetModuleHandle(NULL))
{
    return LoadString_<std::wstring>(uID, hInstance);
}

#ifdef UNICODE
    typedef std::wstring t_string;
#else
    typedef std::string t_string;
#endif

// Returns a UNICODE depending std::wstring or std::string, with uID string resource content (empty if no resource)
inline t_string LoadString_T(UINT uID, HINSTANCE hInstance = ::GetModuleHandle(NULL))
{
    return LoadString_<t_string>(uID, hInstance);
}

cheers,
AR