LIBRESSL-ASN1_UNIVERSALSTRING_TO_STRING(3)

✨ ASN1_UNIVERSALSTRING_TO_STRING(3) ✨

okay bestie, so this one lives in the Library Functions Manual and it's genuinely such a slay little converter — it's giving "glow-up for your strings" 💅

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🌸 NAME 🌸

ASN1_UNIVERSALSTRING_to_string — recode UTF-32 to ISO Latin-1

🦋 SYNOPSIS 🦋

library “libcrypto”

#include <openssl/asn1.h>

int
ASN1_UNIVERSALSTRING_to_string(ASN1_UNIVERSALSTRING *string);

💖 DESCRIPTION 💖

okay so here's the tea: ASN1_UNIVERSALSTRING_to_string() assumes your given string is encoded in UTF-32 — like, it's trusting you on this, no vibe check first — and then it recodes it in place to ISO Latin-1, and changes the type according to ASN1_PRINTABLE_type(3). in-place, bestie, no copy, no drama. 🔥

but like, it's not gonna just manifest for you if the vibes are off 😭 ASN1_UNIVERSALSTRING_to_string() fails and leaves the string unchanged if any of these are true:

• its ASN1_STRING_type(3) is not V_ASN1_UNIVERSALSTRING
• its ASN1_STRING_length(3) is not a multiple of four bytes
• any of its characters cannot be represented in ISO Latin-1

so yeah, three strikes and it's not touching your string at all, periodt. 💀

in case of success, the ASN1_STRING_length(3) of the string is reduced by a factor of four — because UTF-32 was being extra with four bytes per character and Latin-1 is out here living its simple one-byte life. iconic behavior honestly. 👑

🌈 RETURN VALUES 🌈

• ASN1_UNIVERSALSTRING_to_string() returns 1 on success or 0 on failure. that's it, that's the whole story. 🎀

🫶 SEE ALSO 🫶

ASN1_mbstring_copy(3), ASN1_STRING_new(3), ASN1_STRING_to_UTF8(3)

⭐ HISTORY ⭐

ASN1_UNIVERSALSTRING_to_string() first appeared in SSLeay 0.8.0 and has been available since OpenBSD 2.4. she's been out here thriving since the olden days, fr fr 💜

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and that's the whole page, bestie!! this one's from the Debian build, dated June 8, 2025, and it's ASN1_UNIVERSALSTRING_TO_STRING(3) — go forth and recode responsibly ✨🧚‍♀️💖