microsoft / microsoft/PowerToys

Mouse Without Borders cannot connect when Windows device name contains Japanese / non-ASCII characters

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#47,673 0 comments 0 reactions 0 assignees View on GitHub
Issue-Bug Needs-Triage Product-Mouse Without Borders
Dominant language
C
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Forks
8.6k
PR merge metrics
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Description

### Microsoft PowerToys version

v0.99.1

### Installation method

Microsoft Store

### Area(s) with issue?

Mouse Without Borders

### Steps to reproduce

### Description

Mouse Without Borders cannot connect when the Windows device name contains Japanese characters.

For example, if one of the PCs has a device name such as "ポチ" or "個人", Mouse Without Borders fails to connect.
After renaming the device to an ASCII-only name such as "Pochi" or "PC-01", the connection works normally.

This looks like Mouse Without Borders may not handle non-ASCII / Unicode computer names correctly.

### Steps to reproduce

1. Prepare two Windows PCs.
2. Install PowerToys on both PCs.
3. Enable Mouse Without Borders.
4. Set the Windows device name of one PC to a Japanese name, for example:
- ポチ
- 個人
- テストPC
5. Restart Windows if required after renaming the device.
6. Try to connect the two PCs using Mouse Without Borders.
7. Rename the same PC to an ASCII-only name, for example:
- Pochi
- TestPC
- PC-01
8. Try to connect again.

### Expected Behavior

Mouse Without Borders should connect successfully even if the Windows device name contains Japanese / Unicode characters.

### Actual Behavior

Mouse Without Borders fails to connect when the device name contains Japanese characters.
After changing the device name to ASCII-only characters, the connection succeeds.

### Additional Information

This issue may affect users whose Windows device names contain non-ASCII characters, such as Japanese, Chinese, Korean, accented Latin characters, etc.

Please let me know if additional logs or tests are needed.

### ✔️ Expected Behavior

Mouse Without Borders should work correctly even when the Windows device name contains Japanese characters.

### ❌ Actual Behavior

Mouse Without Borders could not connect while the Windows device name contained Japanese characters.

After renaming the device from a Japanese name to an English / ASCII-only name, the connection succeeded.

### Upload Bug Report ZIP-file

[PowerToysReport_2026-05-06-14-13-08.zip](https://github.com/user-attachments/files/27425889/PowerToysReport_2026-05-06-14-13-08.zip)

### Additional Information

_No response_

### Other Software

_No response_

Contributor guide

Open the contributing guide

Research direction

Start by reproducing the connection failure with the Japanese device names listed in the issue, then compare it with the ASCII-name case. Review the attached PowerToysReport ZIP for diagnostic details; done means Mouse Without Borders connects reliably with the listed non-ASCII names as well as ASCII names.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
c
Domain
desktop, networking
Issue type
Bug
Difficulty
4/5
Estimated time
3-5 days
Activity status
Quiet
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
45/100

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