diff --git a/Utilities/StrFmt.cpp b/Utilities/StrFmt.cpp
index 51ed10c3e6..58ed16f145 100644
--- a/Utilities/StrFmt.cpp
+++ b/Utilities/StrFmt.cpp
@@ -1,6 +1,9 @@
 #include "stdafx.h"
 #include "StrFmt.h"
 
+static const std::string fmt::placeholder = "???";
+
+
 //wrapper to deal with advance sprintf formating options with automatic length finding
 //can't take strings by reference because of "va_start", so overload it with char *
 std::string fmt::FormatV(const char *fmt, va_list args)
diff --git a/Utilities/StrFmt.h b/Utilities/StrFmt.h
index 2338ea7d07..5f98262268 100644
--- a/Utilities/StrFmt.h
+++ b/Utilities/StrFmt.h
@@ -15,7 +15,7 @@ namespace fmt{
 
 	struct empty_t{};
 
-	//static const string placeholder = "???";
+	extern const string placeholder;
 
 	// write `fmt` from `pos` to the first occurence of `fmt::placeholder` to
 	// the stream `os`. Then write `arg` to to the stream. If there's no
@@ -24,7 +24,7 @@ namespace fmt{
 	template<typename T>
 	empty_t write(const string &fmt, ostream &os, string::size_type &pos, T &&arg)
 	{
-		string::size_type ins = fmt.find(/*placeholder*/"???", pos);
+		string::size_type ins = fmt.find(placeholder, pos);
 
 		if (ins == string::npos)
 		{