Convert bytes to a string

Question

I\'m using this code to get standard output from an external program:

>>> from subprocess import *
>>> command_stdout = Popen([\'ls\', \'-l         


        

Answer 1

When working with data from Windows systems (with \r\n line endings), my answer is

String = Bytes.decode("utf-8").replace("\r\n", "\n")

Why? Try this with a multiline Input.txt:

Bytes = open("Input.txt", "rb").read()
String = Bytes.decode("utf-8")
open("Output.txt", "w").write(String)

All your line endings will be doubled (to \r\r\n), leading to extra empty lines. Python's text-read functions usually normalize line endings so that strings use only \n. If you receive binary data from a Windows system, Python does not have a chance to do that. Thus,

Bytes = open("Input.txt", "rb").read()
String = Bytes.decode("utf-8").replace("\r\n", "\n")
open("Output.txt", "w").write(String)

will replicate your original file.