Python, Unicode, and the Windows console

Question

When I try to print a Unicode string in a Windows console, I get a UnicodeEncodeError: \'charmap\' codec can\'t encode character .... error. I assume this is b

Answer 1

The cause of your problem is NOT the Win console not willing to accept Unicode (as it does this since I guess Win2k by default). It is the default system encoding. Try this code and see what it gives you:

import sys
sys.getdefaultencoding()

if it says ascii, there's your cause ;-) You have to create a file called sitecustomize.py and put it under python path (I put it under /usr/lib/python2.5/site-packages, but that is differen on Win - it is c:\python\lib\site-packages or something), with the following contents:

import sys
sys.setdefaultencoding('utf-8')

and perhaps you might want to specify the encoding in your files as well:

# -*- coding: UTF-8 -*-
import sys,time

Edit: more info can be found in excellent the Dive into Python book