Setting the correct encoding when piping stdout in Python

Question

When piping the output of a Python program, the Python interpreter gets confused about encoding and sets it to None. This means a program like this:

# -*- co         


        

Answer 1

An arguable sanitized version of Craig McQueen's answer.

import sys, codecs
class EncodedOut:
    def __init__(self, enc):
        self.enc = enc
        self.stdout = sys.stdout
    def __enter__(self):
        if sys.stdout.encoding is None:
            w = codecs.getwriter(self.enc)
            sys.stdout = w(sys.stdout)
    def __exit__(self, exc_ty, exc_val, tb):
        sys.stdout = self.stdout

Usage:

with EncodedOut('utf-8'):
    print u'ÅÄÖåäö'