[Python-ideas] Python 3000 TIOBE -3%

[Stephen J. Turnbull]

Paul Moore writes:

 > I'm now 100% convinced that
 > encoding="ascii",errors="surrogateescape" is the way to say this in
 > code.

It probably is, for you.  If that ever gives you a UnicodeError, you
know how to find out how to deal with it.  And it probably won't.<wink/>

That may also be a good universal default for Python 3, as it will
pass through non-ASCII text unchanged, while raising an error if the
program tries to manipulate it (or hand it to a module that
validates).  (encoding='latin-1' definitely is not a good default.)
But I'm not sure of that, and the current approach of using the
preferred system encoding is probably better.

I don't think either argument applies to everybody who needs such a
recipe, though.  Many will be best served with encoding='latin-1' by
some name.