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1
2:mod:`codecs` --- Codec registry and base classes
3=================================================
4
5.. module:: codecs
6   :synopsis: Encode and decode data and streams.
7.. moduleauthor:: Marc-Andre Lemburg <mal@lemburg.com>
8.. sectionauthor:: Marc-Andre Lemburg <mal@lemburg.com>
9.. sectionauthor:: Martin v. Löwis <martin@v.loewis.de>
10
11
12.. index::
13   single: Unicode
14   single: Codecs
15   pair: Codecs; encode
16   pair: Codecs; decode
17   single: streams
18   pair: stackable; streams
19
20This module defines base classes for standard Python codecs (encoders and
21decoders) and provides access to the internal Python codec registry which
22manages the codec and error handling lookup process.
23
24It defines the following functions:
25
26.. function:: encode(obj, [encoding[, errors]])
27
28   Encodes *obj* using the codec registered for *encoding*. The default
29   encoding is ``'ascii'``.
30
31   *Errors* may be given to set the desired error handling scheme. The
32   default error handler is ``'strict'`` meaning that encoding errors raise
33   :exc:`ValueError` (or a more codec specific subclass, such as
34   :exc:`UnicodeEncodeError`). Refer to :ref:`codec-base-classes` for more
35   information on codec error handling.
36
37   .. versionadded:: 2.4
38
39.. function:: decode(obj, [encoding[, errors]])
40
41   Decodes *obj* using the codec registered for *encoding*. The default
42   encoding is ``'ascii'``.
43
44   *Errors* may be given to set the desired error handling scheme. The
45   default error handler is ``'strict'`` meaning that decoding errors raise
46   :exc:`ValueError` (or a more codec specific subclass, such as
47   :exc:`UnicodeDecodeError`). Refer to :ref:`codec-base-classes` for more
48   information on codec error handling.
49
50   .. versionadded:: 2.4
51
52.. function:: register(search_function)
53
54   Register a codec search function. Search functions are expected to take one
55   argument, the encoding name in all lower case letters, and return a
56   :class:`CodecInfo` object having the following attributes:
57
58   * ``name`` The name of the encoding;
59
60   * ``encode`` The stateless encoding function;
61
62   * ``decode`` The stateless decoding function;
63
64   * ``incrementalencoder`` An incremental encoder class or factory function;
65
66   * ``incrementaldecoder`` An incremental decoder class or factory function;
67
68   * ``streamwriter`` A stream writer class or factory function;
69
70   * ``streamreader`` A stream reader class or factory function.
71
72   The various functions or classes take the following arguments:
73
74   *encode* and *decode*: These must be functions or methods which have the same
75   interface as the :meth:`~Codec.encode`/:meth:`~Codec.decode` methods of Codec
76   instances (see :ref:`Codec Interface <codec-objects>`). The functions/methods
77   are expected to work in a stateless mode.
78
79   *incrementalencoder* and *incrementaldecoder*: These have to be factory
80   functions providing the following interface:
81
82      ``factory(errors='strict')``
83
84   The factory functions must return objects providing the interfaces defined by
85   the base classes :class:`IncrementalEncoder` and :class:`IncrementalDecoder`,
86   respectively. Incremental codecs can maintain state.
87
88   *streamreader* and *streamwriter*: These have to be factory functions providing
89   the following interface:
90
91      ``factory(stream, errors='strict')``
92
93   The factory functions must return objects providing the interfaces defined by
94   the base classes :class:`StreamReader` and :class:`StreamWriter`, respectively.
95   Stream codecs can maintain state.
96
97   Possible values for errors are
98
99   * ``'strict'``: raise an exception in case of an encoding error
100   * ``'replace'``: replace malformed data with a suitable replacement marker,
101     such as ``'?'`` or ``'\ufffd'``
102   * ``'ignore'``: ignore malformed data and continue without further notice
103   * ``'xmlcharrefreplace'``: replace with the appropriate XML character
104     reference (for encoding only)
105   * ``'backslashreplace'``: replace with backslashed escape sequences (for
106     encoding only)
107
108   as well as any other error handling name defined via :func:`register_error`.
109
110   In case a search function cannot find a given encoding, it should return
111   ``None``.
112
113
114.. function:: lookup(encoding)
115
116   Looks up the codec info in the Python codec registry and returns a
117   :class:`CodecInfo` object as defined above.
118
119   Encodings are first looked up in the registry's cache. If not found, the list of
120   registered search functions is scanned. If no :class:`CodecInfo` object is
121   found, a :exc:`LookupError` is raised. Otherwise, the :class:`CodecInfo` object
122   is stored in the cache and returned to the caller.
123
124To simplify access to the various codecs, the module provides these additional
125functions which use :func:`lookup` for the codec lookup:
126
127
128.. function:: getencoder(encoding)
129
130   Look up the codec for the given encoding and return its encoder function.
131
132   Raises a :exc:`LookupError` in case the encoding cannot be found.
133
134
135.. function:: getdecoder(encoding)
136
137   Look up the codec for the given encoding and return its decoder function.
138
139   Raises a :exc:`LookupError` in case the encoding cannot be found.
140
141
142.. function:: getincrementalencoder(encoding)
143
144   Look up the codec for the given encoding and return its incremental encoder
145   class or factory function.
146
147   Raises a :exc:`LookupError` in case the encoding cannot be found or the codec
148   doesn't support an incremental encoder.
149
150   .. versionadded:: 2.5
151
152
153.. function:: getincrementaldecoder(encoding)
154
155   Look up the codec for the given encoding and return its incremental decoder
156   class or factory function.
157
158   Raises a :exc:`LookupError` in case the encoding cannot be found or the codec
159   doesn't support an incremental decoder.
160
161   .. versionadded:: 2.5
162
163
164.. function:: getreader(encoding)
165
166   Look up the codec for the given encoding and return its StreamReader class or
167   factory function.
168
169   Raises a :exc:`LookupError` in case the encoding cannot be found.
170
171
172.. function:: getwriter(encoding)
173
174   Look up the codec for the given encoding and return its StreamWriter class or
175   factory function.
176
177   Raises a :exc:`LookupError` in case the encoding cannot be found.
178
179
180.. function:: register_error(name, error_handler)
181
182   Register the error handling function *error_handler* under the name *name*.
183   *error_handler* will be called during encoding and decoding in case of an error,
184   when *name* is specified as the errors parameter.
185
186   For encoding *error_handler* will be called with a :exc:`UnicodeEncodeError`
187   instance, which contains information about the location of the error. The error
188   handler must either raise this or a different exception or return a tuple with a
189   replacement for the unencodable part of the input and a position where encoding
190   should continue. The encoder will encode the replacement and continue encoding
191   the original input at the specified position. Negative position values will be
192   treated as being relative to the end of the input string. If the resulting
193   position is out of bound an :exc:`IndexError` will be raised.
194
195   Decoding and translating works similar, except :exc:`UnicodeDecodeError` or
196   :exc:`UnicodeTranslateError` will be passed to the handler and that the
197   replacement from the error handler will be put into the output directly.
198
199
200.. function:: lookup_error(name)
201
202   Return the error handler previously registered under the name *name*.
203
204   Raises a :exc:`LookupError` in case the handler cannot be found.
205
206
207.. function:: strict_errors(exception)
208
209   Implements the ``strict`` error handling: each encoding or decoding error
210   raises a :exc:`UnicodeError`.
211
212
213.. function:: replace_errors(exception)
214
215   Implements the ``replace`` error handling: malformed data is replaced with a
216   suitable replacement character such as ``'?'`` in bytestrings and
217   ``'\ufffd'`` in Unicode strings.
218
219
220.. function:: ignore_errors(exception)
221
222   Implements the ``ignore`` error handling: malformed data is ignored and
223   encoding or decoding is continued without further notice.
224
225
226.. function:: xmlcharrefreplace_errors(exception)
227
228   Implements the ``xmlcharrefreplace`` error handling (for encoding only): the
229   unencodable character is replaced by an appropriate XML character reference.
230
231
232.. function:: backslashreplace_errors(exception)
233
234   Implements the ``backslashreplace`` error handling (for encoding only): the
235   unencodable character is replaced by a backslashed escape sequence.
236
237To simplify working with encoded files or stream, the module also defines these
238utility functions:
239
240
241.. function:: open(filename, mode[, encoding[, errors[, buffering]]])
242
243   Open an encoded file using the given *mode* and return a wrapped version
244   providing transparent encoding/decoding.  The default file mode is ``'r'``
245   meaning to open the file in read mode.
246
247   .. note::
248
249      The wrapped version will only accept the object format defined by the codecs,
250      i.e. Unicode objects for most built-in codecs.  Output is also codec-dependent
251      and will usually be Unicode as well.
252
253   .. note::
254
255      Files are always opened in binary mode, even if no binary mode was
256      specified.  This is done to avoid data loss due to encodings using 8-bit
257      values.  This means that no automatic conversion of ``'\n'`` is done
258      on reading and writing.
259
260   *encoding* specifies the encoding which is to be used for the file.
261
262   *errors* may be given to define the error handling. It defaults to ``'strict'``
263   which causes a :exc:`ValueError` to be raised in case an encoding error occurs.
264
265   *buffering* has the same meaning as for the built-in :func:`open` function.  It
266   defaults to line buffered.
267
268
269.. function:: EncodedFile(file, input[, output[, errors]])
270
271   Return a wrapped version of file which provides transparent encoding
272   translation.
273
274   Strings written to the wrapped file are interpreted according to the given
275   *input* encoding and then written to the original file as strings using the
276   *output* encoding. The intermediate encoding will usually be Unicode but depends
277   on the specified codecs.
278
279   If *output* is not given, it defaults to *input*.
280
281   *errors* may be given to define the error handling. It defaults to ``'strict'``,
282   which causes :exc:`ValueError` to be raised in case an encoding error occurs.
283
284
285.. function:: iterencode(iterable, encoding[, errors])
286
287   Uses an incremental encoder to iteratively encode the input provided by
288   *iterable*. This function is a :term:`generator`.  *errors* (as well as any
289   other keyword argument) is passed through to the incremental encoder.
290
291   .. versionadded:: 2.5
292
293
294.. function:: iterdecode(iterable, encoding[, errors])
295
296   Uses an incremental decoder to iteratively decode the input provided by
297   *iterable*. This function is a :term:`generator`.  *errors* (as well as any
298   other keyword argument) is passed through to the incremental decoder.
299
300   .. versionadded:: 2.5
301
302The module also provides the following constants which are useful for reading
303and writing to platform dependent files:
304
305
306.. data:: BOM
307          BOM_BE
308          BOM_LE
309          BOM_UTF8
310          BOM_UTF16
311          BOM_UTF16_BE
312          BOM_UTF16_LE
313          BOM_UTF32
314          BOM_UTF32_BE
315          BOM_UTF32_LE
316
317   These constants define various encodings of the Unicode byte order mark (BOM)
318   used in UTF-16 and UTF-32 data streams to indicate the byte order used in the
319   stream or file and in UTF-8 as a Unicode signature. :const:`BOM_UTF16` is either
320   :const:`BOM_UTF16_BE` or :const:`BOM_UTF16_LE` depending on the platform's
321   native byte order, :const:`BOM` is an alias for :const:`BOM_UTF16`,
322   :const:`BOM_LE` for :const:`BOM_UTF16_LE` and :const:`BOM_BE` for
323   :const:`BOM_UTF16_BE`. The others represent the BOM in UTF-8 and UTF-32
324   encodings.
325
326
327.. _codec-base-classes:
328
329Codec Base Classes
330------------------
331
332The :mod:`codecs` module defines a set of base classes which define the
333interface and can also be used to easily write your own codecs for use in
334Python.
335
336Each codec has to define four interfaces to make it usable as codec in Python:
337stateless encoder, stateless decoder, stream reader and stream writer. The
338stream reader and writers typically reuse the stateless encoder/decoder to
339implement the file protocols.
340
341The :class:`Codec` class defines the interface for stateless encoders/decoders.
342
343To simplify and standardize error handling, the :meth:`~Codec.encode` and
344:meth:`~Codec.decode` methods may implement different error handling schemes by
345providing the *errors* string argument.  The following string values are defined
346and implemented by all standard Python codecs:
347
348.. tabularcolumns:: |l|L|
349
350+-------------------------+-----------------------------------------------+
351| Value                   | Meaning                                       |
352+=========================+===============================================+
353| ``'strict'``            | Raise :exc:`UnicodeError` (or a subclass);    |
354|                         | this is the default.                          |
355+-------------------------+-----------------------------------------------+
356| ``'ignore'``            | Ignore the character and continue with the    |
357|                         | next.                                         |
358+-------------------------+-----------------------------------------------+
359| ``'replace'``           | Replace with a suitable replacement           |
360|                         | character; Python will use the official       |
361|                         | U+FFFD REPLACEMENT CHARACTER for the built-in |
362|                         | Unicode codecs on decoding and '?' on         |
363|                         | encoding.                                     |
364+-------------------------+-----------------------------------------------+
365| ``'xmlcharrefreplace'`` | Replace with the appropriate XML character    |
366|                         | reference (only for encoding).                |
367+-------------------------+-----------------------------------------------+
368| ``'backslashreplace'``  | Replace with backslashed escape sequences     |
369|                         | (only for encoding).                          |
370+-------------------------+-----------------------------------------------+
371
372The set of allowed values can be extended via :meth:`register_error`.
373
374
375.. _codec-objects:
376
377Codec Objects
378^^^^^^^^^^^^^
379
380The :class:`Codec` class defines these methods which also define the function
381interfaces of the stateless encoder and decoder:
382
383
384.. method:: Codec.encode(input[, errors])
385
386   Encodes the object *input* and returns a tuple (output object, length consumed).
387   While codecs are not restricted to use with Unicode, in a Unicode context,
388   encoding converts a Unicode object to a plain string using a particular
389   character set encoding (e.g., ``cp1252`` or ``iso-8859-1``).
390
391   *errors* defines the error handling to apply. It defaults to ``'strict'``
392   handling.
393
394   The method may not store state in the :class:`Codec` instance. Use
395   :class:`StreamWriter` for codecs which have to keep state in order to make
396   encoding efficient.
397
398   The encoder must be able to handle zero length input and return an empty object
399   of the output object type in this situation.
400
401
402.. method:: Codec.decode(input[, errors])
403
404   Decodes the object *input* and returns a tuple (output object, length consumed).
405   In a Unicode context, decoding converts a plain string encoded using a
406   particular character set encoding to a Unicode object.
407
408   *input* must be an object which provides the ``bf_getreadbuf`` buffer slot.
409   Python strings, buffer objects and memory mapped files are examples of objects
410   providing this slot.
411
412   *errors* defines the error handling to apply. It defaults to ``'strict'``
413   handling.
414
415   The method may not store state in the :class:`Codec` instance. Use
416   :class:`StreamReader` for codecs which have to keep state in order to make
417   decoding efficient.
418
419   The decoder must be able to handle zero length input and return an empty object
420   of the output object type in this situation.
421
422The :class:`IncrementalEncoder` and :class:`IncrementalDecoder` classes provide
423the basic interface for incremental encoding and decoding. Encoding/decoding the
424input isn't done with one call to the stateless encoder/decoder function, but
425with multiple calls to the
426:meth:`~IncrementalEncoder.encode`/:meth:`~IncrementalDecoder.decode` method of
427the incremental encoder/decoder. The incremental encoder/decoder keeps track of
428the encoding/decoding process during method calls.
429
430The joined output of calls to the
431:meth:`~IncrementalEncoder.encode`/:meth:`~IncrementalDecoder.decode` method is
432the same as if all the single inputs were joined into one, and this input was
433encoded/decoded with the stateless encoder/decoder.
434
435
436.. _incremental-encoder-objects:
437
438IncrementalEncoder Objects
439^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
440
441.. versionadded:: 2.5
442
443The :class:`IncrementalEncoder` class is used for encoding an input in multiple
444steps. It defines the following methods which every incremental encoder must
445define in order to be compatible with the Python codec registry.
446
447
448.. class:: IncrementalEncoder([errors])
449
450   Constructor for an :class:`IncrementalEncoder` instance.
451
452   All incremental encoders must provide this constructor interface. They are free
453   to add additional keyword arguments, but only the ones defined here are used by
454   the Python codec registry.
455
456   The :class:`IncrementalEncoder` may implement different error handling schemes
457   by providing the *errors* keyword argument. These parameters are predefined:
458
459   * ``'strict'`` Raise :exc:`ValueError` (or a subclass); this is the default.
460
461   * ``'ignore'`` Ignore the character and continue with the next.
462
463   * ``'replace'`` Replace with a suitable replacement character
464
465   * ``'xmlcharrefreplace'`` Replace with the appropriate XML character reference
466
467   * ``'backslashreplace'`` Replace with backslashed escape sequences.
468
469   The *errors* argument will be assigned to an attribute of the same name.
470   Assigning to this attribute makes it possible to switch between different error
471   handling strategies during the lifetime of the :class:`IncrementalEncoder`
472   object.
473
474   The set of allowed values for the *errors* argument can be extended with
475   :func:`register_error`.
476
477
478   .. method:: encode(object[, final])
479
480      Encodes *object* (taking the current state of the encoder into account)
481      and returns the resulting encoded object. If this is the last call to
482      :meth:`encode` *final* must be true (the default is false).
483
484
485   .. method:: reset()
486
487      Reset the encoder to the initial state.
488
489
490.. _incremental-decoder-objects:
491
492IncrementalDecoder Objects
493^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
494
495The :class:`IncrementalDecoder` class is used for decoding an input in multiple
496steps. It defines the following methods which every incremental decoder must
497define in order to be compatible with the Python codec registry.
498
499
500.. class:: IncrementalDecoder([errors])
501
502   Constructor for an :class:`IncrementalDecoder` instance.
503
504   All incremental decoders must provide this constructor interface. They are free
505   to add additional keyword arguments, but only the ones defined here are used by
506   the Python codec registry.
507
508   The :class:`IncrementalDecoder` may implement different error handling schemes
509   by providing the *errors* keyword argument. These parameters are predefined:
510
511   * ``'strict'`` Raise :exc:`ValueError` (or a subclass); this is the default.
512
513   * ``'ignore'`` Ignore the character and continue with the next.
514
515   * ``'replace'`` Replace with a suitable replacement character.
516
517   The *errors* argument will be assigned to an attribute of the same name.
518   Assigning to this attribute makes it possible to switch between different error
519   handling strategies during the lifetime of the :class:`IncrementalDecoder`
520   object.
521
522   The set of allowed values for the *errors* argument can be extended with
523   :func:`register_error`.
524
525
526   .. method:: decode(object[, final])
527
528      Decodes *object* (taking the current state of the decoder into account)
529      and returns the resulting decoded object. If this is the last call to
530      :meth:`decode` *final* must be true (the default is false). If *final* is
531      true the decoder must decode the input completely and must flush all
532      buffers. If this isn't possible (e.g. because of incomplete byte sequences
533      at the end of the input) it must initiate error handling just like in the
534      stateless case (which might raise an exception).
535
536
537   .. method:: reset()
538
539      Reset the decoder to the initial state.
540
541
542The :class:`StreamWriter` and :class:`StreamReader` classes provide generic
543working interfaces which can be used to implement new encoding submodules very
544easily. See :mod:`encodings.utf_8` for an example of how this is done.
545
546
547.. _stream-writer-objects:
548
549StreamWriter Objects
550^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
551
552The :class:`StreamWriter` class is a subclass of :class:`Codec` and defines the
553following methods which every stream writer must define in order to be
554compatible with the Python codec registry.
555
556
557.. class:: StreamWriter(stream[, errors])
558
559   Constructor for a :class:`StreamWriter` instance.
560
561   All stream writers must provide this constructor interface. They are free to add
562   additional keyword arguments, but only the ones defined here are used by the
563   Python codec registry.
564
565   *stream* must be a file-like object open for writing binary data.
566
567   The :class:`StreamWriter` may implement different error handling schemes by
568   providing the *errors* keyword argument. These parameters are predefined:
569
570   * ``'strict'`` Raise :exc:`ValueError` (or a subclass); this is the default.
571
572   * ``'ignore'`` Ignore the character and continue with the next.
573
574   * ``'replace'`` Replace with a suitable replacement character
575
576   * ``'xmlcharrefreplace'`` Replace with the appropriate XML character reference
577
578   * ``'backslashreplace'`` Replace with backslashed escape sequences.
579
580   The *errors* argument will be assigned to an attribute of the same name.
581   Assigning to this attribute makes it possible to switch between different error
582   handling strategies during the lifetime of the :class:`StreamWriter` object.
583
584   The set of allowed values for the *errors* argument can be extended with
585   :func:`register_error`.
586
587
588   .. method:: write(object)
589
590      Writes the object's contents encoded to the stream.
591
592
593   .. method:: writelines(list)
594
595      Writes the concatenated list of strings to the stream (possibly by reusing
596      the :meth:`write` method).
597
598
599   .. method:: reset()
600
601      Flushes and resets the codec buffers used for keeping state.
602
603      Calling this method should ensure that the data on the output is put into
604      a clean state that allows appending of new fresh data without having to
605      rescan the whole stream to recover state.
606
607
608In addition to the above methods, the :class:`StreamWriter` must also inherit
609all other methods and attributes from the underlying stream.
610
611
612.. _stream-reader-objects:
613
614StreamReader Objects
615^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
616
617The :class:`StreamReader` class is a subclass of :class:`Codec` and defines the
618following methods which every stream reader must define in order to be
619compatible with the Python codec registry.
620
621
622.. class:: StreamReader(stream[, errors])
623
624   Constructor for a :class:`StreamReader` instance.
625
626   All stream readers must provide this constructor interface. They are free to add
627   additional keyword arguments, but only the ones defined here are used by the
628   Python codec registry.
629
630   *stream* must be a file-like object open for reading (binary) data.
631
632   The :class:`StreamReader` may implement different error handling schemes by
633   providing the *errors* keyword argument. These parameters are defined:
634
635   * ``'strict'`` Raise :exc:`ValueError` (or a subclass); this is the default.
636
637   * ``'ignore'`` Ignore the character and continue with the next.
638
639   * ``'replace'`` Replace with a suitable replacement character.
640
641   The *errors* argument will be assigned to an attribute of the same name.
642   Assigning to this attribute makes it possible to switch between different error
643   handling strategies during the lifetime of the :class:`StreamReader` object.
644
645   The set of allowed values for the *errors* argument can be extended with
646   :func:`register_error`.
647
648
649   .. method:: read([size[, chars, [firstline]]])
650
651      Decodes data from the stream and returns the resulting object.
652
653      *chars* indicates the number of characters to read from the
654      stream. :func:`read` will never return more than *chars* characters, but
655      it might return less, if there are not enough characters available.
656
657      *size* indicates the approximate maximum number of bytes to read from the
658      stream for decoding purposes. The decoder can modify this setting as
659      appropriate. The default value -1 indicates to read and decode as much as
660      possible.  *size* is intended to prevent having to decode huge files in
661      one step.
662
663      *firstline* indicates that it would be sufficient to only return the first
664      line, if there are decoding errors on later lines.
665
666      The method should use a greedy read strategy meaning that it should read
667      as much data as is allowed within the definition of the encoding and the
668      given size, e.g.  if optional encoding endings or state markers are
669      available on the stream, these should be read too.
670
671      .. versionchanged:: 2.4
672         *chars* argument added.
673
674      .. versionchanged:: 2.4.2
675         *firstline* argument added.
676
677
678   .. method:: readline([size[, keepends]])
679
680      Read one line from the input stream and return the decoded data.
681
682      *size*, if given, is passed as size argument to the stream's
683      :meth:`read` method.
684
685      If *keepends* is false line-endings will be stripped from the lines
686      returned.
687
688      .. versionchanged:: 2.4
689         *keepends* argument added.
690
691
692   .. method:: readlines([sizehint[, keepends]])
693
694      Read all lines available on the input stream and return them as a list of
695      lines.
696
697      Line-endings are implemented using the codec's decoder method and are
698      included in the list entries if *keepends* is true.
699
700      *sizehint*, if given, is passed as the *size* argument to the stream's
701      :meth:`read` method.
702
703
704   .. method:: reset()
705
706      Resets the codec buffers used for keeping state.
707
708      Note that no stream repositioning should take place.  This method is
709      primarily intended to be able to recover from decoding errors.
710
711
712In addition to the above methods, the :class:`StreamReader` must also inherit
713all other methods and attributes from the underlying stream.
714
715The next two base classes are included for convenience. They are not needed by
716the codec registry, but may provide useful in practice.
717
718
719.. _stream-reader-writer:
720
721StreamReaderWriter Objects
722^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
723
724The :class:`StreamReaderWriter` allows wrapping streams which work in both read
725and write modes.
726
727The design is such that one can use the factory functions returned by the
728:func:`lookup` function to construct the instance.
729
730
731.. class:: StreamReaderWriter(stream, Reader, Writer, errors)
732
733   Creates a :class:`StreamReaderWriter` instance. *stream* must be a file-like
734   object. *Reader* and *Writer* must be factory functions or classes providing the
735   :class:`StreamReader` and :class:`StreamWriter` interface resp. Error handling
736   is done in the same way as defined for the stream readers and writers.
737
738:class:`StreamReaderWriter` instances define the combined interfaces of
739:class:`StreamReader` and :class:`StreamWriter` classes. They inherit all other
740methods and attributes from the underlying stream.
741
742
743.. _stream-recoder-objects:
744
745StreamRecoder Objects
746^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
747
748The :class:`StreamRecoder` provide a frontend - backend view of encoding data
749which is sometimes useful when dealing with different encoding environments.
750
751The design is such that one can use the factory functions returned by the
752:func:`lookup` function to construct the instance.
753
754
755.. class:: StreamRecoder(stream, encode, decode, Reader, Writer, errors)
756
757   Creates a :class:`StreamRecoder` instance which implements a two-way conversion:
758   *encode* and *decode* work on the frontend (the input to :meth:`read` and output
759   of :meth:`write`) while *Reader* and *Writer* work on the backend (reading and
760   writing to the stream).
761
762   You can use these objects to do transparent direct recodings from e.g. Latin-1
763   to UTF-8 and back.
764
765   *stream* must be a file-like object.
766
767   *encode*, *decode* must adhere to the :class:`Codec` interface. *Reader*,
768   *Writer* must be factory functions or classes providing objects of the
769   :class:`StreamReader` and :class:`StreamWriter` interface respectively.
770
771   *encode* and *decode* are needed for the frontend translation, *Reader* and
772   *Writer* for the backend translation.  The intermediate format used is
773   determined by the two sets of codecs, e.g. the Unicode codecs will use Unicode
774   as the intermediate encoding.
775
776   Error handling is done in the same way as defined for the stream readers and
777   writers.
778
779
780:class:`StreamRecoder` instances define the combined interfaces of
781:class:`StreamReader` and :class:`StreamWriter` classes. They inherit all other
782methods and attributes from the underlying stream.
783
784
785.. _encodings-overview:
786
787Encodings and Unicode
788---------------------
789
790Unicode strings are stored internally as sequences of code points (to be precise
791as :c:type:`Py_UNICODE` arrays). Depending on the way Python is compiled (either
792via ``--enable-unicode=ucs2`` or ``--enable-unicode=ucs4``, with the
793former being the default) :c:type:`Py_UNICODE` is either a 16-bit or 32-bit data
794type. Once a Unicode object is used outside of CPU and memory, CPU endianness
795and how these arrays are stored as bytes become an issue.  Transforming a
796unicode object into a sequence of bytes is called encoding and recreating the
797unicode object from the sequence of bytes is known as decoding.  There are many
798different methods for how this transformation can be done (these methods are
799also called encodings). The simplest method is to map the code points 0--255 to
800the bytes ``0x0``--``0xff``. This means that a unicode object that contains
801code points above ``U+00FF`` can't be encoded with this method (which is called
802``'latin-1'`` or ``'iso-8859-1'``). :func:`unicode.encode` will raise a
803:exc:`UnicodeEncodeError` that looks like this: ``UnicodeEncodeError: 'latin-1'
804codec can't encode character u'\u1234' in position 3: ordinal not in
805range(256)``.
806
807There's another group of encodings (the so called charmap encodings) that choose
808a different subset of all unicode code points and how these code points are
809mapped to the bytes ``0x0``--``0xff``. To see how this is done simply open
810e.g. :file:`encodings/cp1252.py` (which is an encoding that is used primarily on
811Windows). There's a string constant with 256 characters that shows you which
812character is mapped to which byte value.
813
814All of these encodings can only encode 256 of the 1114112 code points
815defined in unicode. A simple and straightforward way that can store each Unicode
816code point, is to store each code point as four consecutive bytes. There are two
817possibilities: store the bytes in big endian or in little endian order. These
818two encodings are called ``UTF-32-BE`` and ``UTF-32-LE`` respectively. Their
819disadvantage is that if e.g. you use ``UTF-32-BE`` on a little endian machine you
820will always have to swap bytes on encoding and decoding. ``UTF-32`` avoids this
821problem: bytes will always be in natural endianness. When these bytes are read
822by a CPU with a different endianness, then bytes have to be swapped though. To
823be able to detect the endianness of a ``UTF-16`` or ``UTF-32`` byte sequence,
824there's the so called BOM ("Byte Order Mark"). This is the Unicode character
825``U+FEFF``. This character can be prepended to every ``UTF-16`` or ``UTF-32``
826byte sequence. The byte swapped version of this character (``0xFFFE``) is an
827illegal character that may not appear in a Unicode text. So when the
828first character in an ``UTF-16`` or ``UTF-32`` byte sequence
829appears to be a ``U+FFFE`` the bytes have to be swapped on decoding.
830Unfortunately the character ``U+FEFF`` had a second purpose as
831a ``ZERO WIDTH NO-BREAK SPACE``: a character that has no width and doesn't allow
832a word to be split. It can e.g. be used to give hints to a ligature algorithm.
833With Unicode 4.0 using ``U+FEFF`` as a ``ZERO WIDTH NO-BREAK SPACE`` has been
834deprecated (with ``U+2060`` (``WORD JOINER``) assuming this role). Nevertheless
835Unicode software still must be able to handle ``U+FEFF`` in both roles: as a BOM
836it's a device to determine the storage layout of the encoded bytes, and vanishes
837once the byte sequence has been decoded into a Unicode string; as a ``ZERO WIDTH
838NO-BREAK SPACE`` it's a normal character that will be decoded like any other.
839
840There's another encoding that is able to encoding the full range of Unicode
841characters: UTF-8. UTF-8 is an 8-bit encoding, which means there are no issues
842with byte order in UTF-8. Each byte in a UTF-8 byte sequence consists of two
843parts: marker bits (the most significant bits) and payload bits. The marker bits
844are a sequence of zero to four ``1`` bits followed by a ``0`` bit. Unicode characters are
845encoded like this (with x being payload bits, which when concatenated give the
846Unicode character):
847
848+-----------------------------------+----------------------------------------------+
849| Range                             | Encoding                                     |
850+===================================+==============================================+
851| ``U-00000000`` ... ``U-0000007F`` | 0xxxxxxx                                     |
852+-----------------------------------+----------------------------------------------+
853| ``U-00000080`` ... ``U-000007FF`` | 110xxxxx 10xxxxxx                            |
854+-----------------------------------+----------------------------------------------+
855| ``U-00000800`` ... ``U-0000FFFF`` | 1110xxxx 10xxxxxx 10xxxxxx                   |
856+-----------------------------------+----------------------------------------------+
857| ``U-00010000`` ... ``U-0010FFFF`` | 11110xxx 10xxxxxx 10xxxxxx 10xxxxxx          |
858+-----------------------------------+----------------------------------------------+
859
860The least significant bit of the Unicode character is the rightmost x bit.
861
862As UTF-8 is an 8-bit encoding no BOM is required and any ``U+FEFF`` character in
863the decoded Unicode string (even if it's the first character) is treated as a
864``ZERO WIDTH NO-BREAK SPACE``.
865
866Without external information it's impossible to reliably determine which
867encoding was used for encoding a Unicode string. Each charmap encoding can
868decode any random byte sequence. However that's not possible with UTF-8, as
869UTF-8 byte sequences have a structure that doesn't allow arbitrary byte
870sequences. To increase the reliability with which a UTF-8 encoding can be
871detected, Microsoft invented a variant of UTF-8 (that Python 2.5 calls
872``"utf-8-sig"``) for its Notepad program: Before any of the Unicode characters
873is written to the file, a UTF-8 encoded BOM (which looks like this as a byte
874sequence: ``0xef``, ``0xbb``, ``0xbf``) is written. As it's rather improbable
875that any charmap encoded file starts with these byte values (which would e.g.
876map to
877
878   | LATIN SMALL LETTER I WITH DIAERESIS
879   | RIGHT-POINTING DOUBLE ANGLE QUOTATION MARK
880   | INVERTED QUESTION MARK
881
882in iso-8859-1), this increases the probability that a ``utf-8-sig`` encoding can be
883correctly guessed from the byte sequence. So here the BOM is not used to be able
884to determine the byte order used for generating the byte sequence, but as a
885signature that helps in guessing the encoding. On encoding the utf-8-sig codec
886will write ``0xef``, ``0xbb``, ``0xbf`` as the first three bytes to the file. On
887decoding ``utf-8-sig`` will skip those three bytes if they appear as the first
888three bytes in the file.  In UTF-8, the use of the BOM is discouraged and
889should generally be avoided.
890
891
892.. _standard-encodings:
893
894Standard Encodings
895------------------
896
897Python comes with a number of codecs built-in, either implemented as C functions
898or with dictionaries as mapping tables. The following table lists the codecs by
899name, together with a few common aliases, and the languages for which the
900encoding is likely used. Neither the list of aliases nor the list of languages
901is meant to be exhaustive. Notice that spelling alternatives that only differ in
902case or use a hyphen instead of an underscore are also valid aliases; therefore,
903e.g. ``'utf-8'`` is a valid alias for the ``'utf_8'`` codec.
904
905Many of the character sets support the same languages. They vary in individual
906characters (e.g. whether the EURO SIGN is supported or not), and in the
907assignment of characters to code positions. For the European languages in
908particular, the following variants typically exist:
909
910* an ISO 8859 codeset
911
912* a Microsoft Windows code page, which is typically derived from an 8859 codeset,
913  but replaces control characters with additional graphic characters
914
915* an IBM EBCDIC code page
916
917* an IBM PC code page, which is ASCII compatible
918
919.. tabularcolumns:: |l|p{0.3\linewidth}|p{0.3\linewidth}|
920
921+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
922| Codec           | Aliases                        | Languages                      |
923+=================+================================+================================+
924| ascii           | 646, us-ascii                  | English                        |
925+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
926| big5            | big5-tw, csbig5                | Traditional Chinese            |
927+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
928| big5hkscs       | big5-hkscs, hkscs              | Traditional Chinese            |
929+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
930| cp037           | IBM037, IBM039                 | English                        |
931+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
932| cp424           | EBCDIC-CP-HE, IBM424           | Hebrew                         |
933+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
934| cp437           | 437, IBM437                    | English                        |
935+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
936| cp500           | EBCDIC-CP-BE, EBCDIC-CP-CH,    | Western Europe                 |
937|                 | IBM500                         |                                |
938+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
939| cp720           |                                | Arabic                         |
940+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
941| cp737           |                                | Greek                          |
942+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
943| cp775           | IBM775                         | Baltic languages               |
944+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
945| cp850           | 850, IBM850                    | Western Europe                 |
946+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
947| cp852           | 852, IBM852                    | Central and Eastern Europe     |
948+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
949| cp855           | 855, IBM855                    | Bulgarian, Byelorussian,       |
950|                 |                                | Macedonian, Russian, Serbian   |
951+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
952| cp856           |                                | Hebrew                         |
953+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
954| cp857           | 857, IBM857                    | Turkish                        |
955+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
956| cp858           | 858, IBM858                    | Western Europe                 |
957+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
958| cp860           | 860, IBM860                    | Portuguese                     |
959+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
960| cp861           | 861, CP-IS, IBM861             | Icelandic                      |
961+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
962| cp862           | 862, IBM862                    | Hebrew                         |
963+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
964| cp863           | 863, IBM863                    | Canadian                       |
965+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
966| cp864           | IBM864                         | Arabic                         |
967+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
968| cp865           | 865, IBM865                    | Danish, Norwegian              |
969+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
970| cp866           | 866, IBM866                    | Russian                        |
971+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
972| cp869           | 869, CP-GR, IBM869             | Greek                          |
973+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
974| cp874           |                                | Thai                           |
975+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
976| cp875           |                                | Greek                          |
977+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
978| cp932           | 932, ms932, mskanji, ms-kanji  | Japanese                       |
979+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
980| cp949           | 949, ms949, uhc                | Korean                         |
981+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
982| cp950           | 950, ms950                     | Traditional Chinese            |
983+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
984| cp1006          |                                | Urdu                           |
985+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
986| cp1026          | ibm1026                        | Turkish                        |
987+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
988| cp1140          | ibm1140                        | Western Europe                 |
989+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
990| cp1250          | windows-1250                   | Central and Eastern Europe     |
991+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
992| cp1251          | windows-1251                   | Bulgarian, Byelorussian,       |
993|                 |                                | Macedonian, Russian, Serbian   |
994+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
995| cp1252          | windows-1252                   | Western Europe                 |
996+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
997| cp1253          | windows-1253                   | Greek                          |
998+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
999| cp1254          | windows-1254                   | Turkish                        |
1000+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1001| cp1255          | windows-1255                   | Hebrew                         |
1002+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1003| cp1256          | windows-1256                   | Arabic                         |
1004+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1005| cp1257          | windows-1257                   | Baltic languages               |
1006+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1007| cp1258          | windows-1258                   | Vietnamese                     |
1008+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1009| euc_jp          | eucjp, ujis, u-jis             | Japanese                       |
1010+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1011| euc_jis_2004    | jisx0213, eucjis2004           | Japanese                       |
1012+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1013| euc_jisx0213    | eucjisx0213                    | Japanese                       |
1014+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1015| euc_kr          | euckr, korean, ksc5601,        | Korean                         |
1016|                 | ks_c-5601, ks_c-5601-1987,     |                                |
1017|                 | ksx1001, ks_x-1001             |                                |
1018+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1019| gb2312          | chinese, csiso58gb231280, euc- | Simplified Chinese             |
1020|                 | cn, euccn, eucgb2312-cn,       |                                |
1021|                 | gb2312-1980, gb2312-80, iso-   |                                |
1022|                 | ir-58                          |                                |
1023+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1024| gbk             | 936, cp936, ms936              | Unified Chinese                |
1025+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1026| gb18030         | gb18030-2000                   | Unified Chinese                |
1027+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1028| hz              | hzgb, hz-gb, hz-gb-2312        | Simplified Chinese             |
1029+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1030| iso2022_jp      | csiso2022jp, iso2022jp,        | Japanese                       |
1031|                 | iso-2022-jp                    |                                |
1032+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1033| iso2022_jp_1    | iso2022jp-1, iso-2022-jp-1     | Japanese                       |
1034+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1035| iso2022_jp_2    | iso2022jp-2, iso-2022-jp-2     | Japanese, Korean, Simplified   |
1036|                 |                                | Chinese, Western Europe, Greek |
1037+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1038| iso2022_jp_2004 | iso2022jp-2004,                | Japanese                       |
1039|                 | iso-2022-jp-2004               |                                |
1040+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1041| iso2022_jp_3    | iso2022jp-3, iso-2022-jp-3     | Japanese                       |
1042+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1043| iso2022_jp_ext  | iso2022jp-ext, iso-2022-jp-ext | Japanese                       |
1044+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1045| iso2022_kr      | csiso2022kr, iso2022kr,        | Korean                         |
1046|                 | iso-2022-kr                    |                                |
1047+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1048| latin_1         | iso-8859-1, iso8859-1, 8859,   | West Europe                    |
1049|                 | cp819, latin, latin1, L1       |                                |
1050+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1051| iso8859_2       | iso-8859-2, latin2, L2         | Central and Eastern Europe     |
1052+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1053| iso8859_3       | iso-8859-3, latin3, L3         | Esperanto, Maltese             |
1054+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1055| iso8859_4       | iso-8859-4, latin4, L4         | Baltic languages               |
1056+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1057| iso8859_5       | iso-8859-5, cyrillic           | Bulgarian, Byelorussian,       |
1058|                 |                                | Macedonian, Russian, Serbian   |
1059+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1060| iso8859_6       | iso-8859-6, arabic             | Arabic                         |
1061+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1062| iso8859_7       | iso-8859-7, greek, greek8      | Greek                          |
1063+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1064| iso8859_8       | iso-8859-8, hebrew             | Hebrew                         |
1065+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1066| iso8859_9       | iso-8859-9, latin5, L5         | Turkish                        |
1067+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1068| iso8859_10      | iso-8859-10, latin6, L6        | Nordic languages               |
1069+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1070| iso8859_11      | iso-8859-11, thai              | Thai languages                 |
1071+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1072| iso8859_13      | iso-8859-13, latin7, L7        | Baltic languages               |
1073+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1074| iso8859_14      | iso-8859-14, latin8, L8        | Celtic languages               |
1075+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1076| iso8859_15      | iso-8859-15, latin9, L9        | Western Europe                 |
1077+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1078| iso8859_16      | iso-8859-16, latin10, L10      | South-Eastern Europe           |
1079+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1080| johab           | cp1361, ms1361                 | Korean                         |
1081+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1082| koi8_r          |                                | Russian                        |
1083+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1084| koi8_u          |                                | Ukrainian                      |
1085+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1086| mac_cyrillic    | maccyrillic                    | Bulgarian, Byelorussian,       |
1087|                 |                                | Macedonian, Russian, Serbian   |
1088+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1089| mac_greek       | macgreek                       | Greek                          |
1090+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1091| mac_iceland     | maciceland                     | Icelandic                      |
1092+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1093| mac_latin2      | maclatin2, maccentraleurope    | Central and Eastern Europe     |
1094+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1095| mac_roman       | macroman                       | Western Europe                 |
1096+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1097| mac_turkish     | macturkish                     | Turkish                        |
1098+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1099| ptcp154         | csptcp154, pt154, cp154,       | Kazakh                         |
1100|                 | cyrillic-asian                 |                                |
1101+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1102| shift_jis       | csshiftjis, shiftjis, sjis,    | Japanese                       |
1103|                 | s_jis                          |                                |
1104+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1105| shift_jis_2004  | shiftjis2004, sjis_2004,       | Japanese                       |
1106|                 | sjis2004                       |                                |
1107+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1108| shift_jisx0213  | shiftjisx0213, sjisx0213,      | Japanese                       |
1109|                 | s_jisx0213                     |                                |
1110+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1111| utf_32          | U32, utf32                     | all languages                  |
1112+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1113| utf_32_be       | UTF-32BE                       | all languages                  |
1114+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1115| utf_32_le       | UTF-32LE                       | all languages                  |
1116+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1117| utf_16          | U16, utf16                     | all languages                  |
1118+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1119| utf_16_be       | UTF-16BE                       | all languages (BMP only)       |
1120+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1121| utf_16_le       | UTF-16LE                       | all languages (BMP only)       |
1122+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1123| utf_7           | U7, unicode-1-1-utf-7          | all languages                  |
1124+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1125| utf_8           | U8, UTF, utf8                  | all languages                  |
1126+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1127| utf_8_sig       |                                | all languages                  |
1128+-----------------+--------------------------------+--------------------------------+
1129
1130Python Specific Encodings
1131-------------------------
1132
1133A number of predefined codecs are specific to Python, so their codec names have
1134no meaning outside Python.  These are listed in the tables below based on the
1135expected input and output types (note that while text encodings are the most
1136common use case for codecs, the underlying codec infrastructure supports
1137arbitrary data transforms rather than just text encodings).  For asymmetric
1138codecs, the stated purpose describes the encoding direction.
1139
1140The following codecs provide unicode-to-str encoding [#encoding-note]_ and
1141str-to-unicode decoding [#decoding-note]_, similar to the Unicode text
1142encodings.
1143
1144.. tabularcolumns:: |l|L|L|
1145
1146+--------------------+---------------------------+---------------------------+
1147| Codec              | Aliases                   | Purpose                   |
1148+====================+===========================+===========================+
1149| idna               |                           | Implements :rfc:`3490`,   |
1150|                    |                           | see also                  |
1151|                    |                           | :mod:`encodings.idna`     |
1152+--------------------+---------------------------+---------------------------+
1153| mbcs               | dbcs                      | Windows only: Encode      |
1154|                    |                           | operand according to the  |
1155|                    |                           | ANSI codepage (CP_ACP)    |
1156+--------------------+---------------------------+---------------------------+
1157| palmos             |                           | Encoding of PalmOS 3.5    |
1158+--------------------+---------------------------+---------------------------+
1159| punycode           |                           | Implements :rfc:`3492`    |
1160+--------------------+---------------------------+---------------------------+
1161| raw_unicode_escape |                           | Produce a string that is  |
1162|                    |                           | suitable as raw Unicode   |
1163|                    |                           | literal in Python source  |
1164|                    |                           | code                      |
1165+--------------------+---------------------------+---------------------------+
1166| rot_13             | rot13                     | Returns the Caesar-cypher |
1167|                    |                           | encryption of the operand |
1168+--------------------+---------------------------+---------------------------+
1169| undefined          |                           | Raise an exception for    |
1170|                    |                           | all conversions. Can be   |
1171|                    |                           | used as the system        |
1172|                    |                           | encoding if no automatic  |
1173|                    |                           | :term:`coercion` between  |
1174|                    |                           | byte and Unicode strings  |
1175|                    |                           | is desired.               |
1176+--------------------+---------------------------+---------------------------+
1177| unicode_escape     |                           | Produce a string that is  |
1178|                    |                           | suitable as Unicode       |
1179|                    |                           | literal in Python source  |
1180|                    |                           | code                      |
1181+--------------------+---------------------------+---------------------------+
1182| unicode_internal   |                           | Return the internal       |
1183|                    |                           | representation of the     |
1184|                    |                           | operand                   |
1185+--------------------+---------------------------+---------------------------+
1186
1187.. versionadded:: 2.3
1188   The ``idna`` and ``punycode`` encodings.
1189
1190The following codecs provide str-to-str encoding and decoding
1191[#decoding-note]_.
1192
1193.. tabularcolumns:: |l|L|L|L|
1194
1195+--------------------+---------------------------+---------------------------+------------------------------+
1196| Codec              | Aliases                   | Purpose                   | Encoder/decoder              |
1197+====================+===========================+===========================+==============================+
1198| base64_codec       | base64, base-64           | Convert operand to        | :meth:`base64.encodestring`, |
1199|                    |                           | multiline MIME base64 (the| :meth:`base64.decodestring`  |
1200|                    |                           | result always includes a  |                              |
1201|                    |                           | trailing ``'\n'``)        |                              |
1202+--------------------+---------------------------+---------------------------+------------------------------+
1203| bz2_codec          | bz2                       | Compress the operand      | :meth:`bz2.compress`,        |
1204|                    |                           | using bz2                 | :meth:`bz2.decompress`       |
1205+--------------------+---------------------------+---------------------------+------------------------------+
1206| hex_codec          | hex                       | Convert operand to        | :meth:`binascii.b2a_hex`,    |
1207|                    |                           | hexadecimal               | :meth:`binascii.a2b_hex`     |
1208|                    |                           | representation, with two  |                              |
1209|                    |                           | digits per byte           |                              |
1210+--------------------+---------------------------+---------------------------+------------------------------+
1211| quopri_codec       | quopri, quoted-printable, | Convert operand to MIME   | :meth:`quopri.encode` with   |
1212|                    | quotedprintable           | quoted printable          | ``quotetabs=True``,          |
1213|                    |                           |                           | :meth:`quopri.decode`        |
1214+--------------------+---------------------------+---------------------------+------------------------------+
1215| string_escape      |                           | Produce a string that is  |                              |
1216|                    |                           | suitable as string        |                              |
1217|                    |                           | literal in Python source  |                              |
1218|                    |                           | code                      |                              |
1219+--------------------+---------------------------+---------------------------+------------------------------+
1220| uu_codec           | uu                        | Convert the operand using | :meth:`uu.encode`,           |
1221|                    |                           | uuencode                  | :meth:`uu.decode`            |
1222+--------------------+---------------------------+---------------------------+------------------------------+
1223| zlib_codec         | zip, zlib                 | Compress the operand      | :meth:`zlib.compress`,       |
1224|                    |                           | using gzip                | :meth:`zlib.decompress`      |
1225+--------------------+---------------------------+---------------------------+------------------------------+
1226
1227.. [#encoding-note] str objects are also accepted as input in place of unicode
1228   objects.  They are implicitly converted to unicode by decoding them using
1229   the default encoding.  If this conversion fails, it may lead to encoding
1230   operations raising :exc:`UnicodeDecodeError`.
1231
1232.. [#decoding-note] unicode objects are also accepted as input in place of str
1233   objects.  They are implicitly converted to str by encoding them using the
1234   default encoding.  If this conversion fails, it may lead to decoding
1235   operations raising :exc:`UnicodeEncodeError`.
1236
1237
1238:mod:`encodings.idna` --- Internationalized Domain Names in Applications
1239------------------------------------------------------------------------
1240
1241.. module:: encodings.idna
1242   :synopsis: Internationalized Domain Names implementation
1243.. moduleauthor:: Martin v. Löwis
1244
1245.. versionadded:: 2.3
1246
1247This module implements :rfc:`3490` (Internationalized Domain Names in
1248Applications) and :rfc:`3492` (Nameprep: A Stringprep Profile for
1249Internationalized Domain Names (IDN)). It builds upon the ``punycode`` encoding
1250and :mod:`stringprep`.
1251
1252These RFCs together define a protocol to support non-ASCII characters in domain
1253names. A domain name containing non-ASCII characters (such as
1254``www.Alliancefrançaise.nu``) is converted into an ASCII-compatible encoding
1255(ACE, such as ``www.xn--alliancefranaise-npb.nu``). The ACE form of the domain
1256name is then used in all places where arbitrary characters are not allowed by
1257the protocol, such as DNS queries, HTTP :mailheader:`Host` fields, and so
1258on. This conversion is carried out in the application; if possible invisible to
1259the user: The application should transparently convert Unicode domain labels to
1260IDNA on the wire, and convert back ACE labels to Unicode before presenting them
1261to the user.
1262
1263Python supports this conversion in several ways:  the ``idna`` codec performs
1264conversion between Unicode and ACE, separating an input string into labels
1265based on the separator characters defined in `section 3.1`_ (1) of :rfc:`3490`
1266and converting each label to ACE as required, and conversely separating an input
1267byte string into labels based on the ``.`` separator and converting any ACE
1268labels found into unicode.  Furthermore, the :mod:`socket` module
1269transparently converts Unicode host names to ACE, so that applications need not
1270be concerned about converting host names themselves when they pass them to the
1271socket module. On top of that, modules that have host names as function
1272parameters, such as :mod:`httplib` and :mod:`ftplib`, accept Unicode host names
1273(:mod:`httplib` then also transparently sends an IDNA hostname in the
1274:mailheader:`Host` field if it sends that field at all).
1275
1276.. _section 3.1: https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc3490#section-3.1
1277
1278When receiving host names from the wire (such as in reverse name lookup), no
1279automatic conversion to Unicode is performed: Applications wishing to present
1280such host names to the user should decode them to Unicode.
1281
1282The module :mod:`encodings.idna` also implements the nameprep procedure, which
1283performs certain normalizations on host names, to achieve case-insensitivity of
1284international domain names, and to unify similar characters. The nameprep
1285functions can be used directly if desired.
1286
1287
1288.. function:: nameprep(label)
1289
1290   Return the nameprepped version of *label*. The implementation currently assumes
1291   query strings, so ``AllowUnassigned`` is true.
1292
1293
1294.. function:: ToASCII(label)
1295
1296   Convert a label to ASCII, as specified in :rfc:`3490`. ``UseSTD3ASCIIRules`` is
1297   assumed to be false.
1298
1299
1300.. function:: ToUnicode(label)
1301
1302   Convert a label to Unicode, as specified in :rfc:`3490`.
1303
1304
1305:mod:`encodings.utf_8_sig` --- UTF-8 codec with BOM signature
1306-------------------------------------------------------------
1307
1308.. module:: encodings.utf_8_sig
1309   :synopsis: UTF-8 codec with BOM signature
1310.. moduleauthor:: Walter Dörwald
1311
1312.. versionadded:: 2.5
1313
1314This module implements a variant of the UTF-8 codec: On encoding a UTF-8 encoded
1315BOM will be prepended to the UTF-8 encoded bytes. For the stateful encoder this
1316is only done once (on the first write to the byte stream).  For decoding an
1317optional UTF-8 encoded BOM at the start of the data will be skipped.
1318
1319