[Python-Dev] Printing and __unicode__

[Martin v. Loewis]

In c.l.p, Henry Thompson wondered why printing would ignore
__unicode__. Consider this:

import codecs
stream = codecs.open("/tmp/bla","w", encoding="cp1252")

class Foo:
    def __unicode__(self):
        return u"\N{EURO SIGN}"

foo = Foo()
print >>stream, foo

This succeeds, but /tmp/bla now contains

<__main__.Foo instance at 0x4026e68c>

He argues that it instead should invoke __unicode__, similar to
invoking automatically __str__ when writing to a byte stream.

I agree that this is desirable, but I wonder what the best approach
would be:

A. Printing tries __str__, __unicode__, and __repr__, in this order.

B. A file indicates "unicode-awareness" somehow. For a Unicode-aware
   file, it tries __unicode__, __str__, and __repr__, in order.

C. A file indicates that it is "unicode-requiring" somehow. For a
   unicode-requiring file, it tries __unicode__; if that fails, it
   tries __repr__ and converts the result to Unicode.

Which of these, if any, would be most Pythonish?

Regards,
Martin