[Python-Dev] Python3 "complexity"

[Paul Moore]

On 10 January 2014 12:19, M.-A. Lemburg <mal at egenix.com> wrote:
> Just a word of caution:
>
> Using the 'latin-1' to mean unknown encoding can easily result
> in Mojibake (unreadable text) entering your application with
> dangerous effects on your other text data.

Agreed. The latin-1 suggestion is purely for people who object to
learning how to handle the encodings in their data more accurately.
That's not a criticism, wanting to avoid getting sidetracked into
understanding encodings when porting a personal script is a classic
"practicality vs purity" situation. Current responses to people with
encoding issues tend towards an idealistic "you should understand your
data better" position, which while true in the abstract is not always
what the requester wants to hear.

Paul.