[Python-ideas] Python 3000 TIOBE -3%

[Stephen J. Turnbull]

Greg Ewing writes:

 > Maybe there should be a real data type [parallel to str and bytes
 > that mixes str and bytes], or a flag on the unicode type.

-1.  This is yesterday's problem.  It still hurts today; we need
workarounds.  But it's going to be less and less important as time
goes on, because nobody can afford one-locale software anymore, and
the cheapest way to be multilocale is to process in Unicode, and
insist on Unicode on input and output.

The unknown encoding problem is not one with a generally acceptable
solution.  That's why Unicode was invented.  To "solve" the problem by
ensuring it doesn't occur in the first place.