PEP 277 (unicode filenames): please review

[Terry Reedy]

"Martin v. Löwis" <loewis at informatik.hu-berlin.de> wrote in message
news:j47kiwmgl9.fsf at informatik.hu-berlin.de...
> http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0277.html
>
> The PEP describes a Windows-only change to Unicode in file names: On
> Windows NT/2k/XP, Python would allow arbitrary Unicode strings as
file
> names and pass them to the OS, instead of converting them to CP_ACP
> first. This applies to open() and all os functions that accept
> filenames.

Does 'CP_ACP' == ''mbcs' encoding'?  (Never heard of either.)

PEP looks straightforward.  'Of course' Python should be able to
access all files.

Question: is it NT+ only because other OSes don't (yet) allow unicode
filenames (in which case this is trial run for future when they do) or
because access to such is transparent?

Two issues not addressed:

1.  Will this break any code?  If so, need transition plan.

2. What does 'import <non-latin-unicode-name>' do?  I presume
exception, but which?

I suspect this PEP will increase pressure for unicode identifiers.

Terry J. Reedy