[Python-Dev] Re: Relaxing Unicode error handling (original) (raw)

Martin v. Loewis martin at v.loewis.de
Sat Jan 3 15:06:30 EST 2004

Aahz wrote:

Library writers should avoid using it. If the application uses it, libraries should not notice, since they won't get exceptions that they should not have gotten in the first place.

What if a library wants to ensure that it does get appropriate exceptions so that it can handle them?

It would explicitly need to encode/decode strings as us-ascii, instead of relying on the default encoding (which it shouldn't do in the first place).

Right, but if different parts of an application are turning this off and on, you'll get invalid results, such as unexpected exceptions. The question isn't whether Python's internal state will be consistent, but whether applications can ensure a consistent state for themselves.

When you turn this on, you will get invalid results, period. This is precisely what people request.

Regards, Martin

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