python 2.7 print accents inside a list [duplicate] - python-2.7

Question

If you have a string as below, with unicode chars, you can print it, and get the unescaped version:
>>> s = "äåö"
>>> s
'\xc3\xa4\xc3\xa5\xc3\xb6'
>>> print s
äåö
but if we have a list containing the string above and print it:
>>> s = ['äåö']
>>> s
['\xc3\xa4\xc3\xa5\xc3\xb6']
>>> print s
['\xc3\xa4\xc3\xa5\xc3\xb6']
You still get escaped character sequences. How do you go about to get the content of the list unescaped, is it possible? Like this:
>>> print s
['äåö']
Also, if the strings are of the unicode type, how do you go about doing the same as above?
>>> s = u'åäö'
>>> s
u'\xe5\xe4\xf6'
>>> print s
åäö
>>> s = [u'åäö']
>>> s
[u'\xe5\xe4\xf6']
>>> print s
[u'\xe5\xe4\xf6']

Answer 1

When you print a string, you get the output of the __str__ method of the object - in this case the string without quotes. The __str__ method of a list is different, it creates a string containing the opening and closing [] and the string produced by the __repr__ method of each object contained within. What you're seeing is the difference between __str__ and __repr__.
You can build your own string instead:
print '[' + ','.join("'" + str(x) + "'" for x in s) + ']'
This version should work on both Unicode and byte strings in Python 2:
print u'[' + u','.join(u"'" + unicode(x) + u"'" for x in s) + u']'

Answer 2

Is this satisfactory?
>>> s = ['äåö', 'äå']
>>> print "\n".join(s)
äåö
äå
>>> print ", ".join(s)
äåö, äå
>>> s = [u'åäö']
>>> print ",".join(s)
åäö

Answer 3

In Python 2.x the default is what you're experiencing:
>>> s = ['äåö']
>>> s
['\xc3\xa4\xc3\xa5\xc3\xb6']
In Python 3, however, it displays properly:
>>> s = ['äåö']
>>> s
['äåö']

Answer 4

Another solution
s = ['äåö', 'äå']
encodedlist=', '.join(map(unicode, s))
print(u'[{}]'.format(encodedlist).encode('UTF-8'))
gives
[äåö, äå]

Answer 5

One can use this wrapper class:
#!/usr/bin/python
# -*- coding: utf-8 -*-
class ReprToStrString(str):
def __repr__(self):
return "'" + self.__str__() + "'"
class ReprToStr(object):
def __init__(self, printable):
if isinstance(printable, str):
self._printable = ReprToStrString(printable)
elif isinstance(printable, list):
self._printable = list([ReprToStr(item) for item in printable])
elif isinstance(printable, dict):
self._printable = dict(
[(ReprToStr(key), ReprToStr(value)) for (key, value) in printable.items()])
else:
self._printable = printable
def __repr__(self):
return self._printable.__repr__()
russian1 = ['Валенки', 'Матрёшка']
print russian1
# Output:
# ['\xd0\x92\xd0\xb0\xd0\xbb\xd0\xb5\xd0\xbd\xd0\xba\xd0\xb8', '\xd0\x9c\xd0\xb0\xd1\x82\xd1\x80\xd1\x91\xd1\x88\xd0\xba\xd0\xb0']
print ReprToStr(russian1)
# Output:
# ['Валенки', 'Матрёшка']
russian2 = {'Валенки': 145, 'Матрёшка': 100500}
print russian2
# Output:
# {'\xd0\x92\xd0\xb0\xd0\xbb\xd0\xb5\xd0\xbd\xd0\xba\xd0\xb8': 145, '\xd0\x9c\xd0\xb0\xd1\x82\xd1\x80\xd1\x91\xd1\x88\xd0\xba\xd0\xb0': 100500}
print ReprToStr(russian2)
# Output:
# {'Матрёшка': 100500, 'Валенки': 145}