How to get ° character in a string in python?

Question

How can I get a ° (degree) character into a string?

Answer 1

Above answers assume that UTF8 encoding can safely be used - this one is specifically targetted for Windows.

The Windows console normaly uses CP850 encoding and not utf-8, so if you try to use a source file utf8-encoded, you get those 2 (incorrect) characters ┬░ instead of a degree °.

Demonstration (using python 2.7 in a windows console):

deg = u'\xb0`  # utf code for degree
print deg.encode('utf8')

effectively outputs ┬░.

Fix: just force the correct encoding (or better use unicode):

local_encoding = 'cp850'    # adapt for other encodings
deg = u'\xb0'.encode(local_encoding)
print deg

or if you use a source file that explicitely defines an encoding:

# -*- coding: utf-8 -*-
local_encoding = 'cp850'  # adapt for other encodings
print " The current temperature in the country/city you've entered is " + temp_in_county_or_city + "°C.".decode('utf8').encode(local_encoding)