Print escaped representation of a str

Question

How do I print the escaped representation of a string, for example if I have:

s = "String:\tA"

I wish to output:

String:\tA

on the screen instead of

String: A

The equivalent function in java is:

String xy = org.apache.commons.lang.StringEscapeUtils.escapeJava(yourString); System.out.println(xy);

This question may be of interest to you, though the solution escapes a bit more than what you want.. — m01
– m01, Commented Feb 19, 2013 at 15:19

Martijn Pieters · Accepted Answer · 2013-02-19 15:33:24Z

You want to encode the string with the string_escape codec:

print s.encode('string_escape')

or you can use the repr() function, which will turn a string into it's python literal representation including the quotes:

print repr(s)

Demonstration:

>>> s = "String:\tA" >>> print s.encode('string_escape') String:\tA >>> print repr(s) 'String:\tA'

In Python 3, you'd be looking for the unicode_escape codec instead:

print(s.encode('unicode_escape'))

which will print a bytes value. To turn that back into a unicode value, just decode from ASCII:

>>> s = "String:\tA" >>> print(s.encode('unicode_escape')) b'String:\\tA' >>> print(s.encode('unicode_escape').decode('ASCII')) String:\tA

mgilson · Accepted Answer · 2013-02-19 15:17:54Z

you can use repr:

print repr(s)

demo

>>> s = "String:\tA" >>> print repr(s) 'String:\tA'

This will give the quotes -- but you can slice those off easily:

>>> print repr(s)[1:-1] String:\tA

Sash · Accepted Answer · 2013-02-19 15:18:26Z

0

Give print repr(string) a shot

answered Feb 19, 2013 at 15:18

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Comments

Baz · Accepted Answer · 2013-02-19 15:18:34Z

0

As ever, its easy in python:

print(repr(s))

answered Feb 19, 2013 at 15:18

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salezica · Accepted Answer · 2013-02-19 15:19:34Z

print uses str, which processes escapes. You want repr.

>>> a = "Hello\tbye\n" >>> print str(a) Hello bye >>> print repr(a) 'Hello\tbye\n'