After having read the discussion about the issue 1602, http://bugs.python.org/issue1602, I came to the idea to test Python with the PowerShell. I thought, it could help and manage "unicode" better than the std "dosbox" does
My experience with PowerShell is closed to zero, so take the following as a flat raw information. 1) Setup the coding in PowerShell (font: Consolas) PS D:\jm> $OutputEncoding IsSingleByte : True BodyName : us-ascii EncodingName : US-ASCII HeaderName : us-ascii WebName : us-ascii WindowsCodePage : 1252 IsBrowserDisplay : False IsBrowserSave : False IsMailNewsDisplay : True IsMailNewsSave : True EncoderFallback : System.Text.EncoderReplacementFallback DecoderFallback : System.Text.DecoderReplacementFallback IsReadOnly : True CodePage : 20127 PS D:\jm> chcp 65001 Page de codes active : 65001 PS D:\jm> $OutputEncoding = [Console]::OutputEncoding PS D:\jm> $OutputEncoding BodyName : utf-8 EncodingName : Unicode (UTF-8) HeaderName : utf-8 WebName : utf-8 WindowsCodePage : 1200 IsBrowserDisplay : True IsBrowserSave : True IsMailNewsDisplay : True IsMailNewsSave : True IsSingleByte : False EncoderFallback : System.Text.EncoderReplacementFallback DecoderFallback : System.Text.DecoderReplacementFallback IsReadOnly : True CodePage : 65001 So far, so good. It seems I can enter and display "unicode characters" (as opposed to cp850). PS D:\jm> echo 'abc逜Üß' abc逜Üß PS D:\jm> chcp Page de codes active : 65001 PS D:\jm> 2) Python test PS D:\jm> c:\python31\python.exe Fatal Python error: Py_Initialize: can't initialize sys standard streams LookupError: unknown encoding: cp65001 This application has requested the Runtime to terminate it in an unusual way. Please contact the application's support team for more information. PS D:\jm> Obviously and expectedly Python does not recognize cp65001. That's not the problem. The main concern is, Python crashes with the usual msgbox, "python.exe has stopped working ..." . win7 pro (32 bits), Swiss French setup, cp850/cp1252, Python 3.1.2 . Take this a raw information and do not ask me what's happen behind the scene. Last minute info: Python 3.2.rc1: same behaviour. jmf -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list