First, some background: I'm developing a web application using Python. All of my (text) files are currently stored in UTF-8 with the BOM. This includes all my HTML templates and CSS files. These resources are stored as binary data (BOM and all) in my DB.
When I retrieve the templates from the DB, I decode them using template.decode('utf-8')
. When the HTML arrives in the browser, the BOM is present at the beginning of the HTTP response body. This generates a very interesting error in Chrome:
Extra <html> encountered. Migrating attributes back to the original <html> element and ignoring the tag.
Chrome seems to generate an <html>
tag automatically when it sees the BOM and mistakes it for content, making the real <html>
tag an error.
So, using Python, what is the best way to remove the BOM from my UTF-8 encoded templates (if it exists -- I can't guarantee this in the future)?
For other text-based files like CSS, will major browsers correctly interpret (or ignore) the BOM? They are being sent as plain binary data without .decode('utf-8')
.
Note: I am using Python 2.5.
Thanks!
Since you state:
All of my (text) files are currently
stored in UTF-8 with the BOM
then use the 'utf-8-sig' codec to decode them:
>>> s = u'Hello, world!'.encode('utf-8-sig')
>>> s
'\xef\xbb\xbfHello, world!'
>>> s.decode('utf-8-sig')
u'Hello, world!'
It automatically removes the expected BOM, and works correctly if the BOM is not present as well.
Check the first character after decoding to see if it's the BOM:
if u.startswith(u'\ufeff'):
u = u[1:]
The previously-accepted answer is WRONG.
u'\ufffe'
is not a character. If you get it in a unicode string somebody has stuffed up mightily.
The BOM (aka ZERO WIDTH NO-BREAK SPACE) is u'\ufeff'
>>> UNICODE_BOM = u'\N{ZERO WIDTH NO-BREAK SPACE}'
>>> UNICODE_BOM
u'\ufeff'
>>>
Read this (Ctrl-F search for BOM) and this and this (Ctrl-F search for BOM).
Here's a correct and typo/braino-resistant answer:
Decode your input into unicode_str
. Then do this:
# If I mistype the following, it's very likely to cause a SyntaxError.
UNICODE_BOM = u'\N{ZERO WIDTH NO-BREAK SPACE}'
if unicode_str and unicode_str[0] == UNICODE_BOM:
unicode_str = unicode_str[1:]
Bonus: using a named constant gives your readers a bit more of a clue to what is going on than does a collection of seemingly-arbitrary hexoglyphics.
Update Unfortunately there seems to be no suitable named constant in the standard Python library.
Alas, the codecs module provides only "a snare and a delusion":
>>> import pprint, codecs
>>> pprint.pprint([(k, getattr(codecs, k)) for k in dir(codecs) if k.startswith('BOM')])
[('BOM', '\xff\xfe'), #### aarrgghh!! ####
('BOM32_BE', '\xfe\xff'),
('BOM32_LE', '\xff\xfe'),
('BOM64_BE', '\x00\x00\xfe\xff'),
('BOM64_LE', '\xff\xfe\x00\x00'),
('BOM_BE', '\xfe\xff'),
('BOM_LE', '\xff\xfe'),
('BOM_UTF16', '\xff\xfe'),
('BOM_UTF16_BE', '\xfe\xff'),
('BOM_UTF16_LE', '\xff\xfe'),
('BOM_UTF32', '\xff\xfe\x00\x00'),
('BOM_UTF32_BE', '\x00\x00\xfe\xff'),
('BOM_UTF32_LE', '\xff\xfe\x00\x00'),
('BOM_UTF8', '\xef\xbb\xbf')]
>>>
Update 2 If you have not yet decoded your input, and wish to check it for a BOM, you need to check for TWO different BOMs for UTF-16 and at least TWO different BOMs for UTF-32. If there was only one way each, then you wouldn't need a BOM, would you?
Here verbatim unprettified from my own code is my solution to this:
def check_for_bom(s):
bom_info = (
('\xFF\xFE\x00\x00', 4, 'UTF-32LE'),
('\x00\x00\xFE\xFF', 4, 'UTF-32BE'),
('\xEF\xBB\xBF', 3, 'UTF-8'),
('\xFF\xFE', 2, 'UTF-16LE'),
('\xFE\xFF', 2, 'UTF-16BE'),
)
for sig, siglen, enc in bom_info:
if s.startswith(sig):
return enc, siglen
return None, 0
The input s
should be at least the first 4 bytes of your input. It returns the encoding that can be used to decode the post-BOM part of your input, plus the length of the BOM (if any).
If you are paranoid, you could allow for another 2 (non-standard) UTF-32 orderings, but Python doesn't supply an encoding for them and I've never heard of an actual occurrence, so I don't bother.
You can use something similar to remove BOM:
import os, codecs
def remove_bom_from_file(filename, newfilename):
if os.path.isfile(filename):
# open file
f = open(filename,'rb')
# read first 4 bytes
header = f.read(4)
# check if we have BOM...
bom_len = 0
encodings = [ ( codecs.BOM_UTF32, 4 ),
( codecs.BOM_UTF16, 2 ),
( codecs.BOM_UTF8, 3 ) ]
# ... and remove appropriate number of bytes
for h, l in encodings:
if header.startswith(h):
bom_len = l
break
f.seek(0)
f.read(bom_len)
# copy the rest of file
contents = f.read()
nf = open(newfilename)
nf.write(contents)
nf.close()