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<section id="module-quopri">
<span id="quopri-encode-and-decode-mime-quoted-printable-data"></span><h1><code class="xref py py-mod docutils literal notranslate"><span class="pre">quopri</span></code> — Encode and decode MIME quoted-printable data<a class="headerlink" href="#module-quopri" title="Link to this heading">¶</a></h1>
<p><strong>Source code:</strong> <a class="extlink-source reference external" href="https://github.com/python/cpython/tree/3.13/Lib/quopri.py">Lib/quopri.py</a></p>
<hr class="docutils" id="index-0" />
<p>This module performs quoted-printable transport encoding and decoding, as
defined in <span class="target" id="index-1"></span><a class="rfc reference external" href="https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc1521.html"><strong>RFC 1521</strong></a>: “MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions) Part One:
Mechanisms for Specifying and Describing the Format of Internet Message Bodies”.
The quoted-printable encoding is designed for data where there are relatively
few nonprintable characters; the base64 encoding scheme available via the
<a class="reference internal" href="base64.html#module-base64" title="base64: RFC 4648: Base16, Base32, Base64 Data Encodings; Base85 and Ascii85"><code class="xref py py-mod docutils literal notranslate"><span class="pre">base64</span></code></a> module is more compact if there are many such characters, as when
sending a graphics file.</p>
<dl class="py function">
<dt class="sig sig-object py" id="quopri.decode">
<span class="sig-prename descclassname"><span class="pre">quopri.</span></span><span class="sig-name descname"><span class="pre">decode</span></span><span class="sig-paren">(</span><em class="sig-param"><span class="n"><span class="pre">input</span></span></em>, <em class="sig-param"><span class="n"><span class="pre">output</span></span></em>, <em class="sig-param"><span class="n"><span class="pre">header</span></span><span class="o"><span class="pre">=</span></span><span class="default_value"><span class="pre">False</span></span></em><span class="sig-paren">)</span><a class="headerlink" href="#quopri.decode" title="Link to this definition">¶</a></dt>
<dd><p>Decode the contents of the <em>input</em> file and write the resulting decoded binary
data to the <em>output</em> file. <em>input</em> and <em>output</em> must be <a class="reference internal" href="../glossary.html#term-file-object"><span class="xref std std-term">binary file objects</span></a>. If the optional argument <em>header</em> is present and true, underscore
will be decoded as space. This is used to decode “Q”-encoded headers as
described in <span class="target" id="index-2"></span><a class="rfc reference external" href="https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc1522.html"><strong>RFC 1522</strong></a>: “MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions)
Part Two: Message Header Extensions for Non-ASCII Text”.</p>
</dd></dl>
<dl class="py function">
<dt class="sig sig-object py" id="quopri.encode">
<span class="sig-prename descclassname"><span class="pre">quopri.</span></span><span class="sig-name descname"><span class="pre">encode</span></span><span class="sig-paren">(</span><em class="sig-param"><span class="n"><span class="pre">input</span></span></em>, <em class="sig-param"><span class="n"><span class="pre">output</span></span></em>, <em class="sig-param"><span class="n"><span class="pre">quotetabs</span></span></em>, <em class="sig-param"><span class="n"><span class="pre">header</span></span><span class="o"><span class="pre">=</span></span><span class="default_value"><span class="pre">False</span></span></em><span class="sig-paren">)</span><a class="headerlink" href="#quopri.encode" title="Link to this definition">¶</a></dt>
<dd><p>Encode the contents of the <em>input</em> file and write the resulting quoted-printable
data to the <em>output</em> file. <em>input</em> and <em>output</em> must be
<a class="reference internal" href="../glossary.html#term-file-object"><span class="xref std std-term">binary file objects</span></a>. <em>quotetabs</em>, a
non-optional flag which controls whether to encode embedded spaces
and tabs; when true it encodes such embedded whitespace, and when
false it leaves them unencoded.
Note that spaces and tabs appearing at the end of lines are always encoded,
as per <span class="target" id="index-3"></span><a class="rfc reference external" href="https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc1521.html"><strong>RFC 1521</strong></a>. <em>header</em> is a flag which controls if spaces are encoded
as underscores as per <span class="target" id="index-4"></span><a class="rfc reference external" href="https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc1522.html"><strong>RFC 1522</strong></a>.</p>
</dd></dl>
<dl class="py function">
<dt class="sig sig-object py" id="quopri.decodestring">
<span class="sig-prename descclassname"><span class="pre">quopri.</span></span><span class="sig-name descname"><span class="pre">decodestring</span></span><span class="sig-paren">(</span><em class="sig-param"><span class="n"><span class="pre">s</span></span></em>, <em class="sig-param"><span class="n"><span class="pre">header</span></span><span class="o"><span class="pre">=</span></span><span class="default_value"><span class="pre">False</span></span></em><span class="sig-paren">)</span><a class="headerlink" href="#quopri.decodestring" title="Link to this definition">¶</a></dt>
<dd><p>Like <a class="reference internal" href="#quopri.decode" title="quopri.decode"><code class="xref py py-func docutils literal notranslate"><span class="pre">decode()</span></code></a>, except that it accepts a source <a class="reference internal" href="stdtypes.html#bytes" title="bytes"><code class="xref py py-class docutils literal notranslate"><span class="pre">bytes</span></code></a> and
returns the corresponding decoded <a class="reference internal" href="stdtypes.html#bytes" title="bytes"><code class="xref py py-class docutils literal notranslate"><span class="pre">bytes</span></code></a>.</p>
</dd></dl>
<dl class="py function">
<dt class="sig sig-object py" id="quopri.encodestring">
<span class="sig-prename descclassname"><span class="pre">quopri.</span></span><span class="sig-name descname"><span class="pre">encodestring</span></span><span class="sig-paren">(</span><em class="sig-param"><span class="n"><span class="pre">s</span></span></em>, <em class="sig-param"><span class="n"><span class="pre">quotetabs</span></span><span class="o"><span class="pre">=</span></span><span class="default_value"><span class="pre">False</span></span></em>, <em class="sig-param"><span class="n"><span class="pre">header</span></span><span class="o"><span class="pre">=</span></span><span class="default_value"><span class="pre">False</span></span></em><span class="sig-paren">)</span><a class="headerlink" href="#quopri.encodestring" title="Link to this definition">¶</a></dt>
<dd><p>Like <a class="reference internal" href="#quopri.encode" title="quopri.encode"><code class="xref py py-func docutils literal notranslate"><span class="pre">encode()</span></code></a>, except that it accepts a source <a class="reference internal" href="stdtypes.html#bytes" title="bytes"><code class="xref py py-class docutils literal notranslate"><span class="pre">bytes</span></code></a> and
returns the corresponding encoded <a class="reference internal" href="stdtypes.html#bytes" title="bytes"><code class="xref py py-class docutils literal notranslate"><span class="pre">bytes</span></code></a>. By default, it sends a
<code class="docutils literal notranslate"><span class="pre">False</span></code> value to <em>quotetabs</em> parameter of the <a class="reference internal" href="#quopri.encode" title="quopri.encode"><code class="xref py py-func docutils literal notranslate"><span class="pre">encode()</span></code></a> function.</p>
</dd></dl>
<div class="admonition seealso">
<p class="admonition-title">See also</p>
<dl class="simple">
<dt>Module <a class="reference internal" href="base64.html#module-base64" title="base64: RFC 4648: Base16, Base32, Base64 Data Encodings; Base85 and Ascii85"><code class="xref py py-mod docutils literal notranslate"><span class="pre">base64</span></code></a></dt><dd><p>Encode and decode MIME base64 data</p>
</dd>
</dl>
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