You can simply insert u"\N{DEGREE SIGN}"

Correct, unicode names are not supported (it would take many megabytes to store the mapping from name to unicode point/number).

Is adding the degree symbol support a planned addition to micropython and for now is there a work-around?

I'm pretty sure it's supported, it is in the end just a unicode character. Eg:

degree = str(b'\xc2\xb0', 'utf8') # create from bytes
degree = chr(176) # create from known unicode point
sys.stdout.write(degree)

That will print the degree symbol.

@dpgeorge thanks for the response. I tested your solutions with this result.

u"\N{DEGREE SIGN}" results in the error NotImplementedError: unicode name escapes

degree = chr(176) results in ° when output to a web page through html. It works on the command line.

Both approaches work fine in regular Python.

u"\N{DEGREE SIGN}" results in the error NotImplementedError: unicode name escapes

Yes, what I meant above is that this form is not supported in MicroPython. So you cannot do it this way.

degree = chr(176) results in ° when output to a web page through html.

How exactly is it being output to a web page, what is the code that reproduces the problem?

I moved a copy of my files to GitHub. Take a look at BME280.py line 273 . To run this you would need to put your username and password in boot.py.

https://github.com/bill-orange/MicroPython/tree/main/BME280%20test

Thanks for posting the code.

I can't seem to reproduce any issue. On the unix port of MicroPython I can do:

$ micropython
MicroPython v1.13-186-g5a7027915-dirty on 2020-11-27; linux version
Use Ctrl-D to exit, Ctrl-E for paste mode
>>> s="{}.{:.01d}{}C".format(1, 2, chr(176))
>>> s
'1.2\xb0C'
>>> print(s)
1.2°C
>>> 

Turning that into a HTML, you may need to use °?

That worked. Thanks.

In main.py

<tr><td>Temp. Celsius</td><td><span class="sensor">""" + str(bme.temperature) + """&degC</span></td></tr>

The following MicroPython Program displays temperature in degree Celsius (symbol) on OLED
import ssd1306
from machine import Pin, SoftI2C
import time
import framebuf

i2c = SoftI2C(scl=Pin(22), sda=Pin(21))
oled = ssd1306.SSD1306_I2C(128, 64, i2c)

Custom character bitmap

custom_bitmap = bytearray([0x00, 0x0e, 0x11, 0x11, 0x0e, 0x00, 0x00, 0x00])

Create a frame buffer from the custom bitmap

fb = framebuf.FrameBuffer(custom_bitmap, 8, 8, framebuf.MONO_HLSB)
t= b'45.2'
t1= t.decode()

Display custom bitmap on OLED

oled.fill(0) # Clear the display

Blit the frame buffer to the OLED display at position (0, 0)

oled.blit(fb, 95, 0)
oled.text("Temper= " + t1 + " " + "C", 0, 5)

Update the display

oled.show()

Hi, I'm an old (74) newbie of micropython and ESP32 and I'm trying to use an OLED SH1106 to display data from a BME280 sensor connected to an ESP32 working with uPY. While on the serial monitor the ° degree symbol is correctly printed I was not able to get it displayed on the SH1106. I tried both display.text("{:0.0f}°C".format(temperature), 0, 30) and display.text("{:0.0f}{}".format(temperature, chr(176)), 0, 30) but I keep on getting ValueError: unknown format code 'f' for object of type 'str'. Could you hel pme to fix this issue ? Thanks

The solution depends on which display driver you're using. This one it is subclassed from FrameBuffer: this enables you to use fonts created with font_to_py. Such fonts can contain any glyph you like.

The driver is designed to work as a Python package. It needs to be installed with mpremote as described here. That will create the right directory structure and install boolpalette.py.

You won't regret the move. I ditched Arduino for MicroPython ten years ago and have never looked back.