To represent Chinese characters in the machine-readable zone of Chinese passports and other border-crossing documents, the Chinese government uses an algorithm to convert Chinese words into MRZ-compliant characters. The conversion chart is found on the back cover of GA/T 704.14-2015, "Information codes for entry-exit administration. Part 14: Ser…

prc_travel_doc_name_encoder.py

#!/usr/bin/env python
"""
To represent Chinese characters in the machine-readable zone of Chinese passports
and other border-crossing documents, the Chinese government uses an algorithm to
convert Chinese words into MRZ-compliant characters.

The conversion chart is found on the back cover of GA/T 704.14-2015, "Information
codes for entry-exit administration. Part 14: Serial labels of machine-readable
codes on travel permit for residents of Hong Kong and Macao to visit the mainland
of China."
"""


def main():
    user_input = str(input("Insert characters to be converted: "))
    encode(user_input)


def encode(user_input):
    full_ga_code = ''
    for char in user_input:
        # convert characters into gbk internal code
        internal_code = get_internal_code(char)
        # based on the GA/T 704.14-2015 chart, convert internal code 
        # into GA (which I guess means "gong an," meaning public security) code
        ga_code = gbk_to_ga(internal_code)
        full_ga_code += ga_code
        print(char, ga_code)
    print(full_ga_code)


def get_internal_code(char):
    char = str(char.encode('gbk'))
    char_list = char[2:-1].split('\\x')
    return (char_list[1] + char_list[2]).upper()


def gbk_to_ga(internal_code):
    new_code = ''
    gbk = ['0', '1', '2', '3', '4', '5', '6', '7', '8', '9', 'A', 'B', 'C', 'D', 'E', 'F']
    ga = ['A', 'B', 'C', 'D', 'E', 'F', 'G', 'H', 'I', 'J', 'K', 'L', 'M', 'N', 'O', 'P']
    for char in internal_code:
        for i in range(len(gbk)):
            if char == gbk[i]:
                new_code += ga[i]
    return new_code


if __name__ == '__main__':
    main()