Let's start with substitute for %q that is lacking in python.
The implementation is copied from zodbtools from here:

https://lab.nexedi.com/nexedi/zodbtools/blob/2801fae9/zodbtools/util.py#L39

It is not good for golang to depend on zodbtools and the function is
minor. In the future maybe zodbtools in turn will change to import qq
from golang.