.TH PYTHON "1"
.\" To view this file while editing, run it through groff:
.\" groff -Tascii -man python.man | less
.SH NAME
python \- an interpreted, interactive, object-oriented programming language
.SH SYNOPSIS
.B python
[
.B \-B
]
[
.B \-b
]
[
.B \-d
]
[
.B \-E
]
[
.B \-h
]
[
.B \-i
]
[
.B \-I
]
.br
[
.B \-m
.I module-name
]
[
.B \-q
]
[
.B \-R
]
[
.B \-O
]
[
.B \-OO
]
[
.B \-P
]
[
.B \-s
]
[
.B \-S
]
[
.B \-u
]
.br
[
.B \-v
]
[
.B \-V
]
[
.B \-W
.I argument
]
[
.B \-x
]
[
.B \-X
.I option
]
[
.B \-?
]
.br
[
.B \-\-check-hash-based-pycs
.I default
|
.I always
|
.I never
]
.br
[
.B \-\-help
]
[
.B \-\-help\-env
]
[
.B \-\-help\-xoptions
]
[
.B \-\-help\-all
]
.br
[
.B \-c
.I command
|
.I script
|
\-
]
[
.I arguments
]
.SH DESCRIPTION
Python is an interpreted, interactive, object-oriented programming
language that combines remarkable power with very clear syntax.
For an introduction to programming in Python, see the Python Tutorial.
The Python Library Reference documents built-in and standard types,
constants, functions and modules.
Finally, the Python Reference Manual describes the syntax and
semantics of the core language in (perhaps too) much detail.
(These documents may be located via the
.B "INTERNET RESOURCES"
below; they may be installed on your system as well.)
.PP
Python's basic power can be extended with your own modules written in
C or C++.
On most systems such modules may be dynamically loaded.
Python is also adaptable as an extension language for existing
applications.
See the internal documentation for hints.
.PP
Documentation for installed Python modules and packages can be
viewed by running the
.B pydoc
program.
.SH COMMAND LINE OPTIONS
.TP
.B \-B
Don't write
.I .pyc
files on import. See also PYTHONDONTWRITEBYTECODE.
.TP
.B \-b
Issue warnings about str(bytes_instance), str(bytearray_instance)
and comparing bytes/bytearray with str. (\-bb: issue errors)
.TP
.BI "\-c " command
Specify the command to execute (see next section).
This terminates the option list (following options are passed as
arguments to the command).
.TP
.BI "\-\-check\-hash\-based\-pycs " mode
Configure how Python evaluates the up-to-dateness of hash-based .pyc files.
.TP
.B \-d
Turn on parser debugging output (for expert only, depending on
compilation options).
.TP
.B \-E
Ignore environment variables like PYTHONPATH and PYTHONHOME that modify
the behavior of the interpreter.
.TP
.B \-h ", " \-? ", "\-\-help
Prints the usage for the interpreter executable and exits.
.TP
.B "\-\-help\-env"
Prints help about Python-specific environment variables and exits.
.TP
.B "\-\-help\-xoptions"
Prints help about implementation-specific \fB\-X\fP options and exits.
.TP
.TP
.B "\-\-help\-all"
Prints complete usage information and exits.
.TP
.B \-i
When a script is passed as first argument or the \fB\-c\fP option is
used, enter interactive mode after executing the script or the
command. It does not read the $PYTHONSTARTUP file. This can be
useful to inspect global variables or a stack trace when a script
raises an exception.
.TP
.B \-I
Run Python in isolated mode. This also implies \fB\-E\fP, \fB\-P\fP and \fB\-s\fP. In
isolated mode sys.path contains neither the script's directory nor the user's
site\-packages directory. All PYTHON* environment variables are ignored, too.
Further restrictions may be imposed to prevent the user from injecting
malicious code.
.TP
.BI "\-m " module-name
Searches
.I sys.path
for the named module and runs the corresponding
.I .py
file as a script. This terminates the option list (following options
are passed as arguments to the module).
.TP
.B \-O
Remove assert statements and any code conditional on the value of
__debug__; augment the filename for compiled (bytecode) files by
adding .opt-1 before the .pyc extension.
.TP
.B \-OO
Do \fB\-O\fP and also discard docstrings; change the filename for
compiled (bytecode) files by adding .opt-2 before the .pyc extension.
.TP
.B \-P
Don't automatically prepend a potentially unsafe path to \fBsys.path\fP such
as the current directory, the script's directory or an empty string. See also the
\fBPYTHONSAFEPATH\fP environment variable.
.TP
.B \-q
Do not print the version and copyright messages. These messages are
also suppressed in non-interactive mode.
.TP
.B \-R
Turn on hash randomization. This option only has an effect if the
\fBPYTHONHASHSEED\fR environment variable is set to \fB0\fR, since hash
randomization is enabled by default.
.TP
.B \-s
Don't add user site directory to sys.path.
.TP
.B \-S
Disable the import of the module
.I site
and the site-dependent manipulations of
.I sys.path
that it entails. Also disable these manipulations if
.I site
is explicitly imported later.
.TP
.B \-u
Force the stdout and stderr streams to be unbuffered.
This option has no effect on the stdin stream.
.TP
.B \-v
Print a message each time a module is initialized, showing the place
(filename or built-in module) from which it is loaded. When given
twice, print a message for each file that is checked for when
searching for a module. Also provides information on module cleanup
at exit.
.TP
.B \-V ", " \-\-version
Prints the Python version number of the executable and exits. When given
twice, print more information about the build.
.TP
.BI "\-W " argument
Warning control. Python's warning machinery by default prints warning messages
to
.IR sys.stderr .
The simplest settings apply a particular action unconditionally to all warnings
emitted by a process (even those that are otherwise ignored by default):
-Wdefault # Warn once per call location
-Werror # Convert to exceptions
-Walways # Warn every time
-Wall # Same as -Walways
-Wmodule # Warn once per calling module
-Wonce # Warn once per Python process
-Wignore # Never warn
The action names can be abbreviated as desired and the interpreter will resolve
them to the appropriate action name. For example,
.B \-Wi
is the same as
.B \-Wignore .
The full form of argument is:
.IB action:message:category:module:lineno
Empty fields match all values; trailing empty fields may be omitted. For
example
.B \-W ignore::DeprecationWarning
ignores all DeprecationWarning warnings.
The
.I action
field is as explained above but only applies to warnings that match
the remaining fields.
The
.I message
field must match the whole printed warning message; this match is
case-insensitive.
The
.I category
field matches the warning category (ex: "DeprecationWarning"). This must be a
class name; the match test whether the actual warning category of the message
is a subclass of the specified warning category.
The
.I module
field matches the (fully-qualified) module name; this match is case-sensitive.
The
.I lineno
field matches the line number, where zero matches all line numbers and is thus
equivalent to an omitted line number.
Multiple
.B \-W
options can be given; when a warning matches more than one option, the action
for the last matching option is performed. Invalid
.B \-W
options are ignored (though, a warning message is printed about invalid options
when the first warning is issued).
Warnings can also be controlled using the
.B PYTHONWARNINGS
environment variable and from within a Python program using the warnings
module. For example, the warnings.filterwarnings() function can be used to use
a regular expression on the warning message.
.TP
.BI "\-X " option
Set implementation-specific option. The following options are available:
.RS
.TP
\fB\-X cpu_count=\fIN\fR
Override the return value of \fIos.cpu_count()\fR.
\fB\-X cpu_count=default\fR cancels overriding.
See also \fBPYTHON_CPU_COUNT\fR.
.TP
\fB\-X dev\fR
Enable CPython's "development mode", introducing additional
runtime checks which are too expensive to be enabled by default. It
will not be more verbose than the default if the code is correct: new
warnings are only emitted when an issue is detected. Effect of the
developer mode:
.RS
.IP \(bu 2
Add default warning filter, as \fB\-W default\fR.
.IP \(bu 2
Install debug hooks on memory allocators: see the
PyMem_SetupDebugHooks() C function.
.IP \(bu 2
Enable the faulthandler module to dump the Python traceback on a crash.
.IP \(bu 2
Enable asyncio debug mode.
.IP \(bu 2
Set the dev_mode attribute of sys.flags to True.
.IP \(bu 2
io.IOBase destructor logs close() exceptions.
.RE
.TP
\fB\-X importtime\fR
Show how long each import takes. It shows module name,
cumulative time (including nested imports) and self time (excluding
nested imports). Note that its output may be broken in multi-threaded
application. Typical usage is
\fBpython3 \-X importtime \-c 'import asyncio'\fR.
.IP
\fB\-X importtime=2\fR enables additional output that indicates when an
imported module has already been loaded. In such cases, the string
\fBcached\fR will be printed in both time columns.
.TP
\fB\-X faulthandler\fR
Enable faulthandler.
.TP
\fB\-X frozen_modules=\fR[\fBon\fR|\fBoff\fR]
Whether or not frozen modules should be used.
The default is "on" (or "off" if you are running a local build).
.TP
\fB\-X gil=\fR[\fB0\fR|\fB1\fR]
Enable (1) or disable (0) the GIL. See also \fBPYTHON_GIL\fR.
Only available in builds configured with \fB\-\-disable\-gil\fR.
.TP
\fB\-X int_max_str_digits=\fInumber\fR
Limit the size of int<->str conversions.
This helps avoid denial of service attacks when parsing untrusted data.
The default is sys.int_info.default_max_str_digits. 0 disables.
.TP
\fB\-X no_debug_ranges\fR
Disable the inclusion of the tables mapping extra
location information (end line, start column offset and end column
offset) to every instruction in code objects. This is useful when
smaller code objects and pyc files are desired as well as suppressing
the extra visual location indicators when the interpreter displays
tracebacks.
.TP
\fB\-X perf\fR
Support the Linux "perf" profiler. See also \fBPYTHONPERFSUPPORT=1\fR.
.TP
\fB\-X perf_jit\fR
Support the Linux "perf" profiler with DWARF support.
See also \fBPYTHON_PERF_JIT_SUPPORT=1\fR.
.TP
\fB\-X presite=\fIMOD\fR
Import this module before site. See also \fBPYTHON_PRESITE\fR.
This only works on debug builds.
.TP
\fB\-X pycache_prefix=\fIPATH\fR
Enable writing .pyc files to a parallel
tree rooted at the given directory instead of to the code tree.
.TP
\fB\-X showrefcount\fR
Output the total reference count and number of used
memory blocks when the program finishes or after each statement in the
interactive interpreter. This only works on debug builds.
.TP
\fB\-X tracemalloc\fR
Start tracing Python memory allocations using the
tracemalloc module. By default, only the most recent frame is stored in a
traceback of a trace. Use \fB\-X tracemalloc=\fINFRAME\fR to start tracing with a
traceback limit of NFRAME frames.
.TP
\fB\-X utf8\fR
Enable UTF-8 mode for operating system interfaces,
overriding the default locale-aware mode. \fB\-X utf8=0\fR explicitly
disables UTF-8 mode (even when it would otherwise activate
automatically). See \fBPYTHONUTF8\fR for more details.
.TP
\fB\-X warn_default_encoding\fR
Enable opt-in EncodingWarning for 'encoding=None'.
.RE
.TP
.B \-x
Skip the first line of the source. This is intended for a DOS
specific hack only. Warning: the line numbers in error messages will
be off by one!
.SH INTERPRETER INTERFACE
The interpreter interface resembles that of the UNIX shell: when
called with standard input connected to a tty device, it prompts for
commands and executes them until an EOF is read; when called with a
file name argument or with a file as standard input, it reads and
executes a
.I script
from that file;
when called with
.B \-c
.IR command ,
it executes the Python statement(s) given as
.IR command .
Here
.I command
may contain multiple statements separated by newlines.
Leading whitespace is significant in Python statements!
In non-interactive mode, the entire input is parsed before it is
executed.
.PP
If available, the script name and additional arguments thereafter are
passed to the script in the Python variable
.IR sys.argv ,
which is a list of strings (you must first
.I import sys
to be able to access it).
If no script name is given,
.I sys.argv[0]
is an empty string; if
.B \-c
is used,
.I sys.argv[0]
contains the string
.I '\-c'.
Note that options interpreted by the Python interpreter itself
are not placed in
.IR sys.argv .
.PP
In interactive mode, the primary prompt is `>>>'; the second prompt
(which appears when a command is not complete) is `...'.
The prompts can be changed by assignment to
.I sys.ps1
or
.IR sys.ps2 .
The interpreter quits when it reads an EOF at a prompt.
When an unhandled exception occurs, a stack trace is printed and
control returns to the primary prompt; in non-interactive mode, the
interpreter exits after printing the stack trace.
The interrupt signal raises the
.I Keyboard\%Interrupt
exception; other UNIX signals are not caught (except that SIGPIPE is
sometimes ignored, in favor of the
.I IOError
exception). Error messages are written to stderr.
.SH FILES AND DIRECTORIES
These are subject to difference depending on local installation
conventions; ${prefix} and ${exec_prefix} are installation-dependent
and should be interpreted as for GNU software; they may be the same.
The default for both is \fI/usr/local\fP.
.IP \fI${exec_prefix}/bin/python\fP
Recommended location of the interpreter.
.PP
.I ${prefix}/lib/python