[issue38548] open() and file.write() without file.close()

[kryptomatrix]

New submission from kryptomatrix <volker.weissmann at gmx.de>:

Consider the following program:

f = open("out.txt", "w")
f.write("abc\n")
exit(0)

Please note the absence of f.close().
The documentation 
https://docs.python.org/3/tutorial/inputoutput.html#reading-and-writing-files
says that you should use f.close() or with f = open(), but is not clear whether the program above without f.close() is guaranteed to write. The tutorial says:
"If you don’t explicitly close a file, Python’s garbage collector will eventually destroy the object and close the open file for you, but the file may stay open for a while. Another risk is that different Python implementations will do this clean-up at different times."
For me this sounds like even without f.close() the file is guaranteed to be written. If it is not guaranteed to be written, you should fix the documentation, if it is guaranteed to be written, then I will open another issue because the following program does not write into out.txt on my machine:

from sympy.core import AtomicExpr
class MyWeirdClass(AtomicExpr):
	def __init__(self):
		pass
f = open("out.txt", "w")
f.write("abc\n")
exit(0)

Note: sys.version is: "3.7.3 (default, Oct  7 2019, 12:56:13) \n[GCC 8.3.0]"

----------
assignee: docs at python
components: Documentation
messages: 355062
nosy: docs at python, kryptomatrix
priority: normal
severity: normal
status: open
title: open() and file.write() without file.close()
type: enhancement
versions: Python 3.7

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Python tracker <report at bugs.python.org>
<https://bugs.python.org/issue38548>
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