executing shell commands

[Sean 'Shaleh' Perry]

On 22-Feb-2001 chris lamb wrote:
> I am very new to Python and having to learn quickly! I am enjoying it,
> however. It is a flexible and intuitive environment.
> 
> Can someone advise me if there is an equivalent to running a system process
> from inside a script as there is in Perl? I mean in perl if I use backticks
> to enclose a system command, then the command is executed. Is there a
> comparable way of running these commands from Python?
> 

import os
os.system() or os.popen()

system will run the command, but you do not get anything back other than an
exit status.  popen() can launch and app and connect its output to a Python
file handler and let you read from it.