[Python-ideas] Pythonic buffering in Py3 print()

[Terry Reedy]

On 1/9/2012 12:52 PM, Guido van Rossum wrote:
> This has nothing to do with print or print(). There are no flush() calls
> implied by print/print() calls, nor should there be(*). print/print()
> simply calls sys.stdout.write() one or more times, the final call
> usually being sys.stdout.write('\n') which will trigger a flush() if the
> file is line-buffered -- but if you use a trailing comma (Python 2) or
> end=... (Python 3) the last thing written is not '\n' and no flush()
> will be triggered.
>
> Whether writing \n flushes or not depends on the platform, the Python
> version and implementation, and the environment (e.g. most platforms
> automatically turn on line buffering for files known to be associated
> with a terminal emulator or other interactive device, assuming there's
> an easy way to tell).
>
> __________
> (*) There are plenty of apps that construct their output using many
> print/print() calls, and for which flushing after each call would be
> quite unnecessary and potentially cause lots of redundant I/O
> operations, ultimately slowing down the app.

Thank you for the clarification. I noted on
http://bugs.python.org/issue11633
that there should be no code change

> Apps that need flushing should call flush().

and that saying something like this in the print doc entry is the only 
possible change.

-- 
Terry Jan Reedy