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<title>6. Generic Operating System Services </title>
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<H1><A NAME="SECTION008000000000000000000"><!--x--></A><A NAME="allos"><!--z--></A>
<BR>
6. Generic Operating System Services
</H1>
<P>
The modules described in this chapter provide interfaces to operating
system features that are available on (almost) all operating systems,
such as files and a clock. The interfaces are generally modeled
after the <font style="font-variant: small-caps;">Unix</font> or C interfaces, but they are available on most
other systems as well. Here's an overview:
<P>
<table class='synopsistable' valign='baseline'>
<tr class='oddrow'>
<td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-os.html'>os</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Miscellaneous operating system interfaces.</td></tr>
<tr><td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-os.path.html'>os.path</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Common pathname manipulations.</td></tr>
<tr class='oddrow'>
<td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-dircache.html'>dircache</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Return directory listing, with cache mechanism.</td></tr>
<tr><td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-stat.html'>stat</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Utilities for interpreting the results of
<tt class="function">os.stat()</tt>, <tt class="function">os.lstat()</tt> and <tt class="function">os.fstat()</tt>.</td></tr>
<tr class='oddrow'>
<td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-statcache.html'>statcache</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Stat files, and remember results.</td></tr>
<tr><td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-statvfs.html'>statvfs</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Constants for interpreting the result of
<tt class="function">os.statvfs()</tt>.</td></tr>
<tr class='oddrow'>
<td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-filecmp.html'>filecmp</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Compare files efficiently.</td></tr>
<tr><td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-popen2.html'>popen2</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Subprocesses with accessible standard I/O streams.</td></tr>
<tr class='oddrow'>
<td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-datetime.html'>datetime</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Basic date and time types.</td></tr>
<tr><td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-time.html'>time</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Time access and conversions.</td></tr>
<tr class='oddrow'>
<td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-sched.html'>sched</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>General purpose event scheduler.</td></tr>
<tr><td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-mutex.html'>mutex</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Lock and queue for mutual exclusion.</td></tr>
<tr class='oddrow'>
<td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-getpass.html'>getpass</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Portable reading of passwords and retrieval of the userid.</td></tr>
<tr><td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-curses.html'>curses</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>An interface to the curses library, providing portable
terminal handling.</td></tr>
<tr class='oddrow'>
<td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-curses.textpad.html'>curses.textpad</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Emacs-like input editing in a curses window.</td></tr>
<tr><td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-curses.wrapper.html'>curses.wrapper</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Terminal configuration wrapper for curses programs.</td></tr>
<tr class='oddrow'>
<td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-curses.ascii.html'>curses.ascii</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Constants and set-membership functions for
ASCII characters.</td></tr>
<tr><td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-curses.panel.html'>curses.panel</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>A panel stack extension that adds depth to
curses windows.</td></tr>
<tr class='oddrow'>
<td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-getopt.html'>getopt</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Portable parser for command line options; support both
short and long option names.</td></tr>
<tr><td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-optparse.html'>optparse</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Powerful, flexible, extensible, easy-to-use command-line
parsing library.</td></tr>
<tr class='oddrow'>
<td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-tempfile.html'>tempfile</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Generate temporary files and directories.</td></tr>
<tr><td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-errno.html'>errno</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Standard errno system symbols.</td></tr>
<tr class='oddrow'>
<td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-glob.html'>glob</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'><font style="font-variant: small-caps;">Unix</font> shell style pathname pattern expansion.</td></tr>
<tr><td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-fnmatch.html'>fnmatch</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'><font style="font-variant: small-caps;">Unix</font> shell style filename pattern matching.</td></tr>
<tr class='oddrow'>
<td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-shutil.html'>shutil</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>High-level file operations, including copying.</td></tr>
<tr><td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-locale.html'>locale</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Internationalization services.</td></tr>
<tr class='oddrow'>
<td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-gettext.html'>gettext</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Multilingual internationalization services.</td></tr>
<tr><td><b><tt class='module'><a href='module-logging.html'>logging</a></tt></b></td>
<td> </td>
<td class='synopsis'>Logging module for Python based on <a class="rfc" id='rfcref-79619'
href="http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0282.html">PEP 282</a>.</td></tr>
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<span class="release-info">Release 2.3.4, documentation updated on May 20, 2004.</span>
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