Print Text 'Loading' with dots going forward and backward in python shell

Question

I want to print Text \'Loading...\' But its dots would be moving back and forward (in shell).

I am creating a text game and for that it will look b

Answer 1

You can use backtracking via backspace (\b) in your STDOUT to go back and 'erase' written characters before writing them again to simulate animated loading, e.g.:

import sys
import time

loading = True  # a simple var to keep the loading status
loading_speed = 4  # number of characters to print out per second
loading_string = "." * 6  # characters to print out one by one (6 dots in this example)
while loading:
    #  track both the current character and its index for easier backtracking later
    for index, char in enumerate(loading_string):
        # you can check your loading status here
        # if the loading is done set `loading` to false and break
        sys.stdout.write(char)  # write the next char to STDOUT
        sys.stdout.flush()  # flush the output
        time.sleep(1.0 / loading_speed)  # wait to match our speed
    index += 1  # lists are zero indexed, we need to increase by one for the accurate count
    # backtrack the written characters, overwrite them with space, backtrack again:
    sys.stdout.write("\b" * index + " " * index + "\b" * index)
    sys.stdout.flush()  # flush the output

Keep in mind that this is a blocking process so you either have to do your loading checks within the for loop, or run your loading in a separate thread, or run this in a separate thread - it will keep running in a blocking mode as long as its local loading variable is set to True.