Clear terminal in Python [duplicate]

Answer 1

As for me, the most elegant variant:

import os
os.system('cls||clear')

Answer 2

For Windows, on the interpreter command line only (not the GUI)! Simply type: (Remember to use proper indentation with python):

import os
def clear():
    os.system('cls')

Every time you type clear() on the shell (command line), it will clear the screen on your shell. If you exit the shell, then you must redo the above to do it again as you open a new Python (command line) shell.

Note: Does not matter what version of Python you are using, explicitly (2.5, 2.7, 3.3 & 3.4).

Answer 3

A Pure Python solution.
Does not rely on either ANSI, or external commands.
Only your terminal has to have the ability to tell you how many lines are in view.

from shutil import get_terminal_size
print("\n" * get_terminal_size().lines, end='')

Python version >= 3.3.0

Answer 4

you can make your own. this will not be dependent on your terminal, or OS type.

def clear(num):
    for i in range(num): print 

clear(80)
print "hello"

Answer 5

So just thought I would throw my two cents in here...

No one has provided a true answer to OP question it seems, everyone either responds with 'NO DONT USE os.system() it's evil!!!' without explanation or provides a solution that relies on printing new lines.

For those that need to clear the terminal screen and scroll back, for whatever reason, you can use the following code:

import os

def clear():
    '''
    Clears the terminal screen and scroll back to present
    the user with a nice clean, new screen. Useful for managing
    menu screens in terminal applications.
    '''
    os.system('cls' if os.name == 'nt' else 'echo -e \\\\033c')

print('A bunch of garbage so we can garble up the screen...')
clear()

# Same effect, less characters...

def clear():
    '''
    Clears the terminal screen and scroll back to present
    the user with a nice clean, new screen. Useful for managing
    menu screens in terminal applications.
    '''
    os.system('cls||echo -e \\\\033c')

This has the OP's desired effect. It does use the os.system() command so if that's evil and someone knows a way of implementing this using subprocess.call() please comment as I would also prefer to use subprocess but am not familiar with it at all.

Answer 6

You could try to rely on clear but it might not be available on all Linux distributions. On windows use cls as you mentionned.

import subprocess
import platform

def clear():
    subprocess.Popen( "cls" if platform.system() == "Windows" else "clear", shell=True)

clear()

Note: It could be considered bad form to take control of the terminal screen. Are you considering using an option? It would probably be better to let the user decide if he want to clear the screen.