How to pause a script when it ends on Windows?

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I am running command-line Python scripts from the Windows taskbar by having a shortcut pointing to the Python interpreter with the actual script as a parameter.

After the script has been processed, the interpreter terminates and the output window is closed which makes it impossible to read script output.

What is the most straightforward way to keep the interpreter window open until any key is pressed?

In batch files, one can end the script with pause. The closest thing to this I found in python is raw_input() which is sub-optimal because it requires pressing the return key (instead of any key).

cmd command-line windows python
13 Answers

One way is to leave a raw_input() at the end so the script waits for you to press Enter before it terminates.

regan_646970

There's no need to wait for input before closing, just change your command like so:

cmd /K python <script>

The /K switch will execute the command that follows, but leave the command interpreter window open, in contrast to /C, which executes and then closes.

Dave_Grant_405810

One way is to leave a raw_input() at the end so the script waits for you to press enter before it terminates.

The advantage of using raw_input() instead of msvcrt.* stuff is that the former is a part of standard Python (i.e. absolutely cross-platform). This also means that the script window will be alive after double-clicking on the script file icon, without the need to do 

cmd /K python <script>
bgbg_175230

On Windows you can use the msvcrt module.

  • msvcrt.kbhit()
    Return True if a keypress is waiting to be read.

  • msvcrt.getch()
    Read a keypress and return the resulting character as a byte string. Nothing is echoed to the console. This call will block if a keypress is not already available, but will not wait for Enter to be pressed. If the pressed key was a special function key, this will return '\000' or '\xe0'; the next call will return the keycode. The Control-C keypress cannot be read with this function.

If you want it to also work on Unix-like systems you can try this solution using the termios and fcntl modules.

dF_30020

There's a simple way to do this, you can use keyboard module's wait function. For example, you can do: 

import keyboard
print("things before the pause")
keyboard.wait("esc") # esc is just an example, you can obviously put every key you want
print("things after the pause")
user_102989190
RommeDeSerieux_606550 
import pdb
pdb.debug()

This is used to debug the script. Should be useful to break also.

user_555620
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