python 3 print statement clarification [duplicate]

Question

In python 2, the python print statement was not a function whereas in python 3 this has been turned to into an function

when I type print( I get some hovertext (or something similar) to

print(value,...,sep=' ', end='\n', file=sys.stdout, flush=False)

I know what value means but a clarification on what what those other variables mean and what are the advantages of python 3's print statement over python 2's would be appreciated (especially sep=' ')

Answer 1

When you provide multiple arguments to print they usually get separated by a space:

>>> print(1, 2, 3)
1 2 3

sep lets you change that to something else:

>>> print(1, 2, 3, sep=', ')
1, 2, 3

Normally, print will add a new line to the end. end lets you change that:

>>> print('Hello.', end='')
Hello.>>>

Normally print will write to standard out. file lets you change that:

>>> with open('test.txt', 'w') as f:
...     print("Hello, world!", file=f)
...

Normally print does not explicitly flush the stream. If you want to avoid an extra sys.stdout.flush(), you can use flush. The effect of this is usually hard to see, but trying this without flush=True should make it visible:

>>> import time
>>> while True:
...     print('.', end='', flush=True)
...     time.sleep(0.5)

Answer 2

Python 2 doesn't have a sep equivalent because print wasn't a function and couldn't be passed arguments. The closest you could do was with join:

 print ' '.join([value, ...])

As for file, you'd have to use this (awkward, in my opinion) syntax:

print >> sys.stdout, ' '.join([value, ...])

I'm not going to copy/paste the documentation here, so read it if you want to know what those arguments are for.