Python: Get OS name, platform and release information

Python Basic: Exercise-43 with Solution

Write a Python program to get OS name, platform and release information.

os.name: The name of the operating system dependent module imported. The following names have currently been registered: 'posix', 'nt', 'java'.
platform.system(): Return the name of the OS system is running on.
platform.release(): Return the version of the operating system.

Sample Solution-1:

Python Code:

# Import the 'platform' and 'os' modules.
import platform
import os

# Print the name of the operating system based on the 'os.name' attribute.
# 'os.name' provides the name of the operating system dependent module imported.
print("Name of the operating system:", os.name)

# Print the name of the OS system using the 'platform.system()' function.
# 'platform.system()' returns the name of the operating system, such as 'Windows', 'Linux', or 'Darwin' (macOS).
print("\nName of the OS system:", platform.system())

# Print the version of the operating system using the 'platform.release()' function.
# 'platform.release()' returns the version or release of the operating system.
print("\nVersion of the operating system:", platform.release())

Sample Output:

Name of the operating system: posix

Name of the OS system: Linux

Version of the operating system: 4.4.0-197-generic

Explanation:

This code imports two modules platform and os in Python.

os.name returns the operating system dependent module imported. The following names have currently been registered: 'posix', 'nt', 'java'.

platform.system() returns the system/OS name, such as 'Linux', 'Darwin', 'Java', 'Windows'. An empty string is returned if the value cannot be determined.

platform.release() returns the system’s release, e.g. '2.2.0' or 'NT'. An empty string is returned if the value cannot be determined.

The code prints the name of the operating system using os.name, the name of the OS system using platform.system() and version of the operating system using platform.release().

The name, version, and type of the operating system on which the code runs will be provided.

Sample Solution-2:

Python Code:

import os
import sys
import platform
import sysconfig
print("os.name                     ", os.name)
print("sys.platform                ", sys.platform)
print("platform.system()           ", platform.system())
print("sysconfig.get_platform()    ", sysconfig.get_platform())
print("platform.machine()          ", platform.machine())
print("platform.architecture()     ", platform.architecture())

Sample Output:

os.name                      posix
sys.platform                 linux
platform.system()            Linux
sysconfig.get_platform()     linux-x86_64
platform.machine()           x86_64
platform.architecture()      ('64bit', 'ELF') 

Python Code Editor:

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