Using the Platform module in Python

What is it used for?

The platform module in Python is used to access the underlying platform’s data, such as, hardware, operating system, and interpreter version information.

The platform module includes tools to see the platform’s hardware, operating system, and interpreter version information where the program is running.

How do I use it?

You start with importing the platform module in your program, like this:
import platform
You then specify what you want to find out (more on that below).

For example, if you want to find out which python version you are using, simply add python_version() to the platform, like so:
print platform.python_version()

This will return the Python version as a string.

On my computer it looks like this:
2.7.3

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Platform Functions

Let’s have a look at the different platform functions we can use

platform.architecture()
returns information about the bit architecture

platform.machine()
returns the machine type, e.g. ‘i386’.

platform.node()
returns the computer’s network name (may not be fully qualified!)

platform.platform()
returns a single string identifying the underlying platform with as much useful
information as possible.

platform.processor()
returns the (real) processor name, e.g. ‘amdk6’.

platform.python_build()
returns a tuple (buildno, builddate) stating the Python build number and
date as strings.

platform.python_compiler()
returns a string identifying the compiler used for compiling Python.

platform.python_version()
returns the Python version as string ‘major.minor.patchlevel’

import platform

print 'uname:', platform.uname()

print
print 'system   :', platform.system()
print 'node     :', platform.node()
print 'release  :', platform.release()
print 'version  :', platform.version()
print 'machine  :', platform.machine()
print 'processor:', platform.processor()