How to obtain the name of the calling shell in Python

When running a Python script, you may want to determine which shell or command line environment called your script. For example, you might want to differentiate between a script being run from a Unix shell like Bash, a Windows command prompt, or an interactive Python interpreter. This information can be useful for conditional logic or to provide different behavior based on the calling shell.
In this tutorial, we will explore how to obtain the name of the calling shell in Python using the os and sys modules. We will provide code examples for both Unix-like systems and Windows.
Make sure you have Python installed on your system. You can download Python from the official website (https://www.python.org/downloads/).
To identify the calling shell in a Unix-like system, you can check the SHELL environment variable. This variable typically holds the path to the user’s default shell. Here’s how you can do it in Python:
On Windows, the situation is a bit different. Windows doesn’t have a direct equivalent of the SHELL environment variable to determine the calling shell. However, you can use the os and sys modules to differentiate between common Windows command prompts, such as Command Prompt and PowerShell. Here’s how:
This code works by checking the name of the executable used to run the Python script (accessible through sys.executable) and comparing it to common Windows command interpreters.
Create a Python script using a text editor or an integrated development environment (IDE).
Copy and paste the relevant code block from the sections above based on your operating system.
Save the script with a .py extension, for example, calling_shell.py.
Open your preferred shell (e.g., Bash on Linux, Command Prompt, or PowerShell on Windows).
Navigate to the directory where you saved the script using the cd command.
Run the script using the python command:
The script will print the name of the calling shell on the screen.
In this tutorial, you learned how to obtain the name of the calling shell in Python on both Unix-like systems and Windows. You can use this information in your Python scripts to adapt their behavior depending on the environment in which they are executed. This can be particularly useful for writing cross-platform scripts that respond to the user’s choice of shell.
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