The ‘with’ keyword in Python is a control flow structure that simplifies error handling.
The ‘with’ statement is particularly used for clean-up tasks as you are working with unmanaged resources e.g. opening a file, performing some operations, and closing it (file streams).
However, from version 2.6, the ‘with’ became a keyword and you do not need to enable it in order to use it.
Structure of with statement
Following is the general structure of using the Python with statement:
with expression [as variable]:
#code to execute here
So, in the ‘with’ statement, the expression is evaluated.
In order to make it work, this should result in an object that supports __enter__() and __exit__() methods.
For example, the file object supports the __enter__() and __exit__() method, so you may use it there (as shown in the example below).
An example of using ‘with’ statement
In the following program, the with statement is used with the open function. A text file is given and its content will be displayed in the with block.
#Using with statement with a file
with open("test.txt") as with_demo:
content = with_demo.read()
print (content)
- Normally, as you open the file in the system, you should close it by using the close() method.
- However, in the program, we did not close it by using the close() method.
- The ‘with’ statement has done this automatically for us, as such, it ensures cleaning up the resources.
- Even if a Python exception occurs during the file opening, manipulation (as performing some operation) of the ‘with’ statement will execute the close() before the exception is caught.
