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Python

Peter Evemy
Peter Evemy
1,002 Points
Posted by Peter Evemy
Peter Evemy
1,002 Points

Python: How can you print strings one character at a time?

Hey,

I've been practising python by writing a little text based adventure game. I'm trying to find a way to print out the dialogue in the game one character at a time, kind of like the old pokemon gameboy games.

I've looked around but can't find anything that works. I guess I have to define a function for the print that uses time, which has a sleep(0.02) between each character. Maybe using a loop to pick out each len() in the text and print them? Or convert the string into a list and print it that way?

Very new to python so all help appreciated.

Thanks a lot!

Grigorij Schleifer
Grigorij Schleifer
10,365 Points
Grigorij Schleifer
Grigorij Schleifer
10,365 Points

Very nice. I am glad I could help. Good luck with your program. If you like suggestions and comments, feel free to post your program here in the forum.

2 Answers

Alexander Davison
Alexander Davison
65,469 Points
Alexander Davison
Alexander Davison
65,469 Points

Grigorij Schleifer's solution works, but it's easier to simply use the end parameter on print:

import time
for x in "my string":
    print(x, end='')
    time.sleep(0.05)

By default, end is a newline, therefore Python by default prints a newline after the string, but you can easily change it to have no ending.

Peter Evemy
Peter Evemy
1,002 Points
Peter Evemy
Peter Evemy
1,002 Points

Thank you a lot for this :)!

Grigorij Schleifer
Grigorij Schleifer
10,365 Points
Grigorij Schleifer
Grigorij Schleifer
10,365 Points

Hi Peter, I am not sure I understand your question but here is a very basic code that prints a string one character after another. 

import time
import sys

string = "Some sting"

for char in string:
    # these two lines prevent python from including a new line after every character
    sys.stdout.write(char)
    sys.stdout.flush()
    time.sleep(0.500)

Let me know what you think ...

Peter Evemy
Peter Evemy
1,002 Points
Peter Evemy
Peter Evemy
1,002 Points

Amazing! This was exactly what I was looking for! Thanks so much!

Grigorij Schleifer
Grigorij Schleifer
10,365 Points
Grigorij Schleifer
Grigorij Schleifer
10,365 Points

Hi Peter, you have been asking for a method that does the same thing. 

import time
import sys

word = "Some sting"

def character_timer(string):
    for char in string:
        sys.stdout.write(char)
        sys.stdout.flush()
        time.sleep(0.500)


character_timer(word)

I hope that helps :sunglasses: