How to set a prefix for all print() output in python?

Question

I am printing to a console in python. I am looking for a one off piece of code so that all print statments after a line of code have 4 spaces at the start. Eg.

print('Computer: Hello world')
print.setStart('    ')
print('receiving...')
print('received!')
print.setStart('')
print('World: Hi!')

Output:

Computer: Hello world
    receiving...
    received!
World: Hi!

This would be helpful for tabbing all of the output that is contained in a function, and setting when functions output are tabbed. Is this possible?

Answer 1

You can define a print function which first prints your prefix, and then internally calls the built-in print function. You can even make your custom print() function to look at the call-stack and accordingly determine how many spaces to use as a prefix:

import builtins
import traceback

def print(*objs, **kwargs):
    my_prefix = len(traceback.format_stack())*" "
    builtins.print(my_prefix, *objs, **kwargs)

Test it out:

def func_f():
    print("Printing from func_f")
    func_g()

def func_g():
    print ("Printing from func_g")

func_f()

Output:

                    Printing from func_f
                     Printing from func_g

Reverting back to the built-in print() function:

When you are done with your custom printing, and want to start using the built-in print() function, just use del to "delete" your own definition of print:

del print