Programmatically get current IPython notebook cell output?

Question

I have an imported function that runs in an IPython notebook (input cell X) which produces an output (in output cell X). After the function runs, I have some more code (also in input cell X); is there any way for that code to retrieve the current output (in output cell X)?

There may be other ways to do what I am trying to achieve; but I am curious if the above is possible.

Answer 1

IPython's output caching system defines several global variables:

• [_] (a single underscore): stores previous output, like Python’s default interpreter.
• [__] (two underscores): next previous.
• [___] (three underscores): next-next previous.

Additionally, after each output x is created, there is a variable _<x> created with the output as its value. For example:

In [12]: lst = [i for i in range(11)]  In [13]: lst Out[13]: [0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10]  In [14]: _13 Out[14]: [0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10] 

Also, if you're interested, _i<x> contains the contents of the input cell x:

In [15]: _i12 Out[15]: 'lst = [i for i in range(11)]'