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Accepted
Abhay Patil
Asked: 2020-05-10 07:52:06 +0800 CST

Python3 vs Python 3.8

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Ubuntu (older than 20.04 LTS) ships with Python 3 and python 2 both. When python was typed in terminal, python2.7 opens and to open python 3.6, python3 command is needed. However python3.6 also works.

So my doubt is why python3 and python3.6 both work? Technically since I have python3.6 installed, only python3.6 should work. But then why python3 works as well?

EDIT 1

When I type python and press tabs twice (which shows possible commands), I see python3 and python3.8 both.

My doubt is what is the difference between the python3 command and python3.6 command in their execution.

python python3 python-2.7

1 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    The python3 command is a link to whatever version of Py3 the system is currently using.

    This is very handy so scripts don't need to keep track of the exact version installed and don't break at the next release-upgrade.

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