Using python3 To Install Git -> If Statements/File Reading Error

Question

As part of a larger program, I am using git to check the program itself for updates. Of course, the user will need git installed to do so. I've created a small bit of python3 code to check if the user has git installed, but it does not seem to work:

import linecache
import time
import os

git = linecache.getline('info.txt', 2)
if git == 'no':
               git-ask=input('Is Git Installed? <y/n>\n')
               if git-ask == 'n':
                                 print('Installing Git.')
                                 os.system('apt-get install git-core')
               elif git-ask == 'y':
                                   print("Checking For Updates...")
elif git == "yes":
                 print("Checking For Updates...")
else:
     print("Error: 'GitInfoError'")
     print("Please Contact Eden About This Error: EdenC@dev-hq.net")
     time.sleep(5)
     print("Skipping Updates...")

The program always reverts to else clause, which should NEVER happen! Here is the contents of info.txt:

  GIT:
  no
  REBOOT:
  no

Thanks For Any Advice You Can Offer!

Answer 1

Yes it could happen (computers tend to make very few mistakes ;-)

Your variable git most likely has a newline character attached to it. So it's neither 'no' nor 'yes' but rather 'no\n'

You can either query for git.rstrip()=='no' which would chop off any whitespace (space, newline tabs) or you can try to check by some other route for the presence of git. Maybe issue 'git --version' and see whether it gets back with something reasonable or not.

Let us know if you need help with the latter approach.