how to save the output of a print statement

Question

i just want to save the output of the print statement of each for loop to a text file named test.txt and inside the text file each for loop output should be separated with >>> symbol, plus i want to put a header on the top of the text file as 'column-a'.The code i tried is below:

a = ['oof', 'rab', 'zab']
for i in range(1,5):
    for file in a:
        print('>>>')
        data=print(file)
with open(“test.txt”,w) as f: 
f.write(data)

by executing the above code i am getting out put like as below

oof
rab
zab
oof
rab
zab
oof
rab
zab
oof
rab
zab

but i need output like as below test.txt

column-a
>>> 
oof
rab
zab
>>>
oof
rab
zab
>>>
oof
rab
zab
>>>
oof
rab
zab

I hope some solution i will get.Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

The print statement can be used to directly write into an open file with the file keyword argument:

items = ['oof', 'rab', 'zab']

with open('file.txt', 'w') as file:

    # header
    print('column-a', file=file)

    # loop with >>> separators
    for i in range(5):
        print('>>>', file=file)

        # print list items
        for item in items:
            print(item, file=file)

This code above creates a file.txt file with the content:

column-a
>>>
oof
rab
zab
>>>
oof
rab
zab
>>>
oof
rab
zab
>>>
oof
rab
zab
>>>
oof
rab
zab

Answer 2

You just need to write to the file as well as printing to the screen. Note that you also have UTF-8 "66 & 99" double quotes in your code, not simple " characters.

a = ['oof', 'rab', 'zab']
f = open( "test.txt", "wt" )
for i in range( 1, 5 ):
    for word in a:
        print( word )
        f.write( word + "\n" )
    print( '>>>' )
    f.write( '>>>' + "\n" )
f.close()