Description of `exit` / `quit`

[Joeccp]

Documentation

Current documentation of exit/quit:

Objects that when printed, print a message like “Use quit() or Ctrl-D (i.e. EOF) to exit”, and when called, raise SystemExit with the specified exit code.

However, the current behaviour is:

>>> print(exit)
Use exit() or Ctrl-Z plus Return to exit
>>> print(quit)
Use quit() or Ctrl-Z plus Return to exit

The printed string is different.

Proposed documentation:

Objects that when printed, print a message like “Use quit() or Ctrl-Z plus Return to exit”, and when called, raise SystemExit with the specified exit code.

Linked PRs

• gh-136010: Update printed message of quit #136011

[Joeccp]

Note: Actually Ctrl-D still works, but the docs is about the printed message of exit()/quit() specifically so better to follow the printed message.

[ronaldoussoren]

The message printed is platform specific, the message in the documentation is used on unix-y platforms and on Windows a different message is used.

I personally don't see a need to change the documentation here, but if it is changed it should be changed to a functional description of what printed ("prints a message that instructs how to exit the interpreter").

[Joeccp]

How about this?
Objects that when printed, print a platform-specific instruction on how to exit the interpreter, and when called, raise [SystemExit](https://docs.python.org/3/library/exceptions.html#SystemExit) with the specified exit code.

[ronaldoussoren]

IMHO the documentation text is fine as is, but I'll leave the issue open in case on of the documentation experts disagrees.

[ericvsmith]

I'd leave it alone. It's correct for Windows, and the documentation does say "a message like". In my experience a unix-y user is more likely to know that other systems have a shell that works differently, than a Windows user is to know the difference.